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Celebrate the fucking wins.

Books are my comfort food!

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Teach a man to fish, and he’ll sit in a boat all day drinking beer.

The National Guard is not Batman.

Do we throw up our hands or do we roll up our sleeves? (hint, door #2)

Quote tweet friends, screenshot enemies.

The most dangerous place for a black man in America is in a white man’s imagination.

The poor and middle-class pay taxes, the rich pay accountants, the wealthy pay politicians.

Radicalized white males who support Trump are pitching a tent in the abyss.

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Insiders who complain to politico: please report to the white house office of shut the fuck up.

Let me file that under fuck it.

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You’re just a puppy masquerading as an old coot.

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The current Supreme Court is a dangerous, rogue court.

New McCarthy, same old McCarthyism.

When you’re a Republican, they let you do it.

Hey Washington Post, “Democracy Dies in Darkness” was supposed to be a warning, not a mission statement.

Republicans got rid of McCarthy. Democrats chose not to save him.

The next time the wall street journal editorial board speaks the truth will be the first.

Reality always gets a vote in the end.

You are here: Home / Healthcare / COVID-19 / COVID-19 Coronavirus Updates: Wednesday / Thursday, Jan. 5-6

COVID-19 Coronavirus Updates: Wednesday / Thursday, Jan. 5-6

by | 51 Comments

This post is in: 


Thread of scary numbers, from an expert who isn’t a doom-poster:

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More cities in central China’s Henan province imposed COVID restrictions as infections there rose sharply, while authorities in the northwestern city of Xian apologised on Thursday to a woman whose miscarriage during lockdown stirred public outrage.

Henan reported 64 domestically transmitted infections with confirmed symptoms for Wednesday, up from just four a day earlier, official data showed on Thursday.

While those numbers are small by global standards, and no cases of the highly transmissible Omicron variant have been reported so far in Henan, several cities there imposed new limits on travel and other activities in response…

Nearly all of the more than 4 million residents of Xuchang in Henan province, meanwhile, were to be tested for COVID-19 on Thursday and Friday and movement of people was to be minimised, while the 1 million residents of Yuzhou city, under Xuchang’s juridiction, were in lockdown.

Mainland China has only announced a handful of Omicron cases from international travellers and at least one locally transmitted infection, but it has intensified efforts to reduce the risk of the variant being brought from overseas.,,

International passenger flights into Xian’s airport were halted from Wednesday, the official Xinhua news agency reported on Thursday. Domestic passenger flights had already been suspended.

No emmerde!

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Note: ‘Flurona’ just means you’ve been unlucky enough to contract two different infections at the same time. Ignore the fringe speculation about a ‘superbug’ that somehow combines the two viruses, because that’s hardly biologically possible:

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Reader Interactions

51Comments

  1. 1.

    YY_Sima Qian

    On 1/5 China reported 132 new domestic confirmed (30 previously asymptomatic) & 10 new domestic asymptomatic cases.

    Shaanxi Province reported 63 new domestic confirmed cases (all mild). 38 domestic confirmed cases recovered. There are currently 1806 active domestic confirmed cases (including 10 serious & 3 critical) in the province.

    • Xi’an reported 63 new domestic confirmed cases (all mild), 62 from persons already under home or centralized quarantine & 1 from mass screening. 37 domestic confirmed cases recovered. There currently are 1,780 active confirmed cases in the city. 2 university campuses & 1 sub-district are currently at High Risk. 46 sub-districts & 17 communities are currently at Medium Risk.
    • At Yan’an there currently are 13 active domestic confirmed cases in the city. 5 communities, 1 residential compound, 1 village & 1 company are currently at Medium Risk.
    • At Xianyang 1 domestic confirmed case recovered. There currently are 12 active domestic confirmed case in the city.
    • At Weinan there currently is 1 active domestic confirmed case in the city.

    At Yuncheng in Shanxi Province there currently is 1 active domestic confirmed case, a person arrived from Xi’an in Shaanxi.

