Covid-19 #34 - Alpha, Delta, It’s All Greek to Me!

[Fragile Bird]

I just saw a story about the Lambda variant, saying it’s three times deadlier than Delta. It originated in Peru, which has the world’s highest mortality rate. It’s been detected in 30 countries already. The story I saw said 6 cases have already been detected in the UK. 

[Gorn]

12 hours ago, The Anti-Targ said:

64% effectiveness at preventing infections and mild symptoms of the Delta strain lends credence to the assertion that you need 95%+ vaccination coverage to achieve herd immunity. Because 95% vaccination rate really only means about 60% of the population having fully protective immunity, the other 40% can still at least transmit the infection, and some will still get very sick and possibly die.

At the previously estimated herd immunity vaccination rate of 75%, with a 64% effectiveness this means only 48% of the population is fully protected. So more than half of the population would remain at least susceptible to infection. This means non-pharmaceutical controls (masks in crowded public places, contact tracing, isolation of known infected) will be important for a long time to come.

Presumably, some percentage of population will also have some amount of immunity from a previous infection, so real-world numbers should still be a bit better than this.

[Fragile Bird]

12 hours ago, The Anti-Targ said:

64% effectiveness at preventing infections and mild symptoms of the Delta strain lends credence to the assertion that you need 95%+ vaccination coverage to achieve herd immunity. Because 95% vaccination rate really only means about 60% of the population having fully protective immunity, the other 40% can still at least transmit the infection, and some will still get very sick and possibly die.

At the previously estimated herd immunity vaccination rate of 75%, with a 64% effectiveness this means only 48% of the population is fully protected. So more than half of the population would remain at least susceptible to infection. This means non-pharmaceutical controls (masks in crowded public places, contact tracing, isolation of known infected) will be important for a long time to come.

Your post really confused me. The chart that was posted showed 56% after one dose of Pfizer, 87% after 2, 72% after one dose of Moderna and 67% after one dose of AZ. 64% is the high number after one dose of Pfizer. Or are you not referring to the chart posted by williamjm but to something else?

[Zorral]

I got scolded for being insufficiently upset and concerned about friend's family of anti-vaxxers, who flew from Utah to Colorado for family reunion -- all of whom refuse to be vaccinated too, needless to say.  Many of them are very ill now, including friend's daughter and grand-daughter.  Both are now in hospital.  They, of course, flew back from Colorado, spreading infection happily all the way, proudly sharing modes to avoid wearing a mask much of the time on the plane and in the terminals.

No.  Just.  No.  Don't care that you and your husband got vaccinated; that doesn't carry over to your family's general refusal to follow any covid safety protocol whatsoever, including refusal to get vaccinated.  No. Sympathy.  No. Concern.  They have done everything they can to make themselves and others sick, so wteff are you thinking?  You really think I want to contribute money to them? Yes, indeed, they want all their friends to send money to help them help their family with so many of them sick.

 

 

[Luzifer's right hand]

19 minutes ago, Zorral said:

I got scolded for being insufficiently upset and concerned about friend's family of anti-vaxxers, who flew from Utah to Colorado for family reunion -- all of whom refuse to be vaccinated too, needless to say.  Many of them are very ill now, including friend's daughter and grand-daughter.  Both are now in hospital.  They, of course, flew back from Colorado, spreading infection happily all the way, proudly sharing modes to avoid wearing a mask much of the time on the plane and in the terminals.

No.  Just.  No.  Don't care that you and your husband got vaccinated; that doesn't carry over to your family's general refusal to follow any covid safety protocol whatsoever, including refusal to get vaccinated.  No. Sympathy.  No. Concern.  They have done everything they can to make themselves and others sick, so wteff are you thinking?  You really think I want to contribute money to them? Yes, indeed, they want all their friends to send money to help them help their family with so many of them sick.

 

 

Are their rugged individualistic immune systems not strong enough to handle freedom? 

[Rippounet]

1 hour ago, Heartofice said:

https://unherd.com/2021/06/does-long-covid-really-exist/

The guy who debunks Covid deniers on Covidfaq wrote an interesting piece on long Covid. Essentially we still don’t know enough about it to make any solid claims about it, how common it is, whether people are actually getting it or whether it’s something else.

