Coronavirus daily update: Wednesday, Aug. 5

Blaming the messenger

Perhaps you couldn’t hear it, but it was there: After Gov. Roy Cooper made his announcement this afternoon delaying Phase 3 — which was set to begin in North Carolina this week — I could sense the backlash immediately, ringing from Murphy to Manteo, and most points in between.

Phase 3 is scheduled, tentatively, for Sept. 11. Five more weeks. People hate it — as evidenced by the comments on the governor’s Twitter feed.

Really, we all should have seen the governor’s announcement coming — or, at least, anyone who reads these updates. The positive test rate hasn’t dipped below 7 percent in more than a month; we’re shooting for 5 percent. Urban centers like Wake County (11,425 total diagnoses) and Mecklenberg County (21,517 cases) have not yet leveled off. Plus cases are increasing in rural counties as well — 35 of our 100 counties now have more than 1,000 total diagnoses.

In short, we have not hit our marks. But! We’re getting there! Sort of! More on that in a bit.

Some news

• Footage of John Neville’s time in the Forsyth County jail, that ultimately proved fatal, became available today through a consortium of news companies, which viewed and published the footage. Michael Hewlett’s take in the Journal, one of those companies, is as good as it gets.
• The UNC System is projecting huge revenue losses in the coming year, and crafting a brutal plan to deal with it.
• The RNC will have a small convention for delegates in Charlotte after all. And they’ll be wearing masks.

In the paper

A new issue comes out tomorrow morning, but in the meantime we’ve got new web content.

• An Forsyth County NC House race could change the numbers in Raleigh.
• I’m worried about sending my kids to college. But not for the usual reasons.
• We take a shot at Postmaster General Louis DeJoy, of Greensboro.

The numbers

• North Carolina is leveling off in terms of new cases, with most of the recent spikes coming from rural counties and a downward trend in our 7-day average.
  • Good work, people.
• 1,127 new cases today. That’s relatively low!
  • A lot of people in the hospital — 1,167 of them. But we’ve got room for more.
  • Our positive test rate has gone up to 9 percent, up form 7 percent.
  • Deaths per day are rising — a 7-day average of 27 per day, 2,076 so far.
• Guilford County has 91 new today, for 5,327. 2,993 have recovered and 149 have died.
• I’m still blocked from the Forsyth County website, but the Facebook page reports 21 new cases today (5,028) and two new deaths (51)

A diversion

I am so jaded, folks. So worn out. So tired. I need to see something with fresh eyes. So I ventured down this rabbithole on YouTube: Black, teenage twins listening to music from the popular canon… for the first time. I’ve watched their hot takes on Phil Collins (they loved it) and Jimi Hendrix (freaked them out a little bit) and the White Stripes (totally). But the best one is their very first exposure to Stevie Wonder — they had no idea who he was.

Program notes

• Tonight’s featured image is “The Dispatch-Bearer,” from the overhyphenated Frehc painter Alphonse-Marie-Adolphe de Neuville, in 1880. Taken from the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s public-domain collection.
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