The New Normal in IT

CHAPTER 8Updated Research and CIO Priorities

You don't have to be a genius or a visionary or even a college graduate to be successful. You just need a framework and a dream.

—MICHAEL DELL¹

Updated Research

Infections, Deaths, and Vaccines

As I end this book, I return to the Johns Hopkins University Covid-19 Tracker for an update on where the world sits with regard to the Covid-19 pandemic, including updated cases, the state of variants including Delta, and the number of vaccines administered. As of this writing, Johns Hopkins University has updated their Covid-19 Tracker to include the following key data points as of November 4, 2021:

• 248,243,646 Covid-19 infections worldwide
• 46,253,681 Covid-19 infections in the United States
• 5,024,725 deaths related to Covid-19 worldwide
• 750,431 Covid-19 deaths in the United States
• 7,141,675,382 total vaccine doses administered worldwide²

Many countries around the globe are attempting to flatten the curve or reduce the number of new cases from one day to the next in an effort to show progress against the deadly and infectious disease.³ Johns Hopkins University reports the following seven-day moving average progress and impediment of some recent countries of interest:

• United States – the seven-day moving average of new cases is up above 150,000 cases per day and approaching the peak of 250,000 new cases per day hit in January 2021.
• Iran – the seven-day moving average of new cases rose above 40,000, well exceeding the last peak of ...