Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Whoever he was, that guy was nuts.

I know this must be bad for Joe Biden, I just don’t know how.

Make the republican party small enough to drown in a bathtub.

I’d try pessimism, but it probably wouldn’t work.

Usually wrong but never in doubt

I see no possible difficulties whatsoever with this fool-proof plan.

Presidents are not kings, and Plaintiff is not President.

Too often we confuse noise with substance. too often we confuse setbacks with defeat.

Do not shrug your shoulders and accept the normalization of untruths.

We still have time to mess this up!

Consistently wrong since 2002

The willow is too close to the house.

No offense, but this thread hasn’t been about you for quite a while.

Let us savor the impending downfall of lawless scoundrels who richly deserve the trouble barreling their way.

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

Wow, you are pre-disappointed. How surprising.

A sufficient plurality of insane, greedy people can tank any democratic system ever devised, apparently.

A thin legal pretext to veneer over their personal religious and political desires

Impressively dumb. Congratulations.

Good lord, these people are nuts.

Balloon Juice has never been a refuge for the linguistically delicate.

“Jesus paying for the sins of everyone is an insult to those who paid for their own sins.”

“More of this”, i said to the dog.

It’s the corruption, stupid.

You are here: Home / Healthcare / COVID-19 Coronavirus / COVID-19 Coronavirus Updates: Friday / Saturday, Jan 7-8

COVID-19 Coronavirus Updates: Friday / Saturday, Jan 7-8

by | 32 Comments

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Pharmacist (and parent) Mousebumples forwarded a glass-half-full story I missed earlier:


My take? The ‘conservative’ SC(R)OTUS justices don’t mind the peons getting sick, but damned if they’ll risk having some unvaxxed health care worker breath germs all over them…

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A long article, but it’s the weekend, and it is well worth reading the whole thing:

… The actions India did — and didn’t take — as delta emerged, ultimately saddled its people and the world with a ruthlessly virulent incarnation of the coronavirus, one that challenged vaccines and containment regimes like none before it. Delta upended even the most successful pandemic strategies, snaking into countries like Australia and China with stringent “Covid Zero” curbs in place and effectively closed borders. It’s been the most dominant form of Covid for much of this year, when more than 3.5 million people died of the virus — almost double the toll during the first year of the pandemic.

Multiple scientists interviewed by Bloomberg News said that the way India handled the early days of delta fueled its rise. The variant’s identification was delayed because the country’s laboratories were flying blind for much of 2020 and early 2021, partly because Modi’s government had restricted imports of vital genetic sequencing compounds under a nationalistic agenda to drive self sufficiency, they said. There were repeated efforts to warn the administration about the new strain in early February, the scientists said, yet India went public with details of the more transmissible variant only at the end of March.

“The charitable view is they didn’t want to sound the alarm without having more conclusive evidence,” said Ramanan Laxminarayan, director of the Center for Disease Dynamics, Economics & Policy, a research institute with offices in New Delhi and Washington that has helped conduct some of India’s largest Covid studies. “The more skeptical view is that everything about Covid has been politically managed and therefore it’s a question of whether they didn’t want to alarm people about something happening in India for fear of stigma — almost every country is trying to play this game.”

While the fallout from delta has been devastating, many of its lessons are yet to be addressed. South Africa’s vigilance makes it an outlier, with gaping virus surveillance holes across the world, particularly in countries that have already limited means to purchase and distribute vaccines, let alone the luxury of expensive sequencing programs.

More than 80% of the 6.5 million SARS-CoV-2 genomes that have been decoded and then uploaded to GISAID, the international database that tracks changes in the virus, have come from Europe and North America. Given the way southern Africa was treated when news of omicron emerged — with travel curbs levied from the U.S. to Japan — there may also be limited political appetite to remedy that disparity…

India isn’t the only nation where scientists have struggled to convince governments about the merits of decoding the structure of the virus. Even in the U.K., which has a world-leading Covid sequencing drive that has recorded 13% of all cases, there was early criticism that it was essentially an expensive academic exercise of limited real-world value.

