Has anyone else noticed a sudden absence of antivaxx bots since Twitter was restricted in Russia? ?? After the massive number of bot responses to my #COVID19Vaccines misinformation tweet, the silence is dramatic. #VaccinesWork
— Dr. Joss Reimer (@jossreimer) February 28, 2022
On the two-year anniversary of the start of the pandemic, people in the U.S. are shedding their masks and getting back to normal as COVID-19 deaths and cases plummet 80% in the last six weeks, according to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data. https://t.co/JMqE4kcBzo
— The Associated Press (@AP) March 11, 2022
… The world is finally emerging from a brutal stretch of winter dominated by the highly contagious omicron variant, bringing a sense of relief on the two-year anniversary of the start of the pandemic.
It was March 11, 2020 when the WHO issued its declaration, driving home the severity of the threat faced by a virus that at that point had wreaked havoc primarily in Italy and China. The U.S. had 38 confirmed coronavirus deaths and 1,300 cases nationwide on that date, but reality was starting to sink in: stocks tanked, classrooms started closing and people began donning masks. In a matter of hours, the NBA was canceling games, Chicago’s huge St. Patrick’s Day parade was scuttled and late-night comedians began filming from empty studios — or even their homes.
Since then, more than 6 million people have died globally, nearly 1 million in the U.S. Millions have been thrown out of work, students have endured three school years of disruptions. The emergence of the vaccine in December 2021 saved countless lives but political divisions, hesitancy and inequality in health systems have kept millions of people around the world from getting inoculated, prolonging the pandemic.
The situation is improving, however.
Hospitalizations of people with COVID-19 have plummeted 80% in the last six weeks across the U.S. since a mid-January pandemic peak, dropping to the lowest levels since July 2021, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Case counts have followed the same trend line to the lowest counts since last summer as well. Even the death tally, which typically lags behind cases and hospitalizations, has slowed significantly in the last month…
Another positive: The omicron wave and vaccinations have left enough people with protection against the coronavirus that future spikes will likely require much less disruption to society, experts say…
The United States is poised to run out of tests, treatments and vaccines to fight coronavirus after a $15.6 billion funding plan collapsed in Congress. https://t.co/4RYTC2fjKy
— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) March 11, 2022
Imagine if you knew two years ago, when the first covid shutdown arrived, that this would be a chart of daily U.S. deaths from covid-19 for the next two years. (At the current rate, we'll reach 1M U.S. deaths in a few weeks.) pic.twitter.com/lvlkQdRlpz
— Orin Kerr (@OrinKerr) March 10, 2022
98% of U.S. population can ditch masks as COVID eases -CDC https://t.co/zQs9gFHDKh pic.twitter.com/6z7el148dL
— Reuters (@Reuters) March 11, 2022
Passengers traveling in the U.S. will have to keep their masks on for at least another month with Joe Biden's administration extending mask requirements on airplanes, trains and in transit hubs through April 18 https://t.co/JKHc0KeeK4 pic.twitter.com/BjRT1J5sQT
— Reuters (@Reuters) March 11, 2022
======
The WHO, often criticized for being too slow to declare a pandemic two years ago today, now says countries are being too quick to declare it over and let down their guard.
