Good news, parents — I’m seeing shots should be available by the end of February:
Breaking News: Pfizer and its partner BioNTech are expected to ask the FDA as soon as Tuesday to authorize its Covid vaccine for children 6 months to 4 years old as a two-dose regimen. https://t.co/Kok4Ff81cx
— The New York Times (@nytimes) February 1, 2022
Just worked 12 hours in the ER on a busy Monday and didn’t have a single Covid patient. Not one.
This ain’t over. But it’s a helluva lot better than even just a few weeks ago.
— Craig Spencer MD MPH (@Craig_A_Spencer) February 1, 2022
"Vaccines don't work." New data say yes, they do: pic.twitter.com/3C4MSNa1z5
— Scott Hadland, MD (@DrScottHadland) January 31, 2022
New data from @CDCgov. Lay piece here via @nytimes: https://t.co/ug9HFKm9ST
— Scott Hadland, MD (@DrScottHadland) January 31, 2022
New @FT
"Almost half of the US Covid hospitalisations this winter could have been averted if the country had matched the vaccination coverage of leading European countries"https://t.co/n12C6u49Fg by @mroliverbarnes @jburnmurdoch @JamieSmythF pic.twitter.com/TLvVQurBDk— Eric Topol (@EricTopol) January 31, 2022
This interview was partly frustrating and partly hilarious because the whole time the host was trying desperately to get Fauci to tell him it’s okay to give up and stop worrying about Covid and Fauci kept having to very patiently reiterate that no, that is bad and wrong https://t.co/rn9B9OWkGJ
— Katie Mack (@AstroKatie) January 31, 2022
The upshot of all of it was: yes, eventually we’ll move to a new phase with fewer precautions; no, we’re not there yet while 2200 people are dying daily; more vaccination & boosting will get us there faster; no, the currently cautious people are not somehow permanently broken
— Katie Mack (@AstroKatie) January 31, 2022
======
COVID shines spotlight on imbalanced approach to death globally -expert panel https://t.co/tp7LGTJg3M pic.twitter.com/tNwVG1wLqs
— Reuters (@Reuters) February 1, 2022
China is ringing in the Lunar New Year despite pandemic restrictions, as people gathered outside closed temples offering traditional prayers for the Year of the Tiger. https://t.co/BR69n0jPmO
— The Associated Press (@AP) February 1, 2022
Beijing Olympics says growing COVID cases are "within controllable range" https://t.co/7v95AxYxxK pic.twitter.com/BH1xKtqKb0
— Reuters (@Reuters) February 1, 2022
… The Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics Organising Committee has reported 200 COVID cases since Jan. 23 among airport arrivals and those in the Games “closed loop” bubble that separates all event personnel, including athletes, from the public.
“As more people are entering China the imported COVID-19 cases are increasing,” Huang Chun, deputy director general of the committee’s Pandemic Prevention and Control Office, told a news briefing.
Huang said rising cases were also a result of more effective and accurate COVID detection techniques by customs.
Organisers reported 24 new COVID cases among Games-related personnel on Jan. 31, of which 16 were athletes…
China credits the strict COVID control measures, including frequent nucleic acid testings, for helping prevent clustered cases inside the closed loop.
“(The COVID-19 situation) is generally within our expected controllable range. So the Games participants, including athletes, and Chinese public do not have to worry,” said Huang…
PHOTOS: It’s mandatory to wear a mask in India. And police are enforcing it on the streets. People caught without wearing a mask are fined. But the scrutiny doesn’t extend to the type of mask that is worn, nor the safety criteria. https://t.co/HLJKOjMTca
— The Associated Press (@AP) February 1, 2022
Austria's Covid vaccine law comes into force amid resistance https://t.co/CtGqYTd3Hj
— BBC News (World) (@BBCWorld) February 1, 2022
Denmark has become one of the first European Union countries to scrap most pandemic restrictions because the Scandinavian country no longer considers COVID-19 “a socially critical disease.” https://t.co/PUnM2tQjBu
— AP Europe (@AP_Europe) February 1, 2022
CDC warns against travel to Mexico & 11 other countries. The agency gave the country a Level 4 warning for “very high” risk because of surging Covid cases https://t.co/0HMSTPh7J7 pic.twitter.com/0cbUE4GF2X
— delthia ricks ? (@DelthiaRicks) February 1, 2022
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said he had tested positive for COVID-19 but was feeling fine, while also calling out protestors angry with the country's vaccine mandates https://t.co/b4hcb8GLgV pic.twitter.com/SW8E1fy1GV
— Reuters (@Reuters) February 1, 2022
======
Another brilliant animation from @jburnmurdoch and the team at FT that shows how vaccines, therapies and the lower virulence of omicron have reduced Covid’s deadliness.
Note though that even now it remains deadlier than seasonal flu for older people. https://t.co/fPHKR6rve6— Kai Kupferschmidt (@kakape) January 31, 2022
Moderna has finally received a full license for its #Covid19 vaccine, Spikevax. (Best Covid vax name, hands down.)
