wuhan - coronavirus

[Dmmetler]

1 hour ago, ktgrok said:

I see people reacting to the new oral Covid drug that may cut deaths in half as if that makes. Covid no big deal..then look at that number and think that half that number is still a whole lot of people. 

 

I'm really hoping that it's available for breakthrough cases, and with vsccination AND antivirals, we might get COVID deaths down to the same level as the flu. 

 

Having said that, I had three students diagnosed with COVID this week. And two more who stayed home because a sibling is having symptoms that could be COVID. None are old enough to be vaccinated yet. My studio only has about 20 under age 12 kids! 

[bookbard]

Melbourne's cases about double Sydney's at the moment - 1220 vs 667. I can't quite get my head around how quickly Melbourne's cases have gone up. It makes me really sad. The ACT (Canberra) seems to have a steady number of cases daily, but now have 92% of the population (above 16?) vaccinated which is huge. Tasmania has one case. 

Four kids in ICU - so much for kids aren't affected. I saw a very sad story from UK about a 15 year old who died within days from Covid - her vaccination was to have been the next week. 

My husband keeps wavering re whether we will send the kids back to school. A month to decide.

[Melissa Louise]

DS goes back to work in a week, so ordering him some P2 masks for when the mask mandate is lifted. I'm not too worried till then - his co-workers are also fully vaccinated and everyone will be masked. 

I'm leaning closer and closer to not returning to school. I'll have to do P2 masks for 7 hrs each day, including in the playground + public transport, and I don't think I can actually manage that lung-wise. 

I watched a really good seminar by an AU professor in occupational safety this week - will find the link and put it here - basically schools are not covid safe. 

I think the Dept is gambling on staff being unable to prove they were infected in the workplace. 

 

Edited October 3, 2021 by Melissa Louise

[KSera]

I read this Epidemiologist's thread yesterday on what it means for a virus to become endemic (hint: it doesn't mean what a lot of people think it means). It's a good read.

Thread Reader Version:

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1444088804961304581.html

Twitter thread version:

 

[Ausmumof3]

1 hour ago, bookbard said:

Melbourne's cases about double Sydney's at the moment - 1220 vs 667. I can't quite get my head around how quickly Melbourne's cases have gone up. It makes me really sad. The ACT (Canberra) seems to have a steady number of cases daily, but now have 92% of the population (above 16?) vaccinated which is huge. Tasmania has one case. 

Four kids in ICU - so much for kids aren't affected. I saw a very sad story from UK about a 15 year old who died within days from Covid - her vaccination was to have been the next week. 

My husband keeps wavering re whether we will send the kids back to school. A month to decide.

We’re long term homeschoolers anyway but I’m not signing up for our usual indoor activities this term.  I will reassess after the summer holidays, probably depending on whether vax is available for youngest by then.

I’m not liking some of what I’m reading/hearing about long term impacts of Covid, possible repeat infections etc. I had hoped to feel better about things by now.

[bookbard]

19 minutes ago, KSera said:

what it means for a virus to become endemic (hint: it doesn't mean what a lot of people think it means)

Interesting - sounds like a lot of people thought endemic meant that we all get used to it - like a revamp of the herd immunity idea? That if everyone just 'catches it really quickly' it'll be finished and we don't need to think about it ever again. Makes me realise that when people are arguing (eg anti-vax vs pro-vax) they're probably seeing the world completely differently.

[Ausmumof3]

https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.09.30.462488v1

 

preprint only on waning immunity with Pfizer 

5 minutes ago, bookbard said:

Interesting - sounds like a lot of people thought endemic meant that we all get used to it - like a revamp of the herd immunity idea? That if everyone just 'catches it really quickly' it'll be finished and we don't need to think about it ever again. Makes me realise that when people are arguing (eg anti-vax vs pro-vax) they're probably seeing the world completely differently.

