Fell off Italy curve; now jump to new curve for predictive modeling-but curve has to be same per capita cases on standardized Day X & ahead of us
Jason W. Wilson, MD, PhD, CPE, FACEP
Professor & Founding Chair of EM, University of South Florida | Chief of EM, Tampa General Hospital | Research Director | Emergency Medicine & Addiction Medicine Board Certified | Medical Anthropologist
Hillsborough County has done a good job with testing over the past 4 weeks. The combination of high volume testing and social distancing allowed the region to identify, describe, and, ultimately, contain this outbreak.
The first significant social distancing interventions in Hillsborough County took place approximately 2 weeks before this slope change (e.g. restaurants closing early, decision not to return public school students after spring break).
A county-widee stay at home went into effect after the initial social distancing measures in Tampa - so we may see another, second, bend in the curve next week.
In addition, Florida is still being driven by Miami-Dade but a statewide stay at home policy was implemented on April 3. The UW/IHME model therefore puts the peak for Florida around 4/21 - in other words, the green line should turn, along with Dade County (hopefully) by then, which will probably also coincide with a third slope change for Hillsborough County in two more weeks.
Will probably have to use trend line for Hillsborough County for now for predictive modeling - which is currently ok as the case growth is linear for the time being.
