Analysis – 2 January 2021

Still waiting for the post-holiday values
Christmas and New Year's plus the long weekends resulted in fewer tests to be performed and fewer data to be transmitted. Thus, the curves look more favourable than they should be. Expect values to increase again in the update of the 8th. IHME projections are delayed until next week too and thus last week's projections are left on the graphs. 

Year's end numbers are probably off, with the possible exception of Tunisia and New York State. I will therefore just show the graphs and leave my comment to the coming Saturday. Sweden has even halted number reporting for a few days, which is probably the most honest to do because it does not lead to false hope.

Accordingly, the risk map is off in the U.S., which is apparent as several States that turned entirely yellow. These districts should turn red in the coming week, including Washington State's counties.  Hawai'i though, having instituted swift and decisive measures, and being an island with easy entry control, is truly at the lowest risk (green).

New (1): The graphs now contain the percentage of people who tested positive next to the uppermost line. This number ranges from 0.04% of the population in New Zealand to 6% in the U.S. The number of truly infected people will probably never been known for sure but based on preliminary data it can range anywhere from 2x to 10x as much.

New (2): The maximum daily fatalities in percentage of the average daily deaths is now given for a 7-day average instead of per-day, thus lowering the values considerably. The highest U.S. daily death number was 50% higher than the average, with New York State having been the hardest hit with 160% in April. The European countries had roughly one third more deaths at the peak than on an average day and Tunisia hit 44%.

New (3): I am now including a new graph depicting the vaccination rate. This graph is not accurate (yet) because it combines people with one and two shots, but it shows which countries have started their vaccination programme, notably the UK, the U.S. and Germany.