I have also heard it explained as the idea that many people (including scientists) think it’s only the novel aspect of the virus that makes it bad - because our immune systems aren’t used to it but there’s no evidence for this.  Many viruses are simply really bad for us, regardless of new or old and this might be one of them.  

Edited October 3, 2021 by Ausmumof3

[Corraleno]

Large study on long covid by Oxford and NIH:

"The research found that over 1 in 3 patients had one or more features of long-COVID recorded between 3 and 6 months after a diagnosis of COVID-19. This was significantly higher than after influenza.

For 2 in 5 of the patients who had long-COVID features in the 3- to 6-month period, they had no record of any such feature in the previous 3 months.

The risk of long-COVID features was higher in patients who had more severe COVID-19 illness, and slightly higher among females and young adults. White and non-white patients were equally affected."

https://journals.plos.org/plosmedicine/article?id=10.1371/journal.pmed.1003773

[Melissa Louise]

This is the talk I mentioned above - keeping safe at home and work. 

 

 

[Ausmumof3]

1 hour ago, Melissa Louise said:

This is the talk I mentioned above - keeping safe at home and work. 

 

 

Thanks.  Hoping to watch it when I have mental space for more Covid stuff. I think This guy is part of the OzSAGE Covid group along with Raina McIntyre and others.  I’m glad there’s still people out there trying to provide good information. 

[Ausmumof3]

We have a case here in the border bubble with Vic down in Mt Gambier.  

[Ausmumof3]

waning immunity - eek.  I knew the data wasn’t great but I didn’t know how not great it was looking.

https://www.eurosurveillance.org/content/10.2807/1560-7917.ES.2021.26.39.2100822#html_fulltext
 

“We have investigated a nosocomial COVID-19 outbreak involving the SARS-CoV-2 Delta variant among a highly vaccinated population. The attack rate among exposed individuals reached 23.3% in patients and 10.3% in staff, with 96.2% vaccination rate among exposed individuals. Moreover, several transmissions probably occurred between two individuals both wearing surgical masks, and in one instance using full PPE, including N-95 mask, face shield, gown and gloves.

In a recent publication by Bernal et al., the effectiveness of full vaccination with the Comirnaty vaccine against the Delta variant was high, although lower than against the Alpha variant (88% vs 93.7%) [9]. This was not the experience in Israel, with a rapid increase in cases since June 2021 despite a high vaccination rate [1].

Although reports of breakthrough infections are increasing [10-12], this communication emphasises several points. It challenges the assumption that high universal vaccination rates will lead to herd immunity and prevent COVID-19 outbreaks. This was probably true for the wild-type SARS-CoV-2 virus, but in the outbreak described here, 96.2% of the exposed population was vaccinated. Infection advanced rapidly (many cases became symptomatic within 2 days of exposure), and viral load was high. Another accepted view is that, when facing a possible mismatch between the SARS-CoV-2 variant and vaccine or waning immunity, the combination of vaccine and face mask should provide the necessary protection. Although some transmission between staff members could have occurred without masks, all transmissions between patients and staff occurred between masked and vaccinated individuals, as experienced in an outbreak from Finland [12]. We cannot rule out that protection measures were not optimally implemented, however, transmissibility in summer 2021 differs from our experiences in the previous 18 months. Whether this can be attributed to the low Cq and high transmissibility of the Delta variant is not clear. Of note, in our cases, in particular case patients, the time from vaccination was considerable. The shortest interval was 142 days (5 months), and many of our case patients advanced to severe disease. Data from Israel imply that the main reason for the increase in COVID-19 cases in summer is indeed waning immunity, and a third vaccine dose, 5 months after the second dose will possibly result in trend reversal [13,14].”

[KSera]

6 hours ago, Ausmumof3 said:

Although some transmission between staff members could have occurred without masks, all transmissions between patients and staff occurred between masked and vaccinated individuals

I wonder where they were donning/doffing their masks. I was reading a different study this week looking at how much virus is in the air various places in a hospital, and they found higher concentrations in the hallways. In that setting, the hallways were where masks were changed. Seems a bad idea to take masks off in the hallways. 
 

