COVID-19 News and Discussions

[Xyls]

On Twitter, a lot of experts are going crazy, some are hysterical.

If you look at the data, omicron doesn't seem that dangerous. If you have 3 shots you should be fairly safe, although if you are old ( above 80), that could be trouble. That would also be the case if you are hit by the flu in that age.

Of course, the hospital staff are worn down, the beds are slowly filling up. The major problem is if the hospitals are overwhelmed. Individuals without vaccines should know better by now.

The uncertainty is great at this point, therefore if an expert is very certain, you should be sceptical.

A lot of people do not have access to boosters as they aren't being rolled out for younger age groups in many areas... including mine where I won't qualify until February... Also individuals who are unvaccinated and have covid should be kicked out of hospitals to make room for others. There is 0% reason any of these individuals should be prioritized for care over any other type of patient at this point. Also makes it very easy for health care staff so they don't have to deal with idiot antivaxxer family members.

[Xyls]

[Yuli Ban]

Here's my take on it: Omicron is almost certainly less deadly than Delta
Ideally, it would mark the end of the pandemic as a less deadly, more virulent strain takes over

The issue is that it's not THAT much safer to handle than Delta, and is probably on par with the original wild strain of COVID. Now couple that fact with the other fact it's ungodly virulent, literally the most virulent disease known to mankind.

Delta may infect 10,000 and kill 500.

Omicron may infect 10,000 and kill 50.

But the deal is that it's more like:

Delta will infect 10,000 and kill 500.

Omicron will infect 500,000 and kill 2,500, in a fifth of the time it took Delta. Our healthcare system is flat-out unprepared for that. If it collapses, then it doesn't matter if Omicron is less deadly than Delta in real terms. It'll make up for it in spades in other areas. THAT is the danger.

[Yuli Ban]

Trump's reelection map

[Yuli Ban]

[Yuli Ban]

[R8Z]

It is very unfortunate that the vaccines don't work (lose efficacy, back to 0%) in the long run and the media still call people "fully vaccinated" if they took 2 shots no matter when.

There isn't a single person where I live (that I know of) that is aware that the boosters are required if you still want to have ANY protection against the new variants. Whoever is at risk and has access to a booster should take it asap.

This makes me worry for my grandparents and already old parents (they are almost in their 60s).

[Xyls]

It is very unfortunate that the vaccines don't work (lose efficacy, back to 0%) in the long run and the media still call people "fully vaccinated" if they took 2 shots no matter when.

There isn't a single person where I live (that I know of) that is aware that the boosters are required if you still want to have ANY protection against the new variants. Whoever is at risk and has access to a booster should take it asap.

This makes me worry for my grandparents and already old parents (they are almost in their 60s).

This is not correct. For those who aren't suffering an immune system that is shutting down due to old age or have another auto-immune condition the vaccine is not 0% effective it stop eventually protecting from infection but the actual protection against severe illness/death remains. It means that it has succeeded in making the population no longer "immunologically naive". What we don't know is how the vaccine protects against Long COVID type lingering symptoms from mild infection for this population however.

[R8Z]

It is very unfortunate that the vaccines don't work (lose efficacy, back to 0%) in the long run and the media still call people "fully vaccinated" if they took 2 shots no matter when.

There isn't a single person where I live (that I know of) that is aware that the boosters are required if you still want to have ANY protection against the new variants. Whoever is at risk and has access to a booster should take it asap.

This makes me worry for my grandparents and already old parents (they are almost in their 60s).

This is not correct. For those who aren't suffering an immune system that is shutting down due to old age or have another auto-immune condition the vaccine is not 0% effective it stop eventually protecting from infection but the actual protection against severe illness/death remains. It means that it has succeeded in making the population no longer "immunologically naive". What we don't know is how the vaccine protects against Long COVID type lingering symptoms from mild infection for this population however.

Ok, please source it then. I am specially interested in pfizer's efficacy after 8 months.

[Yuli Ban]

[andmar74]

The vaccines (pfizer) seems to be protecting people from hospitalizations. Even if you only have 2 shots.Here in Denmark, mainly those above 40 has got booster shots. Yesterday, I saw some numbers: The average age of fully vaccinated people in hospital with Covid-19, is 80 years. The average age of unvaccinated in hospital, is 50 years.
So omicron doesn't hit children or young people very hard, unvaccinated or not, at least in Denmark. There's the uncertainty of Long-term effects, of course.
Also, the number of hospitalizations is slowly creeping upwards, currently it's at about 700 patients. I think the hospitals can handle maybe 1400 patients.

Edit: It's been a story the last couple of days in DK, that the number of hospitalizations is an inflated number. It counts everyone in hospital with Covid, even if you are there with a broken leg. When omicron is more wide-spread than Delta ever was, that would naturally inflate the numbers even more. I'm sure that's a problem in other countries too. The DK authorities will release more accurate numbers in a few days.

[Yuli Ban]

"biggest one-day increase on record" is becoming a mini-meme at this point

[wjfox]

Government to triple supply of lateral flow tests - Javid

Posted at 11:00

The government expects to need to constrain the testing system over the next two weeks to manage supply of rapid tests, the health secretary says.

