Survey shows consumers "panicked" about COVID, fear matching Feb 2021 levels. Further evidence negative shocks are transitory --> supports everything rally into YE

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Friday

STRATEGY: Survey shows consumers “panicked” about Delta-variant, further evidence negative shocks transitory

Trends in USA COVID-19 cases are still distorted by holidays, but showing steady improvements…
The surge and scourge of Delta-variant runs its course in specific states but the overall USA cases don’t necessarily capture this because other states are seeing a surge. And case data is distorted by the Labor Day impacts (missing data, true ups) and the book ends of Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur, causing additional distortions. By the end of next week, data will be likely normalized.

– still, daily cases came in at 143,649
– this is down slightly from 150,611 same day last week

The best illustration of the “end date” of Delta variant is the continued downturn in cases in FL. Take a look at the case trends:

– FL has been in back since mid-August
– FL colleges are back in session
– FL continues to take the fewest mitigation steps

Cases are rolling over hard.

VACCINE SAFETY: Singapore study shows 0.13% of mRNA doses lead to suspected adverse events…
Singapore’s Health Ministry posted a comprehensive study of adverse effects from vaccinations. This report, released on Thursday, shows startlingly low adverse effects for mRNA vaccinations:

– 8.7 million doses administered
– 11,737 suspected adverse effects

– 0.13% of the doses

OK. For many people, this is viewed as 11,737 too many adverse effects. But considering that the risks of a severe outcome from a COVID-19 infection itself, one might need to consider that perspective.

Latest Destination Analysts survey shows many consumers “panicked” due to Delta, cancelling/ postponing trips
Since the start of the pandemic, one of our “go to” places to guage travel sentiment has been the work of DestinationAnalysts.com, a travel research firm (in SF). We like their work because they conduct regular surveys (n# > 1,500) and with history available, we can compare changes in sentiment over time.

Their latest survey really highlights the extent that US consumers panicked due to the Delta-variant surge:

– 59% travelers are concerned about Delta variant
– 27% cancelled trips due to Delta variant specifically
– 34% postponed trips due to Delta variant specifically

These are meaningful figures. That is, a lot of travel-related impacts have taken place due to Delta-variant surge. The fact that this turn down happened is not entirely a surprise. It has been well telegraphed and apparent either by anecdotes and by “soft surveys” and it is also showing up in company guidance — airlines cut guidance last week.

Consumer concern about Delta-variant seems like a panic…
Why do we think consumer concern about Delta is more “panic” than appropriate? There are several ways to contextualize this:

– “concern” about COVID-19 is at 64%, surging from 40% in June
– “concern” is same level it was in March 2021

– 179 million Americans are fully vaccinated as of Thursday
– 15 million fully vaccinated in March 2021

– shouldn’t fully vaccinated Americans be less concerned?

Think about this. For a fully vaccinated American, the concern about COVID-19 should be lower today than in February. After all, even if one can get infected (via breakthrough), the healthcare risk is 10X lower — so one should have far less concern today than in March 2021, if one is fully vaccinated:

– this survey implies that even fully vaccinated Americans are just as concerned about COVID-19 now vs March
– is this panic? or is it rationale?

STRATEGY: Travel-related stocks show that investors are even more “panicked” than consumers
In fact, take a look at the airline ETF JETS 0.00% . We want to simply compare the price of the ETF now versus the last time consumers were this worried about COVID-19:

– we looked at the two dates of similar consumer “concern” – now vs late March 2021
– JETS ETF is 25% lower now than in March 2021

– Why are the airline stocks 25% LOWER?

This suggests investors are treating the impact on Delta-concerns as impacting long-term trajectories, rather than transitory.

– true, 27% cancelled travel plans
– is 25% lower appropriate because of short-term cancelled bookings?
– do we really think these are permanently cancelled plans? not to be rebooked?

WTI Oil arguing impact from Delta is transitory, not structural…
Looking outside of equities, the best evidence that Delta impact is likely transitory is the recovery in oil prices. Take a look below. You can see WTI is back to $72. In March, it was $60. So WTI oil has moved up smartly and looks to be breaking out of the recent consolidation.

