Yahoo News shares an encouraging report from former Newsweek correspondent Andrew Romano: Until very recently, nationwide data about how many COVID-19 patients are currently receiving treatment in hospitals was hard to come by. It's still incomplete and inconsistent. But on April 7, researchers at the University of Minnesota launched the U.S. COVID-19 Hospitalization Tracking Project, which is just what it sounds like: the first effort to capture, track, visualize and compare daily data on the number of COVID-19 hospitalizations from the 37 state departments of health that are reporting this information (so far).

The reason this information is so valuable is simple. Because hospitalization typically occurs a week or so after infection, it's less of a lagging indicator than the death count (which trails by two to two and a half weeks) and more directly tied to the trajectory of the epidemic than the testing-dependent case count. It's also a measure of the most pressing public health concern of all: how close we are to exceeding the capacity of our hospital system, which can make COVID-19 much deadlier than it would otherwise be.

Which brings us to New York and California. Chart each state's hospitalization data over the last seven days or so, and two different narratives emerge. Both are encouraging...

On Wednesday, New York's daily death count hit an all-time high: 799. But that reflects infections from weeks ago, before the state's lockdown started. The number of people testing positive stayed relatively flat. Meanwhile, there were fewer new hospitalizations — just 200 — than on any day since March 18. It wasn't a blip. The amount of new daily hospitalizations has been declining since last Thursday: from 1,427 on April 2 to 1,095 on April 3 to 656 on April 6 to 200 on April 8. (There are some questions about inconsistencies between the data from New York state and New York City, but the trend line is the same.) Previously, the total current number of coronavirus patients in New York hospitals had been increasing by at least 20 percent a day for weeks. Now the overall number of hospitalizations is barely increasing at all...

The good news in New York is that the state might be peaking now. The good news in California is that the state might not peak for a long time — but its path to that peak will be so incremental, its curve so flat, that coronavirus patients will never come close to overwhelming the hospital system.
The numbers do look encouraging. (Click on the "Currently Hospitalized" rectangle and then select each state's two-letter abbreviation from the dropdown menu.) In fact, the San Francisco Bay Area recorded its fourth day of declining ICU patients on Saturday. "Home-sheltering efforts may well be paying off, at least according to the number of hospitalizations and patients in ICU," reports the Bay Area Newsgroup.

And SFGate noted Friday that the statewide hospitalization figures "have also been relatively flat in recent days, with Governor Gavin Newsom expressing guarded optimism after the number of individuals in intensive care units decreased Thursday."

A medical device manufacturer has threatened to sue a group of volunteers in Italy that 3D printed a valve used for life-saving coronavirus treatments. From a report: The valve typically costs about $11,000 from the medical device manufacturer, but the volunteers were able to print replicas for about $1. A hospital in Italy was in need of the valves after running out while treating patients for COVID-19. The hospital's usual supplier said they could not make the valves in time to treat the patients. That launched a search for a way to 3D print a replica part, and Cristian Fracassi and Alessandro Ramaioli, who work at Italian startup Isinnova, offered their company's printer for the job. However, when the pair asked the manufacturer of the valves for blueprints they could use to print replicas, the company declined and threatened to sue for patent infringement. Fracassi and Ramaioli moved ahead anyway by measuring the valves and 3D printing three different versions of them.

Uber's autonomous test vehicles were involved in 37 crashes in the 18 months before a fatal March 2018 self-driving car accident, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) said on Tuesday. Reuters reports: The board said between September 2016 and March 2018, there were 37 crashes of Uber vehicles in autonomous mode at the time, including 33 that involved another vehicle striking test vehicles. In one incident, the test vehicle struck a bent bicycle lane bollard that partially occupied the test vehicle's lane of travel. In another incident, the operator took control to avoid a rapidly approaching oncoming vehicle that entered its lane of travel. The vehicle operator steered away and struck a parked car. The NTSB will hold a probable cause hearing on the crash Nov. 19. A spokeswoman for Uber's self-driving car division said the company has "adopted critical program improvements to further prioritize safety. We deeply value the thoroughness of the NTSB's investigation into the crash and look forward to reviewing their recommendations."

Bloomberg is also reporting that Uber's self-driving test car wasn't programmed to recognize and react to jawalkers. The report said "the system design did not include a consideration for jaywalking pedestrians." [Elaine Herzberg, the 49-year-old pedestrian that was struck by one of Uber's self-driving cars] was crossing the road outside of a crosswalk.

Uber's autonomous test vehicles were involved in 37 crashes in the 18 months before a fatal March 2018 self-driving car accident, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) said on Tuesday. Reuters reports: The board said between September 2016 and March 2018, there were 37 crashes of Uber vehicles in autonomous mode at the time, including 33 that involved another vehicle striking test vehicles. In one incident, the test vehicle struck a bent bicycle lane bollard that partially occupied the test vehicle's lane of travel. In another incident, the operator took control to avoid a rapidly approaching oncoming vehicle that entered its lane of travel. The vehicle operator steered away and struck a parked car. The NTSB will hold a probable cause hearing on the crash Nov. 19. A spokeswoman for Uber's self-driving car division said the company has "adopted critical program improvements to further prioritize safety. We deeply value the thoroughness of the NTSB's investigation into the crash and look forward to reviewing their recommendations."

Bloomberg is also reporting that Uber's self-driving test car wasn't programmed to recognize and react to jawalkers. The report said "the system design did not include a consideration for jaywalking pedestrians." [Elaine Herzberg, the 49-year-old pedestrian that was struck by one of Uber's self-driving cars] was crossing the road outside of a crosswalk.