Mikado463

Mikado463

Audioholic Spartan
Folks, just dropped by to wish everyone good luck.
This varrient is exploding. Exploding like nothing on earth ever seen before.

Your fate is already sealed. If you have the booster you'll make it. If not, well, you'll suffer and many will die.

This is so contagious that masks won't save you .

This is biblical stuff.
So you are the 'Grinch' :eek:
 
panteragstk

panteragstk

Audioholic Warlord
Your post sounds like an audiophile salesman just as the customer is about to leave the store without buying anything.
Leave him and his diamond infused power cord alone. His speakers sound better than they ever have.
 
TLS Guy

TLS Guy

Seriously, I have no life.
So where are we now? It is hard to see through the fog.

One thing we do know, is that this omicron variant is incredibly infectious, to an extent never seen before in a respiratory virus.

The big question is how sick do people get, and what immunity is there in the population? This latter makes comparison and using data from other countries, virtually impossible, because of widespread variations in vaccination rates and age.

Now predictions become highly inaccurate and prone to error. So this makes public health and policy guidelines virtually impossible to gauge at this time. The result is chaos, and widely divergent actions in many jurisdictions. Because of this, in the UK their is virtual paralysis and raging arguments, throughout government and the citizenry at large.

Basically what we have now is everyman for himself and individual actions taken in how risk averse they are. So this goes all the way from ignore it, experts are wrong and useless, to massive pull back on social mixing and engagement. This has hit the hospitality industry hard. However it is hard to see most wanting to go off to the pub for a Christmas booze up!

So what do we know about this highly infectious new variant?

Well UK data now strongly suggests that to the unvaccinated this variant is probably no more benign than Delta. However the UK is a highly vaccinated population now, with well over 90% double vaccinated and almost 50% now triple vaccinated and rising fast. Parts of London have low vaccination rates, and this has caused a serious problem, with the Mayo declaring a serious incident, which is in effect a state of emergency.

It seems that two doses of vaccine probably provide marginal benefit from at least serious disease, impact on death not known at this time. Three doses seem to offer pretty good protection against having to be admitted to hospital. Triple vaccination in not preventing a lot of breakthrough infections, so that many are getting a pretty rough few days at home.

It is now clear that everyone will be exposed to this virus sooner rather than later.

So that means with the current weapons we have there more likely than not will be a lot of people sick at home at one time. This is going to have a massive effect on commerce, and keeping hospitals in full operation a nightmare, to say nothing of schools.

Now Moderna say their half dose booster raises lab tested immunity by 35%, a little better than Pfizer at 27%, but probably not significantly so. They say a full booster dose, which I happened to receive, raises lab based immunity 85%. I think there is a trend showing that projections based on lab immunity are likely a little over optimistic.

Moderna say that an omicron specific vaccine is required, and will have one to trial early in the new year.

Now there is a push everywhere for the new antivirals, and calls for massive ramp ups of production. Unfortunately these compounds are complex, entirely synthetic, very hard and expensive to manufacture. So that will be a problem.

Now at this time it would be a good idea to assess your individual risk level by age, from the latest CDC data. Your risk goes up fourfold at 30 to 39, and by 370 times at 85! I will be 75 in less than a month, which increases my risk by 150 times.

So, how to advise people.

Well first, if you are unvaccinated you are an idiot pure and simple. I agree with the Colorado governor, that if you are unvaccinated, get seriously ill or die, it is your own damn fault!

Obviously everyone eligible should get boosted ASAP.

I think obviously the older you are, the greater the precautions you need to take, and that includes the immunocompromised.

I think this variant is so transmissible that draconian lockdown measures are unlikely to be effective.

I would keep out of pubs and restaurants, and not go to events where there are large numbers of people, like concerts, cinemas, theaters etc.

I would limit your social gatherings, keep numbers down and try and make sure people you mix with are fully vaccinated, which should now include a booster.

I think this variant is so infectious that this peak is most likely to be a big, but a relatively brief one.

We may well run out of hospital capacity, so some that otherwise would go to the ICU will have to go to end of life care.

As of this morning we only had one open ICU bed in the whole Twin Cities metro.

Finally I do have a case I became aware of last night. The brother of our daughter in law, who is healthy in his late forties, living in California and is triple vaccinated, came down with a breakthrough case yesterday. He is not in hospital, but by all accounts is having a rough time of it. He was due to join us all for Christmas, so obviously those plans are off.
 
davidscott

davidscott

Audioholic Ninja
Here in Florida our esteemed governor went on FOX with Maria Bartiromo and admitted he had only received one J&J no booster. This from a guy who hired a staunch anti vaxer as Surgeon General. It boggles the mind...
 
M

Mr._Clark

Audioholic Samurai
So where are we now? It is hard to see through the fog.

