That is not dead which can eternal lie, and with strange aeons bring us some web forums whereupon we can gather
https://www.octopusoverlords.com/forum/
https://www.octopusoverlords.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=97382
Average active COVID hospitalizations more than 5 times higher than 2 weeks ago
Recent developments:
- Ottawa's COVID-19 levels are rising and moderate to very high.
- Its hospitalizations and outbreaks have spiked.
- Some numbers are back where they were at the start of 2023.
- Quebec recommends an autumn booster dose for vulnerable people.
- Six more local COVID deaths have been reported.
I largely agree with the caveat that if hospitals start overflowing and they need to start bringing in refrigerated trucks, there will likely be pressure to stem transmission for a few weeks. In other words, it's going to take some magical unknown number of deaths in a short time period + hospitals being overwhelmed to force a discussion. Anything less is just the price we all collectively pay for freedom to brunch.LawBeefaroni wrote: ↑Thu Aug 24, 2023 1:04 pm But we'll never go back to 2020-2021 measures. It's so passé.
I took a covid test just last night. I'd been feeling slightly punk for a couple of days, and wanted to rule that out before starting a new medication that can cause side effects. We stocked up with many, many test kits.LawBeefaroni wrote: ↑Thu Aug 24, 2023 1:04 pm And consider that almost no one is testing any more. The number of people home from work right now with "summer colds" is highly suspicious
But we'll never go back to 2020-2021 measures. It's so passé.
I got a box full of them in April before they weren't "free" in May. I also got a second round delivered when they made them available. I haven't used any of them. I went through three of the original four I got delivered before they were well expired. For all I know the others are expired at this point. It's not that I wouldn't won't use them. It's that ever since going into COVID hiding and leaving an office full of parents who always come in to work sick, I don't get sick any more, so the need to use the tests is pretty much zero.
https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/4 ... -19-cases/The recent upturn in COVID-19 cases in some regions has spurred a handful of entities around the country to reinstate mask mandates, reigniting the debate over what place masking requirements have in an era of living with the coronavirus.
Earlier this week, Hollywood movie studio Lionsgate asked its employees to wear masks on certain floors of its facilities in Santa Monica, Calif., in response to a few staff members testing positive for COVID-19.
Kaiser Permanente began to require staff, patients and visitors to wear masks at its facility in Santa Rosa, Calif., this week in response to a spike in cases. Upstate Medical University in New York announced a similar decision last week for two of its hospitals.
Schools including Rutgers University in New Jersey and Morris Brown College in Georgia have issued mask mandates for their respective campuses, with the Atlanta-based school reinstating masks as a two-week precautionary measure.
We're in a timeline where I get my COVID-19 news from Deadline.After a relatively calm summer, the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health (Public Health) is reporting a rise in measures of Covid-19 transmission for the fifth consecutive week,” the department announced today.
...
The average of 512 daily cases this week is a nearly 35% increase over last week week. Reported cases do not include home tests, so it’s fairly certain that the actual number of Covid infections is much higher.
...
Possibly more important, test positivity has risen to 14%, a not insignificant number. That’s above the 13.8% test positivity peak last winter and very close to the peak of 15.64% the county saw last summer.
...
Currently, Los Angeles County is reporting a daily average of 422 hospitalizations, a 30 percent increase from the week prior and there has also been a consistent, small increase in the proportion of emergency department visits attributed to Covid over the past month. While hospitalizations are increasing, the current levels are still far lower than what was seen in 2022 during the summer peak, when there was an average of 1,287 COVID patients hospitalized each day.
$1.49 for the autumn sale right now. Game replaced. We'll see how well it stands the test of time. I think the last time I played was in the XP era, maybe even late 98 era.LordMortis wrote: ↑Mon Jul 31, 2023 6:31 amI wonder what it takes to get those old CDs working on my computer with Windows 10... GOG. I may just have to break down and pay $6 again for the memories.