Would love to know why it took @US_FDA more than twice as long to process Moderna's application than Pfizer's. https://t.co/yu9CKFHT79— Helen Branswell (@HelenBranswell) January 31, 2022
Will another devastating variant follow #Omicron? Virologists say it's still too early to tell https://t.co/hzGVazAlQe
— delthia ricks ? (@DelthiaRicks) February 1, 2022
Vaccination markedly cuts SARSCoV2 transmission in households, studies are demonstrating. 2 reports in Science show substantial vaccine benefit especially when it comes to unvaccinated children. However, 1 of the studies noted waning protection over time https://t.co/7VUnKY3ogU pic.twitter.com/QMYdfR6gmF
— delthia ricks ? (@DelthiaRicks) January 31, 2022
Omicron is driving new concerns about #LongCovid. More than a third of people post-Covid have lingering problems, such as headaches, ringing in the ears, brain fog & a host of other complications. Sufferers are asking whether this is the new normal https://t.co/Y77HEFV148 pic.twitter.com/Az9LwYoAAi
— delthia ricks ? (@DelthiaRicks) January 31, 2022
Tests of lung performance in #COVID19 survivors finds, "significantly impaired gas transfer from the lungs to the bloodstream even though other tests – including CT scans – came back as normal..[possible] microscopic damage to the respiratory system."https://t.co/0G9yKlhHQP
— Laurie Garrett (@Laurie_Garrett) January 31, 2022
Huge volumes of COVID hospital waste threaten health – WHO https://t.co/Fsl1ng6N59 pic.twitter.com/5kjclD38n5
— Reuters (@Reuters) February 1, 2022
Reuters really screwed up just now, wrongly reporting that a Phase III clinical trial showed Ivermectin was effective against Omicron, and then correcting the story after damage was already done. pic.twitter.com/blZ3BsWBS2
— Arieh Kovler (@ariehkovler) January 31, 2022
Lots of stuff has a antiviral effect in a test tube but doesn't help fight viral disease in humans, so while it was disappointing that Ivermectin doesn't help with Covid, it wasn't very surprising.
— Arieh Kovler (@ariehkovler) January 31, 2022
======
One reason America's #COVID19 data is a mess is coroners: About 40% of US counties have coroners sign death certificates and, "Coroners reliant on voters who are skeptical about covid have not been as scrupulous as their medical-examiner peers."https://t.co/EserZmftKo
— Laurie Garrett (@Laurie_Garrett) January 31, 2022
At a hospital in California, the Omicron variant has brought a record number of patients, putting a strain on hospital staff that have already taken a beating https://t.co/3miyVI06GR pic.twitter.com/3fMMfzaHgi
— Reuters (@Reuters) February 1, 2022
Denver will let its mask mandate expire this week because the number of new #coronavirus cases and hospitalizations are declining. From #WaPost pic.twitter.com/2znfKmcP5R
— delthia ricks ? (@DelthiaRicks) January 31, 2022
This wave will end. The few remaining interventions will be relaxed. Is that getting on? Is getting rid of masks in parts of the country that still have them getting on? While we are barreling towards 1.000.000 deaths? Is pretending Covid exist and forcing normalcy getting on?
— veto players stan account (@Convolutedname) January 31, 2022
It's not remotely rational that more people are more anxious about flying than driving, but that doesn't mean that particular pattern of transportation anxiety is some kind of difficult-to-explain mystery.
— David Watkins (@djw172) January 31, 2022
On The Road – BretH – A Walk in the Park – Ivy Creek Natural Area
matt
First, kill all the contrarian take merchants.
NotMax
FYIs.
NeenerNeener
Monroe County, NY:
There were 184 new laboratory-confirmed cases of COVID-19 on 1/31/22. There were 103 newpositive home tests reported on 1/31.
Hospitalizations:
163 people hospitalized, 70% unvaxed
24 of those are in the ICU, 79% unvaxed
13 of those are intubated, 77% unvaxed.
Deaths now at 1708, up from 1672. The new case rate seems to be coming down but the death rate looks like it’s going up.
We had more people intubated last week than this week…looking at the new total death count they may not have recovered.
OzarkHillbilly
A buddy of mine and his whole fam damily just headed south of the border last week for a 4 month road trip going as far south as Guatemala. They’re all fully vaccinated, not sure about boosted. Stay safe K & A, the inside of a Mexican hospital is not something everyone should see.
Kay
Denmark has an 80% vaxx rate. If we hadn’t have had an entire political Party and 500 celebrity grifters “doing their own research” and working against it we could have had that too.
Kay
Trump has dropped promoting the covid vaccine at rallies.
Opposition to vaccines is going to be a requirement for Republican politicians, and it isn’t going to stop at the covid vaccine. They’re getting the whole anti-vaxx contingent. The whole package. Good fucking riddance. I’d rather lose than have those people.
