Happy two year anniversary to this piece mocking Silicon Valley "gearing up for Doomsday scenarios" and taking "extreme caution" like discouraging handshakes and asking people who recently travelled from China to work from home. pic.twitter.com/WFZsFj3UyX
— Bad COVID-19 Takes (@BadCOVID19Takes) February 14, 2022
Biden's push to spur a renewed global vaccine campaign is falling short. The world isn't on pace to vaccinate 70% of people by later this year – a goal of both Biden & the WHO.
The U.S. is the top vaccine donor but thinks supply is ever-less the problem.https://t.co/Mqs9EEMc5z
— Josh Wingrove (@josh_wingrove) February 14, 2022
The vaccination of children 5 to 11 years old in the U.S. is occurring at a snail's pace. The @AmerAcadPeds, using @CDCgov data, reports that 23% of 5-11 yos had received 2 doses by Feb. 9. This chart suggests the rate of new vaccinations is slowing. https://t.co/yafi8dGFrA pic.twitter.com/pocHBHhO0c
— Helen Branswell (@HelenBranswell) February 14, 2022
======
Due to low testing rates & serious under-counting, the real toll of Covid-19 on low & middle-income countries remains hidden
This analysis by @fibke shows the real damagehttps://t.co/iNnBQJQyXR
— Madhu Pai, MD, PhD (@paimadhu) February 14, 2022
Major Chinese industrial city steps up COVID control; Bosch affected https://t.co/mRcjWswkDd pic.twitter.com/G7tMK2TUnD
— Reuters (@Reuters) February 15, 2022
… The city of Suzhou – a trading, commercial and industrial hub in the eastern province of Jiangsu – reported eight domestically transmitted infections with confirmed symptoms for Monday, the National Health Commission (NHC) said on Tuesday.
The highly transmissible Omicron variant was detected among the cases, a Suzhou official said on Monday, without specifying the number of Omicron cases.
Despite the low caseload by global standards, Suzhou said on Monday it had suspended some long-distance bus services, locked down affected buildings and urged residents not to leave home or the city for nonessential reasons.
On Tuesday it closed 15 highway entrances and required drivers and passengers leaving through others to have proof of negative test results within 48 hours.
Suzhou Industrial Park – an important high-tech development zone that hosts about 100,000 companies and accommodates manufacturing facilities of foreign firms such as Samsung and Eli Lilly – started a round of mass testing on Monday…
Including the infections in Suzhou, about 80 km (49 miles) west of Shanghai, mainland China detected 40 locally transmitted cases with confirmed symptoms for Monday, according to the NHC.
There were no new deaths, leaving the death toll unchanged at 4,636.
As of Feb. 14, mainland China had 107,094 cases with confirmed symptoms, including both locally transmitted ones and those arriving from abroad.
#Covid cases in Hong Kong are surging as the city struggles to control Omicron.
A dangerously small proportion of people 80 & older have had 2 doses of vaccine, only 26%. Only 5% have received a booster. https://t.co/aFylkdw5d8 pic.twitter.com/Cis0789PFO— Helen Branswell (@HelenBranswell) February 14, 2022
Hong Kong leader says no plans for citywide lockdown as COVID infections spiral https://t.co/ih16uO12yL pic.twitter.com/BUU9Xuls8D
— Reuters (@Reuters) February 15, 2022
That’s not a good sign that unions think they have to appeal to the public rather than get the government to adapt to the reality on the ground.
As infections are scaling (as everyone saw coming at least several weeks back), things are turning into chaos. https://t.co/MjA7gCAJyy— Renaud Haccart (@RHaccart) February 15, 2022
Hong Kong hotels will need to sign up to a HK Govt. plan to provide up to 10,000 rooms very quickly to support the city's worsening Covid fight, says HK's leader Carrie Lam
Carrie Lam doesn't want to use special powers to obtain them.
— Danny?李嘉洪: not CTN’d yet??? (@JournoDannyAero) February 15, 2022
#BREAKING: Hong Kong’s Department of Justice sues Cathay Pacific Airways for failing to keep Omicron at bay, one source says, after two infected crew members broke quarantine rules upon arrival. The city’s leader Carrie Lam has openly said she would hold the airline accountable.
