I continue to check my little dashboard of #SanFrancisco COVID numbers each morning to decide whether to go inside the local good-but-not-amazing …

I continue to check my little dashboard of #SanFrancisco COVID numbers each morning to decide whether to go inside the local good-but-not-amazing sandwich shop. If you've been following me for a while, you might remember that I track three stats. I blog about it when some stat crosses from a pretty-safe value to a not-so-safe value or vice-versa; but first I wait a week after the stat crosses the pretty-safe-line to see if it stays on that side of the line. These stats are pretty noisy, and I don't want to blog "Everybody panic!" on Monday and then "Everybody stop panicking!" on Wednesday. Usually, things settle down within a week or two and then I do/don't blog about it as appropriate. But lately, stuff has been happening and not settling down. Below is a graph of how things have been going in SF for the last two months. A couple of stats have been bouncing up and down across the pretty-safe line for the past ~three weeks.

chart tracking three values over the past 60 days. the red stat, tracking new reported COVID cases in SF, started near zero and has gradually ramped up to low-but-noticeable. The purple stat % of positive PCR covid tests started low, but then trended upwards to the pretty-safe line; for the past few weeks it has bounced above and below the pretty-safe line. The green COVID-in-wastewater stat started out a little above the pretty-safe line (eek!), strangely trended down to safe levels during the same stretch of time the %positive PCR tests stat trended up. Lately, it's bounced high again; but it's a very bouncy stat

Yeah, it's weird that the COVID-in-wastewater stat was going down at the same time that the other stats were going up. It's not necessarily super-weird; if there's a surge, you don't necessarily see it in all the stats at the same time. But it's weird that SF's wastewater number was going down at the same time that California's overall wastewater number was going up; also at the same time that the overall San Francisco Bay Area's wastewater number was going up. Over the past few weeks, the California Department of Public Health, for all regions they track, has raised their level from "Very Low" to "Low". ("Low" doesn't sound so bad until you remember that the Department is thinking in terms of "Have things gotten bad enough yet such that hospitals in the region are filling up and we should send patients to other regions?")

Anyhow, what have I been doing lately, indoor-sandwich-wise? As I did half a year ago, I'm still going inside places. But if these stats ever make up their mind on "up" vs "down" and choose "up," then I might restrict myself to getting sandwiches at Luke's Local, who will hand them to me through the window.