COVID-19 Megathread 6: Return of the Omicron

[Koharu]

Glad to know that 320 people a day is "nobody." That's still significantly higher than, say, the flu (~90ish a day, averaged out over the year) and car accident deaths (~100 a day).

[Mr. Morden]

Glad to know that 320 people a day is "nobody." That's still significantly higher than, say, the flu (~90ish a day, averaged out over the year) and car accident deaths (~100 a day).

It is of course possible for Covid to be killing people, and yet for "excess deaths" to be zero.  That's because, regardless of cause of death, everyone who dies from Cause A, had they not been killed by Cause A, would have eventually died from one of Cause B, C, D, E, etc.  And so, it's a matter of timing.  You could have a situation where Covid is preferentially killing people who would otherwise be soon to die of something else.  Or you could have a situation where a large fraction of those who would have otherwise died this year from some other cause ended up getting killed by Covid in 2020 or 2021.

By some combination of those effects, you could in fact have fewer total people dying in July 2022 than in (pre-Covid) July 2019, and yet Covid still being a top 5 cause of death in July 2022 that was non-existent in July 2019.

[Since I'm the mad scientist proclaimed by myself]

Glad to know that 320 people a day is "nobody." That's still significantly higher than, say, the flu (~90ish a day, averaged out over the year) and car accident deaths (~100 a day).

Considering that most of the people dying are disabled, and acknowledging that this is still a problem might mean having to mildly inconvenience oneself by wearing a mask, our society is never going to be admitting that its a problem.

[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.

[Pericles]

Glad to know that 320 people a day is "nobody." That's still significantly higher than, say, the flu (~90ish a day, averaged out over the year) and car accident deaths (~100 a day).

My feeling is that Covid deaths, while tragically still happening, are now overstated by the official death tolls. Omicron being so transmissible but also milder means that a meaningful portion of it could be people who have mild Covid but also happen to die soon after of other causes.

[Koharu]

It is of course possible for Covid to be killing people, and yet for "excess deaths" to be zero.   -Snip-

I wasn't directly responding to you--I should have quoted the post I was. It was a page earlier.

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.  The winter Omicron wave was the last time covid was causing a statistically significant number of deaths.  It's never going to be literally zero due to the whole deaths from covid/deaths with covid thing, but recent waves haven't seen deaths increase at all from the trough.  So, yes, I unironically believe covid positive people should go about their lives unless they feel sick enough to be more comfortable staying at home.

Like I said, 300 people a day, more than the flu or car accidents on a daily average, is not nobody.

[emailking]

I think he's saying the the number dying of Covid is a lot less than 300 and may be 0. Now that's debatable, but I don't think he's saying 300 dying of Covid is trivial.

[Fmr. Gov. NickG]

Assuming this is accurate, it looks like the number of excess deaths in the US is now ~zero.  In fact, there were slightly more deaths per week at this point in 2018 and 2019 then there are now:

https://twitter.com/lymanstoneky/status/1545065471497617408

Who chose the colors on this graph?  You have nine lines, five of which are all shades of red. The shades for 2016 & 2021 and 2017 & 2022 appear to me to be identical.  It makes the graph much more confusing than it needs to be. 

[Хahar 🤔]

Assuming this is accurate, it looks like the number of excess deaths in the US is now ~zero.  In fact, there were slightly more deaths per week at this point in 2018 and 2019 then there are now:

https://twitter.com/lymanstoneky/status/1545065471497617408

Who chose the colors on this graph?  You have nine lines, five of which are all shades of red. The shades for 2016 & 2021 and 2017 & 2022 appear to me to be identical.  It makes the graph much more confusing than it needs to be. 

I don't think there's any way to make it good, because with a line graph you can realistically only manage four or five lines before it becomes too much for the human eye to account for at a glance even with optimal color choices, but these colors certainly make things a lot worse.

https://twitter.com/lymanstoneky/status/1545087431057330176

I sure hope nobody is paying this guy for this kind of work!

[Meclazine for Israel]

Got my 4th COVID shot today.

Sore arm-itis.

[Inmate Trump]

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

Still positive today

[jamestroll]

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

[jamestroll]

Youngkin is getting a lot of back lash from state workers for calling them back into the office.

Nope, they can no longer use the pandemic as an excuse to work in their pajamas. Those lazy s. Virginia state workers are notoriously LAZY.