— Ezra Cheung (@ezracheungtoto) February 14, 2022
U.S. health authorities are advising Americans to avoid traveling to South Korea as the country reported its highest number of COVID-19 deaths in a month during a fast-developing omicron surge. https://t.co/rStYAfeBed
— The Associated Press (@AP) February 15, 2022
Thousands of Australian nurses go on strike over pay and staffing issues https://t.co/JH81xWj3qL
— BBC News (World) (@BBCWorld) February 15, 2022
Italy reports 28,630 coronavirus cases on Monday, 281 deaths https://t.co/6hw3gDe0PQ pic.twitter.com/YRktfnUmWC
— Reuters (@Reuters) February 14, 2022
Omicron threat remains high in east Europe – WHO https://t.co/eCTtzpRHSy pic.twitter.com/Lx9OfCQBzA
— Reuters (@Reuters) February 15, 2022
Canada's Ontario to lift some pandemic measures, Alberta ends masks in schools https://t.co/nqesjTYgCl pic.twitter.com/61Ml27o6f4
— Reuters (@Reuters) February 14, 2022
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau activated rarely used emergency powers in an effort to end protests that have shut some U.S. border crossings and paralyzed parts of the capital https://t.co/LphRhilwPR pic.twitter.com/11iZz5BwdD
— Reuters (@Reuters) February 15, 2022
Canadian police made several arrests on Sunday and cleared protesters and vehicles that occupied the Ambassador Bridge in Windsor, Ontario, reopening North America's busiest trade link for traffic https://t.co/pzy88pQQtU pic.twitter.com/YfK6iE60pK
— Reuters (@Reuters) February 15, 2022
======
This “guide to protecting the vulnerable” includes 0 of the broad based public health measures that “the vulnerable” have been advocating for, like sick leave + ventilation. And ZERO mention of Long Covid or the fact that the virus can have lasting effects https://t.co/o9icC8IjEV
— Taylor Lorenz – ON BOOK LEAVE (@TaylorLorenz) February 14, 2022
People who are immunocompromised are unlikely to get enough protection from #Covid vaccines. They should have priority access to monoclonal antibody therapies, @llborio & John Moore argue. https://t.co/ZZr19G1G2H
— Helen Branswell (@HelenBranswell) February 14, 2022
THREAD: I keep being asked when we can go "back to normal" or "like it was before". My personal thoughts:
We've added a new disease to our population, more infectious and more severe than flu.
The world pre 2020 no longer exists – we may want it to, but it just doesn't. 1/13
— Prof. Christina Pagel (@chrischirp) February 10, 2022
From a thread by the “Director @UCL_CORU, Prof Operational Research”:
Vaccines are amazing but do wane – esp vs sympomatic infection. Immunity from infection wanes too. Surely Omicron has proven that high levels of antibodies in your population are no guarantee against v high levels of illness & disruption. 2/13
We *could* act as we used to & accept millions of people getting sick once or twice a year. Yearly education, business disruption. And gradually, a slightly sicker pop’n. That seems to be the current plan in UK and e.g. US. But that’s NOT the *old normal* – it’s worse 3/13
We *can’t* go back – but we *can* go forward *if* we accept we need some adaptations – driven by what we have *learned*.
Learning: 1. Outdoors is pretty safe – so let’s invest research and funding into making indoor air as much like the outdoors as possible 4/13
It’s *not* easy, but it *is* possible – we did it with clean water, electricity infrastructure, CFCs, telephone and broadband…
The best thing about cleaner indoor air is it works against *any* airborne disease and also reduces e.g. allergies. 5/13
2. Vaccinate the world as soon as possible – and keep working towards vaccines that are longer lasting and more variant proof.
3. Invest in global infrastructure to support surveillance of new variants of Covid *and* other new infectious diseases. There will be more. 6/13
4. Add permanent surveillance of Covid infection rates in UK to existing programmes for flu, measles etc in public health
5. Invest in understanding & treating longer term clinical impacts of Covid, inc organ damage & Long Covid + treatments (eg antivirals) for acute phase. 7/13
6. We need to urgently increase funding and staffing for NHS if it is expected to cope with regular Covid surges *and* existing backlogs *and* years of understaffing and not enough money.
This includes *supporting* existing staff to stay..! 8/13…
Fundamentally, world is different now. Acting as if it isn’t, which UK seems determined to do, may feel good in short term but will result in a new normal worse than the old one.