Baud
@Kay:
It was that long ago that antivaxxism was a little more bipartisan.
Dems aren’t perfect, but the main difference between us and them as that we move towards better instead of in the other direction.
Matt McIrvin
@Baud: And the (incorrect) stereotype was that antivaxxers were all liberals. We’d complain about Republicans hating science and they’d go “what about antivaxxers? They’re all granola hippie moms”.
Baud
@Baud:
Was = wasn’t
Barbara
@Baud: That would be the “natural immunity” crowd that disdains introducing “toxins” into their bodies. But it was never clear to me that most of them had any real political affiliation.
Baud
@Matt McIrvin:
Whataboutism is a go-to argument for them. They are above criticism as long as anyone left of center is imperfect. It’s their comfort blanket.
Kay
@Baud:
Once they made it ideological- about “liberty” or “government over reach”- the die was cast. The far Right Supreme Court has even endorsed it. Anti-vaxxers were hooting and hollering over the headlines they read about that decision. “Victory!” They thought it was a high court validation of their position.
Trump is cunning. He dropped it because he knows it’s now forbidden in the GOP.
NotMax
@Baud
Anti-fluoridation still around, also too.
Baud
@Barbara:
I think they were probably all over the place, but that would make them a bipartisan group.
OzarkHillbilly
I talked to the NOLA son last night. Sounds like he has the long covid. Coughing and fatigued, probably more (asthmatic, so I expect shortness of breath, also a migraine sufferer so I expect an increase there too). I wasn’t able to talk too long last night so I gotta call him back today and see what other details I can pull out of him.
Baud
@Kay:
Perversely looking forward to the summer when they will pull out all the stops to regulate women’s bodies.
lowtechcyclist
Maybe we can get Ted Cruz to take another vacation down there?
NotMax
@Kay
Occam’s Razor says he dropped it because he’s been booed by the red hat brigades when he bought it up.
lowtechcyclist
That truly sucks. Sorry to hear it.
OzarkHillbilly
@Baud: @Barbara:
Religious fundamentalists on the right, new age woo-ers on the left.
Baud
@OzarkHillbilly:
How long ago was his infection?
NotMax
@OzarkHillbilly
Oh my. If anyone is deserving of a break from matters medical, it’s NOLA son.
Matt McIrvin
Massachusetts’ state numbers on booster shots are considerably higher than what the CDC claims–most of the state is hovering around 50% boosted, with poorer and redder areas lower than bluer and richer ones:
https://www.mass.gov/doc/weekly-covid-19-vaccination-report-january-27-2022/download
but considering that Mass. also claims 123% of the population of Nantucket has gotten at least one shot, I’m not clear on who’s right here.
OzarkHillbilly
@Baud: A couple weeks, I think. He downplays everything health wise in conversation, acts like all is well. But his coughing last night was deep and persistent and he admitted to being tired all the time.
@NotMax: Truth.
@lowtechcyclist: Thanx.
New Deal democrat
Nationwide in the US, cases are down almost 45% from peak, to a still huge 460,000. Deaths rose slightly to about 2450. Deaths should peak in 10-14 days, and they continue to rise at the same rate as they have in the past 4 weeks, roughly 250 per week, that would be a peak of about 2700 to 2900 deaths – second only to the 3500 peak last winter.
All Census regions continue to decline, with the Northeast now over 80% below peak. States with cases still rising 10% or more from a week before have dwindled to exactly 1: Alabama. Maine still has never had an Omicron wave at all. Only CT, NJ, NY, and OH have declined to close to their pre-Omicron levels.
Internationally Omicron appears to have peaked in all the countries I have been tracking: Canada, Denmark, Ireland, Israel, Portugal, South Africa, and the U.K. only in Ireland have cases declined to their pre-Omicron levels. In the others where there had been sharp declines, case levels have stopped declining at levels well above their previous troughs.
What is causing the “long tail” seen in most cases is increasingly becoming noticed as an issue by the experts. The BA2 subvariant is a likely culprit. Whether it is able to infect those who weren’t reached by the original Omicron, or whether it represents re-infection is being debated. If the former, a continued slow decline could be expected; if the latter, it could mark the beginning of yet another (but presumably smaller) wave.
By now 22% of all Americans have had confirmed cases. If we multiply that by 2.2, that’s almost 50% who have actually had infections. Even if that is just randomly spread among vaccinated and unvaccinated, we are probably approaching 85% of the population with some resistance.
Baud
@OzarkHillbilly:
That’s not too long. Hopefully it’ll improve soon.
?
Kay
The parents of small children who get sick with covid talk about the coughing. I heard it again yesterday. A dry cough that is so rapid and violent the kids panic because they can’t get air. I wonder why you don’t hear more about it. I know the incidence of illness is really low in kids, and even lower for serious illness, but those that do get sick all report this coughing. That’s why they go to the emergency room. It’s panic inducing.
