Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

if you can’t see it, then you are useless in the fight to stop it.

The fight for our country is always worth it. ~Kamala Harris

So many bastards, so little time.

A snarling mass of vitriolic jackals

He imagines himself as The Big Bad, Who Is Universally Feared… instead of The Big Jagoff, Who Is Universally Mocked.

New McCarthy, same old McCarthyism.

If marriage is the equivalent of selling yourself into slavery, women with self respect should reject the offer.

You don’t get to peddle hatred on saturday and offer condolences on sunday.

Since when do we limit our critiques to things we could do better ourselves?

Speaker Mike Johnson is a vile traitor to the House and the Constitution.

You come for women, you’re gonna get your ass kicked.

American History and Black History can not be separated.

Russian mouthpiece, go fuck yourself.

Balloon Juice, where there is always someone who will say you’re doing it wrong.

Boeing: repeatedly making the case for high speed rail.

The real work of an opposition party is to hold the people in power accountable.

People are complicated. Love is not.

‘Museums aren’t America’s attic for its racist shit.’

Yeah, with this crowd one never knows.

I am pretty sure Katy Tur wasn’t always such a bootlicking sycophant.

Republicans got rid of McCarthy. Democrats chose not to save him.

Prediction: the gop will rethink its strategy of boycotting future committees.

This year has been the longest three days of putin’s life.

When your entire life is steeped in white supremacy, equality feels like discrimination.

You are here: Home / Healthcare / COVID-19 / COVID-19 Coronavirus Updates: February 28, 2024

COVID-19 Coronavirus Updates: February 28, 2024

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No longer pandemic, just endemic — with flareups.


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“Non-profits”, under law if not logic. Worth reading the whole article [gift link]:

… Children’s Health Defense, an anti-vaccine group founded by Robert F. Kennedy Jr., received $23.5 million in contributions, grants and other revenue in 2022 alone — eight times what it collected the year before the pandemic began — allowing it to expand its state-based lobbying operations to cover half the country. Another influential anti-vaccine group, Informed Consent Action Network, nearly quadrupled its revenue during that time to about $13.4 million in 2022, giving it the resources to finance lawsuits seeking to roll back vaccine requirements as Americans’ faith in vaccines drops.

Two other groups, Front Line Covid-19 Critical Care Alliance and America’s Frontline Doctors, went from receiving $1 million combined when they formed in 2020 to collecting more than $21 million combined when they formed in 2020 to collecting more than $21 million combined in 2022, according to the latest tax filings available for the groups.

The four groups routinely buck scientific consensus. Children’s Health Defense and Informed Consent Action Network raise doubts about the safety of vaccines despite assurances from federal regulators. “Vaccines have never been safer than they are today,” the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said on its webpage outlining vaccine safety…

Arthur Caplan, head of the division of medical ethics at the New York University Grossman School of Medicine, said that in his view, the four groups endanger lives with their spread of misinformation.

“These groups gave jet fuel to misinformation at a crucial time in the pandemic,” Caplan said. “The richer they get, the worse off the public is because, indisputably, they’re spouting dangerous nonsense that kills people.”

The influx of pandemic cash sent executive compensation soaring, boosted public outreach, and seeded the ability to wage legislative and legal battles to weaken vaccine requirements and defend physicians accused of spreading misinformation…

Many of the contributors are not known because nonprofits are generally not required to publicly report their donors. But nonprofits are supposed to disclose groups to which they contribute more than $5,000. In addition to the tax forms filed by the four groups, The Post reviewed more than 330 filings by nonprofits that donated to the groups during the pandemic. Half of those gifts over $100,000 were made through a tax vehicle popular among the ultrawealthy known as “donor-advised funds,” which allow individuals to obscure their identities. The Post identified two funds dedicated to advancing biblical, libertarian or conservative values that each had given at least $1 million in total to at least three of the groups since 2020…

As the groups’ coffers grew, so did the salaries of some top executives. Children’s Health Defense paid Kennedy, then chairman and chief legal counsel and now an independent candidate for president, more than $510,000 in 2022, double his 2019 salary, tax records show. Informed Consent Action Network paid Executive Director Del Bigtree $284,000 in 2022, a 22 percent increase from 2019. Bigtree now works as communications director for Kennedy’s presidential campaign.