…Buy Yom Kippur = Friday stocks should gain, despite “quad witching”
Finally, we are finally exiting the seasonal “sell Rosh Hashana, Buy Yom Kippur”. As you can see below, stocks have been sloppy during this period. And it has coincided with quad witching. Quad witching is the simultaneous expiration of:

– equity options
– index options
– equity single stock futures
– equity index futures

This is quarterly event and given the growing role of derivatives, could have a bigger impact on cash markets. In other words, next week, the dual overhangs of “Sell Rosh Hashana, Buy Yom Kippur” plus “quad witching” are behind us.

SALT CONF: Day 3 Panel Summaries
We are including a summary of the Day 3 panel summaries from the SALT conference. This conference was in NYC and as we mentioned earlier this week, this was the first institutional “in-person” conference since the pandemic era.

General McMaster took the first question about recent events in Afghanistan. He made the point that the debate in the media is really missing the point and can be misleading. Failed wars have consequences on a humanitarian level and he postulated that our adversaries will likely test us on the international stage as a result. General Kelly said the struggle against radical extremists who use violence for political ends is not over. The Taliban will not be good partners to the US, despite some reports due to their DNA. The panel agreed that the US needs to shift toward Great-Power competition with China and Russia while maintaining robust counterterrorism capabilities.

General McMaster stated that our enemies face in one of two ways, ‘stupidly or asymmetrically.’ His point was that there is no conventional military match for the United States. The routing of the Iraqi army (which was the fourth largest mobilized military in the world at the time) proved this. Despite a reliance on precision and advanced weapons system, McMaster stated in true Army fashion, that ground fighting will never become obsolete. Despite rhetoric about the changing nature of war, McMaster also added that “wars still resemble each other more than any other human activity.”

Kelly mentioned that a conventional war with China would require a level of commitment not seen since the Second World War and thus favors avoiding direct military confrontation. Michelle Fournier agreed with this point and stressed that this was the exact reason why maintaining a strong deterrent is key to US foreign policy success. John Kelly and McMaster said that the US should not trade dependence on Arab oil for dependence on fragile supply chains. All panelists stressed the importance of solidifying alliances with advanced western democracies and syncing up on foreign policy objectives. There was a consensus that China’s aggressive industrial policy of the past 20 years should be in some way imitated by the US. Things like the CHIPS Act are a good start.

This panel was brief but tackled the key issue of hedging against tail risk. The discussion primarily focused on the costs and benefits of hedging. The panelist put the question this way; ‘Is it better to eat well, or sleep well.” His answer was essentially that it varies by investor and objective. He mentioned that those who do not hedge carefully, and instead do so sloppily, may seriously undermine returns.

He mentioned that risk management and the responsible use of leveraged instruments in effective hedging became more prominent after the Global Financial Crisis.

One thing the main panelist said that rung very true to us was the ‘Cassandras are bad investors.’ In other words, folks who constantly warn of impending bearish doom rarely get the timing right and can provide useful investing advice through that lens on an even rarer basis.

Dr. Gottlieb, to the relief of the audience, started his presentation by praising the COVID-19 protocols of the conference and gave his stamp of approval to the safety of the attendees. He said the Northeast is due for a spike in cases given that prevalence is very low compared to other areas of the country. He mentioned that the negligence around flu policy leads to way more deaths from the virus then there should be. He speculated that in the case of a respiratory pathogen like COVID-19, we will not have the same luxury of complacence particularly in winter months.

He thinks masks will likely become more prevalent going forward. He also says that retrofitting buildings and gathering areas with air filtration will be a key action in prevention. He mentioned the Israelis were presenting data on booster shots and while many FDA experts predict the future need for boosters, he believes that it is possible only vulnerable cohorts will require them.

Dr. Gottlieb then began discussing salient points from his recent book, including some of the behind-the-scenes reasons why the CDC stumbled. The rest of the Federal government appears to have had way greater confidence in the ability of the CDC than was merited, and in typical bureaucratic fashion, the agency was unwilling to admit its lack of preparedness. He mentioned some debacles around testing as well as what he said was the costliest piece of guidance from the agency, the 6-foot social distancing rule. This is the rule that prohibited schools from opening earlier and it was changed to 3-feet largely based on political pressure from Biden administration.

Another source of the bungled US COVID-19 response was that most of our planning was based on an influenza pandemic. Operationally, the responses in this plan proved ill-suited to meet the novel virus that changed humanity so much. One of the largest sources of adverse outcomes in the US was a lack of testing capacity which was directly exacerbated by the CDC. The CDC wouldn’t share virus samples with the manufacturers and forced them to license their IP. This proved a fatefully disastrous decision. The FDA subsequently empowered manufacturers through the Defense Production Act to help alleviate the deadly debacle.

