Coronavirus thread

[greg]

Prosecutor who opposed COVID vaccine mandates dies after contracting virus (CBS News)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3XTzk9RouSY

How can you not see the angle the media is going for with stories like these?
See, this is what you get when oppose vaccine mandates. We will let the world know you died, and feign concern while doing so in order to avoid backlash.
In the video, they say they don't even know if she's vaccinated. So the point isn't that getting vaccinated would have saved her, because they admit they don't know if she was.
Obvious scare tactics in order to manipulate people to submit control of their lives, destiny and personal choices to the government.
Creeping authoritarianism.

[Karl Henning]

Testing indicates hundreds of Cambridge students might have COVID as schools reopen Wednesday

By Travis Andersen, Bianca Vázquez Toness and Martin Finucane Globe Staff, Updated January 5, 2022, 15 minutes ago

Schools in Massachusetts on Wednesday continued to grapple with the Omicron-fueled COVID-19 surge that has driven case counts to record levels and is straining hospitals.

Students in Cambridge headed back to school for the first time since winter break amid great uncertainty. The district had delayed the start of school for two days in an ambitious plan to test all students Monday and review results Tuesday before welcoming children back to class.

When parents woke up Wednesday morning, Cambridge still did not have the individual test results for 3,500 students who were tested.

Officials said pool testing indicated hundreds of students might be infected. But students were allowed to return to classes anyway, a move families questioned.

In a message to parents late Tuesday night, district leaders said 157 out of 362 testing pools were positive.

"This means that there are at least 157 positive individuals, but there could be well over 1,000," Superintendent Victoria Greer wrote.

By mid-morning Wednesday, only 125 individual test results had come back, officials said. It wasn't clear how many were positive.

"If we receive positive results after school starts and your student is in attendance at school, your student will be quarantined at school for immediate pickup," wrote Greer.

Parents took to online groups and Whatsapp lists to decide how to interpret the data and instructions, many opting to keep their kids home Wednesday.

"It doesn't make sense to send in everyone while awaiting results," wrote one parent of a student at the King Open Elementary School. "But if they've notified most of the positive cases then that's another story."

Another parent agreed. "It defeats the whole purpose of the delayed start unless those who tested positive have been notified."

While the schools struggled to deal with COVID-19, the city on Wednesday announced it was amending its masking order for indoor public spaces to include common areas of residential buildings with at least four units as well as common areas of office and laboratory buildings. City officials also said public meetings would be conducted remotely rather than in person. City-sponsored events and gatherings must also be conducted outdoors, with the exception of youth activities or youth athletic programs. The changes go into effect on Friday.

In Boston, where some 1,000 school staffers were absent Tuesday, including more than 400 teachers, Superintendent Brenda Cassellius headed into the classroom Wednesday to pinch-hit for a sick fourth-grade teacher at the Nathan Hale Elementary School in Roxbury.

"I jumped into gear and said I'd clear my calendar," Cassellius told reporters outside the school Wednesday morning.

By late morning Wednesday, school officials had not released the number of staff who were out.

Students in neighboring Watertown were also back at school Wednesday after a rocky post-holiday return. The district had welcomed children back Monday, but after reviewing student COVID test results from that day, the district abruptly canceled school Tuesday.

Massachusetts has been wracked by the COVID-19 pandemic for nearly two years. The toll of confirmed deaths from the diseases is nearing 20,000, and there are several hundred more deaths probably caused by the disease.

Massachusetts has a relatively high vaccination rate. But it is seeing skyrocketing case numbers, and hospitalization levels are nearing those at the peak of last year's surge. Death rates so far have not risen as sharply.

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that the highly infectious Omicron variant accounted for 94.5 percent of all US COVID-19 cases in the week ending Jan. 1. The formerly predominant Delta variant only accounted for 4.6 percent of cases.

[Holden]

As many of you know, I'm a teacher and our students return to school on Jan 24 - or will they? The current approach of Qld's new CHO is that Omicron is here, it's not going to be controllable unless drastic restrictions are put into place, for 99% of people it's either asymptomatic or very mild so let it run it's course. I agree with him and this would suggest that our students will return on Jan 24, with maybe an indoor mask mandate for all students - not just high schoolers, and with online learning provisions put in place for any who are immuno-compromised.

I'm not sure what happens in your neck of the woods but the rule here is that all indoor venues such as retail outlets and hospitality establishments must have their own QR codes available at entry points and anyone who enters must scan the code. The idea behind this is 'contact tracing' to inform people they have been in the same venue with a confirmed Covid19 patient. As of today, I'm not going to bother based on the following.

