It’s been a long and hard road including, in my view, the expression of Donald Trump’s revenge on the American people for giving him the boot, but the US is on track to whip COVID-19 by mid-year. Levels are still high but falling fast. Via BofA:
The number of people hospitalized with COVID-19 in the US has declined dramatically to 81,439, or 51,035–39% off the peak which occurred on January 5th(Figure 3)-a rapid turn in the crisis (Figure 4). The decrease is broad-based (50 states+DC, except for AKthat saw a minimal 2-person increase over the past week). The weekly percentage change in US COVID-19 hospitalized is consistent with the largest declines seen during the Coronavirus crisis (Figure 5). Moreover the 7-day test positivity rate has declined to7.2% from the 13.6% peak on January 8th(Figure 6). Since hospitalizations are lagged relative to time of infection the USCorona outbreaks peaked back in the second half of December. Finally, the vaccine rollout in the US has accelerated to above 2mn doses per day over the weekend and a cumulative 41.2mn doses administered through February 7th(Figure 7,Figure 8).
As hospitals are debottlenecked, the economic boom cometh.
David Llewellyn-Smith is Chief Strategist at the MB Fund and MB Super. David is the founding publisher and editor of MacroBusiness and was the founding publisher and global economy editor of The Diplomat, the Asia Pacific’s leading geo-politics and economics portal.
He is also a former gold trader and economic commentator at The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, the ABC and Business Spectator. He is the co-author of The Great Crash of 2008 with Ross Garnaut and was the editor of the second Garnaut Climate Change Review.