The agency urged continued vigilance against Covid in several forums this week. https://t.co/3HSr1CYsfU
— The New York Times (@nytimes) March 11, 2022
Covid deaths probably three times higher than records show, say researchers https://t.co/Wqs36Jizog
— BBC News (World) (@BBCWorld) March 11, 2022
BREAKING: China imposes a lockdown on 9 million residents in the northeastern industrial center of Changchun amid a new virus outbreak. https://t.co/OCQk84OoAf
— The Associated Press (@AP) March 11, 2022
Mainland China reported over 1,000 new local COVID-19 infections on Friday, the highest daily count since Beijing contained its first national outbreak in early 2020, driven by a jump in asymptomatic infections amid the spread of the Omicron variant. https://t.co/talVY5BU9f
— Reuters Health (@Reuters_Health) March 11, 2022
China's Shanghai shuts schools due to fresh COVID-19 outbreak https://t.co/HwkasMRsNe pic.twitter.com/YObKFXEm41
— Reuters (@Reuters) March 11, 2022
Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam said on Friday that the city's COVID-19 vaccination programme would focus on its elderly and children, as authorities battled to reduce a surge of coronavirus infections and climbing death rates. https://t.co/n0JxHuoNF0
— Reuters Health (@Reuters_Health) March 11, 2022
Omicron cases continue to surge in parts of Asia. Covid won't end until it ends for everyone worldwide. https://t.co/lHAAyjM2SD
— delthia ricks ? (@DelthiaRicks) March 10, 2022
Japan is considering offering a fourth coronavirus vaccine shot later this year, a newspaper reported on Friday, while a government spokesman said a decision would be made based on the severity of the pandemic. https://t.co/Uha9X7SACw
— Reuters Health (@Reuters_Health) March 11, 2022
Philippines approves emergency use of Pfizer's COVID-19 drug Paxlovid https://t.co/D0bgAlfiLk pic.twitter.com/BnCBovEU8j
— Reuters (@Reuters) March 11, 2022
As Omicron surges, New Zealand's businesses want COVID bubble burst https://t.co/4Ma1WNh2vn pic.twitter.com/vbAj8FDAhv
— Reuters (@Reuters) March 11, 2022
Coronavirus infections in Germany have passed 250,000 in a single day for the first time since the beginning of the pandemic. https://t.co/1SZEGfjEaP
— Jess-Leggera-G ?? (@MeetJess) March 11, 2022
======
How has the COVID-19 pandemic changed after two years?
More places are shifting to a return to normal. Safe, effective vaccines have been developed. Questions remain, but experts know a lot more about the virus. https://t.co/QeTFrhw1Gv
— The Associated Press (@AP) March 11, 2022
The past few months have been frustrating for guardians hoping to get their young children immunized against the coronavirus. But in the coming weeks, Pfizer and Moderna will have results from their vaccine trials in young children that may bring clarity. https://t.co/YWtKgzQvfE
— The New York Times (@nytimes) March 11, 2022
Valneva now expects a positive recommendation from the European Medecines Agency (EMA) in April for its VLA2001 COVID-19 candidate vaccine, the French vaccine maker said on Friday, compared to an earlier target for the end of March. https://t.co/VStVgSlEnF
— Reuters Health (@Reuters_Health) March 11, 2022
Doctors said in interviews they are treating long covid patients who are clearly too sick to work but who have difficulty meeting the evidence threshold insurers demand: objective medical test results showing an inability to perform work. https://t.co/RLiICoJf6e
— BA Haller (@Mediadisdat) March 9, 2022
======
?? NEW: My own crude estimate: Vaccine refusal *specifically* has killed 180K – 235K Americans to date:https://t.co/nYknYmC18f
— Charles Gaba ???? (@charles_gaba) March 10, 2022
As noted in the headline & at the link, my own methodology is pretty crude. For comparison, here's a more-detailed analysis by @KFF which estimated the total to be around 163,000…in *mid-December*.
Another ~162K Americans have died of COVID since then.https://t.co/LQbJ72CI0m
— Charles Gaba ???? (@charles_gaba) March 10, 2022
As the pandemic enters its third year, there’s no return to normal for Hari Close and other Black funeral directors. https://t.co/Pn7ONL9Mi6
— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) March 8, 2022
The $8B #COVID19 shake-down:
"suspects wrongfully obtained fdl loans to bolster companies that didn’t actually exist…large, transnational crime syndicates stole workers’ identities to receive generous unemployment benefits under someone else’s name."https://t.co/lQo14vE904— Laurie Garrett (@Laurie_Garrett) March 10, 2022
United Airlines to let unvaccinated employees return to jobs March 28 -memo https://t.co/qXNbloPv2l pic.twitter.com/oSD20hq0WX
— Reuters (@Reuters) March 11, 2022
On The Road – The Dangerman – PSL Lighthouse (Central Coast, California)
NeenerNeener
Monroe County, NY:
77 new cases on 3/10.
New Deal democrat
Cases in the US declined slightly to 36,800, or 11 cases per 100,000. Deaths declined to 1259.
