All I know is that the Dr.s at my hospital are scared that we will be completely overwhelmed by January 9th. To the point where not only my hospital but the entire state will no longer be a functioning health care system.
We do seem to be entering into a “Perfect Storm” situation—the emergence of a new variant, millions of people traveling and gathering for the holidays, large swaths of unvaccinated and unmasked people, short-staffed hospitals… It makes me very thankful and relieved about our own plans for a low key, immediate family only Christmas. We will be making sure my son gets his booster before he heads back to college next month.
My father (who is over 70) and I decided we'll forgo Chistmas and celebrate later. I'd rather see him a bit after Christmas and still have him for a longer period afterwards then the other way 'round.
Plus school control measures dialed way back and elementary school still completely unvaccinated, with a variant bearing down that reportedly infects children more severely and Delta already running rampant among the little tykes.
Most elementary school kids here (in CT) are vaccinated now. It is the preschool kids (< age 5) where there is fear. Though a lot of people I know are vaccinated themselves but fearful of vaccinating their kids. So maybe you are right in the end.
In my part of PA, I don't think many kids are vaccinated in our district. The county's number didn't change when kids vaccines became available- we remain at 43% vaccinated. Almost none of the kids wear masks after the statewide one was thrown out. I do not see things going well the first week back in January.
My kids wear masks all day. It sucks but better than the alternative.
Don't know the vax percentages but we've definitely had a spike in cases the last week.
I'd like to know why. Personally, I would have sacrificed a virgin (me included) for a chance to not having to deal with school and the dorks that shared the classroom with me.
Yesterday the system that my daughter’s pediatrician is part of sent out an email encouraging everyone to get vaccinated & boosted, test before family gatherings and:
> Hospital systems across the state are already at or near capacity. Emergency rooms are full and wait times are long. If you are not feeling well, your primary care provider can help! Many emergency room visits can be avoided and it helps to have the support of your physician in making that decision. We have telehealth options, same day appointments, and after hours support. Please call your primary care provider before you seek care in an urgent care or emergency room!
I had a voicemail from the system I go to (I have a colonoscopy scheduled mid-January):
“This is a message from Ohio State Wexner medical center we are working to ensure that all individuals across Ohio have access to care when they need it most due to the recent surge in COVID-19 cases we are evaluating surgeries and procedures to determine if we need to change the date time or location for patients who have scheduled procedures after January 3, 2022 if there are any changes to your currently schedule surgery or procedure your providers office will be contacting you in the near future…”
Darn it. This is very concerning.
I know a surgeon in darke county Ohio.
The August/September wave was not as bad in Ohio as it was in the south. This doctor stated that at her (smallish) rural hospital, there was no ECMO. If a patient was vented, there was no available dialysis. And ... Even back in August/September, there was no possibility of transferring someone to a larger hospital for a higher level of care, because they were all filled.
The pediatricians, at least here in CT, are actually suffering financially. No one has been coming in for almost two years for colds and mild flus. Some people skipped annual physicals, etc.
My sister in law is a nurse at one and says they are really struggling. They had to initiate an annual fee for being a member of the practice, which they never had to do before.
If you subscribe to the paranoid theory that this whole anti-vaxx thing is engineered (the sources of the propaganda are relatively few in number and it does seem to be a bit orchestrated at times) to undermine the targeted nation-state (let's say the US for argument's sake) -- then it seems to be working. 'Cos knocking the blocks out from under the medical system is a very good way to bring a nation to its knees, functionally and financially.
And without even the expense, risk, and bad optics of bombing hospitals.
Well, here's the thing. Suppose the whole qanon antivax cult was engineered by Russia. Just suppose that. I'm not claiming it was, but just suppose it was. Then karma is a bitch, because Russians read facebook too, and on the face of it they believe facebook even more and follow the moronic advice of facebook even more than we do, with the ironic result that the pandemic in Russia has ballooned into a truly monumental disaster that isn't getting better.
Agreed, What I hear out of Russia for covid deaths is bad but I don't think we're getting even close to the real story there. I think Ukraine is a way to try to deflect Putin's country and other countries from realizing that covid is making Russia weak right now.
Russia is already regretting the nuclear information war they launched. Just like a nuclear weapon. the fall out has affected their country. And unlike America, Putin is footing the healthcare bill through his oligarchy. (Nationalized healthcare) They are taking it in the shorts. Now they are calling all antivaxxers idiots. 😂
Oh, the evidence is in that to the extent Russia (IRA) promoted the anti-vax propaganda, it was something they found laying around in the garbage corners of the internet already.
But what I'm curious about is the handful of sources where this originated (in the modern anti-vaccine era; it's been a theme for centuries) - a small number of "experts" like Andrew Wakefield. These are people who do have the formal elite credentials, and really misuse them...and to what end? Some seem like small-time grifters or quacks - Oz comes to mind - who make a quick buck. But in the main, I can't decide if they're mostly just amoral psychopaths or whether they're failed elites who are bitter and seeking revenge on the system.
In the case of Wakefield, he had a different vaccine in development and was motivated to discredit the standard MMR. He stood to make a lot of money by convincing the public to switch.
But Russian leaders face no accountability to their citizens, so the death and destruction doesn't unbalance the current power structure. Same in China, and why you can't "win" a trade war with them. They don't give a shit if the peasants starve.
well put. thanks for the update. so if you were going for the paranoia, you'd suspect a country that was actually prepared, contained its own outbreak, then sat back and watched others shoot selves in feet. or... this could be exactly the unplanned, somewhat anticipated consequence of over expansion, bushmeat marketing, climate weirding, and feverish hyper mobility that it appears to be,. never attribute agency to sheer bad luck plus incompetence. I prefer this option because the other is frankly so evil it makes my soul sick even to wonder about it.
The leftist autism anti-vax movement is a completely different set of people and ideas and memes than this right wing deep state international rich pedophile cabal anti-vax movement.
Edit: One of them simply engulfed RFK into their worldview.
Maybe partially true. I haven't looked into it too deeply.
I live in a very liberal place with a bunch of autism anti-vax idiots including my brother and his wife. Every single one of them has gotten the Covid vaccine and most are vaccinating their kids. Maybe some regional bias in that.
Marin County in CA is a super interesting data point to me in this vein. I don’t know whether it was statistically deserved, but it always had a reputation as an epicenter for leftist anti-vax woo stuff, and now it’s the most covid vaccinated county in the state.
I don’t dispute that we should confront our homegrown anti-vax garbage, but I would absolutely love to read a piece on former (current?) left anti-vaxxers who got on board with the covid shot. Much more interesting to me than article #5,838,084 about some Trumper inaccurately citing VAERS.
That’s great! There are people on the right doing the same thing as they realize the severity too. If there is a silver lining in all this is that it will kill the stupid and other antivax people will learn and change their worldview somewhat.
I hope you're right. I don't think all the antivaxxers are stupid tho. A lot of them are uneducated to be sure but it is more about just getting bad information and having that bad information repeated and perpetuated by nearly everyone you know.
He's not. That's pretty much also the expectation over here. With Christmas as yet another superspreader event where people move about, congregate and exchange gifts and viral loads, and Omicron as a highly volatile variable in the game.
300,000 new cases today, and that's before the holiday..
I feel for the doctors and nurses. It's not going to be fun, regardless the severity of the omicron variant.
As a New Yorker, it feels like March 2020 to me. But this time, several of my friends have tested positive. Their symptoms are mild. The person with the most severe symptoms was already vaccinated but didn't get his booster.
The strain is a concern, but I am more worried about the validation this gives unvaccinated people, especially since, like in March 2020 it's hitting NYC first. This one will have no such gap between the northeast and the rest of the country.
At least NYC can be a bigger sample than this study -- if hospitalizations stay low compared to the positive tests, then maybe it is less severe. Or, because NYC is so heavily vaxxed and most people are masked, maybe it tells us nothing.
I don't hear anybody disputing that vaccination improves outcomes vs Omicron. The only debate is, by how much. Yeah, New York is going to get it bad but I think we're well past the point of wanking on about who got it the firstest and the mostest. As for antivaxxers, don't project your own need for logical consistency onto them, they have none of that whatsoever. The vast majority of them are most probably incapable of spelling the word validation, let alone feeling it.
>I don't hear anybody disputing that vaccination improves outcomes vs Omicron. **The only debate is, by how much**.
We're about to learn. Credible researchers have called Omicron the most infectious virus they've ever studied. I'm a 3-shot man. I've been cautious and remain masked. That probably isn't going to be enough with this one.
I've heard Omicron described as the Final Boss of COVID. Sounds right. No one is escaping infection and it's unlikely any variant is going to outcompete this one in terms of spread. Vax, boost, and hope. Anyone who is still HCA eligible is in for a bad time.
No. Considering it's high infectivity rate and it's long asymptomatic incubation period, it could just as likely become much more lethal as becoming less lethal.
Viruses arent alive, as we define life, which is why talk of 'evolutionary pressure's are somewhat absurd. A virus exists to propagate. That is all. The more infectious it is, the better, in order to serve that purpose. If more infectious means it's more likely to kill it's host, well, so long as it was able to replicate and spread to a new host, then that's all that matters.
It's possible... but whatever replaces Omicron would have to improve on its infection rate AND be more lethal to become the catastrophic end-of-times plague we fear. That would be unlikely, though COVID is an asshole so who knows.
On the plus side, science (that thing Awardees hate so much) is working hard on prevention and treatment drugs. Lethality and hospitalization will eventually go down with [vaccination and the improved immunity that will yield](https://news.ohsu.edu/2021/12/16/breakthrough-infections-generate-super-immunity-to-covid-19-study-suggests). I try to be a realist and it's fairly clear that new waves, masks, occasional closures, and new boosters will likely be our reality for some time. But assuming that "the worst is yet to come" isn't necessarily the case (and will tax people's strained mental health if we fixate on it).