Matt McIrvin
The disparity between case rates and death rates is also striking: in MA, deaths are concentrated heavily among the elderly as always, but case rates are now almost a smooth downward slope with increasing age, with little kids getting sick at more than twice the rate of the over-70s. I assume this is the combination of Omicron, open schools, and vaccination rates for kids still being dramatically lower than all other groups (even for age groups that are now eligible). It’s a different pattern than we had months ago where it was people in their 20s and 30s doing most of the spreading.
https://www.mass.gov/info-details/covid-19-response-reporting#covid-19-interactive-data-dashboard-
YY_Sima Qian
On 1/31 China reported 27 new domestic confirmed (none previously asymptomatic) & 1 new domestic asymptomatic cases.
At Xi’an in Shaanxi Province 9 domestic confirmed cases recovered. There are currently 25 active domestic confirmed cases in the province.
At Guangdong Province reporter 1 new domestic confirmed case. 6 domestic confirmed case recovered. There currently are 52 active domestic confirmed & 3 active domestic asymptomatic cases in the province.
At Guangxi “Autonomous” Region there currently are 1 active domestic confirmed (at Ningming County in Chongzuo) & 1 active domestic asymptomatic (at Chongzuo) cases in the province.
Tianjin Municipality reported 7 new domestic confirmed cases (1 mild & 3 moderate), 4 at Hebei District 2 at Hongqiao District & 1 from Jinnan District (all from persons under centralized quarantine). 17 domestic confirmed cases recovered . There currently are 68 active domestic confirmed cases (all presumed Omicron). 1 residential building is remains at High Risk. 3 residential buildings remain at Medium Risk.
Beijing Municipality reported 2 new domestic confirmed (1 mild & 1 moderate) & 1 asymptomatic cases, all from persons under centralized or home quarantine, all related to the Delta outbreak at cold storage warehouses in Fengtai District. There currently are 92 active domestic confirmed cases & 13 active domestic asymptomatic cases. 1 Medium Risk residential building has been elevated to High Risk. 2 communities & 1 village & 1 residential building are currently at High Risk. 2 communities, 3 residential compounds & 1 warehouse are currently at Medium Risk.
At Liaoning Province there currently are 1 active domestic confirmed (at Shenyang) & 4 active domestic asymptomatic (3 at Dalian & 1 at Shenyang) cases in the province.
Shandong Province did not report any new domestic positive cases. There currently at 2 active domestic confirmed (at Jinan) & 1 active domestic asymptomatic (at Liaocheng) cases in the province, all part of the transmission chain from the cold storage warehouses outbreak at Fengtai District in Beijing.
Shanxi Province did not report any new domestic positive cases. There currently are 3 active domestic confirmed cases in the province (2 at Datong & 1 at Yuncheng).
Hebei Province reported 4 new domestic confirmed cases, all at Gucheng County in Hengshui, all F1 & F2 close contacts of domestic positive cases reported by Tianjin. There currently are 15 active domestic confirmed cases (5 at Xiong’an, 4 each at Hengshui & Langfang & 2 at Baoding) in the province. 1 village at Xiong’an is currently at Medium Risk.
Yili Prefecture in Xinjiang “Autonomous” Region did not report any new domestic positive cases. 1 domestic confirmed case recovered & 2 domestic asymptomatic cases were released from isolation. There currently are 14 active domestic confirmed (11 at Horgos & 3 at 4th Div. of XPCC) & 30 active domestic asymptomatic (24 at Horgos & 6 at 4th Div. of XPCC) cases at the border crossing. 4 residential compounds & 1 residential building are currently at Medium Risk.
Heilongjiang Province did not report any new domestic positive cases. There currently are 29 active domestic confirmed & 44 active domestic asymptomatic cases in the province.
At Shanghai Municipality 2 domestic asymptomatic cases were released from isolation. There currently are 2 active domestic confirmed & 13 active domestic asymptomatic cases in the city. 1 village remains at Medium Risk.
Zhejiang Province reported 13 new domestic confirmed cases (all presumed Omicron), all at Hangzhou, all from persons under centralized quarantine. 4 domestic confirmed cases recovered. There currently are 101 active domestic confirmed & 1 active domestic asymptomatic cases in the province. 1 shop at Hangzhou is currently at High Risk. 8 residential compounds & 4 businesses at Hangzhou are currently at Medium Risk.
Huanggang in Hubei Province did not report any new domestic positive cases. There currently is 1 active domestic asymptomatic case in the city, party of the transmission chain from Hangzhou in Zhejiang.
Anshun in Guizhou Province did not report any new domestic positive cases. There currently is 1 active domestic confirmed case in the city, party of the transmission chain from Hangzhou in Zhejiang.
At Shangrao in Jiangxi Province there currently is 1 active domestic asymptomatic case, part of the transmission chain from the factory outbreak at Hangzhou in Zhejiang.
Henan Province did not report any new domestic positive cases. 60 domestic confirmed case recovered. There currently are 606 active domestic confirmed cases in the province.
