Coronavirus

[Cygnia]

[Cygnia]

[L. Marcus]

First jab received. Pehiser, or something.

[Starlord]

10 hours ago, Pariah said:

It might just be the venue. I mean, Paul Brown Stadium isn't exactly known as the home of champions....

 

😛

 

I'd argue if I could 

[Cygnia]

🤬

 

Miami private school, citing false claims, tells vaccinated teachers they can't be around students

[Starlord]

This just in, all Florida man memes have been changed to Florida school memes.

[Pariah]

Dammit, Florida!

[Cygnia]

[Lord Liaden]

Less than a quarter of the American population has been fully vaccinated. While the risk to the rest of contracting COVID outdoors is very small if they maintain social distance, you often can't do that. This is not the time to relax, and anyone who tries to convince you otherwise is literally contributing to killing people.

[archer]

4 hours ago, Lord Liaden said:

Less than a quarter of the American population has been fully vaccinated. While the risk to the rest of contracting COVID outdoors is very small if they maintain social distance, you often can't do that. This is not the time to relax, and anyone who tries to convince you otherwise is literally contributing to killing people.

 

Very disappointed in President Biden coming out yesterday and stating that the CDC has changed it's recommendations: vaccinated people don't have to wear masks while outdoors.

 

With Biden's de facto State of the Union address happening tonight on his 99th day in office, the change in the recommendation appears at least on the surface as politically motivated to publicize his success from his first 100 days in office. 

 

You don't have any control over whether the people who aren't wearing masks are vaccinated or not.

 

You have very little control over people coming close to you (and practically none at all when almost everyone can move faster than you).

 

None of the vaccines are 100% effective against even the original strain of the virus. And with all the mutations spawning so quickly that the news doesn't even bother reporting them individually anymore, who the hell actually knows if the vaccine is very effective (or not) against whatever you might be exposed to?

 

The administration has been very effective at getting vaccine out to people. IMO it doesn't need landmarks set up at politically opportune moments in order to drive that home.

 

They were reporting on MSNBC that 68% of US seniors are fully vaccinated, which is an astounding feat. And in less than 100 days, the country has gone from people staying up until all hours of the night trying desperately to get vaccine appointments to widespread news reports of public officials begging people to come in to be vaccinated because they have more vaccine than willing arms to put it in.

 

As an individual, your chance of being infected outdoors is small. But as a country, if people don't wear masks outdoors, a large number of people will be infected who wouldn't have been otherwise. 100% of those people will be coming indoors as some point. A huge percentage of those people will be maskless indoors with family or friends at some point and pass along the disease.

[Starlord]

46 minutes ago, archer said:

 

Very disappointed in President Biden coming out yesterday and stating that the CDC has changed it's recommendations: vaccinated people don't have to wear masks while outdoors.

 

 

I took it as incentive for more people to go get vaccinated...I've heard from more than one pundit that more people would get vaccinated with extra incentives thrown in.  Should you need that?  I don't think so, but that's just me.

[archer]

17 minutes ago, Starlord said:

 

I took it as incentive for more people to go get vaccinated...I've heard from more than one pundit that more people would get vaccinated with extra incentives thrown in.  Should you need that?  I don't think so, but that's just me.

 

Since you aren't required to prove you're vaccinated and aren't even going to be questioned by anyone about it so that you'd even have to do so much as go through the effort to lie about it, I don't take it as being an incentive on any level.

 

[death tribble]

India through 18 million cases and 200,00o dead.

[unclevlad]

5 hours ago, archer said:

 

Since you aren't required to prove you're vaccinated and aren't even going to be questioned by anyone about it so that you'd even have to do so much as go through the effort to lie about it, I don't take it as being an incentive on any level.

 

 

True but it's focusing only on the negatives.  And mind:  I actually had a similar discussion with the receptionists at my chiropractor's office yesterday.  The difference there was lifting  masking mandates *at stores*.  For example:  a store could be allowed to check a vaccination card then let people in without masks.  BUT, from a store's perspective, that's a PITA.  It's also got the exact same issue...someone might wear a mask to get in, but then take it off.  And now it's in a somewhat mobile but *indoor* space...higher risk.  So I don't see something like that.

When is this going to end?  When are we going to be able to return to mostly-normal?  Do we really have to wait until herd immunity to start relaxing restrictions?

No.

Will some jerks abuse this?  Yes...but those of us who've been vaccinated, have a lot less to worry about.

 

Another issue is central leadership.  If local authorities are relaxing their restrictions across the country...and I don't mean Texas or Florida that never wanted them in the first place, but places like San Francisco where, I believe, the Giants have been given the green light to sell more tickets...then reasonable, prudent steps by the Feds *makes sense*.  

[Cancer]

Quote

“It’s a complete massacre of data,” says epidemiologist Bhramar Mukherjee. “From all the modeling we’ve done, we believe the true number of deaths is two to five times what is being reported.”

 

Strong suspicions that the situation in India is much worse than the already dire numbers indicate.

[unclevlad]

7 minutes ago, Cancer said:

 

Strong suspicions that the situation in India is much worse than the already dire numbers indicate.

 

Yeah, I've seen that statement too.

I rather like the comparative "deaths above expected" measures.  A large country has a large enough population to generally eliminate sampling errors;  over 2.8 million people died in the US in 2019.  And there's plenty of historical data to account for seasonal factors.  So when deaths are wildly higher than the norm, there's *something* going on.  Sure, some will be readily attributable...storms, violence, etc...there are still a LOT left over.  It's not proof of any specific cause, but the data doesn't lie.  SOMETHING caused these deaths, and if the known reasons don't cover it...look to others.  

