Covid-19 #18: Everything Old is New Again!

[The Anti-Targ]

1 hour ago, Impmk2 said:

There's been a bit of research in the last couple years showing the efficacy of the flu vaccine can drop pretty quickly (depending upon the strain), making it offer significantly less protection after just a few months. Holding off and getting it a little later, right before peak season, may not a bad idea.

There is also the recent report of 4 Koreans dying after receiving this year's 'flu shot. Not sure if thje deaths have been confirmed to be related to the vaccine or not. I lost track of the news story after seeing the initial report. And since we are in summer time mode 'flu shots are not on anyone's mind here, esp since no one is heading north for a summer holiday in the wintery parts of the world.

[Fragile Bird]

51 minutes ago, Chataya de Fleury said:

I laughed at that, but it was one of those faint, halfhearted, trying to be brave laughs.

I’m seriously contemplating a social media break until the election is over, and then after that maybe spring.

I would be very sad...

[mashiara]

9 hours ago, Luzifer's right hand said:

Things are worse number wise here in Austria but our goverment is still trying to avoid a new lockdown. They stopped trying to trace infections in schools because...well children can't spread it if you don't test and quarantine them I guess.

This. So much! Greece's cases have been rising and rising and there is talk of a new lockdown coming up in the next two weeks, but schools? Schools will remain open, no doubt about it.

There is no testing for children or teachers, even when there's a confirmed case at a school. Not unless people are willing to pay the 100euro price to test privately. If you don't test, if you don't trace contacts, then everything is peachy at schools and the virus "clearly" doesn't get passed around in crowded classrooms. I teach 2nd grade this year. The little ones are struggling with the masks and at any given time half of them are wearing them wrong, or touching them, or taking it off. It's been a fun two months.

Chataya, regarding flu shots. Up until last year anyone who wanted a flu shot could get one, pay for it out of pocket or have their doctor prescribe it. This year, while they initially  emphasized the need for everyone, including kids, to get a flu shot, then they realized they just don't have enough...so they changed the rules and you can only get one with a valid doctor prescription AND you have to have one of various serious medical conditions to qualify for one, not everyone is entitled to it. Dalthor and his heart condition qualify, his doctor also put me down as having asthma so I could have one -but I don't want the boys' pediatrician to put down some false medical condition that's gonna be on their permanent health record for ever just so they get vaccinated this year, so the boys dont get one.

[JoannaL]

13 hours ago, Clueless Northman said:

Indeed. The only reason why kids are still in schools is because otherwise the slaves wouldn't be able to go to work but would have to stay home - and kids are also seriously limiting productivity if you work from home. Locking down most of the society but still telling people it's fine to work and letting kids go to schools so that they can bring back the virus home is the definitive proof you're dealing with a government that cares way more about "teh economuh" than about the health and well-being of the people.

No, I do not believe that to be true at least not in Germany. Otherwise you could just let the schools for the smaller children open (lets say up to 10 years) and close for the others which can fend for themselves at home.

There were quite a lot of studies about superspreading events and it is not schools (its weddings, partys, events, pubs, business meetings, church services and such).

Does that  mean that schools are totally safe? No certainly not, so you have to close them as well in a full lockdown.

But if you do a lockdown "lite" you have to set priorities. What is important and what isnt. In the first lockdown the schools stayed closed even if restaurants and such could open again. So what is more important : that people can go out and have fun (and spend money for the economy) or that children can get an education and a stable and mosty"normal" daily life. There were quite a few studies this summer here in Germany on the bad effects the lockdown had on the development and emotional  well being of children and teenagers (apart from the educational disaster). this is serious: for children there are consequences of not having a normal school day and they are suffering from this.

What can you do to have a mostly safe school environment - apart form masks and opening windows and such? mostly testing. I can not speak for other countries but in Germany there is quite extensive testing. If a child is positive the whole class is quarantined (for two weeks), sometimes even more parts of a school have to go into quarantine (e.g. in high school if a teacher is positiv who teaches many different classes). Some of the German states  offer also free testing for teachers once a week. So there is a lot done to keep schools open in the interest of our children.

If our lockdown lite will not work out, then it may be necessary to close shops and schools again as well, but there are many reasons to fight to avoid this.

 

 

[Zorral]

 

[RhaenysBee]

Woke up to a sore throat and body aches and later developed a headache. Didn’t get out of bed all day. I took a throat soother and a paracetamol sachet around noon. Sore throat is mostly gone, body aches better, headache is still going strong. No fever, no cough, need to get tested tomorrow because I’m supposed to start a new damn job on Monday. 
 

the joke is, the system’s so overwhelmed it’ll likely be Monday when I can get private testing and Wednesdayish by the time the result comes in. Still, I’ll try to get a test tomorrow and results on Saturday. Love to spend money in hurrying things...

[Zorral]

No surprises here, it was totally, thoroughly, specifically itemized and predicted all through the late spring and summer this is what it would be with bars, gyms, religious gatherings, weddings, indoor dining, colleges and universities reopening physically.  Just sayin' here: it would make a lot more sense to have libraries open at 25% capacity, staggered visits -- and being able to keep the online checkout and checkin going, while providing at least a half hour a day by sign up the essential wifi service that poor and rural citizens so depended on.  But then, as German said, "You closed the schools in the fall in favor going to the beach this summer."