At the moment I agree that it is being used as a political stick by a lot of people. ‘ what about long Covid’ is usually the response once it becomes clear that Covid deaths are falling. Personally I’m less concerned about it from everything I’ve read on the subject.

This is a topic of interest to me, as someone who experienced Covid symptoms for about three months. And I would gladly put it on general stress/anxiety, but around the end of these three months I had an odd episode when I couldn't get out of bed for 24h, something which only happened to me twice in my entire life. I'm familiar with stress/anxiety and it does not do that to me.

I guess "Long Covid" can be:
1) Psychosomatic effects of stress/anxiety. Also, lack of exercise and lack of social contact (because of the lockdowns).
2) An actual "long Covid," i.e. your immune system taking longer to eliminate the disease than average for some reason.
The doctor I saw initially said that 6 to 8 weeks was absolutely not uncommon, and on the "Long Covid" group that I briefly belonged to, three months was in fact said to be the "average" length for "Long Covid."
3) Sequelae of Covid, especially for people who were hospitalized and required breathing assistance.

And I think one should bear in mind that regardless of the discussion about 1) and 2), the numbers for 3) are well above 20%. Another way to put it is that it's pretty uncontroversial that people hospitalized because of Covid have about a 1 in 4 chance of developing a "Post-Covid" condition (see for instance: https://s3.amazonaws.com/media2.fairhealth.org/whitepaper/asset/A Detailed Study of Patients with Long-Haul COVID--An Analysis of Private Healthcare Claims--A FAIR Health White Paper.pdf ).
I think it's pretty intuitive: generally speaking any disease serious enough to send you to a hospital is likely to leave your body with consequences that will take time to fully heal.

Anyway, I understand this is all political, but the reality remains that many hundreds of people (possibly millions worldwide) suffer from some form of post-Covid condition. And while it's tempting to dismiss this as unimportant or not worrying because the overall percentages (of populations) are small, that's still on top of people dying.
Given the fact that even vaccination does not fully protect from some variants (numbers seem to be between 65% to 90%, yes?), and given the fact that most of the world is still unvaccinated, "Long Covid" means the pandemic will remain a serious issue for the foreseeable future, regardless of whether we feel concerned.

[Luzifer's right hand]

We have a cluster caused by a parliamentary investigation committee. Because of an anti-vax/anti-mask right wing member of our parliament and because people believe acrylic glass sheets offer decent protection. At least the other infected had one shot. The same people that pretend that the pandemic is over and we should all forgive the anti-measure idiots for making everything so difficult. Screw reconciliation those are the same people that make fighting climate change impossible. We are not on the same side and have not been for a long time imho. 

[Padraig]

 

17 hours ago, williamjm said:

I saw some data reported from Canada today which seems more in line with the UK figures:

Interesting.  I should try to find out the sample size in the Israeli study.  On face value, the UK and Canadian studies should be larger (but not sure).

5 hours ago, L'oiseau français said:

I just saw a story about the Lambda variant, saying it’s three times deadlier than Delta. It originated in Peru, which has the world’s highest mortality rate. It’s been detected in 30 countries already.

In the Curevac study, lambda generated 20% of cases (IIRC).  I knew we'd be hearing more about it then!  But I'm wary of it being 3 times deadlier than Delta.  Peru has a very high mortality rate but is that because they are being more honest than other countries?  Or because their hospital system broke down?  I doubt Delta was in Peru at the time Lamda was really bad, so its difficult to compare.

In fact, I don't think people are sure that Delta is deadlier than Alpha yet?  And that hit wealthier countries.

And Anti-Targ was using the Israeli numbers presumably.

As for long COVID.  I know the economic argument regarding removing restrictions in the UK.  The mask one is strange to me though, as there is no economic justification for that.  Its just convenience for people, which is hardly a good justification given the negative side of COVID (e.g  long COVID, more mutations).  Obviously long COVID isn't deaths, so that is good, but not knowing enough about it is not a good reason to ignore it.  It will be interesting to see how many people continue to use them in crowded places.

