Good news on the case growth trend.

[Ms. Toad]

42. It's a simple curve fitting polynomial.

Nothing sophisticted at all. I'm also running an exponential curve - but is nto as good a fit. It was not steep enough for a while, and is now too steep.

I just played with the polynomials in Excel until I found the degree I could reliably make fit - typically I have been able found one that fits with R^2 = .995+ (a pretty good fit). I adjust it daily as each new day's data comes in - I add a new point to the plot, replace the trend line and grab the new constants. It fits pretty well for about a week out (two days ago it was only off by 152; today about 200, if I recall correctly - genearlly within 1-2% of the next day's case total (for example). It has been a good ballpark general predictor for longer - for predicting within a day of when milestones farther than week or so out are likely to be hit.

Today is the first day the peak # of cases was wtihin the range I've been plotting (until today, both the polynomial and the exponential just kept climbing off the page).