Biden: Folks keep asking are we going back to March 2020? The answer is no bc 1) More than 200M Americans are vaccinated, 2) We are prepared today for what is coming bc we have stockpiled medical resources, 3) We know a lot more than in 2020 including how to keep schools open.
— Yamiche Alcindor (@Yamiche) December 21, 2021
I know that I'm an utterly basic normie liberal who offends this website every day by suggesting that Joe Biden is not the literal Devil. But my hot take for today is that it is actually a healthy sign when the White House reverses course after a mistake. https://t.co/2rStBGnAvw
— Ian Millhiser (@imillhiser) December 21, 2021
Average new cases in the US has risen to 145,397 per day, its highest since September. pic.twitter.com/yYDuW60oBd
— Patrick Chovanec (@prchovanec) December 21, 2021
And the daily death toll in the US from COVID-19 has remained fairly stable at just over 1,200 per day. pic.twitter.com/WBw94Wr0xw
— Patrick Chovanec (@prchovanec) December 21, 2021
End of a thread:
5/#Biden #WinterSolstice2021 speech
•FEMA is setting up Pop-Up Vaccination Clinics nationwide
•Deploying more vaccinators to 12 States and tribes
•Allowing surge in pharmacy teams & scaling up drugstore capacities pic.twitter.com/Gl46mlJNIu— Laurie Garrett (@Laurie_Garrett) December 21, 2021
Just as Americans and Europeans were eagerly awaiting their most normal holiday season in couple of years, omicron has unleashed a fresh round of fear and uncertainty — for travelers, shoppers, party-goers and economies. @PaulWisemanAP and @ADInnocenzio: https://t.co/9qcYXgxZ2f
— AP Business News (@APBusiness) December 21, 2021
======
Global #COVID19 distribution, latest 18,400+ #SARSCoV2 genomes posted to @GISAID :
Africa 77% #Omicron, 19% #Delta, 3% Others
Asia 94% Delta, 5% Omicron
Europe 94% Delta, 5.6% Omicron
North America 97.5% Delta, 2.5% Omicron
South America 96% Delta, 2.7% Omicron pic.twitter.com/SaS0h5AMnW— Laurie Garrett (@Laurie_Garrett) December 21, 2021
Despite consumption hit, China to stand fast on tough COVID-19 curbs https://t.co/TRMtKV626I pic.twitter.com/U1r7c1tIBR
— Reuters (@Reuters) December 22, 2021
Japan reports first case of community spread of Omicron https://t.co/ccjXiL0agw pic.twitter.com/bFfQJB1vvu
— Reuters (@Reuters) December 22, 2021
Singapore to freeze new ticket sales for quarantine-free arrivals https://t.co/ufoLOv4YZy pic.twitter.com/8xjZNs5TtH
— Reuters (@Reuters) December 22, 2021
… Under the vaccinated travel lane (VTL) programme, Singapore allows quarantine-free entry for fully vaccinated travellers arriving from certain countries on designated flights or buses. The travellers have to undergo regular testing.
About two dozen countries are listed in the programme including Australia, India, Malaysia, Britain and the United States.
But no new tickets would be issued for people hoping to arrive from any of those countries from Thursday to Jan. 20, the government said on Wednesday…
Australia:
I have to admit, when looking at the absolutely immense quantity of vaccines that the government ordered for delivery in Q4 2021 and Q1 2022, I thought they were psychologically overcompensating for the slow supply in early 2021. It turned out to be a great move. https://t.co/E1YSJIbcN1
— John B (@johnb78) December 22, 2021
Israel, like America, has a stubborn minority of anti-vaxxers who are making things more difficult for everybody:
Israel will roll out a 4th dose of vaccine. Medical teams will begin giving the shots to people 60 and older as well as to health care personnel https://t.co/HHB3KbB53E pic.twitter.com/8kHEA5C9zZ
— delthia ricks ? (@DelthiaRicks) December 22, 2021
Russia on Wednesday confirmed 25,264 Covid-19 infections and 1,020 deathshttps://t.co/Qdb2pVI1tq
— The Moscow Times (@MoscowTimes) December 22, 2021
Omicron will push Europe towards brink, says WHO https://t.co/FDPkvmFtYj
— BBC News (World) (@BBCWorld) December 22, 2021
France could soon have 100,000 COVID cases a day, health minister says https://t.co/xMirJydNNl pic.twitter.com/fRHxNFC8d9
— Reuters (@Reuters) December 22, 2021
Portugal is renewing restrictions, including closing bars and discos and making it mandatory to work from home, fearing the threat from the omicron variant. https://t.co/kCeXfYf8sc
— AP Europe (@AP_Europe) December 21, 2021
No further Covid restrictions for England before Christmas, UK PM Boris Johnson says – but he “can’t rule out any further measures after Christmas” https://t.co/qQYWwUtFth
— BBC Breaking News (@BBCBreaking) December 21, 2021
Doctors are under more work pressure than during height of covid-19 pandemic in 2020 | The BMJ https://t.co/cs4BB2nKIB