    At Guangdong Province 2 domestic confirmed cases recovered. There currently are 19 active domestic confirmed (all at Dongguan) & 1 active domestic asymptomatic (at Foshan) cases in the province.

    At Guangxi “Autonomous” Region there currently are 19 active domestic confirmed (all at Dongxing in Fangchenggang) & 1 active domestic asymptomatic (at Chongzuo) cases in the province. 1 village at Fangchenggang remains at High Risk.

    At Hulun Buir in Inner Mongolia “Autonomous” Region 9 domestic confirmed cases recovered. There currently are 7 active domestic confirmed cases remaining (all at Manzhouli).

    Shanghai Municipality did not report any new domestic asymptomatic cases. There currently are 8 active domestic asymptomatic cases in the city. 

    Jiangsu Province did not report any new domestic positive cases. There currently are 1 active domestic confirmed & 3 active domestic asymptomatic cases in the province.

    • At Nanjing there is 1 active domestic confirmed case, a Yangtze River boat pilot found via regular screening.
    • At Wuxi there currently are 3 active domestic asymptomatic cases remaining.

    Zhejiang Province reported 5 new domestic confirmed & 1 new domestic asymptomatic cases. All 5 domestic confirmed cases are reported by Beilun District in Ningbo, all traced close contacts already under centralized quarantine. The domestic asymptomatic case is reported by Jinhua, a driver who had used the same gas station restroom as the 2 domestic positive cases reported by Zhoukou in Henan, when they were doing deliveries in Zhejiang Province. 104 domestic confirmed cases recovered. There currently are 358 active domestic confirmed (spread across Shaoxing, Ningbo & Hangzhou) & 1 active domestic asymptomatic (at Jinhua) cases in the province. 1 factory & 1 village at Beilun District in Ningbo are currently at Medium Risk.

    At Suzhou in Anhui Province the domestic confirmed case recovered.

    At Xiamen in Fujian Province there currently is 1 active domestic confirmed case remaining, a quarantine hotel worker.

    At Chongqing Municipality there currently is 1 active domestic confirmed case remaining.

    Henan Province reported 64 new domestic confirmed (30 previously asymptomatic) & 9 asymptomatic cases. 1 domestic confirmed case recovered. There currently are 90 active domestic confirmed & 22 active domestic asymptomatic cases.

    • Zhengzhou reported 5 new domestic confirmed (3 previously asymptomatic) & 8 new domestic asymptomatic cases. 1 domestic confirmed case recovered. There currently are 21 active domestic confirmed & 15 active domestic asymptomatic cases in the city. 2 residential compounds have been elevated to Medium Risk.
    • Zhoukou reported 3 new domestic confirmed cases (all previously asymptomatic). There currently are 6 active domestic confirmed cases in the city.
    • Luoyang reported 4 new domestic confirmed cases (all previously asymptomatic). There currently are 7 active domestic confirmed & 2 active domestic asymptomatic cases in the city, all at Xin’an County. 1 community & 1 village are currently at Medium Risk.
    • Xuchang reported 50 new domestic confirmed cases (20 previously asymptomatic). There currently are 55 active domestic confirmed (53 mild & 2 moderate) & 3 active domestic asymptomatic cases in the city. 1 sub-district & 1 township are currently at High Risk. 3 villages, 2 residential compounds & a school have been elevated to Medium Risk.
    • Xinyang reported 1 new domestic confirmed & 1 new domestic asymptomatic cases, both at Gushi County, both returned from Zhengzhou in Henan on 1/3. The confirmed case was found via voluntary testing on 1/4 due to recent travel history to Zhengzhou, & the asymptomatic case was identified as a close contact & placed under centralized quarantine late on 1/4.
    • Shangqiu reported 1 new domestic confirmed case, a traced close contact of a domestic positive case  reported by Zhengzhou (attended a wedding there at end of Dec. & returned to Shangqiu on 12/31), already under centralized quarantine since 1/4.