I prefer for us to build a new normal that’s *better* than frequent sickness & disruption. 13/13
Prior COVID offers less protection vs Omicron; mRNA booster shot efficacy declines within months https://t.co/dyBfPLyZNn pic.twitter.com/SsrJA8If0X
— Reuters (@Reuters) February 15, 2022
The impact of vaccine 2-doses and 3-doses on deaths, Omicron wave in Switzerland, all ages, and by age groups below, by @redouad @OurWorldInData https://t.co/fMjGwsyOrM pic.twitter.com/uceEKXfVVf
— Eric Topol (@EricTopol) February 14, 2022
======
Religious exemptions are increasingly becoming a workaround for unvaccinated hospital and nursing home workers who want to keep their jobs as federal mandates go into effect nationwide this week. https://t.co/zZEfc6jbLK
— The Associated Press (@AP) February 15, 2022
As a person of faith, I find this kind of narcissistic thimblerigging deeply offensive:
… In some institutions, religious exemptions are being invoked by staff and approved by managers in large numbers. It’s a tricky issue for hospital administrators, who are struggling to maintain adequate staff levels and are often reticent to question the legitimacy of the requests…
As of Monday health care workers in 24 states — all but three of which went for then-President Donald Trump in the 2020 election — will be required to have received their first vaccine dose or an exemption. The mandate already took effect late last month in jurisdictions that didn’t challenge the requirement in court, although enforcement actions won’t begin immediately.
It affects a wide swath of the industry, covering doctors, nurses, technicians, aides, hospital volunteers, nursing homes, home-health agencies and other providers that participate in the federal Medicare or Medicaid programs…
While reasons given for seeking exemptions vary, the vaccines’ remote link to fetuses aborted decades ago is often cited — lab-grown cell lines descended from those fetuses were used in testing and manufacturing processes. The vaccines do not contain fetal cells, however, and workers generally are seeking the exemptions without the backing of major denominations and prominent religious leaders.
But as the health care mandate takes effect, hospital leaders acknowledge that they see the exemptions as a way to retain staff at a time when resources are already stretched thin…
New York City fires 1430 municipal workers who failed to meet the vaccination mandate. That amounts to less than 1% of city employees. Many of the anti-vaxxers were also opposed to wearing masks https://t.co/dIqBJL3pPT
— delthia ricks ? (@DelthiaRicks) February 14, 2022
California is leaving its school mandate in place, even as other mask mandates are eased https://t.co/2nZgcM9oE7
— delthia ricks ? (@DelthiaRicks) February 15, 2022
D.C., Maryland join others in easing COVID restrictions https://t.co/EREwxrDeRC pic.twitter.com/7GptRRr9yL
— Reuters (@Reuters) February 15, 2022
One obvious problem with calling opposition to vaccine mandates "populist" is that the position is, in fact, massively unpopular https://t.co/Jz58s2icej
— Scott Lemieux (@LemieuxLGM) February 14, 2022
NeenerNeener
Monroe County, NY:
There were 53 new laboratory-confirmed cases of COVID-19 on 2/14/22.
There were 42 new positive home tests reported on 2/14/22.
70.9% of Monroe County residents now fully vaccinated. It’s inching up slowly, but it is going up.
Deaths are also still going up, now at 1753 since March of 2020.
Hospitalizations:
94 cases hospitalized; 69% unvaxed
13 cases are in the ICU; 61.5% unvaxed
NO CASES INTUBATED! As of this report, anyway.
Still no test kits in the mail at my house.
Cermet
Yes, the world has forever change (not that that doesn’t always occur) but in a big way that affects every single human on the planet. Like AGW everyone pays a new price – but of course, the poor, weak, and old pay the highest prices.
Only the media can post utter crap like the statement that Biden’s world vaccine goal of reaching ‘x’ vaccination level has failed. Like Biden can in any manner or way control what the world does – that is simply an insane and asinine statement.
Amir Khalid
Malaysia’s Ministry of Health reports 22,133 new Covid-19 cases today in its media statement, for a cumulative reported total of 3,083,683 cases. It also reports 24 deaths as of midnight, for an adjusted cumulative total of 32,149 deaths – 1.04% of the cumulative reported total, 1.11% of resolved cases.
Based on cases reported yesterday, Malaysia’s nationwide Rt is at 1.38.
103 confirmed cases are in ICU, 55 of them on ventilators. Meanwhile, 7,584 more patients have recovered, for a cumulative total of 2,868,538 patients recovered – 93.0% of the cumulative reported total.
16 new clusters were reported today, for a cumulative total of 6,629 clusters. 444 clusters are currently active; 6,185 clusters are now inactive.
22,053 new cases today are local infections. 80 new cases today are imported.
The National Covid-19 Immunisation Programme (PICK) administered 149,888 doses of vaccine on 14th February: 38,738 first doses, 1,489 second doses, and 109,661 booster doses. As of midnight, the cumulative total is 65,198,894 doses administered: 26,297,198 first doses, 25,734,211 second doses, and 13,373,479 booster doses. 80.5% of the population have received their first dose, 78.8% their second dose, and 41.0% their booster dose.
YY_Sima Qian
On 2/14 Mainland China reported 40 new domestic confirmed (1 previously asymptomatic) & 7 new domestic asymptomatic cases.