In a letter to MPs, Sajid Javid says the supply of lateral flow tests (LFDs) is being tripled in January and February from a pre-Omicron plan of 100 million to 300 million per month.

"To respond to anticipated demand over the coming few weeks we are buying hundreds of millions more LFD tests, bringing new products on board and accelerating their deployment to the public," he says.

But "in light of the huge demand for LFDs seen over the last three weeks, we expect to need to constrain the system at certain points over the next two weeks to manage supply over the course of each day, with new tranches of supply released regularly throughout each day".

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/uk-5982 ... type=share

[wjfox]

Take a look at the last few pages of this thread. This is what "learning to live with" the virus looks like.

Does anyone else get f***ing sick of hearing this phrase? LeArNiNg tO LIve wIth Covid.

uggghhh *cringe*

Is this really the kind of world you want to live in???

This virus can either grow exponentially, or decline exponentially. That's it. There will never be a plateau.

We should be pushing for elimination. It's a perfectly achievable goal, with the right combination of public health measures, and some regions have already come close to it. The only thing preventing elimination is stupidity, selfishness, and this obsession with short-term thinking.

[Ken_J]

the people calling for learning to live with it are seemingly the same idiots that thought this is just a flu, because that's sort of the same stance they were going for before. If we were to just live with it, it would need to have no other consequences that the flu does. No increase in cardiovascular, kidney and lung conditions. No long haulers, and no neurological disorders. No longer term effects on child development. There are frankly a lot of consequences beyond death that make this a nightmare if it remains in circulation for years.

But then maybe that's what they are counting on. A nice Thanos Snap, cull the weak from the species and leave the strong to take over the post scarcity world. And of course they think they are the fittest, gods chosen to inherit the earth.

maybe they even imagine this is a version of the great flood and their faith will grant them entrance into the kingdom of god, so they are not in the least worried about the consequences of this 'act of god'.

And yes I do know people that believe these things. and it's frustrating that it's not as easy as letting them kill themselves, because they are going to take us with them. But that was always the case. If the virus didn't come, then the climate crisis would be the horseman they'd hitch their wagon to.

[wjfox]

Major rail route through central and southwest London, shutting down for 10 days.

Totally normal to do this, of course – corona is just the flu, nothing to see here, yada yada.
/s

[wjfox]

[andmar74]

I'm calling it. We will manage omicron, even if they are saying Denmark has most positives per capita in the world. 47% of the population has the booster shot, and increasing rapidly. It's clear now that omicron is milder than delta.

[caltrek]

Striking Antibody Evasion Manifested by the Omicron Variant of SARS-CoV-2
December 23, 2021

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-03826-3

Briefing:

(Nature) The Omicron (B.1.1.529) variant of SARS-CoV-2 (severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2) was only recently detected in southern Africa, but its subsequent spread has been extensive, both regionally and globally. It is expected to become dominant in the coming weeks2, probably due to enhanced transmissibility. A striking feature of this variant is the large number of spike mutations that pose a threat to the efficacy of current COVID-19 (coronavirus disease 2019) vaccines and antibody therapies. This concern is amplified by the findings from our study. We found B.1.1.529 to be markedly resistant to neutralization by serum not only from convalescent patients, but also from individuals vaccinated with one of the four widely used COVID-19 vaccines. Even serum from persons vaccinated and boosted with mRNA-based vaccines exhibited substantially diminished neutralizing activity against B.1.1.529. By evaluating a panel of monoclonal antibodies to all known epitope clusters on the spike protein, we noted that the activity of 17 of the 19 antibodies tested were either abolished or impaired, including ones currently authorized or approved for use in patients. In addition, we also identified four new spike mutations (S371L, N440K, G446S, and Q493R) that confer greater antibody resistance to B.1.1.529. The Omicron variant presents a serious threat to many existing COVID-19 vaccines and therapies, compelling the development of new interventions that anticipate the evolutionary trajectory of SARS-CoV-2.

Of related interest: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-03825-4 and
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-03827-2

[caltrek]

Researchers Fear Growing COVID Vaccine Hesitancy in Developing Nations
by Smriti Mallapaty
December 23, 2021

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-03830-7

Introduction:

(Nature) COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy has long been recognized as a problem in high- and middle-income nations. But in some of the world’s poorest countries, lack of access to vaccines has been a much bigger hurdle. Now researchers say that as doses are trickling in, resistance to getting vaccinated is also emerging as a major issue in those nations.

Scientists fear that persistent pools of unvaccinated people around the world will present a greater risk for the emergence of new variants of concern, such as Omicron. “When you have a lot of community transmission, that’s where variants will emerge,” says Jeffrey Lazarus, a global health researcher at the Barcelona Institute for Global Health, Spain. Addressing people’s hesitancy is therefore crucial, to curb viral spread and to avert hospitalizations and deaths, he says.

Scientists report that hesitancy might now be contributing to the slow uptake of vaccines in some nations where large proportions of the populations remain unvaccinated. These include South Africa — one of the nations where Omicron was first detected — Tanzania, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Papua New Guinea and Nepal.

“We have more hesitant people in the global south than we ever thought we did,” says Rupali Limaye, a behavioural scientist at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore, Maryland. Although in many countries, limited supply is still the main problem, say researchers.