The U.S. also reported omicron cases much later than other countries, even though officials said the new variant was likely already in the country, a sign of gaps in its sequencing systems…

For a second time in two days, the majority of passengers arriving in India on a flight from Italy have tested positive for Covid according to Indian officials.

On Friday, 173 out of 285 passengers aboard the flight from Rome to Amritsar tested positive on arrival.

It follows more than a hundred people testing positive after arriving in Amritsar from Milan on Wednesday.

On Thursday, cases in Italy reached a new record of nearly 220,000.

India reported more than 100,000 cases on Friday – experts believe Omicron is causing the sharp jump in infections the country has seen in the last week…

The passengers with Covid who arrived from Rome have been sent for institutional quarantine in their home districts, local health officials said.

The infected passengers from the Milan flight two days earlier were taken to hospital.

However, at least 13 people on the Milan flight managed to escape quarantine. Police say they will file complaints against them.

India has so far recorded more than 35 million Covid cases and around 483,000 deaths from the virus.


From the longer thread:

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Reader Interactions

32Comments

  1. 1.

    NeenerNeener

    Monroe County, NY:

    The Monroe County website:
    There were 2373 new laboratory-confirmed cases of COVID-19 on 1/7.
    There were 981 new positive COVID home tests reported on 1/7.
    The NYSDOH website: 2098 new cases

    Hospitalizations as of 1/5:

    144 people hospitalized, 108 are unvaxed (75%)
    29 are in the ICU, 24 are unvaxed
    22 are intubated, 18 are unvaxed

  3. 3.

    NotMax

    Locally,

    The state Department of Health is reporting a COVID-19 count of 3,586 new cases today. This comes following a record high of 4,789 new cases reported yesterday (Thursday, Jan. 6, 2022).

    Todayʻs count includes 579 cases on Maui, 286 on Hawaiʻi Island, 237 on Kauaʻi, 20 on Molokaʻi, 11 on Lānaʻi, and 66 out of state, as the omicron surge spreads across the state. There are 2,387 new COVID-19 cases on Oʻahu.
    [snip]
    Hawai‘i’s COVID-19 deaths increased to 1,101, with three new deaths reported today, including one on Oʻahu, and two on Hawaiʻi Island. Source:

    Hawaii education officials on every level are scrambling to contend with the latest COVID-19 surge, with public schools reporting another jump in teacher absences and Chaminade University joining the growing list of institutions shifting temporarily to virtual learning.

    Today, 1,812 public school teachers were absent, meaning approximately 14% of the 12,800 teachers statewide were out, according to state Department of Education data.

    The absences were roughly 13% higher than the 1,600 that interim state schools Superintendent Keith Hayashi reported Wednesday, and about 39% higher than the approximately 1,300 teachers DOE said were typically out in December before the omicron variant surge. Source

    Temporary interisland shipping disruptions are expected for small container or palletized shipping as a result of COVID-19 related worker impacts at the Young Brothers shipyard on Maui, Mayor Michael Victorino confirmed.

    “On Wednesday of this week, I received a letter from Young Brothers about interisland cargo shipping disruptions that may be occurring,” said Mayor Victorino during an afternoon press briefing on Friday, noting that the impact is due to [a] COVID-19 outbreak at the maui shipping yard. “Young Brothers will be temporarily suspending most outgoing cargo from Kahului Harbor that [is] not containerized. And also bringing in bulk or pallet shipping that are not containerized–will be interrupted.”
    [snip]
    “But you can be rest assured, you don’t have to run off to Costco, or to Walmart, or to Walgreens, or to CVS/Longs, and start stocking up with toilet tissue and hand towels and other things. We are safe. However, there will be the small shipping–and this will affect like our farmers, our small businesses that ship off maybe flowers and other items that will affect our consumers here and away with the cost. So just be prepared for slight delays in that area,” said Mayor Victorino. Source

    Elsewhere,

    Troops have been deployed to London hospitals. Health care workers infected with COVID-19 are treating patients in France. The Netherlands is under a lockdown, and tented field hospitals have gone up in Sicily.