— Equity & Health (@equitylist) December 19, 2021
Medical experts in South Africa say the noticeable drop in new COVID-19 cases in recent days may signal that the country's dramatic omicron-driven surge has passed its peak. https://t.co/i63uAgc7X7
— AP Africa (@AP_Africa) December 22, 2021
There it goes, the South African R0 is below one, from as high as possibly 4 in late November. pic.twitter.com/q4GVGEiBg8
— Mike Bird (@Birdyword) December 22, 2021
======
Scoop: FDA to authorize coronavirus pills as soon as tomorrow. Pfizer’s Paxlovid and Merck’s molnupiravir are intended for higher-risk people. The pills, taken at home over several days, could ease burden on hospitals as infections soar through the winter.https://t.co/y8yks7pnRm
— Jennifer Jacobs (@JenniferJJacobs) December 21, 2021
While we’re asking Santa for presents…
Huge if true—
Walter Reed scientists “expect to announce that they have developed a vaccine that protects people from COVID-19 and all its variants, even Omicron, as well as from previous SARS-origin viruses that have killed millions of people worldwide.”https://t.co/M0FNuOeLe2
— David Priess (@DavidPriess) December 22, 2021
US army scientists are developing a pan-coronavirus vaccine, possibly effective against all variants:
SARS-CoV-2 ferritin nanoparticle vaccine elicits protective immune responses in nonhuman primates https://t.co/zj9XulfWZl There are also now promising phase 1 results in humans.
— Nicholas A. Christakis (@NAChristakis) December 22, 2021
Covid: Australian trial tests blood thinner as nasal spray https://t.co/FJrFhbU53o
— BBC News (World) (@BBCWorld) December 22, 2021
… The nasal spray uses the cheap drug heparin in an attempt to neutralise Covid’s spike protein.
When sprayed into the nose of a Covid-infected person it appears to make them non-infectious, the researchers say.
The trial will not conclude until mid-2022. If effective, it could be used with vaccines and other measures.
Researchers hope the spray could help both as an early treatment and as a nasal mask to stop the virus spreading.
It could be applied “anywhere where you mix with the public in a crowded situation”, lead researcher Prof Don Campbell told the BBC.
“For people like me who are afraid of Covid, the idea that I might take a squirt before I go shopping or to the football is going make to feel a heck of a lot less anxious. It’s a tool that gives me control.”…
======
Deaths do lag cases but New York City's major omicron outbreak does not seem to be translating so far to a higher mortality rate. One person died of COVID yesterday in NYC (population: 8.8M) and the city's 7-day death average actually ticked down slightly. pic.twitter.com/D3kANz5vp7
— Byron Tau (@ByronTau) December 21, 2021
BREAKING: Boston will now begin banning unvaccinated people from going to all restaurants, bars, nightclubs, sports arenas, fitness centers, movie theaters, concert venues, museums, and entertainment venues.
— Kim Mangone (@KimMangone) December 20, 2021
Chicago will require proof of coronavirus vaccination at restaurants, bars, gyms and other indoor venues starting Jan. 3, Mayor Lori Lightfoot announced Tuesday. The requirement comes as the omicron variant drives a nationwide spike in COVID-19 infections. https://t.co/a4QEbfUNiv
— The Associated Press (@AP) December 21, 2021
California will require healthcare workers to get booster shots against the coronavirus. Gov. Gavin Newsom announced the mandate Tuesday, citing the rise of the omicron variant. https://t.co/7SBXiX5zd2
— The Associated Press (@AP) December 22, 2021
Intel will put unvaccinated employees on unpaid leave https://t.co/dQ6YsREFrc pic.twitter.com/dAgZEtNeXe
— The Verge (@verge) December 22, 2021
if the vax uptake was even 15% higher than it is -roughly half of the holdouts- you’re talking about halving hospitalizations and deaths. every action biden took to twist those arms was met with screams and shrieks and court cases. this is the bed you’ve made. https://t.co/dFYLnWi6TU
— kilgore trout, tucker carlson’s mailman (@KT_So_It_Goes) December 21, 2021
for some reason salena zito can never find these people, probably because they aren’t involved in somebody’s campaign for office
— kilgore trout, tucker carlson’s mailman (@KT_So_It_Goes) December 21, 2021
reminder: spreading Covid is Fox/GOP’s top priority https://t.co/wNs6A5AUzR
— Eric Boehlert (@EricBoehlert) December 22, 2021
New Deal democrat
Cases grew by nearly 10,000 in just one day yesterday to 148,000. Deaths increased by about 100 to 1324. All 4 regions are now in uptrends.
