'Overwhelmed and Terrified': Las Vegas' Reopening Backfires Terribly

[mucifer]

As the coronavirus pandemic continues to pummel the United States, Las Vegas seems to be operating business as usual. Casinos have been open since June 4—undeterred by the 123 visitors who have tested positive for the highly contagious virus and the 51-year-old Caesars employee who died in late June.

But it’s not business as usual for doctors and nurses in Las Vegas’ besieged health-care system, who say they are “overwhelmed and terrified” about the massive influx of new cases in a state officially deemed a “red zone” by the White House.

“I would say in the last month we’ve been completely overwhelmed with COVID-19 patients and our hospital is running out of space,” one Las Vegas emergency room doctor, who wished to remain anonymous for fear of professional retaliation, told The Daily Beast on Friday. “Not only are we overwhelmed and terrified, but based on the numbers for the rest of the country, it’s only going to get worse for us.”

And Sin City is a microcosm for the whole state—which also shattered COVID-19 numbers on Thursday with 1,447 new cases and six new deaths. ICUs are at about 84 percent capacity.

“It’s even more troubling that COVID-19 in Nevada is disproportionately impacting communities of color,” Bethany Khan, the communications director for the Culinary Union in Las Vegas, told The Daily Beast on Friday. “Workers fear that they will contract the virus and bring it home to their families or possibly die from it.”

https://www.thedailybeast.com/las-vegas-casino-reopening-backfires-as-covid-19-surges-in-nevada

[dchill]

1. "What happens in Vegas..."

Now available in a handy to-go virus!

[DBoon]

6. "What happens in Vegas comes back to California, Arizona, Utah, Texas..."

and infects the entire family

[magicarpet]

2. Covid Fodder....

[Wounded Bear]

3. Any place dependent almost entirely on tourism and entertainment is doomed...

You see it in Florida, too. They need people to travel and gather and party and spend money in an era when those are the most dangerous things people can do. California is highly dependent on those industries, too, though they have a broader base, but they're experiencing the same problems. People getting out and mingling and partying.

This was pretty predictable.

[mucifer]

4. But, New York with a lot of hard work got it under control

[leftieNanner]

5. You can go gamble in Las Vegas

But the currency is your life.

[DBoon]

8. You can try this slot machine

[leftieNanner]

9. Wow.

That's powerful.

Every time I think - I'd like to go do X.

My answer is always - it's not worth it.

[cagefreesoylentgreen]

7. Outdated story

Culinary Union: 22 members or their family have died from COVID-19, hundreds hospitalized

https://www.rgj.com/story/news/2020/07/17/nevada-culinary-union-since-march-22-members-have-died-covid-19/5461676002/

[progree]

10. Nevada - 6th highest state on per-capita basis (most recent day)

OOPS - forgot the link! https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/us/coronavirus-us-cases.html

All states - little charts of cases per capita (default) from the beginning -- charts are side by side for easy comparison between states / seeing all the states. In order of per-capita on most recent day, but the lines shown themselves are 7 day moving averages. (I think the states should be ordered according to 7 day moving average, not most recent day, since some days can be very suspiciously high or low relative to other nearby days)

In the top group, where cases are mostly increasing (again this group is ordered by cases per capita, most recent day)
Nevada is top row after Florida, Louisiana, South Carolina, Alabama, Texas.

In the 2nd group - where cases per capita have been mostly the same lately, according to the NYT, honorable mention goes to Arizona, which has a sky-high per-capita case rate, but surprisingly has been considerably falling in the last few days -- 7 day moving average down 20% since July 6, but there are suspiciously low daily amounts on some days. (Arizona has generally been rising *and* generally been number one in cases per capita until about a week ago)

Arizona: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/us/arizona-coronavirus-cases.html

Nevada: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/us/nevada-coronavirus-cases.html

Oh, back to the original U.S. link -- https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/us/coronavirus-us-cases.html

This is what the Solid South looks like - very aptly named

See the map, which by default is "Hot Spots" and how they are overwhelmingly in the Old South

One should also click on "Per Capita" above the map -- the Old South stands out in this too, but so does the Northeast along the coast (though mostly that's from the early weeks of the pandemic -- the cases per capita are cumulative since the beginning in this view)