There is an interesting trend across the country when it comes to cases vs deaths.
In both cases we are currently in the 3rd wave.
With respect to cases, each wave not only was higher than the previous wave, but was about double the previous wave. The peak of the first wave was about 35,000 cases in a day, second wave about 74,000 cases in a day. It is not certain that we are at the peak of the 3rd wave yet, so it could go higher, but the cases are 160k in a day right now.
With deaths, it is the opposite trend.
First wave deaths peaked at about 2750 deaths in a day. Second wave peaked at about 1800 deaths in a day. And again, it is not certain that we have hit the peak yet for the 3rd wave, especially in deaths as death peaks tend to happen 7-14 days (typically 10-12) behind peaks in cases. So the next week or so it will be a key metric to see if deaths/day stay below 1800 even with skyrocketing cases. That is indicative of two things. One, that we are better at treating the virus. And two, the human immune system has started to catch up to the virus.
For instance, the current peak in deaths (a day or 2 ago) is at about 1500 deaths, it correlates to the peak in cases about 12 days ago or so around October 30th, which was 101,000 cases. So 1500/101,000 is a death rate of about 1.48%.
That seems bad, but compared to the original peaks: cases 34,500, deaths 2700 which is a death rate of 7.83%. The current death rate being so much lower is a good/huge trend in the right direction.