Octopus Overlords

In this lawless world, we’ve all become public-health vigilantes. And that’s stupid. I’m really not sure how else to say it.

The end

Isgrimnur wrote: ↑Wed Jan 12, 2022 12:33 pm

hepcat wrote: ↑Wed Jan 12, 2022 11:58 am edit: changed twitter link to a better view of the whole exchange...including giant fake check prop rolled out to emphasize Senator Marshall's stupidity...although he probably thought it was smart.

I guess, as a former OB/GYN, he'd know better than most on how far one can fit one's head up one's own ass.

That's not where babies come from.

Not without an episiotomy, at least.

Isgrimnur wrote: ↑Wed Jan 12, 2022 5:39 pm Not without an episiotomy, at least.

Is that the a study of theories of knowing what's up someone's ass?

LordMortis wrote: ↑Wed Jan 12, 2022 5:51 pm

Isgrimnur wrote: ↑Wed Jan 12, 2022 5:39 pm Not without an episiotomy, at least.

Is that the a study of theories of knowing what's up someone's ass?

Something like that.

LawBeefaroni wrote: ↑Wed Jan 12, 2022 5:33 pm

Isgrimnur wrote: ↑Wed Jan 12, 2022 12:33 pm

hepcat wrote: ↑Wed Jan 12, 2022 11:58 am edit: changed twitter link to a better view of the whole exchange...including giant fake check prop rolled out to emphasize Senator Marshall's stupidity...although he probably thought it was smart.

I guess, as a former OB/GYN, he'd know better than most on how far one can fit one's head up one's own ass.

That's not where babies come from.

Tell it to Peacemaker.

Wednesday update

U.S. COVID update: Cases and hospitalizations at record-high, deaths rising

- New cases: 908,916
- Average: 791,803 (+27,457)
- States reporting: 50/50
- In hospital: 150,119 (+4,247)
- ICU: 25,170 (+557)
- New deaths: 2,665
- Average: 1,817 (+95)

Once again, the pattern holds. Cases rise, followed a few weeks later by more hospitalizations, followed a few weeks later by more death. Over and over.

But I'm told it's done.

We're hearing about peak COVID even more than we heard about peak oil.

My county is at a 23.32% positivity rate. The town where I shop? 24.5%.

Blackhawk wrote: ↑Wed Jan 12, 2022 11:18 pm My county is at a 23.32% positivity rate. The town where I shop? 24.5%.

Congrats on such low levels!

If the director of the CDC can work from home, I think the rest of us can too:

During the transition last fall, Walensky expressed apprehension about moving from the Boston area to take the helm of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta during the Covid-19 pandemic, a transition official told West Wing Playbook. It caused angst in the ranks. Ultimately, the CDC director did not relocate full-time to Atlanta and continues to work remotely from the Boston area, with frequent trips to CDC headquarters and Washington.

That is...not a good look.

You've heard of the Waffle House Index, with regard to disaster recovery?

One of the ways I track the pandemic severity is with my Instacart Index. For the last year, I've been placing a groceries order with Instacart about once a week. I tip either 20% or $20, whichever is more, and a shopper normally picks up the order within a couple of minutes of it landing in the system. Today, the order has been sitting there, unclaimed, for more than a half an hour and counting.

Instacart Index: CODE RED

Update: The final time-to-shopper was 45 minutes. That's the first time in the last year that it was over 5 minutes. #Anecdata

Coronavirus hits the food supply chain hard

High demand for groceries combined with soaring freight costs and Omicron-related labor shortages are creating a new round of backlogs at processed food and fresh produce companies, leading to empty supermarket shelves at major retailers across the United States.

Growers of perishable produce across the West Coast are paying nearly triple pre-pandemic trucking rates to ship things like lettuce and berries before they spoil. Shay Myers, CEO of Owyhee Produce, which grows onions, watermelons and asparagus along the border of Idaho and Oregon, said he has been holding off shipping onions to retail distributors until freight costs go down.

Myers said transportation disruptions in the last three weeks, caused by a lack of truck drivers and recent highway-blocking storms, have led to a doubling of freight costs for fruit and vegetable producers, on top of already-elevated pandemic prices. "We typically will ship, East Coast to West Coast – we used to do it for about $7,000," he said. "Today it’s somewhere between $18,000 and $22,000."

Birds Eye frozen vegetables maker Conagra Brands' CEO Sean Connolly told investors last week that supplies from its U.S. plants could be constrained for at least the next month due to Omicron-related absences.

Earlier this week, Albertsons CEO Vivek Sankaran said he expects the supermarket chain to confront more supply chain challenges over the next four to six weeks as Omicron has put a dent in its efforts to plug supply chain gaps.

