BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19

Subject: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 23 Mar 20 - 11:25 AM

Apparently it kills, or can kill, your sense of smell:

https://www.boston.com/news/health/2020/03/23/coronavirus-sense-of-smell/amp

Also Ohio is canceling "nonessential abortions" -- what on earth is a cosmetic abortion?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 23 Mar 20 - 11:32 AM

It is elective surgury.

My sense of smell is off the charts. I'd hate to lose it.

The oldest Congress of US Senators in history is in grave danger

3 are down already

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 23 Mar 20 - 11:35 AM

https://www.quorum.us/data-driven-insights/the-115th-congress-is-among-the-oldest-in-history/175/

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Iains
Date: 23 Mar 20 - 12:15 PM

Almost two thirds of critically ill coronavirus patients are overweight and 37% are under 60, NHS audit reveals

    Excess weight against chest makes it harder for muscles to draw in deep breath
    Weak immune system allows COVID-19 to spread to lungs and cause pneumonia
    These two factors may explain why two thirds of ICU coronavirus patients obese
    Comes as coronavirus death toll in UK rises to 281 and infections sit at 5,600

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: DMcG
Date: 23 Mar 20 - 12:37 PM

And in the general population?

"In the 2017 survey, it found that 28.7% of adults in England are obese and a further 35.6% are overweight, making a total of 64.3% who are either overweight or obese. 2 Of obese adults, around one in eight are morbidly obese (3.6% of all adults)"

Or almost two thirds. So the correlation of the virus and being overweight is uncertain at best.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Iains
Date: 23 Mar 20 - 01:16 PM

You may be right, after all it   was the daily wail reporting. However the statistic is accurate, as is the explanation for the obese requiring intubation. The factor to carry away is that having the virus is a heightened risk if overweight

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: DMcG
Date: 23 Mar 20 - 01:21 PM

But that is exactly the factor you cannot carry away. In *any* random sample of people from England you would expect about two thirds to be overweight. In so far as the figures show anything, they suggest being overweight has no bearing at all on your chances of survival. Of course, a formal analysis would be required, but the prima facie evidence suggests there is no connection.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: DMcG
Date: 23 Mar 20 - 01:24 PM

It matters, by the way, because we don't want people thinking "I am not overweight so my risk is lower." As far as we can tell so far, it isn't.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 23 Mar 20 - 06:36 PM

best case worst case scenario nyt

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Iains
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 04:58 AM

Obesity carries inherant heightened health risks:
Heart disease and stroke.
High blood pressure.
Diabetes.
Cancer.
Gallbladder disease and gallstones.
Osteoarthritis.
Gout.
Breathing problems, such as sleep apnea

Many are associated with increased mortality from Covid-19
In Italy, 76.1% of patients who died from COVID-19 had hypertension, or high blood pressure.
One-third of COVID-19 patients who died in Italy had heart disease.
About one-quarter of people who died from the coronavirus in Italy had atrial fibrillation.
Diabetes was the second most common condition among COVID-19 patients who died: 35.5% had the illness.
Of those who died in Italy, 20.3% had active cancer in the past five years.
The study found that 18% of people who died had chronic kidney disease.
Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease — or lung diseases such as chronic emphysema and bronchitis — was present in 13.2% of the people who died.
People who previously had a stroke made up 9.6% of COVID-19 patients who died in Italy.
In Italy, 6.8% of COVID-19 patients who died had dementia.Chronic liver disease was the 10th most common underlying condition.
My take on this is that if you are overweight you likely have one or more underlying conditions that rank you with a higher risk.
Statistically if you are obese youa re more likely to die.Reducing weight reduces the risk eg less pressure on the heart, perhaps no more diabetes (if type 2 etc.).................
*Type 2 = remission not cure it might be more accurate to say
My source article insisted on mixing up percentages and fractions- not me.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: DMcG
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 05:36 AM

Again, Iains, you quote all those numbers without saying how common they are in the general population.