Sharp, exponential increases have occurred in DC, HI, NJ, NY, OH, PR, RI, and have started in GA, IL, LA, and VA.
Moderate increases have also occurred in CA, DE, MA, MS, MO, NC, TN, TX, and WA.
One silver lining: northern New England, where Delta caused a sharp increase, is now flat to declining. The northern Plains and some Rocky Mountain States also show declines.
In SA, cases declined for the 4th straight day, for a total decline of 25% from peak. Deaths did increase slightly, to about 3.5x their recent low. Cases also rose sharply in the U.K., and there was an apparent data dump of recorded deaths. Cases also continued to soar in Canada, having more than doubled in the last week to a new all-time high, although deaths continued to decline.
Canada and Puerto Rico are most noteworthy because Canada is almost 80% fully vaccinated, and PR over 80%, and yet Omicron is raging. It would probably take something like 90% full vaccinations to develop “herd immunity” to Omicron. The US is simply never going to get there, so other strategies must be employed.
Meanwhile, Trevor Bedford has now updated his graphs of Omicron and Delta cases in 9 countries to include forward projections through yesterday of the Rt and number of cases for both variants.
https://github.com/blab/rt-from-frequency-dynamics/tree/master/results/omicron-countries
He finds an Rt off less than 1 for Delta in 7 of the 9 countries, suggesting Omicron has at least some crowding out effect. In both the U.K. and SA the effect is dramatic, with Rt’s for Delta of 0.4 and 0.5 respectively. In fact his forward projections forecast that Delta cases have declined by over 50% in at least 4 of the 9 countries in the past two weeks.
He projects that there are presently still more Delta than Omicron cases in the US, but not by much. While the graphs don’t indicate precise numbers, it looks like about 65,000 Omicron and 95,000 Delta cases, with Omicron poised to overtake Delta within the week. Note this is in conflict with the CDC’s estimate of 73%, which was based on data only through November 27.
If Omicron is both less lethal and is crowding out Delta, that is *relatively* good news!
NeenerNeener
Monroe County, NY:
There were 267 new laboratory-confirmed cases of COVID-19 on 12/21.
There were 63 new positive home tests reported on 12/21.
Spanky
Portugal is closing discos? About 40 years too late.
debbie
12,500+ new cases yesterday in Ohio. This is the highest number of daily cases since ever.
Amir Khalid
Malaysia’s Ministry of Health reports 3,519 new Covid-19 cases today in its media statement, for a cumulative reported total of 2,728,203 cases. It also reports 57 deaths as of midnight, for an adjusted cumulative total of 31,192 deaths – 1.14% of the cumulative reported total, 1.16% of resolved cases.
Based on cases reported yesterday, Malaysia’s nationwide Rt is at 0.90.
263 confirmed cases are in ICU, 122 of them on ventilators. Meanwhile, 5,118 more patients have recovered, for a cumulative total of 2,647,587 patients recovered – 97.0% of the cumulative reported total.
Two new clusters were reported today, for a cumulative total of 6,088 clusters. 234 clusters are currently active; 5,854 clusters are now inactive.
3,419 new cases today are local infections. 100 new cases today are imported.
The National Covid-19 Immunisation Programme (PICK) administered 167,323 doses of vaccine on 21st December: 3,161 first doses, 4,390 second doses, and 159,772 booster doses. As of midnight, the cumulative total is 56,207,871 doses administered: 25,962,638 first doses, 25,561,600 second doses, and 4,879,326 booster doses. 79.5% of the population have received their first dose, 78.3% their second dose, and 14.9% their booster dose.
lowtechcyclist
They are Axis Sally in the war on Covid.
Only they’re operating right here in the U.S.A.