    At Yunnan Province 3 domestic confirmed cases recovered & 1 domestic asymptomatic case was released from isolation. There currently are 18 active domestic confirmed (10 at Dehong Prefecture & 5 at Kunming) & 8 active domestic asymptomatic (6 at Dehong Prefecture & 2 at Sipsongpanna Prefecture) cases in the province. 1 residential compound at Kunming is currently at Medium Risk.

    At Tongren in Guizhou Province there currently is 1 active domestic confirmed case in the city, a person who returned from Jinghong, Sipsongpanna Prefecture in Yunnan.

    Imported Cases

    On 1/5, China reported 57 new imported confirmed cases (6 previously asymptomatic), 35 imported asymptomatic cases, 2 imported suspect cases:

    • Shanghai Municipality – 20 confirmed cases, 5 Chinese nationals each returning from the US & Canada, 2 from the UAE & 1 each from the Sudan, France, Germany & the UK (via Copenhagen), a Swedish & an Argentinian nationals coming from Argentina (both via the US), a Columbian national coming from Columbia (via the US) & a US national coming from the US; 2 suspect cases, no information released
    • Guangzhou in Guangdong Province – 9 confirmed cases, 7 Chinese nationals returning from the US & 1 each from Mexico & Singapore; 12 asymptomatic cases, 7 Chinese nationals returning from the US, 3 from Timor Leste & 1 each from Iran & Venezuela (via)
    • Shenzhen in Guangdong Province – 1 confirmed case, a Chinese national returning from Singapore
    • Hangzhou in Zhejiang Province – 7 confirmed cases (3 previously asymptomatic), the 4 new cases are 2 coming from Chad & 1 each from the Sudan & South Sudan; 4 asymptomatic cases, 2 coming from Spain & 1 each from Germany & Nigeria
    • Xiamen in Fujian Province – 6 confirmed cases, 1 Chinese national each returning from Thailand, Canada & the US, 2 Canadian nationals coming from Canada, s& a US national coming from the US
    • Putian in Fujian Province – 1 asymptomatic case, no information released
    • Fuzhou in Fujian Province – 1 asymptomatic case, coming from Spain
    • Tianjin Municipality – 4 confirmed cases, 2 Chinese nationals returning from the US & 1 each from Congo-Brazzaville & Madagascar (both via Paris CdG); 3 asymptomatic cases, 2 Chinese & an Italian nationals returning from Italy
    • Guangxi “Autonomous” Region (location not specified) – 2 confirmed & 4 asymptomatic cases, no information released
    • Chengdu in Sichuan Province – 2 confirmed cases (both previously asymptomatic), 1 Chinese national each returning from Kazakhstan & Russia; 1 asymptomatic case, a Chinese national returning from Singapore
    • Yunnan Province (location not specified) – 2 confirmed cases, 1 Chinese national each returning from Laos & Myanmar; 7 asymptomatic cases, 4 Chinese nationals returning from Laos & 3 from Myanmar; all via land border crossings
    • Changchun in Jilin Province – 1 confirmed case, coming from South Korea
    • Yangzhou in Jiangsu Province – 1 confirmed case, coming from Finland, off a flight that landed at Shanghai
    • Linyi in Shandong Province – 1 confirmed case, a Chinese national returning from Japan; the case had arrived at Shanghai on 12/14, passed through the 14 days of centralized quarantine & tested negative 6 times, upon release from quarantine on 12/28 the case returned to Linyi by long distance bus service & re-entered centralized quarantine, tested negative 2 further times before testing positive on 1/4
    • Zhengzhou in Henan Province – 1 confirmed case, no information released
    • Dalian in Liaoning Province – 1 asymptomatic case, no information released

    Overall in China, 198 confirmed cases recovered (39 imported), 12 asymptomatic cases were released from isolation (11 imported) & 36 were reclassified as confirmed cases (6 imported), & 3,889 individuals were released from quarantine. Currently, there are 3,282 active confirmed cases in the country (939 imported), 30 in serious condition (3 imported), 629 active asymptomatic cases (583 imported), 2 suspect cases (both imported). 41,619 traced contacts are currently under centralized quarantine.