Guangdong Province reported 2 new domestic confirmed cases. As the province does not breakdown recoveries between domestic & imported cases, I cannot track the count of active cases in parts of the province.
Guangxi “Autonomous” Region reported 1 new domestic confirmed case. There currently are 270 active domestic confirmed & 1 active domestic asymptomatic cases in the province.
At Shaoyang in Hunan Province there currently is 1 active domestic confirmed case in the city, part of the transmission chain spreading from Shenzhen in Guangdong.
Tianjin Municipality did not report any new domestic positive cases. 9 domestic confirmed case recovered. There currently are 18 active domestic confirmed cases (all presumed Omicron). 2 residential buildings remain at Medium Risk.
Beijing Municipality did not report any new domestic positive cases. As Beijing does not separate recoveries between imported & domestic cases, I cannot track the number of active cases on the city. The High Risk community has been re-designated to Medium Risk. All other Medium Risk areas have been re-designated to Low Risk.
Liaoning Province reported 29 new domestic confirmed cases (1 previously asymptomatic). There currently are 92 active domestic confirmed & 3 active domestic asymptomatic cases in the province.
At Shandong Province there currently are 1 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.
At Datong in Shanxi Province 1 domestic confirmed case recovered. There currently is 1 active domestic confirmed case remaining in the city.
At Hebei Province 3 domestic confirmed cases recovered. There currently are 10 active domestic confirmed cases (3 at Xiong’an, 4 at Hengshui & 3 at Langfang) in the province, all part of the transmission chain from the cold storage warehouses outbreak in Fengtai District in Beijing. 1 village at Hengshui remains at Medium Risk.
At Yili Prefecture in Xinjiang “Autonomous” Region all remaining domestic positive cases have recovered or were released from isolation.
Heilongjiang Province did not report any new domestic positive cases. There currently are 20 active domestic confirmed (all at Mudanjiang) & 40 active domestic asymptomatic (11 at Heihe, 25 at Mudanjiang & 4 at Qiqihar) cases in the province. 5 residential buildings at Heihe are currently at Medium Risk. All areas in Mudanjiang are now at Low Risk.
At Shanghai Municipality there currently are 2 active domestic confirmed & 1 active domestic asymptomatic cases in the city.
At Huanggang in Hubei Province there currently is 1 active domestic asymptomatic case in the city, part of the transmission chain from Hangzhou in Zhejiang.
Suzhou in Jiangsu Province reported 8 new domestic confirmed (6 mild & 2 moderate) & 4 new domestic asymptomatic cases (all presumed Omicron), all workers at the massive Suzhou Industrial Park or their close contacts, 5 from fever clinics & the others are traced close contacts. There currently is 8 active domestic confirmed & 5 active domestic asymptomatic cases in the city. 6 residential buildings have been elevated to Medium Risk.
At Tongren in Guizhou Province there currently is 1 active domestic confirmed case in the city, part of the transmission chain spreading from Huludao in Liaoning.
At Henan Province 17 domestic confirmed case recovered. There currently are 109 active domestic confirmed cases in the province.
Yunnan Province reported 3 new domestic asymptomatic cases, all at Malipo County in Wenshan Prefecture, 2 traced close contacts under centralized quarantine & 1 from screening of residents in areas in under movement restrictions. 1 domestic confirmed case recovered. There currently are 10 active domestic confirmed (2 at Kunming, 5 at Sipsongpanna Prefecture & 3 at Wenshan Prefecture) & 16 active domestic asymptomatic (6 at Sipsongpanna Prefecture & 10 at Wenshan Prefecture) cases remaining. All of Mengla County in Sipsongpanna Prefecture is now at Low Risk.
Imported Cases
On 2/13, Mainland China reported 40 new imported confirmed cases (3 previously asymptomatic), 37 imported asymptomatic cases, 2 imported suspect cases:
Overall in Mainland China, 80 confirmed cases recovered (30 imported), 50 asymptomatic cases were released from isolation (47 imported) & 4 were reclassified as confirmed cases (3 imported), & 5,746 individuals were released from quarantine. Currently, there are 1,398 active confirmed cases in the country (701 imported), 6 in serious condition (1 imported), 791 active asymptomatic cases (714 imported), 3 suspect cases (both imported). 30,116 traced contacts are currently under centralized quarantine.
As of 2/14, 3,052.435M vaccine doses have been injected in Mainland China, an increase of 5,748M doses in the past 24 hrs.
On 2/15, Hong Kong reported 1,619 new positive cases, all domestic. There are another ~ 5,400 cases who are preliminarily positive, awaiting confirmation.
