COVID 46 - Please disperse, nothing to see here!

[Zorral]

3 hours ago, Padraig said:

But if I go back to vulnerability, for vulnerable people, the hospitalisation rate doesn't tell you a lot.  For those people, you need to know how prevalent the disease is.  The % of positive tests is probably the best metric to go with, but I agree that the lack of data isn't great for them.  You end up having to be more careful than you need to be.

It is so frustrating not knowing how prevalent covid is in my general vicinity, not to mention the city. It makes assessing risk impossible.  Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

[DireWolfSpirit]

On 4/27/2022 at 11:05 AM, Chataya de Fleury said:

Pisses me off that he didn’t take the test straightaway. 

I have the same frustrating experience with a few foolish workmates and 1 supervisor.

All of them most certainly have long covid at this point. 

3 with chronic coughs all winter. 1 recently had heart attack and surgery due to hardening of the arteries after his covid experience, the others missing weeks of work. All claiming its just the flu and they know they haven't Covid. 

And of course the idiot supervisor not doing anything about sending sick people home because he's a covid denier as well.

This shit I gotta put up with being around these clowns has had me half tourrets mumbling to the mirrors. 

The heart attack to the one denier has been the ultimate 'I told you so" moment, though I haven't said a word because I still believe they all remain willfully in denial. You cannot help these people.

[Zorral]

South Africa says it may be entering fifth COVID wave

https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/south-africa-may-be-entering-fifth-covid-wave-health-minister-2022-04-29/

Quote

 

Country had expected another COVID wave in May or June
Resurgence seems to be driven by Omicron sub-variants
No sign sub-variants cause much more severe disease
No dramatic rise in ICU admissions, deaths so far

JOHANNESBURG, April 29 (Reuters) - South Africa may be entering a fifth COVID wave earlier than expected after a sustained rise in infections over the past 14 days that seems to be driven by the BA.4 and BA.5 Omicron sub-variants, health officials and scientists said on Friday.

The country that has recorded the most coronavirus cases and deaths on the African continent only exited a fourth wave around January and had predicted a fifth wave could start in May or June, early in the southern hemisphere winter

 

 

[Impmk2]

21 hours ago, Zorral said:

South Africa says it may be entering fifth COVID wave

https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/south-africa-may-be-entering-fifth-covid-wave-health-minister-2022-04-29/

 

The more positive note on a vaccine level:

Omicron is less severe than Delta, but also doesn't generate as good a neutralising antibody response. However vaccination plus Omicron infection puts you in a substantially better place (both as far as magnitude and as well as durability of antibody response) than immunity derived from infection alone. The population level immunity is likely to be much higher in places with a good vaccination rate who have have had substantial BA.1 / BA.2 waves, than in South Africa.

Hopefully it's enough to reduce any potential winter BA4 / BA5 waves.

[Zorral]

(CNN)The US should prepare for a possible summer surge of Covid-19 cases across Southern states, former White House Coronavirus Response Task Force coordinator Dr. Deborah Birx told CBS on Sunday morning.

Quote

 

It's now predictable that the South will see surges in the summer and Northern states will see surges in the winter -- especially around the holidays, Birx said.

Birx said she closely follows data out of South Africa, which has recently seen a rise in new Covid-19 cases.

"Each of these surges are about four to six months apart. That tells me that natural immunity wanes enough in the general population after four to six months -- that a significant surge is going to occur again," Birx told "Face the Nation."

 

