Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

This fight is for everything.

Every one of the “Roberts Six” lied to get on the court.

Wow, I can’t imagine what it was like to comment in morse code.

This has so much WTF written all over it that it is hard to comprehend.

This chaos was totally avoidable.

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

He wakes up lying, and he lies all day.

Just because you believe it, that does not make it true.

We’re watching the self-immolation of the leading world power on a level unprecedented in human history.

We know you aren’t a Democrat but since you seem confused let me help you.

Motto for the House: Flip 5 and lose none.

I’d hate to be the candidate who lost to this guy.

The line between political reporting and fan fiction continues to blur.

Museums are not America’s attic for its racist shit.

You cannot shame the shameless.

Something needs to be done about our bogus SCOTUS.

Dear elected officials: Trump is temporary, dishonor is forever.

Republicans want to make it harder to vote and easier for them to cheat.

I swear, each month of 2025 will have its own history degree.

The willow is too close to the house.

Hell hath no fury like a farmer bankrupted.

We’ve had enough carrots to last a lifetime. break out the sticks.

Anne Laurie is a fucking hero in so many ways. ~ Betty Cracker

Our messy unity will be our strength.

You are here: Home / Healthcare / COVID-19 / COVID-19 Coronavirus Updates: November 1, 2023

COVID-19 Coronavirus Updates: November 1, 2023

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COVID-19 Coronavirus Updates: November 1, 2023

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COVID-19 Coronavirus Updates: November 1, 2023 1
Arguably another (incidental) pandemic casualty:

… An announcement from China’s Center for Disease Control and Prevention about Wu’s death gave no cause, but said that “rescue measures failed.”

Wu’s health had been poor. He disappeared out of the public eye for months last year while battling cancer.

Wu, who earned his master’s and doctorate from the University of California, Los Angeles, had spent much of his early career working on HIV/Aids prevention in China…

Yet, as China battled the COVID-19 virus, Wu came to be criticized by some for his choice to publicly voice support for the country’s strict virus control measures even as the weaknesses of the strategy became more pronounced.

“Dynamic zero-COVID is appropriate for China’s reality, and is the best choice to control our country’s current COVID situation,” he said in April 2022, during the height of Shanghai’s lockdown…

In private, Wu disagreed with the excesses of the zero-COVID strategy, but felt powerless to go against it.

As zero-COVID got unsustainable in the fall of 2022, he wrote an internal report urging the government to avoid excessive measures. But in public press conferences throughout the past few years, he voiced the official line.

Wu visibly aged during the virus fight. He was pictured in 2020 with mostly black hair; by 2022, his locks had gone entirely gray.

None of the below stories from India are scientifically rigorous, but IMO they’re an indicator of the kind of sociopolitical toll the pandemic will be taking for the next many years…

COVID-19 Coronavirus Updates: November 1, 2023 2
(link)

COVID-19 Coronavirus Updates: November 1, 2023 3
(link)

COVID-19 Coronavirus Updates: November 1, 2023 4
(link)

COVID-19 Coronavirus Updates: November 1, 2023 5

COVID-19 Coronavirus Updates: November 1, 2023 6
(link)

COVID-19 Coronavirus Updates: November 1, 2023 7
(link)

COVID-19 Coronavirus Updates: November 1, 2023 8
(link)

Another hard-hit, populous nation now seeing political blowback from its leaders’ (shameful) actions during the pandemic:
COVID-19 Coronavirus Updates: November 1, 2023 9
(link)

COVID-19 Coronavirus Updates: November 1, 2023 10
(link)

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Don’t panic:

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Apocalypse pretty soon!

Reader Interactions

28Comments

  1. 1.

    WereBear

    This is a chilling way to weed out the sick. If you can’t keep it together to run all the obstacles, or have someone to do it for you, it can be fatal.

  2. 2.

    New Deal democrat

    The new wastewater contractor, Google subsidiary Verily, is still useless. Unfortunately I haven’t read any pushback or alarm from the medical community to this travesty.

    The CDC did update its variant data last Friday, surprisingly showing that almost one year after it first appeared, variants of XBB still make up 1/3rd of all cases. Several other descendants of BA.2, especially HV.1, EG.5, and FL.1.5.1, make up the other 2/3rds. There does not seem to be any increased virulence in these variants.

    As to the current status I did finds this article from WebMD from several days ago. A few snippets:

     https://www.webmd.com/covid/news/20231027/new-covid-mutation-brings-concern

    “ The coronavirus is constantly mutating to survive the growing antibody pushback it encounters as our bodies learn how to fight it after vaccinations and infections.”
     
    “ The virus is evolving, says virus tracker Rajendram Rajnarayanan, PhD, from the New York Institute of Technology at Arkansas State University. And, ‘This is the top dog binding better.’”
     
    “If we had an alert system, I would call this an amber alert,” Rajnarayanan said. ‘It’s not an urgent, red alert at this time, but the amber alert is definitely a wake-up call to remind us it’s time to pay attention again.’”
     