HAHA I saw a few comments of people upset of this calling him Trumpkin.  Lmao

[Inmate Trump]

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.

[BG-NY]

We need to ramp up vaccinations again.

[100% pro-life no matter what]

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.

The CDC doesn't even recommend continuing to test this long after an infection.

[jamestroll]

Youngkin is getting a lot of back lash from state workers for calling them back into the office.

Nope, they can no longer use the pandemic as an excuse to work in their pajamas. Those lazy s. Virginia state workers are notoriously LAZY.

HAHA I saw a few comments of people upset of this calling him Trumpkin.  Lmao

A sampling of comments online from state workers upset with Youngkin's telework policy.

To me, advocating for mostly well off people working in their pajamas is not my idea of "progressive".

Governing to this Youngkin Bumpkin is easy. He just smiles and lies.

It's a play to replace people with Youngkin sycophants. This is how Republicans plan to govern. It doesn't matter the norms, rules, laws, or anything..so long as the institutions are loyal to the party, then they will carry out the party's bidding.We are watching authoritarianism take hold in America.

Maybe they’ll vote blue next time. You get what you vote for. Elect the guys who deny science and you go back to the office.


Me. If they tell me to go back more than one day a week, at my age, I’m retiring.

Fully remote, so I spend about half the year traveling around and staying at Airbnb’s or with friends and family and work from all over the country


if only our electorate weren’t so ing gullible as to fall for the made-up CRT boogeyman


Tough to fight against literal propaganda and racism when so much of the electorate is racist or dumb as .


Youngkin is a pos tbh

*** glenn youngkin this is what he wanted

I am not opposed to telework and see the benefits it has for everyone. But I wouldn't expect a place like Virginia to have lazy state employees. It does... and they need to be monitored.  I have heard many horror stories of bad service in the state.

Oh.. and I am tired of remote workers using "COVID" as an excuse.. just say you work remotely because you can and do not want to deal with out people. It has nothing to do with "covid" at this point.

[Inmate Trump]

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.

The CDC doesn't even recommend continuing to test this long after an infection.

I’m doing it out of concern for my grandmother.

Do you guys have people in your lives you wish to keep around as long as possible?

[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

[jamestroll]

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.

The CDC doesn't even recommend continuing to test this long after an infection.

I’m doing it out of concern for my grandmother.

Do you guys have people in your lives you wish to keep around as long as possible?

You can put a kn95 MASK on.

[emailking]

FDA gives emergency use authorization to Novavax's Covid-19 vaccine

The US Food and Drug Administration on Wednesday authorized Novavax's Covid-19 vaccine for emergency use in adults. It is the fourth coronavirus vaccine available in the United States, and it uses a different type of vaccine technology than the shots already available.

Novavax's vaccine will be available as two-dose primary series for people 18 and older.

The FDA's independent Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee voted in favor of authorization of the vaccine June 7, saying that the benefits of the vaccine outweigh its risks for adults. It is also being used in 170 other countries.

The shots can't be administered until the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's independent vaccine advisers weigh in on whether to recommend the vaccine and the CDC director has signed off on the recommendation. The CDC's Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices is scheduled to meet July 19.

https://www.cnn.com/2022/07/13/health/novavax-covid-vaccine-fda-authorization/index.html

[Progressive Pessimist]

Youngkin is getting a lot of back lash from state workers for calling them back into the office.

Nope, they can no longer use the pandemic as an excuse to work in their pajamas. Those lazy s. Virginia state workers are notoriously LAZY.

HAHA I saw a few comments of people upset of this calling him Trumpkin.  Lmao

You've certainly changed your tune on Youngkin. Last I remember, aside from myself and Non Swing Voter maybe, you were among those who was the most devastated at the prospect of him winning.

[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.

[emailking]

No that's a logical fallacy. If they said it's worse because it's more transmissible but not more severe, it does not follow that their sole metric is transmissibility.

It also does not follow from that that the common cold is worse than Covid. But regardless, Omicron & descendants are more infectious than the common cold! So even if transmissibility was their only metric, the common cold would not be worse.

[Bandit3 the Worker]

Another lie that needs to be called out: The AP ran a piece saying the 7-day average of deaths in the U.S. is 489. Actually, it's 315.