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You are here: Home / Healthcare / COVID-19 / COVID-19 Coronavirus Updates: Sunday / Monday, April 4-5

COVID-19 Coronavirus Updates: Sunday / Monday, April 4-5

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From a long thread:

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Vaccine? Never! Cattle wormer? Worth a try!…

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Reader Interactions

39Comments

  1. 1.

    Chris T.

    Dr Tom Friedman’s tweets, about how vaccinating the more-vulnerable pays off faster, is where the 95% (or 90% or any other %) efficacy and other epidemiology things really pay off. The statistical stuff works in large populations, and reducing the retransmission rate has compound-interest-like effects. He mentions “future generations of spread”, and with 7 or 14 day incubation and transmission period, “one generation” is as little as “one week”.

    Compound interest at 7% is how house prices double in a decade. It’s also how a pandemic doubles—or halves—in a week or a month. But this is in whole populations. Individuals don’t matter here except in terms of being parts of the whole population.

  2. 2.

    mrmoshpotato

    Why You Should Not Use Ivermectin to Treat or Prevent COVID-19

    But I read on the Internet that…!

  3. 3.

    Brachiator

    @Chris T.:

    Dr Tom Friedman’s tweets, about how vaccinating the more-vulnerable pays off faster, is where the 95% (or 90% or any other %) efficacy and other epidemiology things really pay off.

    Friedman has a point, but it is not either/or. We need to produce more vaccine and get more people vaccinated.

    Some of the remaining issues have to do with getting the message out and getting the vaccine out to people. In Los Angeles, they have a big setup at Dodger Stadium. This does not work if you don’t have a car or live nearby.

    I keep hearing that it is not easy for people without computers to make appointments and that making appointment by phone is not always easy for seniors and non English speakers. Libraries, community centers and even some churches, which may be used more by some lower income people and seniors, are still closed.

    In some places we need to get smarter about logistics and access.

  4. 4.

    Brachiator

    Access denied: Many of the foreign workers who power the economy of the tiny, oil-rich sheikhdom of Kuwait are struggling to get coronavirus vaccines. Kuwait has faced criticism for choosing to vaccinate its own people first.

    Talk about short sighted. Throughout the pandemic, outbreaks and surges have occurred in most countries that use immigrant labor. Including the US.

  5. 5.

    Robert Sneddon

    @Brachiator: ​
     

    The easy-to-vaccinate population, the ones with cars and internet access and savvy and willingness to hunt down an appointment hopefully make up a large part of the population and it takes little effort to get them vaccinated. That’s a good thing because numbers count in an epidemic more than anything.

    Vaccinating lots of people quickly limits the spread of the disease to others who can’t be vaccinated right now, giving them a better chance to avoid catching the disease before they get vaccinated in their turn. I’d expect vaccination programs will send teams out door to door to vaccinate isolated individuals or small family groups eventually. Right now a vaccination team can do a hundred or more walk-up or drive-up vaccinations a day in a big conference hall but they might manage ten vaccinations going door-to-door in a day otherwise and right now it’s better for them to vaccinate the largest number of people they can.

    The world also needs to be planning for the next vaccination cycle, probably starting in the autumn in the developed word, of booster shots for already-vaccinated people to knock down the variant COVID-19 infections which are growing more widespread even as we roll out the first wave of vaccinations. “One and done” is the wrong way to think about this disease.

  7. 7.

    NeenerNeener

    Monroe County, NY stats:

    New cases = 207
    Confirmed active cases = 2669
    2.4% test positivity. This just keeps going up.

    Deaths at 1206 now

    36.8% of Monroe County has had at least 1 vaccine dose.

  8. 8.

    RobertDSC-Mac Mini

    I got my second shot of Pfizer on Saturday. It put me out on Sunday, so bad that I went to sleep at 6 PM. But the sleep helped as I feel tons better and will be able to go to work today.

  9. 9.

    Amir Khalid

    Malaysia’s Director-General of Heath Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah reports 1,079 new Covid-19 cases today in his media statement, for a cumulative reported total of 352,029 cases. He also reports seven new deaths today, for a cumulative total of 1,295 deaths — 0.37% of the cumulative reported total, 0.38% of resolved cases.

    There are currently 14,278 active and contagious cases; 180 are in ICU, 89 of them intubated. Meanwhile, 1,294 patients recovered and were discharged, for a cumulative total of 336,456 patients recovered – 95.56% of the cumulative reported total.

