Coronavirus

[downer]

While the death rate is high and climbing, it's clear the main goal is still to flatten the curve to reduce the crisis with the availability of hospital beds. So we want to reduce a spread of COVID. With omicron, it's starting to feel that's a lost cause.

I got called for jury service soon. That should be interesting.

[apl68]

With masks less and less effective, and the new variant making end-runs around the current vaccines, and everybody long since fatigued at taking precautions, there's a great deal of fatalism setting in.  Downer's right that we should still be doing what we can to "flatten the curve," but it's getting harder and harder for people to make themselves do that.  Omicron is just going to have to burn itself out, I guess. 

Excellent point made by Puget about how those of us who've kept COVID-free until now have been successful at dodging the more serious early variants.  Our work of isolating and masking and vaccinating hasn't all been in vain.  It has saved many lives, and is still saving them.  That's a worthwhile thing to do, even if we've been unable to save everybody.

[the_geneticist]

With masks less and less effective, and the new variant making end-runs around the current vaccines, and everybody long since fatigued at taking precautions, there's a great deal of fatalism setting in.  Downer's right that we should still be doing what we can to "flatten the curve," but it's getting harder and harder for people to make themselves do that.  Omicron is just going to have to burn itself out, I guess. 

Excellent point made by Puget about how those of us who've kept COVID-free until now have been successful at dodging the more serious early variants.  Our work of isolating and masking and vaccinating hasn't all been in vain.  It has saved many lives, and is still saving them.  That's a worthwhile thing to do, even if we've been unable to save everybody.

Right now it seems to be flatting on the Y-axis, not the X.  The fact that Omicron is so much more contagious is frightening.

[Puget]

With masks less and less effective, and the new variant making end-runs around the current vaccines, and everybody long since fatigued at taking precautions, there's a great deal of fatalism setting in.  Downer's right that we should still be doing what we can to "flatten the curve," but it's getting harder and harder for people to make themselves do that.  Omicron is just going to have to burn itself out, I guess. 

Excellent point made by Puget about how those of us who've kept COVID-free until now have been successful at dodging the more serious early variants.  Our work of isolating and masking and vaccinating hasn't all been in vain.  It has saved many lives, and is still saving them.  That's a worthwhile thing to do, even if we've been unable to save everybody.

Right now it seems to be flatting on the Y-axis, not the X.  The fact that Omicron is so much more contagious is frightening.

It is however, starting to peak and then drop in the earliest hit areas (NYC, Boston, DC, etc.) and will hopefully fall quickly as it did elsewhere. Levels in Boston wastewater have been plunging for example, which is generally a leading indicator.

[apl68]

The test kit distributions have been such a frustrating business!  Because there are such massive back orders of tests, the state is getting them only in dribs and drabs, and thus can only pass them on to us in dribs and drabs.  There aren't remotely enough at any one time.  Some libraries have been waiting until they have their day's allotment in hand and then announcing a time to distribute.  The result is long lines in which only the first few in line get anything, and everything's gone in a few minutes.  It seems like there's no way to do this that really works.

To me that doesn't seem a very satisfactory alternative to how we've done it on our first two days.  But the staff have convinced me that it would overall be the best way to do it, so we'll try that today.  The local health officer is trying to get them to us in about two hours.  They think they can snag us an additional case of kits to distribute as well. 

We've gotten lots and lots of requests to reserve kits for later pickup.  We can't do that--it's first-come, first-served.  I've had to tell a close friend at church who badly needs one that I can't hold one for her.  That was heartbreaking.

Our schools and many businesses are now shut down.  It's like a ghost town here.  Like it was in the spring of 2020.

[Kron3007]

With masks less and less effective, and the new variant making end-runs around the current vaccines, and everybody long since fatigued at taking precautions, there's a great deal of fatalism setting in.  Downer's right that we should still be doing what we can to "flatten the curve," but it's getting harder and harder for people to make themselves do that.  Omicron is just going to have to burn itself out, I guess. 

Excellent point made by Puget about how those of us who've kept COVID-free until now have been successful at dodging the more serious early variants.  Our work of isolating and masking and vaccinating hasn't all been in vain.  It has saved many lives, and is still saving them.  That's a worthwhile thing to do, even if we've been unable to save everybody.

Right now it seems to be flatting on the Y-axis, not the X.  The fact that Omicron is so much more contagious is frightening.

That's true of case counts, but not death toll, which is more important. 

Despite Omicron, the vaccine is still largely working to prevent the worst cases.  The issue facing hospitals remains the unvaccinated and they would have a lot more breathing room if uptake was higher.  Where I am, the ICU is over 50% unvaccinated despite a vaccination rate well into the 80s...

[downer]

Why am I getting news alerts about Novak Djokovic? I really don't care that much -- it's slightly interesting and basically unimportant.

Looking at the states with highest hospitalization rates,
https://www.beckershospitalreview.com/public-health/states-ranked-by-covid-19-hospitalization-rates-august-2.html
I'm not seeing as close a correlation between states with low vaccination rates as I'd expect.

I have seen graphs showing the unvaccinated are at far greater risk.
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/11/briefing/omicron-deaths-vaccinated-vs-unvaccinated.html

I'm guessing hospitalization and death rates are going to start shooting up in states were the vaccination rate is low.

