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

[Kepler]

Darn. I can't get into Yemen...

Turkmenistan. Was it something I said?

[walrus]

Totally off topic but listening to the Beeb about the drought in Europe- the Loire riverbed is dry in some places. Other rivers are having sig less water. I wondered about how they were going to deal with river cruises.

Cruises least of their worries, can't get ships with gas, oil and coal on them to their destinations

[leswp1]

https://www.medpagetoday.com/infecti...wComments=true

New CDC guidance. At least they are honest about their motivations- "to limit social and economic impacts, quarantine of exposed persons is no longer recommended, regardless of vaccination status"

This steams me. Translation- we don't give a **** about prevention. We don't care if you personally bear the economic or personal impact of getting sick, missing work, getting those in your house sick, them missing work, the kids having to stay home so you miss work... And if you get long covid- oh gee! Or if you get sequential infections with all of the sequelae they are seeing occur- well, that doesn't count because its the economy stupid.

And people are so freaking stupid they will be all excited they don't need to do stuff to prevent. How is it economically sound for all these people to get sick, miss work/school, disrupt the workplace/class with their absences. I feel like I am living in an Orwellian Virtual world where people suffer individually while being told no one is suffering.

/end rant

Meanwhile mr les is negative at day 5 and counting. Thank goodness!

[Swansong]

Because capitalism needs to capitalism.

[ericredaxe]

https://www.medpagetoday.com/infecti...wComments=true

New CDC guidance. At least they are honest about their motivations- "to limit social and economic impacts, quarantine of exposed persons is no longer recommended, regardless of vaccination status"

This steams me. Translation- we don't give a **** about prevention. We don't care if you personally bear the economic or personal impact of getting sick, missing work, getting those in your house sick, them missing work, the kids having to stay home so you miss work... And if you get long covid- oh gee! Or if you get sequential infections with all of the sequelae they are seeing occur- well, that doesn't count because its the economy stupid.

And people are so freaking stupid they will be all excited they don't need to do stuff to prevent. How is it economically sound for all these people to get sick, miss work/school, disrupt the workplace/class with their absences. I feel like I am living in an Orwellian Virtual world where people suffer individually while being told no one is suffering.

/end rant

Meanwhile mr les is negative at day 5 and counting. Thank goodness!

In fairness - these updated guidelines will have fewer kids missing school, people missing work etc due to exposures and waiting for negative tests.

Under the previous guidelines, given the trend of newer variants being less severe, for most people, the life disruption consequences of getting covid were much worse than the actual infection itself.

[Swansong]

Just a point of clarification.

Newer variants (Omicron BA.xxx) are not proven to be less severe innately. There is much mixed data on that, and no conclusion can be drawn. They are in effect less severe due to acquired immunity, via vaccination and/or infection, but that's different from saying "new variants are less severe". They aren't, at least in a definitive way.

[Kepler]

They are in effect less severe due to acquired immunity, via vaccination and/or infection, but that's different from saying "new variants are less severe".

Thank you for this clarification. What is the technical terminology for severity (in a vacuum), severity (with immunity) etc? And is there a measure of immunity that is different from the measure of severity vs the baseline of no immunity, or is that just a circular definition?

[Swansong]

I don't know enough to answer that question, sorry. It is virtually impossible to measure actual levels of immunity - we use antibody/t-cell/other cell levels to determine approximate level of immune response but even that is more "well this person has all the fight'n cells, so they should be ok unless other factors involved". I don't want to sound like an actual scientician here so I'm using purposefully goofy language.

They also use things like IFR and CFR, as death is a pretty good indicator of severity. But not always.

The CDC has some stuff on this:
https://www.cdc.gov/flu/pandemic-res...framework.html

That's influenza related but I'm mostly sure the concepts are general.

[ericredaxe]

Just a point of clarification.

Newer variants (Omicron BA.xxx) are not proven to be less severe innately. There is much mixed data on that, and no conclusion can be drawn. They are in effect less severe due to acquired immunity, via vaccination and/or infection, but that's different from saying "new variants are less severe". They aren't, at least in a definitive way.

Agreed - For the purposes of this discussion though, I am talking about the severity of infection that most people are experiencing today. That may well be because of so much inquired immunity as you mention.

My real point was that under the previous guidelines - more people were missing work / school due to the protocols than due to actually being sick.

[Swansong]

Agreed - For the purposes of this discussion though, I am talking about the severity of infection that most people are experiencing today. That may well be because of so much inquired immunity as you mention.

My real point was that under the previous guidelines - more people were missing work / school due to the protocols than due to actually being sick.