    As of 1/5, 2,872.017M vaccine doses have been injected in Mainland China, an increase of 8.456M doses in the past 24 hrs.

    On 1/6, Hong Kong reported 38 new positive cases, 34 imported & 4 domestic (3 connected to imported cases & 1 from cryptic community transmission).

  2. 2.

    NeenerNeener

    Monroe County, NY:

    THE NYSDOH website says 1749 new cases yesterday.

    I got a robocall from one of my doctors to confirm an appointment on Monday, and it said it was an “in office appointment” at the hospital. The first thing I did when the office opened the next morning was change it to a Zoom call. No way I’m going near a hospital right now if I don’t have to.

  3. 3.

    New Deal democrat

    In the past 10 days, hospitalizations in the US have increased by 70% from 70,000 to 120,000, and are only about 12,000 under their all-time high from one year ago. They are likely to top that record within 3 days. Cases had increased 60% in the 10 day period before that, meaning that so far there is no indication that cases on average have been milder. I saw several more graphs yesterday that failed to properly show the lag in the hospitalization data, although a few experts I follow, notably Eric Topol and Conor Kelly, have picked up on the same thing.

    I got a question yesterday whether the proper comparison isn’t with the previous Delta wave. That got me to thinking whether the pattern would hold true for *all* previous waves. So here is the ratio of cases at peak to deaths at peak for all previous waves plus Omicron so far:
    Spring 2020: 14.3
    Summer 2020: 60.1
    Winter 2020-21: 74.4
    Delta: 78.7
    Omicron (so far): 97.4

    Here is the same ratio at the troughs following the 4 previous waves:
    Spring 2020: 39.5
    Summer 2020: 49.0
    Winter 2020-21: 51.4
    Delta: 61.8

    The pattern is clear. Each successive wave has been “milder” in terms of the percentage of cases that have resulted in deaths. That might be because of better treatments, behavior adjustments, the inherent nature of each variant, or increased resistance in the population due to vaccinations or previous infection, or some combination of them. In any event, it suggests that future waves are likely to have progressively less impact.

    One thing is clear: vaccinations alone will never work for the US. Portugal is the most vaccinated country in Europe, with 89% of its population fully vaccinated, and yet their cases went from 10 to 240 per 100,000 in Omicron so far, although deaths have not increased yet significantly.

    There are a few signs that the places in the US first hard hit may be peaking, as NY, HI, and PR have not had a significant increase in cases in the past 3 days.

    Finally, South Africa’s news is not so good, as cases have risen again slightly, and deaths made another new Omicron high, having risen 7x from their pre-Omicron low (but still at a low level compared with previous peaks).

  4. 4.

    p.a.

    Soooo… US rapid antigen tests are NG testing for omicron because they take nasal and not throat samples? ☹️ I’m reading that correctly?

  5. 5.

    Matt McIrvin

    @New Deal democrat: But as with South Africa, I’m hearing from doctors that a lot of these are incidental hospitalizations–people admitted for something else who then test COVID positive. So it’s mostly an indication of how hellaciously contagious this is. The fraction who go into the ICU is lower. But not so low that it makes sense to not treat this as dangerous.

    I’ve always assumed cases were being undercounted by a huge factor in the spring 2020 wave, so it makes sense for that to be a big outlier in terms of CFR. But they’re probably being undercounted by a large factor now too.

  6. 6.

    NotMax

    Locally,

    On the eve of the 2022 legislative session, the leaders of the state Senate and House announced today that the state Capitol again will be closed to the public — for now — because of rising concerns over COVID-19.
    [snip]
    Senate and House floor sessions and hearings will be held remotely and [House Speaker] Saiki told Spotlight Hawaii that plans will be announced on how the public can submit testimony. Source

    Culled from the AP.

