[Ryan]

Welp. Got home from Hawaii this morning. Took a nap, woke up feeling lousy and initially assumed it was jet lag but used an at-home test to be sure. Came up positive.

No fever and normal pulse ox. Just feels like a normal cold so far. I'm triple-vaxxed and young so not really at risk for much more.

[turtle]

We just buried our Tae Kwon Do Master. He was 60 and covid destroyed his lungs. He got covid back in January and just never made it out of the hospital.

This is the closest person my family has known that has died of covid (complications).

[Brad]

Queen Elizabeth was diagnosed with COVID-19 a couple days ago, yesterday there were reports of hospital equipment being moved into Buckingham Palace, and now she's cancelling various engagements.

Royal family politics aside, it would be a really terrible end to her incredibly long life and career if this pandemic took her out too. I can only begin to imagine how the world would react to that.

On second thought, probably just a big apathetic shrug at this point.

[drewprops]

Condolences to all who are losing people afresh.

The Queen has to keep going until they solve the mystery of Boris Johnson's hair.



...

[psmith2.0]

Originally Posted by Brad Queen Elizabeth was diagnosed with COVID-19 a couple days ago, yesterday there were reports of hospital equipment being moved into Buckingham Palace, and now she's cancelling various engagements. Royal family politics aside, it would be a really terrible end to her incredibly long life and career if this pandemic took her out too. I can only begin to imagine how the world would react to that. On second thought, probably just a big apathetic shrug at this point.

I was about to say, until reading your last paragraph, "I'm not so sure anyone would care, big picture".

But, yeah. Of all things that may end her time. That would be a bite, big picture.

Does that mean Charles finally gets a job?

There are enough Royal Family nerds here in the States to make up for any lack of concern/response anywhere else on the planet. People who wake up at 3am to watch day-long royal wedding coverage, cry/rejoice over new births, who needed therapy after Diana died, who hang on the every word/action of Harry and Meghan, etc. I know a few of these freaks. Holy smokes...they forget to feed their own family dinner, but they can tell you everything William's old lady is wearing in every photo.

"Jeez...why don't you go live there if you're this taken with it all? Can't you see how nobody around you gives a shit?!"

That always goes over great.



Sorry...back to COVID talk/coverage.


PS - I hope she pulls through, of course. I don't wish this bad stuff on anyone, period. The above was more about obsessed weirdos here.

[PB PM]

Originally Posted by drewprops Condolences to all who are losing people afresh. The Queen has to keep going until they solve the mystery of Boris Johnson's hair. ...

I was hoping she’d live long enough for Charles to kick the bucket. But seriously though, I am hoping for that. She’s just a short time from being the longest reigning monarch in history, it would be sad if she goes from COVID. I don’t care much for the monarchy itself, but I respect her as a person.

[Matsu]

It's just terrible what's been happening, and there's no promise of reprieve in sight. Leaders are throwing around the term "endemic" like it's some sort of hard stop on mandates. It's not.

Some credible analyses project the "endemic" will erase longevity gains of the last 20 years, and disproportionately erase any gains towards parity that had been made among racialized and poor populations in the US over that same period.

It has yet to show any sign of killing at less than an order of magnitude greater than the flu. In the US flu deaths are between 12,000-50,000 yearly. If nothing changes, COVID-19 can be expected to claim 120,000-500,000 lives per year during the endemic phase.

Some perspective using 2020 CDC numbers for USA...

Heart disease: 696,962
Cancer: 602,350
COVID-19: 350,831
Accidents (unintentional injuries): 200,955
Stroke (cerebrovascular diseases): 160,264
Chronic lower respiratory diseases: 152,657
Alzheimer’s disease: 134,242
Diabetes: 102,188
Influenza and pneumonia: 53,544
Nephritis, nephrotic syndrome, and nephrosis: 52,547

Not captured there are underlying behavioral causes.