    Six new clusters were reported today: Lorong Dua and Taman Komersial in Selangor; Jalan Inovasi in Kuala Lumpur and Putrajaya; Jalan Mata Kuching in Melaka; Persiaran Utama in Negeri Sembilan; and Bukit Sera in Kedah.

    Bukit Sera is a community cluster. The rest are workplace clusters.

    1,061 new cases today are local infections. Selangor reports 325 local cases: 18 in older clusters, six in Taman Komersial and Lorong Dua clusters, 224 close-contact screenings, and 77 other screenings. Sarawak reports 225 cases: 61 in existing clusters, 126 close-contact screenings, and 38 other screenings.

    Penang reports 133 cases: 39 in existing clusters, 41 close-contact screenings, and 53 other screenings.

    Kuala Lumpur reports 83 local cases: six in existing clusters, 43 close-contact screenings, and 34 other screenings. Sabah reports 65 cases: 23 in existing clusters, 27 close-contact screenings, and 15 other screenings. Johor reports 54 local cases: 12 in existing clusters, 28 close-contact screenings, and 14 other screenings. Pahang reports 36 local cases: 14 in existing clusters, nine close-contact screenings, and 13 other screenings. Kedah reports 34 cases: 10 in older clusters, 10 in Bukit Sera cluster, nine close-contact screenings, and five other screenings. Kelantan reports 31 cases: three in existing clusters, 16 close-contact screenings, and 12 other screenings. Melaka reports 25 cases: 16 in older clusters, and nine in Jalan Mata Kuching cluster.

    Labuan reports 17 cases: 15 in existing clusters, one close-contact screening, and one other screening. Negeri Sembilan reports 12 cases: six in Persiaran Utama cluster, four close-contact screenings, and two other screenings.

    Perak reports eight cases: two close-contact screenings, and six other screenings. Putrajaya also reports eight cases: six in Jalan Inovasi cluster, and two close-contact screenings. Terengganu reports three cases, all close-contact screenings. And Perlis reports two cases, both found in other screening.

    Nine new cases today are imported: five in Kuala Lumpur, two in Selangor, one in Johor, and one in Pahang.

    The deaths reported today are an 86-year-old man in Selangor with hypertension; a 58-year-old man in Sabah with diabetes, hypertension, dyslipidaemia, heart disease, and cancer of the tongue; a 68-year-old man in Saba with hypertension; a 64-year-old man in Selangor with diabetes, hypertension and chronic kidney disease; an 85-year-old man in Selangor with hypertension and dyslipidaemia; a 46-year-old man in Johor with diabetes; and an 84-year-old man in Selangor with hypertension and dyslipidaemia.

  10. 10.

    Geo Wilcox

    I read that the 4th wave won’t be a wave so much as a bunch of tornadoes. Areas that are affluent and have a lot of vaccinated people won’t suffer like the places that are not those things. Tornadoes will pop up all over the place and infections among those who can’t get the vaccine easily will go up, esp with the variants that are more infectious.

  11. 11.

    Buckeye

    @Brachiator:

    Libraries are open and are often being used as testing/vaccine sites.

    americanlibrariesmagazine.org/blogs/the-scoop/covid-19-vaccine-a-shot-in-the-arm/

    I know here in Dayton they’re using using libraries in high need communities as sites. Pharmacies, churches, community centers, grocery stores, etc. are being used as sites. The county has set aside a large number of shots that are phone only, and our public transit has made it easy to get to the sites.

    Some of the initial problems in access were of course quantity, which is much less of a problem now.
    And obviously there’ll be differences in logistics from state to state, county to county.

  12. 12.

    Kay

    @Buckeye:

    We seem to have more supply than demand here, in 4 rural counties. I’m wondering if it’s partly because it’s so Trumpy so participation is low? I made an appointment with no problem at all and then had to reschedule the 2nd shot- no problem. They’ve had two special dates focused on high school students at the county health department sites already- two Saturday AM sessions.

  19. 19.

    Kay

    @rikyrah:

    I’m thrilled the kid trials are going so well too. The quarantines are horrible for them- even if the school is open they quarantine them every time you turn around. Our entire high school choir is currently quarantined.

  20. 20.