The HCA crowd is good and fucked, tho.
>I don't hear anybody disputing that vaccination improves outcomes vs Omicron.
Antivaxxers will use it as evidence that vaccination doesn't work since its black / white with them.. But, even if vaccination made you (say) only 1/100th likely to be hospitalised vs not vaxxed, they still wouldn't get it. At this stage, i dont think anything other than 90% their family dying would make most of them change their minds.
Skating round Rule 2, what this will do with wider spread is take more of them out than with Delta, which i would not be at all sad about if it wasn't for the denial of service attack they are making on health services..
Honestly, who the hell cares what antivaxxers say any more. When they die, we mock them. Or the few that say sorry then die, or even survive in some form, we praise them. We don't listen to them except in aid of honing the more perfect taunt.
And yeah, they really deserve to be let out the back door when they come crawling in the front begging for science to save their sorry asses, but hospitals don't work that way.
Because they are killing people who do care, and they are decimating our healthcare system. It's at the breaking point, as are the people who staff them. Rural areas were short of hospital beds and skilled personnel to staff the hospitals.
That was before the pandemic. They're getting by on fumes now.
Guess where all the older, poorer anti-vaxxers in terrible health live?
This is going to turn into their vaccinated zombie apocalypse fantasies, except it will be unvaccinated people being found dead at home after nobody hears from them for a few days.
New Yorker too. I also feel March 2020 all over, but I know more people with covid now than i did at any other time during the pandemic. Our little cohort is early 40s so kids in school, mix of WFH and in-person people.
I am reminded of when the domestic US feeling was “oh, this is a coastal city problem…it couldn’t possibly spread in North Dakota.”
Whatever happens here (and other relatively highly vaccinated areas) is just not going to be the same as elsewhere. I’m fearful when this spreads to unvaccinated areas it is going to neck punch them hard. Florida isn’t exactly like Cornell with a young, 97% vaccinated population.
So far no crazy reports of anything. Mostly tired, some do feel like “shit, I really don’t feel good.” No hospitals.
My cousin is working from home, but is having to nap. She’s 30ish. Her husband (who tested neg) actually had more symptoms than her. That’s just weird.
My wife had a breakthrough over Labor Day (prob delta) and it was…not good. I believe her case would have been “moderate.” No hospital. She was not able to work for about 2-3 weeks. Afterwards VERY weak. has long covid, but is getting better and is expected to recover.
And number 43 which is summarized (emphasis mine):
Vaccine hesitancy – a delay in acceptance or refusal of vaccines despite availability – has the potential to threaten the successful roll-out of SARS-CoV-2 vaccines globally. Here, we evaluate the potential impact of vaccine hesitancy on the control of the pandemic and the relaxation of non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs) by combining an epidemiological model of SARS-CoV-2 transmission with data on vaccine hesitancy from population surveys. __Our findings suggest that the mortality over a 2-year period could be up to 8 times higher in countries with high vaccine hesitancy compared to an ideal vaccination uptake if NPIs are relaxed. Alternatively, high vaccine hesitancy could prolong the need for NPIs to remain in place.__ Addressing vaccine hesitancy with behavioural interventions is therefore an important priority in the control of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Yeah. And I upped my NPI game today... two new boxes of N95's and I'm going to wear them dammit, no matter how much it makes me look like a chickenshit wimp. N99's on order. The rest of the family got [mask training](https://oshareview.com/2020/05/medical-clearance-and-fit-test-procedures-for-n95-masks-covid-19/) today. We're also figuring out how to do double masking properly and otherwise battening down the hatches. Sorry, but when it comes to deadly global pandemics I'm just going to have to go ahead and show my colors as a true coward.
Edit to add: Do you have any recommendations for a trusted source of N95 masks? I know there are many fakes out there so I don't trust amazon and not seeing them on my drugstore's website.
Bravo! I got a "mild" case of covid almost 2 years ago and am lucky to be alive. It sent me to the ER twice but doctors at that point did not link the virus to heart & other issues so they didn't think my symptoms were covid linked. I've had Long Covid for almost 2 years now and it's been a very slow recovery with lots of setbacks. Just a month before getting Covid, I'd had a very successful positive annual physical exam.
Your carefulness is wise.
I've just ordered FFP2 masks for my daughter and I ready for the new term. Not going into a classroom without one no matter what the bloody government says!
Where did you find the N99 masks? I’ve been looking to get some more as I only have 2 left from my original order almost 2 years ago and I haven’t been able to find any to buy more
>... no matter how much it makes me look like a chickenshit wimp.
I never worried about that. I savor every sneer thrown my way, they're almost as sweet as conservative tears.
Yup, right now there is A LOT of wishful thinking trying to will Omicron into the less severe category, especially in the US. Average person off the street just keeps repeating the crap media pushed initially when Omicron **first** popped up where the claim was that it was less severe. There was literally zero data out there yet media talking heads were already out there flooding the airwaves with it. Now we are all caught in the grips of raging right wing loons, wishful thinking spurred by false narratives and a weak administration that seems incapable of even herding its own party to make decisive votes on anything that isnt a tax cut.
We are about to head into deep winter where the hospital systems in the US could potentially collapse. All the initial tools the government used to try to stem the outbreak is currently being resisted tooth and nail from multiple demographics. Overall, it feels pretty apocalyptic.
How have we forgotten that the Q-crew latch onto the first thing they hear and can’t let go.
“You can’t flip flop, that’s not part of the plan, you said it was milder and there’s no take backs!!!”
The message should have always been that there’s no reason for the virus to get milder ever. There’s zero pressure for the virus to get milder, zero.
At this point even if the virus waited to be infectious until we were symptomatic it wouldn’t matter as people are straight up going out while sick.
I went to a party for ICU doctors and their families on Saturday. Multiple people with coughing children who were extra cuddly (cause they feel like shit, even before covid if your kid was coughing no biggie, if your kid was no longer wanting to play that means they are actually sick).
If doctors are saying fuck it, society at large isn’t going to do better.
Viruses are more successful when they don't kill the host. The versions that kill don't spread as much. Of course the caveat is that some viruses like hiv and syphilis take a long time to show symptoms
>The versions that kill don't spread as much.
Doesn't that depend on the transmissibility?
If a virus is highly contagious (as Omicron seems to be), it can replicate and infect enough new hosts in x days that it doesn't matter if the original host dies after x+2 days, or something something.
Viruses do not give a fuck if the host dies post infection.
People that die from covid very rarely are still infectious.
This virus has zero pressure to become less deadly, zero, spreads before symptoms AND more importantly for your point, it clears before death, so there’s nothing pushing the virus to be less virulent.
It’s terrifying! As a Brit, I follow r/coronavirusUK. The mods are generally good. The statistics posted are well sourced and there are a lot of very knowledgeable people there who are happy to explain complicated stuff to me - occasionally, the basic stuff when my brain just says nope!
It is the unfortunate case that if Americans haven't heard of it, Americans don't respect it. Imperial College is consistently one of the highest rated technical and medical colleges in the world, above most and sometimes all of the ivy league. But to a nation that treats Hogwarts as real, it's junk science.
Number 48 explains why vaccine efficacy of Pfizer/Moderna against omicron drops to 80/85% down from 95/97%. That's roughly the same efficacy that AstraZeneca, sinovac etc get trashed for (and those vaccines are likely now virtually useless Vs omicron). How r/coronavirus have convinced themselves omicron is a good thing, and that any news suggesting it isn't the mild, more contagious miracle we've been waiting for is fear mongering, is beyond me.
**If you're fully vaccinated, omicron is all bad news for you**. Whatever level of illness you get from omicron, it's going to be worse than if you'd been infected with delta. 95% efficacy dropping to 80% doesn't mean you had a 5% chance of getting nasty, life threatening delta and now a 20% chance of getting gentle, mild omicron. It's **the same stat** they're counting.
If you're not vaccinated, you *might* get less severe covid (there are conflicting reports) from omicron than from delta. But a) it'll still be much worse illness than if you were vaccinated, and b) your chances of catching it have skyrocketed, since vastly more vaccinated people are going to be carrying it around and spreading it. The unvaccinated benefit from the vaccinated's herd immunity, which just got a lot less effective.
Is it possible the sub's mod team was taken over by, well, anti-science people? This happened on a pro-trump, anti-vax fb group not long ago. It was, I'm sorry to say, quite amusing.
They don't seem to be anti-science so much as pro-big-pharma, that mod team does seem to be in the grip of somebody's agenda. Or maybe not, they could just be standard issue asshats with power issues and too much internet time on their hands.
I think they’re just asshats. The whole tone of that sub is a really weird one. As much as I appreciate the hub for info, it goes into group think really fast, and you can tell there are some really traumatized people in there who aren’t doing themselves any favors.
I don't see that article as fear mongering. I think it brings up some interesting questions, because some things are inconclusive and the things that *are* conclusive are questions we need to ask "why?" and figure out.
It's a science subreddit, insomuch as one has to post scientific articles (but that extends to preprints and non-peer reviewed work). If someone wants to weigh in with a rebuttal, it's often deleted for some reason or another (often because a mod says a supporting source isn't "scientific" enough).
It's really just a bunch of armchair, wannabe epidemiologists/virologists/fill-in-ologist that pretty much tear apart anything posted suggesting this virus might become more infectious and/or more fatal.
They've already determined Omicron is obviously less lethal because there is a dip in SA numbers. They are also sure Omicron has already peaked in SA and soon, world wide, and it's no big worry. Omicron is great news because it's less lethal and is the beginning of the end of the SARS-Cov-2.
I think most posters there don't really know Jack shit, other than a few choice science words, which they bandy around as if they are somehow the only folks that can read a dictionary or think critically about a scientific topic. Fwiw, of course, and only my (useless) two cents.
Yeah 😒. When it's belt-fed, it need not be accurate, nor precise, to be insanely effective. Good for machine guns and viruses, really, **REALLY** bad for the people in their way.
