Expect COVID-19 To Return In The Fall In A Big Way

 

A look at what's happening in the Southern Hemisphere suggests something that no one wants to hear.

Covid-19 on a Southern Hemisphere Rampage

An Email exchange with Jim Bianco and Erik Townsend reveals a Covid-19 pattern that many of us expected but no one wanted.

Bianco reports "The virus is exploding in the southern hemisphere … Central/South America, Africa, around India and around Iran."  

"Here is my thinking/idea: The virus is no where near disappearing. Instead it has moved to the southern hemisphere (winter) and out of the northern hemisphere (summer). If so, we are enjoying a summer respite before a second way this coming winter."

Reported Infections - The World Excluding the US

Bianco emailed charts of Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Mexico, Egypt, Ethiopia, South Africa, Keyna, India, Iran, Iraq, Pakistan, and other countries. 

I put those countries on a single chart, above. Data is from Our World in Data, with credit to Bianco for the idea. 

Thanks Jim!

Comments from Erik Townsend

Jim,

As always, thanks for keeping the conversation going and for your excellent charts.

The whole thing feels like it’s just starting here in Chile. Our region’s legislative council just voted last night to impose a lock-down for the first time. They already have one in Santiago, where the population density is much higher. The case count alone doesn’t appear to justify a lockdown here on the coast. But what’s happening is exactly what places like Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard went through a few months ago. Wealthy people in Santiago are violating the quarantine and bugging out to their beach houses here on the coast. The local authorities don’t want the influx of infections. So the mayors of all the principal “beach towns” got together and lobbied the federal government to impose a lockdown uniformly across both Santiago and the coast, and they asked them to step up enforcement against people who have been bugging out to their 2 homes.

The whole thing has gotten surreal: In our building there are warnings posted everywhere that building security is closely monitoring the security cameras, and non-permanent residents who are seen in the building will immediately be reported to the carrabineros (state police). Of course this is So. America so bribes are rampant and the building is still full of people who don’t normally live here except on weekends.

Jim, I agree with your analysis (2 wave coming to N. Hemisphere right around election time). But my thinking has evolved a bit more beyond that. Here’s my latest thesis:

Phew! That sucked but we got through it. A much smaller “2 wave” is plausible but unlikely, and to be sure if there is a 2 wave, that will be the end.

This is just getting started. We had the 1 wave in N. Hemisphere, now in seasonal retreat. So. Hemisphere is exploding now. We are going to see a “continuous, rolling pattern” around the globe where there’s always an outbreak somewhere, and seasonality punctuates the overall multi-year event into waves.

There has never been a good reason to assume wave 2 would be smaller than wave 1, and that assumption will be challenged by the second Northern Hemisphere wave this fall. This will continue until there is a widely effective vaccine or global herd immunity. Neither should be assumed to be assured to happen. There has never been a successful human coronavirus vaccine ever in the history of the world and because R0 is so high, we need at least 80% of the population to be infected before we achieve effective herd immunity.

All the best, 

Erik Townsend, Macro Voices Podcast Host 

Phew?!

Yes, we have a collective "Phew" but the chart shows that is not even justified. 

The US has flattened the curve and no more. 

The recent riots may easily un-flatten the curve just as things were, at least for a while, starting to look better, even as some states are looking worse.

US COVID-19 Cases 2020-06-04

New US Epicenters

• Illinois
• California
• Texas
• Florida
• Georgia
• Virginia

While people breathe a sigh of relief about recent declines in New York and New Jersey, huge problems erupted in Illinois, California, Texas, Florida, Georgia, and Virginia despite warmer weather.

Seven days of mass rioting without masks are sure to exacerbate these worsening trends.