One thing we do know, is that this omicron variant is incredibly infectious, to an extent never seen before in a respiratory virus.

The big question is how sick do people get, and what immunity is there in the population? This latter makes comparison and using data from other countries, virtually impossible, because of widespread variations in vaccination rates and age.

Now predictions become highly inaccurate and prone to error. So this makes public health and policy guidelines virtually impossible to gauge at this time. The result is chaos, and widely divergent actions in many jurisdictions. Because of this, in the UK their is virtual paralysis and raging arguments, throughout government and the citizenry at large.

Basically what we have now is everyman for himself and individual actions taken in how risk averse they are. So this goes all the way from ignore it, experts are wrong and useless, to massive pull back on social mixing and engagement. This has hit the hospitality industry hard. However it is hard to see most wanting to go off to the pub for a Christmas booze up!

So what do we know about this highly infectious new variant?

Well UK data now strongly suggests that to the unvaccinated this variant is probably no more benign than Delta. However the UK is a highly vaccinated population now, with well over 90% double vaccinated and almost 50% now triple vaccinated and rising fast. Parts of London have low vaccination rates, and this has caused a serious problem, with the Mayo declaring a serious incident, which is in effect a state of emergency.

It seems that two doses of vaccine probably provide marginal benefit from at least serious disease, impact on death not known at this time. Three doses seem to offer pretty good protection against having to be admitted to hospital. Triple vaccination in not preventing a lot of breakthrough infections, so that many are getting a pretty rough few days at home.

It is now clear that everyone will be exposed to this virus sooner rather than later.

So that means with the current weapons we have there more likely than not will be a lot of people sick at home at one time. This is going to have a massive effect on commerce, and keeping hospitals in full operation a nightmare, to say nothing of schools.

Now Moderna say their half dose booster raises lab tested immunity by 35%, a little better than Pfizer at 27%, but probably not significantly so. They say a full booster dose, which I happened to receive, raises lab based immunity 85%. I think there is a trend showing that projections based on lab immunity are likely a little over optimistic.

Moderna say that an omicron specific vaccine is required, and will have one to trial early in the new year.

Now there is a push everywhere for the new antivirals, and calls for massive ramp ups of production. Unfortunately these compounds are complex, entirely synthetic, very hard and expensive to manufacture. So that will be a problem.

Now at this time it would be a good idea to assess your individual risk level by age, from the latest CDC data. Your risk goes up fourfold at 30 to 39, and by 370 times at 85! I will be 75 in less than a month, which increases my risk by 150 times.

So, how to advise people.

Well first, if you are unvaccinated you are an idiot pure and simple. I agree with the Colorado governor, that if you are unvaccinated, get seriously ill or die, it is your own damn fault!

Obviously everyone eligible should get boosted ASAP.

I think obviously the older you are, the greater the precautions you need to take, and that includes the immunocompromised.

I think this variant is so transmissible that draconian lockdown measures are unlikely to be effective.

I would keep out of pubs and restaurants, and not go to events where there are large numbers of people, like concerts, cinemas, theaters etc.

I would limit your social gatherings, keep numbers down and try and make sure people you mix with are fully vaccinated, which should now include a booster.

I think this variant is so infectious that this peak is most likely to be a big, but a relatively brief one.

We may well run out of hospital capacity, so some that otherwise would go to the ICU will have to go to end of life care.

As of this morning we only had one open ICU bed in the whole Twin Cities metro.

Finally I do have a case I became aware of last night. The brother of our daughter in law, who is healthy in his late forties, living in California and is triple vaccinated, came down with a breakthrough case yesterday. He is not in hospital, but by all accounts is having a rough time of it. He was due to join us all for Christmas, so obviously those plans are off.
I take it the breakthrough case In California is omicron?

I'd like to avoid omicron until after the hospitals recover, the Pfizer pills become available, and the GSK antibody treatment becomes more widely available (if ever), etc., but I'm not sure it is possible.

For entertainment tonight, I'm trying to decide between The Sum of All Fears and Pale Rider (If Rainbow Six was out, that might be in the running to see how the "real" Mr Clark would handle the virus).
 
TLS Guy

TLS Guy

Seriously, I have no life.
I take it the breakthrough case In California is omicron?

I'd like to avoid omicron until after the hospitals recover, the Pfizer pills become available, and the GSK antibody treatment becomes more widely available (if ever), etc., but I'm not sure it is possible.

For entertainment tonight, I'm trying to decide between The Sum of All Fears and Pale Rider (If Rainbow Six was out, that might be in the running to see how the "real" Mr Clark would handle the virus).
Yes, it was a California omicron case, where that is the dominant infection now. The GSK antibody treatment as shown activity against omicron antigens, but that is not infield data.

