Depressing world stats.

I keep wondering if I should stop taking a daily look at the world Stats for Covid-19.   The patterns are complicated as countries seem to go through wave like patterns that when put together make a swirling mess of data, although sometimes the local waves form into a large world-wide swell (it is looking as if we are in the third world-wide swell)  

Just when the UK numbers were dropping the country was hit by Delta...what other local waves are coming?   Likewise the USA numbers were dropping and are now rising fast again.   [I find these new waves depressing]   Seeing this also happening in Israel after high vaccination rates is also depressing.

Then there are some small island states that are currently seeing massive rises in the per-capita case and death rate (I will post more on this when a full month's data is in).  This shows just how fast covid can sweep small areas, and how quickly it can overcome the health facilities - here larger countries might have an advantage if they can ship hospital cases all over the country.  I am sure if one lived in places like Fiji or the French Polynesia it would not now seem like a "powder puff".

I mentioned, above, about countries showing a wave pattern...but quite a few are showing straight line statistics [Belarus is the worse example with between 9 and 11 deaths a day without variation]  This pattern clearly shows the official statistics are not reflecting what is actually happening, probably because there is limited testing capacity and the numbers show the results of test and not the overall picture.  It is depressing that some countries showing large number of deaths also seem to be following this sort of pattern, (I include Russia and Iran in this group).  It is depressing that the real situation in places seems to be be much worse the the already awful situation official statistics are reporting.

When comparing neighbouring countries it seems to show up under-reporting.  Thus India's current rates look suspiciously low when countries like Nepal, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka are all showing much higher per-capita rates.  I know the rates between neighbouring countries can vary, but i would have expected somewhat similar wave pattern, but at slightly differing times.  

Recently a number of S.E,Asian countries which had seen very low levels of Covid during the first year of the outbreak have seen numbers rise significantly: places like Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam - all countries with large populations.  

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I find Josh's daily report interesting, but depressing as the political will was not there to stop this in the tracks and now we have to learn to live with this sweeping wave of variant after variant, like the common cold but more deadly.  I suppose I need to get out the novels and stories of the 1800s when "Consumption" [T.B.] was a big killer, This might give an idea of how society coped with the ever present threat of death.   

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