This study was a bit depressing, though it likely wouldn’t generalize to the general population, considering the elderly and highly compromised health status of the patients involved. 

[Jean in Newcastle]

7 hours ago, Ausmumof3 said:

waning immunity - eek.  I knew the data wasn’t great but I didn’t know how not great it was looking.

https://www.eurosurveillance.org/content/10.2807/1560-7917.ES.2021.26.39.2100822#html_fulltext
 

“We have investigated a nosocomial COVID-19 outbreak involving the SARS-CoV-2 Delta variant among a highly vaccinated population. The attack rate among exposed individuals reached 23.3% in patients and 10.3% in staff, with 96.2% vaccination rate among exposed individuals. Moreover, several transmissions probably occurred between two individuals both wearing surgical masks, and in one instance using full PPE, including N-95 mask, face shield, gown and gloves.

In a recent publication by Bernal et al., the effectiveness of full vaccination with the Comirnaty vaccine against the Delta variant was high, although lower than against the Alpha variant (88% vs 93.7%) [9]. This was not the experience in Israel, with a rapid increase in cases since June 2021 despite a high vaccination rate [1].

Although reports of breakthrough infections are increasing [10-12], this communication emphasises several points. It challenges the assumption that high universal vaccination rates will lead to herd immunity and prevent COVID-19 outbreaks. This was probably true for the wild-type SARS-CoV-2 virus, but in the outbreak described here, 96.2% of the exposed population was vaccinated. Infection advanced rapidly (many cases became symptomatic within 2 days of exposure), and viral load was high. Another accepted view is that, when facing a possible mismatch between the SARS-CoV-2 variant and vaccine or waning immunity, the combination of vaccine and face mask should provide the necessary protection. Although some transmission between staff members could have occurred without masks, all transmissions between patients and staff occurred between masked and vaccinated individuals, as experienced in an outbreak from Finland [12]. We cannot rule out that protection measures were not optimally implemented, however, transmissibility in summer 2021 differs from our experiences in the previous 18 months. Whether this can be attributed to the low Cq and high transmissibility of the Delta variant is not clear. Of note, in our cases, in particular case patients, the time from vaccination was considerable. The shortest interval was 142 days (5 months), and many of our case patients advanced to severe disease. Data from Israel imply that the main reason for the increase in COVID-19 cases in summer is indeed waning immunity, and a third vaccine dose, 5 months after the second dose will possibly result in trend reversal [13,14].”

My niece, who is a respiratory therapist in a big city ICU, still sees only unvaccinated patients in the ICU.  I really do think that hospitalization and ICU rates are more important at this point. 

[Not_a_Number]

11 minutes ago, Jean in Newcastle said:

My niece, who is a respiratory therapist in a big city ICU, still sees only unvaccinated patients in the ICU.  I really do think that hospitalization and ICU rates are more important at this point. 

I think the Israel data suggested that protection against severe cases and hospitalizations ALSO waned, but slower. I think it was at something like 86% against hospitalizations at the 6-month point? 

I'm actually pretty worried about what happens next. Having surveyed people around here, enthusiasm about boosters is NOT high due to the rate of side effects from the shots. (And, to be fair, I do understand that. I do NOT think I'd be willing to get a vaccine with this rate of side effects for the flu, for example.) So that means that Delta is going to hit here in November right when immunity for most people is wearing off and people won't be boosted, either.

Edited October 3, 2021 by Not_a_Number

[TCB]

12 minutes ago, KSera said:

I wonder where they were donning/doffing their masks. I was reading a different study this week looking at how much virus is in the air various places in a hospital, and they found higher concentrations in the hallways. In that setting, the hallways were where masks were changed. Seems a bad idea to take masks off in the hallways. 
 

This study was a bit depressing, though it likely wouldn’t generalize to the general population, considering the elderly and highly compromised health status of the patients involved. 