Yunnan Province did not report any new domestic positive cases. There currently are 9 active domestic confirmed (4 at Kunming & 5 at Sipsongpanna Prefecture) & 6 active domestic asymptomatic (all at Sipsongpanna Prefecture) cases remaining. 1 zone at Mengla County in Sipsongpanna Prefecture remains at Medium Risk.
Imported Cases
On 1/31, China reported 39 new imported confirmed cases (5 previously asymptomatic), 31 imported asymptomatic cases, 0 imported suspect cases:
Overall in China, 119 confirmed cases recovered (51 imported), 36 asymptomatic cases were released from isolation (all imported) & 4 were reclassified as confirmed cases (3 imported), & 2,664 individuals were released from quarantine. Currently, there are 1,884 active confirmed cases in the country (856 imported), 10 in serious condition (1 imported), 812 active asymptomatic cases (687 imported), 1 suspect case (imported). 42,504 traced contacts are currently under centralized quarantine.
As of 1/31, 3,000.532M vaccine doses have been injected in Mainland China, an increase of 334K doses in the past 24 hrs.
On 2/1, Hong Kong reported 129 new positive cases, 27 imported & 107 domestic (22 do not have sources of infection identified). This is a most concerning development for the city.
On 2/1, Taiwan reported 60 new positive cases, 44 imported (20 from Malaysia, 6 from the US, 3 from the UK, 2 from Japan & 1 each from Indonesia, the Philippines, Vietnam, Brazil, Panama, France, Poland& Sweden, 5 still under investigation) & 16 domestic.
Robert Sneddon
@Kay: The UK has a high rate of vaccination too, but a lot of those numbers are vaccinations that happened more than six months ago and the efficacy of those early doses has waned significantly.
The UK’s general figures per capita for new cases, deaths etc. is only a little lower than the US despite our higher vaccination rate. The one saving grace attributable to vaccination is the much lower numbers of hospitalisations and especially ICU/mechanical ventilation bed occupancy. Scotland has about 6 ICU COVID-19 cases per million population while the comparable figure in the US is ca. 73 ICU cases per million population (source: Our World In Data).
Ken
I could swear I read exactly the same thing three or four days ago.
Sorry, that sounded like a criticism of Anne Laurie. It’s not our esteemed aggregator’s fault that the same stupid questions keep getting asked.
JMG
@Matt McIrvin: Nantucket’s 123 percent is the result of summer people getting vaccinated there last summer. The clinics and pharmacies record the shots, while the state measures them against the lower permanent population.
Matt McIrvin
@New Deal democrat: I’m not sure there’s a lot to explain wrt long tails. In most places that are past peak, the Biobot wastewater virus counts have been tailing off in what looks like a smooth exponential fashion. It’s a slower decay than the rise, but that’s to be expected when you have a novel variant that does a significant amount of immune escape. Cases are going to have more of a variable lag built in because people take different amounts of time to realize they’re sick.
https://www.mwra.com/biobot/biobotdata.htm
https://biobot.io/data/
debbie
@Kay:
Cunning or not, Trump dropped it because he knows he no longer really controls the cult.
Ken
@Kay: Ah, pertussis. A really good example of how the success of vaccines has backfired. I remember stories from my grandparents of taking care of children with pertussis, and the absolute terror that non-stop, body-wracking cough caused. Nowadays no one’s experienced that, so they can say “what’s the big deal about a cough?”
Let’s hope that there aren’t too many state governments that, in their sovereign majesty, decide to do away with the mandates.
debbie
@Ken:
The first few years of her life, my niece had croup every fall. That cough was horrifying.
Robert Sneddon
@debbie: Smart conmen don’t control their marks, they get in front of them and confirm their biases while picking their pockets or exploiting them in other ways. Cult leaders have to work hard, Donald Trump is inherently too lazy to lead anything.
Donald Trump’s political speeches are full of ideological tests and teasers, to determine what the marks want to hear. If they don’t respond well, the idea gets dropped like a hot potato and is never brought up again and any questioner that asks about it gets told it never happened, he never ever said that or it’s being misinterpreted. If the teaser does get a good response it gets edited into a three-word slogan (a magical feature of human psychology) and becomes a rallying cry. “Build The Wall”, “Blue Lives Matter”, “Lock Her Up”.
He tried promoting vaccines, it got a bad response so he never said it and he didn’t mean it the way it was reported in the press, let’s move on, illegals!
Ken
@debbie: I stand corrected; people do still experience it.
AnonPhenom
Dangerous. Sound an awful lot like “Get BREXIT done” which won an election for Johnson and the Tory Party and turned into a disaster for the U.K.
NotMax
@Robert Sneddon
Contaminated COVID caravans!
//
Enhanced Voting Techniques
That article about the hospital in CA that’s overwhelmed the first reply is some Alpha Male Super Plus had a fever over 100 for six days “but just dealt with it” by which I assume, didn’t bother to wear a mask, take time off work, or any of that sissy shit, since the guy is clear to much of moron to understand the problem with a virus is you got to just deal with it, once you’re infected or you might infect people around you.