No one is saying being overweight or obese is good for you, or is without risks. But as yet there is insufficient evidence that you are more liable to become critically ill with coronavirus because of it. That evidence may arrive in time.

But for the moment: EVERYONE should act as if they are as susceptible as everyone else. Not developing the idea that 'that group is at greater risk than I am'. It is no exaggeration to say that attitude could cost lives.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Iains
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 06:14 AM

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/which-groups-are-most-at-risk-from-the-coronavirus/


https://www.npr.org/sections/coronavirus-live-updates/2020/03/22/819846180/study-calculates-just-how-much-age-medical-conditions
Statistically if you are obese you have underlying conditions
underlying conditions make you more vulnerable to covid-19
How many of those conditions are created,enhanced by obesity.
No one argues that cigarette smoking is good for you anymore!
Why is that?
Perhaps the same mindset should apply to obesity(apart from that created by medical conditions)
The reason 60$ of people on ventilators are obese is because gluttony
has a downside.
original report below.

https://www.icnarc.org/About/Latest-News/2020/03/22/Report-On-196-Patients-Critically-Ill-With-Covid-19   (open it up and extract the document inside)

Oxford University research found that moderate obesity, which is now common, reduces life expectancy by about 3 years, and that severe obesity, which is still uncommon, can shorten a person's life by 10 years. This 10 year loss is equal to the effects of lifelong smoking.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 07:11 AM

I haven't heard anything, in spite of being inundated with Coronavirus news like everyone else, that loss of smell or taste are symptoms of Coronavirus. As for acid environments, the pH up your nose as you inhale virus particles, or in your eyes or mouth, is quite likely to be the much same as everyone else's. I know you like to be different and stand out from the crowd, but I might suggest you stick to known facts when it comes to this issue. It's worrying enough without rumour-mongers putting their oar in.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 07:27 AM

Well I did just find this:

"The group wants doctors worldwide to tell their patients to isolate themselves for seven days if they begin to lose their sense of smell or taste, even if they do not have any other COVID-19 symptoms, The New York Times reported. Losing those senses is also a frequent symptom of the common cold, another, milder form of coronavirus.


RELATED: Here’s How to Tell If That Sneeze Is Coronavirus, the Flu or Just a Cold..."

Either you're a sucker who believes everything, or you can take cod-science with a pinch of salt. I mean, when you know that most colds are not caused by coronaviruses and that sneezing is not a symptom of Covid-19, would you believe anything else in the article? Losing your sense of smell happens when you get a cold or other upper respiratory tract infection when you already have the other miserable symptoms. Stick to the dry cough and fever is my advice...not that anyone should listen to my advice...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Iains
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 07:29 AM

The American Academy of Otolaryngology posted on its website this week that the amount of anecdotal evidence of anosmia, hyposmia (reduced ability to smell), and dysgeusia (reduced sense of taste) is significant enough that they are added to the list of screening tools for possible infection.

ENT surgeons in the UK also issued a statement urging that anosmia should be categorized as an important symptom that may indicate infection in an otherwise asymptomatic carrier, allowing clinicians at COVID-19 clinics to quickly rule out or confirm this subtle symptom.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 07:32 AM

I can easily persuade myself that my sense of smell isn't quite as good as it was yesterday. Let's stick to the dry cough and fever.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Iains
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 07:42 AM

When the asymoptomatic are totally unknown in the population and testing is not general it makes sense to use every tool you can. Were this not the case Doctors would not say:
It is significant enough that they are added to the list of screening tools for possible infection.

Cod are best left in the sea I say - the stocks need to recover after EU depradations.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 09:00 AM

No abortions are elective, though. They are needed, not wanted.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 09:36 AM

Mrrzy I understand yet there are meaningful semantics on each side.
owzat for diplomacy? Unlike elective cosmetic surgury it is somthing that can't be postponed.

There are 4 distinct colds caused by a corona varient.

