elected officials cannot fix this

When I read things like the following, my hackles raise:

The number of COVID-19 cases in our county is rapidly increasing.  There have been at least 38 new cases identified in our community just since last Friday (July 3rd).  To better illustrate just how quickly the virus is spreading, the new cases since last Friday represent 20% of all cases in the county since we started keeping records around the first of March.  

As of this morning, there are 54 individual homes in the county that contain one or more residents who have been diagnosed with active COVID-19.  There are no specific geographic areas where there are more cases than others, and it appears to be spread pretty much throughout the county.  There are no active cases in any of the nursing homes or assisted living facilities in our community.  

This press release from a Georgia Sheriff goes on in this vein for a bit without really offering much in the way of a solution other than to obey the supposed experts. 

I've said it before and I'll repeat it until you get it: case numbers are bullshit.  They mean almost nothing important.  Deaths, specifically the percentage of deaths caused by the virus over and above baseline deaths is the very definition of an epidemic, per the CDC.  Deaths from Covid-19 are declining and have been for weeks and weeks and weeks to the point where we have very nearly reached a level that would define the end of the epidemic.  That is, the number of deaths is so low that the CDC definition of an epidemic doesn't fit and so we are no longer in one. 

In the ten county health district in which I live, there have been zero deaths for more than a week.  (source: http://www.oconeecountyobservations.org/2020/07/northeast-health-district-adds-83-new.html)

My own charts of the Georgia DPH data show the same decline in mortality rates statewide.  The red line is a rolling 15-day average.  The blue line is a rolling 5-day median.  I use both because I'm not convinced one is a better measure of central tendency than the other, but both are down from earlier peaks.

Case numbers are up because of increased testing, and yes, probably because relaxing standards for group contact, especially in younger populations.  But the danger is when I see someone from the government, like a Sheriff, who is NOT a medical professional nor a statistician, putting out a press release like the one above, it most likely means that official is seeking to justify another Unconstitutional power grab, nothing more.

The idea that there is ANYTHING an elected official can do, especially a law enforcement official, to affect a virus is absurd.  The virus does not obey any laws other than those of nature.  If you believe that we can legislate our way out of this virus, that makes as much sense as demanding that Congress repeal the law of gravity.  The virus will not go away because of legislation.  Nor will it leave just because we hide from it.  There is no law or regulation we can pass that the virus will obey and searching for one is ludicrous.

Take reasonable precautions based on your own adult common sense and stop letting elected officials scare you with numbers out of context, numbers they don't understand and cannot affect.