Max Peck wrote: ↑Fri Jan 14, 2022 11:41 am You've heard of the Waffle House Index, with regard to disaster recovery?

One of the ways I track the pandemic severity is with my Instacart Index. For the last year, I've been placing a groceries order with Instacart about once a week. I tip either 20% or $20, whichever is more, and a shopper normally picks up the order within a couple of minutes of it landing in the system. Today, the order has been sitting there, unclaimed, for more than a half an hour and counting.

Instacart Index: CODE RED

Update: The final time-to-shopper was 45 minutes. That's the first time in the last year that it was over 5 minutes. #Anecdata

For me it's always listed as 2 1/2 hour wait altho usually it's about 1 1/2 hours. I haven't been the the grocery store in over a month and only once in the last two months. I'm about 9 miles away and it's all mountains.

malchior wrote: ↑Sat Jan 15, 2022 8:18 am Coronavirus hits the food supply chain hard

I took these pics on Thursday.





The difference from early in the pandemic is that these are rolling outages. Next week the chicken case might be brimming while the beef is sparse.

I've read that processed food is especially impacted, but I didn't shop any of those aisles so no pics.

It's pretty much the same everywhere I go around here.

This is the defining issue of the pandemic, and we are failing

Here in the US, every day we see OpEds in the WSJ and The Atlantic from highly vaccinated, wealthy, healthy people saying “they’re done” with Covid-19

It's always nice when we can be an example for other nations...in a bad way.

The US outlier status for its rise in hospitalizations
—vs European countries now starting descent from Omicron
—in the US, the Omicron wave was superimposed on a 2nd Delta surge
—the US very low 62% vaxx and 23% booster rate is contributing to this

So weird how other countries didn't get the message that everyone is going to get COVID and they should just get back to doing whatever.

dbt1949 wrote: ↑Sat Jan 15, 2022 9:31 am

Max Peck wrote: ↑Fri Jan 14, 2022 11:41 am You've heard of the Waffle House Index, with regard to disaster recovery?

One of the ways I track the pandemic severity is with my Instacart Index. For the last year, I've been placing a groceries order with Instacart about once a week. I tip either 20% or $20, whichever is more, and a shopper normally picks up the order within a couple of minutes of it landing in the system. Today, the order has been sitting there, unclaimed, for more than a half an hour and counting.

Instacart Index: CODE RED

Update: The final time-to-shopper was 45 minutes. That's the first time in the last year that it was over 5 minutes. #Anecdata

For me it's always listed as 2 1/2 hour wait altho usually it's about 1 1/2 hours. I haven't been the the grocery store in over a month and only once in the last two months. I'm about 9 miles away and it's all mountains.

The initial delivery window was "today." Once a shopper picked up the order, everything went at a normal pace and it took about a 1.5 hours until delivery. I'm guessing that either demand was up sharply or, more likely, the number of shoppers logging into the system was down significantly.

Waste water monitoring here in Ottawa seems to indicate that community spread has started to decline for the last few days, which is being taken to indicate that the increased public health measures are having an impact. I guess we'll know for sure if the hospitalization rate starts to decline in a few days as well.



Of course, the provincial government is re-opening the schools on Monday, so that could lead to an upswing in community spread if things don't go well.

Another interesting graph from the waste water monitoring shows just how quickly Omicron took over and pushed out Delta.

As I think I mentioned in the EBG Covid thread, my wife tested positive via rapid test on Friday (subsequently confirmed via PCR). She's fine (very mild symptoms), and my kids and I are all negative (tested both on Friday, then again this morning). She's vaccinated and boosted, as am I (kids are double-shotted, and 12 YO daughter is getting boosted today).

I have to admit I'm mildly baffled how none of the rest of the family got it, at least to date. *Maybe* my wife happened to become infectious right when we tested her, but seems unlikely. She's been isolating in the living room since the positive test, though she's been out a couple times to the kitchen (not at the same time as us) admittedly double-masked and with the screen door to the outside open, so our protocols haven't been fully Smoove-ian, but I guess that's been enough.

El Guapo wrote: ↑Tue Jan 18, 2022 12:15 pm As I think I mentioned in the EBG Covid thread, my wife tested positive via rapid test on Friday (subsequently confirmed via PCR). She's fine (very mild symptoms), and my kids and I are all negative (tested both on Friday, then again this morning). She's vaccinated and boosted, as am I (kids are double-shotted, and 12 YO daughter is getting boosted today).