While the impact of COVID-19 was certainly not helped by poor leadership and bureaucratic infighting, the Federal Government simply did not possess the perquisite infrastructure to effectively manage the pandemic. He mentioned hardened production processes used to produce Neupogen, a vital drug to reduce the health impact of a radiological event, is a good model to base production and processes key to responding to COVID-19 and future pandemics.

Andrew Ross Sorkin interviewed legendary hedge fund manager Ray Dalio. Mr. Dalio began the discussion by elaborating on his work on ‘The Arc of History,’ where he compared modern characteristics of the economy to past economic circumstances to try to infer what the future will look like. He said three key things have happened that suggest history may be near a major turning point.

1. The world of zero interest rates, money printing that devalues currency and the willingness to always monetize debt.
2. Large wealth and opportunity gaps are tearing at the fabric of society by fomenting internal conflict and polarization.
3. The presence of another rising power, in this case China, often presages the decline of the existing hegemon. Dalio suggests that China’s rise will likely dislocate the constellation of post-World War II institutions that comprise the current global order.

He believes his research on the rise and fall of empires is often caused by similar circumstances and broad forces in history and thus he believes he can make certain inferences about the future based on history. He believes that bad finance, spending more than we’re earning and having more liabilities than assets is degrading faith in our political system and the dollar as a reserve currency.

He mentioned a Deng Xiaoping quote about capitalism and communism that he thought exemplified the Chinese attitude toward commerce. “It doesn’t matter if the cat is black or white as long as it catches mice,” is the quote he attributed to the late former Chinese Communist Party leader. He seemed to infer that the US and China, despite cultural differences, have a shared cultural value of pragmatism that may be underestimated by analysis clouded by an ideological lens.

In a fun moment, Ray Dalio surveyed the crowd to ask who owned Bitcoin and who owned Gold. Significantly more members of the crowd owned Bitcoin. He thought Bitcoin was great in many ways, but he warned the audience that he believed regulators would shut down cryptocurrency if it was ‘too successful.’

Mr. Dalio mentioned he had personally seen the evolution of Chinese society and had been frequently visiting since 1984 and had met folks from all walks of life in the nation. He suggested the fundamental difference between the Chinese and US approach to solving many of the same policy problems differ because of their society. The US system of liberalism is more individually based and political will is thus exerted in a bottom-up fashion. China has a history of collectivism pre-dating any Marxist thought and thus its’ political solutions are centralized and of a more ‘top-down’ character.

Dalio mentioned he had particular measures of capitalism that he liked to use. He said, based on these measures, the strength of capitalism in the US and China was about equivalent, but that somewhat counterintuitively, Europe was less capitalist than China.

Lunch contained a discussion with famed theoretical physicist Michio Kaku who is considered one of the leading minds in the formation of String Theory. The discussion was not on finance so we won’t dwell too much on it, but it was extraordinary, fascinating and entertaining. The topics discussed ranged from transporting our digital selves through a laser in the galaxy, to telepathically controlling our environment around us in the future, to the recent Pentagon report on UFOs.

One of the more fascinating points made by Dr. Kaku was that many different segments and interests of society explain economic growth in different ways and they may have some merit to them. He explained that he believed discoveries in the field of physics were the primary drivers of the major economic revolutions we have had since pre-industrial society was forever changed by harnessing the power of heat. This would not have been possible without the discovery thermodynamics.

The second great economic revolution was built upon physicists discovering electricity and magnetism. These discoveries greatly increased efficiency, productivity and the quality of human life. The third wave, which we are still experiencing benefits of, was the discovery of Quantum Mechanics. The insights associated with these fields enabled technologies such as lasers, the internet and other vital strides in innovation. The big question he aimed to answer with this setup was: What will the 4th and 5th waves be?

He predicted the next economic revolution unleashed by physics would be the discovery of physical realities at the molecular level. This will enable artificial intelligence, nanotechnology and unprecedented biotechnology that will forever change humanity and the quality of life on our planet.

What about the more distant future? The fifth wave of physics-induced economic revolutions will be based on cold-fusion power, which would essentially enable us to extract unlimited energy from sea-water. Another side of this wave will likely be quantum computing, which will permit humanity to advance beyond the approaching physical constraints of Moore’s Law. He believed advances in fusion power could end up being the ‘ace-in-the-hole’ in humans potentially being able to save the planet from climate change.