If the conditions are anything like what I see, then I don’t think you can really draw reliable conclusions, unless they observed every interaction carefully. Patients very rarely wear masks and often wear them incorrectly if they wear them. The people at work, that I know,  who have become infected with Covid, have caught it from fellow staff members, not patients, and their mask wearing is not reliable.

I don’t know how anyone can come to hard and fast conclusions about mask wearing being effective, unless they are conclusions about the effectiveness of improper mask wearing. So many people do not wear them properly.

[ktgrok]

28 minutes ago, KSera said:

This study was a bit depressing, though it likely wouldn’t generalize to the general population, considering the elderly and highly compromised health status of the patients involved. 

Also, regarding the patients that caught it, they were already sick and hospitalized (or at least hospitalized) BEFORE catching it, which I'm sure is another factor. Seems most would be dealing with a strained immune system already, given they were hospitalized for something. 

[Pawz4me]

24 minutes ago, Not_a_Number said:

I think the Israel data suggested that protection against severe cases and hospitalizations ALSO waned, but slower. I think it was at something like 86% against hospitalizations at the 6-month point? 

I'm actually pretty worried about what happens next. Having surveyed people around here, enthusiasm about boosters is NOT high due to the rate of side effects from the shots. (And, to be fair, I do understand that. I do NOT think I'd be willing to get a vaccine with this rate of side effects for the flu, for example.) So that means that Delta is going to hit here in November right when immunity for most people is wearing off and people won't be boosted, either.

 

For comparison--I'm in a low vax county. Only 48 percent of the 12+ group are fully vaccinated. But the health department is reporting a very enthusiastic response (so far) to the boosters. All their appointments are being gobbled up quickly. So it's like the people around here who were eager to get vaccinated when they were first available are also eager to get boosted. I'm hoping that keeps up.

[Not_a_Number]

3 minutes ago, Pawz4me said:

For comparison--I'm in a low vax county. Only 48 percent of the 12+ group are fully vaccinated. But the health department is reporting a very enthusiastic response (so far) to the boosters. All their appointments are being gobbled up quickly. So it's like the people around here who were eager to get vaccinated when they were first available are also eager to get boosted. I'm hoping that keeps up.

Hmmm, interesting. I haven't seen any health department reports, but I'm watching the daily vaccination numbers, and there isn't an appreciable uptick. 

[RootAnn]

8 hours ago, Ausmumof3 said:

Infection advanced rapidly (many cases became symptomatic within 2 days of exposure), and viral load was high.

This one study may also be challenging the previous accepted science that viral load is not as high in vaccinated people and that vaccinated people don't transmit at high levels. We know they can trasmit and the idea was that they would transmit at lower rates than unvaccinated people. This was almost all vaccinated people transmitting.

It gives me zero reassurance that the vaccinated and at least theoretically masked hospitalized patients were sick/old or had stressed immune systems.

I hope more studies like this are done as I would like to see if this is an isolated finding or if the results hold water.

[KSera]

1 minute ago, RootAnn said:

This was almost all vaccinated people transmitting.

That’s because the population was something like 96% vaccinated (not looking at the numbers right now), so there’s no comparison to see how many unvaccinated would have transmitted in the same circumstance. Certainly this shows that in this compromised population 5+ months from vaccination, they had a high rate of transmission and infection. But it doesn’t tell us anything about how that rate compares to the rates in similar unvaccinated patients. It does make me glad boosters are available for people in this group now. 

[RootAnn]

Just now, KSera said:

That’s because the population was something like 96% vaccinated (not looking at the numbers right now), so there’s no comparison to see how many unvaccinated would have transmitted in the same circumstance. Certainly this shows that in this compromised population 5+ months from vaccination, they had a high rate of transmission and infection. But it doesn’t tell us anything about how that rate compares to the rates in similar unvaccinated patients. 

