So about this paper designed to crucify the heretics in charge of South Dakota

Problem for public health folks is that S. Dakota and @govkristinoem appear to have them on mute.

Despite having public health types on mute, S. Dakota has done well, ostensibly because there are more people that live in one block in New York City than the entire state (hyperbole). But then along came the annual Sturgis Motorcycle rally...

And an opportunity to see if the predicted COVID apocalypse would materialize. The researchers studied cases, and not deaths. Why, you ask?

Because there has been one recorded death as of 9.2. I know, I know, there's a lag. But still.. they could have also waited to publish!

But we expect cases to go up as people gather and socialize more, whether that be at motorcycle rallies, or at a local target store.. so its really not surprising that cases rise as Americans do what they value.. And 2 wks post rally, SD sees almost 400 new cases/day

To get a sense of scale, here's the rise in cases in California, Washington & Florida ...all seemingly quiet until a few weeks after Memorial day weekend. These are of course more populous states, but something or the other triggered epidemics of upto 12k new cases/day..

Anyone remember memorial day weekend festivities that happened about 2 weeks prior in many of these cities?

Same author (Dave ) fascinatingly found that BLM protest activity had no impact on cases spiking positing locals increased stay at home behavior. In the s. dakota study they use cellphone data to show that S. Dakotans stayed at home 10% less..

To review authors body of work to date: Spikes across the country a few weeks after BLM protests, weren't because of protests. Sturgis rally caused spike locally and nationally, and was a superspreader event.

Does appear S. Dakota has a rise in cases a few weeks post Sturgis rally, but already seems to be over the hump... (Though remember -- S.Dakota 300-400 new cases/day, CA/FL/TX with 10-12k cases/day)

And one imagines that every prior year 400k people come together at motorbike rally, there's an increase in viral illnesses... so notable that 2019/2020 doesn't appear that much different from any other year post sturgis rally..

And the scary superspreader events to dread are the ones that cause hospitals to be overflowing, refrigerated trucks to be commissioned, hospital ships to set sail right? How did SD do with surge? Would appear SD hospitals are 1/2 empty almost 1 month post Sturgis..

Paper also makes a big deal about national spread by noting that US counties outside of SD that sent lots of residents to rally had increased cases when residents returned from rally. National superspreading event!!

Weld County, CO is one of the high inflow counties.. Here's their crazy sturgis infused spread... See it?

Remember.. authors have dismissed massive upticks to 12k cases/day 2 weeks after mass protests, but do want you to shake your head at this graph.

I am shaking my head..

Here's another high inflow county to the Sturgis Rally - Clark County, AZ (Home of Las Vegas that opened casino's in a modified manner early June) ... See the chaos unleashed by Sturgis mid august?!!... Right.. me neither.

Just to make sure i'm not cherry picking I picked another county : Campbell, County, WY. Seems more promising. A spike in early September. But the peak is 8 cases. Not 8000, or 800, but 8 cases.

And some how this all adds up to $12.2 billion in costs. I'm also more convinced than ever that the country is safest with economists playing monopoly rather than writing covid papers.