Also from CDC, Smoking is the leading preventable cause of death in the USA. It claims about 450,000 people per year (a lot of those cancers and heart diseases in the list above). About 10% of those deaths are from second hand smoke, which causes about 7000 cancer deaths and 33,000 coronary heart disease deaths in people unlucky enough to have to live/work with or otherwise tolerate chronic smokers. And that's why we have smoking mandates, because if you want to kill yourself, that's up to you, but there are at least some rules to make it a bit harder to kill your children, spouse, patrons, co-workers, etc... All those by-laws and smoke free jursidictional rules which are basically, you know... otherwise known as "Mandates"

I don't see COVID much differently than smoke free mandates. Some may not want to get vaxxed, but restrictions on their ability to endanger others are entirely appropriate, which includes exclusion from non-essential activities and gathering, as well as workplace, masking, testing, travel and quarantine requirements.

[Yontsey]

Originally Posted by Matsu I don't see COVID much differently than smoke free mandates. Some may not want to get vaxxed, but restrictions on their ability to endanger others are entirely appropriate, which includes exclusion from non-essential activities and gathering, as well as workplace, masking, testing, travel and quarantine requirements.

You're living in a dream world on this one. England about to drop all restrictions. Airlines having a hard push to drop all mask restrictions next month. I was at the NBA Allstar weekend all this past weekend, 4 days in a row. No mask or vaccine requirements. If you were vaccinated, you just registered through Clear and got a wrist band. If you weren't, you either did a rapid test there or provided a negative test. Might see stuff like that for awhile but it'll never be a requirement. I have all 3 shots, but we haven't had masks in Ohio, nor have I worn a mask in months. Only when required at the airport a couple months back. Cases here are way down on the average too.

[Matsu]

All depends on the situation on the ground. We have to be prepared for restrictions if/when evidence supports those restrictions. Certainly in Ohio, evidence supports/ed behavioral mandates in place for January early Feb'22 (masks, passports, gathering limitations). Your rolling 7-day average deaths is still at 70/day. It doesn't look like they report every day, but Ohio's average death rate has been between 50-100 consistently since September, and was peaking at about 150/day in mid January.

I'm not saying we will do it, mind. I'm saying we're going to start pretending it's over and it isn't, and that's dangerous even for those who are vaccinated.

Ohio's a nice comparator: Great lakes state, population about 11.7 Million, middle class, urban rural mix. Ontario: great lakes province, population about 14.6 Million, largely urban population concentration.

Ohio total deaths: 35,493
Ontario total deaths: 12,264

I guess 3.6X higher mortality rate is an acceptable trade off ? I don't know your exact breakdown for vaxed vs unvaxed mortality rates, but we can probably assume it's similar to observed rates elsewhere, meaning more of the recent dead are unvaccinated. Enforcement of mandates and social restrictions as a tool to encourage these folks to save their own lives isn't a bad thing.

Edit: Ohio has a nice dashboard, Oye, vaccination rate is low-low-low, 57% all ages.

[Yontsey]

You’re leaving out facts though. Ohio had 2.65m cases reported vs 1.09m in Ontario. While neither is good, the death rate will be higher. Both in that 1.1-1.3% mortality rate. So Ontario and Ohio are essentially the same.

As for Ohio, we didn’t really impose any new mandates in January. They had a couple Cavs games where they required masks but no one wore them. Same with concerts in the same venue. I went to 3 Cavs games and saw Kacey Musgraves and masks were far and few between. All while daily avgs plummeted. It is what it is at this point.

For vaccination rates, I want to say Ohio is around 60%.

[Matsu]

I didn't mean too leave that info out, but it fits hand in glove with the case I'm making, which is that mandates save lives because they prevent infections. Ontario had/has restrictions on gathering, workplace and public masking and distancing mandates, vaccine passports, and 81% vaccination rate (all ages) and 85% vaccination all persons over 5 years of age, with a further 4% partially vaccinated. They're not the same because one has been much more successful at preventing spread and vaccinating more people earlier.