Cermet
The Pfizer anti-viral pill will be a game changer relative to hospital admissions. I laugh at the chicken littles that compare todays covid issues to early 2020; no similarities at all. Hopefully, the universal vaccine Walter-Reed is developing pans out and then this entire covid plague will be blunted and vaccinated people will have essentially normal lives again.
None of this means we are out of the woods but certainly we are near the edge and thanks to all this very successful research, future pandemics will be far better controlled – and frankly, we were lucky this one was no where as deadly as many other possible viral illnesses could be.
Steeplejack (phone)
@New Deal democrat:
Where is “SA”?
Bruce K in ATH-GR
@lowtechcyclist: I keep comparing Tucker Carlson to William Joyce, a/k/a Lord Haw-Haw, and keep advocating for Carlson to undergo the same sort of de-platforming that Joyce experienced in January 1946. (Look up William Joyce’s Wikipedia entry and you’ll understand.)
And Carlson’s not the only one, either. Hannity might as well be a 21st-century Goebbels.
Brit in Chicago
@Cermet: Yes, it will be a game-changer for those who:
I’m in that group, but I supsect a lot of people who are likely vicitms of Covid are not.
NotMax
Decent rundown.
How well do COVID vaccines and their boosters protect against omicron? What data show
Also, expanding on something up top,
trnc
Sadly, the Chovanec tweets aren’t aging well. Looks like we had 180,000 new cases and 1800 deaths yesterday, and that doesn’t even count whatever phony Florida numbers DeSantis is currently making up.
FlyingToaster (Tablet)
@Steeplejack (phone): South Africa
New Deal democrat
@Steeplejack (phone): South Africa.
Btw, failed to mention it above, but Florida’s update this week is going to be a doozy. I expect it to show something like a quadrupling in cases.
lowtechcyclist
@trnc: He’s almost certainly referring to the 7-day average, which has been in the 1200s for the past two weeks or so.
Which is to say, 1.3 Jonestowns every day, or one 9/11 every two and a half days.
Another Scott
A hopeful thread, ICYMI:
(via dsquareddigest)
Cheers,
Scott.
Cameron
Put heparin up my nose? That seems sub-optimal to me. I had the pleasure of shooting up Lovenox pre- and post-surgery a few times, and that’s kind of a watered-down heparin. I’d need to know a whole lot more before I jumped all over that puppy.
trnc
@lowtechcyclist: Right, but the one day case spike and a couple of other recent days look like they’ll drive that up. Deaths may not go up on average as much, though.
Anne Laurie
You joke, but I’m told that discos are the second biggest draw — after sunshine — for tourists from Britain, Germany, & other northern climes. It’s a(nother) serious hit to the tourism industry, which is a significant part of Portugal’s GDP.
It’s like NYC people & Times Square: “Nobody” goes there, except all the tourists, and the thousands of NYCers who sell their services to those tourists, and the other thousands of NYCers who also go to shop, dine, etc…
Bruce K in ATH-GR
Greece: the week-to-week numbers, which had been dropping for the better part of a month, seem to be higher at the moment than at this point last week. Tuesday’s numbers: 6,424 new cases, 77 dead, 661 patients intubated in ICUs.
Positivity rate is reported by Kathimerini (source) at 1.15 percent.
Close to home, my office called everyone in to get PCR tests yesterday (Tuesday), and the managing partner sent out a blast e-mail this morning that said: results were 100% negative, so have a happy holiday and we’ll do it all again in the new year.
Hope the entire jackaltariat is as lucky this holiday.
Ken
Good news on the effectiveness, but the name seems designed to trigger anti-vaxxers.
Another Scott
Here’s an Army.mil story (from 12/16) about their vaccine efforts, with links to the original scientific articles.
Cheers,
Scott.
O. Felix Culpa
@Ken:
What wouldn’t trigger them? Do you think comfy patriotic security blanket vaccine would elicit a different response?
Matt McIrvin
@Ken: Adults have to use correct declarative language when speaking among themselves on technical matters. When it comes time to market the thing, then you worry about branding.
Robert Sneddon
Scotland — today’s new reported cases number is less than half that reported yesterday, something in the data pipeline is badly wrong and the health authorities are trying to sort it out. The test positivity rate being reported is vaguely believable at 13%. Deaths and hospitalisations remain low although the numbers aren’t falling any more from the September peak.
Booster vaccination numbers are increasing, now at 78,000 a day with new mass vaccination centres open in Edinburgh and Glasgow improving the logistics. This brings the boostered percentage of 18+ adults up to 64%.