    France announced a staggering 332,252 daily virus cases Wednesday, smashing a string of recent records, as hospitals prepared drastic measures to brace for patient surges and the government strained to avoid a new lockdown.

    With Europe’s highest-ever single-day confirmed infection count, France is facing an omicron-driven surge that is dominating the race for April’s presidential election and increasingly disrupting workplaces, schools and public life.
    [snip]
    France’s weekly average of virus cases has doubled in the past 10 days, with more than 1,800 people out of 100,000 testing positive over the past week, according to the government health agency.

    The number of virus patients in hospitals has been on an upward trajectory for two months, and more than 72% of French ICU beds are now occupied by people with COVID-19. Source

    Just two weeks before it was to be held in Park City, Utah, the Sundance Film Festival is canceling its in-person festival and reverting to an entirely virtual edition due to the current coronavirus surge.

    Festival organizers announced Wednesday that the festival will start as scheduled on Jan. 20 but will shift online. Source

    The Grammy Awards were postponed Wednesday weeks before the planned Los Angeles ceremony over what organizers called “too many risks” from the omicron variant, signaling what could be the start of another year of pandemic upheaval for awards season. Source

  9. 9.

    Kay

    Just ripping thru kids here. One third of our local school district students (K-8) were absent yesterday. About 1/4 of staff were out.

  11. 11.

    John S.

    @rikyrah:

    I think they just did. And just in time for me to get my 14 year old a booster now that he’s 6 months out from his second shot. ?

  12. 12.

    lowtechcyclist

    There are now 4,561 schools closed across the nation according to Burbio.

     

    Context: there are 140K schools in US

    Clearer context, perhaps: about 1 out of every 30 U.S. schools are closed.

    One missing piece of context: does this include weather-related closures?  Schools in my county are open today for the first time since before Christmas, but it’s been due to snow, and downed trees and power lines resulting from the snow.  I’m sure the DC area isn’t the only place that got hit this week.

  14. 14.

    John S.

    @Kay:

    Here too. But that was expected here in Ron Deathsantis’ Freedumb state. My daughter told me that there’s a lot of kids missing from her middle school this week. Mostly the ones who didn’t wear masks.

  18. 18.

    Kay

    @John S.:

    Ours have to wear masks. The superintendent held firm in the face of a lot of Trumpist screaming last year (it’s a 65% Trump county) but the screaming waned and now no one talks about it anymore- every kid is masked every day.

    But we have less than 40% vaccinated, so I assumed it would hit hard.

  19. 19.

    Asparagus Aspersions

    France – We’re at 1753 cases per 100,000, with positive testing rate of 15.88 %, and 129 percent increase in case numbers since last week. Anecdotally, I have never known so many people with COVID, as a number of friends and acquaintances have tested positive over the past week or two. Most of them did a home test, and then had the results confirmed with a rapid antigen or PCR test (I’m not sure about smaller towns, but in Paris it is incredibly easy to get a rapid antigen test at a pharmacy. I think the longest line we waited in was about 20 minutes. The tests are 25 euros but are fully covered if you’re vaccinated, or have a prescription).

  20. 20.

    sdhays

    @Kay: It looks like that study is set to end in the middle of next year. I was more lamenting that we seem to have to wait for April at the earliest (and hope this time Pfizer has something that works). I was really hoping there would be an approved vaccine available for children younger than 5 by now. I got overly expectant with the rollout of vaccines for adults and older children.

  21. 21.

    Starfish

    @Kay: It is almost like it was a coordinated attack on schools, and none of those folks had kids in the school district.

  22. 22.

    Kay

    @lowtechcyclist:

    15 of the largest 100 districts were closed yesterday- two due to weather.