    Sloane Ranger

    So, no data was reported from Wales yesterday and Northern Ireland has only reported vaccination numbers. with those provisos, we had 2297 new cases on Sunday. This is a decrease of 29.7% in the rolling 7-day average. New cases by nations reporting,

    England – 1954 (down @900)
    Scotland – 343 (down 54).

    Deaths – There were 10 deaths within 28 days of a positive test yesterday. This is a decrease of 43.9% in the rolling 7-day average. Deaths by nations reporting, England – 10, Scotland – 0.

    Testing – Not updated.

    Hospitalisations – Not updated.

    Vaccinations – As of 3 April, a total of 31,523,010 people had received 1 dose of a vaccine and 5,381,745 were fully vaccinated. This means that 59.8% of all adults in the UK have had their 1st shot and 10.2%, both.

    General – Boris Johnson is to address the nation at 5pm today. He is expected to confirm that the next step in easing the lockdown in England will go ahead as planned on 12 April; to address the issue of foreign travel, due to be allowed from 17 May, by introducing a “traffic light” system (although which countries will be designated what colour will be decided nearer the time); the trialling of “vaccine passports” at a number of designated events and the introduction of free, twice weekly rapid testing for everyone in England.

    Scotland has already eased some restrictions by allowing hairdressers, garden centres and homeware shops to re-open from today.

  22. 22.

    Soprano2

    @rikyrah:  We need Mobile units willing to go out and service hard to reach populations

    I agree, this is crucial. I still think this is a race, though, so we need to get a lot of people vaccinated fast rather than worrying about making sure the “right” people go first. It must be a multi-pronged effort.

    Our local state university is having a mass vaccination event with the J&J vaccine on April 8th/9th. I’m hoping a bunch of the college students take advantage of it to get vaccinated before they go home for the summer. I talk to everyone I can about getting signed up with the state navigator Web site so they can get an appointment, or about getting on pharmacy “waste” lists. I actually saw one woman that next day who told me because I talked to her about it she was signed up for her vaccination! Yay!

    I feel fortunate, once I was eligible I was able to get my first shot right away because my employer is city government; they had clinics just for their employees. I don’t understand why there isn’t more effort to go to where people work; for example, is the WalMart pharmacy vaccinating all the WalMart workers at their location? That’s the easiest way to get them shots fast, and it’s important; they see a lot of people every day, and if you want to stop the spread as well as stopping death it’s important that those who are regularly exposed to a lot of people get vaccinated. That’s why I was so cranky about these lists of “eligible” people – once we had the people over 65, health care workers, and first responders who wanted it done, we should have opened it to everyone rather than having “tiers” of “qualified” people. Why was I, who sit in an office every day, eligible sooner than a clerk at WalMart who probably sees hundreds of people every day? That made absolutely no sense to me.

  23. 23.

    Soprano2

    @Kay: Did you see the article about how liberals are going “vaccine hunting” in rural counties? One person said she Googled “counties where there was a Trump landslide” and got an appointment right away that was within an hour of her location! The way it’s been distributed in some places is a travesty IMHO.

  24. 24.

    Soprano2

    @Kay: I’m thrilled the kid trials are going so well too.

    Me too, that’s a huge hole in our vaccination effort. I hope there’s a mass effort to go to schools and get them vaccinated as soon as it’s possible.

  26. 26.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Soprano2:

    The way it’s been distributed in some places is a travesty IMHO. 

    I hear ya there.  (Searched Walgreens site around Chicago for weeks, but downstate kept having open appointments.) But I’m not sure the quantity of vaccine could’ve been distributed better when they were just ramping up manufacturing, and have no idea which areas will have a bunch of refuseniks.

  27. 27.

    dmsilev

    @Kay: If you look at one of those maps that color-codes states by vaccination rate, the pattern is pretty stark. The southeast is by far the slowest region of the country, and some of the mountain west states are starting to also visibly lag. So yeah, there’s an effect.

    Bourn out by polling on vaccine attitudes; the subgroup with the largest rate of “don’t want to get the vaccine” is Republicans.

  28. 28.

    Soprano2

    @mrmoshpotato:But I’m not sure the quantity of vaccine could’ve been distributed better when they were just ramping up manufacturing, and have no idea which areas will have a bunch of refuseniks.