[Frank777]

Originally Posted by Matsu I didn't mean too leave that info out, but it fits hand in glove with the case I'm making, which is that mandates save lives because they prevent infections. Ontario had/has restrictions on gathering, workplace and public masking and distancing mandates, vaccine passports, and 81% vaccination rate (all ages) and 85% vaccination all persons over 5 years of age, with a further 4% partially vaccinated. They're not the same because one has been much more successful at preventing spread and vaccinating more people earlier.

Matsu, are we sure that the mandates are themselves saving lives, or merely prolonging some of them?

Yontsey points out that the virus mortality rate looks largely the same across the jurisdictions. Assuming that locking down is not a strategy that can be implemented much longer than it already has, then the virus is going to run across the population at some point.

I don't know much about the data myself, and apparently there's a reason for that. (Don't bother asking if the Ottawa crew are releasing more than the CDC.)

But in the absence of data, I'm starting to believe that a lot, if not most, of the over-70 deaths would have happened anytime they were exposed.
No one has suggested that two years of popping Vitamin D tablets has made anyone more personally safe from the virus.

And so then one wonders if that's the case, why would we lockdown our economy and cause more obesity, drug overdoses, mental health collapses, bankruptcies, divorces and the like, in order to save lives we seem unable to save.

Remember, I'm pro-life. I'm happy to live with emergency restrictions if it can be shown to save lives.
If Omicron's truly less lethal and people were saved long-term by holding them back from the more dangerous variants, that's a huge win.

However, we all got into this not because we thought we could save people by restricting their movements.
We signed up to save lives because the ERs were going to be overrun. And that is apparently no longer a concern.

[chucker]

Originally Posted by Frank777 Matsu, are we sure that the mandates are themselves saving lives, or merely prolonging some of them?

Yikes. And also, yes.

[Frank777]

C'mon chucker, I'm just asking for the data points we are using to evaluate success.

I mean, this month the Washington Post/Bloomberg ran a headline saying "Mask Mandates didn't make much of a difference anyway."

[chucker]

It is intuitive that a barrier ought to prevent germs from being emitted into the air. But if that’s true, why isn’t there more evidence for the benefits of masking two years into the pandemic?

There is plenty of evidence.

For example, effect of masks on transmission in public transport: https://twitter.com/dfisman/status/1...818886145?s=21

[drewprops]

I don't think this has been shared here yet. A new study shows that deep cleaning is not particularly helpful at reducing the spread of Covid. According to their research Covid isn't floating on aerosolized water droplets, it's floating on aerosolized mucus droplets instead. The spike protein gets filled with proteins from the mucus as it dries, and the signature spike protein on the outer shell of the virus becomes bound with the mucus proteins. Even rehydrating the Covid virus doesn't seem to clear those fouled spike proteins.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/med...why/ar-AAU8Tu6


...

[PB PM]

Originally Posted by Frank777 C'mon chucker, I'm just asking for the data points we are using to evaluate success. I mean, this month the Washington Post/Bloomberg ran a headline saying "Mask Mandates didn't make much of a difference anyway."

That’s like saying, not using a mask while spray painting, metal working, sanding, or working in extremely dusty environments is pointless. I also hear similar arguments from people who won’t use ear protection when working with loud gas powered tools. I can tell you from experience that it makes a difference in all those cases.

I don’t think the mask mandates were a bad idea at all. Even if all they did was limit the spread of other viruses, the mandates still achieved something. If anything the type of mask we’ve been forced to use, surgical for the most part, has limited the effectiveness of mask mandates, rather than the other way around.

[drewprops]

I guess it all boils down to what we each believe "matters".

What is the return on investment?

...

[psmith2.0]

Originally Posted by PB PM I also hear similar arguments from people who won’t use ear protection when working with loud gas powered tools. I can tell you from experience that it makes a difference in all those cases.

If I can reach any younger whippersnapper here, I can't stress the above enough.

Three-plus decades of playing music/bands and woodworking/building stuff, and only using ear protection these past 5-6 years, has been one of my biggest regrets in life. I brought this encroaching deafness/indistinct-wash-of-noise on myself by being stupid for 30+ years, too "cool" to be seen with anything in my ears in my teens, 20's/30's, and too "I need to get this done" to do so in my 30's and 40's, flipping on saws and routers and taking all that harsh noise, inches away, at full strength. Be smarter, and more responsible, than I was. Please. PS - I've never skimped on the eye protection, I'm happy to say. I took Norm's advice to heart, from day one.

