Covid 19 thread

[LKeet6]

540k now for America

Or, for our friend from the old thread over at tgct, with the completely baseless "it's only half what they say it is," 270k.

With the worst of the "bad flu year" having been 70k.

Just would like one day to see a "yeah, I got it wrong. the models were pretty accurate, the warnings over it being infectious, 2nd waves and no vaccine were correct."

[cliffs]

Yes, let's rush through a vaccine...it is likely that those who get vaccinated are in reality, "Guinea pigs".

People are likely to need a third dose of a Covid-19 vaccine within a year of getting fully vaccinated and may subsequently need annual shots to protect against the coronavirus, Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla said Thursday.

Pfizer and its German partner, BioNTech, are studying how long the vaccines' protective immunity will last. Their findings will guide whether additional booster shots will be necessary.

Bourla said it's "likely" that a booster will be needed within 12 months of the initial two-shot regimen.

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Worldwide Covid-19 deaths have surpassed three million, according to AFP.

The number of coronavirus fatalities continues to rise globally despite vaccination campaigns, as countries such as India and Brazil are battling meteoric rises in Covid-19 infections and hospitalisations.

After a slight lull last month, daily death tolls have been increasing, with an average of 12,000 deaths a day last week.

For comparison, three million people is more than the population of Jamaica or Armenia, and three times the death toll of the Iran-Iraq war which raged from 1980-1988.

While some countries like Israel have benefited from mass inoculation efforts, the pandemic is showing no sign of slowing down: the 829,596 new infections reported worldwide on Friday is the highest number yet, according to AFP's tally.

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NEW YORK (AP) — How long does protection from COVID-19 vaccines last?

Experts don't know yet because they're still studying vaccinated people to see when protection might wear off. How well the vaccines work against emerging variants will also determine if, when and how often additional shots might be needed.

“We only have information for as long as the vaccines have been studied," said Deborah Fuller, a vaccine researcher at the University of Washington. “We have to study the vaccinated population and start to see, at what point do people become vulnerable again to the virus?”

So far, Pfizer's ongoing trial indicates the company's two-dose vaccine remains highly effective for at least six months, and likely longer. People who got Moderna’s vaccine also still had notable levels of virus-fighting antibodies six months after the second required shot.

Antibodies also don't tell the whole story. To fight off intruders like viruses, our immune systems also have another line of defense called B and T cells, some of which can hang around long after antibody levels dwindle. If they encounter the same virus in the future, those battle-tested cells could potentially spring into action more quickly.

Even if they don't prevent illness entirely, they could help blunt its severity. But exactly what role such “memory” cells might play with the coronavirus -- and for how long -- isn’t yet known.

While the current COVID-19 vaccines will likely last for at least about a year, they probably won’t offer lifelong protection, as with measles shots, said Dr. Kathleen Neuzil, a vaccine expert at the University of Maryland.

“It’s going to be somewhere in the middle of that very wide range,” she said.

Variants are another reason we might need an additional shot.

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Ridiculous - 


Mount Everest's reopening suffers a blow with Covid cases

At least one climber on Mount Everest has tested positive for Covid-19, just weeks after the world's tallest peak reopened to climbers following a year of closure.

Norwegian climber Erlend Ness was isolated in hospital for eight nights due to the virus, he told the BBC.

Reports say a sherpa in his party had also tested positive for the virus.

The outbreak is a blow to Nepal, which relies heavily on income generated from Everest expeditions.

Mr Ness is unsure where he could have caught the virus, but raised the possibility of catching it whilst in one of the tea houses along the Khumbu Valley.

He added that he could have "done more" to protect himself, such as being more diligent with handwashing, and wearing a mask all day.

"Not many people used masks on the trek," recalled Mr Ness, who had been feeling sick for about six days in the mountains before being evacuated on April 15 by helicopter.

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Who didn't expect this?


There have been fewer influenza cases in the United States this flu season than in any on record. About 2,000 cases have been recorded since late September, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In recent years, the average number of cases over the same period was about 206,000.

As measures to stop the spread of the coronavirus were implemented around the country in March 2020, influenza quickly disappeared, and it still has not returned. The latest flu season, which normally would have run until next month, essentially never happened.

After fears that a “twindemic” could batter the country, the absence of the flu was a much needed reprieve that eased the burden on an overwhelmed health care system. But the lack of exposure to the flu could also make the population more susceptible to the virus when it returns — and experts say its return is certain.

“We do not know when it will come back in the United States, but we know it will come back,” said Sonja Olsen, an epidemiologist at the CDC.

Experts are less certain about what will happen when the flu does return. In the coming months — as millions of people return to public transit, restaurants, schools and offices — influenza outbreaks could be more widespread than normal, they say, or could occur at unusual times of the year. But it’s also possible that the virus that returns is less dangerous, having not had the opportunity to evolve while it was on hiatus.

“We don’t really have a clue,” said Richard Webby, a virologist at the St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital in Memphis, Tennessee. “We’re in uncharted territory. We haven’t had an influenza season this low, I think as long as we’ve been measuring it. So what the potential implications are is a bit unclear.”


I did not go to the doctor's but once for my physical "before" the pandemic hit. With the social distancing, businesses closed or limited and wearing of masks helped me have a healthy year for the first time in a long time. Not saying it was not a bad year for others but myself and in actuality, my entire family, were not sick at all last year.

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For more than a year, masks have been considered an accessory more essential than bras. But now, we've finally been let off the hook: The CDC announced this afternoon that if you are fully vaccinated against Covid-19, you do not need to wear a mask — indoors or outdoors, in most places.