[Puget]

Why am I getting news alerts about Novak Djokovic? I really don't care that much -- it's slightly interesting and basically unimportant.

Looking at the states with highest hospitalization rates,
https://www.beckershospitalreview.com/public-health/states-ranked-by-covid-19-hospitalization-rates-august-2.html
I'm not seeing as close a correlation between states with low vaccination rates as I'd expect.

I have seen graphs showing the unvaccinated are at far greater risk.
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/11/briefing/omicron-deaths-vaccinated-vs-unvaccinated.html

I'm guessing hospitalization and death rates are going to start shooting up in states were the vaccination rate is low.

I think this is largely an artifact of the fact that this wave hit the (highly vaccinated) coasts first. The individual case level data are very clear that the vaccines still have upwards of 90% relative effectiveness against hospitalization.

The picture is further confused by the fact that something like 40% of cases many places are hospitalized with rather than for COVID currently. States are just starting to separate these out in reporting.

[apl68]

We opened today's distribution at 2:00 p.m.  We did get two cases to distribute this time.  The distribution lasted all of half an hour.  Giving everybody a designated time when a distribution would begin, instead of simply starting the distribution when we got the materials, did indeed work better.  The initial line was not as long or as disruptive as I had feared.  I was afraid we might have a traffic jam in our parking lot and spilling out onto the road.  But everything went smoothly and efficiently.

Interesting to note how framing and nudging can affect people's behavior.  The state's web site says that individuals can get one test kit (containing two tests), and lets households get one test per family member, up to six, i.e. three kits.  Most people interpreted that to mean "I'm entitled to ask for three kits" regardless of household size.  Staff members were basically handing everybody who came along three kits, unless they specifically asked for only one or two.  The problem is, with the shortage of available test kits as dire as it is, this is not a good way to stretch the supply.

When we started handing people one kit, explaining that there were two tests inside, and asking how many were in their household if they asked for more, we were able to turn some requests for two kits (for couples) into one, and requests for three (when there were only three or four in the household) to two.  If we hadn't done that, the last eight or nine people who came would have gone away empty-handed.

We're supposed to get more kits to distribute on Tuesday.  No word yet on what time.

[nebo113]

With masks less and less effective, and the new variant making end-runs around the current vaccines, and everybody long since fatigued at taking precautions, there's a great deal of fatalism setting in.  Downer's right that we should still be doing what we can to "flatten the curve," but it's getting harder and harder for people to make themselves do that.  Omicron is just going to have to burn itself out, I guess. 

Excellent point made by Puget about how those of us who've kept COVID-free until now have been successful at dodging the more serious early variants.  Our work of isolating and masking and vaccinating hasn't all been in vain.  It has saved many lives, and is still saving them.  That's a worthwhile thing to do, even if we've been unable to save everybody.

Right now it seems to be flatting on the Y-axis, not the X.  The fact that Omicron is so much more contagious is frightening.

That's true of case counts, but not death toll, which is more important. 

Despite Omicron, the vaccine is still largely working to prevent the worst cases.  The issue facing hospitals remains the unvaccinated and they would have a lot more breathing room if uptake was higher.  Where I am, the ICU is over 50% unvaccinated despite a vaccination rate well into the 80s...

In my area, ICU/ventilation is over 90%.  Sheer insanity.

[hmaria1609]

Showing proof of vaccination is required in DC:
https://wtop.com/dc/2022/01/web-story-business-covid-townhall/
Posted on WTOP online 1/15/22

[Langue_doc]

Some colleges are deciding to stay open this semester on the grounds that Covid is now endemic.
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/16/us/politics/omicron-colleges-restrictions-spring.html

[apl68]

We distributed another 180 COVID test kits yesterday.  This time it took us a whole hour, instead of not quite half that.  Sounds like maybe people aren't as desperate now, although demand continues to exceed supply.  The county health nurse said that she noticed that they weren't as desperately busy yesterday either.  Maybe that's a hopeful sign?  The state's hospitalization figures have just hit a new record, but there are at least significantly fewer ventilator and ICU cases. 

We just got word from the county nurse that we probably won't have kits available tomorrow either.  Must be some new snag in the supply chain.  Right now the state distribution is having to fill the gap before the new federal distributions start coming through.

[dismalist]

Rationed tests [seven per person per day] are free at the pharmacy in the UK and cost less than $1 per test in Germany. Have been readily available for a long time, over a year.

Why not in the US? Thimk.

[Caracal]

With masks less and less effective..

I don't think there's any reason to think that's true. Let's pretend that the chance of catching delta in a room where one person is infected, with 10 people for an hour was 25 percent if everyone was unmasked and only 5 percent if everyone had a mask on. . Imagine Omnicron made the chance of infection for both the masked and unmasked go up 3x. It would seem like masks were less and less effective, but their effectiveness would have actually remained the same.

Probably, the numbers don't work this way and the risk actually goes up for the unmasked more. We haven't suddenly heard lots of reports of classroom spread, for example. If you do the pretend numbers again and imagine that its still 5 percent for the masked room if there's one infected person, it would seem like masks were less effective because you'd see more people getting infected. After all, more people are getting infected when everyone is wearing a mask. But, actually, its just that there are lots more infections so there are more chances for that 5 percent to happen.