VOR
@Kay: I posted yesterday that the 2020 Texas Republican platform is against mask mandates, lockdowns for disease, and vaccine mandates. Their leading edge is already there.
NeenerNeener
The CDC is saying avoid Mexico? I guess I won’t be puppy-sitting for my boss at the end of the month.
Kay
@VOR:
It was inevitable. Everything they do involves this long tail of damage. There’s a real recklessness on the Right. There’s no consideration of consequences for actions at all. Of course it will bleed out to all vaccinations and public health generally. They defined it as ideological. It’s now “liberty” or “freedom”.
Anti vaxx will be like anti abortion. A litmus test.
Suzanne
Whatever.
I needed some good news and this will do. January hasn’t been so great. Fingers crossed for a vaccine for Youngest in February.
Soprano2
@VOR: What they have never understood is that when disease gets bad you don’t have to have lockdowns – people just naturally stay home because they don’t feel good (if they’re able to). They worry that lockdowns hurt the economy, but it’s the disease that’s actually hurting the economy! With no mandates and no official measures at all, our business was down in December and January. That’s because of covid, it’s not anything the government did.
I heard a story on NPR this morning about people being reluctant to test. One woman who was a dog groomer said she got a positive test, and when she called her employer to tell them she had to take off because of it she got fired! It’s not hard to understand why people are reluctant to test under circumstances like that. They said there are a lot of reports that people want the rapid tests rather than the PCR ones, because they think the rapid tests aren’t reported as official test results (I’m not sure if that’s actually true or not).
Matt McIrvin
@Soprano2: My daughter’s school went to all remote teaching for a few weeks in January–not as a precaution, but because so much of the staff and student body were out sick–they had neither staff nor students. A very different situation from last year.
Peale
@Soprano2: Government assistance to businesses came when there was lockdowns. Now thats been used up and since the “just suck up and deal” crowd has completely won the political debate, the consequences of that is that there will be no more aid forthcoming. The case for aid was based on the idea that its not fair to businesses and employees to have the government shut down their businesses. So welcome to the new normal.
The next step when the GOP gets back in is going to be to disband the agencies that report on outbreaks so that we won’t even have the information that will trigger us to stay away from crowds.
Matt McIrvin
@NotMax: That’s been the big whataboutism with COVID from the beginning: Democrats are just as bad because COVID comes from illegal immigrants and Democrats let them in. To hell with finding any evidence of such an effect–it resonates with conservative instincts about who’s “clean” or “dirty”.
Matt McIrvin
@Peale: That’s how the pandemic is going to “end”: when we decide to stop counting people who get sick or die.
I keep thinking about the hostile commenter I saw on a roller-coaster video who chewed out the creator for wearing a mask on a roller coaster (because he was required to by park rules): the commenter said that “this all ends when we all stop wearing masks”. That was what the pandemic was for them, people wearing masks.
lowtechcyclist
Can’t argue – if that had happened to my kid when he was little, I’d have been scared shitless.
NeenerNeener
@Soprano2: Monroe County NY started including rapid tests in the case count around the first of the year.
Peale
@Kay: At this point I’m planning on earning money during retirement in 20 years starting a right wing grift organization aimed at profiting from the deaths of children in the US from preventable diseases. I’m resigned to having mandates for childhood vaccinations rolled back nationally and public funding for vaccines revoked, if not having vaccines outright banned. Whenever a child dies of diptheria, I’ll just send their parents a note thanking them for fighting for freedom and preventing autism. Raise money to claim that I’m going to be building a memorial on the National Mall for the “angel soldiers” and their brave parents who have sacrificed for the greater good…and for a $27.99 engraving fee you, grieving parent, can make sure your little angel isn’t forgotten.
Cruel, sure. But I’d like to have a decent retirement, and since nothing is ever done about grifters, I might as well take my share.
Suzanne
@Matt McIrvin: I am worried about something different: that basic good health is going to become a partisan marker. Nothing good comes of that.
Elizabelle
Re: The WaPost article about Mexico being among 11 countries with State Department Level 4 warnings (“Very high risk; Don’t go”).
WaPo commenters writing that they feel safer in Mexico than their homes in Florida and Texas. That Mexicans are wearing masks, and the larger stores are checking temperatures on the way in. Lots of comments that the USA should be on the Level 4 list. Truth.
smith
@Matt McIrvin: Regarding booster rates, I think it’s important to be very precise as to what they mean, especially in regards to the effect of that rate on overall infections/hospitalizations/deaths. According to CDC, MA currently has 76.4% of its total population fully vaccinated, and 47.4% of those boosted. Even if it’s actually 50% boosted, that’s only half of the 76.4%, or only 38.2% of the whole population optimally protected against covid.