Internationally, in some places where BA.2 has become dominant, like South Africa or Ireland, it has resulted in a slowly declining or flat fat tail of cases. In others, like the UK and Portugal, it has coincided with a new increase on the order of 30% (but since
precautions have been relaxed or dumped almost everywhere in Europe, and absolutely the UK, that is a confounding factor).
The worst States in the US are AK, with over 50 cases per 100,000, followed by ID, MT, ME, WV, CT, VT, CO, AL, and AR, with 16. The best jurisdictions are LA, with 5 cases per 100,000, followed by MD, SD, UT, NE, IA, PR, OH, MS, and SC, with 6.
Cases are increasing week over week in CT, AK, DE, and AL. This is an increase of 1 State form yesterday and 2 one week ago. Cases are down 10% for the week in NY and NJ. I suspect we are seeing the effect of BA.2 in the NYC metro area. I expect cases and deaths to continue to decline nationwide, but there are a few signs we will not decline to the levels of last June, when there were only 11,300 cases, or 3.5 cases per 100,000.
Amir Khalid
Malaysia’s Ministry of Health reported 30,787 new Covid-19 cases yesterday in its media statement, for a cumulative reported total of 3,741,986 cases. It also reported 70 deaths for an adjusted cumulative total of 33,567 deaths – 0.90% of the cumulative reported total, 0.98% of resolved cases.
Malaysia’s nationwide Rt stands at 1.04.
153 confirmed cases are in ICU, 96 of them on ventilators. Meanwhile, 26,457 more patients have recovered, for a cumulative total of 3,393,999 patients recovered – 90.7% of the cumulative reported total.
Four new clusters were reported yesterday, for a cumulative total of 6,869 clusters. 419 clusters are currently active; 6,450 clusters are now inactive.
30,179 new cases reported yesterday were local infections. 608 new cases were imported.
The National Covid-19 Immunisation Programme (PICK) administered 64,759 doses of vaccine on 10th March: 20,178 first doses, 1,736 second doses, and 42,845 booster doses. The cumulative total is 68,002,567 doses administered: 27,241,640 first doses, 25,767,503 second doses, and 15,202,158 booster doses. 83.4% of the population have received their first dose, 78.9% their second dose, and 46.6% their booster dose.
New Deal democrat
Remember when Congress refused to appropriate money for Trump’s wall, but he declared a state of emergency and spent it anyway? Well, COVID —> sauce/goose/gander.
OzarkHillbilly
@New Deal democrat: Yeah, I remember that. I’d rather we didn’t normalize lawless and unconstitutional behavior in our presidents. I would much prefer we just arrest trump, not that I think that will ever happen.
Martin
China has fucked up. Their success has been largely due to a compliant population. The govt asked people to test, they tested. Asked them to quarantine, they quarantined. But video has surfaced of workers going into the home of a person who was infected and killing their dog by beating it to death with a stick. Suddenly the population is no longer compliant, at least the ones with pets. This is primarily happening around Shenzhen, across from Hong Kong. Shit in Hong Kong is going very sideways and they now have the highest death rate from Covid that anyone anywhere has seen, at any point of this. And a stones throw away, Shenzhen residents are rebelling just a bit. I’m afraid the whole effort is going to unravel.
Baud
@Martin:
Why did they kill the dog?
raven
@Baud: Because they thought it was a carrier?
Matt McIrvin
@New Deal democrat: The situation in CT no longer looks like explosive growth and I am less worried about it than I was. It looks to me like there was a genuine outbreak in New Haven that manifested over the last weekend and showed up as a big spike in the Monday data, but it’s largely burned itself out already.
YY_Sima Qian
On 3/10 Mainland China reported 397 new domestic confirmed (21 previously asymptomatic), 703 new domestic asymptomatic cases.
Guangdong Province reported 11 new domestic confirmed (1 previously asymptomatic) & 167 new domestic asymptomatic cases.