I have to admit I'm mildly baffled how none of the rest of the family got it, at least to date. *Maybe* my wife happened to become infectious right when we tested her, but seems unlikely. She's been isolating in the living room since the positive test, though she's been out a couple times to the kitchen (not at the same time as us) admittedly double-masked and with the screen door to the outside open, so our protocols haven't been fully Smoove-ian, but I guess that's been enough.

I don't want to burst your bubble and hope you all remain healthy, but it is still early. A podcaster I listen to had the same thing happen to him - wife positive on Thursday, whole family negative on Monday. Remainder of family had it by Thursday (with the exception of a daughter who never tested positive). Incubation period is different for everyone.

stessier wrote: ↑Tue Jan 18, 2022 12:44 pm

El Guapo wrote: ↑Tue Jan 18, 2022 12:15 pm As I think I mentioned in the EBG Covid thread, my wife tested positive via rapid test on Friday (subsequently confirmed via PCR). She's fine (very mild symptoms), and my kids and I are all negative (tested both on Friday, then again this morning). She's vaccinated and boosted, as am I (kids are double-shotted, and 12 YO daughter is getting boosted today).

I have to admit I'm mildly baffled how none of the rest of the family got it, at least to date. *Maybe* my wife happened to become infectious right when we tested her, but seems unlikely. She's been isolating in the living room since the positive test, though she's been out a couple times to the kitchen (not at the same time as us) admittedly double-masked and with the screen door to the outside open, so our protocols haven't been fully Smoove-ian, but I guess that's been enough.

I don't want to burst your bubble and hope you all remain healthy, but it is still early. A podcaster I listen to had the same thing happen to him - wife positive on Thursday, whole family negative on Monday. Remainder of family had it by Thursday (with the exception of a daughter who never tested positive). Incubation period is different for everyone.

Yeah it is. Odds are decent that at least one of us tests positive before this is over, but we'll see. I read that omicron has a pretty short incubation period, at least.

Another factor to consider, as I understand it, is that the rapid antigen tests are less sensitive to Omicron and thus more prone to false negatives.

We had a household positive (picked up via rapid antigen and confirmed via PCR). Despite spending a few days before detection without isolation in place, no one else got it. Rest of household tested every 36 hours via rapid and every 72 hours via PCR.

LawBeefaroni wrote: ↑Tue Jan 18, 2022 2:53 pm We had a household positive (picked up via rapid antigen and confirmed via PCR). Despite spending a few days before detection without isolation in place, no one else got it. Rest of household tested every 36 hours via rapid and every 72 hours via PCR.

I'm curious about the biology of how that happens. There's little doubt in this type of situation that there's extended exposure, right? So if no one else in the house pops a positive, seems like the most likely explanation is that the respective immune systems reacted promptly and thoroughly enough that the virus levels never got up to detectable levels - is that about right?

Maybe a question for Smoove, but does anyone know of any articles accessible to laymen about differences in immune responses to the same virus? I'm newly fascinated by that subject.

No idea but after symptom onset (before we knew that a mere runny nose was a symptom) we did the usual. We ate together, sat on the couch for together for hours at a time, and packed for holiday travel in close proximity (travel which was subsequently cancelled). Since it was right at the start of holiday "vacation" we quarantined for 14 days, leaving only for PCR testing. 1 positive, 3 negative the entire time.

I guess the free tests are pretty popular.

I guess we aren't getting away from the psychology of testing.

I'm happy Floridans can get these directly to their mailbox.

We got a call tonight that our daycare sitter tested positive tonight for COVID. :ground:

Time for 2 weeks of constant concern for our daughter who is too young to be vaxxed! And shuffling work schedules as an added bonus on top of it.

I ordered my 4 just because.

Our county public health board tied 5-5 on reinstating the mask mandate, which means no mask mandate. Because obviously with things as bad as they've ever been under previous mask mandates, lifting it is the only option. They caved to public pressure and all the mouth breathing FREEDUMB fighters we have that show up to these meetings.

When my son got it a while back, distancing within the house wasn't an option (it's just too small of a house.) It was before Omicron (that's weird to say, as it was only what, six weeks ago?), and boosters had just become available so we hadn't gotten ours yet. And yet none of us tested positive. Three tests each - when we found out, midway, and then five days after his quarantine was over, and they weren't rapid tests.

Maybe we got lucky. Maybe we'd had it and been asymptomatic at some point in the recent past without ever realizing it (he was asymptomatic, and we never would have known had he not gotten a test pre-surgery.) Who knows? But with scores of hours sitting just a few feet from him during a school vacation in which none of us left the house, I'm very surprised that none of us contracted it.