This panel was quite fascinating and illuminated a key area of innovation that some investors may miss. While we are all focused and aware of the digital revolution, we may forget that there are vast sections of our economy that have not undergone disruptive shifts as a result. Food, materials and therapeutics are amongst areas that have not seen the hyper-pace of innovation that is a defining characteristic of the digital age. That may be changing quicker than we think.

We’re all aware of the recent rise of companies like Beyond Meat and Impossible that are using plant-based meat substituted. As the recent adoption by major food vendors and fast-food chains can attest, the taste of these products has measurably improved since earlier meat replacement products. However, these companies and their plant based patties don’t even begin to scratch the surface of the type of innovation possible in this space.

Dr. Uma Valeti, CEO of UPSIDE Foods, spoke of a future where some of the most environmentally problematic, and costly supply chains could be eliminated. How? Well, he explained that DNA is very similar across species and that recent advances in stimulating desired cell-growth, CRISPR technology and other concurrent advances are raising the possibility of a future where healthier, tastier meat than you’ve ever had will be grown and harvested in a stable environment outside of the animal. That means slaughter-less meat houses.

Meat has always been at the center of the human plate and now it can be sustainably and in a more a healthy fashion. The supply chains for the transport of meat are incredibly expensive and require refrigeration and an enormous carbon footprint. If all meat was produced locally with this new technology it could unlock vast efficiencies and have a positive impact from an environmental perspective.

Physical goods may also be altered by similar technology, and it is intuitive how this could also affect the production of medicines and biotechnology applications. This underappreciated emerging field of innovation presents a vision for a cleaner and brighter future for primitive and dated methods of producing and transporting food.

Space is the final frontier and one of the hottest areas in not only investing but the public imagination. Recent strides in the privatization of space travel, including a major milestones of the first fully civilian crew Wednesday, made this one of the more well-attended events on the third day. The distinction and centrality of the panelists to their nascent industry made it a special event that provided an illuminating discussion on a complicated subject.

The mere fact that the above-mentioned launch was happening, according to panelists, was proof that the costs of going to space have been materially diminished by the participation of private innovators. The headlines is of recyclable, cheap rockets that can land themselves of course, and why wouldn’t they be? However, one of the things that cheap rockets enable is a greater division of labor. Now that there are operators who can sell other operators vital infrastructure, the high-cost and infinitely complex process of designing comprehensive bottom-to-top spacecraft can be avoided.

The panelists also mentioned other opportunities created by the rapid pace of space innovation. Certain items can be manufactured in space. Data centers may be also well-suited to be put in orbit as well. New sensors given innovations in satellite technology can help us understand our planet better with things like CO2 sensors. A higher level of satellite coverage also makes aviation safer.

One of the panelists described the stage of space innovation we are in currently, similar to the period when internet companies had to build their own data centers. The commercialization of space is also one of the only areas that can potentially limitless expand productivity by gaining access to precious resources and compounds not found in our environment. There are a lot of emerging legal questions and the modernization of the legal and regulatory framework to ensure space becomes a peaceful domain supportive of commerce is essential.

There was a lot of innovation passed down from the government-run space program, which is a pretty well-known fact. The panelists agreed it will likely be infinitely more from commercialized space operations. Closed-loop systems required for space have always helped promote innovation here on Earth.

There is an exciting IP race underway in space and the US Government and DoD are still a key stepping stone for many private companies. The innovation environment is changing for the better and the Government is somewhat breaking old and detrimental habits. Some space companies used to have to sue agencies to even be considered for contracts. The government is also promoting incentives to extend the timeline for projects into the future. The effect is that commercial timelines for viability are being pushed back, which can foster more thoughtful innovation.

The panelists agreed that NASA is not that interested in telling Space-X how to build rocket. Stacked development and a constant investment in science seem to be key. The Photon satellite platform was mentioned as an example of a useful product that can enable more focused innovation, since firms don’t have to build their own satellite platforms anymore.

The innovators on stage had advice for space startups. Don’t be a startup squared. In other words, for your success as a company, you should not be dependent on a startup that doesn’t yet exist. There are a limited number of viable players in the space industry at this time (probably about 20 they said), so if you want to be a viable company then build something that one of these twenty folks need for their companies to succeed or improve in the next four years. Where is the next stop for commercial space travel? The moon of course, and then beyond!