On 2/15, Taiwan reported 45 new positive cases, 40 imported & 5 domestic.
Baud
Doesn’t matter if the popular side doesn’t unite.
@Cermet:
Dem presidents have God-like powers but like the God-like discretion to refuse to solve all problems perfectly.
John S.
Carrie Lam sounds like a pretty shitty leader based on some of those tweets. I suppose she’s just your garden-variety Communist party puppet, which is pretty much the only thing that can be “elected” in HK at this point.
debbie
@John S.:
I’ve heard her interviewed a number of times on the BBC. She really is Beijing’s useful puppet.
NotMax
The stupid, it
burnskills.The stupid, it
burnskills II.FYI.
Amir Khalid
Novak Djokovic may say he’s no anti-vaxxer, but I say he is. And if Covid-era travel rules force an end to his playing career, it’s all his own fault.
lowtechcyclist
You know how, in horror movies, there’s always that point where they *think* the monster has been beaten and they can now breathe easy?
It’s the new “Groundhog Day” and we’re at that scene yet again.
Baud
@Amir Khalid:
?
New Deal democrat
Cases in the US declined to 150,000, only 30,000 above their level just before The Omicron wave started. Deaths declined slightly to 2300.
US Census regions vary between 25 (Northeast) and 55 (West) cases per 100,000, with all regions declining, compared with the 20 to 40 range in Canada’s provinces. At the current rate of decline, within a week the Northeast will be below any point in the past year except for May through July. PA is already there. MD, DC, and PR are also close. On the other hand, the States doing the worst, still at or close to roughly 100 cases per 100,000, are mainly rural States hit later: AK, WV, KY, ID, TN, MT, ND, FL, MN, MS, and NM. No States show any increase, although SC is flat.
Deaths in the U.K. are down by 1/3rd, while in South Africa they have risen back close to their peak. Dr. Tom Moultrie of South Africa continues to believe this is haphazard, late reporting rather than a new wave. Cases in the U.K. are down over 60%, while in South Africa they have been flat for the past 3 weeks at a level off 85% from peak, but over 8* their level before Omicron. This may be the BA2 subvariant creating a long tail – but so far there is no evidence of that in the US or Canada.
This is about the best, most hopeful data trend I have seen since the Delta wave started last July. *If* the current trends hold, the Northeast corridor, Ohio, and PR could be down to their late spring 2021 averages within two weeks. I’ll worry about the next variant tomorrow; today I am optimistic.
NotMax
From 1956. If it’s good enough for “the King”….
Steeplejack
@NeenerNeener:
Your comment prompted me to check on my order, which I made on January 18, when we first learned that the USPS page was active.
I found this useful article, which said to check whether I had received an order tracking number from USPS. I went back through my mail and found that I had. (You can use that number in any USPS search box.) I entered that number and got this message: “Your order of COVID-19 tests is being processed.” [Sad trombone sound]
At least this answered one question I had—whether the tests had come and gotten snagged by one of my neighbors (six-unit building). Apparently not.
Kay
@NotMax:
Do the patients who have the misfortune to encounter her in a hospital have the right to be notified that she follows religious dictates rather than accepted standards of care?
What about the patients? Is anyone considering them at all? I want to know if my health care provider has religious objections to health care. I want the option to refuse having her in my hospital room. She’s a danger to me.
germy
Baud
@Kay:
During AiDS, the GOP supported all kinds of restrictions on people with HIV that had no basis in how that virus is transmitted.
YY_Sima Qian
@John S.: Well, Hong Kong did manage to contain COVID-19 for 2 years, even in face of Delta. Omicron has proven a bridge too far. The problem is the city failed to maximize vaccination rate, especially among the elderly (that is on both the city’s government & segments of the population), during the 2 years that its policy bought, & also clearly failed to plan for the eventuality that its “Dynamic Zero COVID” will prove untenable. I am sure they were hoping that it would eventually prove unnecessary.
The current outbreak has exceeded the city’s capacity for Test/Trace/Isolate. There is a danger of Omicron spread from Hong Kong to the rest of the Pearl River Delta, which is the largest manufacturing center in the world, especially for consumer electronics. Even if the Chinese jurisdictions maintain their success in containing & eliminating Omicron outbreaks as they are discovered, constant localized lock downs due to repeated introductions from Hong Kong will prove very disruptive to the global supply chain.
As of today nearly 20 trucker drivers carrying goods to & from Hong Kong have tested positive in Shenzhen, though they have not seeded any community transmission, yet. The tightened response to such cases is also impacting logistics of daily supplies into Hong Kong.
