—Voice of OC
Orange County’s soaring coronavirus hospitalizations and daily case increases are at the highest levels ever, so far, while some public health officials and epidemiologists fear Thanksgiving cases will worsen the situation.
“Duct tape your underpants,” UC Irvine epidemiologist Andrew Noymer said in a Thursday phone interview.
Noymer, a public health expert, said the situation is going to continue to get worse.
“We’re breaking records on the daily here,” he said. “Thanksgiving is starting to bite. Thanksgiving was a fortnight ago, exactly.”….
OC managed to shatter two records in one day: overall hospitalizations and the number of people in intensive care units.
As of Thursday, 1,025 county residents were hospitalized, including 257 people in intensive care units, according to state data.
That’s a 460% increase since Nov. 1, when 183 people were hospitalized, including 60 in ICUs.
OC eclipsed its previous record from the July 14 peak, when 722 people were hospitalized, including 239 in intensive care units.
“It’s the first time we set a record on both of these statistics since July,” Noymer said. “These numbers look really bad.”….
During the peak July hospitalization period, OC was averaging a little over 800 new cases a day. By the end of the month, the seven-day average was 470 new daily cases.
Now, OC is averaging over 1,800 new cases a day. When December began, the average seven-day average was 790 new cases a day.
The virus trends forced county Emergency Medical Services Medical Director, Dr. Carl Schultz, to issue a directive to hospitals late Wednesday evening, urging them to activate surge plans and halt non-emergency surgeries….
Without intervention, county officials warn that Orange County’s emergency medical services could collapse….
Meanwhile, Supervisor Michelle Steel railed against the regional shut down at the weekly Thursday OC news conference.
“As I have said since the very first stage of this pandemic, we must take a balanced approach to slowing the spread of this virus while ensuring the least economic harm to families,” Steel said….
Steel said Gov. Gavin Newsom “Has frankly created an inconsistent mess … moving the bar each time to justify their actions with no scientific base.”
But public health experts like Noymer said the order should’ve gone a step further and close down all nonessential retail, like malls and department stores.
“It’s more important now than March. I would’ve rather seen the malls open in March than now, of course that’s easy to say in hindsight,” Noymer said. “I would say yeah, indoor shopping needs to shut down. We’re really in a crisis.”….
“So two cases cause four, four cases cause eight and eight causes 16,” Noymer said. “Thanksgiving set in train a series of infections that are going to set in train a new series of infections. It’s not like Thanksgiving is done — it takes an explosion and makes it an even worse explosion … it’s not a road bump, it’s a mountain.”….
"I think it’s really troubling when you have millions of people who believe that the election was stolen when there’s no good evidence to support that." Rick Hasen, law professor at UC Irvine.
—OC Reg
✅ Some Orange County ambulances with patients are ‘waiting hours’ for ER beds -- The rising flood of coronavirus patients has prompted Orange County’s Health Care Agency to warn that emergency room backups have had some ambulances waiting “hours” to offload patients and the county’s critical care network “may collapse unless emergency directives are implemented now.” Ian Wheeler, Roxana Kopetman in the Orange County Register -- 12/11/20
The conservative radio titan has been a fierce advocate of President Trump’s baseless election claims. This week, he took the talk a step further.
—WashPo
✅ New data sheds light on parent debt burden for college students -- The new information gives new insight into intergenerational debt. Experts argue that the federal loans taken out by low-income parents can be a net negative for the family. Mikhail Zinshteyn CalMatters -- 12/11/20
✅ Community colleges hardest hit as college enrollment among high school graduates falls nationally amid the pandemic -- Community colleges have seen the sharpest drop among colleges in high school graduates enrolling this fall, a likely effect of the Covid-19 pandemic, according to an annual report published Thursday by the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center. Betty Márquez Rosales EdSource -- 12/11/20
Professor who studies pederasty sues students who've said he's sympathetic to pedophiles. Fellow classicists argue that he's treading into dicey legal and ethical territory in trying to police expression.
—Inside Higher Ed
A professor who does controversial research on age of consent is suing a graduate student who publicly criticized his writing and pedagogical choices.
The new libel lawsuit parallels two others the professor filed earlier this year. Both of those were against undergraduate students.
The professor, Thomas Hubbard, a classicist at the University of Texas at Austin, says he’s been unfairly maligned to the point of becoming a target of violence. As proof, he points to an early-morning protest outside his home last year, during which his property was vandalized. He says he so fears for his safety in Texas that he’s relocated to California.
Many scholars following the case say that they don’t condone physical violence or threats by any means. But they argue that Hubbard is now seeking to limit the very freedom of expression that affords him the right to study what he does….
Indeed, Hubbard’s lawsuits are very much about language. Among other topics, Hubbard studies pederasty, or sexual activity involving a man and a male youth. The practice occurred with some regularity in ancient Greece, and Hubbard has argued that U.S. age of consent laws should be re-examined with that tradition in mind. He points to contemporary statutory rape laws in parts of Europe where the age of consent is as young as 14, and argues that these thresholds may be different for young men and women. Age of consent laws are gender neutral in the U.S., but Hubbard has argued that young men may require less legal protection, or merit a lower age of consent, than young women….
—Inside Higher Ed
Some colleges are falling behind on making progress in remedial education reform just two years after California enacted legislation on the issue.
The latest report from the California Acceleration Project and Public Advocates shows that only three of California's 116 community colleges have achieved complete implementation of the changes listed in Assembly Bill 705 for both English and math.
The bill, which took effect in 2018, requires community colleges to use high school grades for placement, restricts colleges from requiring students to take remedial courses and requires colleges to place students in the English and math courses that will maximize the likelihood of students completing transfer-level coursework in those areas within a year.
Research has shown that students are more likely to complete transfer-level English and math courses if they begin in transferable courses, rather than remedial courses that tend to not earn students credit….
—CHE
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