Octopus Overlords

Isgrimnur wrote: Sun Sep 25, 2022 5:01 pm Time is a flat circle. And full of selfish assholes.

Prelude to winter? With exceptions, COVID cases are increasing in the Northeast with BA4.6 starting to make a move. Highest along Eastern seaboard with Region 7 exception. BA4.6 is pretty immune invasive & evades Evusheld preventive antibody. May be recombinant variant. New vax!

Kurth wrote: Wed Sep 28, 2022 10:48 am It highlights just how few people are getting seriously ill - let alone facing death - from COVID today.

Smoove_B wrote: Wed Sep 28, 2022 11:19 am

Kurth wrote: Wed Sep 28, 2022 10:48 am It highlights just how few people are getting seriously ill - let alone facing death - from COVID today.

And I know I'm a broken record on this, but it's not just about death. Initially? Sure. The Long Covid element is still unclear and I'm not sure we're going to get answers anytime soon. I had someone ask me when I was going to stop stressing about all this and I think my answer is now connected to Long Covid. Namely, identifying exactly what it is, who's at greatest risk and figuring out how to treat it (if possible).

Difficulty thinking or concentrating (sometimes referred to as “brain fog”)
Headache.
Sleep problems.
Dizziness when you stand up (lightheadedness)
Pins-and-needles feelings.
Change in smell or taste.
Depression or anxiety.

Blackhawk wrote: Wed Sep 28, 2022 3:10 pm Short of death, I'm not that worried about the immediate experience of being sick with COVID. Sickness and pain suck. Hospitals suck. But all are temporary things, and things I've survived before. I'm more worried about what the remaining years of my life are going to be like.

Maybe Long COVID isn't what we think it is. Maybe we'll find that it's temporary, too. Maybe we'll find a 'cure'. Or maybe we won't, and it really is going to have me barely functional for the remaining 20-40 years of my life. We just don't know.

And if we don't know, how foolish would I have to be to completely disregard it? It's not a guarantee, but it is, without question, a risk, and one where being wrong could destroy my life and my dreams. We're not talking about shutting down the country here, but basic precautions that are nothing but a minor inconvenience? Hey, do you. But you'll have to forgive me if I think that the cost/risk balance is pretty heavy in favor of getting a shot and putting on a damned mask.

Max Peck wrote: Wed Sep 28, 2022 4:39 pm

Blackhawk wrote: Wed Sep 28, 2022 3:10 pm Short of death, I'm not that worried about the immediate experience of being sick with COVID. Sickness and pain suck. Hospitals suck. But all are temporary things, and things I've survived before. I'm more worried about what the remaining years of my life are going to be like.

Maybe Long COVID isn't what we think it is. Maybe we'll find that it's temporary, too. Maybe we'll find a 'cure'. Or maybe we won't, and it really is going to have me barely functional for the remaining 20-40 years of my life. We just don't know.

And if we don't know, how foolish would I have to be to completely disregard it? It's not a guarantee, but it is, without question, a risk, and one where being wrong could destroy my life and my dreams. We're not talking about shutting down the country here, but basic precautions that are nothing but a minor inconvenience? Hey, do you. But you'll have to forgive me if I think that the cost/risk balance is pretty heavy in favor of getting a shot and putting on a damned mask.

+1

That's pretty much where my head is at too.

MA COVID wastewater levels took a big jump in recent days - no state case/hospitalization reports since Thurs given weekly state reporting. But it’s clear that we are on a rapid upswing. Plan accordingly.

Victoria Raverna wrote: Thu Sep 29, 2022 12:14 am I can understand if there are people that are against vaccine because they don't trust it but I can't understand people that are against wearing masks to prevent COVID-19.

Kurth wrote: Thu Sep 29, 2022 1:35 am It’s not that the vax or boosters are without a cost (one I’m also privileged enough to bear while taking a paid sick day if I have to), but they are short term and seem far more bearable to me than perpetually masking up and social distancing.

Smoove_B wrote: Thu Sep 29, 2022 10:46 am

Kurth wrote: Thu Sep 29, 2022 1:35 am It’s not that the vax or boosters are without a cost (one I’m also privileged enough to bear while taking a paid sick day if I have to), but they are short term and seem far more bearable to me than perpetually masking up and social distancing.