1. Getting a PCR test here in Qld is almost impossible as the waiting time in queues is huge so we've been told that if we display mild symptoms to simply stay at home and isolate for a week and allow the system to work with those who are really ill. Now you might be thinking - what about a Rapid Antigen Test (or RAT)? Well, our government, in it's wisdom, didn't think to increase the availability of them before choosing to open the borders. You cannot get a RAT for love nor money anywhere in Qld so you don't know if you have Covid19 or not. Apparently 18 million kits will arrive in the state next week. With the large number of people still isolating, I wonder how quickly they will be delivered?

2 Consider this statement from Qld Health

Queensland contact tracers are to focus on vulnerable settings and will limit publishing exposure sites unless they are venues of high concern, as the Omicron wave is set to peak and COVID cases become unmanageable.

These two states of affair, especially the first, negate any positives of using the QR code check in system.

To go back to a point I made earlier - delivery systems. We are experiencing much longer delivery times due to the Covid case increases (30,000+ active cases in Qld at the moment). I'm wondering if this might hit the food supply chain? Lucky for me I nearly always have a full freezer. I sent a parcel to the US recently. It sat at customs at BNE waiting for an available flight for seven days. It was a return of a faulty piece of equipment using Australia Post. It's replacement is already on its way via FedEx while the one  sent is still on the ground at LAX. A courier company with its own fleet of aircraft makes all the difference. The parcel (a headphone amp) was dispatched on Tuesday and I'll have it by Weds at the latest but probably sooner.

[Spotted Horses]

Prosecutor who opposed COVID vaccine mandates dies after contracting virus (CBS News)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3XTzk9RouSY

How can you not see the angle the media is going for with stories like these?
See, this is what you get when oppose vaccine mandates. We will let the world know you died, and feign concern while doing so in order to avoid backlash.
In the video, they say they don't even know if she's vaccinated. So the point isn't that getting vaccinated would have saved her, because they admit they don't know if she was.
Obvious scare tactics in order to manipulate people to submit control of their lives, destiny and personal choices to the government.
Creeping authoritarianism.

Numerous other media reports say that the prosecutor's husband revealed that she was unvaccinated at the time of her death.

I agree that these reports of a prominent vaccine opponent or Covid-19 denier dying of Covid-19 are sensational and not terribly informative, since they are anecdotal. For the same reason it is also not terribly informative when "breakthrough" infections are given great emphasis. What is informative is that FDA reviewed data indicates that the mRNA vaccines are 95% effective at preventing hospitalization/severe illness, and that they maintain close to this level of effectiveness after boosters. The vast majority of people in Covid-19 wards and dying of Covid-19 are unvaccinated. Statistics give the most accurate information, but only when presented in the correct context and when reviewed by someone who understands statistics. People who don't understand math are easily deceived by statistics taken out of context.

As far as "creeping authoritarianism" I am more worried about a political party that tries to use fraudulent claims to suppress votes for their opponents. We have had vaccine mandates for many decades, and that is why we no longer have tens of thousands of children dying of polio, smallpox and measles in the United States. Covid-19 vaccine requirements are sane public health policy, not "creeping authoritarianism."

[vandermolen]

Please pass along our well wishes...."from the 'cat group".   

PD

p.s.  I must admit that sleeping in front of a fire does sound quite restorative; it's worked for many a cat.

Will do - thank you and to John (MI) and other well-wishers.

[Karl Henning]

Well, I was sorry to learn that a flute instructor from school days in my home town has died from respiratory failure severely aggravated by COVID. What's worse is, having learnt that she was an anti-vaxxer, and that her death was therefore thoroughly preventable.

[greg]

Numerous other media reports say that the prosecutor's husband revealed that she was unvaccinated at the time of her death.

Then that leads to the question of who reported first.
If CBS News was first, then the point remains, they are just reporting to disgracefully shame someone opposing mandates.

If they reported because other news reported first, then the point of other news outlets could creating that story could be multiple possibilities. And it would be kinda pathetic on CBS News' part that they copy a story, yet don't even read it enough to get the details that she wasn't vaccinated and instead act as if they don't know.

Or they were unaware of it being reported already, then that would lead to my original point.

But also- yeah, unvaccinated would lead to a higher chance of dying, so I wouldn't doubt it.

edit: should add that her not being vaccinated doesn't necessarily mean anti-vaxx- maybe in other articles it may clarify, but in the video it's not clear if she is against other people taking the vaccine- but if her position was something like banning vaccines for everyone, then I'd strongly disagree and say she should be open to plenty of opposition to that opinion.

We have had vaccine mandates for many decades, and that is why we no longer have tens of thousands of children dying of polio, smallpox and measles in the United States. Covid-19 vaccine requirements are sane public health policy, not "creeping authoritarianism."

