Category: Disasters and Disaster Preparedness
-
COVID-19 Update: March 17
The number of confirmed COVID-19 cases jumped sharply, according to statistics updated today by the Virginia Department of Health. But don’t panic! While the number of cases increased 31%, the number of people tests leaped 110% as testing kits became increasingly available. The leap is a function of the testing, not the spread of the…
-
Damn the Coronavirus! Full Speed Ahead!
The budget forecasts underpinning Virginia’s General Fund budgets for FY 2021 and 2022 suggests that revenues will increase 4.5% next year and 3.7% the year after that. Secretary of Finance Aubrey Layne released those numbers back in December, when COVID-19 was still an obscure disease incubating in a Wuhan wet market. But it’s a very…
-
Blame COPN for Looming Bed Shortages
by James Sherlock The hospital bed shortages cited by Jim Bacon in his post, “Not Nearly Enough Hospital Beds,“ is a direct outcome of how the Virginia Department of Health (VDH) has administered Virginia’s Certificate of Public Need law. Virginia’s scarcity of physicians and nurses also can be traceable in part to COPN’s denial of…
-
Doctors and Nurses Need Child Care to Fight Coronavirus
by Hans Bader Last week, several governors correctly closed their states’ schools to slow the spread of coronavirus. The draconian actions were needed to keep hospitals from being overwhelmed in the coming weeks as the number of coronavirus cases grows exponentially. But closing the schools will place heavy burdens on many parents who have to…
-
Northam Shuts Down Schools. What’s Next?
By DJ Rippert Early Spring Break. Last Thursday Virginia Governor Northam somewhat suddenly decided to shut down all K-12 schools starting the next day. The shutdown is for “at least two weeks.” The question of how to manage continuing free and reduced price meals during the shutdown has been left up to the individual school districts.…
-
Not Nearly Enough Hospital Beds
by James A. Bacon On Friday, the VDH reported on its COVID-19 page that 30 individuals had been identified as having contracted the coronavirus and 10 had been hospitalized. As of Saturday, VDH was stating that the number of cases had increased to 41, but it no longer provided the number of hospitalizations. The website…
-
About that High Emergency Preparedness Rating…
by James A. Bacon It is entirely appropriate during a crisis like the COVID-19 epidemic for elected officials to urge calm. Panic often leads to counter-productive behavior. At the same time, it is important not to instill a sense of false confidence, which could engender complacency. Finding the right balance is difficult. Governor Ralph Northam…
-
Are Hospitals Prepared for the COVID-19 Contagion?
by James A. Bacon In my previous post, I laid out the case that Virginia potentially faces a severe shortage of hospital capacity should the COVID-19 pandemic spread in the Old Dominion at the geometric rate of increase as seen in other countries. I estimated that the Richmond region’s acute-care hospitals have only 1,400 un-utilized…
-
More Bad News on Coronavirus
All I need is the air that I breathe. Recent research indicates that the coronavirus can live in air for 3 hours post aerosolization. The Hill reports that, “A study awaiting peer review from scientists at Princeton University, the University of California-Los Angeles and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) posted online Wednesday indicated that…
-
Does Virginia Have Enough Hospital Beds?
by James A. Bacon Now that the COVID-19 virus has arrived in Virginia, key institutions are reacting. Several universities are extending their spring breaks; others are shifting to online classes. Event organizers are cancelling their events, from book fairs to health fairs. Major employers are telling employees to work remotely. Jails are suspending visitations to…
-
A Critical Coronavirus Graph
By DJ Rippert OK, Boomer. A study conducted last month from the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention provides statistics about the lethality of COVID-19. Those statistics were analyzed by Business Insider. You can see those statistics in the graph on the left. Younger people have a one in 10,000 (0.01%) chance of dying…
-
Running the Numbers on Coronavirus in America
By DJ Rippert Sprichst du panik? Liz Specht is an biologist and engineer. She is currently the Associate Director of Science and Technology at The Good Food Institute. On Friday Dr. Specht (who holds a Ph.D. from UCSD) posted a long series of tweets regarding the spread of Coronavirus and the limitations of America’s healthcare…
-
Getting Serious about Flooding
by James A. Bacon Everybody talks about the weather, as the old saying goes, but nobody does anything about it. Well, here in Virginia, people are getting serious about one aspect of the weather — flooding. Last week Governor Ralph Northam issued an executive order, the Virginia Flood Risk Management Standard, to encourage the “smart…
-
Reliability, Resilience and a 100% Renewable Electric Grid
by James A. Bacon California is getting a vivid lesson on the trade-offs between sustainability and reliability of the electric grid. Pacific Gas & Electric has taken the extraordinary action of cutting off electric power to 700,000 customers in California to reduce the risk of sparking forest fires. Many customers could go without power for…
-
Dominion Vies to Become Sustainability Leader — at What Cost?
by James A. Bacon Dominion Energy is aggressively positioning itself as a leader among U.S. electric utilities in renewable energy and environmental stewardship. Whether the shift in strategic direction will win it any friends among Democrats and environmentalists who increasingly dominate Virginia politics is an open question. The environmental wing of the Democratic Party of…