[Matsu]

I worked on OSHA policies for a number of years. It’s amazing how little worker protection existed just a generation ago. My dad died of a degenerative disorder after a career of working with solvents and petrochemicals and metals. Nothing that would be considered exotic, just the stuff you’d find on a regular machinists bench and mechanics station way back when mechanics were equal parts fabricator and did a lot of grinding, soldering, welding, etc. They didn’t wear masks, or cover their skin. Hell, he used to clean the grease off his hands with some solvents. Did it cause his illness? Who knows. Three of his close friends died of cancer, and most of those products they used would have specific handling instructions today or have been outright replaced.

[Frank777]

I have a distant family member who went blind from working with chemicals from their job.

And I'm not an anti-masker, I've personally used a mask since the mandates started, and continue to today.

But while I'm out shopping, I see hordes of people who are deliberately defeating the purpose of the mask, and others who are clearly using it incorrectly.

It's not a crime to wonder aloud if the mask mandates are making a huge difference out there, when everyone can see that there is rampant non-compliance.

[chucker]

Originally Posted by Frank777 But while I'm out shopping, I see hordes of people who are deliberately defeating the purpose of the mask, and others who are clearly using it incorrectly. It's not a crime to wonder aloud if the mask mandates are making a huge difference out there, when everyone can see that there is rampant non-compliance.

“Are masks even that effective” is a very different question than “are masks even that effective when so many can’t or won’t wear them correctly”, though?

[Frank777]

Originally Posted by chucker “Are masks even that effective” is a very different question than “are masks even that effective when so many can’t or won’t wear them correctly”, though?

Originally Posted by Frank777 Matsu, are we sure that the mandates are themselves saving lives...

My question was about the mandates, not the masks themselves.

[PB PM]

Never thought of you as an anti-masker, hope it didn’t come across that way. You have legitimate questions, no issue with that. There was a report on the effectiveness of masks, solid face shields and the plastic barriers in stores here in BC in January, IIRC.

Ideally yes, we’d all have N95 masks, and learn how to use them properly. The plastic shields were shown to not be helpful, unless the building has a good ventilation system the cycles the air quickly.

[chucker]

Originally Posted by Frank777 My question was about the mandates, not the masks themselves.

So, is it the enforcement that you're questioning? Because that isn't what the WaPo article you linked did; it outright questioned whether masks are even that effective. The author's phrasing implied to me that the author did assume that people wear them properly.

[drewprops]

I've seen masks used as totems from deep in the days of no vaccinations. Probably posted about it here. It's as if the mere presence of a mask about their person (chin, ear, hand) were enough to satisfy the requirements.


...

[Yontsey]

Let's be honest, the mask mandates didn't do shit. You're a fool if you think they did.

Cleveland had like a 94% drop in the last month and zero mask mandates. We went from like 20k a day to less than 1000 a day. My county is at less then 50 every 100k people.

And I voted for Biden.

[Matsu]

The data comparing jurisdictions with mandates to those without says otherwise. Compliance is never going to be perfect, but that doesn't invalidate specific efforts.

That's not why I chimed in though: China is currently in the midst of its largest outbreak since this began owing to an even more aggressive Omicron subvariant. So, it will be important to understand what they did and didn't do to leave themselves vulnerable, and how we compare.

I wonder if Trudeau will grow a spine and temporarily suspend in-bound non-essential visitors from China or restrict return travel from same pending further analysis/reporting?

[PB PM]

Unlikely anything will change, the government has been spineless since the day we first heard about COVID. Why take preventive measures when you can react once the disaster happens? Actually, that defines every government in the history of the planet.

[Matsu]

To be fair this is almost on no one's radar right now, but it should be, because it would be an absolute disaster to find ourselves set back to day one measures if we lose control of this thing again.