Guangxi “Autonomous” Region reported 6 new domestic asymptomatic cases (5 at Fangchenggang & 1 at Baise), all traced close contacts already under centralized quarantine or found via screening of residents in areas under movement restrictions. 7 domestic confirmed cases recovered. There currently are 81 active domestic confirmed (49 at Fangchenggang, 30 at Baise, & 1 each at Chongzuo & Nanning) & 46 active domestic asymptomatic cases (33 at Fangchenggang, 12 at Baise & 1 at Chongzuo) in the province. 2 zones at Fangchenggang are currently at Medium Risk.
Inner Mongolia “Autonomous” Region reported 2 new domestic confirmed (1 previously asymptomatic, both mild) cases. 27 domestic confirmed cases recovered. There currently are 123 active domestic confirmed & 1 active domestic asymptomatic cases in the province.
Tianjin Municipality reported 18 new domestic confirmed cases (1 previously asymptomatic, 15 mild & 2 moderate), 15 are traced close contacts already under quarantine, 1 from screening of persons at risk of exposure & 1 from fever clinic. 7 domestic confirmed cases recovered. There currently are 62 active domestic confirmed & 1 active domestic asymptomatic cases in the city. 1 Medium Risk construction site has been elevated to High Risk. 2 sites are currently at High Risk.
Shandong Province reported 121 new domestic confirmed (10 previously asymptomatic, 64 mild & 2 moderate) & 255 new domestic asymptomatic cases. There currently are 422 active domestic confirmed cases & 713 active asymptomatic cases in the province.
Shanxi Province did not report any new domestic positive cases. There currently are 27 active domestic confirmed cases in the province (15 at Jinzhong, 5 each at Yuncheng & Taiyuan, 1 each at Jincheng & Xizhou).
Hebei Province reported 16 new domestic confirmed (all mild) & 16 domestic asymptomatic cases. 1 domestic asymptomatic case was released from isolation. There currently are 76 active domestic confirmed & 23 active asymptomatic case in the province.
Liaoning Province reported 4 new domestic confirmed cases (1 previously asymptomatic, all mild), all at Shenyang, all of the new domestic positive cases are traced close contacts already under centralized quarantine. 8 domestic confirmed case recovered. There currently are 133 active domestic confirmed (121 at Huludao & 12 at Shenyang) & 7 active domestic (5 at Shenyang & 2 at Dandong) cases in the province. 1 village at Suizhong County is currently at High Risk.
Heilongjiang Province reported 8 new domestic confirmed & 2 new domestic asymptomatic cases. 3 domestic confirmed cases recovered & 1 domestic asymptomatic case was released from isolation. There currently are 25 active domestic confirmed& 64 active domestic asymptomatic cases in the province.
Jilin Province reported 98 new domestic confirmed (2 previously asymptomatic, all mild) & 148 new domestic asymptomatic cases. There currently are 512 active domestic confirmed & 520 active domestic asymptomatic cases in the province.
Beijing Municipality reported 5 new domestic confirmed (1 previously asymptomatic, 4 mild & 1 moderate) & 2 new domestic asymptomatic cases, all are traced close contacts already under centralized quarantine.
Shanghai Municipality reported 11 new domestic confirmed & 64 new domestic asymptomatic cases, 72 are traced close contacts already under centralized quarantine & 3 from screening of persons at risk of exposure. There currently are 34 active domestic confirmed & 370 active domestic asymptomatic cases in the city. 6 sites are currently at Medium Risk.
Shaanxi Province reported 18 new domestic confirmed cases (10 mild & 8 moderate), 8 at Xi’an, 8 at Baoji & 2 at Hanzhong, all are traced close contacts already under centralized quarantine. There currently are 63 active domestic confirmed cases in the province (38 at Xi’an, 21 at Baoji & 4 at Hanzhong), all part of the transmission chain spreading from Shanghai. A restaurant at Baoji has been elevated to High Risk. A residential building & an office building at Baoji have been elevated to Medium Risk, as has a residential building at Hanzhong. 10 sites at Xi’an are currently at Medium Risk.
Hubei Province province reported 1 new domestic asymptomatic case, at Xianning, a person coming from out of province. There currently are 39 active domestic confirmed (30 mild & 9 moderate, all at Wuhan) & 11 active domestic asymptomatic (8 at Wuhan & 1 each at Huanggang & Xianning) cases in the province..