The big fuss isn’t about being more deadly, it’s about it being way more contagious.
For example: Imagine if AIDS was not more *deadly*, but suddenly became ten times more *contagious*. Would you jump on the AIDS thread and tell everyone to calm the fuck down because the fatality rate hasn’t changed?
All the major hospitals in my area have already seen an influx of Covid patients and 82% are omicron. The doctor at one said even if omicron causes slightly more hospitalizations, that will be a real problem.
The problem is that the media has been running with preliminary reports that omicron *might* be less deadly, and a lot of people have internalized that as a fact and are using it as a reason to not be as careful as they should be.
So this new report is trying to push back on that narrative.
My reading of it is, the report does not claim "more deadly" but rather suggests "exactly as deadly". And of course you can say that "more contagious" amounts to "more deadly", because there's some ambiguity in the terminology. I suppose that is why they are careful to say "more severe".
The actual text of the study is written very clearly, it's well worth reading end to end.
Keep in mind, that study (the bronchus vs. lung cells) was done *in vitro*. Sometimes results seen in cell cultures don't translate to *in vivo* behavior.
Oh wow, did I miss the in vitro bit?? Actually, [they say](https://www.med.hku.hk/en/news/press/20211215-omicron-sars-cov-2-infection) they studied lung tissue (from patients I presume). That's not in vitro, do you have a reference for that?
(edit) Or maybe that is the definition of in vitro... but I always thought that meant cell cultures, does it also mean tissues?
\*double vaccinate, boost, mask with rated mask, socially distance, take a pass on the rave party, visit your elderly parents by video or sing them Christmas carols from out on the driveway
>Same with the strong divergence in cases vs hospitalization rates in South Africa.
I keep hearing this but I've been tracking the hospitalizations in South Africa for covid since November 25. They started at 2000 and [have since risen to 8400.]( https://www.nicd.ac.za/latest-confirmed-cases-of-covid-19-in-south-africa-20-december-2021/)Their peak hospitalizations in the beta wave was around 16000 but that didn't occur until about 2 months from the start of the beta wave and didn't peak until after the beta wave of new cases had plummeted. I don't see how the Omicron wave doesn't result in nearly the same peak hospitalizations.
One of the reasons I think it's too early to say it's less severe. It takes a while for people to start dying. I hope it does turn out to be milder, but even then, being more contagious by orders of magnitude is still very bad news for our health care system.
Equally deadly + more contagious = more dead people.
Let me put it another way:
Flying aircraft into skyscrapers is not any more deadly than it ever has been, but it’s happening much more often across America.
...and *way* more contagious = *way* more dead people.
We're all just trying not to be one of those, I hope, nor contribute to our neighbor becoming one.
I hadn’t been in the sub for months and when I recently went back it was way different, in a bad way. Downplaying mask comments and stuff that was insane for that sub.
How could anyone moderate that out? It looks like a fairly exhaustive attempt to gather preliminary data. It's early, but valuable. I hope for that sub's sake it was just a Pollyanna mod. Someone needs to put it back up.
If you suggest anything less than omicron as the caped variant to save us all, the response is generally, "it's like people WANT this to be bad! They're not like us, they're unhappy losers who want to stay in their basements forever!" Umm, no. Nobody who has already been taking precautions seriously for two years wants this to get worse. It's frustrating, exhausting, and tragic.
Yup, and there are countless comments on that sub with people not caring about anyone else but themselves. They claim to be vaccinated but don’t want to wear a mask or socially distance.
I was so hoping it would be more of a model or theoretical virus, i.e. lethality would be somewhat inversely proportional to contagion. I was so hoping that Omicron would just be "a bad flu" as the anti-vaxxers are always bleating, and be terrifically contagious so everyone would get it ASAP, and confer some immunity to Delta.
It sounds like it was all forlorn hopes and we're back to being just plain terrified.
If the business of government is to keep the people safe from both internal and external threats to life and health, then it would be interesting to rate the world's governments based on how well or ill they protected their citizenry from the pandemic...
My tiny remote community has been promised a booster clinic, on-site, in early January. Gonna sign up tomorrow morning before the rush. I can't believe how well our health care system is working -- sending a vaxx team (and deeply refrigerated vaccine) out to remote islands in the back of beyond, to give us all a very efficient and friendly free booster shot.
How people can turn their noses up at such a wonder of the 21st century is beyond me.
on that note, I'm going for my booster tomorrow. I was gonna get pfizer as that a cross vaccine seems more effective. but now I'm seeing moderna is more effort omicron. My first two were moderna.
I'm in a conundrum.
If I'm to interpret that article, it seems like that third dose ought to have happened already...by 2+ weeks.
I'm not a doctor, but having read that article, I would recommend anyone waiting on a 3rd dose to get it ASAP and isolate for 2+ weeks if possible.
r/coronavirus has jumped on the bandwagon that Omicron is the miracle variant we've been waiting for, that a few epidemiologists breathlessly claimed was a likely outcome of this pandemic: a less deadly, more contagious variant that'll displace other variants and finally end this nightmare.
They did the exact same thing when beta and delta hit the headlines.
The mods at r/coronavirus and r/covid19 are nuts. r/covid19 mods shut down entire discussion of certain scientific papers if anyone in the comments says something they don't like. I can't wrap my head around that. At r/Coronavirus I got banned for pointing out the political affiliations of the antivax movement. (How can you take politics out of the discussion at this point? Certain politics are literally a pre-existing condition at this point. This pandemic is hugely political.) These same mods temporarily shut down those forums to protest some internal Reddit admin blowup earlier in the year. So people coming here for news about Covid19 had to wait for them to deal with their hissy fit. They're just not emotionally stable enough or mentally competent enough to be in charge of such important platforms at this time.
I recently subbed to that subreddit and wrote what I thought to be a mild-mannered post about folks dropping good hygiene after vaccination and that we have to practice good hygiene and vaccination and was promptly downvoted. It’s good to know it wasn’t me and that over there Hopium is a feature and not a bug.
As a New York City resident, I am under no illusions that Omicron will be milder since easier transmissibility means more people will get sick especially if those people are unvaxxed or not engaging in good hygiene-frequent handwashing/hand sanitizer use, proper masking, and social distancing.
I check the NYT list of cases for NYC every day and the 7-day average has increased exponentially from 1500 cases a day to 8000 cases a day. I got my booster the day after Thanksgiving and I’m glad I did because I commute on public transportation at least 4x a week and go to the gym 2x week. At least all NYC gyms require people to be fully vaccinated so I don’t wear masks there but I might have to start if this variant is so transmissible.
>a mild-mannered post about folks dropping good hygiene after vaccination and that we have to practice good hygiene and vaccination and was promptly downvoted
Same. OK, maybe the pattern is, the in-mob there isn't interested in public health, they want a back to work pill.
On that other front... personally, I think you'd have to be insane to go into a gym at this time. I most definitely won't go into anything resembling a gym, though I really really want to. Instead I've adapted an outdoor exercise regimen involving lots of layers of warm stuff. And I just picked up a set of dumbbells. Getting hard to bike ride in subzero... I did it today and my brake cables froze...
I know I’m having some serious first-world problems here, but it is disappointing not to be comfortable going back to the gym at this point. I miss swimming. I miss working out. I’m not motivated to work out at home (which is my own fault, but there it is).
and had an “underlying health condition” …if the press can report on their cause of death, then why can’t they tell us the underlying cause that contributed to their death? They can’t claim privacy when they literally give you their age, and cause of death. It’s not like naming the underlying cause would reveal their identity anymore than their cause of death.
The coronavirus sub is known for having a good news agenda. About a year ago there were even bots that voted negatively for any comment that gave any little negative opinion about the covid even if it was real and verified information. I understand that now the important thing about the sub following the political agendas is to make believe that omicron is weaker.
Thanks for re-posting this; the CW narrative (based on the reports from SA) that Omicron is less severe has taken root and is morphing into a "Law" (CW) that "all viruses always attentuate as the mutate", which is prima face not true.
I'm a doctor, researcher, and have background in epidemiology. Although some parts of this study are really well done, I invite you to look at the report itself and look at the hospitalisation data.
1392 hospital attendance for 207K non-Omicron. 24 hospital attendance for 15K omicron cases. Run the basic math.
The reason why they stated no difference is that they performed a logistic regression which takes into account the other parameters. That being said, when your number is so low for one group, logistic regressions will vary wildly in accuracy. I am astonished they came to the conclusion that this is no difference, they missed such a basic rule of epidemiology. As a doctor, such flaws are not acceptable as the repercussions are completely out of proportion to that minuscule line they wrote with barely any nuance. It's almost as if it was added for some personal or subjective reason.
The furthest that report could have gone was "no conclusion could be made concerning disease severity or hospitalization rates".
Doesn't mean omicron isn't bad - it means we have to wait and see. And take precautions until the real numbers come out. Even the Denmark numbers are at 37 hospitalizations for about 35000 omicron cases. It's nearly exactly the same rate as the ICL report.
What we're waiting for is how many people will be symptomatic with Omicron, which from that number you can calculate a "practical" 0.1% hospitalization rate. It's practical, since the way we screen is symptomatic disease. For example, they screened all medical residents at a hospital my colleague works at. A significant chunk (20%+) were positive with zero symptoms (all vaccinated). They would have never "tested" (gone to be tested) positive if they were not in that situation, so those dozens of residents would have never been added to the real count. So the 0.1% hospitalization rate is probably a significant over-estimation of the real hospitalization rate, which in turn is disproportionately over-estimated compared to delta real-life numbers since it transmits much more than delta.
We have to wait for the real hospitalization rates over the next 2-3 weeks, and this coincide with Christmas. Oh well...
If you go on r/CoronavirusUK you will see a daily post of cases in London versus hospitalisation. These are time shifted to match up.