A few exceptions: Masks (and social distancing) are still required when in hospitals, nursing homes, prisons, jails, and homeless shelters. Ditto with public transportation and airports. The CDC also notes that local businesses and workplaces are still allowed to require masks and there are, of course, federal, state, and local laws to contend with, but still!



"We have all longed for this moment," Rochelle P. Walensky, MD, MPH, the CDC director, said at a White House news conference Thursday. "If you are fully vaccinated, you can start doing the things that you had stopped doing because of the pandemic."

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India set a new global record for the number of coronavirus deaths reported in a day, at 4,529.

The US previously held the record, with 4,475 deaths recorded on January 12.

India has been battling a huge surge of the virus that overwhelmed the health system.

India set a global record for the number of coronavirus deaths reported in a single day, breaking a record previously held by the US.

India's health ministry recorded 4,529 deaths on Tuesday, The New York Times reported - the highest any country has recorded over the course of the pandemic.

Before that, the US held the record, with 4,475 deaths recorded on January 12, according to Johns Hopkins University.

A devastating surge of the virus began in India in April, overwhelming hospitals, morgues, and crematoriums.

People died due to oxygen shortages, and while waiting for treatment outside full hospitals.

Its number of new daily cases have started to fall, but death figures take longer to rise due to the time it takes for someone to get infected and to then have worsening symptoms.





Meanwhile countries are dropping all restrictions...... "DERP"

[cliffs]

I would have to say that this is as outdoors as it gets....


KATHMANDU, Nepal (AP) — An expert climbing guide said Saturday that a coronavirus outbreak on Mount Everest has infected at least 100 climbers and support staff, giving the first comprehensive estimate amid official Nepalese denials of a COVID-19 cluster on the world’s highest peak.

Lukas Furtenbach of Austria, who last week became the only prominent outfitter to halt his Everest expedition due to virus fears, said one of his foreign guides and six Nepali Sherpa guides have tested positive.

“I think with all the confirmed cases we know now — confirmed from (rescue) pilots, from insurance, from doctors, from expedition leaders — I have the positive tests so we can prove this,” Furtenbach told The Associated Press in Nepal’s capital, Kathmandu.

“We have at least 100 people minimum positive for COVID in base camp, and then the numbers might be something like 150 or 200,” he said.

He said it was obvious there were many cases at the Everest base camp because he could visibly see people were sick, and could hear people coughing in their tents.

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Vaccine or not...this is not over by a long shot.


As the delta variant of the coronavirus spreads in southeastern China, doctors say they are finding that the symptoms are different and more dangerous than those they saw when the initial version of the virus started spreading in late 2019 in the central city of Wuhan.

Patients are becoming sicker, and their conditions are worsening much more quickly, doctors told state-run television Thursday and Friday. Four-fifths of symptomatic cases developed fevers, they said, although it was not clear how that compared with earlier cases. The virus concentrations that are detected in their bodies climb to levels higher than previously seen and then decline only slowly, the doctors said.

Up to 12% of patients become severely or critically ill within three to four days of the onset of symptoms, said Guan Xiangdong, director of critical care medicine at Sun Yat-sen University in the city of Guangzhou, where the outbreak has been centered. In the past, the proportion had been 2% or 3%, although occasionally up to 10%, he said.

Doctors in Britain and Brazil have reported similar trends with the variants that circulated in those countries, but the severity of those variants has not yet been confirmed.

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And the idiots still keep tweeting idiotic comments.


Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.) on Wednesday tweeted and then deleted a post mocking the threat of the Delta variant of COVID-19.



“The easiest way to make the Delta variant go away is to turn off CNN,” wrote the QAnon-endorsing Colorado Republican, touting her way of tackling the mutated strain of the coronavirus that was first discovered in India and is significantly more transmissible than others.



“And vote Republican,” she added, in a further attempt to politicize the issue.



Boebert nixed the post after an hour but it remains documented on ProPublica’s “Politwoops” page.



In response to the post, Colorado State Rep. Steven Woodrow (D) said Boebert “proves once again that stupidity has a champion in Colorado.”

[cliffs]

BEKASI, Indonesia — By the thousands, they sleep in hallways, tents and cars, gasping for air as they wait for beds in overcrowded hospitals that may not have oxygen to give them. Others see hospitals as hopeless, even dangerous, and take their chances at home.
Wherever they lie, as COVID-19 steals their breath away, their families engage in a frantic, daily hunt for scarce supplies of life-giving oxygen.
Indonesia has become the new epicenter of the pandemic, surpassing India and Brazil to become the country with the world’s highest count of new infections. The surge is part of a wave across Southeast Asia, where vaccination rates are low but countries had, until recently, contained the virus relatively well​. Vietnam, Malaysia, Myanmar and Thailand are also facing their largest outbreaks yet and have imposed new restrictions, including lockdowns and stay-at-home orders.
In Indonesia, cases and deaths have skyrocketed in the past month as the highly contagious delta variant sweeps through densely populated Java island, as well as Bali. In some regions, the coronavirus has pushed the medical system past its limits, although hospitals are taking emergency steps to expand capacity.

[cliffs]

Finally hitting close to home.

Youngest g-daughter was close contact tested ( was negative). Still didn't see her for 10 days.

BUT closer yet -  her dad works for the State and they passed a mandate requiring state workers, including prison guards, to be vaccinated against the coronavirus by Oct. 17. If they cannot show proof of vaccination or receive approval for an exemption, those executive branch employees will be subject to disciplinary action, up to and including termination.

His only hold out is that he is a repub and does not like being told what to do by the gov. (Ironic that he works for the government)