Jiangsu Province reported 36 new domestic (30 mild & 6 moderate) & 12 new domestic asymptomatic cases. 10 domestic confirmed cases recovered & 6 domestic asymptomatic cases were released from isolation. There currently are 107 active domestic confirmed & 37 active domestic asymptomatic cases in the province.
At Anhui Province tere currently are 3 active domestic asymptomatic cases in the province (2 at Suzhou & 1 at Anqing).
Zhejiang Province reported 16 new domestic confirmed cases (all mild), 13 at Hangzhou (all logistics workers & traced close contacts already under quarantine) & 3 at Quzhou (all traced close contacts already under centralized quarantine). There currently are 29 active domestic confirmed cases (16 at Hangzhou, 8 at Quzhou, 3 at Wenzhou, & 1 each at Huzhou & Jiaxing) in the province.
Gansu Province reported 26 new domestic confirmed (2 previously asymptomatic, 51 mild & 15 moderate) & 4 new domestic asymptomatic cases. There currently are 114 active domestic confirmed & 15 active domestic asymptomatic.
Xining in Qinghai Province reported 1 new domestic confirmed case (previous asymptomatic), a person returning from Lanzhou in Gansu on 3/6.
Henan Province reported 1 new domestic confirmed (previously asymptomatic) & 1 new domestic asymptomatic cases, both at Puyang, the new domestic positive case is a close contact already under centralized quarantine. There currently are 4 active domestic confirmed (3 at Puyang & 1 at Zhengzhou) & 2 active domestic asymptomatic (both at Puyang) cases in the province. 1 hotel & 1 residential building at Puyang are currently Medium Risk.
At Chongqing Municipality there currently is 1 active domestic asymptomatic case in the city.
Yunnan Province reported 5 new domestic confirmed & 25 new domestic asymptomatic cases. 2 domestic confirmed cases recovered. There currently are 69 active domestic confirmed & 239 active domestic asymptomatic cases remaining in the province.
Imported Cases
On 3/10, Mainland China reported 158 new imported confirmed cases (20 previously asymptomatic, 8 in Guangdong), 111 imported asymptomatic cases, 3 imported suspect cases:
Overall in Mainland China, 141 confirmed cases recovered (69 imported), 39 asymptomatic cases were released from isolation (32 imported) & 41 were reclassified as confirmed cases (20 imported), & 10,050 individuals were released from quarantine. Currently, there are 5,024 active confirmed cases in the country (2,540 imported), 6 in serious condition (2 imported), 3,972 active asymptomatic cases (1,387 imported), 7 suspect cases (all imported). 118,813 traced contacts are currently under centralized quarantine.
As of 3/10, 3,180.06M vaccine doses have been injected in Mainland China, an increase of 5.076M doses in the past 24 hrs.
On 3/11, Hong Kong reported 29,381 new positive cases, 4 imported & 29,277 domestic (18,884 via RT-PCR & 10,493 from rapid antigen tests), 196 deaths (22 fully vaccinated) + 98 backlogged deaths.
On 3/11, Taiwan reported 82 new positive cases, 75 imported & 7 domestic.
YY_Sima Qian
China just announced that it is approving the sale of at home antigen tests for average citizens, rather than relying entirely upon RT-PCR tests. Another sign of tiptoeing away from “Dynamic COVID Zero”.
Baud
@Matt McIrvin:
Ugh. Yalies.
Matt McIrvin
@Baud: Dogs and cats can get COVID, though they don’t seem to play a large role in transmission to humans. But there have been previous cases of Chinese authorities killing the pets of infected people, especially early in the pandemic when no one was really sure what to do and it was arguably a legit concern.
YY_Sima Qian
Note that the Changchun in Jilin is instituting a snap lock down to conduct 3 rounds of mass screening, it is not intended to be locked down until getting zero (like Xi’an). Jilin City in the same province is seeing a larger outbreak, but no lock down. There is no city-wide lock down in Shanghai or Qingdao.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@Baud:
Because that’s the same segment of the Chinese population that thinks drinking tea with powdered rhino horn makes their dicks work better. Or that drinking bear bile is an aphrodisiac. Or that eating some portion of pangolin is helpful to health.