Of note:Several weeks ago, two op-eds appeared in The Boston Globe—one by President Biden’s former Covid czar, Ashish Jha, and the other by Jerome Adams, President Trump’s surgeon general. The occasion was the clear increase in Covid-19 cases this summer. Jha, who is back at his old gig as the dean of the Brown University School of Public Health, made a case for, in his words, “ignoring” Covid. This is an old refrain of his by now: We have the tools. If you’re vaccinated and have access to Paxlovid, why worry? Jha briefly acknowledged that some people may be more vulnerable, but apart from that, he played his biggest hit: Don’t worry, be happy. It’s what got him to the White House, and he’s not changing his tune now.
...
Despite what Jha says, it is still prudent to protect yourself and those you love from infection, particularly since community-level protections are gone and widespread environmental upgrades that could have minimized the spread (such as indoor ventilation) were never implemented. Yes, things are far better than in 2020, but the virus is still here, and you don’t want to get it.
...
Jha and Doron and their ilk can speak so soothingly because they are part of the class that is much more insulated from the worst effects of Covid. People like them—the ones with money and access—can afford the expensive Covid tests. They can ensure that Paxlovid reaches their door quickly. They’ll be first in line for the new boosters. Some of them even have a concierge physician on speed dial for when things get hairy. Meanwhile, they offer the rest of the country the policy equivalent of “You do you” and “Let them eat cake.”
In closing:The New York Times recently reported on new estimates from researchers that Covid might lead to at least 45,000 deaths between September and April—and that’s the best-case scenario. “Based on these projections, Covid is likely to remain in the leading causes of death in the United States for the foreseeable future,” Justin Lessler, an epidemiologist at the UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health, told the Times.
In his 1992 book The Culture of Contentment, a series of essays that ring very true today, the late economist John Kenneth Galbraith wrote that “individuals and communities that are favored in their economic, social and political condition attribute social virtue and political durability to that which they themselves enjoy. That attribution, in turn, is made to apply even in the face of commanding evidence to the contrary.”
This is the exact problem we face now: a favored class that sees its own comfort as a sign that everything’s fine. As a result, the members of the Church of the Contented Establishment—from the White House to Jha and his Brown colleague Emily Oster, to David Leonhardt at The New York Times and Leana Wen at The Washington Post, to even infectious-disease doctors like Monica Gandhi at the University of California San Francisco—are pushing a narrative about Covid and our public health that, thanks to its influence within elite circles, is more subtly corrupting and poisonous than anything that outright Covid denialists like Ron DeSantis have come up with.
Just chiming in to say this is all true and it is a microcosm of how all policy making is happening in our society. I'm hardly a populist but I get why people are so, so angry out there. They don't necessarily understand what happened but there are a lot people debilitated and suffering out there because of amoral pricks like Jha and his ilk.Smoove_B wrote: ↑Fri Sep 01, 2023 10:56 amIn closing:In his 1992 book The Culture of Contentment, a series of essays that ring very true today, the late economist John Kenneth Galbraith wrote that “individuals and communities that are favored in their economic, social and political condition attribute social virtue and political durability to that which they themselves enjoy. That attribution, in turn, is made to apply even in the face of commanding evidence to the contrary.”
This is the exact problem we face now: a favored class that sees its own comfort as a sign that everything’s fine. As a result, the members of the Church of the Contented Establishment—from the White House to Jha and his Brown colleague Emily Oster, to David Leonhardt at The New York Times and Leana Wen at The Washington Post, to even infectious-disease doctors like Monica Gandhi at the University of California San Francisco—are pushing a narrative about Covid and our public health that, thanks to its influence within elite circles, is more subtly corrupting and poisonous than anything that outright Covid denialists like Ron DeSantis have come up with.
September 8th US update:
Community spread of Covid is "high", with a correction upwards last week as well. Current estimates:
720,000 new infections/day
What's interesting is if you read through the comments:
So, we are nearing March-April 2020 & “darkest winter of our lives” numbers?