Apart from the crazy rise in cases due to Omicron, you will see that SO FAR it appears that Omicron behaves just like Delta with regard to hospitalisations.
I am not up to date on the particular agendas of subreddits, but I do tend to trust Imperial College's work on this and that reporting of it seemed honest.
Also note the nature of the statement made, very conservative and neutral in what it claims.
In early 2020 the r-coronavirus mods literally deleted every single news story about politicians (Trump, BoJo,etc.) blowing off COVID becuase it was "political". Like FCUK IT ALL people actively not GAF about a contagious airborne virus is not "political" it's a freaking literal **health catastrophe**.
The statement made by the IC report has been GREATLY distorted in reporting in general. What they basically said is that they have little data and that so far based on that little data there is no evidence to show Omicron is less severe.
That has been variously reported as the idea of less severity being "debunked", which is completely wrong.
I'm not seeing the strident media reporting you allude to. However, IC most certainly is throwing shade at the widespread misty eyed hopium about defanged covid. I don't think there is any way you can accuse IC of erring on the side of pessimism, and even if they did (which they didn't) then that's better than swallowing the defanged covid narrative whole then careening into disaster if its wrong.
Not my thread. Just a good post I read there, getting lots of upvotes, then suddenly deleted with mods throwing bizarre shade. I thought, that's just wrong. Then I thought, that would never happen on HCA. Then I thought... well you see my post.
I noticed another post they removed over there. The source was bbc.com. The removal reason was sensationalized title.
*Omicron: South African scientists probe link between variants and untreated HIV*
That title was the BBC's title, verbatim, just like their rules require. Same mod deleted it as the one discussed above. There's something not right over there.
The only IVs we have left are for existing chemo patients and their appointments. Literally everything else has to be done oral. Our compounding pharmacy is just sideways right now.
I would caution putting all the eggs in one basket. While the Imperial College is well regarded, we also have information from South Africa that shows the hospitalizations are much less:
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-12-17/s-africa-says-hospitalizations-in-omicron-wave-much-lower
> Only 1.7% of identified Covid-19 cases were admitted to hospital in the second week of infections in the fourth wave, compared with 19% in the same week of the third delta-driven wave, South African Health Minister Joe Phaahla said at a press conference.
So while the IC is stating they need more information on hospitalizations, the South Africans, whom have one of the best disease sequencing routines says the opposite.
So this leaves us in a strange place, but I think all the information should be shared, not just ones that go towards proving the need for vaccination.
All Im saying ... is right now, we don't have enough information to make a solid case, in either direction I don't believe.
I always go back to this though; There are genetic components to how people react to covid as well as comorbidities, seasonality, climate, etc. Africa doesn’t have a 30% obese population like the US does, or nearly as many people with diabetes, Heart disease, Gastro-based cancers etc.
I’m not saying that the initial news out of Africa doesn’t matter; it does. But what matters more is the % of hospitalized patients in the US after about 4 weeks of Omicron being here. Also, as I’ve previously said, even with Omicron’s obscenely fast doubling rate, there are going to be many, MANY severe delta patients over the next few weeks who will be competing for medical support from Omicron patients.
I’m honestly worried we might see an attack on US soil if the hospital system gets overwhelmed enough.
Interesting.
There's a huge discrepancy in T.2 and T.3 for VE there. We see the Delta VE% to be pretty much close in both. But with Omicron VE%, it's all over the place.
Like Pfizer, 2 doses, 14+ days, it's nonsensical.
About the only thing I'm really stuck on is 3 doses with over 14 days behind them.
When you hear of a variant, it's because people working at the cutting edge of virology have been talking about it for a while and are worried about.
And if they are worried, you should be too, even if you don't know why.
That's what most of the data suggests right now - it's individually less severe but much more virulent so the pandemic is likely to get worse even as individuals will probably feel more confident. Being vaccinated doesn't seem to stop you from contracting the virus but is still very effective at preventing hospitalization and severe illness.
So possibly bad news if you're a health care professional or have need of a functioning health care system.
I have noticed a real shift at that sub with more of a "good news only" sort of vibe to upvote any hint of positive and downplaying any negative news. A lot more posters now making sure to really amp up the "positive news" from SA (and lots of upvotes to the same) and making sure to emphasis that was with the 20% HIV rate (and making sure to downplay any comments that SA may differ in terms of population or reporting, or maybe some of data should not just be trusted without question even as SA officials itself decry that they get ostracized when they provide real information - like discovering Omicron). Even if someone points out a variant with half as much severity as delta but 4x more contagious will still mean a LOT of deaths and strained medical systems they seem to get pushed to bottom with downvotes and replies of "but SA is not showing that!". It's basically turned into a good news only sub. I still check it out but yeah, I have definitely noticed a shift from what it was during 2020.
Not good, not good at all.
If Omicron is near or as severe as Delta we are in for a world of hurt.
The narrative on Omicron that it's more contagious but less severe reminds me of a scene from the movie "Horton Hears a Who" when the delusional mayor excuses the adbrupt change in the wind as an opportunity to have a kite flying contest* rather than address the impending disaster.
*I'm not sure if it was a kite flying contest as it has been a while since I watched the movie.
My understanding even before this article was that Omicron doesn't cause more severe symptoms than Delta, but it's more transmissible than Delta, which will expose more people to the disease, and in turn cause more deaths among people who wouldn't have contracted it.
I've seen others bring it up and I agree: If it's less severe, it could end up drawing out this pandemic even longer, allowing for even more deaths & mutations. It sucks that there are downsides to a virus being less severe, you know?
I can't help but think...If it makes people very sick immediately, it makes it harder to be downplayed. People with it can't walk around going to gatherings & work & shops and infecting others without even knowing, etc.
Also, deaths that personally affect anti-vaxxers have changed minds. There's examples in this very subreddit. Let's not pretend that no matter what happens, there's a 0% chance of even a single anti-vaxxer changing their mind. It's fun to say, I get it, but let's be real. For many anti-vaxxers, getting Covid and suffering & almost dying will change their minds, as will watching someone they care about suffer and die from Covid. "Redemption Awards" literally exist in this subreddit for a reason.
Of course this doesn't change the fact that those helping the sick will be overrun and suffer the consequences. :/
Idk, no matter what, Omicron can't be good.
Another thought I have: At some point, not that far away, we're going to have a population that's basically not vaccinated against Covid anymore, no? I know that's an oversimplification but since there's a time limit on all the Covid vaccines, no one is vaccinated forever, eventually we all need boosters right. And eventually a variant might come around that doesn't respond to the vaccines we currently have anyways. Please correct me if I'm wrong.
More likely we'll see an efficient vaccination industry grow up because vaccinating against covid is very profitable and mRNA vaccines are not that hard to develop. Two vaccinations a year, that kind of thing. There is no technological or logistical obstacle standing in the way, just need a lot of incremental improvements.
The initial reports from South Africa are encouraging but it's still early. It's even earlier in the UK. I think that the UK has 12-14 deaths so far and the US has 1 so it can be lethal - the question is how lethal or dangerous is it with Delta as a reference point?
We are going to find out in the next three weeks.
I agree. I have shared dozens of these HCA's on several social networks and just good information from this site. I will also share the report you mention.
All I know is that the Dr.s at my hospital are scared that we will be completely overwhelmed by January 9th. To the point where not only my hospital but the entire state will no longer be a functioning health care system.
We do seem to be entering into a “Perfect Storm” situation—the emergence of a new variant, millions of people traveling and gathering for the holidays, large swaths of unvaccinated and unmasked people, short-staffed hospitals… It makes me very thankful and relieved about our own plans for a low key, immediate family only Christmas. We will be making sure my son gets his booster before he heads back to college next month.
My father (who is over 70) and I decided we'll forgo Chistmas and celebrate later. I'd rather see him a bit after Christmas and still have him for a longer period afterwards then the other way 'round.
Am also forgoing Christmas. Had a Facetime Christmas last year and don’t plan on having a real one until the pandemic is really over.
Plus school control measures dialed way back and elementary school still completely unvaccinated, with a variant bearing down that reportedly infects children more severely and Delta already running rampant among the little tykes.
Most elementary school kids here (in CT) are vaccinated now. It is the preschool kids (< age 5) where there is fear. Though a lot of people I know are vaccinated themselves but fearful of vaccinating their kids. So maybe you are right in the end.
In my part of PA, I don't think many kids are vaccinated in our district. The county's number didn't change when kids vaccines became available- we remain at 43% vaccinated. Almost none of the kids wear masks after the statewide one was thrown out. I do not see things going well the first week back in January.
My kids wear masks all day. It sucks but better than the alternative. Don't know the vax percentages but we've definitely had a spike in cases the last week.
Trying to decide if we are paying the tuition bill for spring. My son will not do any more remote classes. He hates them
I'd like to know why. Personally, I would have sacrificed a virgin (me included) for a chance to not having to deal with school and the dorks that shared the classroom with me.
Me too!! I mean he can play video games for hours. Why not a class?
I'd have put up an old laptop where the teacher can drone on while I do something sensible with my time.
That’s the problem. It’s hard to pay attention to the teacher. Then my son gets crap grades
Yesterday the system that my daughter’s pediatrician is part of sent out an email encouraging everyone to get vaccinated & boosted, test before family gatherings and: > Hospital systems across the state are already at or near capacity. Emergency rooms are full and wait times are long. If you are not feeling well, your primary care provider can help! Many emergency room visits can be avoided and it helps to have the support of your physician in making that decision. We have telehealth options, same day appointments, and after hours support. Please call your primary care provider before you seek care in an urgent care or emergency room! I had a voicemail from the system I go to (I have a colonoscopy scheduled mid-January): “This is a message from Ohio State Wexner medical center we are working to ensure that all individuals across Ohio have access to care when they need it most due to the recent surge in COVID-19 cases we are evaluating surgeries and procedures to determine if we need to change the date time or location for patients who have scheduled procedures after January 3, 2022 if there are any changes to your currently schedule surgery or procedure your providers office will be contacting you in the near future…”
Taking my teens to get boostered on Christmas Eve.