    Well, in MO they were having mass vaccination events in rural areas that probably had fewer “eligible” people than the amount of vaccinations in the event! You’d think they would have known where their eligible population lived, and distributed the vaccine accordingly. They didn’t have any mass vaccination events in K.C. or St. Louis until sometime at the end of March; that wasn’t an accident. Look at our own commenter, who drove from St. Louis to SEMO just to get a shot because he couldn’t find any appointments in or around St. Louis. That’s crazy, that’s a population center. It wasn’t an accident that the vaccine was distributed to the areas that voted for Republicans first.

  29. 29.

    YY_Sima Qian

    On 4/4 China reported 15 new domestic confirmed & 5 new domestic asymptomatic cases, all in Yunnan Province. There are currently 48 domestic confirmed & 37 domestic asymptomatic cases in the province.

    • Ruili in Dehong Prefecture reported 15 new domestic confirmed (6 moderate & 9 mild) & 5 new domestic asymptomatic cases. There are currently 48 domestic confirmed & 36 domestic asymptomatic cases there. Of the new domestic confirmed cases, 4 are Chinese nationals and 11 are Burmese nationals. Of the new domestic asymptomatic cases, 3 are Chinese nationals & 3 are Burmese nationals. 3 communities were elevated to High Risk. 3 residential compounds, 1 factory & 2 villages are at Medium Risk.
    • Gengma County in Lincang City did not report any new positive cases. There is 1 domestic asymptomatic case there.

    Imported Cases

    On 4/4 China reported 17 new imported confirmed cases, 13 imported asymptomatic cases:

    • Xi’an in Shaanxi Province – 4 confirmed cases (1 previously asymptomatic), 3 Chinese nationals & a foreign national returning from Pakistan; 3 asymptomatic cases, all Chinese nationals returning from Pakistan; all off flights diverted from Beijing
    • Shanghai Municipality – 3 confirmed cases, 1 Chinese national each returning from Senegal (via Paris CdG), Mali (via Paris CdG) & Russia
    • Chengdu In Sichuan Province – 3 confirmed cases, 1 Chinese national each returning Algeria, Chad (via Cairo) & Serbia (via Amsterdam Schiphol); 1 asymptomatic case, a Chinese national returning from Egypt
    • Nanjing in Jiangsu Province – 1 confirmed case (previously asymptomatic), an Italian national coming from Italy; 2 asymptomatic cases, no information released
    • Lianyungang Port in Jiangsu Province – 1 confirmed case, coming from the Philippines
    • Beijing Municipality – 1 confirmed case, a Chinese national returning from Sweden
    • Tianjin Municipality – 1 confirmed case, a Chinese national returning from Zimbabwe (via Paris CdG); 1 asymptomatic case, 1 Chinese national returning from Benin (via Paris CdG)
    • Hohhot in Inner Mongolia “Autonomous” Region – 1 confirmed case, no information released
    • Hangzhou in Zhejiang Province – 1 confirmed case, coming from the US
    • Xiamen in Fujian Province – 1 confirmed case, a Chinese national returning from the Philippines
    • Foshan in Guangdong Province – 2 asymptomatic cases, 1 Chinese national each returning from Iraq & France, off flights that landed at Guangzhou
    • Guangzhou in Guangdong Province – 1 asymptomatic case, a Chinese national returning from Indonesia
    • Shenzhen in Guangdong Province – 1 asymptomatic case, a Chinese national returning from South Africa
    • Qingdao in Shandong Province – 1 asymptomatic case, a Chinese national returning from the Philippines
    • Changsha in Hunan Province – 1 asymptomatic case, no information released

     

    Overall in China, 9 confirmed cases recovered, 10 asymptomatic cases were released from isolation & 3 were reclassified as confirmed cases, and 240 individuals were released from quarantine. Currently, there are 238 active confirmed cases in the country (189 imported), 2 in critical/serious condition (both imported), 304 asymptomatic cases (267 imported), 2 suspect cases (all imported). 7,430 traced contacts are currently under centralized quarantine.

    As of 4/4, 139.97M vaccine doses have been injected in Mainland China, an increase of 3.293M doses in the past 24 hrs.

    On 4/5, Hong Kong reported 16 new cases, 15 imported & 1 domestic (source of infection not identified).

  30. 30.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Soprano2:

    It wasn’t an accident that the vaccine was distributed to the areas that voted for Republicans first. 

    I forget that there were a few weeks where the orange shitstain controlled vaccine distribution.  Skips my mind since I expected the mobster motherfuckers to seize it all for themselves.

  31. 31.