As we (me?) have been saying for a while, it's all about deaths - and the lack thereof. As long as people aren't dropping dead, nothing else matters. Sick for a month? Heart muscle damage? Long Covid? Doesn't matter - you're not dead.In number of cases per day yes. In hospitalizations and deaths, nowhere close. More comparable to fall of 2022 in all metrics.
I'm just frustrated that yet again we've managed to fuck it up in an entirely self-inflicted way. It's September 8th, and neither I nor anyone else has public info as to when and whether I'll be able to vaccinate. I should have [the option to have] this fucker in my arm by now.
Yesterday they said info today with shot being available as early as Monday. Today they said info Tuesday. Tuesday they'll say....Zaxxon wrote: ↑Fri Sep 08, 2023 8:11 pmI'm just frustrated that yet again we've managed to fuck it up in an entirely self-inflicted way. It's September 8th, and neither I nor anyone else has public info as to when and whether I'll be able to vaccinate. I should have [the option to have] this fucker in my arm by now.
Yes! Maybe something that works on horses, too - and kills mosquitoes!
Now imagine you never stopped paying close attention. I am absolutely fried.LordMortis wrote: ↑Fri Sep 08, 2023 8:27 pm I really hate that I'm starting to pay close attention again and worse the attempt are yielding how bad the information out there is.
There is probably a point at which the stress of caring so much is more dangerous to you than COVID is. You probably passed it in 2021.Smoove_B wrote: ↑Fri Sep 08, 2023 10:15 pmNow imagine you never stopped paying close attention. I am absolutely fried.LordMortis wrote: ↑Fri Sep 08, 2023 8:27 pm I really hate that I'm starting to pay close attention again and worse the attempt are yielding how bad the information out there is.
Why you need to keep updating the vaccines while in other countries like for example where I am right now, most people stopped doing boosters since over a year ago. And we don't see a lot of COVID-19 cases or hospitalization here this year. Is COVID-19 really over for most countries or they just don't keep track of it and there are excess death worldwide that are hidden?Smoove_B wrote: ↑Fri Sep 08, 2023 8:14 pm Frustrating is the right word. As I mentioned earlier, the big "sell" for the mRNA vaccines was how fast they could be updated and produced. That means nothing if administrative nonsense is holding up approvals. But again, if people aren't dying, there's no need to rush. What kind of message would that send? Why are you rushing for something that is no big deal anymore? That's confusing!
Also, really, really be prepared to not be able to get a vaccination. I still cannot rule it out.
The city's pandemic numbers to watch are mostly stable or rising at moderate to high levels in the weekly Ottawa Public Health (OPH) updates.
Because of this, OPH says the city's health-care institutions are at a high risk from respiratory illnesses like they would be in December, January and February.
Medical Officer of Health Dr. Vera Etches said around the start of the month that, like last year, COVID activity is expected to pick back up in autumn along with flu and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV).
Citing the respiratory virus season, The Ottawa Hospital said it's bringing back mandatory masking in waiting rooms and clinical areas such as patient rooms and nursing stations on Monday, Sept. 11.
The Queensway Carleton Hospital made a similar move at the end of August.
Experts recommend that people wear masks, keep their hands clean, stay home when sick and keep up to date with COVID vaccines to help protect themselves and vulnerable people.
Updated booster doses are expected in early autumn.
In a nutshell, because 90%+ of the world has been vaccinated, had the virus or a combination of both the pressure to *do anything* seems to have disappeared. And the reason the pressure to do anything has disappeared is because people (largely) aren't dying anymore; people are not overwhelming hospitals. Like many other diseases, we've now pushed it on to the most vulnerable - elders, children and people with underlying medical conditions. That said, children aren't dying in large numbers and people with underlying medical conditions are historically ignored, which leaves us with elders. They're still (seemingly) the highest risk for death, so that's where most attention is going right now.Victoria Raverna wrote: ↑Sat Sep 09, 2023 10:28 am Is COVID-19 really over for most countries or they just don't keep track of it and there are excess death worldwide that are hidden?