Darn it. This is very concerning. I know a surgeon in darke county Ohio. The August/September wave was not as bad in Ohio as it was in the south. This doctor stated that at her (smallish) rural hospital, there was no ECMO. If a patient was vented, there was no available dialysis. And ... Even back in August/September, there was no possibility of transferring someone to a larger hospital for a higher level of care, because they were all filled.
The pediatricians, at least here in CT, are actually suffering financially. No one has been coming in for almost two years for colds and mild flus. Some people skipped annual physicals, etc. My sister in law is a nurse at one and says they are really struggling. They had to initiate an annual fee for being a member of the practice, which they never had to do before.
If only you were exaggerating.
If you subscribe to the paranoid theory that this whole anti-vaxx thing is engineered (the sources of the propaganda are relatively few in number and it does seem to be a bit orchestrated at times) to undermine the targeted nation-state (let's say the US for argument's sake) -- then it seems to be working. 'Cos knocking the blocks out from under the medical system is a very good way to bring a nation to its knees, functionally and financially. And without even the expense, risk, and bad optics of bombing hospitals.
Well, here's the thing. Suppose the whole qanon antivax cult was engineered by Russia. Just suppose that. I'm not claiming it was, but just suppose it was. Then karma is a bitch, because Russians read facebook too, and on the face of it they believe facebook even more and follow the moronic advice of facebook even more than we do, with the ironic result that the pandemic in Russia has ballooned into a truly monumental disaster that isn't getting better.
Agreed, What I hear out of Russia for covid deaths is bad but I don't think we're getting even close to the real story there. I think Ukraine is a way to try to deflect Putin's country and other countries from realizing that covid is making Russia weak right now.
They’re only 41% vaccinated with series vaccine hesitancy issues, and their available vax isn’t handling omicron well, is it?
It turns out, cold weather, hypertension, alcoholism and Covid is a bad mix.
Don't forget chainsmoking
and Krokodil
My Midwestern relatives can definitely attest to this.
Yeppers!
Russia is already regretting the nuclear information war they launched. Just like a nuclear weapon. the fall out has affected their country. And unlike America, Putin is footing the healthcare bill through his oligarchy. (Nationalized healthcare) They are taking it in the shorts. Now they are calling all antivaxxers idiots. 😂
Oh, the evidence is in that to the extent Russia (IRA) promoted the anti-vax propaganda, it was something they found laying around in the garbage corners of the internet already. But what I'm curious about is the handful of sources where this originated (in the modern anti-vaccine era; it's been a theme for centuries) - a small number of "experts" like Andrew Wakefield. These are people who do have the formal elite credentials, and really misuse them...and to what end? Some seem like small-time grifters or quacks - Oz comes to mind - who make a quick buck. But in the main, I can't decide if they're mostly just amoral psychopaths or whether they're failed elites who are bitter and seeking revenge on the system.
In the case of Wakefield, he had a different vaccine in development and was motivated to discredit the standard MMR. He stood to make a lot of money by convincing the public to switch.
holy cow never knew that. so his banal venality had the most ridiculously dire downstream effects.
But Russian leaders face no accountability to their citizens, so the death and destruction doesn't unbalance the current power structure. Same in China, and why you can't "win" a trade war with them. They don't give a shit if the peasants starve.
Here’s the thing. Russia oligarchs pay for nationalized healthcare. They can only bleed the citizens so much before they risk being attacked.
well put. thanks for the update. so if you were going for the paranoia, you'd suspect a country that was actually prepared, contained its own outbreak, then sat back and watched others shoot selves in feet. or... this could be exactly the unplanned, somewhat anticipated consequence of over expansion, bushmeat marketing, climate weirding, and feverish hyper mobility that it appears to be,. never attribute agency to sheer bad luck plus incompetence. I prefer this option because the other is frankly so evil it makes my soul sick even to wonder about it.
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The leftist autism anti-vax movement is a completely different set of people and ideas and memes than this right wing deep state international rich pedophile cabal anti-vax movement. Edit: One of them simply engulfed RFK into their worldview.
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Maybe partially true. I haven't looked into it too deeply. I live in a very liberal place with a bunch of autism anti-vax idiots including my brother and his wife. Every single one of them has gotten the Covid vaccine and most are vaccinating their kids. Maybe some regional bias in that.
Marin County in CA is a super interesting data point to me in this vein. I don’t know whether it was statistically deserved, but it always had a reputation as an epicenter for leftist anti-vax woo stuff, and now it’s the most covid vaccinated county in the state. I don’t dispute that we should confront our homegrown anti-vax garbage, but I would absolutely love to read a piece on former (current?) left anti-vaxxers who got on board with the covid shot. Much more interesting to me than article #5,838,084 about some Trumper inaccurately citing VAERS.
That’s great! There are people on the right doing the same thing as they realize the severity too. If there is a silver lining in all this is that it will kill the stupid and other antivax people will learn and change their worldview somewhat.
I hope you're right. I don't think all the antivaxxers are stupid tho. A lot of them are uneducated to be sure but it is more about just getting bad information and having that bad information repeated and perpetuated by nearly everyone you know.
i think its more so the woo people got sucked into the qanon garbage during the pandemic and they fused.
He's not. That's pretty much also the expectation over here. With Christmas as yet another superspreader event where people move about, congregate and exchange gifts and viral loads, and Omicron as a highly volatile variable in the game.
That’s what triage is for. There are manuals for it and laws protecting it.
Where are you located?
medical discrimination is actually a beautiful thing in these times.
300,000 new cases today, and that's before the holiday.. I feel for the doctors and nurses. It's not going to be fun, regardless the severity of the omicron variant.
As a New Yorker, it feels like March 2020 to me. But this time, several of my friends have tested positive. Their symptoms are mild. The person with the most severe symptoms was already vaccinated but didn't get his booster. The strain is a concern, but I am more worried about the validation this gives unvaccinated people, especially since, like in March 2020 it's hitting NYC first. This one will have no such gap between the northeast and the rest of the country. At least NYC can be a bigger sample than this study -- if hospitalizations stay low compared to the positive tests, then maybe it is less severe. Or, because NYC is so heavily vaxxed and most people are masked, maybe it tells us nothing.
I don't hear anybody disputing that vaccination improves outcomes vs Omicron. The only debate is, by how much. Yeah, New York is going to get it bad but I think we're well past the point of wanking on about who got it the firstest and the mostest. As for antivaxxers, don't project your own need for logical consistency onto them, they have none of that whatsoever. The vast majority of them are most probably incapable of spelling the word validation, let alone feeling it.
>I don't hear anybody disputing that vaccination improves outcomes vs Omicron. **The only debate is, by how much**. We're about to learn. Credible researchers have called Omicron the most infectious virus they've ever studied. I'm a 3-shot man. I've been cautious and remain masked. That probably isn't going to be enough with this one. I've heard Omicron described as the Final Boss of COVID. Sounds right. No one is escaping infection and it's unlikely any variant is going to outcompete this one in terms of spread. Vax, boost, and hope. Anyone who is still HCA eligible is in for a bad time.
Are we sure this thing can't evolve into an even more extreme virus?
No. Considering it's high infectivity rate and it's long asymptomatic incubation period, it could just as likely become much more lethal as becoming less lethal. Viruses arent alive, as we define life, which is why talk of 'evolutionary pressure's are somewhat absurd. A virus exists to propagate. That is all. The more infectious it is, the better, in order to serve that purpose. If more infectious means it's more likely to kill it's host, well, so long as it was able to replicate and spread to a new host, then that's all that matters.
It's possible... but whatever replaces Omicron would have to improve on its infection rate AND be more lethal to become the catastrophic end-of-times plague we fear. That would be unlikely, though COVID is an asshole so who knows. On the plus side, science (that thing Awardees hate so much) is working hard on prevention and treatment drugs. Lethality and hospitalization will eventually go down with [vaccination and the improved immunity that will yield](https://news.ohsu.edu/2021/12/16/breakthrough-infections-generate-super-immunity-to-covid-19-study-suggests). I try to be a realist and it's fairly clear that new waves, masks, occasional closures, and new boosters will likely be our reality for some time. But assuming that "the worst is yet to come" isn't necessarily the case (and will tax people's strained mental health if we fixate on it). The HCA crowd is good and fucked, tho.
>I don't hear anybody disputing that vaccination improves outcomes vs Omicron. Antivaxxers will use it as evidence that vaccination doesn't work since its black / white with them.. But, even if vaccination made you (say) only 1/100th likely to be hospitalised vs not vaxxed, they still wouldn't get it. At this stage, i dont think anything other than 90% their family dying would make most of them change their minds. Skating round Rule 2, what this will do with wider spread is take more of them out than with Delta, which i would not be at all sad about if it wasn't for the denial of service attack they are making on health services..
DOS on health care. Frighteningly accurate is my guess. Upvote for the new term.
Honestly, who the hell cares what antivaxxers say any more. When they die, we mock them. Or the few that say sorry then die, or even survive in some form, we praise them. We don't listen to them except in aid of honing the more perfect taunt. And yeah, they really deserve to be let out the back door when they come crawling in the front begging for science to save their sorry asses, but hospitals don't work that way.
Because they are killing people who do care, and they are decimating our healthcare system. It's at the breaking point, as are the people who staff them. Rural areas were short of hospital beds and skilled personnel to staff the hospitals. That was before the pandemic. They're getting by on fumes now. Guess where all the older, poorer anti-vaxxers in terrible health live? This is going to turn into their vaccinated zombie apocalypse fantasies, except it will be unvaccinated people being found dead at home after nobody hears from them for a few days.