The state with the best vax numbers (VT, of course) has a little over 45% of its total population boosted. If we need something like 80% of a population effectively immunized to get covid under control, we’re nowhere near there yet. Of course, vaxxed-but-not-boosted and recovered-from-covid also give some immunity, and maybe we can eventually get to an acceptable end point by fits and starts and a lot of unnecessary morbidity and mortality, but I’m not feeling sanguine about seeing that soon.
laura
Still missing friend of the blog Amir Khalid, his daily report and his wry sense of humor. Hope he returns soon.
Peale
@Ken: I swear I heard the same thing after Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta…look, the answer from anyone credible is always going to be “we don’t know if eta and psi will be worse or better.”
Robert Sneddon
Scotland — 7,565 new cases of COVID-19 reported, 30 new deaths of people who have tested positive. Some of these reported deaths will be delayed from the weekend, the 7-day weekly rolling average is more indicative and that’s about a hundred deaths a week at the moment.
1,177 people were in hospital yesterday with recently confirmed COVID-19, with 29 people in intensive care. Not much change there but still way down on what it was a few weeks ago.
There’s been a sudden uptick in first vaccinations for some reason, all to the good but the 18-39 age group still lags behind.
Generally here in Scotland things are open with no vaccination passporting in place any more. Masks are still required on public transport, shops etc. but not sports stadiums and the like. Observationally I’m seeing less adherence to the rules about masking among shop customers and some of the staff but most people are still complying. There are more tourists around now that Spring is on the horizon. A lot of them are wearing masks in the street, especially the Asians.
Elizabelle
@laura: Yes. Hope so. I liked your comment a few days ago, about Amir’s many good qualities.
I like that he has moral courage, and is very good about correcting others’ errors without coming across as a pedant. And pedants be here.
Be well, Amir. Good to hear that Steeplejack is on the hunt. I do kind of worry that “Amir Khalid” is a common name, very possibly a pseudonym, but at least Steep has the journalism angle to work on. And maybe the guitar habit, the excellent guitar names (Rosetta Tharpe), beloved Bianca …
Robert Sneddon
@Peale: It’s maybe not that much comfort but the Jiant Brains of the computing world have been throwing Big AI to attempt to model what a significant evolutionary variant of the two main current strains, Delta and Omicron might look like and what sort of effects it might have in terms of spreading rates, disease progression etc.
It’s very speculative and may not pan out, if it does we might get a week or two’s advantage if and when their predictions turn out to be true.
Peale
On the local front, cases appear to be around 100 per day, which was the threshold I set to go about my normal business again. So today after 3 months of waiting it out, I’m getting a haircut.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Rapid tests you can take at home but OSHA regulations demands a witness.
I would think the easiest way to deal with a “I don’t believe in COVID” boss is to come into work infected. At that point it’s “here, let me cough over these documents before I hand them to you Sir” is a moral imperative.
Matt McIrvin
@smith:
Oh, geez, that fully explains the discrepancy I thought I saw! I thought those percentages were relative to the whole population, not the fully vaccinated.
cain
@Kay:
My fear is that they will also stop govt investment into vaccines and research. If true believers are getting into positions of power – this is going to be a bad thing.
Matt McIrvin
Now that we’re past peak across New England, it’s clear than in most of the region, this has been as bad as or slightly worse than the winter 2020-21 wave in terms of actual damage, hospitalizations and deaths, and it’s because the lower severity of Omicron is completely compensated by its far greater ability to infect people. (Also, our Delta wave was still in full swing when Omicron hit, so we had a double shock.) A smaller fraction of a very big number is still big. The vast majority of people who are dying or filling up the ICUs are unvaccinated–we don’t have as many unvaccinated here as in most parts of the country, but the virus is finding them all.
Sloane Ranger
Monday in the UK we had 92,368 new reported cases. This is a decrease of 5% in the rolling 7-day average. The figure is probably inflated by “catch up” cases from weekend office closures across the UK. New cases by nation,
England – 81,720 (up 22,161 from Sunday)
Northern Ireland – 4159 (up 1090)
Scotland – 1961 (down 1578)
Wales – 4528 (up 1688).
Deaths – There were 51 deaths within 28 days of a positive test reported yesterday. This is a decrease of 0.3% in the rolling 7-day average. This figure will be an under-estimate due to office closures over the weekend. 37 deaths were in England, 3 in Northern Ireland, 11 in Wales and 0 in Scotland.
Testing – 1,128,019 tests were conducted on Sunday, 30th. This is a decrease of 5.7% in the rolling 7-day average.
Hospitalisations – There were 15,938 people in hospital and 535 on ventilators on Friday, 28th January. The weekly average for hospital admissions was down by 12.9% as of 25th January.
Vaccinations – As of 30th January, 91% of all UK residents aged 12+ had had 1 shot, 84.2% had had 2, and 64.9% had had a 3rd shot/booster.
Matt McIrvin
(I suppose the one bright side relative to 2020-21 is that since healthcare workers can get vaccinated, they at least have the ability to reduce their personal risk considerably.)
