This week in Wisconsin COVID. Same growth in cases, more deaths

As the state's new mask mandate takes effect, let's look at the situation that got us here.

Here's a list of headlines from today's Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel.

So are the Cardinals the new ghosts haunting the Pfister, since they've been locked down in that hotel all weekend as more positive tests roll in for the team? For the record, I'm not sure if the Cardinals' positives count in the state's totals or not.

Though we're starting to see evidence of a plateau of new cases statewide (your local situation might not be as fortunate), we still are seeing an unprecedented level of new COVID-19 cases in recent weeks. That figure needs to start going down before we can even think we're turning back toward "normal".

That resurgence of cases in late June and July is now translating into a resurgence of deaths for late July and August. Last week had the most COVID-19 related deaths in the state in 8 weeks.

This means that if Wisconsin gets another week of 8 deaths a day, we will go over 1,000 total COVID deaths by the end of this week. And for those who try to blow off 1,000 deaths as insignificant, it's worth noting that it's taken less than 5 months to get to that point, and would mean COVID-19 killed more Wisconsinites in that short time period than what the flu and pneumonia killed in all of 2017 (the last year listed for the Wisconsin Death Report).

You can see why action was needed. And when I track the County numbers for COVID later this week, I bet we will find out that a lot of the districts "represented" by Republicans who are threatening to take action against the mask mandate will also be the same places responsible for the recent rise in both cases and deaths that got us to this point.