    There’s some confusion about this (or ignorance, don’t know) because there’s a divide between majority/minority districts and majority white districts that has been true thru the whole pandemic, where majority/minority district parents are more concerned about covid and more supportive of school closures. So Detroit and Toledo were closed, but one shouldn’t assume Detroit and Toledo parents don’t support this- many of them do.

  24. 24.

    Mousebumples

    @Kay: we live 2+ hours from Madison (the + is more referring to winter driving, lol), and i considered trying to enroll my 2 year old when they started up there in August.

    I haven’t heard details on progress or results, other than what you’ve shared. So thanks for that glimmer of hope that I won’t need to wait until April to vaccinate my little girl.

  25. 25.

    Kay

    @sdhays:

    I don’t know about all the trials but my daughter was told the NY trial was complete and they expected approval in February. She too is anxious for approval because she doesn’t know if her daughter got the vaccine or not- it was blind and 1/4 didn’t get the real vaccine.

  26. 26.

    New Deal democrat

    @Matt McIrvin: Here is a thread from Dr. Tom Moultrie in South Africa I just read this morning:
    mobile.twitter.com/tomtom_m/status/1478795238978248713

    “the data on hospitalisations (this from http://sacmcepidemicexplorer.co.za) from the DatCov system show numbers of admissions that are lower than in previous waves, but not as dramatically as much as the deaths are lower.”

    The real decoupling from prior waves was in deaths.

    Also, according to
    mobile.twitter.com/EricTopol/status/1478919822125645825

    “The level of patients requiring ICU beds is nearly as high as the monster 3rd wave (well below the 1st wave)” in NYC.

  28. 28.

    Kay

    @Mousebumples:

    Oh, it must be so hard. My daughter is a PA and she’s worked thu the whole thing and worried about the baby getting it the whole time. Her daughter had zero side effects in the trial- the biggest issue was the blood draws, which she (understandably) hated, but we don’t know if she got the vaccine or the control so “zero side effects” doesn;t mean much :)

  29. 29.

    Starfish

    @Kay: I got softblocked on Twitter by a school board member as she cheered return to school yesterday. I told her that the behavior was gross.

  30. 30.

    Soprano2

    @Matt McIrvin: Cases will always be undercounted with Covid because there are so many asymptomatic cases. Lots of people have had Covid and don’t know it, and will probably never know for sure. Asymptomatic cases are only found when people are tested for other reasons – hospital admission, for example.

  31. 31.

    sdhays

    @Kay: Oh, wow. It seems I only hear about Pfizer maybe being available in the nearer term. That gives me hope!

  32. 32.

    Soprano2

    @Kay: We’re probably going to see the same thing here because so many people are unvaccinated, and the local school district was forced to discontinue their mask mandate by the stupid state government. The Delta peak of daily cases was 406; yesterday’s was 473., which could possibly be a holiday bump. The 7-day case average is 248, and the positivity rate is 9%. I think in a week or so it’s going to be absolutely brutal here.

  33. 33.

    Percysowner

    It’s unclear what Djokovic can now do to enter Australia

    Uh, get vaccinated and wait until it’s taken effect? He won’t make whatever match he wanted to play, but it’s not like he doesn’t have options. A check of the article says his medical reasons are that he had COVID, to nothing that says he can’t be vaccinate.

     

    Of course his father is saying

    “Tonight they can throw him in a dungeon, tomorrow they can put him in chains. The truth is he is like water and water paves its own path. Novak is the Spartacus of the new world which won’t tolerate injustice, colonialism and hypocrisy.”

    Srdjan accused the Australian government of “holding my son captive” and threatened to “gather in the street” should the government not “let him go in half an hour.”

    So the antivax is strong in this family

  34. 34.

    Cermet

    The rate for boosters isn’t encouraging; and I am extremely glad that the  6 month to 5 year old’s will soon be able to get the vaccine (but not soon enough for Omicron); however, the total number of vaccinated in this country will never be even remotely close enough to control Omicron.  But then, considering this should burn out by February(?), maybe not as important. As long as a new variant does not appear that burns through, we might – with vaccinated and the fool’s that get immunize the hard way – get through this pandemic and ‘just’ see an epidemic for a while.