    Nations across Europe are scrambling to prop up health systems strained by staff shortages blamed on the new, highly transmissible omicron variant of the coronavirus, which is sending a wave of infections crashing over the continent.
    [snip]
    Italy is reporting record daily new coronavirus infections, hitting 219,000 new cases on Thursday. Authorities believe the peak in this surge is still two to three weeks away.

    The hospital system already is swamped in the southern Italian city of Naples.

    “We risk the collapse of the national healthcare service,” said the head of the local hospital doctors’ association, Bruno Zuccarelli.
    [snip]
    The governor of the Campania region surrounding Naples announced Friday he was planning to delay the Jan. 10 reopening of elementary and middle schools for at least two weeks since “the conditions aren’t there to reopen in safety.” Source

  4. 4.

    Bnut

    Healthcare worker, vaxxed and boosted. Tested positive on Wednesday. Bad head cold and lethargy. Symptoms abated after 48 hours, wife asymptomatic, 10 month old had a fever for a day. We are lucky.

    Completely true on the everyone treating this as if it were over. Our clinic is being crushed atm with staffouts and extended testing times, we are AGAIN delaying surgery because we can’t get pre-screening done (I have opinions on this that are not of the mainstream of this site).

    The vax works, stupidity does not.

    I am still unaware of what several of my coworker’s smiles look like after some of them have been with us for months. It’s a crushing reality, losing nurses to telehealth and other work from home roles. The rest of us still plugging along making dog sh*t pay for a hospital that helped developed the vaccine.

  6. 6.

    New Deal democrat

    All 4 of the US jurisdictions first hit hard by Omicron – NY, NJ, HI, and PR – show signs of plateauing. DC has turned down week over week.

    Hospitalizations are now only 2% below their all time high, and are likely to break their record today. Hospitalizations lagged by 10 days have risen at about 2/3’s the rate of cases lagged by 10 days. ICU admissions have also increased. Deaths spiked to their highest daily level in over 3 months, due to data dumps from a number of Midwestern States.

    Deaths in South Africa rose again, to 14x their pre-Omicron low (still well below the 80x rise in cases). Deaths also rose in the UK and in Canada, again nowhere even close to the rise in cases. Deaths are still falling in Denmark and Portugal.

    Also: the graph in today’s post showing a lower rate of ventilator usage in UK hospitals is not lagged. So a huge increase in admissions, which don’t immediately require ventilators, shows up as a big decline in ventilator usage. Misleading!

  7. 7.

    Barbara

    @Bnut: Same experience with my family.  Except that we isolated for a few days and are vigilant about wearing high quality masks. The “all or nothing” mentality is discouraging, especially when it comes to wearing masks.

  9. 9.

    satby

    I think I’m through the worst of whatever I had; though the head cold aspect is over the wheezing asthmatic aftereffects of every respiratory bug I get has started. Other people at the store where the doctors office is have tested positive, so far only the retail side, who were lax about mask usage. I can well imagine we’re a few weeks from a peak just witnessing how this is spreading locally. Testing here is a clusterfuck: if I didn’t have covid before I got in that line I certainly was exposed for the entire time there. As was everyone else.

  12. 12.

    Robert Sneddon

    The chart from the UK’s Torygraph (pro-Boris Telegraph) that A-L references above is highly deceptive. “Look, the amount of people needing ICU beds is going down! We’re saved!”
    The number of ICU and mechanical ventilation beds in use is actually increasing, not going down. The chart represents the PROPORTION of COVID-19-positive cases needing a high level level of medical support but the COVID-19 hospital population is soaring, about triple what it was a couple of months ago and still not at its expected peak.​

  14. 14.

    YY_Sima Qian

    On 1/7 China reported 95 new domestic confirmed (none previously asymptomatic) & 6 new domestic asymptomatic cases.

