Heems is an Indian-American rapper who was once apart of famed yet semi-controversial rap group Das Racist, which formed in Brooklyn, New York before disbanding circa 2012. Nonetheless Heems has continued his journey as an artist, going on to form Swet Shop Boys alongside Riz Ahmed. Last year, he actually came out as queer.

Today, Heems is in the news for an entirely different reason, but it’s one we’ve grown all too familiar with in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. Heems’ father has passed away after suffering from the Coronavirus, and the rapper opened up about it to CNN.

Heems’ father was only 67 when he passed away, he had been living at a Long Island nursing home when the pandemic broke out, and caught the virus. This is apparently despite the fact that Heems’ had thought that his father was tested for COVID-19– buthe hadn’t been tested due to a lack of nasal swabs, as it turns out. “Why do I have to grieve with the notion of a supply chain?” he asks. We’ve been seeing many stories about the lack of testing readily available for those who need it.

Heems is still grateful for all the healthcare workers out there on the frontlines, adding, “I don’t operate from a place of hate or anger…” his voice trailed off, “but they never got swabs?”

“He was a prime candidate for something like this. But still that doesn’t ease my grief,” Heems continued later. “He seemingly went in his sleep peacefully. That is the narrative, at least, that I hope for.”

We’re sending our condolences to Heems’ and his family during this difficult time, and we’re hoping everyone is staying safe and staying home.

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Two autopsy results reveal deaths that resulted from the coronavirus during early to mid February, three weeks before the first known U.S. death was recorded from the deadly virus. These two deaths occurred February 6 and 17 in Northern California’s Santa Clara County. Previously, the first known death from the coronavirus was recorded on February 29th, in Kirkland, Washington, a major hotspot in the U.S. outbreak of COVID-19.

These findings help experts to know exactly how early this virus was actually spreading. Dr. Sara Cody, the county’s chief medical officer, states to New York Times the two California residents who died from COVID-19 didn’t have any known travel to China, or anywhere else they could possibly have been exposed to the virus. This lead them to believe the two have caught the virus through the community transmission.

Dr. Ashish K. Jha, director of the Harvard Global Health Institute, tells CNN, “Somebody who died on February 6, they probably contracted that virus early to mid-January. It takes at least two to three weeks from the time you contract the virus and you die from it. If they did not contract coronavirus through travel abroad, that also is significant. That means there was community spread happening in California as early as mid-January, if not earlier than that,” Jha said. He emphasized the importance of this new finding.

Jha stated it’s important for us to now re-trace our steps as far as back as January and early December, to find out when exactly the virus began to infect American soil.

At the time of these deaths, virus testing was limited to those who had traveled and those with certain symptoms. Both people died in their homes, and had their tissues tested for Coronavirus, as did another who died in early March (and also tested positive). 

This news essentially means that the Coronavirus U.S. numbers may be much higher than we think.

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The United States is on its way to amassing more cases of coronavirus than either China or Italy in total , as the number of confirmed cases and deaths continues to rise across America. Just yesterday (March 25th), the World Health Organization warned that the U.S. could become the new centre of disease. As of today (March 26th), according to Worldometer, the U.S. is only 428 infections behind China’s overall total: China has reported a total of 81,285 infections throughout its outbreak, while the US has 80,857. Among China’s 81,285 cases, 74,051 people have recovered, while 3,287 have died. There are only 3,947 active cases in China at the moment, a starkly low number compared to the U.S.’s 77,830 active cases. In the U.S., only 1,864 patients have recovered, and 1,163 have died.

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Italy, which was hit hardest by the pandemic, has recently begun to stabilize. Italy has had a total of 80,589 cases at the time of writing, only 35 more than the U.S. The European country, however, has seen the number of new cases decline or remain flat for several days. They currently have 62,013 active cases, with 10,361 recovered and 8,215 dead.

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A major key difference between these countries’ approaches is that China and Italy have imposed nationwide lockdowns in order to “flatten the curve.” However, Trump has yet to invoke such a measure throughout the U.S., instead making highly unlikely promises about reopening businesses and relaxing quarantine practices around Easter (April 12th). Lockdowns could take two to six weeks to take noticeable effect, so if drastic measures aren’t taken soon, the U.S. will be on course to surpass China and Italy’s numbers of cases and deaths.