Absolutely. That's what makes this so very valuable information -- that the population involved was almost completely vaccinated. This is what we may be looking at in the US even if we were able to get to an absolutely (unattainable) 95%+ level of vaccination. I am absolutely not comparing this to what could happen with unvaccibated people. We have that now. This is maybe a possible glimpse into the future that the US is trying to go for. 

More study is needed, IMO, to be able to have an educated discussion on the future with Covid in this country & this world.

Separately, the US will have just as much trouble (or more) enforcing 3rd dose & booster uptake as initial vaccination. The very situation this data looked at is what the US is facing right now -- except with a much lower vaccination percentage. I.e., we need even more options than we currently have. I am glad there are still people studying new treatments. 

‐---

"Although [mask] use was inconsistent, it was enforced during patient–staff encounters for both sides. On the dedicated COVID-19 ward, dedicated staff members worked with full personal protective equipment (PPE): N-95 mask, face shield, gown, gloves and hair cover."

This seems to imply that our current highest level of precautions may not be enough.

From a behavior-level standpoint, proper, consistent, inexpensive, large-scale n-95 usage will likely not to be achievable in the population as a whole. Real world conditions and not ideal hopes need to be discussed by the epidemiologists moving forward. A sobering and eye-opening data set but not by itself enough to panic or base change on, IMO.

[TCB]

Here’s our Covid story of the week.

Dh was in a room with a client for an hour on Monday. Both were vaccinated and neither were wearing masks. Dh does have an air purifier, hepa filter, which he runs when he’s in the room, and he may well have had the window open. The client tested positive the next day, I believe was symptomatic that next day. My dh has so far not developed any symptoms, and got tested on day 4 and was negative. He’s been working from home since just in case. He had the Moderna vax, not sure which one the client had.

[Melissa Louise]

Sorry about AU content. 

NSW now to be lead by a corrupt, incompetent right wing Opus Dei 'let it rip' Premier. 

Fun ******* times. 

[bookbard]

27 minutes ago, Melissa Louise said:

NSW now to be lead by a corrupt, incompetent right wing Opus Dei 'let it rip' Premier. 

 

Yeah I felt physically sick finding that out. However, maybe it'll be so clear how bad he is that they'll lose the next election? Or he'll get backstabbed by one of his mates and finally kicked out of parliament? There's always hope - Abbott didn't last very long, did he?

In the short term, though, when it comes to this kind of politics, I turn and focus on my local grassroots community. We can really make a big difference at that level. I just heard this week that a pregnant woman got her double vax - this was after I chatted to her seriously about the risks of covid, when he husband was feeding her covid conspiracies. And now she's persuaded him to get done too. 

[Melissa Louise]

1 minute ago, bookbard said:

Yeah I felt physically sick finding that out. However, maybe it'll be so clear how bad he is that they'll lose the next election? Or he'll get backstabbed by one of his mates and finally kicked out of parliament? There's always hope - Abbott didn't last very long, did he?

In the short term, though, when it comes to this kind of politics, I turn and focus on my local grassroots community. We can really make a big difference at that level. I just heard this week that a pregnant woman got her double vax - this was after I chatted to her seriously about the risks of covid, when he husband was feeding her covid conspiracies. And now she's persuaded him to get done too. 

We don't go to the polls for a long time. I'm worried about Covid but also about years without assisted dying legislation. Plus Warragamba. Hospitals, mental health.. It's a really bad outcome for the state. 

Glad you were able to help get someone vulnerable vaccinated.

 

[lewelma]

Looking bad. Covid has slipped out of Auckland into a small town nearby, and now a taxi driver in Auckland has tested positive. Announcement in a few hours. 

[bookbard]

14 minutes ago, Melissa Louise said:

We don't go to the polls for a long time. I'm worried about Covid but also about years without assisted dying legislation. Plus Warragamba. Hospitals, mental health.. It's a really bad outcome for the state. 

Sorry, I didn't mean to brush over the impact of this - you're right, it's a disaster on so many levels.

