Digitized Medicine

The 2020 presidential election was held only three days ago.    Since then:

• The number of daily new cases of COVID-19 in the United States has been exponentially increasing, now nearing 120,000 new cases each day
  • because of the pandemic 
• The number of people dying each day from COVID-19 is increasing 
  • because of the pandemic 
• The presidential race remains extremely close
•  An unprecedented number of people mailed their ballots rather than risking exposure to COVID-19 by going to a polling place
  • because of the pandemic 
• So most of the votes currently being counted are the mailed ballots
  • because of the pandemic
•  Local elections officials have a shortage of poll workers
  • because of the pandemic 
• So it is taking a really long time to tally the votes  
  • because of the pandemic 
• And election results in 5 closely contested states remain too close to call
  • because of the pandemic 
• After Trump began fanning conspiracy theories about voter fraud this past summer by denouncing mailed-in ballots and asking his followers to vote in person, he is now proclaiming victory and declaring voter fraud with no evidence of broad-based or systemic fraud
• After Biden encouraged voters to vote early or mail ballots to reduce risk of exposure to COVID-19, he is now winning the majority of mailed-in votes still being counted and is gaining on Trump in all the contested states
• Biden has asked Americans to be patient while legally casted votes get counted
• In the past 12 hours Biden took the lead in 4 of the 5 closely contested states after the lead apparently flipped in 2 of them 
•  Americans in general, and the news media in particular, have understandably been mesmerized by the presidential election and lost focus on COVID-19 even as new cases are reaching critical levels 

So this is what today, November 6th, 2020, is like:

• A chaotic election, the result of which will have a profound impact on how America addresses the pandemic
• A pandemic with exponentially rising rates of new daily infections which will have a profound negative impact on the economy for decades to come

How well we respond to the pandemic has direct correlation to how negatively the economy is affected.  For decades.  

I pray for America and our elected leaders.