Over the past few days, I noticed people in my neighborhood more relaxed in their social distancing practices. Probably a combination of removal of shelter-in-place orders from the governor, perception that the numbers of infections and deaths in Georgia are going down, and general fatigue from the social isolation. I’ve been tracking the published data on the Georgia Department of Public Health, which is very helpful for tracking cases over time, but does not provide the trend in deaths or hospitalizations. I downloaded the data from https://covidtracking.com/api to create a few plots for Georgia: daily and 7-day moving average of deaths, total weekly deaths, and daily increase in hospitalizations. Conclusion? We’re at a plateau with a slight downward trend on all metrics. I believe the plateau will last a while because while people have relaxed their social distancing measures, they’ve changed their habits; most people are wearing masks in public indoor spaces, and still maintaining a reasonable adherence to safety guidelines.