I think that a big part of the Great Cultural Revolution was to try to reacculturate the peasantry into thinking in a more Confucian, rational way, and it just didn’t work.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Pretty much what the epidemiologists predicted back in 2020. Three waves and the second is the worst.
Matt McIrvin
…Similarly, the “bounce” in cases rates in Vermont already seems to be clearing. Vermont and Maine both seem to be following a pattern where the lower population density effectively flattened the curve of the Omicron outbreak, meaning they had a lower peak and a longer, more jagged comedown. In Maine it’s complicated by the fact that vaccination rates are relatively poor in the rural, Trump-voting northern parts of the state.
Meanwhile, cases are declining more smoothly in New Hampshire to the extent that it seems I won’t have to worry too much about hanging out there for a little while.
New Deal democrat
@OzarkHillbilly: “I’d rather we didn’t normalize lawless and unconstitutional behavior in our presidents”
Just my opinion, but when the other side breaks norms, unilateral disarmament is the worst response.
ETA: According to Supreme Court precedent dating back several decades, Trump’s actions were neither illegal not Unconstitutional.
YY_Sima Qian
@Martin: Not yet. The cruel actions of the health workers certainly angered cats/dogs owners in China, but they remain a relatively small authority. You know there is a massive backlash if the local government rebukes & punishes the health workers in question to assuage popular discontent. This is not the 1st time workers killed pets while the owner was in quarantine, but it is not standard practice, either.
What is starting to make “Dynamic Zero” untenable is outbreaks popping all over the place, making the responses required much more damaging to the overall economy. The huge waving washing over neighboring regions also makes border defenses untenable.
OzarkHillbilly
It’s not unilateral disarmament. It’s blowing pure oxygen on the smoldering constitution. It’s suicide.
So using funds for things they were not appropriated for by Congress is constitutional? The things I learn here.
Soprano2
@New Deal democrat: And this has the advantage of actually being an emergency!!!
Soprano2
@Martin: OMG, that is so horrible! Are they now trying to say that Covid comes from people’s pets? I guess anything except admit that they have native transmission between people, huh? They’d rather spread the falsehood that you can get Covid from frozen packages.
I’ve always thought their effort to have “zero Covid” was going to fail unless they’re willing to wall themselves off from the world forever. And what’s happening in Hong Kong sounds like what happened in New York City in April 2020, before vaccines. I’ve read here and elsewhere that uptake of the vaccines among the elderly was low because of mistrust of the government.
Soprano2
This is my opinion too. For example, fuck paying attention to “blue slips” unless Democrats want to. Republicans broke that when it suited them, so why should we be different? It’s not a law, it’s just a damn tradition that Republicans evidently don’t care about anymore, so why should Democrats care about it? It’s gone.
YY_Sima Qian
@Soprano2: Pets have caught COVID-19 from their owners, but there has never been documented transmission from pets to owners, at least not dogs & cats. However, pet owning culture is still new in most parts of China, I don’t think many of the local authorities in China have the sensitivity to respond sensitively. Animal right movement itself is also relatively new.
Baud
@Soprano2:
We’re not different. Our current blue slip policy is the exact same one the Republicans established when they were in charge of Congress.
Ohio Mom
Re: long Covid patients who are too sick to work but can’t prove it through “objective tests” and as a result, can’t qualify for disability insurance.
Those aren’t the appropriate tests then. You can’t measure length with a scale. They are not testing for the actual impairments.
Not that the insurance companies will change their testing protocols, obviously not.
This is going to take new laws and regulation. So isn’t going to happen, at least any time soon.
sdhays
It wasn’t that at all. It was a pogrom against intellectualism and pragmatism and a drive for Mao to reassert his dominance after years of catastrophic failures. People didn’t get sent to the countryside to “reacculturate the peasantry”. They were sent in order to think more like peasants – and shut up.