Fair enough.

[leswp1]

Agreed - For the purposes of this discussion though, I am talking about the severity of infection that most people are experiencing today. That may well be because of so much inquired immunity as you mention.

My real point was that under the previous guidelines - more people were missing work / school due to the protocols than due to actually being sick.

This may be true but now there is a free-for-all as far as go to work while you are infectious. People are getting sick, not dying, but sick enough to miss work or school. The way this is set up it will be close to impossible to protect yourself (your kids, anyone who is in the workplace) the way the guidelines are. It is not medically sound advice to stop good infectious control measures because people who get exposed need to be quarantined to keep the rest of the populace safer. You bet your sweet a55 that if this was TB or measles no one would be suggesting something this stupid. We shut down whole effing schools when one person has TB.

Great for people who have benefits and sick time. They can burn PTO to stay home if they or their kids are sick or infectious.

Really bad for people who are working multiple part time jobs, with no benefits and a guideline that encourages return to work at a time they would be most infectious. Most people are not wearing fit N95 masks. Folks who are not financially stable aren't going to be able to afford them. Those jobs have always been unforgiving as far as missed work. The previous guidelines people had a specific guidance that was a hard no. Now there is no focus on prevention these people will once again be at higher risk for impact- more settings for exposure, kids with high risk for exposure, lack of finances to avoid exposure. For these people missing work can be catastrophic financially and they have no way to protect themselves from the risks the settings will impose.

So the take home- if you are well off you are excited. You get to live your life and if someone is positive it is an inconvenience. You get excited and get to pretend there will be less disruption. If you are not well off then you are screwed while people run around touting how there will be so much less disruption.

You don't want people to stay out if exposed then have the balls to give appropriate guidelines do decrease transmission rather than decide that too many people are spoiled brats and we can't make them do what they need to keep more people from getting sick. WIll you totally prevent transmission? No. But this is the equivalent of guaranteeing increased spread.

No strong feelings here.

[Deutsche Gopher Fan]

I know why Williamsburg is lower but Jesus Christ.

religion is a cancer

https://twitter.com/davidjoachim/sta...yuj66HJZ_7AKfg

[Drew S.]

This may be true but now there is a free-for-all as far as go to work while you are infectious. People are getting sick, not dying, but sick enough to miss work or school. The way this is set up it will be close to impossible to protect yourself (your kids, anyone who is in the workplace) the way the guidelines are. It is not medically sound advice to stop good infectious control measures because people who get exposed need to be quarantined to keep the rest of the populace safer. You bet your sweet a55 that if this was TB or measles no one would be suggesting something this stupid. We shut down whole effing schools when one person has TB.

Great for people who have benefits and sick time. They can burn PTO to stay home if they or their kids are sick or infectious.

Really bad for people who are working multiple part time jobs, with no benefits and a guideline that encourages return to work at a time they would be most infectious. Most people are not wearing fit N95 masks. Folks who are not financially stable aren't going to be able to afford them. Those jobs have always been unforgiving as far as missed work. The previous guidelines people had a specific guidance that was a hard no. Now there is no focus on prevention these people will once again be at higher risk for impact- more settings for exposure, kids with high risk for exposure, lack of finances to avoid exposure. For these people missing work can be catastrophic financially and they have no way to protect themselves from the risks the settings will impose.

So the take home- if you are well off you are excited. You get to live your life and if someone is positive it is an inconvenience. You get excited and get to pretend there will be less disruption. If you are not well off then you are screwed while people run around touting how there will be so much less disruption.

You don't want people to stay out if exposed then have the balls to give appropriate guidelines do decrease transmission rather than decide that too many people are spoiled brats and we can't make them do what they need to keep more people from getting sick. WIll you totally prevent transmission? No. But this is the equivalent of guaranteeing increased spread.

No strong feelings here.

I don’t understand why people focus so much on the ‘sick’ part versus what it does to your body long term. There is so much we don’t know about the virus and if reasonable precautions prevent the spread we’d do well to take them. If people wore masks in large, indoor public gatherings and stayed home when they are sick we would keep it under control.

[ericredaxe]

I know why Williamsburg is lower but Jesus Christ.

religion is a cancer

https://twitter.com/davidjoachim/sta...yuj66HJZ_7AKfg

Evidently there is a large orthodox Jewish population of which a significant percentage are anti vax.

this same area had a large measles outbreak in 2019

[Handyman]

Yes Williamsburg has a lot of Hasids...they hate vaccines but they love hookers! (this is true)