. Luckily it hasn’t bern bad, I’ve had colds that were worse. A couple of days of aches/pains, 4 days of light fever. Sill have head and chest congestion, but things have gotten better each day.I think this where I'm stuck:Among people who are still paying attention to Covid-19, there’s been a recent surge — not just in viral activity but in the concern once again being paid to Covid.
...
While the angst is understandable, there’s something we need to grasp at this point in our coexistence with SARS-CoV-2: This is our life now.
...
Yes, the number of new hospital admissions is rising, and the number of deaths may follow. But they are far below the figures of previous years. In the last week of August 2021, there were nearly 86,000 new hospital admissions. Last year at the same time, the number was 37,000. This year it was 17,400.
It's that last part. When I think about the amount of work I've done for annual influenza vaccinations - a disease that kills a quarter (?) a third (?) of the people currently dying from Covid each year, it makes my head spin - because in comparison we aren't doing jack shit for Covid anymore. And if we're not doing anything for a disease that's killing 120k (?) people a year, why the hell are we doing anything about influenza? Food safety? Cars? I know I've said it before, but that's what I'm really struggling with.None of this is to say that Covid isn’t a serious threat for some. Although the infection feels like a cold or the flu for many people, this is not the common cold. It can put an infected person into hospital. It can kill. It can trigger long Covid, in which symptoms linger for months or longer.
Epidemiologist Bill Hanage noted that already this year, there have been roughly 100,000 Covid deaths in the United States — and there are 3.5 months left in the year. If half that number of people were to die during a flu season, it would be deemed a disastrous flu year.
And this:For instance, Osterholm suggested it would be worthwhile having a discussion about whether schools in a particular area should temporarily close if absenteeism hits high numbers. The idea, he said, would be to treat a local burst of illness like snow days — not closing in-person schooling for protracted periods, as was done during the pandemic.
“But you can’t have that discussion right now. It’s like a third rail,” he said. But if influenza was emptying schools in the years before the Covid pandemic, “we would have done it in a heartbeat.”
Final observation:“It is a struggle to figure out how to communicate what’s going on with Covid activity accurately, to give people a sense of scale,” she said. “We are about two months into this recent increase … but it’s not as severe as this time last year … both, I think, in terms of activity in general … and in terms of hospitalizations and deaths.”
Justin Lessler, an epidemiologist at the University of North Carolina’s Gillings School of Global Public Health, can see Hanage’s point, but he also has concerns that in normalizing Covid’s role in our lives, we might be tempted to minimize it.
“I think there’s this idea that … ‘here to stay’ or ‘endemic’ somehow means ‘no big deal,’” he said. “And that’s not true.”
Anyway, I thought it was a fair and reasonable article....as we head into our next Covid winter.Coming to grips with what life is going to be like with Covid as a part of the respiratory diseases mix could help us make better, more sustainable decisions about what we are and are not willing to do to try to mitigate its damage, the experts said. And toning down reactions to blips or upticks in cases could help avoid further Covid burnout that could prove counterproductive down the road, they suggested.
This week, I wrote about the need to focus resources on treating and preventing long covid. I can relate to the frustration and desperation of people suffering from long-term conditions, as I’ve been managing my own months-long recovery from pneumonia.
In July, I wrote about the unsettling experience of being on the other side of the stethoscope when I suddenly fell very ill and was hospitalized. Many readers have kindly written to ask whether I’ve fully recovered.
I wish I could say yes — that as soon as the antibiotics kicked in, I was back to everything I was doing before. The truth is far from that.
The first week was rough, as expected. I was so tired, I could barely get out of bed. I gasped for breath after walking 10 steps to the bathroom. Thankfully, the fatigue lessened, and I was able to resume work.
720,000 new infections/day