I wish all those frackin' Sturgis assholes would be made to the dig the graves of the people they killed.  And that includes the bar owners and mayor etc. of Sturgis, and particularly the governor of South Dakota.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/coronavirus-surge-new-restrictions/2020/10/28/b88c0dd2-1939-11eb-aeec-b93bcc29a01b_story.html

Quote

 

A federal government briefing document circulated to top officials and obtained by The Washington Post rates the 3,141 counties in the country by levels of “concern” and suggests it would be theoretically possible to travel from the Canada border all the way to northern Mississippi without exiting a “sustained hotspot” county.

Another forecast, updated Oct. 22 by the University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation, projected that by Nov. 11, the country would once again surpass 1,000 deaths a day from covid-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus. That same projection said the country would exceed 2,000 daily deaths Dec. 28. Those numbers are slightly less grim than the models projected in September, but they still envision close to 400,000 cumulative deaths from the virus by Feb. 1.

 

 

[Zorral]

MOBODY said BLAME IT ALL ON STURGISE.   I know you're sick, but sheesh get over your petty needling.

But they and their attitudes deserve to dig the goddamn graves and work as slaves for the rest of their lives to the medical people who are having to KILL themselves for what they and their behaviors and attitudes have contributed so significantly.  And a whole buncha others like those assholes who think having a wedding in enclosed building of 10,000 guests should be.  There are so many who have earned this.

[Kalbear]

On average the R is 1.1. But in practice it happens with a few people spreading it to a ton of others. Plus since there aren't many precautions it doesn't take much for a superspreader event in an area like the Dakota to be directly responsible for the next few months. 

[Kalbear]

17 minutes ago, Chataya de Fleury said:

There is no such place as “the Dakota”. 

There is North Dakota and South Dakota. I realize I am peevish because I’m about to be the first person ever to die of a sinus infection, so if I do, please remember these states are completely separate and distinct.

****
While the R0 is an average of around 1, the dispersion metric, k, is also important.

They aren't as far as the pandemic is concerned or how people traveled to Sturgis and where they came from. 

[rotting sea cow]

15 hours ago, mashiara said:

There is no testing for children or teachers, even when there's a confirmed case at a school. Not unless people are willing to pay the 100euro price to test privately. If you don't test, if you don't trace contacts, then everything is peachy at schools and the virus "clearly" doesn't get passed around in crowded classrooms. I teach 2nd grade this year. The little ones are struggling with the masks and at any given time half of them are wearing them wrong, or touching them, or taking it off. It's been a fun two months.

Really guys, stop fretting too much about the kids. Specially those in the first classes. For some goddammed reason, children are bad spreaders of the disease (I suppose they do not generate much aerosols). They also do not seem to get it at the same rates as adults and when they get it they tend to get it mild. Adolescents are another story.

The main driver of the pandemic are young adults.

ETA:

 

COVID-19 in children and young people

 

https://science.sciencemag.org/content/370/6514/286

 

 

[Filippa Eilhart]

22 hours ago, Chataya de Fleury said:

@RhaenysBee - whut, y’all don’t have flu shots yet??? My kid and I got ours in late August, as usual.

flu season here is Jan-March, the recommendation is you get a flu shot late October- beginning of December.

[Relic]

Im in the Czech Republic, and its curfew time. Not allowed to be outside. They had 6 months to prepare for this OBVIOUS surge in the fall, and instead they did...nothing. And now they tell us we can't go outside after 8:59. Yeah...things are looking real good. 

[Clueless Northman]

1 hour ago, Killjoybear said:

On average the R is 1.1.

Was. If cases go up, then the R has gone up as well. Specially since cold weather is coming. Look to Europe to see the kind of trend parts of the US will go through way too soon.

 

16 minutes ago, Relic said:

They had 6 months to prepare for this OBVIOUS surge in the fall, and instead they did...nothing.

Not just the Czech government. I'm not sure if there is any European Government who actually bothered to plan and then implemented said plan when shit hit the fan. Well, Sweden didn't bother obviously, but looks like all the others did the same, and look surprised that things go bad, even though the growth is way slower than in March - it's way too fast of course, but doubling time is quite higher than for the 1st wave.

[Fragile Bird]

One American died every 90 seconds from the coronavirus in the US yesterday. 

[Zorral]

I got flu and pneumonia shots early in October -- earlier than I would normally.

Partner got the shots today.

 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

44 minutes ago, Fragile Bird said:

One American died every 90 seconds from the coronavirus in the US yesterday. 

We're number one!!!

[Zorral]

Thank you Sturgis, thank you rumptubtup for your grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr8 rallies without masks, thank you kids who just have to party and blow in each others' faces all the time, thank you religious selfish snowflakes who insist the rules and laws of where you live don't apply to YOU, thank you, thank you, thank one and all for making this possible, and making the numbers even higher tomorrow!

[Week]

Time to start stocking up on TP and beans. It's gonna be a winter.

[Fragile Bird]

I don’t understand the timing difference between Johns Hopkins and Worldometer. Johns Hopkins says the US had 85,000 cases today and Worldometer says there were 91,000.

eta: JH reporting 87,164, I gather