Why the increase in number of daily deaths is the most important COVID-19 data point.

Forget about who is getting tested and who isn't. Forget about how many tests are coming back negative. Forget dividing the number of deaths by the number of known cases to determine a snapshot of the death rate. Forget all the stats but one: the number of Americans who are dying from this each day is doubling every three days and we are just now entering the phase of accelerated escalation.

Why be so sanguine that that rate will stop so soon? Why be confident this won't find its way to places which have no cases at all yet? Why be certain we know about all the hotspots? -Or that everyone who has tested negative are immune to it?

People want hope and are cherry picking the facts to find it. Only one nation seems to be on the back side of their curve and that is North Korea (I don't believe anything from China or Iran. Heck I hardly trust our own figures).

If you want hope, here: Italy seems to be peaking. Their numbers of daily deaths seems to be at its crest with 683 lost souls today. If they are at the top of their curve, and the downslope is a mirror image of the upslope, then only 15,006 Italians will have died from this at its end. That is a remarkably low number for a country of 60 million. They also exceeded their medical system's capacity rather quickly. Ours has a vastly superior capacity and quality of care. Only 74,000 Italians were confirmed to have it and they were able to relatively isolate it to the region around Milan.

We have the beginnings of outbreaks in many of our biggest cities and already we have confirmed 64,000 cases and we are likely to exceed 900 deaths by nightfall. Undoubtedly there are many who have it but have no symptoms. Some speculate that 60 million may test positive right now if we had the testing capability. But here's the rub: Even if you are confirmed with it, unless you are really sick, you are not admitted to the hospital. You're told to go home, isolate, and try to beat it. It is for this reason that we should focus on the number of severe cases and the number of our fellows who are dying from it. People of all ages seem to be getting sick from it, but I am still struggling to get the data on who is dying from it.

But, like I say, until that rate of increase in the number of daily deaths starts to level off, we should not be sanguine that the end is in sight. We'll only catch a glimpse of that longed-for finality when we near the top of this terrible mountain.

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For those of you who like to discount the danger of this Wuhan disease by pointing out seasonal flu stats, here is another thing to consider: the flu already thins the herd each year. It's kind of a natural, unpreventable thing that doesn't even approach tragedy nor catastrophe, precisely because you can count on it like you can count on snow in Michigan in the winter. The reliability of the seasonal flu already picking the low-hanging fruit from our tree emphasises precisely why this Wuhan disease is horribly tragic and catastrophic (if the number of deaths continues to climb exponentially), because it is snatching not the low-hanging fruit that is ripe to be plucked, but rather it is plucking the sturdier people farther up the tree who would have easily sailed through the flu season.

Plus, I am not buying that this disease is merely a 'boomer remover' as is so often touted. The people who are getting sick from it are people of all ages. I'd like to get more stats on the ages of who is dying from it here in America, but this is surely not just an old person's disease. And let me finish by saying that I am more than a little disgusted with the lack of concern people seem to be showing about it wiping out the elderly in the first place. It's almost as if they have stripped them of their dignity and humanity; as if somehow life at 80 is not as valuable as life at 50. That is precisely the kind of thinking which leads to death panels, euthanasia, and the general devaluing of life across the board.

In America we have always focused on extending life among the elderly. It's part of what makes our system the best in the world and also the most costly. I think a lot of people are looking at this through an accountant's calculative eyes and not through eyes which treasure the sacred sanctity and inherent dignity in life, even in sickness and suffering.