Some of the individuals behind the family foundations or trusts that fund the four groups also contributed the legal maximum in personal donations to Kennedy’s presidential bid, according to OpenSecrets, which tracks political donations…

The groups contributed to a media ecosystem that spread misinformation during the pandemic. Children’s Health Defense started an internet TV channel with daily programming casting doubt on vaccine safety, said Dorit Reiss, a professor at the University of California College of the Law at San Francisco who tracks the influence of these organizations. Informed Consent Action Network spent nearly $6 million on online “educational programs” in 2022 that the group says reached more than 6 million viewers in 209 countries, according to tax filings.

Caplan said that in his view, the four groups “were able to take advantage of fear and panic and anger at a crucial time in the pandemic and raise considerably more money to tell people what some of them wanted to hear.”…

Reader Interactions

35Comments

  1. 1.

    AlaskaReader

    Thanks Anne

     

    Through last December case rates where I live hovered around 40 per 100,000.

    In January that the case rate jumped from 44.1 in the week ending Jan. 20 to 84.8 in the week ending Jan. 27.

    Now, in the most recent data as of Feb. 17, that rate has climbed higher to 93.3, and my area is the only one of 10 regions studied in the state that show an increase week-over-week.

    I’m often the only person in public wearing a mask.

    It’s mindboggling that my neighbors are so taken up with the idea that Covid is either inevitable, or wholly imaginary. Vaccination rates are abysmal.

    Trumpism has done this population no favors. Witness recent measles outbreaks and TB cases in Alaska elementary schools.

    And of course, suffering policy from  Republican appointed public health officials, (who, in one case, has zero medical or health eduction and in another case inflated and lied about his education and bonafides), that hasn’t helped.

     Vax. Boost. Mask. Distance. Ventilate. Isolate. Quarantine.

    Help yourself as you help others.

  3. 3.

    Jay

    @AlaskaReader:

    Isolate. Quarantine.

    That’s kinda hard to do for a lot of people.

    When Covid first hit, The Orange granted 98 days of paid sick time. You didn’t have to be sick to take it. About 1/2 the staff took the option. That lead to a shit show. If you didn’t take it, it got paid out. The next year, back to 5 days sick time paid even though covid was still out there.

    When I was at the next job, co-worker came in with the flu, as they had already used up their sick time, and despite being one of the few vaccinated, I was out for 3 days and our 8 person shop was down to 2 staff.

    Later, another co-worker who was out of sick time, came in with RSV. That was a miserable 3 weeks off sick, and they had to close the store and the shop for two weeks.

    Sadly, a lot of people in Alaska, can’t quarantine. That requires isolated rooms, and there is a shortage of housing

    If you get sick at work, from somebody who has run out of sick time, and MGMT didn’t send them home, (preferably with pay) you should be able to sue and win.

  4. 4.

    New Deal democrat

    First of all, it’s important to reiterate that the first and last two years of this pandemic – through the end of the dominance of the Omicron BA.1 strain – have been entirely different in severity. Only for about 2 months of the entire first 2 year period were hospitalizations under 20,000 and deaths under 3,500 per week.

    But by now, almost everyone has been immunized and/or infected and even re-infected. Plus treatments are much more effective, so since February 2022 a similar level of virus prevalence has resulted in much lower levels of hospitalizations and deaths, even with the almost complete cessation of mitigation measures.

    To wit, in the last 12 months the highest number of hospitalizations was 35,000 just after New Year’s, and deaths peaked at 2,500 several weeks later. The latest hospitalization data for the week of February 17 shows hospitalizations down to 19,000, over halfway back to their summer 2023 low of 6,300. Deaths, as of January 27, were down to 1,900, vs. their summer 2023 low of just below 500. Based on the pattern this winter, by the week of February 17 they were probably down to 1,500 or lower.

    As of 12 days ago, variant JN.1 was responsible for close to 100% of all new cases. Its future is unclear, as both Biobot and the CDC show particles in wastewater either level or even increasing again somewhat in the past 2 weeks. Both agree the main problem by far is in the South. The primary difference is that the CDC shows a big decline in the West, while Biobot does not.