It went on for 10 years, and they literally didn’t teach you anything at school. Progress of any kind, other than ideological, was banned. When Mao died and the Cultural Revolution ended, the only people in a position to start the work of becoming doctors or engineers or any other advanced technical practice were those who studied in secret and under threat during those ten years.
lowtechcyclist
I remember March 11, 2020 well. Over at the message board that was then my main online hangout, there was a thread asking what the NCAA should do about the NCAA basketball tournament. I remember posting that morning that they should either play the tournament before empty houses, or scrap it altogether, adding that of course they wouldn’t. Up to that point, only a handful of colleges had canceled classes, but otherwise it was business as usual here in the U.S.
Then early that afternoon, the NBA canceled the rest of its season, and from there, the dominoes fell with sudden rapidity.
Matt McIrvin
@Baud: In case you were wondering, it looks like Cambridge, Massachusetts is also a hot spot–Middlesex County is just large enough that it blunts the impact of that in the per-county stats.
YY_Sima Qian
@Soprano2: The elderly in Hong Kong trust the government more than the younger generation, but they trust TCM even more. The city’s government certain failed in its vaccination campaign, so did civil society & so did individuals.
Matt McIrvin
@lowtechcyclist: We had tickets to a Nathaniel Rateliff concert in Boston right around then, and while the concert was not cancelled, I refused to go (and my spouse decided against it too once the news really sank in–the tickets had been a present to her and she was really looking forward to it, so that was rough). That was the first thing I really missed because of the pandemic. Right after that, my office shut down and everything started to close.
Baud
@Matt McIrvin:
There are several colleges in Cambridge, so I can’t blame Harvard alone for that.
Fair Economist
@YY_Sima Qian: China must have noticed Taiwan has been able to keep COVID minimal through Omicron without lockdowns. From your reports, test and trace plus targeted quarantines should be enough for China. That said, they should really start a mad push to get the elderly vaxxed.
Matt McIrvin
@Baud: Right now, if you look at a county-by-county map of US COVID cases and look for the remaining hot spots, a lot of them are places with college towns in them. Ithaca, NY is another one; Northampton, MA has higher levels than the rest of the state too. Now, to some extent that’s probably because these places are also testing heavily. But it’s not surprising that college campuses would be the last places for an outbreak to clear.
Anne Laurie
… ‘Long as you watch out for the bears and the libertarians. (Insert snark emoji)
YY_Sima Qian
@Fair Economist: We shall have to see about Taiwan, an outbreak like Shanghai’s (95% asymptomatic) will simply fly under the radar there. I certainly hope there is a mad dash to vaccinate the rural elders, but that data is not regularly released.
topclimber
@OzarkHillbilly: If I recall correctly, TFG re-purposed existing military appropriations (e.g. construction funds for bases) to build his wall.
Given that COVID is a threat to worldwide stability (as is climate change), Biden might be able to fund research and treatment. Congress can override his decision, but that is subject to a veto and the reason A-hole was able to switch the funds.
Soprano2
@lowtechcyclist: I remember seeing that, we were at the pub when they made the announcement and there was a lot of confusion among the customers about what it meant. I’d been telling people for two weeks that it was coming and was going to be a seriously bad thing, and most of them thought I was nuts. That’s when I first knew for sure that I was right.
New Deal democrat
@OzarkHillbilly:
The Supreme Court held that Executive emergency declarations are the equivalent of vetoes, and can only be stopped by a 2/3’s vote of both Houses of Congress.
It’s lunacy, but it’s the Law*.
*(depending on how the GOP 6 are feeling today).
Another Scott
https://biobot.io/data/ is a site summarizing Covid wastewater test results in the US.
Via a story at Science.org
Cheers,
Scott.
Soprano2
The good news here is that the 7-day average of cases has dropped to 22, from a previous high in January of 771. We’re almost in the “green zone” as far as cases are concerned. We have 46 people in the hospital, down from the high of 254 in January. The bad news is that they added 10 more deaths to the February death toll. All preventable, what a tragedy…
Soprano2
@New Deal democrat: Could Biden do it under the already-declared emergency for Covid? You know, the one the idiot “People’s Convoy” wants him to repeal? Running out of Covid tests and drugs really would be an emergency.
lowtechcyclist
@Matt McIrvin:
Sonuvabitch, that must’ve hit hard. I’d love to see him in concert, with or without the Night Sweats.
Yeah, my last day in the office was Friday, March 13th.