2 minutes ago, lewelma said:

Looking bad. Covid has slipped out of Auckland into a small town nearby, and now a taxi driver in Auckland has tested positive. Announcement in a few hours. 

Sorry to hear this - so hard!

[KSera]

17 minutes ago, lewelma said:

Looking bad. Covid has slipped out of Auckland into a small town nearby, and now a taxi driver in Auckland has tested positive. Announcement in a few hours. 

Oh, crud. I’m so sorry!

[wathe]

8 hours ago, TCB said:

If the conditions are anything like what I see, then I don’t think you can really draw reliable conclusions, unless they observed every interaction carefully. Patients very rarely wear masks and often wear them incorrectly if they wear them. The people at work, that I know,  who have become infected with Covid, have caught it from fellow staff members, not patients, and their mask wearing is not reliable.

I don’t know how anyone can come to hard and fast conclusions about mask wearing being effective, unless they are conclusions about the effectiveness of improper mask wearing. So many people do not wear them properly.

My experience is the same.

 

[Ausmumof3]

NSW 623 and 6 deaths

VIC 1377 and 4 deaths

ACT 28 and 2 deaths

QLD 1 unlinked mystery case.  I saw video of the NRL grand final last night and I hope they get away with it because there was serious crowding.

Our regional border bubble case may in fact have more contacts than initially disclosed so things might get messy.  I suspect things are worse in Vic than the case numbers show because we’re getting so many spillover cases.

We are getting great vax rates now though.  I just wish someone would start talking about boosters 😞
 

[Ausmumof3]

WA, Tas and SA have all also announced press conferences today, ours is worryingly later than the usual time 😬

[Ausmumof3]

https://ozsage.org/media_releases/ozsage-advice-a-stronger-safer-nsw-reopening-plan-to-avoid-lockdowns/
 

Advice from OzSAGE on a safer reopening.

Still working my way through it but these bits stand out.

The period around February 2022 is also important, as waning of vaccine-induced immunity is expected to be apparent by then for people vaccinated around August 2021 (the peak of vaccine uptake in NSW).

For health workers vaccinated in March, waning is already occurring and fully vaccinated health workers have been infected. In Israel, in a 96% Pfizer vaccinated group of health workers and patients, a large hospital outbreakoccurred at about the six-month mark after vaccination.

Layered, combined protections such as safe indoor air, testing, tracing and mask wearing will provide a much greater chance of safer and sustainable re-opening until we await the promise of second generation and Delta-matched vaccines, boosters and smarter vaccine strategies.

 

and

3. Make indoor air safer

NSW needs an indoor ventilation plan, because the SARS-CoV-2 virus is airborne. The plan should ensure homes, schools, businesses, and other public venues have safe indoor air, and that the community is as well informed on safe air as it is on handwashing, so that people and businesses are empowered to mitigate risk in their own settings.

and

The Doherty report estimates 276,000 Australian children will be infected in the first six months after reopening in the most likely scenario, with 2,400 hospitalisations, 206 ICU admissions and 57 child deaths in that time – but assumed no vaccination in this group. If all children 12 and over are vaccinated, these estimates would be lower, but still significant and important to prevent.

[Ausmumof3]

Just thought I’d update in case anyone was following that my 12-16 year old cohort in my house have had the first dose and fully bounced back.  

[Ausmumof3]

@Melissa Louise

https://ozsage.org/media_releases/protecting-children-from-covid-19-and-making-schools-and-childcare-safer/

 

OzSAGE advice for schools specifically just in case it helps your cause at all.

[Melissa Louise]

7 minutes ago, Ausmumof3 said:

@Melissa Louise

https://ozsage.org/media_releases/protecting-children-from-covid-19-and-making-schools-and-childcare-safer/

 

OzSAGE advice for schools specifically just in case it helps your cause at all.

Thank you.

Will definitely take this into a meeting with the boss. 

 

[Ausmumof3]

35 minutes ago, Melissa Louise said:

Thank you.