  5. 5.

    New Deal democrat

    From the linked article on the latest scariant:

    “ So far, no cases of BA.2.87.1 have been identified in the U.S. In fact, the strain has only been detected in South Africa — just nine times from September to December 2023 — and doesn’t yet appear to be highly transmissible, the [CDC] said.

    “…. ‘The fact that only nine cases have been detected in one country since the first specimen was collected in September suggests it does not appear to be highly transmissible — at least so far,’ the [CDC] wrote.“

    Oh.

  6. 6.

    raven

    @New Deal democrat: “scariant”

    I love it! I have a professor friend who is in a constant state of hysteria and offers all kinds of advice on supplements, strategies and horror stories. Guess what, I’m 74 fucking years old and I’m not spending what time I have left in the bunker.

  7. 7.

    Matt McIrvin

    @New Deal democrat: Wastewater levels in the Boston area had a sort of plateau in late January/early February but are now in obvious decline. But I think most of the country is a little behind us on that track.

    The severity is an important point. I see a lot of people fretting about how this winter was “the second-largest wave ever” in many places, going by pure virus counts, and it sounds insane that most people were treating it almost as a non-event.

    But even going by that metric, it was the second-largest only in the sense of being slightly larger than last winter’s wave, though nowhere near the size of the first Omicron wave. And in severity, going by local statistics, I would call this the fifth-worst COVID wave and maybe 1/2 to 1/3 as bad as last winter’s wave.

    The pre-Omicron waves had a death toll all out of proportion to the virus count: those variants were far less transmissible but killed far more often, probably more because of the lack of immunity in the general population than because the viruses were in some sense worse. And then the first Omicron wave killed a lot of people just by infecting nearly everybody. Nothing since then has been in the same ballpark.

    People are still not treating it with the seriousness that they should, given the possibility of long-term damage, but it’s not the stark madness-of-crowds absurdity that some of the handwringing would imply.

  8. 8.

    New Deal democrat

    @Matt McIrvin:

    The pre-Omicron waves had a death toll all out of proportion to the virus count: those variants were far less transmissible but killed far more often, probably more because of the lack of immunity in the general population than because the viruses were in some sense worse.

    It sounds callous to say it, but part of the reason for the lower severity is probably that the segment of the population that was most susceptible to COVID has already been killed by it, so are no longer in the current statistics.

  9. 9.

    New Deal democrat

    @raven: in re “scariant,” I wish I could claim credit for it, but the term was coined by others a couple of years ago, I think in response to Dr. Eric Feigl-Deng’s hair-on-fire constant updates.

  10. 10.

    Barbara

    @New Deal democrat: There are people becoming newly vulnerable everyday and while many people have died, I don’t think it’s enough to make your hypothesis a likely explanation for lower mortality of more recent variants.

  11. 11.

    RevRick

    My wife and I just finished our Paxlovid regimens after getting reinfected with Covid. And we’ve been among the very few who continue to mask in public. Fortunately, we both feel pretty much back to normal. But I know several young women who are dealing with Long Covid. And it has debilitated them. One, in fact, has a syndrome called POTS, which causes life-threatening tachycardia. The other has severe brain fog. Both are zealous advocates for vaccines and other precautions.

  12. 12.

    Jay

    @Matt McIrvin:

    People are still not treating it with the seriousness that they should, given the possibility of long-term damage, but it’s not the stark madness-of-crowds absurdity that some of the handwringing would imply.

    In BC right now, 1:18 have Covid. That’s ER tested and self reported, so the ratio is actually much lower. Probably 1:10 or less.

    Same number of Covid beds occupied, 37% fewer deaths than at the peak.

    In the Safeway, I was one of 5, (2 were staff), wearing a mask.

    One of the elevators in the building, (1 of two) was out again. People were cramming 22 deep into a “hotbox”. at rush hour, no masks. It took half an hour waiting until there were few enough people in the elevator for me to feel safe.