Peale
@Matt McIrvin: At the beginning of Omicron I wondered what would have happened if it were the first wave of COVID. It was supposed to be ‘milder’. I think the answer is that it would have been an unimaginable catastrophe. The number of deaths per day here is about the same level as the number of deaths per day during the winter of 2020/21. But still well below what it was in March/April 2020. But that’s with advanced treatments and vaccines. Without them, who knows? 10,000 deaths per day would not be an unreasonable assumption.
laura
@Elizabelle: Steeplejack was very kind in correcting me that I was looking for him in the wrong country?.
There’s a very very long list of heart health clinics- and mucho healthcare tourism in Kuala Lumpur, and I’m not even sure that Amir Khalid’s procedure was heart related, so I’m hoping that Steep’s connecting will be helpful. I just keep hoping that Amir Khalid will pop up, tell an amazing story that explains his extended absence, share plans for that next guitar and a new kitty cat because the alternative moves me to tears.
These darn Jackals- I don’t know any of you very well, but each of you are so much a part of my daily grind and any absence diminishes the whole of Jackaldom in my estimation. (I got the great good fortune to meet Darkrose when I connived Wonkette to visit Sacramento a few years ago – and we got to do some BillinGlendale-ing when he came to photograph the Capital on the hottest day of any year and a handful turned out for a meetup barbeque lunch at the Urban Roots.)
Matt McIrvin
@Peale: Nearly everyone would have gotten COVID over a short period of time, unvaccinated. The IFR of Omicron in unvaccinated patients with no prior immunity from infection is probably less than wild-type COVID but it’s not an order of magnitude less–just spitballing, it’s more like a factor of 2 or 3. So, being conservative, say you have 200 million infected in the US and about a 0.3% fatality rate. That’s 600,000 dead in just the first wave–so, about the number of dead we had by August 2021 but in a couple of months, assuming numbers that are probably on the low side. That’s without reckoning in the far greater amount of severe illness and medical systems breaking down to a greater degree than they actually did.
Ruckus
@lowtechcyclist:
I get wanting to get rid of him, but what about the people that he’ll infect with cruzitus? Don’t humans everywhere deserve better than that?
Ruckus
@Ken:
Not sure success has backfired is the reasonable way to look at vaccine success, but it is realistic to see that so many people are no longer used to the level of disease that folks in their late 60s and older are/were used to as kids. At my 50th HS reunion a few years back we all talked about everyone having all the “normal” diseases because the only existing vaccine when I was born in the late 40s was smallpox. The next one was polio – which I knew of 4 people with it within a 5 mile radius. 2 upper body and 2 involving legs. Those with upper body were 2 of my friends moms – had iron lungs in their homes. But we all had all the rest of the then common infections.
I believe that the dipshit that said that the MMR vaccine caused autism – which has been widely proven that there is no connection whatsoever – is a lot of the cause of the current problems we see with Covid vaccines. People don’t want vaccine shots, they take them because they prevent far, far worse than being stuck by a needle, and people used to know that because everyone got sick and many knew someone who died, or had lifelong polio, and the effects of that were pretty damned obvious. But some want an excuse, any excuse, not to get a shot and that concept that a proven, tested vaccine could instill a nasty side effect like autism, gave people an excuse.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@laura:
Wait, that’s as hot as it gets there? It was a tad warm and y’all were complaining about the air quality, but remember I’m from the LA basin and I think it got up to 113 that year here.
RaflW
I don’t think life would be grand and perfect if BF & I lived in, say, Denmark. But we have so g.d. much decision fatigue right now. As ‘currently cautious’ people (ok, we’re always cautious in the sense of giving a fair bit of consideration to decisions, and not just YOLOing thru life) we’re freakin’ exhausted.
Should we have three friends over for a music jam session? How careful are they? How much Covid is in the schools their kids are attending. How many days after the jam session is it OK to go visit the 70-something parents? Everyone in our friend and fam circle is vax’d (except one ostracized dude), vast majority boosted. But the nagging anxiety lingers.
So, yeah, I’m incredibly resentful of the careless and reckless. I was cussing in my head like a madman in the airports yesterday. The number of men (literally ALL men) who were maskless but not eating or drinking or even pretending to do so. Ugh. Mostly men 25-45, but a few pretty obvious biz types with the entitled Diamond medallion freq flier airs, too.
I’m sick of it all. But not to the point of giving up on my own protection or caring about being a vector to others. I just wonder what the snapping point may look like, if I get there.
Mary G
That’s my “local” hospital that’s overwhelmed there. (One of the big corporations consolidating hospitals and networks of doctors bought our little city hospital three or four years ago promising to keep it open, then promptly closed it, promising to build a state of the art urgent care center, but the building is still empty.)
I wish the man going under the vent a complete recovery, because I was one of those kids visiting Daddy and seeing him get worse and worse, and it was sheer hell, but substituting the laying on of hands for modern medicine is an age-old decision that doesn’t often end well.