Yesterday was a SIX Green Arrow Day.
What is the Relevant Number?
Good Morning,
Through May 12th, the US has 1.4 million recorded cases of COVID 19, of which 25,000 are within Ohio. Yes, these numbers are accurate, but are they the most significant? We know that there are not that many patients still in need of care, almost all have recovered, and others have passed. Perhaps the more critical number is the open cases. Those numbers are just above 400,000 in the US and 5,000 in Ohio.
We calculate those still in need of care and label that population as “Open Net Cases (see tab ONC on the spreadsheet).” It adds those patients that have had COVID 19 for more than two weeks and are not in a hospital. Self-diagnosed recoveries are not recorded by any agency nor reported in any database we can find; we label them as “Unaccounted Recoveries (UR).” The MAK table calculates all recoveries; those confirmed plus those UR’s.
Ohio, has a population of 11.7 million and an annual budget approaching $70 billion. Imagine if Ohio focused on those 5,000 non-hospitalized patients that still need care. The state certainly knows who they are because they are confirmed cases. Likewise, we know their physical characteristics to assess the degree of risk each faces.
We have all seen maps that show where the concentration of accumulated cases happens to be. What isn’t shown are maps displaying only those patients (areas) still in need of care. The map on the left comes from Ohio’s DOH; the other is our estimation of what a map would look like with only “Open Net Cases.” Maybe that’s the more relevant map.
Ohio COVID-19 Maps
The map on the left is from the Ohio DOH and shows cumulative cases. The map on the right shows what it might look like with only those still in need of care