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26 Granny Shot Ideas:
26 Granny Shot Ideas: We performed our quarterly rebalance on 07/30. Full stock list here –> Click here
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POINT 1: Daily COVID-19 cases 143,649, down -6,962 vs 7D ago…
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Current Trends — COVID-19 cases:
– Daily cases 143,649 vs 150,611 7D ago, down -6,962
– Daily cases ex-FL&NE 133,041 vs 137,164 7D ago, down -4,123
– 7D positivity rate 7.7% vs 7.9% 7D ago
– Hospitalized patients 89,539, down -6.8% vs 7D ago
– Daily deaths 1,943, up +25.2% vs 7D ago
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*** Florida and Nebraska stopped publishing daily COVID stats updates on 6/4 and 6/30, respectively. We switched to use CDC surveillance data as the substitute. However, since CDC surveillance data is subject to a one-to-two day lag, we added a “US ex-FL&NE” in our daily cases and 7D delta sections in order to demonstrate a more comparable COVID development.

The latest COVID daily cases came in at 143,649, down -6,962 vs 7D ago. This week’s data is still distorted due to Labor Day. We expect the distortion to clear out on Wednesday. Nonetheless, the average 7D delta since Labor Day is negative, suggesting that cases are rolling over.

We’ve recently been at the critical stage of case rollover for many states. All states that had been falsely rolling over are beginning to roll over again. We will continue to monitor all relevant data closely, but as long as 7D deltas remain negative, case rollover will continue.

Rolling 7D delta in daily cases is positive due to distortion…
As shown in the chart below, the rolling 7D delta in daily cases is currently positive due to Labor Day distortion. We expect the distortion to clear out and for the rolling 7D delta to turn consistently negative on Wednesday.

Tuesday’s negative rolling 7D delta suggests that cases appear to be rolling over despite the distortion. We will continue to monitor all relevant data closely, but as long as 7D deltas remain negative, case rollover will continue.

Low vaccinated states seem to have a larger increase in daily cases compared to their recent low…
The “Parabolic Case Surge Tracker” monitors the possible parabolic surge in daily case figures. In the table, we included both the vaccine penetration and the recent case trend for 50 US states + DC. The table is sorted by the multiple of their recent peak daily cases divided by the daily cases when their case surges started.

– The states with higher ranks are the states that have seen a more significant rise in daily cases
– We also calculated the number of days during the recent case surge; a state with a high multiple but low number of days since its low means the state is facing a relatively rapid surge in daily cases
– The US as a whole, UK, and Israel are also shown at the top as a reference

Hospitalization continues rising, while positivity rate has plateaued… Daily deaths also start to surge now…
Below we show the aggregate number of patients hospitalized due to COVID, daily mortality associated with COVID, and the daily positivity rate for COVID.

– Hospitalization has exceeded the peak level we’ve seen in Wave 1 and 2 in 2020 and continues surging.
– With the increasing number of daily tests, positivity rate has plateaued over the past week. As daily cases have already start to roll over in some states, the positivity rate could roll over soon.
– Daily deaths have been surging recently, but less “dramatic” than the cases or hospitalization trends. Currently, daily death has surpassed the peak we have seen in Wave 2.

POINT 2: VACCINE: vaccination pace has been steadily rising…
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Current Trends — Vaccinations:
– avg 0.8 million this past week vs 0.8 million last week
– overall, 53.8% fully vaccinated, 62.9% 1-dose+ received
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Vaccination frontier update –> all states now near or above 90% combined penetration (vaccines + infections)
Below we sorted the states by the combined penetration (vaccinations + infections). The assumption is that a state with higher combined penetration is likely to be closer to herd immunity, and therefore, less likely to see a parabolic surge in daily cases and deaths. Please note that this “combined penetration” metric can be over 100%, as infected people could also be vaccinated (actually recommended by CDC).

– Currently, all states are near or above 90% combined penetration
– RI, MA, FL, CT, SD, NJ, IL, NY, DE, NM, UT, PA, ND, NV, KY, ND, CO, KS, TN, OK, WI, SC, AZ, MN, CA, NE, LA, DC, MT, AK, MD, ID, VI, AR, AL, MS, and NC are now above 100% combined penetration (vaccines + infections). Again, this metric can be over 100%, as infected people could also be vaccinated. But 100% combined penetration does not mean that the entire population within each state is either infected or vaccinated.