    J R in WV

    Someone here posted either the actual side-effects chart, or at least a link to it.

    I was so relieved to see that Moderna vaccination #2 had 47% of recipients reporting side effects reporting muscle cramps or spasms. I have been prone to muscle spasms for decades, and 4 or 5 days after my second vaccination I got cramps and that in places I had never had them before.

    Now I know I wasn’t crazy to expect that was actually because of the injection.

    Could have been just because it was my turn to have painful muscle issues again, but not so much if 47% of people reporting side effects report muscle cramps. Would still take vaccination shots, will take a booster asap, even seriously painful cramps and spasms are nothing like dying on a vent. Have seen that up close, no one deserves that!

  32. 32.

    West of the Cascades

    No offense to James Palmer, but equating “less suicide” with “less loneliness” is fucking stupid. Studies have shown that most people, and particularly younger people, are experiencing more loneliness during the pandemic (peer-reviewed study reported at medicalnewstoday.com/articles/alarming-covid-19-study-shows-80-of-respondents-report-significant-sym… for example). I sure am. Josh Marshall thinks that the explanation for less suicide is a mutual sense of “we’re all going through this together because every single person in the world is dealing with it,” and thus a sense of solidarity (and crisis-response mode) that is making suicidal ideation less likely. Good musings at talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/covid-suicide-and-solidarity

  33. 33.

    Dopey-o

    @mrmoshpotato:

    It wasn’t an accident that the vaccine was distributed to the areas that voted for Republicans first.

    I forget that there were a few weeks where the orange shitstain controlled vaccine distribution. Skips my mind since I expected the mobster motherfuckers to seize it all for themselves.

    Spouse and i drove 400 miles round trip twice to get surplus shots in the republican governor’s hometown. Even though i am tier 1A, there were none available in Missouri’s blue counties.

    Still aren’t. Coincidence? Daily Kos has a diary up today that leads one to suspect malfeasance and self-dealing at work in missouri.

    Sorry, no link. Speaking of mobsters, did anyone ever locate the 18 million doses that went AWOL in December 2020? I suspect Jared sent them to some rich pals in the Middle East, and sent to cash to an account in the Cayman Islands.

  34. 34.

    StringOnAStick

    @West of the Cascades: Agreed.  Loneliness has been a huge part of the Covid experience, even if the suicide rate is down.  I’m certainly feeling it and plenty of others have reported the same here.

  35. 35.

    StringOnAStick

    @Dopey-o: I’ve always suspected the same.  Jared cut a sweet deal for vaccine to his buddy MBS, you just know he did.  I hope there’s a trail to follow and the will to follow it.

  36. 36.

    JaneE

    DeSantis is GOP slime.  If the Publix deal wasn’t pure pay-to-play, it was a deliberate attempt to keep the vaccine away from areas with large Black populations and increase their chances of catching and dying before the vaccine reached them.  I wish Biden would send National Guard medical teams into the most vulnerable population centers with their own dedicated supply of vaccine and bypass the state control altogether.

  37. 37.

    JaneE

    @StringOnAStick: How much of the loneliness vs suicide rate is the knowledge that this loneliness isn’t just me and my problem but something that is shared with the whole country?  Knowing that the isolation is actually helping to save lives and is consciously chosen may make it more tolerable than feeling that you are somehow different (in a bad way) from everyone else.

  38. 38.

    Another Scott

    Phys.org:

    A new study from the University of Central Florida suggests that masks and a good ventilation system are more important than social distancing for reducing the airborne spread of COVID-19 in classrooms.

    The research, published recently in the journal Physics of Fluids, comes at a critical time when schools and universities are considering returning to more in-person classes in the fall.

    “The research is important as it provides guidance on how we are understanding safety in indoor environments,” says Michael Kinzel, an assistant professor in UCF’s Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering and study co-author.

    “The study finds that aerosol transmission routes do not display a need for six feet social distancing when masks are mandated,” he says. “These results highlight that with masks, transmission probability does not decrease with increased physical distancing, which emphasizes how mask mandates may be key to increasing capacity in schools and other places.”

    […]

    More information: Aaron Foster et al, Estimating COVID-19 exposure in a classroom setting: A comparison between mathematical and numerical models, Physics of Fluids (2021). DOI: 10.1063/5.0040755

    (Emphasis added.)

    We’re going to need masks for a long time, I think.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

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