Just today, 3 positive cases were found in Guangzhou in Guangdong Province, all Mainland Chinese residents who apparently had set sail from Zhuhai in Guangdong at end of Jan., met up w/ friends from Hong Kong while on the seas, returned to Guangzhou on 2/14. They proceeded to tour & eat their way across the city, before getting tested in the evening (presumably for travel), w/ positive results. Another 2 positive cases were found in Cenzhou in Hunan Province, both Mainland Chinese residents who took a boat from Hong Kong to Zhuhai (rumor has it they were smuggled in to avoid centralized quarantine) & then drove by private car back to Wenzhou. At least they had the presence of mind to get tested immediately.
Right now just Mainland China & Taiwan are still keep lid on Omicron.
Kay
@Baud:
It’s only fair that patients can choose too.
If you announce you will not be following ordinary standards of and care and prevention of disease transmission with this virus and you’re a health care provider, I have to wonder what other medical/patient care standards you ignore/subvert because your religion demands it.
I want to be cared for by a health care provider who follows accepted, modern, consistent standards of care. If I wanted crack pot woo woo I would have chosen that. Can I rely on that in a hospital or not? Just depends on which employee wanders into my room and which set of standards that employee has refused to follow? Is she vaccinated at all? What else is she going to infect me with? If “God is the guardian of health” does she wash her hands and follow the other infection prevention rules, ot is it just pick and choose?
debbie
@NeenerNeener:
Mine finally showed up last night. They’ll need a few days to come to room temperature, I think.
Baud
@Kay:
Their rights > your rights.
debbie
@Baud:
That’s a very good point. In NYC, I remember someone even brought up some sort of tattoo to warn others to keep their distance. ?
NotMax
Head/desk head/desk head/desk.
OzarkHillbilly
@Baud: Godless Liberals don’t have any rights.
NeenerNeener
@Steeplejack: Thanks, I used the order number to track it and mine still says “Being processed” too.
Baud
@OzarkHillbilly:
To be fair, religious liberals don’t either.
Cameron
@Kay: If God is the guardian of health, why are they staying in the health-care profession? Isn’t that kind of blasphemous?
sab
@Kay: On of my granddaughter’s half sister’s caught Covid at her middle school. Masking and vaxxing were optional there. She was unvaxxed because her idiot mother wouldn’t let her be vaxxed. She wore masks at school, but most of the other kids didn’t.
After she got it, her 8 month old baby brother got it and wound up on oxygen in the hospital. Everyone recovered, fortunately.
Idiot mother works in a nursing home. In Ohio
ETA Mandates all through the system would have been very helpful.
OzarkHillbilly
@NotMax: The Encyclopedia of American Loons, I like.
Kay
@OzarkHillbilly:
Patients should be noticed. It is simply not fair to demand that people who are vulnerable enough to be in a hospital are subjected to this without their informed consent. I don’t want her in the room- not with me, not with my family members, I want a different nurse. I don’t have time to interview each hospital employee on which infection mitigation rules they follow and it’s not my job.
OzarkHillbilly
@Baud: There are no religious liberals, only heretics following false gods.
lowtechcyclist
@debbie: Make them wear a patch that says, “Plague Rat.”
If they got a religious exemption*, they can put “God says it’s OK” in small letters underneath.
*Yeah – a ‘religious exemption’ from “love your neighbor as yourself.” A funny thing for a supposed Christian** to ask for.
**I’m sure there are some exceptions, but I bet >99% of the people asking for these exemptions identify as Christian.
Kay
@sab:
A “rights” analysis or policy includes the rights of others. These are health care facilities! Why is there no analysis of the rights of patients not to be subjected to this?
It’s ridiculous. Are they protecting vulnerable patients from these people? Don’t the patients at least deserve notice?
matt
@germy: Fuck David Leonhardt. He spends 90% of his time ragging on people for wearing masks.
Cameron
@Kay: That’s how my friend got COVID. She was in the hospital for other stuff, and a temp came in and succeeded in infecting 18 patients and staff. Apparently God was off at an anti-mask rally or something.
Soprano2
This is a good question. So far I haven’t encountered a health care worker who wasn’t vaccinated, but I’m sure there are some down here. I wonder if someone will file a lawsuit if a relative who dies of Covid was treated by an unvaccinated worker and they weren’t informed of it. A responsible organization would give people a choice.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
By her logic her job is evil for thwarting God’s will on disease.
debbie
@NeenerNeener:
I received an email when the order was finally in route.
sdhays
@lowtechcyclist: There are other religions than “Christian”, and you can have religious convictions without going to church. Christian™ churches don’t have a monopoly on religion, as much as they think they deserve to.
