Covfefe-19 The 12th Part: The Only Thing Worse Than This New Board Is TrumpVirus2020

[Kepler]

For me 9/11 and the Bush tax cuts were a massive turning point for us.

That was Act II.

[dxmnkd316]

4/4 people something something contract something something is a sample size so laughably small as not to be relevant, and shame on the media for this.

I mean, it was one person on Twitter with a fairly large following. He's outwardly pro-vaccine, pro-mask etc. He didn't claim any specific expertise. He was pretty clear about vaccines being the solution. He also said everyone is recovering but said he experienced symptoms over the last 1-2 weeks along with his wife. His vaccinated child was asymptomatic. It also seemed clear this was an anecdote intended to make sure we don't let our guard down. So I'm not sure what the problem is with this.

That said, by and large, the media is covering Delta poorly. It's either:
1. This thing is Covid's second coming
2. This is nothing to worry about

We don't know enough about Delta to make either statement conclusively. There are some eye-catching numbers coming out of Israel and the UK but the reporting on these numbers has been garbage. ANd given the poor quality of reporting on the numbers, I tend to agree with the "ignore the media" part. (Specifically how many vaccinated people are getting Delta vs. unvaccinated; how many vaccinated people are getting ill; are any of them suffering from long covid; what's the mortality rate and hospitalization rate; etc.) Until we know a little more about Delta in the next month or so, I think it would be wise to start masking up inside again if you (general) stopped.


(GOing to start wandering here...)

As much as I'm starting to hate Substack, this seems to be a fairly good article about what's going on with Delta in general terms. Makes sense. I'd be willing to bet this tracks across states w/ highest vaccination rates. You can see Delta distributions here. Just click "Show Regions" on Sequences over Time. (I'm hoping my link preserves the Delta selection). WA might be the one to watch. Relatively high vax rate, "high" sequencing rate (relative to the rest of the country), and a relatively high Delta proportion.

Further, it does appear that the outbreaks of Delta are among the least vaccinated counties:
https://theuscovidatlas.org/map?lat=...ty_usfacts&v=2

But it's also worth looking at current cases/100k vs. vaccination rates vs. cumulative cases/100k. It's interesting (and probably makes sense) that the hardest hit areas right now track inversely with cases/100k cumulative. NE Texas, southern MO, northern AR, and western CO are all getting hit hard but up to this point have had a fairly low cumulative cases/100k. On the other hand, low vax, high spread (wild + Alpha) counties like most of TN, the FL panhandle, western TX, the Dakotas, etc. are all faring pretty well.... so far. Naturally, the high vax states are all doing pretty well too. And honestly, this all makes sense. Delta is going to hit the areas with the lowest immunity (low vax, low prior incidence). ANd it's going to hit very quickly. Delta just seems to be spreading faster and it's going to hit the dumbest areas the hardest.

The two areas that just don't make sense to me are the Virginias. Low incidence, low vax, still low daily case rates. *shrug*, maybe methanol and lead kill this thing.

[Swansong]

I disagree with your choices of "this is horrendous or this is nothing". This is a serious problem but there's no second coming/reinvention of COVID. It's a big problem for the unvaccinated and a tiny problem for the vaccinated. It's making things objectively worse, but it's coming at a time when a smaller and smaller portion of the population (at least in the US) is susceptible.


Delta isn't nothing, it's pretty bad. But we - the US - is in a place where the damage will be a fraction of what it would have been had it struck last year.

[dxmnkd316]

It would be nice to have the per-100k data for each state tracked separately between the vaccinated and unvaccinated. Might show just how crazy the differences are in a format even the average American could digest.

[dxmnkd316]

I disagree with your choices of "this is horrendous or this is nothing". This is a serious problem but there's no second coming/reinvention of COVID. It's a big problem for the unvaccinated and a tiny problem for the vaccinated. It's making things objectively worse, but it's coming at a time when a smaller and smaller portion of the population (at least in the US) is susceptible.


Delta isn't nothing, it's pretty bad. But we - the US - is in a place where the damage will be a fraction of what it would have been had it struck last year.