    Shaanxi Province reported 46 new domestic confirmed cases. 70 domestic confirmed cases recovered. There are currently 1824 active domestic confirmed cases in the province.

    • Xi’an reported 46 new domestic confirmed cases (all mild), all from persons already under home or centralized quarantine. 68 domestic confirmed cases recovered. There currently are 1,778 active confirmed cases in the city. 2 university campuses & 1 sub-district remain at High Risk. 1 Medium Risk sub-district & 4 Medium Risk communities have been re-designated to Low Risk. 44 sub-districts & 11 communities remain at Medium Risk.
    • At Yan’an 1 domestic confirmed case recovered. There currently are 11 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 10 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.

    Guangdong Province reported 2 new domestic confirmed cases, both at Shenzhen, 1 found via regular screening & the other is the case’s spouse. They are infected by Delta Variant, source of infection still unknown. At least no further positive cases have been identified. 1 domestic asymptomatic case was released from isolation (at Foshan). There currently are 20 active domestic confirmed cases (18 at Dongguan & 2 at Shenzhen) 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. The High Risk village at Fangchenggang has been re-designated to Low Risk.

    At Hulun Buir in Inner Mongolia “Autonomous” Region the last 5 domestic confirmed cases recovered.

    Shanghai Municipality reported 5 new domestic asymptomatic cases, all traced close contact of previously reported imported & domestic asymptomatic cases, already under centralized quarantine since 1/1 or 1/3. There currently are 16 active domestic asymptomatic cases in the city. 

    At Jiangsu Province there currently are 1 active domestic confirmed (at Nanjing) & 3 active domestic asymptomatic cases (all at Wuxi) in the province.

    Zhejiang Province reported 4 new domestic confirmed cases. 3 domestic confirmed cases are reported by Beilun District in Ningbo & 1 at Jinhua, all traced close contacts already under centralized quarantine. 37 domestic confirmed cases recovered. There currently are 299 active domestic confirmed cases (spread across Shaoxing, Ningbo, Hangzhou & Jinhua) in the province. A factory & a village at Jinhua are currently at Medium Risk. A factory & a village at Beilun District in Ningbo are currently at Medium Risk.

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

    At Chongqing Municipality the last domestic confirmed case recovered.

    Henan Province reported 43 new domestic confirmed & 1 new domestic asymptomatic cases. There currently are 188 active domestic confirmed & 3 active domestic asymptomatic cases.

    • Zhengzhou reported 24 new domestic confirmed cases. There currently are 71 active domestic confirmed cases in the city. 1 residential compound has been elevated to Medium Risk. 3 residential compounds are currently at Medium Risk.
    • Zhoukou reported 1 new domestic confirmed case, a truck driver that visited the ceramics factory at Yuzhou in Xuchang, already under centralized quarantine since 1/3. There currently are 7 active domestic confirmed cases in the city.
    • Luoyang did not report any new domestic positive cases. 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 18 new domestic confirmed cases. There currently are 100 active domestic confirmed cases in the city, all at Yuzhou. Yuzhou has completed 4 rounds of screening & is starting the 5th. Rest of Xuchang has completed the 1st round of mass screening. 1 township, 1 sub-district, 4 villages, 3 residential compounds, 1 community, 1 residential building & 1 school are currently at High Risk. 2 townships & 3 sub-districts have been elevated to Medium Risk.
    • Xinyang did not report any new domestic positive cases. There currently are 2 active domestic confirmed cases in the city, both at Gushi County, both returned from Zhengzhou in Henan on 1/3.
    • Shangqiu reported 1 new domestic asymptomatic case, the spouse of the previously reported domestic confirmed case, already under centralized quarantine since 1/4. There currently are 1 active domestic confirmed & 1 active domestic asymptomatic cases, part of the transmission chain from Zhengzhou.