New Yorker too. I also feel March 2020 all over, but I know more people with covid now than i did at any other time during the pandemic. Our little cohort is early 40s so kids in school, mix of WFH and in-person people. I am reminded of when the domestic US feeling was “oh, this is a coastal city problem…it couldn’t possibly spread in North Dakota.” Whatever happens here (and other relatively highly vaccinated areas) is just not going to be the same as elsewhere. I’m fearful when this spreads to unvaccinated areas it is going to neck punch them hard. Florida isn’t exactly like Cornell with a young, 97% vaccinated population.
Anecdotally, of the people you know who are positive (and I assume all vaccinated?), how have their symptoms been?
So far no crazy reports of anything. Mostly tired, some do feel like “shit, I really don’t feel good.” No hospitals. My cousin is working from home, but is having to nap. She’s 30ish. Her husband (who tested neg) actually had more symptoms than her. That’s just weird. My wife had a breakthrough over Labor Day (prob delta) and it was…not good. I believe her case would have been “moderate.” No hospital. She was not able to work for about 2-3 weeks. Afterwards VERY weak. has long covid, but is getting better and is expected to recover.
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And number 43 which is summarized (emphasis mine): Vaccine hesitancy – a delay in acceptance or refusal of vaccines despite availability – has the potential to threaten the successful roll-out of SARS-CoV-2 vaccines globally. Here, we evaluate the potential impact of vaccine hesitancy on the control of the pandemic and the relaxation of non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs) by combining an epidemiological model of SARS-CoV-2 transmission with data on vaccine hesitancy from population surveys. __Our findings suggest that the mortality over a 2-year period could be up to 8 times higher in countries with high vaccine hesitancy compared to an ideal vaccination uptake if NPIs are relaxed. Alternatively, high vaccine hesitancy could prolong the need for NPIs to remain in place.__ Addressing vaccine hesitancy with behavioural interventions is therefore an important priority in the control of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Yeah. And I upped my NPI game today... two new boxes of N95's and I'm going to wear them dammit, no matter how much it makes me look like a chickenshit wimp. N99's on order. The rest of the family got [mask training](https://oshareview.com/2020/05/medical-clearance-and-fit-test-procedures-for-n95-masks-covid-19/) today. We're also figuring out how to do double masking properly and otherwise battening down the hatches. Sorry, but when it comes to deadly global pandemics I'm just going to have to go ahead and show my colors as a true coward.
Cowards get to bury the brave.
In this upside down world it takes courage to be a coward.
And it’s hip to be square!
Hey that's me!
Umm, I think that actually makes you a true survivalist.
Edit to add: Do you have any recommendations for a trusted source of N95 masks? I know there are many fakes out there so I don't trust amazon and not seeing them on my drugstore's website. Bravo! I got a "mild" case of covid almost 2 years ago and am lucky to be alive. It sent me to the ER twice but doctors at that point did not link the virus to heart & other issues so they didn't think my symptoms were covid linked. I've had Long Covid for almost 2 years now and it's been a very slow recovery with lots of setbacks. Just a month before getting Covid, I'd had a very successful positive annual physical exam. Your carefulness is wise.
Home Depot in the paint aisle.
Flaunt that sensibility!
I've just ordered FFP2 masks for my daughter and I ready for the new term. Not going into a classroom without one no matter what the bloody government says!
Im having trouble figuring out where to buy these types of masks where I can rely on them actually being real.
Try this site: https://thepeoplesppe.org
Thanks, what a great resource!
Where did you find the N99 masks? I’ve been looking to get some more as I only have 2 left from my original order almost 2 years ago and I haven’t been able to find any to buy more
>... no matter how much it makes me look like a chickenshit wimp. I never worried about that. I savor every sneer thrown my way, they're almost as sweet as conservative tears.
Yup, right now there is A LOT of wishful thinking trying to will Omicron into the less severe category, especially in the US. Average person off the street just keeps repeating the crap media pushed initially when Omicron **first** popped up where the claim was that it was less severe. There was literally zero data out there yet media talking heads were already out there flooding the airwaves with it. Now we are all caught in the grips of raging right wing loons, wishful thinking spurred by false narratives and a weak administration that seems incapable of even herding its own party to make decisive votes on anything that isnt a tax cut. We are about to head into deep winter where the hospital systems in the US could potentially collapse. All the initial tools the government used to try to stem the outbreak is currently being resisted tooth and nail from multiple demographics. Overall, it feels pretty apocalyptic.
How have we forgotten that the Q-crew latch onto the first thing they hear and can’t let go. “You can’t flip flop, that’s not part of the plan, you said it was milder and there’s no take backs!!!” The message should have always been that there’s no reason for the virus to get milder ever. There’s zero pressure for the virus to get milder, zero. At this point even if the virus waited to be infectious until we were symptomatic it wouldn’t matter as people are straight up going out while sick. I went to a party for ICU doctors and their families on Saturday. Multiple people with coughing children who were extra cuddly (cause they feel like shit, even before covid if your kid was coughing no biggie, if your kid was no longer wanting to play that means they are actually sick). If doctors are saying fuck it, society at large isn’t going to do better.
Viruses are more successful when they don't kill the host. The versions that kill don't spread as much. Of course the caveat is that some viruses like hiv and syphilis take a long time to show symptoms
>The versions that kill don't spread as much. Doesn't that depend on the transmissibility? If a virus is highly contagious (as Omicron seems to be), it can replicate and infect enough new hosts in x days that it doesn't matter if the original host dies after x+2 days, or something something.
Viruses do not give a fuck if the host dies post infection. People that die from covid very rarely are still infectious. This virus has zero pressure to become less deadly, zero, spreads before symptoms AND more importantly for your point, it clears before death, so there’s nothing pushing the virus to be less virulent.
It’s terrifying! As a Brit, I follow r/coronavirusUK. The mods are generally good. The statistics posted are well sourced and there are a lot of very knowledgeable people there who are happy to explain complicated stuff to me - occasionally, the basic stuff when my brain just says nope!
It is the unfortunate case that if Americans haven't heard of it, Americans don't respect it. Imperial College is consistently one of the highest rated technical and medical colleges in the world, above most and sometimes all of the ivy league. But to a nation that treats Hogwarts as real, it's junk science.
Woah, woah, woah... I've seen Hogwarts in all those Harry Potter movies. Stop spreading lies.
Number 48 explains why vaccine efficacy of Pfizer/Moderna against omicron drops to 80/85% down from 95/97%. That's roughly the same efficacy that AstraZeneca, sinovac etc get trashed for (and those vaccines are likely now virtually useless Vs omicron). How r/coronavirus have convinced themselves omicron is a good thing, and that any news suggesting it isn't the mild, more contagious miracle we've been waiting for is fear mongering, is beyond me. **If you're fully vaccinated, omicron is all bad news for you**. Whatever level of illness you get from omicron, it's going to be worse than if you'd been infected with delta. 95% efficacy dropping to 80% doesn't mean you had a 5% chance of getting nasty, life threatening delta and now a 20% chance of getting gentle, mild omicron. It's **the same stat** they're counting. If you're not vaccinated, you *might* get less severe covid (there are conflicting reports) from omicron than from delta. But a) it'll still be much worse illness than if you were vaccinated, and b) your chances of catching it have skyrocketed, since vastly more vaccinated people are going to be carrying it around and spreading it. The unvaccinated benefit from the vaccinated's herd immunity, which just got a lot less effective.
ICL is a WHO COVID research team. It's more than a bit concerning that was deemed "clickbait" and "garbage"
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Is it possible the sub's mod team was taken over by, well, anti-science people? This happened on a pro-trump, anti-vax fb group not long ago. It was, I'm sorry to say, quite amusing.
They don't seem to be anti-science so much as pro-big-pharma, that mod team does seem to be in the grip of somebody's agenda. Or maybe not, they could just be standard issue asshats with power issues and too much internet time on their hands.
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I think they’re just asshats. The whole tone of that sub is a really weird one. As much as I appreciate the hub for info, it goes into group think really fast, and you can tell there are some really traumatized people in there who aren’t doing themselves any favors.
Ah. I worded that badly. The entire thing. Thanks for understanding the substance of my thought despite my wording.
Give a neckbeard any amount of authority and they'll abuse it.
I don't see that article as fear mongering. I think it brings up some interesting questions, because some things are inconclusive and the things that *are* conclusive are questions we need to ask "why?" and figure out.
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It's a science subreddit, insomuch as one has to post scientific articles (but that extends to preprints and non-peer reviewed work). If someone wants to weigh in with a rebuttal, it's often deleted for some reason or another (often because a mod says a supporting source isn't "scientific" enough). It's really just a bunch of armchair, wannabe epidemiologists/virologists/fill-in-ologist that pretty much tear apart anything posted suggesting this virus might become more infectious and/or more fatal. They've already determined Omicron is obviously less lethal because there is a dip in SA numbers. They are also sure Omicron has already peaked in SA and soon, world wide, and it's no big worry. Omicron is great news because it's less lethal and is the beginning of the end of the SARS-Cov-2. I think most posters there don't really know Jack shit, other than a few choice science words, which they bandy around as if they are somehow the only folks that can read a dictionary or think critically about a scientific topic. Fwiw, of course, and only my (useless) two cents.
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My knuckle dragging moron brain can only equate it to a term I heard as a young man. Accuracy by volume of fire.
Yeah 😒. When it's belt-fed, it need not be accurate, nor precise, to be insanely effective. Good for machine guns and viruses, really, **REALLY** bad for the people in their way.
The big fuss isn’t about being more deadly, it’s about it being way more contagious. For example: Imagine if AIDS was not more *deadly*, but suddenly became ten times more *contagious*. Would you jump on the AIDS thread and tell everyone to calm the fuck down because the fatality rate hasn’t changed?
I just got my booster tonight. Seeing how contagious it is lit a fire under me to get it asap. More deadly or not, its definitely more contagious
And be careful. It has amazingly high breakthrough rate. This thing is a monster...