This point I've already seen in this thread, and it's not a good comparison, also it doesn't address the issue of personal autonomy ("my body my choice" position) at all.




Worldwide:

How many children have died from COVID-19?
Among the 3.4 million COVID-19 deaths1 reported in the MPIDR COVerAGE database, 0.4 per cent (over 12,000) occur in children and adolescents under 20 years of age. Of the over 12,000 deaths reported in those under 20 years of age, 58 per cent occurred among adolescents ages 10–19, and 42 per cent among children ages 0–9.

Data correct as of December 2021. For more information, including age and sex disaggregated data, visit our interactive dashboard.

1based off 65 per cent of the total global deaths reported by JHU.

US:
https://data.cdc.gov/NCHS/Provisional-COVID-19-Deaths-Focus-on-Ages-0-18-Yea/nr4s-juj3

Less than 1,000 kids in the US have died from Covid.




Is it really worth forcing 300 million people to get a shot, when we still don't know long term effects?
And if children are the concern, then you can mandate that they get shots, but why all of us, too? Why don't we get a choice?
Nothing wrong with choosing to get one for yourself or your kid, it may save your life. But the mentality of people who are okay being forced to get it, and being okay with others being forced to get it, is wrong. It completely disrespects personal choice and autonomy over their own body.
You don't have to agree, but this is what point that anti-mandate people are making, but it tends to get misrepresented by the media.

[Spotted Horses]

Is it really worth forcing 300 million people to get a shot, when we still don't know long term effects?
And if children are the concern, then you can mandate that they get shots, but why all of us, too? Why don't we get a choice?
Nothing wrong with choosing to get one for yourself or your kid, it may save your life. But the mentality of people who are okay being forced to get it, and being okay with others being forced to get it, is wrong. It completely disrespects personal choice and autonomy over their own body.
You don't have to agree, but this is what point that anti-mandate people are making, but it tends to get misrepresented by the media.

I never said children were the only or primary consideration for the Covid-19 vaccine. The fear of "long-term effects" is an unhinged conspiracy theory. I do not know of any case where a vaccine was reliably established to have long-term side effects. Side effects generally take the form of an allergic reaction, anaphylaxis being the worst case scenario, or an autoimmune reaction such as the one that seems to lead to rare instances of serious blood clots in recipients of the AstraZeneca vaccine. Such reactions typically emerge hours or days after the vaccine is administered. After hundreds of millions of vaccine doses have been administered with an extremely small number of serious reactions the vaccine has been proved safe with great certainty. In a year and a half, more than 800,000 Americans suffered the long-term side effect of SARS-CoV-2, being dead. Many more seem to have suffered long-term, perhaps permanent organ damage.

And, as far as I know, no one is seriously advocating that people be literally forced to receive the vaccine. The most extreme position being taken is that people who refuse the vaccine be denied certain privileges, such as using public transportation or other public facilities, or being employed in certain jobs. Children not vaccinated against measles, small pox and other serious diseases forfeit the right to attend public schools. The only difference here is that a similar standard is being applied to adults.

[Madiel]

This point I've already seen in this thread, and it's not a good comparison, also it doesn't address the issue of personal autonomy ("my body my choice" position) at all.

"My body my choice" is an idiotic argument that pretends the consequences of your infection magically stop at the boundaries of your body.

I mean, that's not how infectious diseases work. By definition. They're diseases that are passed from one person to another. One person's refusal to reduce the risk of transmission has a direct effect on the risks of everyone they come into contact with.

It's the same argument as passive smoking. We brought in rules around smoking precisely because we understood that the effects of smoking are not automatically confined to the person who's lighting the cigarettes - a point that is far less obvious than the fact that infectious diseases are passed from one person to another.

"My body my choice" might work fine for medical conditions that you can't pass on. It's stupid for ones that you can, and indeed where the only mechanism for catching them is... catching them.

If there's one thing that's been really wrong about the whole approach to this issue, it's the fact that people haven't been taught enough about vaccination science to STOP believing that it's all about them as an individual. That's not actually the scientific rationale for vaccination campaigns.

[Madiel]

ADDENDUM: Plus, of course, there's the minor detail that most "my body my choice" people still want medical treatment to rescue them if they get infected. So their "personal" choice also leads to increased strains on the health care system.

Maybe I'd be more sympathetic to "my body my choice" if the choice came with a promise to personally fund a hospital bed and medical team. Though just one hospital bed for personal use probably isn't enough, as per my previous post they should also cover anyone they pass the infection onto.

