Colds and Flus, the Unintended but Appreciated Casualties of Our War against the Coronavirus

One of the more interesting measuring sticks deployed during this outbreak is the one from Kinsa thermometers — a collection of aggregate, anonymous data from the company’s 1.3 million thermometers that connects temperature readings to GPS data. On any given day, the company collects data from 60,000 to 160,000 thermometers and plugs them into maps and charts, measuring what parts of the country are experiencing more atypically high body temperatures, and calculating how much “influenza-like illness above the normal expected levels the company’s thermometers have detected.”

The most recent Kinsa  map of data is detecting raised temperatures in New York City and most of New Jersey; central Massachusetts; south Florida in and around Miami; Duval County, Florida; Salt Lake City; Lexington County, South Carolina; and King County, Washington.

But other than that . . . the country looks pretty good, keeping in mind that a significant swath of the Midwest and Rockies have no data to report. Keep in mind, the thermometers can only detect raised temperature; they can’t diagnose what caused the raised temperature. It could be the regular flu or some other illness.

But here’s what’s really intriguing: starting on March 24, the percentage of thermometers detecting raised temperatures dropped outside of the normal range for the tail end of winter cold and flu season, and day by day, it just kept on dropping. And since April 15, that figure has been as low as the system can measure. Social distancing hasn’t just slowed the spread of SARS-CoV-2; keeping Americans at home and minimizing their interactions with others has also crushed the regular flu, colds, and anything else that can result in a raised temperature.

Staying at home and social distancing and canceling big events and wearing masks in public and washing our hands more obsessively than Lady Macbeth can be a real pain . . . but it is bringing some benefits.