  35. 35.

    Another Scott

    @Cermet:  Never is a very long time. Mandates work (look at the DoD).

    It will be interesting to see how the mandate goes in France.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  36. 36.

    Robert Sneddon

    @sdhays: I was really hoping there would be an approved vaccine available for children younger than 5 by now. I got overly expectant with the rollout of vaccines for adults and older children.

    The testing organisations and approval authorities have to be careful. Biologically speaking, babies are not toddlers, toddlers are not young children and young children are not teenagers. Safety first is the guiding principle.

    Rushing things could lead to pediatric wards in hospitals filling up with kids with serious adverse reactions to vaccines that were developed and tested primarily on adults. Sure the various vaccines have been successful and safe in widespread use but that success and safety is only provably true for adults and now older children.

  37. 37.

    Starfish

    @Cermet: There are a number of reasons people are not boosted yet. Some of it may be “they dragged their feet on the first two vaccines and have not had enough time between the second and third vaccine.” I did not consider this possibility until someone who did this explained it to me. They had their second vaccine in September, so they had not had six months to get boosted. They dropped the requirement to five months yesterday, so hopefully that opens up boosters to more people.

  38. 38.

    Jay

    Making life fun, we have 58 people at work out, ( sick, quarantine, testing), 1/3rd of all staff, including Part Timers, all since Dec 30 “case 1”.

    So yesterday, 15 hours of store opening, there was just 1 guy in tool rental.

    Nobody in Plumbing or Flooring.

  39. 39.

    Kay

    @Starfish:

    I think it’s been really hard for schools and anyone who assumes bad faith on the part of schools should not be listened to. They have been grinding thru this a long time now. Also! Don’t forget! They also got slammed with the critical race theory panic for months.

    There are honest brokers on public schools, people absolutely can criticize public schools- they’re a public entity and accountable to the public- but there are also a lot of people who have a political/ideological ax to grind and are using CRT/covid/whatever as an excuse to attack them.

    You just have to figure out who to listen to.

  40. 40.

    Yarrow

    For those with kids in schools or who deal with schools, this is a good thread on how to make air safer in schools. It’s UK based so some of the links may not be as useful but it’s good for general principles. Of course also applies to other indoor situations.

    Thread: How do we make the air in classrooms safer?
    All you need to know about HEPA filters,CO2 monitors and ventilation. Contents: basic ideas; how to with links to resources; caveats; links to studies / evidence (that I’ll add to cos takes more time) 1/
    — Adam squires (@adsquires) January 5, 2022

  41. 41.

    Barbara

    Of all the interesting data points, the two I find most significant are (1) the percentage of people who are hospitalized with other diagnoses who are determined to have asymptomatic Covid and (2) data I have read elsewhere about the number of people who are flooding ERs in order to get a Covid test.  The latter is an example of the most suboptimal behavior you can imagine from a public health perspective, and yet, here we are.  The simple, cheap preventive technology — vaccine — is spurned in favor of the mostly useless and overpriced intervention that coincidentally has the collateral effect of putting large numbers of other people at risk.
    My county has not been perfect by any means but it did set up three free testing sites throughout the county so that people could get a test without going to an ER.  It also mandated masks for students and staff in schools.  It’s also doing pooled testing to identify school cases.​

  43. 43.

    Robert Sneddon

    Scotland — 11,300 new cases of COVID-19 reported, again with the caveat that PCR testing at the central labs is backed up due to the increased load and the long holiday weekend just past. Test positivity rate is 23%. I can’t see a current breakdown of case numbers, Omicron variant versus Delta variant but a couple of weeks ago it was 80% Omicron. If the Omicron variant is going to displace the Delta variant it should be much higher now.