    At Yunnan Province 1 domestic asymptomatic case was released from isolation. There currently are 13 active domestic confirmed (8 at Dehong Prefecture & 5 at Kunming) & 7 active domestic asymptomatic (5 at Dehong Prefecture & 2 at Sipsongpanna Prefecture) cases in the province.

    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 1/7, China reported 64 new imported confirmed cases (7 previously asymptomatic), 48 imported asymptomatic cases, 1 imported suspect case:

    • Shanghai Municipality – 32 confirmed cases, 6 Chinese nationals returning from the US, 5 from Canada, 2 each from France & the UAE & 1 each from Brazil (via Frankfurt), Bolivia (via Bogotá & Amsterdam Schiphol), Dominican Republic (via Frankfurt), Kazakhstan (via Frankfurt), Singapore, South Korea, Germany, the Ukraine (via Zürich), the DRC (via Paris CdG), Ghana (via Amsterdam Schiphol), Senegal (via Paris CdG), Togo (via Paris CdG), 4 German nationals coming from Germany & a US national returning from the US; 3 asymptomatic cases, 2 Chinese nationals returning from the IS & 1 from the UAE; 1 suspect case, no information released
    • Guangzhou in Guangdong Province – 7 confirmed cases, 3 Chinese national returning from the US, 2 from Canada & 1 each from Australia & Saudi Arabia; 2 asymptomatic cases, 1 Chinese national each returning from the US & Tajikistan (via Istanbul)
    • Tianjin Municipality – 6 confirmed cases, 4 Chinese nationals returning from the Philippines & 1 from the US, no information released yet for the last 1; 10 asymptomatic case, 3 Chinese nationals returning from the Philippines, 2 from Congo-Brazzaville (via Paris CdG) & 1 from France, no information released yet for the last 1
    • Guangxi “Autonomous” Region (location not specified) – 6 confirmed (1 previously asymptomatic) & 7 asymptomatic cases, no information released
    • Xiamen in Fujian Province – 3 confirmed cases, 1 Chinese national each returning from the US, Hungary (via Amsterdam Schiphol) & the Ukraine (via Amsterdam Schiphol)
    • Fuzhou in Fujian Province – 1 confirmed case (previously asymptomatic), a Chinese national returning from Japan; 1 asymptomatic case, coming from Indonesia
    • Longyan in Fujian Province – 1 asymptomatic case, a Chinese national returning from Myanmar; the case had arrived at Yunnan on 12/13, passed through the 21 days of centralized quarantine & tested negative multiple times, upon release from quarantine on 1/4 the case flew to Xiamen in Fujian & was transferred to Longyan & re-entered centralized quarantine, tested positive on 1/6
    • Changsha in Hunan Province – 3 confirmed (all previously asymptomatic) & 3 asymptomatic cases, no information released
    • Yunnan Province (location not specified) – 3 confirmed cases, 2 Chinese national returning from Laos & & 1 from Myanmar; 4 asymptomatic cases, 3 Chinese nationals returning from Laos & 1 from Myanmar; all via land border crossings
    • Shenyang in Liaoning Province – 1 confirmed & 1 asymptomatic cases, no information released
    • Zhengzhou in Henan Province – 1 confirmed case (previously asymptomatic), no information released
    • Chengdu in Sichuan Province – 1 confirmed case (previously asymptomatic), a Chinese national returning from Bangladesh; 2 asymptomatic cases, 1 Chinese national each returning from Algeria & Thailand
    • Wuhan in Hubei Province – 5 asymptomatic cases, all coming from Pakistan
    • Beijing Municipality – 4 asymptomatic cases, no information released
    • Hangzhou in Zhejiang Province – 4 asymptomatic cases, 2 coming from Spain & 1  each from Egypt & Peru
    • Yantai in Shandong Province – 1 asymptomatic case, a Chinese national returning from South Korea

    Overall in China, 151 confirmed cases recovered (38 imported), 16 asymptomatic cases were released from isolation (15 imported) & 7 were reclassified as confirmed cases (all imported), & 5,578 individuals were released from quarantine. Currently, there are 3,367 active confirmed cases in the country (1004 imported), 27 in serious condition (3 imported), 661 active asymptomatic cases (628 imported), 1 suspect case (imported). 39,276 traced contacts are currently under centralized quarantine.

