COVID-19 News and Discussions

weatheriscool
Posts: 12946
Joined: Sun May 16, 2021 6:16 pm

Re: COVID-19 News and Discussions

Post by weatheriscool »

Public Health Experts Call On CDC To Change Its Mask Guidance
Source: NPR




July 22, 20211:20 PM ET


..............................

............................
"This is the low season. It shouldn't be spreading as fast during summer," says Ali Mokdad, who tracks coronavirus trends at the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) at the University of Washington. Respiratory diseases such as the flu and COVID-19 usually spike in the winter, when people spend much of their time sequestered indoors.

But now, in the blazing heat of summer, hospitals in some parts of the country are again getting slammed with COVID-19 patients. Holiday gatherings over the Fourth of July — which President Biden once hoped would mark the country's independence from the virus — may have fueled new outbreaks. Cases, hospitalizations and deaths are ticking up after a long decline.

Back in mid-May, when over a million new people were getting vaccinated each day, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued guidance declaring that it was safe — for fully vaccinated people — to shed their masks in most settings. "You can do things you stopped doing because of the pandemic," the CDC's director, Dr. Rochelle Walensky, said at the time.

Now, with vaccination progress stalling, a growing chorus of doctors and experts is saying the CDC let up on masking too early. They want the nation's public health agency to call for masking and mitigation measures in areas that are suffering, to stop the virus's spread..................................
Read more: https://www.npr.org/sections/health-sho ... rm=nprnews
User avatar
erowind
Posts: 544
Joined: Mon May 17, 2021 5:42 am

Re: COVID-19 News and Discussions

Post by erowind »

Low and behold not only has America never locked down fully even once it hasn’t even built more permanent beds in most regional health systems despite almost running out entirely multiple times.
User avatar
raklian
Posts: 1747
Joined: Sun May 16, 2021 4:46 pm
Location: North Carolina

Re: COVID-19 News and Discussions

Post by raklian »

erowind wrote: Fri Jul 23, 2021 8:23 pm Low and behold not only has America never locked down fully even once it hasn’t even built more permanent beds in most regional health systems despite almost running out entirely multiple times.
We should just yank the entire healthcare system from politicians. Nothing good comes from politicians trying to base their decisions on their reelection chances.
To know is essentially the same as not knowing. The only thing that occurs is the rearrangement of atoms in your brain.
User avatar
caltrek
Posts: 6509
Joined: Mon May 17, 2021 1:17 pm

Re: COVID-19 News and Discussions

Post by caltrek »

^^^Especially when their campaign war chests are filled by donations from the corporate elite.
Don't mourn, organize.

-Joe Hill
User avatar
wjfox
Site Admin
Posts: 8730
Joined: Sat May 15, 2021 6:09 pm
Location: London, UK
Contact:

Re: COVID-19 News and Discussions

Post by wjfox »

Shocking thread on Long Covid.


[...] "The cognitive deficits remained whether ongoing symptoms were there or not, and did not depend on time since covid either.

This seems to suggest it is a long lasting effect.

...[cognitive] deficits experienced by hospitalised covid patients (0.47 for ventilator, 0.26 no ventilator) were worse than average deficit by people who'd suffered a stroke (0.24).

ONS estimated 634K people with long covid that impacts their life in June.

For comparison, c. 260K people are diagnosed with diabetes & 500K with heart disease each year.

Evidence for long term neurological and other impacts of covid is growing. But govt position seems to be that infections don't matter as long as NHS not overwhelmed."


weatheriscool
Posts: 12946
Joined: Sun May 16, 2021 6:16 pm

Re: COVID-19 News and Discussions

Post by weatheriscool »

Biden Officials Now Expect Vulnerable Americans to Need Booster Shots
Source: New York Times

WASHINGTON — Biden administration health officials increasingly think that vulnerable populations will need booster shots even as research continues into how long the coronavirus vaccines remain effective. Senior officials now say they expect that people who are 65 and older or who have compromised immune systems will most likely need a third shot from Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna, two vaccines based on the same technology that have been used to inoculate the vast majority of Americans thus far.

That is a sharp shift from just a few weeks ago, when the administration said it thought there was not enough evidence to back boosters yet.On Thursday, a key official at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said the agency is exploring options to give patients with compromised immune systems third doses even before regulators broaden the emergency use authorization for coronavirus vaccines, a step that could come soon for the Pfizer vaccine.

Dr. Amanda Cohn, the chief medical officer of the C.D.C.’s immunizations division, told an advisory committee to the agency that officials were “actively looking into ways” to provide certain people access to booster shots “earlier than any potential change in regulatory decisions.” “So stay tuned,” she added. The growing consensus within the administration that at least some Americans will need a booster is tied in part to research suggesting that the Pfizer vaccine is less effective against the coronavirus after about six months. More than half of those fully vaccinated in the United States so far have received Pfizer’s vaccine, in two doses administered three weeks apart.