    After my RSV exposure, got vaxxed, got the pneumonia vax, and just updated myself for measles. Had them as a kid, before there was a vax, sucked big time and you can’t even buy Calomine lotion off the shelf any more. 2 years later, the measles vax came out and we all got the MMR shot.

    Didn’t even get tested to see if I had some immunity, just booked it, got it. We don’t have a lot of “family” doctors here, and testing is not something an ER or Clinic will do.

  13. 13.

    OzarkHillbilly

    I had to get some tests done the past 2 weeks. I and the entire hospital staff were the only ones masked.

  14. 14.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    The out of control grifting over the pandemic reminds me of the Penn Teller’s essay about how social media rewards lying.

  15. 15.

    Suzanne

    @OzarkHillbilly: I had to take SuzMom for some pre-surgical tests at two different hospitals last August. I had Spawn the Youngest with me. Approximately half of the hospital staff was masked, and adult patients and visitors were not required to be masked. But they told me that Spawn the Youngest had to wear a mask. Which makes no freaking sense. And as someone who actually had to get a young kid wearing masks during that time…. let me tell you, she were fine with it when everyone was doing it, because it’s easy to understand the concept of a social norm. But it was much harder when she saw that she was one of only a few. She asked me why she had to wear one but others didn’t. So I, of course, wore one, too.

  16. 16.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @raven: worth noting I know people who are well over your age,  were infected by the latest variant, half them didn’t have any symptoms, the other half were seriously ill for a week and recovered with no long term ill effects.

  17. 17.

    Scout211

    We both tested positive for the first time over two weeks ago.  We are in our second week of post-COVID symptoms and they are not fun.  The “normal” period of post-COVID symptoms is up to four weeks and as slow as the improvements are in our symptoms, I would not be surprised if it will be four weeks for us.  At least we have experienced improvements but those improvements have been very gradual.

    I can imagine just how frustrating it is for people with long COVID to experience this for months at a time.   I have the deepest sympathy for long COVID sufferers and I sincerely hope that the medical community doesn’t stop trying to help those who continue to suffer.

  18. 18.

    TBone

    Trying to brush aside the morning cobwebs without much success – if this was already posted, I haven’t caught up yet. This part stuck out for me:

    “Importantly, the care needs of people with Long Covid are unmet. Patients are often met with skepticism and dismissal of their symptoms as psychosomatic. The attribution of symptoms to psychological causes has no scientific support; it perpetuates stigma and disenfranchises patients from accessing the care they need.”

    More Topol:

    https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adl0867

  19. 19.

    TBone

    @Scout211: I hope you continue to recuperate!  After initial infection in 2020, I was feeling almost well again over the months of 2023, until I got sick again December.  It’s very discouraging.

  21. 21.

    TBone

    I barely leave the house and yard anymore, and if I do I stay in the vehicle while hubby does the running.  He does almost all of the chores and cleaning.  We’ll have to change that routine for his upcoming surgery and I might have to hire help.

  23. 23.

    arrieve

    @Jay:

    Didn’t even get tested to see if I had some immunity, just booked it, got it. We don’t have a lot of “family” doctors here, and testing is not something an ER or Clinic will do.

    My doctor did test my immunity. I knew I’d had measles (65 years ago!) and I’d apparently had mumps, though nobody ever told me that. I’d never had rubella though and he asked if I wanted a vaccine just for rubella or to get the MMR and I voted MMR. Because if it makes me less likely to get sick with anything in any way I want it.

  24. 24.

    dnfree

    I am so grateful for the effort that goes into these updates.   It’s really the ONLY place I see much of this information, and I’m a consumer of news.

    Being in our late 70s, we decided to risk traveling again this year while we still can.  We do mask locally anytime we’re indoors with other people, and we mask in airports and on planes.  We are just back from a trip to the Yucatan peninsula of Mexico, where a lot of our tours were outdoors.  We got Covid somewhere, most likely not in the airports or planes judging from the appearance of symptoms as soon as we got home.

    We’re fully vaccinated including last fall and our symptoms were mild and lasted only a few days, but the lasting fatigue is real.  Our daughter said to treat it like recovery from a concussion and not to resume “normal” exercise activity.