    “ So many people have some level of immunity from prior infection, vaccines, or both, that scientists monitoring wastewater aren’t seeing a rise in infections or COVID-related hospitalizations in the U.S. now.”

    The article specifically cites variants JN.1 and HV.1, all descended from BA.2.

    In other relative good news, hospitalizations last week remained at 16,000, a 25% decline from their recent peak, vs. 6,000 at their lows last June. Deaths peaked in the last two weeks of September at just over 12,000, vs. they’re low just below 500 in early July.

    At 3.5+ years into the pandemic, I am heartened by its continually decreasing virulence. Here’s some numbers I crunched over the weekend:

    Below are deaths broken down into 6 and 12 month increments, to show how the death toll has been declining over time. The first number is the 6 month total (in thousands), the 2nd the 12 month total:

    4/1/20-9/30/20:  211
    10/1/20-3/31/21:  353 [564]
    4/1/21-9/30/21: 166 [519]
    10/1/21-3/31/22:  267 [433]
    4/1/22-9/30/22: 62 [329]
    10/1/22-3/31/23: 65 [127]
    4/1/23-9/30/23: 23 [88]

    As with economic data, the 12 month moving average takes away the seasonality issue. And we can see that the 12 month total has been relentlessly declining. Indeed, for the last 12 months it has equaled about an average annual flu season.

    And here is the breakdown between warmer and colder seasons over time:
    Colder: 353, 267, 65
    Warmer: 211, 166, 62, 23

    If this decline in virulence holds for this colder season as well, I would expect less than 50,000 deaths, and perhaps as low as about 30,000. As usual, these are mainly going to be among the elderly and the unvaccinated.

  3. 3.

    New Deal democrat

    @New Deal democrat: Just saw Eric Topol’s comments above. Biobot is updating again. Hallelujah!

    infections are down about 1/2wY back to their summer lows, but have steadied there. Infections are down in every Census region except the Midwest.

  5. 5.

    hrprogressive

    Bad News:
    *Continued high evolution rate
    *Continued lack of good data from governments that want to ignore it
    *Continued presence of what seem like perpetual waves of the damn thing

    Good News:
    *Nice to see the EPA test on the CR Boxes, which ought to be a lightbulb moment for everyone (but because our society has been gaslit about its severity, it won’t be)
    *Nice to see reasonably steady or downward trends for now

    It would be nice if perhaps 2024 was the year it started to behave “more flu-like” in a “once a season” pattern, but I am not getting my hopes up anymore, I’ll just wait until I see it happen before I believe it.

  6. 6.

    Soprano2

    You notice that the people who claim to have “mountains of evidence” never show you any of it. Like the “evidence” that Joe Biden took a $5 million bribe – there isn’t any.

  7. 7.

    Soprano2

    @New Deal democrat: Our wastewater treatment plant readings from last week show that Covid spiked at the larger one and is declining at the smaller one, but both are low levels compared to previous periods.

    I’m planning for us to get our Covid shots on Sunday. I talked to one of the pharmacists at hubby’s pharmacy last week. He’s a good guy – he was in the military and has done other health care things before becoming a pharmacist. I once overheard him telling a man that the medication he was picking up for his wife was double the strength it had been before, and if he didn’t know about that he should check with her doctor before giving it to her. He told me that if I ever had questions about anything regarding my or my husband’s drugs or treatment he’d be happy to help me. It’s nice to have a resource like that.

  8. 8.

    NeenerNeener

    Monroe County, NY:

    36 new cases on 10/24/23
    53 new cases on 10/23/23
    60 new cases on 10/24/23
    51 new cases on 10/25/23
    40 new cases on 10/26/23
    35 new cases on 10/27/23
    28 new cases on 10/28/23

    2353 deaths as of 10/3o/23, up 5 from last week.

    I’ve had to reschedule my COVID vax twice this week because I just have so much to do before I move to Virginia and I don’t really have time for the 36 hour recovery that the five previous vaccinations required. I’m hoping to keep the Friday afternoon appointment.

  9. 9.

    New Deal democrat

    @Soprano2: Getting both my flu and COVID booster shots today, one in each arm so I can tell which one, if either, I have a reaction to.  Held off till now so they would both be at maximum strength through the winter.

  12. 12.

    Another Scott

    Saturday at 11 AM I got Shingrix #1 (left arm); flu and COMIRNATY (BioNTech) Covid right arm vaccinations at Walgreens (made the appointments online a couple of weeks earlier). They asked if I wanted the RSV too, I said I’d probably get that with Shingrix #2.

    The Shingirx site was a bit more painful for longer, but none of them were really bad. My resting pulse went from about 65 to around 100 for about 24 hours, I slept 12 hours on Sunday evening and took Monday off, but was back to pretty much normal by 3 PM on Monday.

    I’m pretty sure I didn’t get placebos. ;-)

    Stay safe, everyone.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  13. 13.

    Ohio Mom

    @Another Scott: You are the opposite of me, I space my vaccines out, a week or two between them. If I am going to have a reaction, I want to be able to tell what it’s to. Also, I don’t do shots on my lymphedema arm.

