he bustling heart of New York City has become eerily quiet. In Manhattan south of Central Park, with its office towers, restaurants and stores empty of the workers who normally pour in from throughout the region, the number of people out and about Friday was off 87% compared to the same day in the first week of March, before the coronavirus pandemic took off in the U.S.
In the U.S., Teralytics says it acquires anonymized data on tens of millions of cellphone users’ movements from a single major telecom provider, whose name it won’t reveal. It didn’t make estimates for counties where it has data for less than 5% of the population. In San Francisco and Silicon Valley, where tech giants were the first large U.S. companies to send workers home, travel has been down 50% to 65% most days since March 17, after many northern California counties issued shelter in place orders.
But inconsistent messaging on social distancing and lack of policing by local authorities create conditions where the disease can spread. “There’s still churches that are holding meetings, there are still stores that are open,” says Alain Labrique, an epidemiologist and director of an