[williamjm]

1 hour ago, Padraig said:

In fact, I don't think people are sure that Delta is deadlier than Alpha yet?  And that hit wealthier countries.

In the UK the government scientists think that Delta may lead to a higher risk of hospitalisation but the say have 'low confidence' in that conclusion at the moment so I think more data needs to be gathered. They didn't specifically comment on the risk of deaths but it's probably inevitable that an increase in risk of hospitalisation has some impact on deaths.

[The Anti-Targ]

12 hours ago, Gorn said:

Presumably, some percentage of population will also have some amount of immunity from a previous infection, so real-world numbers should still be a bit better than this.

Indeed, perhaps the 95+% vaccinated figure is only really applicable in countries where there has been essentially no community spread, like Aus and NZ. Since we have a negligible percent of the population with post infection immunity we will be entirely reliant on vaccine uptake to generate any kind of population immunity. So we will need a high proportion of people to be vaccinated before we start opening the country to non-quarantine arrivals from other countries.

In countries where there are 5-10% of the population confirmed to have been infected, and likely at least double that for all people who have been infected, the effective immunity rate is the vaccination % + unvaccinated recovered cases. So if you get to 60% vaccinated, there is a good chance that you have at least 70% with some immunity, noting there will be some cross over of people previously infected who have been vaccinated.

12 hours ago, L'oiseau français said:

Your post really confused me. The chart that was posted showed 56% after one dose of Pfizer, 87% after 2, 72% after one dose of Moderna and 67% after one dose of AZ. 64% is the high number after one dose of Pfizer. Or are you not referring to the chart posted by williamjm but to something else?

I'm referring the the article about Israel posted by Padraig. Probably should have said I was talking about that.

In other news, the Janssen one shot vaccine has now been approved here. So we have Pfizer + Janssen now.

A headline I read about Lambda was it was much more infectious, it didn't say more deadly. Although more infectious does indirectly mean more deadly. Admittedly it was only the headline I read, so the article might have said it is both, but given the tendency to put the most sensational stuff in headlines it would be curious for an article to say it is more deadly but for the headline not to say it.

[Wall Flower]

My city (Canberra) has moved to mandated mask-wearing for the first time due to the Delta outbreak in Sydney. Went to the hairdresser today and everything was very strict - no entry without a mask, use the check-in app and hand sanitiser. So I was feeling reassured until I started chatting with the cutter about masks. Her comment " I think it's stupid. It's not as if the virus is airborne, I mean you practically have to stick your tongue down someone's throat to get it".  Dead silence in the salon until someone piped up to point out it was in fact airborne and highly contagious, particularly the Delta strain.  Apparently, she just avoids the news and prefers not to know anything even though she is someone with chronic health issues and two young children. 

I admit I was pretty shocked about that level of ignorance after more than a year of the pandemic. Maybe, we've just been too privileged in Canberra where we haven't had a case of community infection for almost a year.

[Luzifer's right hand]

First shots are taking a real nosedive around here and they are trying pop-up and walk in vaccinations now. 

Took only two months from "lets stretch the interval between shots" to "not enough people want the vaccine" here.

[DireWolfSpirit]

Japan's 7 day average for Daily New cases is turning up right before the World is set to descend on the country for the Tokyo games.

Is this a slow moving trainwreck?

[Luzifer's right hand]

22 minutes ago, DireWolfSpirit said:

Japan's 7 day average for Daily New cases is turning up right before the World is set to descend on the country for the Tokyo games.

Is this a slow moving trainwreck?

Well it could be worse.

The Olympics could be in a dictatorship that pretends Covid-19 is no problem. 

[Maithanet]

Lots of my wife's family have been vaccine hesitant, and we're working on convincing them (made some progress even).  One thing that is interesting is that across the board they all prefer the J&J shot rather than either of the RNA options.  It's a combination of being a name brand, a more proven technique, and just one shot.  Really makes me think that the fairly ridiculous pause on J&J shots really hurt the overall US vaccine rollout. 