    As far as medical offices, when my husband went for a blood draw masked, he commented that the phlebotomist was also masked and she said “I’m only wearing a mask because you are.”

  26. 26.

    Hob

    @dnfree: ​
     As a former healthcare worker, I can’t say I’m shocked to see someone in the field with an attitude like that— there’s always someone. And to be honest, my nursing experience probably contributed to me being somewhat lackadaisical about other aspects of self-care (just not that one), because I had seen so many very sick people that I felt comparatively bulletproof.
    Still…..!!! If I met that phlebotomist, and if I weren’t so conflict-averse, I might tell them: “You have so much more reason to wear a mask here than your clients do! They’re seeing you once for 5 minutes. You’re seeing dozens of people a day.”
    That’s why even though I feel relatively safer these days and don’t feel immediately panicked on my own behalf if I realize I’ve walked into a store without a mask, I still want to have one (and do my little bit toward normalizing others having one, for whatever that’s worth) for the benefit of the retail worker who has to be there all day with a series of randos 2 feet from their face.

  28. 28.

    glc

    Since Doctorow is writing about health care and private equity today, I’ll link to that and to a similar article on a particular instance of the same.

    Michelle Monje seems to have made some progress understanding Long Covid but I don’t find any of the accounts directed to the public (me) very enlightening. There’s an article in the Economist and an interview with Topol.

    Microglia in the white matter were reacting to immune-cell-activating molecules called cytokines released in response to covid infection. Moreover, subsequent post-mortem examinations suggested the same thing was happening in people.

    How significant or useful this information is escaped me.  What I could tell was that Topol finds it valuable.

    I’ve got a neighbor with a lot of chronic brain fog and physical symptoms off and on since his (initially mild) infection.  For now people like him seem to be on their own, in practical terms.

  30. 30.

    AlaskaReader

    @Jay: Any ‘advice’ I might offer is always tempered with the caveat that people will do what is possible.  For some, isolating and quarantining is difficult, I hadn’t ‘forgotten’ that qualification, …but that difficulty doesn’t make the advice any less pertinent or lessen it’s effectiveness should it be utilized.

    For as long as I’ve been able to observe humans, some think nothing of endangering others by their actions.  This is not always a function of them not having alternatives, it’s that a whole lot of people simply don’t care about others.

    From what I observe, there will always be sick people on airplanes. Some may very well have little alternative,

    …and some just don’t give a damn for the people in the other seats.

    My region of Alaska is not the worst off in terms of a housing problem, yet my region is the only one demonstrating week over week increases in cases.  Housing problems in my region are less likely driving the problem than simple lack of caring about who may get sick next.

  31. 31.

    AlaskaReader

    @raven: That kind of simplification shows a real lack of empathy for others.

    There are almost zero people suggesting you spend all your time in a bunker,

    …most people, health professionals and others are suggesting you take reasonable steps to help keep yourself and others free from debilitating sickness and death.

    It’s not a heavy lift.

    It’s certainly not too much to ask of anyone regardless of how old they may be.

  32. 32.

    Scout211

    This thread may be dead, but a new CDC recommendation was just announced today:

    NBC.

    People at higher risk for the most severe complications of Covid — primarily those ages 65 and older — should receive a booster shot this spring, advisers to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Wednesday.

    Another round of the vaccine given within the next few months would offer the best protection possible, they said, ahead of another likely rise in illness this summer.

  33. 33.

    glc

    @Scout211: Thanks. As far as I’m concerned, the thread is not quite dead. And I’ve been waiting for this.  I was going to ask my doctor what I could expect, in my semi-annual checkup next week. This looks like it will take care of the issue. And then we have some travel planned.

    In a less useful direction, there’s another piece up about bran fog at the BBC.Nothing special, but at least they’re covering the topic.

  34. 34.

    Chris T.

    @Suzanne:

    But it was much harder when she saw that she was one of only a few. She asked me why she had to wear one but others didn’t. So I, of course, wore one, too.

    “We’re in a hospital. It’s full of sick people. You can catch some things by breathing them in, so the smart people in hospitals wear masks. We’ll be smart and wear masks.”

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