{"id":10086,"date":"2020-04-21T18:40:09","date_gmt":"2020-04-21T23:40:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cottrillcompass.com\/blog\/?p=10086"},"modified":"2020-04-21T18:40:12","modified_gmt":"2020-04-21T23:40:12","slug":"covid-19-perception-and-reality","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cottrillcompass.com\/blog\/2020\/covid-19-perception-and-reality.html","title":{"rendered":"COVID-19: Perception and Reality"},"content":{"rendered":"<!-- wp:themify-builder\/canvas \/-->\n\n\n<p>Walking down the street today, you might be forgiven if you thought for a moment that everything was &#8220;normal&#8221;. If anything, streets are busier. Shopping and business almost seemed to be going on as normal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\"><figure class=\"aligncenter size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"500\" height=\"252\" src=\"https:\/\/cottrillcompass.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/busy-street-apr20a.jpg\" alt=\"A busy street in an Ixtapaluca neighbourhood, April 2020.\" class=\"wp-image-10087\" srcset=\"https:\/\/cottrillcompass.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/busy-street-apr20a.jpg 500w, https:\/\/cottrillcompass.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/busy-street-apr20a-300x151.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 500px) 100vw, 500px\" \/><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\"><figure class=\"aligncenter size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"475\" height=\"328\" src=\"https:\/\/cottrillcompass.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/busy-street-apr20b.jpg\" alt=\"Another busy street in an Ixtapaluca neighbourhood, April 2020.\" class=\"wp-image-10088\" srcset=\"https:\/\/cottrillcompass.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/busy-street-apr20b.jpg 475w, https:\/\/cottrillcompass.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/busy-street-apr20b-300x207.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 475px) 100vw, 475px\" \/><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p>I was reminded again today of how differently things look depending on where you are &#8211; in which country, or even on which street. I&#8217;ve read articles from people in Mexico that seem difficult to believe &#8211; but then I&#8217;m reminded that even here, things are quite different depending on where you are. Even from one community to the next.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>J<strong>ust so you know, everything is <em>not<\/em> normal, although it&#8217;s difficult to give a general overview. It&#8217;s complicated.<\/strong> Many businesses are indeed closed. And right now many people are even more concerned about the dreaded &#8220;Phase 3&#8221;. Phase 3 is the threatened phase when things are supposed to get a lot stricter, and it&#8217;s likely to happen this week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Oops &#8211; <em>already out of date!<\/em> A &#8220;Phase 3&#8221; was declared this morning. We are now learning about Phase 3 and what it will mean to all of us.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But just exactly what that will look like no one really knows &#8211; and again, it will vary from place to place (that&#8217;s not necessarily a bad thing, of course).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But people who, up until now, have been holding on to their jobs, or mostly regular hours, may find themselves in a much worse situation soon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>(There are actually more phases, but phases after 3 relate to recovery. So phase 3 is the worst phase, when the spread of the virus is considered to be the most dangerous.)<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"has-text-align-left wp-block-heading\">Today&#8217;s Chart<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>I thought you&#8217;d be interested in another chart &#8211; another chart that shows just how difficult it is to rely on simple &#8220;total cases&#8221; numbers that you may see (in Mexico now nearing 10,000). I was curious to compare testing rates &#8211; just how many people are actually being tested for COVID-19? Now, why would you test fewer people? Maybe because the cases are less severe. Or you have less money for testing. Or because people don&#8217;t bother to get tested. Many possible reasons! But testing rates obviously affect the totals we see.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So here it is, based on a chart from <a href=\"https:\/\/ourworldindata.org\/coronavirus-data\">Our World in Data<\/a> at Oxford University.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\"><figure class=\"aligncenter size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"500\" height=\"255\" src=\"https:\/\/cottrillcompass.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/testing-rates.jpg\" alt=\"COVID-19 testing rates in North America\" class=\"wp-image-10089\" srcset=\"https:\/\/cottrillcompass.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/testing-rates.jpg 500w, https:\/\/cottrillcompass.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/testing-rates-300x153.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 500px) 100vw, 500px\" \/><figcaption>COVID-19 testing rates in North America<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p>Canada is red &#8211; they&#8217;ve been doing an amazing amount of testing. The USA is blue. And Mexico is green. Can you see the green line?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So yes, that will make a difference in the stats.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"has-text-align-left wp-block-heading\">Just for fun &#8211; &#8220;Stay home!&#8221; in the languages of Mexico&#8230;<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>Since this is a somewhat random post, here&#8217;s something fun from the government of Mexico. Would you like to hear what &#8220;Stay home!&#8221; sounds like in some of the many languages of Mexico? Scroll down <a href=\"https:\/\/site.inali.gob.mx\/Micrositios\/materiales_de_prevencion_covid-19\/index.html\">this page to where it says &#8220;<strong>AUDIOS QU\u00c3\u2030DATE EN CASA<\/strong>&#8220;<\/a>, and you can click on over 50 different languages, urging you to stay home.  \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>(Interesting, considering that <strong><em>dozens of languages in Mexico still have no Bible in their language<\/em><\/strong>! Something to think about&#8230;)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Walking down the street today, you might be forgiven if you thought for a moment that everything was &#8220;normal&#8221;. If anything, streets are busier. Shopping and business almost seemed to be going on as normal. I was reminded again today of how differently things look depending on where you are &#8211; in which country, or [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,9],"tags":[2170,107,1638,2026],"class_list":["post-10086","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-mexico","category-news-and-current-issues","tag-covid-19","tag-ixtapaluca","tag-mexico","tag-oxford-university","has-post-title","has-post-date","has-post-category","has-post-tag","has-post-comment","has-post-author",""],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>COVID-19: Perception and Reality - Finding direction<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/cottrillcompass.com\/blog\/2020\/covid-19-perception-and-reality.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"COVID-19: Perception and Reality - Finding direction\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Walking down the street today, you might be forgiven if you thought for a moment that everything was &#8220;normal&#8221;. 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