That graph looks a lot like what California already did in December. I'm not sure where to find Re numbers to compare with his discussed ones for Ireland. ANOT

That graph looks a lot like what California already did in December. I'm not sure where to find Re numbers to compare with his discussed ones for Ireland. ANOTHER huge spike on top of the one that only now is starting to slow would be pretty terrible, or maybe we just saw the same thing already (new strains have been identified here, and behavior seems like it deteriorated before the holidays before getting improved after the spike). I think it's fairly incomplete to make predictions about the US like the linked article (let alone speculation about government motivations) without discussing or comparing the current US numbers much at all. The author acknowledges that it would be a spread-out-over-time-regionally thing, but looks at aggregate country-level US data that is going to make it hard to see. The political speculation seems a bit out of left field: in the US I did hear a lot about "the winter will be tough" "it will be worse if people travel after getting fatigued with restrictions" "we can't let our guard down even though numbers are improving now". And we've heard a lot about "we need to keep an eye on new strains and such and may have to make further adjustments." Not this head-in-the-sand posture the author is describing.