[Florestan]

The most extreme position being taken is that people who refuse the vaccine be denied certain privileges, such as using public transportation or other public facilities, or being employed in certain jobs.

Since when is using public transportation or other public facilities a privilege? 

And what do you make of this recent idiocy from Mr. Macron: https://edition.cnn.com/2022/01/05/europe/macron-unvaccinated-comments-vaccine-pass-intl/index.html  A President officially declaring that he splits his fellow countrymen in two parts, one of which he explicitly despises and aims to turn into second-class citizens or even no citizens at all? 

[Mandryka]

In Europe we're seeing very rapid rises in cases of omicron in countries which have been enforcing mask mandates -- France, Holland, probably others. Those mask mandates don't seem to be very effective.

[prémont]

In Europe we're seeing very rapid rises in cases of omicron in countries which have been enforcing mask mandates -- France, Holland, probably others. Those mask mandates don't seem to be very effective.

The extreme contagiousness of the omikron seems to have come as a surprise to everybody - experts included, and to prevent this from spreading is more a question of peoples behavior than about restrictions and mandates.

[Madiel]

In Europe we're seeing very rapid rises in cases of omicron in countries which have been enforcing mask mandates -- France, Holland, probably others. Those mask mandates don't seem to be very effective.

On their own, possibly not. Though it's also a question of timing - when those mandates were in place, as opposed to when omicron took hold - and degree of actual enforcement and compliance (which almost inevitably drops off over time, people are tired of doing these things).

Another flaw is when people have been given the impression that vaccination would solve everything, when the real situation was that vaccination was one strategy along with others such as masks and distancing. People don't want to keep having to live their lives in a different way with masks and isolation, and so it wasn't hard to sell the idea that vaccination would mean not having to do that.

But we're not at the stage of things going back to "normal", if we ever will be. I've seen one epidemiologist suggesting that we might move from a pandemic disease to an endemic disease in another 12 months or so. And one of the biggest issues is that we haven't got people vaccinated. The appearance of new variants was widely predicted because the vaccination rates in some parts of the world was so low. Vaccinating the whole of Western Europe is going to be of limited effectiveness unless you also prevent travel in and out of Western Europe.

Covid-19 is now far more infectious than when it first appeared 2 years ago. So maybe masks aren't that effective. Although you might also find that the situation would be even worse without masks.

[MusicTurner]

There are many surveys showing at least some effect of masks, and under various circumstances. One can't really base an argument against this with one's feelings, or without some knowledge about those surveys.

[Florestan]

people have been given the impression that vaccination would solve everything

Actually, this is not what people have been given the impression. This is what they have been explicitly told in plain English / Romanian / French / German whatever when the first vaccines were launched.  "Get vaccinated, it's the only way to return to normal life." People have been lied to, big time.

[Madiel]

Actually, this is not what people have been given the impression. This is what they have been explicitly told in plain English / Romanian / French / German whatever when the first vaccines were launched.  "Get vaccinated, it's the only way to return to normal life." People have been lied to, big time.

Yes. I'm quite certain that politicians have said such things. And probably made scientists wince in the process.

[Mandryka]

The extreme contagiousness of the omikron seems to have come as a surprise to everybody - experts included, and to prevent this from spreading is more a question of peoples behavior than about restrictions and mandates.

Indeed and I'm pleased to say that in London -- which was leading the omicron vanguard in the UK -- new cases have been coming down despite the New Year celebrations. No mask mandates or anything like that, just a bit of personal responsibility. 

It's anyone's guess what will happen when schools go back of course, or indeed as more older people get omicron.

[Florestan]

Yes. I'm quite certain that politicians have said such things. And probably made scientists wince in the process.

Some scientists, not all. At least in Romania's case, back then almost all scientists and doctors either sitting in the Covid committee or appearing on TV sang the same aria: "Get vaccinated, it's the only way to return to normal life." The very few who were skeptic about that were either ignored or derided as conspiracy theorists. Today the latter are fully vindicated by reality. It's quite probable, though, that this is a scenario which many other countries have seen.

[Mandryka]

Actually, this is not what people have been given the impression. This is what they have been explicitly told in plain English / Romanian / French / German whatever when the first vaccines were launched.  "Get vaccinated, it's the only way to return to normal life." People have been lied to, big time.

The really interesting question for me is what happens when the population lose confidence in the politicians, because they feel they have been misled, or (in the case of the Government here in the UK), because their members have broken the very rules which they have imposed on the people.

My feeling is that it may make people much less cooperative, much more reluctant to comply with imposed rules. I think the situation is saveable, by lots of discussion and two way communication and much greater openness. But time may be running out, and it may be hard in those countries where the state/population relationship is not very open, not very trusting.