Rhinovirus: This bunch is most active in early fall, spring, and summer. They cause 10%-40% of colds. You'll feel plenty miserable when you catch one, but the good news is they rarely make you seriously sick

Coronavirus. These tend to do their dirty work in the winter and early spring. The coronavirus is the cause of about 20% of colds. There are more than 30 kinds, but only three or four affect people.

RSV and parainfluenza. These viruses cause 20% of colds. They sometimes lead to severe infections, like pneumonia, in young children.



Starbucks will pay employees for 30 days no matter what.


The Stock market has hit bottom and is now becoming a buying opportunity. butcha gotta bee quick.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 09:47 AM

We would agree that pandemic Corona has now become the #1 cold symptom virus n'est pas.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Jeri
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 09:56 AM

From WebMD:

"There are more than 200 [viruses]that can lay you low.

It's likely that someday you'll have a close encounter with one of these types:

Rhinovirus
Coronavirus
RSV and parainfluenza

There are also a lot of viruses that doctors haven't identified. About 20%-30% of colds in adults are caused by these "unknown" bugs."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 10:43 AM

Elon Musk is producing respirators. Some 3D printers are capable of doing so as well.

While Trump wants isolation to end as soon as Monday for the sake of the economy there is not a damn thing he can do about it. Its up to govenors and mayors.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 10:58 AM

I'm still waiting for someone to tell me how you objectively assess whether someone's taste or smell has changed between not having coronavirus (when you wouldn't have thought of asking them about it) and having coronavirus. Leading questions, anyone? At least you can hear someone's cough and measure their temperature...The last thing we need is false positives.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 11:08 AM

"We would agree that pandemic Corona has now become the #1 cold symptom virus n'est pas."

No we wouldn't. The coronavirus that's causing this pandemic doesn't give you common cold symptoms. Stick to what we actually know.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 11:21 AM

no matter the POV won't save lives.


Trump to NYC "FUCK YOU" I'm keeping ventilators in Federal stock pile

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Jeri
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 11:41 AM

A couple of days ago "#presidentcuomo" was trending on Twitter. I don't know about him being president, but he's sure fulfilling the role Trump SHOUD be assuming. His behavior in this crisis will hopefully wake some of his idiot followers up.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 12:50 PM

You can only notice your own sense of smell, unless your roommate suddenly can't tell the milk is off.

No olympics.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 12:55 PM

It really isn’t helpful when the combed-over Orange-Utan currently infesting the White House spreads false information.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 12:59 PM

Since networks have dropped Trump's corona task force which turned into an election rally, so now FOX has an exclusive task force Trump town hall.
Dr. Fauci the world leading infectious disease expert has been REPLACED !

In his stead is the great and powerful Dr. OZ who plays a doctor on TV.    no shit.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: gillymor
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 01:56 PM

I can't find any indication that Fauci has been replaced by Dr.Oz.
Is this another detour from reality?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 04:23 PM

India has shut down.

Texas has joined Ohio in banning cosmetic abortions, whatever they are.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Iains
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 05:04 PM

Interesting article on superforecasting and how it likely shaped Britain's response. It is not often the Express is worth quoting but I have not seen this information elsewhere.

https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/1259539/coronavirus-uk-lockdown-cases-deaths-boris-johnson-dominic-cummings-spt

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: keberoxu
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 05:08 PM

Gillymor,
this appears to be another Donuel satire;

Mr. Fauci spoke to the New York Daily News
protesting against the mutterings
about Fauci's absence from Trump's press conference Monday.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 05:12 PM

The Fox exclusive Trump Town Hall in the rose garden, had Dr Oz for questions, I watched it, they had no other Doctors. What is this detour from reality propoganda. You're the one from Texas where UN conspiracy theories are born. I'm from the beltway where reality goes to die..
As for the Task force with j kushner, who never appears, I don't know.