We're drifting into the other thread here, but how do you feel about mandating masking in places where people need to be? Ignoring work (which is a giant, gaping hole), what about places like doctor's offices, post office, supermarkets, banks, mass transit and arguably schools? Here I'm focusing on places that people don't have a choice but to go in order to conduct business or they're legally required to be present (like school or a courtroom).

Again, moving away from "perpetually masking everywhere" to making sure we're focusing on places and areas that at-risk people need to be.

Things have undoubtedly improved since the peak of the crisis, but calling the pandemic “over” is like calling a fight “finished” because your opponent is punching you in the ribs instead of the face.

Mariame Kaba: “Hope is a discipline.”
Paul Farmer: “You fight the long defeat.”
James Stockdale: Combine “the need for absolute, unwavering faith that you can prevail” with “the discipline to begin by confronting the brutal facts.”
These are my touchstones.

Smoove_B wrote: Fri Sep 30, 2022 10:56 am I would also like to take a sabbatical, so yeah - I feel it Mr. Yong. This quote is one I should print out and hang around my neck:

Things have undoubtedly improved since the peak of the crisis, but calling the pandemic “over” is like calling a fight “finished” because your opponent is punching you in the ribs instead of the face.

I do think he's correct, and his observation is likely what's been eating at me (and my peers) this whole time - a realization that not only is the current effort FUBAR but all indications point toward nothing changing in the bigger picture; it will indeed all happen again and we're going to let it. It's making my area of knowledge seem completely useless - because it's pretty clear now that when pressed, we're not going to do the right thing.

A rather prominent public health figure was chased off Twitter last night, so it's been a rough 12 hours. It's also reinforced just how horrific social media is, especially for Covid-19 related discussions. After 2.5+ years it's now worse, not better.

EDIT: Regardless, from deep (so deep) in his thread (above) he provides this gem:

Mariame Kaba: “Hope is a discipline.”
Paul Farmer: “You fight the long defeat.”
James Stockdale: Combine “the need for absolute, unwavering faith that you can prevail” with “the discipline to begin by confronting the brutal facts.”
These are my touchstones.

Kurth wrote: Fri Sep 30, 2022 1:46 pm
Anyway, my point is just to suggest that maybe you shouldn't take the view that our failures in the face of COVID mean that effectively responding to other infectious disease is going to be impossible in the future.

Mounting legal challenges to pandemic public health rules — and judges’ increasing willingness to overrule medical experts — threaten to erode the influence of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other government health authorities.

In the last year, four court rulings against the CDC, including one from the Supreme Court, have forced the agency to stop or change its pandemic mitigation orders. Most recently, a Florida district judge ordered a national injunction ending the agency’s mask mandate on public transport.

“Litigation invites litigation invites litigation,” said Wendy Parmet, faculty co-director at the Center for Health Policy and Law at Northeastern University. It’s a cycle that “creates enormous uncertainty about what CDC could do going forward should the pandemic worsen again, or should another pandemic or even a more regional outbreak arise.”

The high-profile challenges to the CDC sit atop thousands more lawsuits against state and local health authorities that have been filed during the pandemic, experts say, seeking to end localized social distancing and mask orders, vaccine mandates and business closures.

Smoove_B wrote: Fri Sep 30, 2022 2:01 pm EDIT: I guess to be clear, I do believe our laws and regulations likely need review and update; they were never designed to address a modern pandemic.

The two subvariants of particular concern are known as BQ.1 and BQ.1.1, both off-shoots of the omicron variant BA.5 (but with several key changes.) Indeed, they seem able to evade many of the tools we have to defend against it, which could trigger a wave of hospitalizations, disabling victims with long COVID or death.

Also worrying are two other strains: one called BA.2.75.2, which seems to be spreading quickly in Singapore, India and regions of Europe; and XBB, which some research suggests is the most antibody-evasive strain tested, almost on the level of the SARS-CoV-1 virus (known then simply as "SARS") that caused an outbreak in 2003. This could make the new vaccines relatively useless (but still better than nothing.) Moreover, an outbreak caused by one of these highly drug- and antibody-resistant variants could be much worse due to many world governments performing far less testing and reduced public health surveillance compared to 2020 and 2021.

"The degree of immune escape and evasion is amazing right now, crazy," Yunlong Richard Cao, an immunologist at Peking University in Beijing, told Nature this week. Cao co-authored a paper, which has yet to be peer-reviewed, that seems to show previous infections by BA.5 and antibody drugs, including Evusheld and Bebtelovimab, aren't enough to stop a BQ.1 infection.