Will definitely take this into a meeting with the boss. 

 

Wishing you luck. Hope they take it seriously.

[Melissa Louise]

3 hours ago, Ausmumof3 said:

Wishing you luck. Hope they take it seriously.

I think individual schools are hamstrung by department directives, unfortunately, but it's good to have a document to point if asked. 

[Melissa Louise]

My new hobby is ventilation videos, lol. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited October 4, 2021 by Melissa Louise

[SKL]

On 9/29/2021 at 11:45 AM, Not_a_Number said:

My goodness. Practically all the top ones are in the South 😕 . That is so sad, given how much more warning those places had. 

They didn't have more warning for Delta.

[KSera]

41 minutes ago, SKL said:

They didn't have more warning for Delta.

Delta hit overseas first and we had a lot of lead time that it would end up here and predictions of how many weeks we had once it arrived before it would predominate. More warning would only make a difference for places that took precautions as a result. For much of the south, they didn’t change anything in attempt to reduce the death toll from delta. 

[TCB]

2 hours ago, SKL said:

They didn't have more warning for Delta.

Except India and to a lesser extent the UK, Europe and other parts of the world. But we’re not so great at remembering that there actually are other places in the world, never mind paying attention to what’s going on in them.

[prairiewindmomma]

So, I live in a metro area with 19 hospitals. Those 19 hospitals are divided into different regions: central, eastern, south, western, and north. Of all of those hospitals this weekend, all of the emergency rooms were on divert except two: a children's hospital (which had been diverting all week to a different children's hospital, I hear), and the VA/Veteran's hospital.  Both of those hospitals were in one region. The other four regions were all completely closed.

My understanding is that when everyone in a region is full, they still rotate who takes on patients....but for a long time my region of the metro had been full and sending patients to different hospitals in their feeder system with larger bed capacities. 

It's a (insert colorful word) mess. Mobile morgues in the parking lots. Hospitals on the coast where they can't send patients at all and they are dying because they don't have access to the better equipment. National guard doing administrative things. Many of the patients in our metro hospitals aren't local--they are being shipped in from rural, unvaccinated areas but this is affecting us all. 97% of those in the ICU at the hospital I would choose to go if I fell ill are unvaccinated covid patients.  I'm feeling a bit of compassion fatigue.

 

[Jean in Newcastle]

15 minutes ago, prairiewindmomma said:

97% of those in the ICU at the hospital I would choose to go if I fell ill are unvaccinated covid patients.  I'm feeling a bit of compassion fatigue.

 

I think that part of the issue is that most of these people don't want our compassion.  They think that we are stupid for wanting them to change their behavior.  They think that we are stupid for not wanting them to get sick.  And stupid for not wanting them to take unproven meds. 

[ktgrok]

17 hours ago, lewelma said:

Looking bad. Covid has slipped out of Auckland into a small town nearby, and now a taxi driver in Auckland has tested positive. Announcement in a few hours. 

oh no! Do they know how it got out?

[kbutton]

58 minutes ago, Jean in Newcastle said:

I think that part of the issue is that most of these people don't want our compassion.  They think that we are stupid for wanting them to change their behavior.  They think that we are stupid for not wanting them to get sick.  And stupid for not wanting them to take unproven meds. 

True, but they are also latched onto the idea that the vaccinated want them dead or are happy to "thin the herd." They feel the vaccinated want to exclude them from society entirely. It's all mish-mashed together in their thinking. 

They have harsh words for people who's compassion fatigue makes them leak out gallows humor or even expressions of frustration. They seize on it as proof that the vaccinated are out to persecute them.

[Faith-manor]

1 hour ago, prairiewindmomma said:

So, I live in a metro area with 19 hospitals. Those 19 hospitals are divided into different regions: central, eastern, south, western, and north. Of all of those hospitals this weekend, all of the emergency rooms were on divert except two: a children's hospital (which had been diverting all week to a different children's hospital, I hear), and the VA/Veteran's hospital.  Both of those hospitals were in one region. The other four regions were all completely closed.