[Old Man]

1 hour ago, unclevlad said:

 

Yeah, I've seen that statement too.

I rather like the comparative "deaths above expected" measures.  A large country has a large enough population to generally eliminate sampling errors;  over 2.8 million people died in the US in 2019.  And there's plenty of historical data to account for seasonal factors.  So when deaths are wildly higher than the norm, there's *something* going on.  Sure, some will be readily attributable...storms, violence, etc...there are still a LOT left over.  It's not proof of any specific cause, but the data doesn't lie.  SOMETHING caused these deaths, and if the known reasons don't cover it...look to others.  

 

The excess deaths number is easily the most accurate measure of covid deaths.  The problem is that it's not usually available in a timeframe that's useful for reacting to uncontrolled spread.  Even in U.S. states where state governments aren't trying to cover things up, excess death numbers often aren't available until up to four weeks after they occur.

 

India's case rate is slowing, ever so slightly.

[unclevlad]

I wouldn't say easily;  it's got interpretation issues, too, but it can compel the deeper dive into the numbers.  That's the value for me.

Are India's new cases numbers dropping in fact, or is it simple data variance?  From what I see...too early to tell.  We can hope, tho.

[Old Man]

9 minutes ago, unclevlad said:

I wouldn't say easily;  it's got interpretation issues, too, but it can compel the deeper dive into the numbers.  That's the value for me.

Are India's new cases numbers dropping in fact, or is it simple data variance?  From what I see...too early to tell.  We can hope, tho.

 

The upward case trajectory is a teeny bit flatter over the past couple of days.  Could be anything.  Could just be that the spread is so out of control it's affecting the counting of the cases.  I'd like to remain hopeful though.  I've about had enough of this stupid virus, and the stupidity that allowed it to kill so many.

[unclevlad]

5 minutes ago, Old Man said:

 

I've about had enough of this stupid virus, and the stupidity and venality that allowed it to kill so many.

 

Fixed that for you.

 

And...by WorldOMeters, the total number of identified cases in the world just passed the 150M mark....

 

 

 

[Matt the Bruins]

9 hours ago, Starlord said:

 

I took it as incentive for more people to go get vaccinated...I've heard from more than one pundit that more people would get vaccinated with extra incentives thrown in.  Should you need that?  I don't think so, but that's just me.

 

I'm boggled that "If you get it, you won't die horribly in an ICU with your only company the ventilator inflating and deflating your comatose body like a set of bagpipes!" isn't enough of an incentive.

[Simon]

1 minute ago, Matt the Bruins said:

 

I'm boggled that "If you get it, you won't die horribly in an ICU with your only company being the ventilator that's inflating and deflating your comatose body like a set of bagpipes!" isn't enough of an incentive.

I wonder if the realization that ongoing (possibly permanent) neurological/cognitive defects being part of COVID will help or hurt efforts to get people vaccinated (or even just following proper safety protocols)...

Not sure that people realize that loss of sense of smell/taste is just _one_ of the neurological effects that COVID has...and that the others are more worrying (and on-going)

[archer]

16 minutes ago, Simon said:

I wonder if the realization that ongoing (possibly permanent) neurological/cognitive defects being part of COVID will help or hurt efforts to get people vaccinated (or even just following proper safety protocols)...

Not sure that people realize that loss of sense of smell/taste is just _one_ of the neurological effects that COVID has...and that the others are more worrying (and on-going)

 

At one point before vaccines were available, there were headline articles about how doctors were thinking that COVID could be linked to impotence.

 

If those stories had remained in the headlines of the mainstream media, you could guarantee that at least 50% of the adult population would be scrambling to get shots.

 

https://www.webmd.com/lung/news/20210407/erectile-dysfunction-risk-6-times-higher-in-men-with-covid

[Simon]

8 minutes ago, archer said:

 

At one point before vaccines were available, there were headline articles about how doctors were thinking that COVID could be linked to impotence.

 

If those stories had remained in the headlines of the mainstream media, you could guarantee that at least 50% of the adult population would be scrambling to get shots.

 

https://www.webmd.com/lung/news/20210407/erectile-dysfunction-risk-6-times-higher-in-men-with-covid

Certainly true....but that's similar to my field, where you're playing/selling off of FUD (fear, uncertainty, and doubt).  Not really recommended....but that's against an educated/intelligent audience. When dealing with society as a whole, you get into the whole fuzzy/messy side of "what sells."

There's an interesting game being played between hard science (how you get sick, how the virus spreads, what controls that spread, etc.), politics (what benefits a given political power group), and society (what the masses think/fear/want).  Science evolves and changes far faster than the others....and that's been particularly telling with COVID.

The current relaxing of mask mandates for vaccinated individuals is a good example of the intersection of those:  science-wise there haven't been many cases traced to outdoor transmission of the virus in non-crowded situations (e.g. outside of concerts, etc.); politics-wise on the US side of things there's been a fundamental shift back towards trusting in the "intelligentsia" and science; society-wise things are slow...but the shift on the political side is directly tied to the societal...and something that you see mirrored in recommendations coming out of entities like the CDC (anti-maskers are not likely to be converted at this point, so you need to go after the "vaccine reluctant"), hence relaxing of mask requirements outdoors -- the risk of contracting the virus outside (when not in a crowd for a prolonged period) is minimal, but the perceived benefit of not needing to mask up is much greater.

[BarretWallace]

16 hours ago, Matt the Bruins said:

 

I'm boggled that "If you get it, you won't die horribly in an ICU with your only company the ventilator inflating and deflating your comatose body like a set of bagpipes!" isn't enough of an incentive.

 

There you go trying to apply logic and reason to the way people think.....although there are times I am rather illogical myself, so maybe I should just shut up.  😜