It also looks like first and second vaccination numbers are picking up a little too which is good. Proof of vaccination or evidence of a recent negative test is now required to get into pubs and clubs in Scotland. I’ve seen a press report of a nightclub owner who was carrying out lateral-flow tests on patrons at the door when they couldn’t prove their vaccination status. This inconvenience may, just may be encouraging some Young Immortals that it’s now worth their while to get vaccinated.
There’s going to be several days of no reporting of case numbers etc. in Scotland during Xmas and the New Year with updates only being released on the following Wednesdays. The situation is compounded this year with the Mondays and Tuesdays following the weekend festivities being official holidays hence the hiccups.
Bill Arnold
@New Deal democrat:
FWIW Saudi Arabia has SA two letter country code.
Matt McIrvin
@trnc: Best I can tell from the fragmentary indications I’m getting is that yes, Omicron is less severe, but it’s not, like, an order of magnitude less severe. It’s more like a factor of 1/2 or 1/3 in hospital admissions. People do die of it to a degree that is worth major concern, especially if there are many more infections.
BUT… the breakthrough infections, particularly in the boosted, are not catastrophically bad. There are so many that they’re freaking people out, and they’ll cause trouble by hollowing out the workforce, but the severe health impacts are still on the unvaccinated.
New Deal democrat
South Africa has posted its weekly comprehensive update, and the data on deaths is very good.
Per Tom Moultrie:
https://mobile.twitter.com/tomtom_m/status/1473671949112991758
There has been “a substantial decoupling of deaths from cases….”
“overwhelmingly positive news. It really does look like this wave will not be as bad as previous ones. Here’s hoping this is true in other parts of the world too.”
See especially graphs at tweets #9 & 10 in thread.
Matt McIrvin
@New Deal democrat: A while back we were wondering out loud if the sharp increases in New England over the past few weeks were Omicron.
I currently think they were not, they were Delta. We wouldn’t see the outbreak peaking that low if it were Omicron. Omicron has taken over in greater NYC but it’s just getting started here; I expect it to really blow up over the next week or two.
Matt McIrvin
@New Deal democrat: The time lag combined with the extremely rapid peak in cases still makes me a bit suspicious of claims of low fatality rates. I want to see the deaths stop increasing and turn over before I’ll fully believe it.
Fair Economist
@Matt McIrvin: Right, in terms of serious complications, Omicron is providing 3x protection, and layered on a 10x or so from vaccination or even 3x from prior infection, that get mortality down to a livable,although very high level, comparable to car or gun deaths. Long COVID still to be seen, but the loss of COVID specific scary complications like pneumonia and loss of smell is encouraging.
Robert Sneddon
Today’s UK-wide COVID-19 case numbers are out and it’s another record, over 106,000 new cases, the highest since mass testing began early last year. I don’t know if the problems reported in Scotland’s case data today make this an undercount. I expect that the Omicron variant is now 90%-plus of all new cases here in the UK.
The 7-day trend nationwide says case numbers are up 60% over the previous seven days, deaths remain down a little (-3%) and hospitalisations are creeping up (2%). Testing is going gangbusters at 22% more tests reported, both lateral-flow at-home tests as well as RT-PCR although there are bound to be some negative test results that never make it into the national databases. A lot of businesses and mass employers ( public transport, healthcare etc.) are requiring regular testing of vaccinated workers as well as those who aren’t vaccinated which will be pushing the test numbers up.
Nationally the booster campaign is going well with another daily record of about 968,000 vaccinations given. First and second vaccinations are still languishing though at about 94,000 total yesterday. Scotland’s vaccination efforts are a little better than the UK generally but not by that much. Boosters are being recommended for younger people and there are moves towards the general vaccination of 5 to 11 year olds with a one-third dose of an mRNA vaccine — at the moment only medically at-risk children in that age range are being vaccinated at all.
smith
@Matt McIrvin: It’s probably also a good idea to reserve judgment until we see what happens in an older population.
YY_Sima Qian
On 12/21 China reported 57 new domestic confirmed (none previously asymptomatic) & 0 new domestic asymptomatic cases.
At Inner Mongolia “Autonomous” Region 54 domestic confirmed case recovered. There currently are 343 active domestic confirmed cases in the region.
At Heilongjiang Province 2 domestic confirmed case recovered. There currently are 16 active domestic confirmed & 4 active domestic asymptomatic cases in the province.
Shaanxi Province reported 53 new domestic confirmed cases. There are currently 149 active domestic confirmed cases in the province.