The oral antivirals I expect to be in very short supply for a long time. They have not been produced at the scale required yet. To do that, I don't know if factories will have to be built from the ground up, but I suspect that may well turn out to be the case. Pfizer gave a caution last week, as to the difficulty and expense of manufacture.
 
M

Mr._Clark

Audioholic Samurai
Well, that escalated quickly:

>>>The Omicron Covid-19 variant now accounts for over 73% of new coronavirus cases in the US, according to estimates posted Monday by the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

For the week ending December 18, Omicron accounted for 73.2% of cases, with Delta making up an additional 26.6%.
The week prior, ending December 11, Omicron was estimated at 12.6% of circulating virus, versus Delta's 87%. Previously, the CDC estimated Omicron accounted for about 3% that week.

Omicron is even more prevalent in certain parts of the country — making up over 95% of circulating virus in parts of the Northwest and Southeast, the data shows.<<<

 
Mikado463

Mikado463

Audioholic Spartan
Omicron, per the Nightly News tonight, one death with little to no confirmation as to underlying conditions, etc. Yet the media would have you believe it's time to go into your underground bunker ??
 
highfigh

highfigh

Seriously, I have no life.
If the reports are true that Omicron is more contagious but the symptoms are less severe, maybe this is the mechanism by which we'll reach herd immunity.
 
Trell

Trell

Audioholic Spartan
Omicron, per the Nightly News tonight, one death with little to no confirmation as to underlying conditions, etc. Yet the media would have you believe it's time to go into your underground bunker ??
:rolleyes:

Here we go again.
 
D

Dude#1279435

Audioholic Spartan
Omicron, per the Nightly News tonight, one death with little to no confirmation as to underlying conditions, etc. Yet the media would have you believe it's time to go into your underground bunker ??
That ain't happening. The people are burned out on covid as it is.
 
Mikado463

Mikado463

Audioholic Spartan
If the reports are true that Omicron is more contagious but the symptoms are less severe, maybe this is the mechanism by which we'll reach herd immunity.
fingers crossed ? perhaps the rapid spread will get most of the anti-vaxxers off their duff and get poked ? Per the news this AM the first death reported in Texas was a non-vaccinated individual
 
panteragstk

panteragstk

Audioholic Warlord
fingers crossed ? perhaps the rapid spread will get most of the anti-vaxxers off their duff and get poked ? Per the news this AM the first death reported in Texas was a non-vaccinated individual
I feel like at this point most of the deaths will be from the unvaccinated. I'm sure break out cases will occur, but it won't be the norm.

Time will tell though.
 
M

Mr._Clark

Audioholic Samurai
fingers crossed ? perhaps the rapid spread will get most of the anti-vaxxers off their duff and get poked ? Per the news this AM the first death reported in Texas was a non-vaccinated individual
Non-vaccinated and previously infected:

>>>An unvaccinated man with underlying health conditions died in Texas on Monday after testing positive for the COVID-19 omicron variant, officials in Houston said, marking what is believed to be the first death linked to the strain in the U.S. Harris County Public Health revealed in a statement that the man, who was in his 50s and had previously been infected with COVID-19, died after contracting the omicron variant. The county said the man was “at higher risk of severe complications from COVID-19 due to his unvaccinated status and had underlying health conditions.”<<<

To my mind, it makes sense to do everything you can to increase your odds against this f'ing thing.

 
M

Mr._Clark

Audioholic Samurai
That's strange. It looks to me that between Nov 20th and Dec 20th, hospitalizations in South Africa have increased ten-fold.
Coronavirus (COVID-19) Cases - Statistics and Research - Our World in Data
I haven't read through this in detail, but the 91% decline in hospitalizations is compared to the prior wave. There can be a huge increase in total hospitalizations along with a reduced percentage compared to prior waves. There has been a lot of discussion to the effect that the same decline in % hospitalizations may not occur in the other parts of the world. I don't think anyone knows for sure at this point.

And, of course, a lower % could result in more total hospitalizations and deaths if the omicron wave is much large than prior waves.
 
GO-NAD!

GO-NAD!

Audioholic Spartan
We are shell-shocked here in Nova Scotia right now. Prior to this month, our peak single day case count was 227, back in May. This was quickly wrestled down to virtually nothing by early summer. However, since the beginning of December, each day has seen a steadily increasing case count, blowing past May's peak, past 300, then past 400. Today, it was reported that we hit 522 cases for the day. We are utterly bewildered as to how it went out of control so fast. The provincial government has announced restrictions reminiscent of earlier in the pandemic. It's a pretty depressing beginning to the Christmas holiday season. :(

The only bit of data that offers any encouragement is that, so far, our hospital cases have hardly budged - currently 9, with 2 in the ICU. That's for the entire province.
 
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