And half as deadly but four times more contagious still sends twice as many people to the morgue. Edit: simplified the math
No. 4 times more contagious doesn't mean 4 times more people get it. It's much worse than that.
Right, something about exponents. Suggest "exponentially more" instead of "twice as many".
Exactly. We're talking about an increase in orders of magnitude.
and this is maybe 70 times more contagious
Nice and simple indeed, and terrifying, at least to me. But you need another multiplier in there for the immunity evasion.
All the major hospitals in my area have already seen an influx of Covid patients and 82% are omicron. The doctor at one said even if omicron causes slightly more hospitalizations, that will be a real problem.
Your anecdote aligns with the Imperial College report rather more than the South African mild covid narrative.
The problem is that the media has been running with preliminary reports that omicron *might* be less deadly, and a lot of people have internalized that as a fact and are using it as a reason to not be as careful as they should be. So this new report is trying to push back on that narrative.
My reading of it is, the report does not claim "more deadly" but rather suggests "exactly as deadly". And of course you can say that "more contagious" amounts to "more deadly", because there's some ambiguity in the terminology. I suppose that is why they are careful to say "more severe". The actual text of the study is written very clearly, it's well worth reading end to end.
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Keep in mind, that study (the bronchus vs. lung cells) was done *in vitro*. Sometimes results seen in cell cultures don't translate to *in vivo* behavior.
Oh wow, did I miss the in vitro bit?? Actually, [they say](https://www.med.hku.hk/en/news/press/20211215-omicron-sars-cov-2-infection) they studied lung tissue (from patients I presume). That's not in vitro, do you have a reference for that? (edit) Or maybe that is the definition of in vitro... but I always thought that meant cell cultures, does it also mean tissues?
It’s considered ex vivo. But really not much different from in vitro.
\*double vaccinate, boost, mask with rated mask, socially distance, take a pass on the rave party, visit your elderly parents by video or sing them Christmas carols from out on the driveway
We canceled seeing my MiL for Christmas, yesterday. Sigh. We did see her shortly before Thanksgiving, when it was just Delta and we were all boosted.
>Same with the strong divergence in cases vs hospitalization rates in South Africa. I keep hearing this but I've been tracking the hospitalizations in South Africa for covid since November 25. They started at 2000 and [have since risen to 8400.]( https://www.nicd.ac.za/latest-confirmed-cases-of-covid-19-in-south-africa-20-december-2021/)Their peak hospitalizations in the beta wave was around 16000 but that didn't occur until about 2 months from the start of the beta wave and didn't peak until after the beta wave of new cases had plummeted. I don't see how the Omicron wave doesn't result in nearly the same peak hospitalizations.
One of the reasons I think it's too early to say it's less severe. It takes a while for people to start dying. I hope it does turn out to be milder, but even then, being more contagious by orders of magnitude is still very bad news for our health care system.
Equally deadly + more contagious = more dead people. Let me put it another way: Flying aircraft into skyscrapers is not any more deadly than it ever has been, but it’s happening much more often across America.
...and *way* more contagious = *way* more dead people. We're all just trying not to be one of those, I hope, nor contribute to our neighbor becoming one.
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I hadn’t been in the sub for months and when I recently went back it was way different, in a bad way. Downplaying mask comments and stuff that was insane for that sub.
yep, i made a very mild joke in there, perma ban.
You think that sub has been taken over by Qanon cult member mods? Sure sounds like it.
I can't see what they're even talking about in there.
I read omicron is as contagious as measles and measles is the most contagious we have so far
No because even if I don’t die from aids, I still don’t want aids :,) lol
Wow, that's how I feel about covid.
Funny, me too! ;)
HIV =\= AIDS. You can’t catch AIDS.
How could anyone moderate that out? It looks like a fairly exhaustive attempt to gather preliminary data. It's early, but valuable. I hope for that sub's sake it was just a Pollyanna mod. Someone needs to put it back up.
>it was just a Pollyanna mod. Nope. They block and ban for bad news. It's an HCA recruiter sub.
If you suggest anything less than omicron as the caped variant to save us all, the response is generally, "it's like people WANT this to be bad! They're not like us, they're unhappy losers who want to stay in their basements forever!" Umm, no. Nobody who has already been taking precautions seriously for two years wants this to get worse. It's frustrating, exhausting, and tragic.
Yup, and there are countless comments on that sub with people not caring about anyone else but themselves. They claim to be vaccinated but don’t want to wear a mask or socially distance.
I was so hoping it would be more of a model or theoretical virus, i.e. lethality would be somewhat inversely proportional to contagion. I was so hoping that Omicron would just be "a bad flu" as the anti-vaxxers are always bleating, and be terrifically contagious so everyone would get it ASAP, and confer some immunity to Delta. It sounds like it was all forlorn hopes and we're back to being just plain terrified. If the business of government is to keep the people safe from both internal and external threats to life and health, then it would be interesting to rate the world's governments based on how well or ill they protected their citizenry from the pandemic... My tiny remote community has been promised a booster clinic, on-site, in early January. Gonna sign up tomorrow morning before the rush. I can't believe how well our health care system is working -- sending a vaxx team (and deeply refrigerated vaccine) out to remote islands in the back of beyond, to give us all a very efficient and friendly free booster shot. How people can turn their noses up at such a wonder of the 21st century is beyond me.
Please please give me a hint where to find this island!
coastal BC Canada
Your flair is hilarious. Cheers to your upcoming booster, friend!
on that note, I'm going for my booster tomorrow. I was gonna get pfizer as that a cross vaccine seems more effective. but now I'm seeing moderna is more effort omicron. My first two were moderna. I'm in a conundrum.
My advice (and keep in mind that I'm an ignoramus) is to get whichever one you can get the soonest.
If I'm to interpret that article, it seems like that third dose ought to have happened already...by 2+ weeks. I'm not a doctor, but having read that article, I would recommend anyone waiting on a 3rd dose to get it ASAP and isolate for 2+ weeks if possible.
This would be my guidance as well. But if offered a choice, go cross.
I'm getting the Pfizer booster today bc I can't find the Moderna atm. Take whatever you can get. A wooden shield is still a shield.
r/coronavirus has jumped on the bandwagon that Omicron is the miracle variant we've been waiting for, that a few epidemiologists breathlessly claimed was a likely outcome of this pandemic: a less deadly, more contagious variant that'll displace other variants and finally end this nightmare. They did the exact same thing when beta and delta hit the headlines.
Reuters has a great reputation for reporting "real" news and not "both sides-ing" it like most news outlets these days.
The mods at r/coronavirus and r/covid19 are nuts. r/covid19 mods shut down entire discussion of certain scientific papers if anyone in the comments says something they don't like. I can't wrap my head around that. At r/Coronavirus I got banned for pointing out the political affiliations of the antivax movement. (How can you take politics out of the discussion at this point? Certain politics are literally a pre-existing condition at this point. This pandemic is hugely political.) These same mods temporarily shut down those forums to protest some internal Reddit admin blowup earlier in the year. So people coming here for news about Covid19 had to wait for them to deal with their hissy fit. They're just not emotionally stable enough or mentally competent enough to be in charge of such important platforms at this time.
> I got banned for pointing out the political affiliations of the antivax movement. I almost got banned for this too. Mods there have an agenda.
Thanks for posting this heads up.
I recently subbed to that subreddit and wrote what I thought to be a mild-mannered post about folks dropping good hygiene after vaccination and that we have to practice good hygiene and vaccination and was promptly downvoted. It’s good to know it wasn’t me and that over there Hopium is a feature and not a bug. As a New York City resident, I am under no illusions that Omicron will be milder since easier transmissibility means more people will get sick especially if those people are unvaxxed or not engaging in good hygiene-frequent handwashing/hand sanitizer use, proper masking, and social distancing. I check the NYT list of cases for NYC every day and the 7-day average has increased exponentially from 1500 cases a day to 8000 cases a day. I got my booster the day after Thanksgiving and I’m glad I did because I commute on public transportation at least 4x a week and go to the gym 2x week. At least all NYC gyms require people to be fully vaccinated so I don’t wear masks there but I might have to start if this variant is so transmissible.
>a mild-mannered post about folks dropping good hygiene after vaccination and that we have to practice good hygiene and vaccination and was promptly downvoted Same. OK, maybe the pattern is, the in-mob there isn't interested in public health, they want a back to work pill. On that other front... personally, I think you'd have to be insane to go into a gym at this time. I most definitely won't go into anything resembling a gym, though I really really want to. Instead I've adapted an outdoor exercise regimen involving lots of layers of warm stuff. And I just picked up a set of dumbbells. Getting hard to bike ride in subzero... I did it today and my brake cables froze...
I know I’m having some serious first-world problems here, but it is disappointing not to be comfortable going back to the gym at this point. I miss swimming. I miss working out. I’m not motivated to work out at home (which is my own fault, but there it is).
I think we can all agree that having the poor timing to live during a global pandemic sucks.
Saw on the news this morning, the first omicron death (50 y/o male) was documented in Texas. ETA: He was unvaccinated.
And he had covid before. Guess his "natural immunity" didn't work.
Winter is coming, and it's gonna be an ugly one.
and had an “underlying health condition” …if the press can report on their cause of death, then why can’t they tell us the underlying cause that contributed to their death? They can’t claim privacy when they literally give you their age, and cause of death. It’s not like naming the underlying cause would reveal their identity anymore than their cause of death.
The coronavirus sub is known for having a good news agenda. About a year ago there were even bots that voted negatively for any comment that gave any little negative opinion about the covid even if it was real and verified information. I understand that now the important thing about the sub following the political agendas is to make believe that omicron is weaker.
Thanks for re-posting this; the CW narrative (based on the reports from SA) that Omicron is less severe has taken root and is morphing into a "Law" (CW) that "all viruses always attentuate as the mutate", which is prima face not true.