At Shanghai Municipality there currently are 7 active domestic confirmed & 3 active domestic asymptomatic cases remaining. 1 residential compound is currently at Medium Risk.
At Jiangsu Province 1 domestic asymptomatic case was released from isolation. There currently are 1 active domestic confirmed (at Nanjing) & 2 active domestic asymptomatic cases (both at Wuxi) remaining.
Zhejiang Province did not report any new domestic positive case. 1 domestic confirmed case recovered. There currently are 477 active domestic confirmed cases in the province.
Tianjin Municipality reported 1 new domestic confirmed case, a person who had returned from Shaoxing in Zhejiang on 12/7, was placed under at home health monitoring since then, & under centralized quarantine since 12/17.
Suzhou in Anhui Province did not report any new domestic positive cases. There currently is 1 active domestic confirmed case in the city. 1 village is currently at Medium Risk.
Fangcheng in Guangxi “Autonomous” Region reported 1 new domestic confirmed case. There currently are 1 active domestic confirmed case (at Fangcheng) & 1 active domestic asymptomatic case (at Chongzuo) remaining.
Guangdong Province reported 2 new domestic confirmed cases. There currently are 26 active domestic confirmed & 1 active domestic asymptomatic cases in the province.
At Chengdu in Sichuan Province there currently is 1 active domestic confirmed case in the city.
Xiamen in Fujian Province did not report any new domestic positive cases. There currently is 1 active domestic confirmed case in the city.
At Dalian in Liaoning Province 3 domestic confirmed case recovered. There currently are 12 active domestic confirmed & 1 active domestic asymptomatic cases remaining.
At Shijiazhuang in Hebei Province there currently are 4 active confirmed cases remaining.
At Rizhao in Shandong Province there currently are 4 active domestic asymptomatic cases remaining.
At Chongqing Municipality there currently are 2 active domestic confirmed & 1 active domestic asymptomatic cases remaining.
At Henan Province there currently are 28 active domestic confirmed cases remaining (all at Zhengzhou).
Dehong Prefecture in Yunnan Province did not report any new domestic positive cases. 6 domestic confirmed case recovered & 2 domestic asymptomatic case was released from isolation. There currently are 39 active domestic confirmed & 19 active domestic asymptomatic cases at the prefecture.
Imported Cases
On 12/21, China reported 20 new imported confirmed cases (2 previously asymptomatic), 19 imported asymptomatic cases, 2 imported suspect case:
Overall in China, 80 confirmed cases recovered (17 imported), 21 asymptomatic cases were released from isolation (19 imported) & 2 were reclassified as confirmed cases (both imported), & 2,049 individuals were released from quarantine. Currently, there are 1,765 active confirmed cases in the country (639 imported), 7 in serious condition (4 imported), 501 active asymptomatic cases (463 imported), 3 suspect cases (all imported). 51,931 traced contacts are currently under centralized quarantine.
As of 12/21, 2,706.676M vaccine doses have been injected in Mainland China, an increase of 22.386M doses in the past 48 hrs.
On 12/22, Hong Kong reported 7 new positive cases, all imported.
mrmoshpotato
For Boston, I suggest we call the unvaccinated “vaxholes!”
dc
@Spanky: A disco in Portugal is any club that has music and people dance.
emmyelle
woo hoo! Going to Boston to stroll through the Museum of Fine Arts, have a nice dinner in one of my favorite restaurants (Davios, maybe? Stephanie’s? soo many choices!) and maybe take in a concert. Really good stuff coming up at City Winery. But not for you, anti-vaxxers!!
Another Scott
One for the Trevor Bedford fans – STATNews – Helen Branswell interview of Trevor Bedford:
To me, his arguments sound too much like “herd immunity” type arguments that we’ve all heard before. I’m uncomfortable with that line of reasoning.
Why?
0) Herd immunity doesn’t work – vaccines work. (There never was any herd immunity from smallpox.)
1) Reports are that Omicron is more active in the upper respiratory tracts than Delta and the earlier variants. That’s why it’s less severe – it doesn’t get into the lungs as much, not because everyone has some immunity.
2) Also, the Twitter thread above about NSW seems to indicate that arguments about immunity and previous infections don’t hold for Omicron.
3) Finally, AFAIK, it’s still the case that the vast, vast majority of people hospitalized and dying of Covid (of any variant) in the USA have been unvaccinated. That would seem to argue that previous infection or other somehow non-vaccine protection is far inferior to vaccination.
But we’ll see.
It’s worth a click-over.
Cheers,
Scott.