Unfortunately, this assumes that Governors, in particular, learn from what has happened in Florida, Georgia, Arizona, Texas, California - and donāt knuckle under to continued demands from the Trump people that they āopen up.ā
In particular, if lots of schools yield to the pressure and resume in-person classes, there will be increased rates of spread - and even if the children, by and large, have mild cases, their parents, teachers, aides, grandparents, etc., often will not. This could become the next major accelerant in infections and deaths. As of now, at least, the Trumpists continue to clamor for in-person schooling, beginning in about four weeks. Which is to say, about the time that the ābetter late than neverā efforts in some southern and western states to manage the rate of infection start to pay off, the āwe have to open schoolsā efforts will come along to undercut those efforts (in terms of national infection rates and deaths - not clear it will be the same states, of course).
Iāll be optimistic when I see evidence of serious nation-wide commitment to slowing the rate of infection (getting the R down under 1.0), as opposed to the current hodge-podge of state efforts that get turned on and off depending on the political winds. Until there is a serious national policy, grounded in science instead of magic or wishful thinking (or corruption), we will not master this; and I do not expect a serious national policy until the third week in January at the earliest.
So for now, I expect things to get worse. I will continue to assume that people are infectious, and will avoid them as much as possible. Iām tired of it - but I can be rather stubborn if need be.