I am on a Fauci watch later today

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 05:23 PM

Anyone else missing the little things like a haircut, dentist, pancakes, chinese food, 7-11, WaWa, Subway...?,

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: gillymor
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 05:24 PM

More good common sense from Texas

I figured Fauci's days were numbered, nobody upstages the blob and besides, highly competent, truth-telling, professionals aren't welcome in his administration.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 05:46 PM

Fauci is back right behind Trump in his fart vector.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: gillymor
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 05:50 PM

btw, Fauci is on stage with Twit for the CV task force briefing taking place at this moment and, good news, it will all be over by Easter and the churches will be full and it will be beautiful. This dude's elevator doesn't go to the top floor.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 05:54 PM

Hitler would have loved manipulating a pandemic. I think Trump has been drinking liquid luck. Trump argued at his Town Hall how trading old decrepid lives for the economy is practicly a patriotic thing to do.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: gillymor
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 05:58 PM

There is one senior citizen I can think of whose demise would greatly benefit this country and the world.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: robomatic
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 06:17 PM

Watching NBC on broadcast TV and whitehouse.gov on the laptop. From my vantage point, the television feed is about ten minutes AHEAD of the White House feed. Is the delay I'm experiencing via the internet or is the white house putting a delay on its own feed?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 06:22 PM

NPR is even ahead of the TV feed.

I suspect each of us has a dark list we will not say aloud regarding the Covid 19 affliction.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: robomatic
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 06:28 PM

I think my laptop internet feed was slow not because of a white house delay. Hitting 'refresh' changed the apparent time lag each time.

At least Dr. Fauci is back and still calling the believable shots. Trump looks as usual, like he's a big dumb face on a stick that is trying to control its expression to look serious and like it knows what's going on.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 08:07 PM

I mentioned it once before but it looks like this finding is real.
Men are twice as likly to die of Covid 19 than women. !!!!!!
I don't believe in vengeful wrath of god crap but it looks like older men have a target on their back.'

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 24 Mar 20 - 08:32 PM

That is a very premature conclusion. It may apply so far to Italy and China but not elsewhere. The majority in South Korea, very likely the country that monitors the best, is only very slightly skewed towards males. It's also worth noting that 48% of Chinese men smoke and just 2% of Chinese women. And it is a respiratory tract infection after all. You need to dig deeper before blurting out your simplistic claims.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Iains
Date: 25 Mar 20 - 04:21 AM

Gender disparities are seen in South Korea as well, where men make up almost 62 percent of cases, and once an infection takes hold, it is 89 percent more likely to be fatal in men.

https://www.labroots.com/trending/microbiology/17118/susceptible-covid-19-women

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)30526-2/fulltext

A still evolving story

In Italy 23% smoke,28% men, in the UK 15%
Italy has an older population.
Itally has greater resistance to antibiotics than the rest of Europe. This does not help when secondary respiratory infections occur.
Professor Walter Ricciardi, Scientific Adviser to Italy’s Minister of Health, reports, “On re-evaluation by the National Institute of Health, only 12 per cent of death certificates have shown a direct causality from coronavirus, while 88 per cent of patients who have died have at least one pre-morbidity – many had two or three.”

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Senoufou
Date: 25 Mar 20 - 04:24 AM

Do those Chinese women inhale the men's smoke though Steve? Passive smoking. And from what I've heard on TV, the air pollution in the more industrial parts of China is dire.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: mayomick
Date: 25 Mar 20 - 05:16 AM

I don't want to sound non-alarmist but .......... https://swprs.org/a-swiss-doctor-on-covid-19/?fbclid=IwAR1wK8PJ-yDvpa3DH-GGJ_3CRP6AhnJBd_I_agfZ33ML_0ewQ7P40AvcwSw
anyone ?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: mayomick
Date: 25 Mar 20 - 05:27 AM

click click https://swprs.org/a-swiss-doctor-on-covid-19/?fbclid=IwAR1wK8PJ-yDvpa3DH-GGJ_3CRP6AhnJBd_I_agfZ33ML_0ewQ7P40AvcwSw

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 25 Mar 20 - 05:38 AM

Did anyone see the film footage of the London underground yesterday? There was also a news item on construction work in the city. As most of this construction seems to be non essential would it not make sense to call a halt to it?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 25 Mar 20 - 05:39 AM