    There were 18 deaths of people with a positive diagnosis of COVID-19 within the last 28 days reported. Hospitalisation numbers have increased again but ICU and mechanical ventilation bed patient numbers remain lower than the level they were at two months ago when the caseload was all Delta variant.

    The vaccination and booster programs have started up again in Scotland after the holidays. Initial vaccinations (first and second dose) seem to be concentrated now in the 12 to 17 year old age group which are exceeding the vaccination percentages of supposedly sensible adults in the 18-39 age group who have been eligible for vaccination for over six months.

  44. 44.

    sdhays

    @Robert Sneddon: I totally appreciate that. Like I said, the other age groups just rolled out in the timeframe they originally announced, so I got my hopes up that younger children would get the vaccine similarly “on time”.

  45. 45.

    Sloane Ranger

    Wednesday in the UK we had 194,747 new cases. This is an increase of 40.1% in the rolling 7-day average. New cases by nation,

    England – 150,232

    Northern Ireland – 7133

    Scotland – 16,103 (but see Robert Sneddon’s post above)

    Wales – 21,279.

    Deaths – There were 334 deaths within 28 days of a positive test yesterday. This figure probably contains an element of catch-up from the festive period. The moving 7-day average is up by 131.6%. 316 deaths were in England, 3 in Northern Ireland, 5 in Scotland and 10 in Wales.

    Testing – 2,050,101 tests took place on Tuesday, 4th January. This is an increase of 7% in the rolling 7-day average. The PCR testing capacity reported by labs on this date was 965,447.

    Hospitalisations – On Tuesday, 4th, there were 17,276 people in hospital and 911 on ventilators. The 7-day average for hospital admissions was up by 58.5% as of 28 December.

    Vaccinations – As of Tuesday, 4th, 51,845,518 people had had 1 shot of a vaccine, 47,523,676 had had 2 and 34,586,810 had had a 3rd shot/booster. In percentage terms this means that 90.2% of all UK residents aged 12+ had had 1 shot, 82.6% had had 2 and 60.1% had had a 3rd shot/booster as of that date.

  46. 46.

    Stacy

    My fully-vaccinated 7 year old tested positive with an at-home test on Saturday and positive on a PCR test on Monday. She had cold-like symptoms for 2 days and then was fine. My vaxxed and boosted husband started having symptoms on Tuesday, yesterday he said it felt like a bad cold, today he says it feels like he’s getting over a bad cold. I haven’t had any symptoms at all, and we’ll all be getting a PCR tomorrow. We live in northern CA, almost everyone is vaxxed here. We’re pretty sure my daughter got it from a swim lesson last week. It was outside, but she and the teacher were very close for 30 minutes. He had a mask on but I don’t think it would have done much since it was wet.

  47. 47.

    Gravenstone

    This is simply calling out the obvious, but if anyone needed additional proof that Russia is cooking their covid  numbers, just compare their 60 day curve relative to the other countries included in that tweet above. They are the only country to have a persistent negative slope.

  48. 48.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    Positive rate in LA County is at 20%, but testing has been low so those that are being tested may already think they’re infected so that may bump the rate up a bit.  We had a lot of folk out sick at the Home of the Orange Apron.

  49. 49.

    Lacuna Synecdoche

    @OzarkHillbilly: I really wonder how they can have such sun shiny outlooks with their heads so far up their asses.

    I’m guessing it’s the human Klein bottle effect – you get that when your head is so far up your ass it pops out of your own mouth.

  50. 50.

    Bill Arnold

    @Gravenstone:

    …if anyone needed additional proof that Russia is cooking their covid numbers, just compare their 60 day curve relative to the other countries included in that tweet above.

    Russia’s official COVID-19 stats are an insult to statisticians.
    (Anyone with any skill, and dice or an RNG, could generate more believable sequences of daily stats.)

  51. 51.

    daveNYC

    Dunno, the case numbers in the USA (and in most countries other than China) would seem to indicate that things are pretty much out of control now that omicron is on the sceen.

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