My wife was scheduled to have ankle surgery on the 19th, but since it was elective, we got the word on the 16th that it was canceled. She eventually had the surgery late that summer, when things were in more of a lull.
YY_Sima Qian
@sdhays: That is right, though all traditional beliefs were targeted, whether organized religion, folk beliefs or superstitions. However, after the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution ended, those beliefs came roaring back starting from the countryside.
Soprano2
@Another Scott: There is one of those for just the state of Missouri. https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/f7f5492486114da6b5d6fdc07f81aacf I don’t know if other states have similar sites, but I bet a lot of them do.
different-church-lady
We should restrict the rest of fucking Twitter too.
Lyrebird
@YY_Sima Qian: Just wanted to say a big Xie Xie for sharing all this info!
YY_Sima Qian
Here is an article on worried pet owners in Shanghai, in response to the tragedy at Huizhou in Guangdong. It appears each regional administrative division devices their own policy for handling pets of those in quarantine or in isolation. Not a surprise that the brutal handling of pets occurred in low tier cities.
Worried Pet Owners Crowdsource Info as COVID-19 Surge in Shanghai
YY_Sima Qian
@Lyrebird: My pleasure! I will not be able to sustain the the current level of data granularity if the case counts keep escalating (as I expect it to).
Timurid
@Matt McIrvin: There’s been speculation that some cool/cold climate locations are seeing an uptick now because in those regions late winter/early spring is typically when seasonal respiratory viruses have a secondary peak.
New Deal democrat
@Soprano2: “Could Biden do it under the already-declared emergency for Covid?“
Sorry, I’m not sure.
The Moar You Know
The CDC can require whatever they like, but back in November when I flew with an N95 and didn’t get sick from my plane trip for the first time ever, I will never set foot on an aircraft without one again.
Matt McIrvin
@lowtechcyclist: In hindsight it’s kind of amazing to me that I managed to go through knee-replacement surgery in February 2021, when healthcare workers were eligible for vaccination but few other people were (and I certainly wasn’t). The 2020-21 winter wave was subsiding then but far from over.
Matt McIrvin
@The Moar You Know: I wonder if some airlines will ban masks as niche marketing to wingnuts. They can say it’s to prevent terrorism.
lowtechcyclist
@Soprano2:
Yeah, when my agency got the email that said 3/13/2020 would be our last day in the office for awhile, my boss asked me how long I thought we’d be out, a few weeks maybe? I said this was serious shit, and we’d be out until at least June, maybe longer.
As it turns out, we’re still out, but that’s because our agency decided to take advantage of our being out anyway to ‘reimagine’ our workspace, and they won’t be done until sometime next year. I retire at the end of next year, so I’m not sure if I’m ever going back!
Sloane Ranger
Yesterday in the UK we had 71,259 new reported cases. The rolling 7-day average is up by 52.9%. New cases by nation,
England – 52,722
Northern Ireland – 2602
Scotland – 14,387
Wales – 1548.
Deaths – There were 142 deaths within 28 days of a positive test reported yesterday. The rolling 7-day average is up by 0.8%. 95 deaths were in England, 4 in Northern Ireland, 41 in Scotland and 2 in Wales.
Testing – 744,463 tests took place on 9 March. The rolling 7-day average is up by 2.6%.
Hospitalisations – There were 11,751 people in hospital and 266 on ventilators on 9 March. The 7-day average for hospital admissions was up by 17.3% as of 6 March.
Vaccinations – As of 9th March, 91.6% of all UK residents aged 12+ had had 1 shot, 85.5% had had 2, and 66.8% had had a 3rd shot/booster.
eachother
@YY_Sima Qian: Thank you for your elaborate posts.
I have a nagging concern that you have given voice to: “…if the case counts keep escalating (as I expect it to).”
Feathers
Re: fraud. The US really does need to start cracking down on corruption and “white collar” crime. This seems a good place to start. Slam any Democrats who get caught, but a lot of the fraud really does come from the good old boys network. Looking at how much money the various 1/6ers had taken for their businesses was an eye opener.
My little corner of the world is no longer all masks for everyone. I looked up the numbers, but I don’t even know how to interpret them anymore.