https://www.cnn.com/2022/05/01/health/covid-southern-summer-surge-prediction/index.html

~~~~~~~~~~~

Edited to ad I'm so pleased to learn our usual pharmacy, 3 blocks from where we live, is part of the federal 'test to treat' program.  If either of us test positive, we call our doctor, and he can call in the prescription to our pharmacy.  I don't know why it took me so long to figure this out.  Partly, I suppose, it being this time of the year, one of the most busy in the calendar.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Moderna expects ‘large amounts’ of omicron booster available by fall

https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/3473235-moderna-expects-large-amounts-of-omicron-booster-available-by-fall/

Quote

 

Moderna’s Chief Medical Officer Paul Burton said on Sunday that his company was preparing to provide large amounts of its vaccine booster against omicron and other COVID-19 variants this fall. 

“We’re confident by the fall of this year we should have large amounts of that new booster vaccine that will protect against Omicron and other variants,” Burton said in an interview on CBS’s “Face the Nation.”

Last month, Moderna announced that its new bivalent COVID-19 booster shot was more effective against all variants than the company’s currently available coronavirus vaccine. ....

 

 

 

[Zorral]

So, if it is the South in summer and the Northeast in winter that suffers the waves of covid infection -- why is the Northeast surging right now, hmmmmm?

In the meantime, for example, NY - CBS News has three stories posted in a row this morning, informing us that counties in NY state and NYC account for something like 37 of the 54 US counties that are currently US covid hotspots.  At the top of the news is NYC threat of covid infection has now officially rated as "medium".  Right under that is the story that informs us as of Saturday vaccination mandate to attend a theater will be dropped.

Edited to add: and now there are stories in the local news that the mayor is considering re-instating some of the covid mandates such as masking in stores, putting limits on indoor dining, and so on (though most of us are still doing that).  This when he just had a big presser to crow about dropping the vaccination mandate to attend theaters.  

Really, what is the average person supposed to think about covid and safety these days?

Well, I know what I think, which is what I have been thinking right along: wear my mask, try to distance as much as possible, don't go to theaters except in a very small way where all the safety measures are in place, and get every new vax jab that comes along.

 

 

[DireWolfSpirit]

^^^^Probably because the southern red states willfully interfere with true covid reporting from their entities.

[Zorral]

1 hour ago, DireWolfSpirit said:

^^^^Probably because the southern red states willfully interfere with true covid reporting from their entities.

But NY isn't either.  The testing dashboard has been taken down, for instance.

[VigoTheCarpathian]

Our kids had some kind of spring crud last week that the whole family got in one shape or another, all tested (all negatives) at various times through Thursday to make sure on sending them to school .  Sunday morning, doing some deep breath meditation, I kept getting a hitch in my chest and coughing, and tested again on a whim.  Positive, 2 tests in a row. The rest of the family is still negative. 
 

Now quarantining in my home office til Thursday, wearing a mask when I have to step out for anything, hand washing, distancing, all the things. Symptoms are mild, I’m just tired and frustrated at this point in the game…I was volunteering in the hospital for both surges, and missed getting the spiky little bastard.

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

Close to 2,000 people died from Covid yesterday in the U.S. We'll likely eclipse 1,000,000 deaths sometime this weekend. I recall how shocked people were to see the headline that 100,000 people had died and how it chilled every sane person. Now a majority of people will probably shrug when they learn we're millionaires when it comes to Covid deaths. Talk about a snapshot into human nature, especially in the greediest country on the planet. 

[Zorral]

I do believe we did pass the million yesterday or the day before -- officially a million anyway.  Everyone knows there are more than that.

W.H.O. says officially over 25 million have died globally, and that this w/o doubt, a big undercount.

The CDC says nobody should be on planes or other public transportation and gathering venues w/o masks.  But we can't have a mask mandate because an asshole white nationalist authoritarian judge appointed by the asshole of assholes AFTER THE ELECTION says NO NO NO.

 

[Which Tyler]

Excess Deaths, globally:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/61333847

 

Globally 96 per 100,000 population

UK 109 per 100,000

USA 140 per 100,000

[Luzifer's right hand]

2 hours ago, Which Tyler said:

Excess Deaths, globally:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/61333847

 

Globally 96 per 100,000 population

UK 109 per 100,000

USA 140 per 100,000

Those numbers are actually negative for places like Australia, New Zealand Japan in 2020-21 in case people were wondering. Sadly no numbers of Taiwan. Probably because of the lack of flu waves.

It is also interesting to see how much worse Sweden did than Norway despite the very similar cultures. But the Swedes I met during a recent con still insist that COVID is not airborne. The misinformation campaign by it's government worked really well and they still believe they did well compared to the countries that are the most like it. Probably did a lot of harm to efforts in the rest of Europe too with it's approach.

[Which Tyler]

14 minutes ago, Luzifer's right hand said:

Those numbers are actually negative for places like Australia, New Zealand Japan in 2020-21 in case people were wondering.

As you'd expect in places that handled it well.

Measures that work against respiratory / airborn infections, work against all respiratory / airborn infections.

Social distancing and lockdowns, works against all communicable diseases.

Lockdowns work against many traumatic deaths as well (eg, much less likely to be involved in a car crash if there's no cars on the road; or to fall off a mountain if you're not on the mountain in the first place). Obviously, higher risk of some other traumatic deaths, like domestic abuse.

 