The finding is still a mystery. The leading conjecture is that men engage in life long risky behavior perhaps as simple as drinking and smoking.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: mayomick
Date: 25 Mar 20 - 05:47 AM

there are sex differences in longevity in species other than humans Female mammals are usually the longer-lived sex: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4932837/

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: mayomick
Date: 25 Mar 20 - 06:18 AM

"In humans, our cells contain different chromosomes, depending on sex. Females have two X chromosomes while males have an X and a Y. The theory is that the extra X in women has a protective effect against harmful mutations and that this holds true in other species"

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-52007780

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 25 Mar 20 - 08:07 AM

Cloroquine (anti-malarial) doesn't work after all, and is in a brand name of aquarium cleaner that idiots are eating.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 25 Mar 20 - 08:20 AM

Ih yeah

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 25 Mar 20 - 08:20 AM

Oops, meant oh yeah, and Prince Charles.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 25 Mar 20 - 12:02 PM

Just announced on BBC News, a 21 year old woman with no underlying medical issues has died from Covid-19 in the UK.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 25 Mar 20 - 12:28 PM

Whether its conjecture or false information, with no current cure or treatmnt except for forced oxygen, people will get desperate.

I can even see myself gobblimg aspirin and musinex and zithromax and penicillin even if I know there is no proof it would work.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 25 Mar 20 - 03:25 PM

Dave the Gnome.
Yes, it might make sense to stop (unnecessary) construction work. But, many construction workers are self-employed sub-contractors who don't know yet what provision the government will make for them. As such I can understand them wishing to continue working.
I was a civil servant, in an office which is currently still open. I'm so glad I retired!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 25 Mar 20 - 04:16 PM

Jackson Browne has it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 25 Mar 20 - 04:21 PM

https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2020/03/25/coronavirus-patients-do-not-resucitate/

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 25 Mar 20 - 04:55 PM

The CVS pharmacy refused to sell me the 90 day insulin prescription on 3 consecutive days. Today they had it but reduced the prescription to 28 days at a 3000% price increase. I hope this is not being done across the board to everyone.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Iains
Date: 26 Mar 20 - 08:20 AM

Donuel:
Amazon announced its $1 billion acquisition of PillPack in June, sending shares of retail pharmacy companies like CVS Health, Rite Aid and Walgreens plummeting. ... The company said it is licensed to ship prescriptions to all states except Hawaii and can fill schedule III, IV and V medications.Apr 24, 2019

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Iains
Date: 26 Mar 20 - 08:25 AM

Something else you could not make up. From Guido as well.
Hilarious!

A Democrat in support of Boris the Bountiful


https://order-order.com/2020/03/26/sanders-praises-sunak/

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 26 Mar 20 - 08:44 AM

Semi truck trailers are being used to stack bodies outside hospitals in NYC.

The great escape from NYC has probably caused an infection near you.

Montana has the best numbers with under one thousand infections.

Trump is trying to sue TV stations that have ads showing his diminishd capacity. They broadcast his own 'words'

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 27 Mar 20 - 08:12 AM

Boris!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 27 Mar 20 - 08:28 AM

Ok to eat meat on Fridays dduring Lent!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 27 Mar 20 - 08:35 AM

Meat eating in Lent
It seems that many bishops are issuing dispensations for this at the moment.
The above example is from New Jersey, but a search for "Meat in Lent" via Google news will find many examples.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 27 Mar 20 - 08:35 AM

They say Boris has it. I hope he is safe and stays well but I am sure I am not the only one who thought "is this yet another of his populist ploys?".

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: DMcG
Date: 27 Mar 20 - 08:45 AM

I am sure I am not the only one who thought "is this yet another of his populist ploys?".