Pfizer’s continuing global study of its clinical trial participants shows that four to six months after the second dose, the vaccine’s effectiveness against symptomatic infection drops from a high of 95 percent to 84 percent, according to the company. Data from the Israeli government, which has fully vaccinated more than half of its population with Pfizer doses since January, also points to a downward trend in effectiveness over time, although administration officials are viewing that data cautiously because of wide margins for error.
Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/23/us/c ... sters.html
User avatar
andmar74
Posts: 389
Joined: Mon May 24, 2021 9:10 am
Location: Denmark

Re: COVID-19 News and Discussions

Post by andmar74 »

Maybe we all need a booster shot. Possibly a yearly shot that boosts against any new variants.
User avatar
Yuli Ban
Posts: 4631
Joined: Sun May 16, 2021 4:44 pm

Re: COVID-19 News and Discussions

Post by Yuli Ban »

‘I’m sorry, but it’s too late’: Alabama doctor on treating unvaccinated, dying COVID patients
Dr. Brytney Cobia said Monday that all but one of her COVID patients in Alabama did not receive the vaccine. The vaccinated patient, she said, just needed a little oxygen and is expected to fully recover. Some of the others are dying.

“I’m admitting young healthy people to the hospital with very serious COVID infections,” wrote Cobia, a hospitalist at Grandview Medical Center in Birmingham, in an emotional Facebook post Sunday. “One of the last things they do before they’re intubated is beg me for the vaccine. I hold their hand and tell them that I’m sorry, but it’s too late.”

Three COVID-19 vaccines have been widely available in Alabama for months now, yet the state is last in the nation in vaccination rate, with only 33.7 percent of the population fully vaccinated. COVID-19 case numbers and hospitalizations are surging yet again due to the more contagious Delta variant of the virus and Alabama’s low vaccination rate.

For the first year and a half of the pandemic, Cobia and hundreds of other Alabama physicians caring for critically ill COVID-19 patients worked themselves to the bone trying to save as many as possible.

“Back in 2020 and early 2021, when the vaccine wasn’t available, it was just tragedy after tragedy after tragedy,” Cobia told AL.com this week. “You know, so many people that did all the right things, and yet still came in, and were critically ill and died.”

In the United States, COVID is now a pandemic of the unvaccinated, according to the head of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In Alabama, state officials report 94% of COVID hospital patients and 96% of Alabamians who have died of COVID since April were not fully vaccinated.

“A few days later when I call time of death,” continued Cobia on Facebook, “I hug their family members and I tell them the best way to honor their loved one is to go get vaccinated and encourage everyone they know to do the same.”

“They cry. And they tell me they didn’t know. They thought it was a hoax. They thought it was political. They thought because they had a certain blood type or a certain skin color they wouldn’t get as sick. They thought it was ‘just the flu’. But they were wrong. And they wish they could go back. But they can’t. So they thank me and they go get the vaccine. And I go back to my office, write their death note, and say a small prayer that this loss will save more lives.”
And remember my friend, future events such as these will affect you in the future
User avatar
wjfox
Site Admin
Posts: 8730
Joined: Sat May 15, 2021 6:09 pm
Location: London, UK
Contact:

Re: COVID-19 News and Discussions

Post by wjfox »

People who believe in science are more likely to wear masks in public to battle COVID-19

July 24, 2021

Belief in science predicts face mask wearing behavior during the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States, according to a new study published in Personality and Individual Differences. The findings provide evidence that those who place a greater value in scientific information are more likely to engage in behaviors intended to prevent the spread of the deadly virus.

https://www.psypost.org/2021/07/people- ... d-19-61579
weatheriscool
Posts: 12946
Joined: Sun May 16, 2021 6:16 pm

Re: COVID-19 News and Discussions

Post by weatheriscool »

Fauci Says US Headed In 'Wrong Direction' On Coronavirus
Source: AP News
WILMINGTON, Del. (AP) — The United States is in an "unnecessary predicament” of soaring COVID-19 cases fueled by unvaccinated Americans and the virulent delta variant, the nation’s top infectious diseases expert said Sunday. "We’re going in the wrong direction,” said Dr. Anthony Fauci, describing himself as "very frustrated.”

He said recommending that the vaccinated wear masks is "under active consideration” by the government’s leading public health officials. Also, booster shots may be suggested for people with suppressed immune systems who have been vaccinated, Fauci said.

Fauci, who also serves President Joe Biden’s chief medical adviser, told CNN’s “State of the Union” that he has taken part in conversations about altering the mask guidelines.

He noted that some local jurisdictions where infection rates are surging, such as Los Angeles County, are already calling on individuals to wear masks in public regardless of vaccination status. Fauci said those local rules are compatible with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommendation that the vaccinated do not need to wear masks in public...
Read more: https://apnews.com/article/coronavirus- ... c19b608e47
Post Reply