It's always been part of the process of assessing the impact of Covid, and Excess Deaths remains the best measure of Covid mortality. It takes into account all of those factors, both death by Covid, death secondary to Covid, but also life's saved secondary to Covid, and I guess, lives saved by Covid (eg Covid => earlier diagnosis of lung cancer). It's also the most readily comparable country to country, as it doesn't rely on cause of death, political rationale for mentioning / not mentioning Covid on death certificates, arbitrary time frames post-diagnosis etc etc.

[Ran]

19 minutes ago, Luzifer's right hand said:

It is also interesting to see how much worse Sweden did than Norway despite the very similar cultures.

Sweden is nearly three times more densely populated than Norway when you consider population-weighted density.  It also has substantial differences in population demographics, as well as elder care compared to Norway, which is one area that the health administration is examining to see where we can improve and admitted that it failed. Finally, all evidence points to Sweden receiving a very high level of initial seeding of Covid thanks to the timing of sports holidays and our preferred vacation areas during the holidays -- there were literally tens of thousands of Swedes in northern Italy and Austrian ski resorts as the epidemic blew wide open, and a lot of them brought it back with them. Norwegians, Finns, and Danes, not so much. 

[RhaenysBee]

It appears I didn’t get covid in Spain. Ironic indeed. Well I completely fell off the band wagon and I’m unsure if covid is still a thing in the global hive mind. It was definitely wiped from existence and memory in late February here, and it appears that even global news decided to let go of this topic as nobody really seems to care anymore. I suppose the ancient wisdom did work after. If you have a headache, slam your finger with a hammer, you will no longer have a headache. Does this exist in English? If so, I apologize for butchering a mirror translation. I’ll stop posting irrelevant shit to procrastinate and do some work now. Sorry and carry on. 

 

[Luzifer's right hand]

21 minutes ago, Ran said:

Sweden is nearly three times more densely populated than Norway when you consider population-weighted density.  It also has substantial differences in population demographics, as well as elder care compared to Norway, which is one area that the health administration is examining to see where we can improve and admitted that it failed. Finally, all evidence points to Sweden receiving a very high level of initial seeding of Covid thanks to the timing of sports holidays and our preferred vacation areas during the holidays -- there were literally tens of thousands of Swedes in northern Italy and Austrian ski resorts as the epidemic blew wide open, and a lot of them brought it back with them. Norwegians, Finns, and Danes, not so much. 

Your government used kids to spread the virus as much as possible and refused to acknowledge how the virus spreads long enough that every Swede I met since insists that masks are useless. You don't call intent "failure" imho. I know you like to pretend that it is not the case but that is how it looks outside of the Swedish bubble and nearly every source outside of Sweden agrees.

Edit: Also the last time I looked population density in Oslo was far higher than Stockholm. The population density in the regions that actually have decent populations are not that different. But I guess hilliness counts.

Just excuses for the cold and calculating approach of the people in charge of measures. The weak shall persish. Sadly that stance impressed people in the rest of Europe which undermined measures there.

[Ran]

1 hour ago, Luzifer's right hand said:

Your government used kids to spread the virus as much as possible

Nope. Patently false. In fact, school staff had one of the lower rates of COVID infection among occupations in Sweden, which is certainly suggestive that Sweden made the right call, especially in light of the shocking educational and welfare setbacks children have suffered in other countries. The NY Times just had a piece about that.

1 hour ago, Luzifer's right hand said:

Also the last time I looked population density in Oslo was far higher than Stockholm.

If that is your information level, I can't say I'm surprised by anything else you've said. In fact, Stockholm's urban population density is about 4200 per SQ km, vs. 1500 per SQ km for Oslo's urban population. 

[Heartofice]

Swedens numbers much better than you would expect, given the narrative around the country that it 'let it rip'.

The same could be said of the UK, whose excess deaths are below Germany, Spain and Italy.

[Luzifer's right hand]

31 minutes ago, Ran said:

 

Quote

 

 

31 minutes ago, Ran said:

 

 

31 minutes ago, Ran said:

Nope. Patently false. In fact, school staff had one of the lower rates of COVID infection among occupations in Sweden, which is certainly suggestive that Sweden made the right call, especially in light of the shocking educational and welfare setbacks children have suffered in other countries. The NY Times just had a piece about that.

If that is your information level, I can't say I'm surprised by anything else you've said. In fact, Stockholm's urban population density is about 4200 per SQ km, vs. 1500 per SQ km for Oslo's urban population. 

Fake numbers because of lack of testing are irrelevant when we have excess death numbers which countries like Sweden can't fake.

You are correct when it come to the cities themselves. I looked at the metropolitan area last time I checked. That is just nitpicking though and death numbers in your most populated areas were even worse among the migrant population than the overall numbers suggest. 

You are in your bubble and I'm in mine but excess deaths don't lie at least for countries where deaths are tracked properly.

You can make up excuses all you want more people died than in any other Scandinavian country 20-21.

But it is irrelevant anyway to discuss this. Both sides are convinced they are right but one has more deaths and long term health damage.

The infect everyone crowd has won so it is irrelevant to discuss these things anyways.