Sorry, that wasn't clear. I'm saying those are the choices the media has been pushing for the most part. I agree with the bolded completely.

I don't worry about dying from Delta. I do worry about long covid even with a vaccine. I don't think Delta has enough data to show long-term effects. It just hasn't been in the US long enough with enough cases among the vaccinated to let the researchers do meaningful studies. (That I've seen.)

[Swansong]

Just wanted to add that my grammar sucked in my last post and that I should probably stab myself for it.

[The Sicatoka]

Just wanted to add that my grammar sucked in my last post and that I should probably stab myself for it.

No, no you should not.

[The Sicatoka]

Corona's Witnesses ...

< c'mon, that's funny, ... and yeah, I also posted this in a different thread >

[Scarlet]

I asked this a while back but want to bring it up again in case I've missed some news on this - will we need to get additional vaccine shots? You know, like how we get a flu shot every year? I have no problem doing that, especially if it continues to help against these variants. I just don't want to have to go through the same mess we all went through trying to get vaccine appointments.

[FadeToBlack&Gold]

Yeah, it's so funny that people won't get vaccinated against a contagious disease that has already cost the country hundreds of thousands of lives, hundreds of thousands of hours of much-needed time with family and friends, and billions of dollars in revenue and income for small businesses. Why? All because a former POTUS and his minions stupidly decided to make it a political issue. Just hilarious.

[Swansong]

I asked this a while back but want to bring it up again in case I've missed some news on this - will we need to get additional vaccine shots? You know, like how we get a flu shot every year? I have no problem doing that, especially if it continues to help against these variants. I just don't want to have to go through the same mess we all went through trying to get vaccine appointments.

We don't know the answer to that right now. We've heard a firm "maybe" from infectious disease experts and the CEO of Pfizer said to assume boosters would be available (if not needed) this winter, but that was during a financial forecast meeting so not exactly a clinical statement.


So far, however, antibody and T-cell levels have been good enough for at least limited immunity in people infected very early in the pandemic, so we have at least that bit of data.

[WeAreNDHockey]

Yeah, it's so funny that people won't get vaccinated against a contagious disease that has already cost the country hundreds of thousands of lives, hundreds of thousands of hours of much-needed time with family and friends, and billions of dollars in revenue and income for small businesses. Why? All because a former POTUS and his minions stupidly decided to make it a political issue. Just hilarious.

Just be thankful things weren't so overwhelmingly political when vaccines to protect against Measles, Polio, Pertussis, Smallpox and a whole host of other disfiguring, crippling and deadly diseases were developed. There have always been crazies out there railing against vaccines, but it was a much smaller part of the world, and their voice was almost silent thanks to the fact social media as we know that term today was an unknown 50 and 75 and 100 years ago. But now EVERY. GOD. DAMN. THING. IS. POLITICAL.

Frankly I wish every last person out there who CHOOSES to forego a vaccination but could otherwise get one catches a bad case of COVID. Far more people than most are willing to admit only can be brought around with very harsh measures. And for those who think they need to read between the lines to catch my actual meaning, yes, I am wishing ill health or even death on those folks. The right-wing nowadays needs to be beaten over the head (both physically and metaphorically) to get even the most simple of messages. When you see a loved one struggle to gasp at a breath and their lungs burn when doing so, and they are terrified of dying, and you can literally see the fear in their faces, all because they refused to believe what were simple, knowable truths because they didn't jibe with their ****ing politics, maybe then you'll see how wrong you all were.

[rufus]

I'm ok with that.

A lot of people who didn't need to die will have to to get through to some of these people. And even then, they'll blame someone or something else.

[Jeb2020]

I don’t understand why we went away from masks in the first place. I absolutely hate wearing them but honestly until this thing is dead and buried we should have kept wearing them, at least indoors.

It will be interesting where the CDC goes from here. I would like to see intervention now so things don’t get completely out of control but that hasn’t been the American way when it comes to Covid.

Then keep wearing a mask.

[Jeb2020]