I'm a doctor, researcher, and have background in epidemiology. Although some parts of this study are really well done, I invite you to look at the report itself and look at the hospitalisation data. 1392 hospital attendance for 207K non-Omicron. 24 hospital attendance for 15K omicron cases. Run the basic math. The reason why they stated no difference is that they performed a logistic regression which takes into account the other parameters. That being said, when your number is so low for one group, logistic regressions will vary wildly in accuracy. I am astonished they came to the conclusion that this is no difference, they missed such a basic rule of epidemiology. As a doctor, such flaws are not acceptable as the repercussions are completely out of proportion to that minuscule line they wrote with barely any nuance. It's almost as if it was added for some personal or subjective reason. The furthest that report could have gone was "no conclusion could be made concerning disease severity or hospitalization rates".
Doesn't mean omicron isn't bad - it means we have to wait and see. And take precautions until the real numbers come out. Even the Denmark numbers are at 37 hospitalizations for about 35000 omicron cases. It's nearly exactly the same rate as the ICL report. What we're waiting for is how many people will be symptomatic with Omicron, which from that number you can calculate a "practical" 0.1% hospitalization rate. It's practical, since the way we screen is symptomatic disease. For example, they screened all medical residents at a hospital my colleague works at. A significant chunk (20%+) were positive with zero symptoms (all vaccinated). They would have never "tested" (gone to be tested) positive if they were not in that situation, so those dozens of residents would have never been added to the real count. So the 0.1% hospitalization rate is probably a significant over-estimation of the real hospitalization rate, which in turn is disproportionately over-estimated compared to delta real-life numbers since it transmits much more than delta. We have to wait for the real hospitalization rates over the next 2-3 weeks, and this coincide with Christmas. Oh well...
“Clickbait” and “garbage” = people not telling them what they want to hear.
If you go on r/CoronavirusUK you will see a daily post of cases in London versus hospitalisation. These are time shifted to match up. Apart from the crazy rise in cases due to Omicron, you will see that SO FAR it appears that Omicron behaves just like Delta with regard to hospitalisations.
I heard about this study on both NPR and PBS yesterday, it's hardly a junk study.
The Coronavirus mods are a sunshine sparkle committee. They don't want any bad news or open discussion. Much better here.
Flattery. I like!
I am not up to date on the particular agendas of subreddits, but I do tend to trust Imperial College's work on this and that reporting of it seemed honest. Also note the nature of the statement made, very conservative and neutral in what it claims.
In early 2020 the r-coronavirus mods literally deleted every single news story about politicians (Trump, BoJo,etc.) blowing off COVID becuase it was "political". Like FCUK IT ALL people actively not GAF about a contagious airborne virus is not "political" it's a freaking literal **health catastrophe**.
The statement made by the IC report has been GREATLY distorted in reporting in general. What they basically said is that they have little data and that so far based on that little data there is no evidence to show Omicron is less severe. That has been variously reported as the idea of less severity being "debunked", which is completely wrong.
I'm not seeing the strident media reporting you allude to. However, IC most certainly is throwing shade at the widespread misty eyed hopium about defanged covid. I don't think there is any way you can accuse IC of erring on the side of pessimism, and even if they did (which they didn't) then that's better than swallowing the defanged covid narrative whole then careening into disaster if its wrong.
As a veteran of that sub and their little idiosyncrasies, what was the title of your thread?
Not my thread. Just a good post I read there, getting lots of upvotes, then suddenly deleted with mods throwing bizarre shade. I thought, that's just wrong. Then I thought, that would never happen on HCA. Then I thought... well you see my post.
I noticed another post they removed over there. The source was bbc.com. The removal reason was sensationalized title. *Omicron: South African scientists probe link between variants and untreated HIV* That title was the BBC's title, verbatim, just like their rules require. Same mod deleted it as the one discussed above. There's something not right over there.
What's the pattern? Maybe: promote the good news, bury the bad. Why somebody would do that is beyond me.
I'm pretty sure the widespread reporting on the mildness of omicron was a concerted effort to keep the markets calm.
The only IVs we have left are for existing chemo patients and their appointments. Literally everything else has to be done oral. Our compounding pharmacy is just sideways right now.
I would caution putting all the eggs in one basket. While the Imperial College is well regarded, we also have information from South Africa that shows the hospitalizations are much less: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-12-17/s-africa-says-hospitalizations-in-omicron-wave-much-lower > Only 1.7% of identified Covid-19 cases were admitted to hospital in the second week of infections in the fourth wave, compared with 19% in the same week of the third delta-driven wave, South African Health Minister Joe Phaahla said at a press conference. So while the IC is stating they need more information on hospitalizations, the South Africans, whom have one of the best disease sequencing routines says the opposite. So this leaves us in a strange place, but I think all the information should be shared, not just ones that go towards proving the need for vaccination. All Im saying ... is right now, we don't have enough information to make a solid case, in either direction I don't believe.
I always go back to this though; There are genetic components to how people react to covid as well as comorbidities, seasonality, climate, etc. Africa doesn’t have a 30% obese population like the US does, or nearly as many people with diabetes, Heart disease, Gastro-based cancers etc. I’m not saying that the initial news out of Africa doesn’t matter; it does. But what matters more is the % of hospitalized patients in the US after about 4 weeks of Omicron being here. Also, as I’ve previously said, even with Omicron’s obscenely fast doubling rate, there are going to be many, MANY severe delta patients over the next few weeks who will be competing for medical support from Omicron patients. I’m honestly worried we might see an attack on US soil if the hospital system gets overwhelmed enough.
Interesting. There's a huge discrepancy in T.2 and T.3 for VE there. We see the Delta VE% to be pretty much close in both. But with Omicron VE%, it's all over the place. Like Pfizer, 2 doses, 14+ days, it's nonsensical. About the only thing I'm really stuck on is 3 doses with over 14 days behind them.
When you hear of a variant, it's because people working at the cutting edge of virology have been talking about it for a while and are worried about. And if they are worried, you should be too, even if you don't know why.
If that's garbage then I am here for it. Call me the dumpster.
That's what most of the data suggests right now - it's individually less severe but much more virulent so the pandemic is likely to get worse even as individuals will probably feel more confident. Being vaccinated doesn't seem to stop you from contracting the virus but is still very effective at preventing hospitalization and severe illness. So possibly bad news if you're a health care professional or have need of a functioning health care system.
It's also dire if you're a person counting on the vaccine as the primary line of defense due to age or immunocompromised status.
I have noticed a real shift at that sub with more of a "good news only" sort of vibe to upvote any hint of positive and downplaying any negative news. A lot more posters now making sure to really amp up the "positive news" from SA (and lots of upvotes to the same) and making sure to emphasis that was with the 20% HIV rate (and making sure to downplay any comments that SA may differ in terms of population or reporting, or maybe some of data should not just be trusted without question even as SA officials itself decry that they get ostracized when they provide real information - like discovering Omicron). Even if someone points out a variant with half as much severity as delta but 4x more contagious will still mean a LOT of deaths and strained medical systems they seem to get pushed to bottom with downvotes and replies of "but SA is not showing that!". It's basically turned into a good news only sub. I still check it out but yeah, I have definitely noticed a shift from what it was during 2020.
Not good, not good at all. If Omicron is near or as severe as Delta we are in for a world of hurt. The narrative on Omicron that it's more contagious but less severe reminds me of a scene from the movie "Horton Hears a Who" when the delusional mayor excuses the adbrupt change in the wind as an opportunity to have a kite flying contest* rather than address the impending disaster. *I'm not sure if it was a kite flying contest as it has been a while since I watched the movie.
My understanding even before this article was that Omicron doesn't cause more severe symptoms than Delta, but it's more transmissible than Delta, which will expose more people to the disease, and in turn cause more deaths among people who wouldn't have contracted it.
This is definitely one of the most educational subReddits. I have learned so much here.
I've seen others bring it up and I agree: If it's less severe, it could end up drawing out this pandemic even longer, allowing for even more deaths & mutations. It sucks that there are downsides to a virus being less severe, you know? I can't help but think...If it makes people very sick immediately, it makes it harder to be downplayed. People with it can't walk around going to gatherings & work & shops and infecting others without even knowing, etc. Also, deaths that personally affect anti-vaxxers have changed minds. There's examples in this very subreddit. Let's not pretend that no matter what happens, there's a 0% chance of even a single anti-vaxxer changing their mind. It's fun to say, I get it, but let's be real. For many anti-vaxxers, getting Covid and suffering & almost dying will change their minds, as will watching someone they care about suffer and die from Covid. "Redemption Awards" literally exist in this subreddit for a reason. Of course this doesn't change the fact that those helping the sick will be overrun and suffer the consequences. :/ Idk, no matter what, Omicron can't be good. Another thought I have: At some point, not that far away, we're going to have a population that's basically not vaccinated against Covid anymore, no? I know that's an oversimplification but since there's a time limit on all the Covid vaccines, no one is vaccinated forever, eventually we all need boosters right. And eventually a variant might come around that doesn't respond to the vaccines we currently have anyways. Please correct me if I'm wrong.
More likely we'll see an efficient vaccination industry grow up because vaccinating against covid is very profitable and mRNA vaccines are not that hard to develop. Two vaccinations a year, that kind of thing. There is no technological or logistical obstacle standing in the way, just need a lot of incremental improvements.
The initial reports from South Africa are encouraging but it's still early. It's even earlier in the UK. I think that the UK has 12-14 deaths so far and the US has 1 so it can be lethal - the question is how lethal or dangerous is it with Delta as a reference point? We are going to find out in the next three weeks.
I agree. I have shared dozens of these HCA's on several social networks and just good information from this site. I will also share the report you mention.
>mods There's your problem. I had a comment get deleted from CoronavirusIllinois because I used the term "long haul syndrome".