That said, anyone who actually has religious convictions preventing them from getting vaccinated for COVID has problems with all vaccines and lots of other medicine and almost certainly isn’t involved in the health care industry already. Those who are requesting special exemptions just for the COVID vaccines are 1) stupid and gullible and/or 2) political performance artists.
NorthLeft12
@Kay: Yes, this has been one of my concerns for awhile.
My experience is that people who do not get vaccinated are very lax on all of the other precautions to prevent transmission of COVID. A nurse who does not believe in the science behind vaccines might not believe in hand washing, PPE, etc. I would not want a nurse like that taking care of anyone.
Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony
@Cameron: One would think this would be grounds for a lawsuit.
Cermet
@Kay: She’s a lying piece of sh*t. Don’t expect anything logical – that said, since she is lying about religious issues, seriously doubt any such nurse (but absolutely not true for those types with an MD degree) wouldn’t follow standard hygiene rules.
mrmoshpotato
Oh cool – an explosion of Christian Scientists. They refuse any and all medical treatment, ya know – right?
WaterGirl
@sab: Just awful. sigh.
Mai Naem mobile
This Texas cop and pregnant wife decided to not to get vaxxed and then went on vacation to Vegas staying at the Trump Hotel because you know President Biden said the pandemic was over. What happened in Vegas didn’t stay in Vegas. Cop ofcourse has to wear his blue lives baseball cap in the WaPo pics. She spent over 4 months in the hospital and still has medical issues. I am sure the Houston Police Dept wants those kind of insurance bills. I am sure the cop will thank Obamacare for not having limits on his coverage right?
https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2022/02/14/unvaccinated-pregnant-mom-covid-strokes-texas/
Cermet
@mrmoshpotato: Actually, that group does not prohibit vaccination; they allow any member to decide for themselves – so yes, members are allowed to refuse a vaccine on religious grounds but the group does not officially state that vaccines are prohibited and allows individual choice. But that does mean a member can site their belief and refuse.
So the truth is, very few and no major religious groups prohibits vaccinations.
Cermet
@Mai Naem mobile: I will say they allowed the public to see their mistake and its consequences So in that, they are certainly trying to show everyone that avoiding vaccines is dangerous and even deadly (an outspoken uncle did die of covid) – they show themselves as examples of this mind set – that took guts to admit to the world about their foolish actions. I’ll give them that.
mrmoshpotato
@Cameron:
You want logic from these stupid, selfish, plague rat slapdicks? :)
mrmoshpotato
@Cermet: I see.
Robert Sneddon
There was a nurse who claimed a religious exemption from vaccination with nine pages of handwritten Christian apologia, lots of cherry-picked Bible references. She contracted COVID-19 over the New Year and died a few days ago before her claim for exemption could be considered. Pity, that.
pajaro
@lowtechcyclist:
Yes, the good political leaders in DC have decided that, for most purposes, the pandemic is over. Notably, the virus was not invited to their deliberations and is not currently available for comment.
Sloane Ranger
Monday in the UK we had 41,648 new cases. This is reduction of 30% in the rolling 7-day average. Please bear in mind that these figures will involve catch up from the weekend. New cases by nation,
England – 31,943 (down 373)
Northern Ireland – 2465 (up 307)
Scotland – 5118 (down 183)
Wales – 2122 (up 627).
Deaths – There were 35 deaths within 28 days of a positive test reported yesterday but this is probably an undercount due to Registry Office closures over the weekend. The rolling 7-day average is down by 27.2%. 23 deaths were in England, 2 in Northern Ireland, 10 in Wales and none in Scotland.
Testing – 784,455 tests took place on Sunday, 13th. This is a big reduction from recent numbers but many schools in England are on half term so children may not be being tested as much. The rolling 7-day average is down by 13.2%.
Hospitalisations – As of Friday, 11th, 12,357 people were in hospital and 416 were on ventilators. The weekly average for hospital admissions was down by 12.8% as of 8 February.
Vaccinations – As of 13th, 91.3% of all UK residents aged 12+ had had 1 shot (unchanged over the last 4 days), 84.8% had had 2 (unchanged from the day before) and 65.7% had had a 3rd shot/booster (unchanged since the day before).
The Pale Scot
Bloody Protestant savages. It wouldn’t be hard to find theologians that could catalogue which creeds have a claim to being righteously antivaxx. Some outfits have these people answer a questionnaire listing all the treatments that used fetal cells, like aspirin, insulin etc that they have refused in the past. If they lie it’s grounds for dismissal. At least tell them their company provided health insurance won’t cover them if they get COVID
Fair Economist
@YY_Sima Qian: If Hong Kong isn’t reporting any imported cases, they must be so overwhelmed they can’t keep track. Not good.