Messages from son's school:
6:14 am: A student in [son's classroom] has tested positive for COVID, was last in class Monday.
7:00am: [Son's Classroom] is closed today.
7:06am: Vaccinated students may attend.
7:14am: Unvaccinated students must quarantine and show negative PCR after day 7.

Son is vaccinated but the daily uncertainty is tiring.

That's a whole lotta fail right there, LB.

Looking forward to Smoove telling me to ignore this glimmer of hope:

Omicron Is in Retreat https://nyti.ms/359twih

LawBeefaroni wrote: ↑Wed Jan 19, 2022 10:18 am Son is vaccinated but the daily uncertainty is tiring.

But school is open. That's all that matters.

Zaxxon wrote: ↑Wed Jan 19, 2022 10:22 am Looking forward to Smoove telling me to ignore this glimmer of hope:

Omicron Is in Retreat https://nyti.ms/359twih

I'm having my coffee, but I'm happy to ruin everything in a little bit.

LawBeefaroni wrote: ↑Wed Jan 19, 2022 10:18 am Messages from son's school:
6:14 am: A student in [son's classroom] has tested positive for COVID, was last in class Monday.
7:00am: [Son's Classroom] is closed today.
7:06am: Vaccinated students may attend.
7:14am: Unvaccinated students must quarantine and show negative PCR after day 7.

Son is vaccinated but the daily uncertainty is tiring.

We got a message from the twins' school late Monday (MLK Day) afternoon that someone in boy twin's class tested positive on Friday. Per CPS rules, that meant no school for him on Tuesday while teachers prepared for hybrid remote/in-person learning. Vaxxed students (with vaccination on record) who are showing no symptoms could return on Wednesday, while unvaxxed students and vaxxed students showing symptoms would be remote. Girl twin's class proceeded as normal in-person on Tuesday. Since boy twin is vaxxed, I dropped him off at school (with his sister) this morning. It should be interesting to see how many kids are in-person in his class today.

Smoove_B wrote: ↑Wed Jan 19, 2022 10:28 am

LawBeefaroni wrote: ↑Wed Jan 19, 2022 10:18 am Son is vaccinated but the daily uncertainty is tiring.

But school is open. That's all that matters.

Zaxxon wrote: ↑Wed Jan 19, 2022 10:22 am Looking forward to Smoove telling me to ignore this glimmer of hope:

Omicron Is in Retreat https://nyti.ms/359twih

I'm having my coffee, but I'm happy to ruin everything in a little bit.

Yeah aren't they talking a wave through mid-to-end of March with between 60K and 300K deaths? It's in retreat in some places but like every other wave it isn't propagating across the nation uniformly.

Zaxxon wrote:That's a whole lotta fail right there, LB.

Looking forward to Smoove telling me to ignore this glimmer of hope:

Omicron Is in Retreat https://nyti.ms/359twih

The problem with headlines like that one, especially in a newspaper read all across the country, is that the statement doesn't apply everywhere. Parts of New York and New England may be reaching a turning point in the current wave, but much of the country still has a long way to go...and it will most likely get worse for all of us again.

Regarding the situation in CT, our test positivity rate is declining, but the hospital where I work still has a very high number of COVID+ admissions. Counting both patients admitted for symptomatic COVID and those without symptoms but found to be positive by admission screening, about 1/3 of our beds are currently occupied by COVID+ patients. Fortunately, many of those are incidental discoveries and not requiring COVID treatment. Roughly 10% of the total are ICU level care, and an even smaller fraction of those (less than half) are on a ventilator. That's fewer patients with life-threatening illness than any previous surge. We have more COVID+ patients admitted within our healthcare system than any other point since this started, but thanks to CT's high vaccination rate and improved treatment methods, most are not very sick...no overflowing ICUs, ventilator shortages, or suspensions of elective surgery so far. While I would love to see fewer people infected and an end to this whole disaster, at least in my corner of the world, we're in a better place than previous surges.

I've more than had my fill over the last two years, however, and would love to go back to a time when I can go to work without seeing people dying of COVID. Maybe one day...

LawBeefaroni wrote: ↑Wed Jan 19, 2022 10:18 am Messages from son's school:
6:14 am: A student in [son's classroom] has tested positive for COVID, was last in class Monday.
7:00am: [Son's Classroom] is closed today.
7:06am: Vaccinated students may attend.
7:14am: Unvaccinated students must quarantine and show negative PCR after day 7.

Son is vaccinated but the daily uncertainty is tiring.

If it makes you feel any better, we get daily emails since the return from break:
"we've been notified a student in your child's class has tested positive. They were on campus while infectious. See you all tomorrow, where a mask if you want!"
to be bullied.