"Such rapid and simultaneous emergence of multiple variants with enormous growth advantages is unprecedented," Cao and his colleagues warned in the study. "These results suggest that current herd immunity and BA.5 vaccine boosters may not provide sufficiently broad protection against infection."

Meanwhile, BA.2.75.2, an offshoot of the Centaurus omicron subvariant, also shows stark ability to evade antibodies. While it isn't a big deal in the West yet, it is seemingly spreading quickly in India. Some research from Sweden, which also isn't yet peer reviewed but is in line with Cao's research, described BA.2.75.2 as "the most neutralisation resistant variant evaluated to date."

Not only are variants changing, so are the symptoms. Recent reports from the U.K. suggest that a sore throat is now the dominant symptom of COVID infection, rather than fever or loss of smell.

"Fever and loss of smell are really rare now — so many old people may not think they've got COVID," Professor Tim Spector, co-founder of the Covid ZOE app, told The Independent. "They'd say it's a cold and not be tested."

Isgrimnur wrote: Tue Oct 04, 2022 9:57 pm If we breed it down to a level of a rhinovirus, is that a win?

Smoove_B wrote: Tue Oct 04, 2022 10:33 pm I think that's for the variants circulating in the UK and in India. For what we're seeing here in the U.S. that's still primarily BA.5, so I'd expect fever, sorry.

Hope you get good news.

Smoove_B wrote: Tue Oct 04, 2022 10:33 pmHope you get good news.

LawBeefaroni wrote: Wed Oct 05, 2022 10:32 am Daughter went to sleep-over camp with school last week. Yesterday we got a close contact notification from the school. "Wear a mask for 6 days, continue to got to school. It's all good, we just have to inform you due to some stupid rules or whatever. Also, we will provide you with self-tests to be administered yesterday and in 2 days. We should have the tests to you by next week "

Zaxxon wrote: Wed Oct 05, 2022 10:39 amIn a similar vein: Most Americans don’t plan to get a flu shot this season — lots of them say they’ll mask to avoid germs instead.

LOLOLOLOLOLOL

we will provide you with self-tests to be administered yesterday

Zaxxon wrote: Wed Oct 05, 2022 10:39 amIn a similar vein: Most Americans don’t plan to get a flu shot this season — lots of them say they’ll mask to avoid germs instead.

LOLOLOLOLOLOL

In health departments, too, the workforce is threadbare. As local leaders tackle multiple infectious diseases at once, “it’s becoming a zero-sum game,” says Maria Sundaram, an epidemiologist at the Marshfield Clinic Research Institute.

...

“I have staff doing the jobs of three to five people,” she said. “We are in absolute crisis.” Staff have left to take positions as Amazon drivers, who “make so much more per hour.”

Kurth wrote: Wed Sep 28, 2022 11:30 am

Difficulty thinking or concentrating (sometimes referred to as “brain fog”)
Headache.
Sleep problems.
Dizziness when you stand up (lightheadedness)
Pins-and-needles feelings.
Change in smell or taste.
Depression or anxiety.

Sooo... I have all of those except the last one. The headaches also aren't constant so not a big deal until they hit.
I know that long Covid was tossed around as a possible cause to all myedical issues (the kidney failure and strokes and everything else) bit no way to confirm it.
I have decided to just not believe in Covid anymore. If Disney has taught me anything it's that if you dont believe in something it disappears.
Noble prize here I come!

Smoove_B wrote: Fri Sep 30, 2022 2:18 pm Seriously. Once again, vaccines and the childhood vaccination programs are a victim of their own success. How naive I was when I thought the vaccination issue would be put to rest in the mid 2000s. It's without question worse now than it was in the years that followed Wakefield's study.

It reminds me of that scene in Kindergarten Cop where the bad guy is in a pharmacy with his mom and the mom is getting meds for his son and he says something like "you gave me all that crap when I was a kid and I never even got sick" and the mom replies "why do you think you never got sick"
It also reminds me of IT. When you do the job right and nothing ever breaks it makes it look like you aren't needed.

Victoria Raverna wrote: Thu Oct 06, 2022 12:09 am What type of staffs are those? I'm surprised Amazon's drivers "make so much more per hour" than workers in a research institute.

Victoria Raverna wrote: Thu Oct 06, 2022 12:09 am What type of staffs are those? I'm surprised Amazon's drivers "make so much more per hour" than workers in a research institute.