[Zorral]

How can the ICU nurses deal with these people, who are also their neighbors?

https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2021/07/06/appalachian-covid-deniers-nurses-virginia/

Quote

 

. . . . The pandemic had hit late but hard in the Appalachian highlands — the mountainous region that includes Southwest Virginia and Northeast Tennessee — and over the winter many of its victims had ended up on ventilators tended by Boucher and her fellow nurses at Johnston Memorial Hospital.

They were enduring the traumas known to ICU workers across the world: days filled with death, nights ruined by dreams in which they found themselves at infected patients’ bedsides without masks. But they were also enduring a trauma that many doctors and nurses elsewhere were not: the suspicion and derision of those they risked their lives to protect.

Conspiracy theories about the pandemic and lies recited on social media — or at White House news conferences — had penetrated deep into their community. When refrigerated trailers were brought in to relieve local hospitals’ overflowing morgues, people said they were stage props. Agitated and unmasked relatives stood outside the ICU insisting that their intubated relatives only had the flu. Many believed the doctors and nurses hailed elsewhere for their sacrifices were conspiring to make money by falsifying covid-19 diagnoses.

Boucher and her colleagues were pained by those attacks — and infuriated by them. Unlike their exhaustion, that anger rarely showed on their faces, but it was often there: as they scrolled Facebook to see local ministers saying God was greater than any virus, or stood in line with unmasked grocery shoppers who joked loudly about the covid hoax. . . . 

 

 

[Fragile Bird]

The reports that I found very sad were the ones where relatives of deceased deniers demanded that autopsies be performed on the bodies of their loved ones, to determine a cause of death because Covid-19 is a hoax.

[Zorral]

Delta Variant now the dominant strain of covid in the USA!  Yay USA!  We did it! Really Fast 'n Furious!  Watch us deny Biden's election, climate catastrophe, masks and covid's existence, all at the same time! We win! We win!  We win!  And we're wide open, no regs, tracing, testing, distancing or anything else!  So much winning, winning, winning, we never stop winning!

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/07/07/cdc-data-shows-delta-is-now-the-dominant-covid-variant-in-the-us.html

That Hometown Heroes Parade that de Blasio is so proud of, that he and Cuomo both say marks the end of pandemic and celebration that NY is back?

Quote

 

....The union that represents FDNY firefighters has joined the boycott of Mayor de Blasio’s Hometown Heroes ticker tape parade honoring COVID frontline workers.

The Uniformed Firefighters Association sent the message to members Tuesday saying it’s too soon celebrate a crisis that has not yet passed....

 

https://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/ny-fdny-union-covid-ticker-tape-parade-boycott-20210707-4fppgceuq5cl7bic3lfi6xzfby-story.html

Some of us have some sense. But somehow we're always overruled -- by IDIOTS!

[Padraig]

4 hours ago, Maithanet said:

Lots of my wife's family have been vaccine hesitant, and we're working on convincing them (made some progress even).  One thing that is interesting is that across the board they all prefer the J&J shot rather than either of the RNA options.  It's a combination of being a name brand, a more proven technique, and just one shot.  Really makes me think that the fairly ridiculous pause on J&J shots really hurt the overall US vaccine rollout. 

I wonder will Novavax help in the US?  It has used a very proven technique.  But Novavax certainly isn't a brand name.  And it wouldn't be approved for a couple more months.  But if it is more acceptable, better late than never!

Otherwise, only some Central/Eastern European countries are not seeing growth in COVID now in Europe.  Its like the original COVID wave, which hit Western Europe hard (linked to increased mobility here).   Just a matter of time before everything turns red in the East too.  Russia is already bad.

[Clueless Northman]

Thinking about it, it might still not be the worst outcome that Delta hits now N. America and Europe. Considering most restrictions are and will be lifted, and that we haven't had many viruses circulating, covid excepted, for the last 18 months, one can expect next flu season to be quite brutal. If the hospitals aren't overflowed by covid and flu patients at the same time, we can count ourselves lucky. Better have the covid wave recede when flu arrives.