My understanding is that when everyone in a region is full, they still rotate who takes on patients....but for a long time my region of the metro had been full and sending patients to different hospitals in their feeder system with larger bed capacities. 

It's a (insert colorful word) mess. Mobile morgues in the parking lots. Hospitals on the coast where they can't send patients at all and they are dying because they don't have access to the better equipment. National guard doing administrative things. Many of the patients in our metro hospitals aren't local--they are being shipped in from rural, unvaccinated areas but this is affecting us all. 97% of those in the ICU at the hospital I would choose to go if I fell ill are unvaccinated covid patients.  I'm feeling a bit of compassion fatigue.

 

This. The compassion has run out while a dear college friend of ds's in the ER 24 hrs now for a threatening to rupture hernia, in horrific pain, and has yet to be seen because assholes think they get to overwhelm hospitals. 98.8% unvaccinated people according to that county's medical health director. Add the RSV that is going around, and it is an apocalypse out there!

Done. Very, very done. After all the horrific rhetoric out of the let her rip crowd including being told by the local pastor's wife that my grandson is expendable because he has a pre-existing condition, and I will no longer give an ounce of mercy or grace to that crowd. I weep for the innocent children  hurt by their parents' malignant narcissism, but have nothing for the adults espousing this crap.

[lewelma]

1 hour ago, ktgrok said:

oh no! Do they know how it got out?

They are not sure yet, but they are doing the genome testing now. 

Governments has changed tacks slightly. They are going for the aggressive stamp it out, but they are no longer expecting that they can get back to zero. Looks like it is a race between vaccines and the spread if they want to avoid keeping Auckland in lockdown, but they have been very clear that this is NOT a let it rip policy. It will continue to be an aggressive stamp it out approach. There was such a big push on vaccines a month ago, that all the second doses are coming up in the next 2 weeks, so our double vaccinated numbers should soar to about 78%. Then it is the long, hard fight to get the hesitant vaccinated, and the government is announcing its carrot and stick approach today. We are still at about 20 in the hospital nationwide and no deaths in 15 months.

[Jean in Newcastle]

1 hour ago, kbutton said:

True, but they are also latched onto the idea that the vaccinated want them dead or are happy to "thin the herd." They feel the vaccinated want to exclude them from society entirely. It's all mish-mashed together in their thinking. 

They have harsh words for people who's compassion fatigue makes them leak out gallows humor or even expressions of frustration. They seize on it as proof that the vaccinated are out to persecute them.

That’s not even logical. (And I know you aren’t saying this yourself).  If they are not in danger (like many of them claim) then we can’t somehow make them dead even if there was some terrible person who actually wished that (no one I know). 
 

On wanting to exclude them from society then yeah. If you don’t take basic cautions against contagion disease then that’s their consequence that they freely chose. (Usual disclaimer about this not being about those with legitimate medical exemptions. Those of us in that category have always known that we have to monitor and mitigate our exposure to society). 

[ktgrok]

26 minutes ago, lewelma said:

They are not sure yet, but they are doing the genome testing now. 

Governments has changed tacks slightly. They are going for the aggressive stamp it out, but they are no longer expecting that they can get back to zero. Looks like it is a race between vaccines and the spread if they want to avoid keeping Auckland in lockdown, but they have been very clear that this is NOT a let it rip policy. It will continue to be an aggressive stamp it out approach. There was such a big push on vaccines a month ago, that all the second doses are coming up in the next 2 weeks, so our double vaccinated numbers should soar to about 78%. Then it is the long, hard fight to get the hesitant vaccinated, and the government is announcing its carrot and stick approach today. We are still at about 20 in the hospital nationwide and no deaths in 15 months.

I hope the carrots and sticks work! Single vaccination just isn't working for Delta, but having everyone recently double vaccinated should! Is that percentage you are hoping for of the total population, or a certain age group?