COVID-19 Megathread 6: Return of the Omicron

[Hammy]

No, it'll never end.

There will be no herd immunity, and the virus will just mutate endlessly. This is life now.

Do you think we should wear masks 24/7, even in our homes, forever?

I mean, Covid is worse than the Black Death after all.

I mean, Covid is worse than the Black Death after all.

SnowLabrador and the Trump Virus seem to think it is.

No, we shouldn't have anymore mask mandates and we shouldn't have more lockdowns.

Covid isn't close to the Black Death but you're an idiot if you think it's a simple cold.

You guys think that urging caution means we want Americans stuck in their homes forever?

Quite a few red avatars here have been advocating permanent restrictions, including one of the D-NY posters saying we should be acting like China.

[Hammy]

My covid got worse for about a day after my last post. At its worst, it was like a bad cold. I may be underrating its severity since my previous illness, in December, was the worst flu of my life (tested, not covid). Since yesterday morning I have been back on the upswing. Main remaining symptoms are fatigue and that annoying dry covid cough.

Hoping you get better soon, but also a reminder to other posters that even mild covid can knock you down for awhile, in my case even my allergies are utter misery to deal with.

[Hammy]

yawn.. covid smovid.

just live normally.. go to work.. take your trip Gmac.

Don't worry about covid. pretend you are not even infected!

"Go out, infect other people. Some will die. Covid smovid."

No one's really dying of covid anymore.

3000+ people have died in the last ten days. Anybody who's sick with covid should stay away from other people, same with any other communicable disease that can kill--it's completely insane, selfish, and utterly inhuman to decide people with active, visible infections should intentionally go around and spread it to others as some sort of act of normalcy.

[Hammy]

I tested positive on June 30, and only had mild symptoms the whole time.

Still positive today

You'll be fine. You have extra immunity for the winter. Id rather get covid in summer than winter.

Also, STOP WORRYING ABOUT COVID.  you are making yourself SICK.

Relax and calm down

I’m not worried. I’m not sick anymore.

Just annoyed that aim still positive because my family is getting together this weekend for my dad’s birthday. If I’m not negative by then I can’t attend.

At this point I would contact the doctor and ask what to do. When my mom had covid back in late 2020 she was testing positive for two months after before she decided to quit bothering, but the flip side of that is I'm the only other person in the house, and as she'd worked in healthcare was content with continuing to mask in public

[Hammy]

https://www.cnn.com/2022/07/13/world/coronavirus-newsletter-intl-07-13-22/index.html

The 'worst variant' is here

Normally I don't like linking CNN but this alarmism needs called out--they are calling it "the worst" purely because it has a higher rate of transmission/infection, even though later in the article points out it's no more severe than any other recent variant..

By CNN's own metric of solely going on transmissibility to qualify as "the worst", the common cold is worse than covid.

[Hammy]

Hopefully this puts an end to all those conspiracy theories about this virus being lab-grown:

New studies bolster theory coronavirus emerged from the wild

If only conspiracy theorists cared about facts, we wouldn't have the lab leak theory in the first place.

[Hammy]

Hopefully this puts an end to all those conspiracy theories about this virus being lab-grown:

New studies bolster theory coronavirus emerged from the wild

If only conspiracy theorists cared about facts, we wouldn't have the lab leak theory in the first place.

I don’t see what was wrong with entertaining the idea until we had further info. It was a possibility at least.

The problem is those who were pitching it treated it as absolute, unquestionable fact from day one. So I doubt confirming it wasn't the case will have any impact on those who still believe it.

[Hammy]

https://twitter.com/asosin/status/1554825979255832576?s=20&t=UE6ZBf8xaZatcR6...

https://twitter.com/mims/status/1553794492733554694?s=20&t=_M1dv1Jou-Ozuy3Eh...

Most of them are just hypochondriacs.

The fact that it almost always seems that liberals get sicker with covid proves it.

You've lost your mind and are getting as bad with this as the cons with election denial.  And the bold is patently false.

[Hammy]

https://twitter.com/asosin/status/1554825979255832576?s=20&t=UE6ZBf8xaZatcR6...

https://twitter.com/mims/status/1553794492733554694?s=20&t=_M1dv1Jou-Ozuy3Eh...

Most of them are just hypochondriacs.

The fact that it almost always seems that liberals get sicker with covid proves it.

You've lost your mind and are getting as bad with this as the cons with election denial.  And the bold is patently false.

It might be true about "long covid" (which I suspect is largely psychosomatic).  Most people I know have had covid at least once (many twice), and the only "long covid" I know of anyone having is loss of smell (and that's confined to people who had it in 2020).

Long covid is certainly real and mostly tends to involve milder symptoms, rather than anything life-threatening.

But that said, I think it shows we need to have a larger cultural discussion around both mental health impacts of any sort of illness, and how debilitating even 'mild' illnesses can have. One of the primary lingering effects of covid is fatigue (and it's quite likely it can lead to chronic fatigue syndrome) along with sinus problems, something I can say as an allergy sufferer can knock you out of commission--and when they wear you out, they also lead to mental fatigue.

Even with a cold for instance, even though they're not dangerous, the fatigue alone can make it hard to sustain energy for work-related tasks and make mistakes more likely.

[Hammy]

The general consensus among real scientists is that we should have just followed the Great Barrington Declaration.

The same people deny climate change.

[Hammy]

https://twitter.com/gregggonsalves/status/1571106995318722561?s=20&t=V1p7A3x...

Gregg Gonsalves is just flat-out lying about this. A week ago, it was about 335, and it will probably turn out that it's been in the low 300s in the week since. It hasn't been above 450 since April.

Why do you lie and make the most easily disprovable comments? Your lying since covid started has bordered on pathological

[Hammy]

Why do you lie and make the most easily disprovable comments? Your lying since covid started has bordered on pathological

Because what I said is the truth.

Worldometer says the average as of a week ago is only 349, down from 410 a week earlier.

Worldometer is not using accurate numbers if there are higher numbers elsewhere. Most people (myself included) are ready to move on from the restrictions so it's like you're trying to convince yourself more than anything that the numbers are lower than they are, which is just insanity

[Hammy]

I don't see anything wrong with using the Worldometer numbers. We've been primarily using them in this thread since the start of the pandemic. Other counters like Johns Hopkins or CNN source their numbers differently and there's a lag.

I've been using the NYT/Our World in Data source from day one as it's the most readily available and seems to be updated the fastest and you can zoom in and get day by day data.

[Hammy]

Congress is getting complacent about COVID:

https://twitter.com/mcbridetd/status/1609536511313076224

The lack of specialized Covid-19 treatments for people with weak immune systems has left millions of Americans with limited options if they get sick as the pandemic heads into an uncertain winter.

Once heralded as game-changers for Covid patients considered at risk for getting seriously ill — one was used to treat then-President Donald Trump in 2020 — monoclonal antibodies are now largely ineffective against current Covid variants. Easier-to-administer antiviral drugs, such as Paxlovid, have largely taken their place but aren’t safe for all immune-compromised people because they interact with many other drugs.

But the federal government funding that drove drug development in the early days of the pandemic has dried up, and lawmakers have rebuffed the Biden administration’s pleas for more. Without that, there’s little incentive for drugmakers to work on new antibody treatments that could be more effective.

And without a government program like Operation Warp Speed to develop second-generation vaccines and treatments, at-risk patients could be in danger of developing severe cases of Covid and flooding hospitals when the U.S. health care system is already strained, thanks to an influx of patients with an array of respiratory illnesses, including flu and RSV.

Congress doesn't care about healthcare--this isn't exclusive to covid, not by a long shot.