    The Shingrix knocked me out both times. Everything else had just been a sore left arm for 48 hours.

  16. 16.

    NeenerNeener

    @New Deal democrat: Lynchburg for the immediate future, to live with my brother for a bit. My older sister is lobbying for me to buy in Fredericksburg or Culpeper because they’re the closest affordable places to Manassass, but I won’t have the funds right away and I need to get  new Medicare insurance and assemble a new pit crew of doctors. So I may be staying in Lynchburg, which my brother assures me does NOT totally revolve around Jesus U.

    I see there’s a date typo in my first comment. That should have been 10/22/23

  19. 19.

    wjca

    Barely on topic

    It occurs to me to wonder about the comparative vaccination rates in Ukraine vs. Russia.  Probably no way to get reliable data out of Russia, of course.  But still, if the vaccination rates are significantly different it could have an impact on both availability and resilience of troops.  Or of the rest of the economy.

  20. 20.

    New Deal democrat

    @NeenerNeener: Good luck with the move.

    There are two things you can almost trip over anywhere in Virginia: Civil War battlefields and wineries. Sometimes right next to one another.

  21. 21.

    NoOneOfConsequence

    I’m not specifically trying to be critical, but did you have a point in quoting Kristen Mag:

    “Your post is misleading. This was a study of *severe* long covid clinical patients only. It did not consider mild cases.”

    I checked the article, then the paper, and there is no mention that it was of severe long covid – only that a primary care doc sent them to a long covid clinic, and that they filled out the reporting form.

    So: Karen, I mean, Kristen, doesn’t actually present any information, except misleading information, in this round-up. The only thing “severe” about long covid was, a doctor agreed to justify a visit to a specialist. Oh, and, the stats seem to have been collected from all such patients – I didn’t read the whole paper.

  23. 23.

    jonas

    @Soprano2:   Like the “evidence” that Joe Biden took a $5 million bribe – there isn’t any.

    Hey, if you can’t trust the word of a mobbed-up Russian-Ukrainian oligarch, who can you trust?

  24. 24.

    Bill Arnold

    @wjca:

    Probably no way to get reliable data out of Russia, of course.

    Russia lied about its COVID-19 mortality figures, continuously, and probably continues to lie. Early on this was to facilitate international travel by Russians, later it was just maintenance of the lies.
    This was clear because the main state statistics agency continue to report deaths, so excess deaths were easily compared against COVID-19 mortality numbers. Deaths are usually accurately recorded and reported in any developed country that is not a completely totalitarian state. (India was much worse (like 10-1 under-reporting according to a few studies using death-rate proxies), but that was in part driven/facilitated by poor record keeping.)
    There was month or three when the Russian daily death numbers were particularly blatant; there was essentially no variance, like they were reporting a weekly rolling average, but at least what I saw in English translation were indicated they were daily numbers.
    This strongly colored my view of Russian statements and propaganda prior to the Ukraine invasion; they had marked themselves as proven liars.

  25. 25.

    Mel

    @WereBear: This is true. I am getting infusions to treat a genetic immune deficiency. It is one of the very few places that I go or have gone in the past three years, b/c of the high risk of severe Covid due to my health.

    In the infusion center (which also infuses chemo patients), none of the nurses mask, and last time, a nurse with a hacking cough was there, walking through the facility unmasked and openly coughing m, the entire 8 hours that I was hooked up to the infusion. Nobody said a word. Patients, I am sure, were largely too sick, weak, and /or afraid that they would be the ones asked to leave if they raised a concern, esp. since there are signs posted all over the facility stating that masks are not optional, but not required.

    If you are sick, disabled, or elderly in this country, you are viewed as disposable. It is a hard, sad truth to have to face.

  26. 26.

    Burrowing Owl

    Late to the thread, finally got Covid. Monday was Day 1, and I started taking paxlovid that day. Between that and being completely vaxed and boosted, I was sick for two days (cough/congestion) but today am feeling much better. Will still isolate until Day 5.

    Thank you again and still for the update threads.

  27. 27.

    Ruckus

    @Mel:

    If you are sick, disabled, or elderly in this country, you are viewed as disposable. It is a hard, sad truth to have to face.

    You very likely aren’t adding to the GNP if you are sick, disabled or elderly. Therefore some/many would consider you to be disposable. You are supposed to help fill the bank accounts of the wealthy, to make said bank accounts healthier. I ask you, why else would you be on this earth, if not to make the rich richer?

  28. 28.

    Mel

    @Ruckus: Worse, I suspect, for those who worked in helping professions, which don’t pay well enough to truly be able to prepare for a long-term, life-altering event.

    Early on, I had an immunologist tell me that it was a “shame” that I hadn’t chosen to go into a “serious” profession that would have given me a bigger financial cushion.  Because teaching / counseling survivors of violence and veterans struggling with PTSD who are fighting to rebuild their lives is such an unimportant thing in our world, apparently. What an asshole. It’s all part of that same mindset, that non-wealthy people are just cannon fodder.

    I’d do that job again in a heartbeat if I were well.

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