    As of 1/7, 2,887.772M vaccine doses have been injected in Mainland China, an increase of 7.779M doses in the past 24 hrs. 472.774M doses have been injected in the 3 – 17 yrs. old population. 86.25% of the total population have been fully vaccinated, 89.54% of the total population have received at least 1 dose. No information shared on progress of the boosting campaign.

    On 1/8, Hong Kong reported 37 new positive cases (16 asymptomatic), 30 imported (from Germany, the Philippines & the US) & 7 domestic (6 are traced close contacts & 1 from community transmission at Wanchai).

  22. 22.

    Another Scott

    Friday night ER report from Arlington, VA – BlueVirginia.US:

    First off, we are diagnosing a lot of COVID in the emergency department. Patients classified as being symptomatic are testing at a 64% positivity rate. That is up from 59% last week. The good news is we had less symptomatic patients this week than during the holiday week and an overall decline of about 20% of new positive cases among this group of people. It is really crazy to look at the graph that I have kept throughout the pandemic because the number of new cases we’re diagnosing is on a whole different scale than previous surges. We’re seeing 5 times more positive cases among our symptomatic patients that in either of the previous surges. We’re also doing a considerable amount of testing on patients that are classified as asymptomatic. As a reminder, these are patients generally being admitted to the hospital for non-COVID related reasons or have symptoms that are not consistent with COVID. The positivity rate among these patients was less than 1% last week of November. This week, it was over 29%, up from 24% the week previous.

    Many of my asymptomatic patients who have tested positive have presented with headaches, primary psychiatric issues, or were asymptomatic but had a known exposure and required a test prior to admission. Admitted patients who have COVID as a secondary diagnosis still present risk to the staff and require additional time for donning and doffing PPE. Adult patients considered asymptomatic are often brought to the ER for weakness or confusion, so not the classic symptoms such as fever, cough, or shortness of breath. Yet, we’re finding they require admission for altered mental status, acute kidney injury, or metabolic derangements, such as very elevated glucose levels or very low sodium levels.

    […]

    Be careful, everyone.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  23. 23.

    sab

    @Barbara: Our paperhad a list of the school districts with the highest covid rates in the state. 29 out of 30 are in the NE corner. Our city was #16. But we are a big district with 9 high schools. The districts with higher numbers have only 1 or 2 high schools.

    My takeaway is that mitigation works. Our school district required vaxxing and masks for everyone from the first day the returned to in person learning. The other schools with much smaller enrollment and much higher covid had masks as optional.

  25. 25.

    JeanneT

    My 2 year old grandson is part of the Moderna trial.  I’m excited that Moderna will be ready to unblind the study very soon.  He was not a happy participant – he particularly disliked the blood draws – but if they have enough data to submit to the FDA they will unblind the study for the participants.  So soon we’ll know if he has had the vaccine and whether it was effective.

  30. 30.

    Emily68

    Instead of spraying perfume to test your sense of smell do what I do—sniff the bottle of oregano. Vanilla works, too.

  31. 31.

    J R in WV

    Psychiatric issues… hmmm.

    Wonder if the Qanon cult is mostly people with otherwise asymptomatic Covid who can no longer think rationally? Or even the whole Trumpian Republican Party? Because there’s sure a whole lot of irrationality going on in there!

  32. 32.

    dnfree

    We have a very inexpensive test for our sense of smell. When we take walks through our neighborhood (of 55+-age “active” seniors), almost always we pass a house where the dryer is running and the smell of a dryer sheet fills the outdoors.

    I don’t know why anyone uses either those dryer sheets or fabric softeners. I hate when my clothes smell perfumy. And a lot of fabrics, including sheets and towels, now recommend against using them.

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