Below is a diffusion chart that shows the % of US states (based on state population) that have reached the combined penetration > 60%/70%/80%/90%/100%. As you can see, all states have reached 90% combined vaccination + infection. 82.6% of US states (based on state population) have seen combined infection & vaccination > 100% (Reminder: this metric can be over 100%, as infected people could also be vaccinated. But 100% combined penetration does not mean that the entire population within the state is either infected or vaccinated).

There were a total of 731,732 doses administered reported on Monday, up 12% vs. 7D ago. Despite last week’s negative vaccination trend, the trend appears to once again be positive. We believe many catalysts could push the vaccination pace even higher.

– Proof of vaccination required by many US cities and venues
– Booster shots
– Full FDA approval of Pfizer COVID vaccines (hopefully it could help overcome vaccine hesitancy)
– Biden’s vaccination plan

The daily number of vaccines administered remains the most important metric to track this progress and we will be closely watching the relevant data.

53.1% of the US has seen 1-dose penetration > 60%…
To better illustrate the actual footprint of the US vaccination effort, we have a time series showing the percent of the US with at least 45%/45%/50% of its residents fully vaccinated, displayed as the orange lines on the chart. Currently, 100% of US states have seen 40% of their residents fully vaccinated. However, when looking at the percentage of the US with at least 45% of its residents fully vaccinated, this figure is 88.5%. And only 63.2% of US (by state population) have seen 50% of its residents fully vaccinated.

We have done similarly for residents with at least 1-dose of the vaccination, denoted by the purple lines on the chart. While 97.6% of US states have seen 1 dose penetration > 50%, 79.3% of them have seen 1 dose penetration > 55% and 54.8% of them have seen 1 dose penetration > 60%.

This is the state by state data below, showing information for individuals with one dose and two doses.

The ratio of vaccinations/ daily confirmed cases has been falling significantly (red line is 7D moving avg). Both the surge in daily cases and decrease in daily vaccines administered contributed to this.

– the 7D moving average is about ~5 for the past few days
– this means 6 vaccines dosed for every 1 confirmed case

In total, 388 million vaccine doses have been administered across the country. Specifically, 209 million Americans (64% of US population) have received at least 1 dose of the vaccine. And 179 million Americans (55% of US population) are fully vaccinated.

POINT 3: Tracking the seasonality of COVID-19

In July, we noted that many states experienced similar case surges in 2021 to the ones they experienced in 2020. As such, along with the introduction of the more transmissible Delta variant, seasonality also appears to play an important role in the recent surge in daily cases, hospitalization, and deaths. Therefore, we think there might be a strong argument that COVID-19 is poised to become a seasonal virus.
The possible explanations for the seasonality we observed are:

– Outdoor Temperature: increasing indoor activities in the South vs increasing outdoor activities in the northeast during the Summer
– “Air Conditioning” Season: similar to “outdoor temperature”, more “AC” usage might facilitate the spread of the virus indoors

If this holds true, seasonal analysis suggests that the Delta spike could roll over by following a similar pattern to 2020.

We created this section within our COVID update which tracks and compare the case, hospitalization, and death trends in both 2020 and 2021 at the state level. We grouped states geographically as they tend to trend similarly.

CASES
It seems as if the main factor contributing to current case trends right now is outdoor temperature. During the Summer, outdoor activities are generally increased in the northern states as the weather becomes nicer. In southern states, on the other hand, it becomes too hot and indoor activities are increased. As such, northern state cases didn’t spike much during Summer 2020 while southern state cases did. Currently, northern state cases are showing a slight spike, especially when compared to Summer 2020. This could be attributed to the introduction of the more transmissible Delta variant and the lifting of restrictions combined with pent up demand for indoor activities.

HOSPITALIZATION
Current hospitalizations appear to be similar or less than Summer 2020 rates in most states. This is likely due to increased vaccination rates and the vaccine’s ability to reduce the severity of the virus.

DEATHS
Current death rates appear to be scattered compared to 2020 rates. This is likely due to varying vaccination rates in each state. States with higher vaccination rates seem to have lower death rates given the vaccine’s ability to reduce the severity of the virus; states with lower vaccination rates seem to have higher death rates.