I don’t see how China can keep out Omicron if it goes pandemic in Hong Kong. Is the border closed? Wouldn’t that be a huge economic problem?
The Pale Scot
On their forehead, please
Bill Arnold
@Baud:
But that is different. We must respect the rights of people who hold religious beliefs that include obeying God by spreading deadly infectious diseases.
It’s in the US constitution, somewhere: The Right Of Godly People To Kill Random People.
(Also to cause lifelong damage in even more random people, but that’s a minor additional detail.)
YY_Sima Qian
@Fair Economist: Travel across the Mainland-Hong Kong has always required quarantine since the start of the pandemic, there is customs & immigration control just like an international border (the border is also fenced & has a creek w/ concrete banks for much of it), though there were “green lane” exemptions when cases were very low in Hong Kong. Logistics & goods transfer never stopped. However, a lot of Mainland Chinese w/ residencies in Hong Kong or Hong Kongers w/ Mainland residencies are trying to make their way across the border right now.
Hong Kong has been registering few imported cases in recent weeks because the city’s government had stopped flights to much of the world w/ high Omicron prevalence weeks before.
YY_Sima Qian
@YY_Sima Qian: Hong King’s economy rests on 4 pillars: finance, logistics, real estate & tourism related services. Finance is large borderless, & will continue to do fine as Chinese companies increasingly eschew Wall Street for IPOs. Logistics might see some impact from a major Omicron wave. Real estate is essentially a local oligopolistic market through collusion between the tycoons and the city’s government (has been since the British colonial days). Tourism related services had been badly mauled by the 2019 protests (since the vast majority of the tourism comes from Mainland China), w/ the pandemic making things that much worse.
Bill Arnold
@matt:
I’m done with him. He is on team Stochastic Mass Murder, just for an improved personal position on Team Contrarian. If I ever meet him physically I will call him a selfish mass murderer to his face.
J R in WV
@Amir Khalid:
Tennis star Joker deserves what comes for him: Covid infection with long-term effects ending any sort of athletic endeavor.
He’s killing people by setting a terrible example.
lowtechcyclist
@sdhays: You seem to be taking issue with something I said, but damned if I can figure out what.
If you think that a significant portion of religious exemptions to vaccination are sought by adherents of non-Christian religions, that might explain where you’re coming from. But it doesn’t appear that you believe that, so I’m confused.
bluegirlfromwyo
@Kay: Absolutely there needs to be informed consent. We got lucky on this. My husband’s now former primary care physician is unvaccinated. If we hadn’t known her political leanings and her sister’s unvaxxed status, we wouldn’t have known to ask. Even then, it wasn’t the doctor who told us, it was her receptionist. People who go to the hospital or even to most doctors offices don’t have that kind of inside knowledge. No one shouldn’t have to assume that risk on their own.
lowtechcyclist
@Bill Arnold: I too have had it with the contrarian centrist anti-maskers.
At least the RWNJ anti-maskers make some sort of perverted sense: it’s all about tribal identity for them, and my wearing a mask means I’m a member of one of the tribes they hate.
But the contrarian anti-maskers, OTOH, I have no idea why it upsets them when someone else wears a mask.
OK, maybe I do: maybe they’re just picking on people to demonstrate what they believe is their superiority in reasoning. In which case fuck’em.
Ruckus
@Amir Khalid:
Let’s see, he’s screwing his career over not getting a vaccine for a deadly disease, in a career that he travels around the world to play tennis so it’s rather likely that he’s had to get other vaccines and he’s not willing to get this vaccine. Hmmmm. I’m thinking he’s at the very least anti-this-vaccine. Also I have no idea how many vaccines are needed to travel freely around the world currently but I bet it’s over zero. We got a bunch of them in boot camp during the Vietnam war, from which I enjoyed the extra 9 days of boot camp that I spent in the hospital with a 105 deg temp. Good times.
Ruckus
@lowtechcyclist:
I’d bet it takes rather perverted “logic” to make any kind of excuse for not protecting one’s self and others from a deadly disease. In the US it’s obviously mostly political, the right wing PTB seem to not giving a fuck about their own supporters. One might assume that they would see the futility of killing off their own supporters but I’d bet they think that they will kill off more of the actual humans that oppose them. Freedom at any, and every price, including losing power. Because I’d bet that the RethuglicanPowersThatBe are vaccinated. Their last idiot leader is, I’d bet that DeathSantus is. How many of the idiot congress rethuglicans are?