I have read that a lot of times elsewhere already, so you are not. It shows how depressingly low our trust of politicians has got that the thought even occurs to us.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 27 Mar 20 - 10:50 AM

The coronavirus that's causing this pandemic doesn't give you common cold symptoms

Of the many things that give you a cold, coronaviridae are included. There are 5 coronaviruses that affect humans (many many more that affect other mammals), three are more serious, MERS, SARS-CoV and SARS-CoV2.

For all practical purposes the difference between a cold and 'flu is severity. The symptoms are better described as a syndrome, you may not get all of them. Especially if you caught a whiff of SARS-CoV the first time.

Musk may have done a few stupid things, but he ain't stupid when it comes to seeing a need and driving a huge thick wedge through it. And if riding the publicity was his worst vice - we can tolerate that. Surely.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 27 Mar 20 - 11:13 AM

*And* the British health minister.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Mar 20 - 01:04 PM

"For all practical purposes the difference between a cold and 'flu is severity."

Absolutely not the case. Unless you're talking about a cold and man flu. The two illnesses are quite distinct in speed of onset, symptoms and severity. I've had flu five times in my life. No runny or blocked-up nose, no sneezing. Aching limbs, tender skin all over, fever, nausea, severe headache, unable to get out of bed, utter exhaustion. If you're lucky. A dose of flu can down you in an hour from your feeling just fine.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: robomatic
Date: 27 Mar 20 - 07:22 PM

God Save the Queen (seriously, she met with Boris earlier in March. Hopefully, this was before he shook the hands of Covid patients).

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 27 Mar 20 - 07:28 PM

Only 30 people tested positive at work out of 32,000 employees.
It is a big place with its own power plant, waste disposal and fire department.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 27 Mar 20 - 08:10 PM

Or... Maybe not:

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 27 Mar 20 - 08:11 PM

https://slate.com/technology/2020/03/coronavirus-sense-of-smell-nytimes-fact-check.html

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: leeneia
Date: 28 Mar 20 - 09:46 PM

The newspaper had a disturbing report yesterday. Child-abuse reports in Kansas and Missouri are down 50% from the usual, because many reports come from schools, and schools are not in session.

I have no doubt that all parts of the world where schools are closed are seeing the same thing.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 29 Mar 20 - 03:20 AM

The UK government are sending a letter to every household in the land. WTF? Putting strain on the already overstretched postal service and increasing the risk of spreading the virus. I have just read it online. It says nothing we don't already know.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 29 Mar 20 - 06:31 AM

Last week I went to Bude Morrisons once and Holsworthy Waitrose once (sounds like I'm doing too much shopping, but I'm also helping out older friends who are self-isolating). The precautions being taken to control customer numbers, distancing, queuing in the car parks and checkout monitoring were exemplary at both. Waitrose allowed just twenty in the store at any one time and only twenty trolleys were in use, each of which was sanitised between customers. Both shops had signs up everywhere and there were frequent announcements over the PA. Well I went to Bude Lidl yesterday afternoon. Following the visit, I sent the following email to Lidl's head office:

When I visited this store today, there were hardly any measures in place to protect staff and customers. There was no control of customers entering. There was no sanitisation of baskets and trolleys. There were marks on the floor at the tills (nowhere else) but there was no supervision. There were no signs up in the shop. The narrow aisles meant that customers passing each other were far too close together, and many customers were simply not complying with the 2-metre rule. The protection of staff at checkouts was virtually non-existent. My visit to the store, for the purpose of shopping for a couple over 70 who are self-isolating, was most unnerving, and I won't be visiting the store again. My experience was in stark contrast to two other stores in my area, where very responsible controlling of customers and careful sanitisation were being carried out, and in both of which careful controlling of checkout queues was being carried out. I simply couldn't understand the wild-west approach to the crisis that seems to be prevailing at this store. I hope you will take this message seriously and take prompt action to do the right thing. Thank you.
Steve Shaw

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Senoufou
Date: 29 Mar 20 - 07:14 AM

We went to Morrisons yesterday Steve (one out in the sticks, with a mainly elderly clientele) and were very impressed with their arrangements. Supervision of distancing outside and inside the shop, strict control of queues at the tills, screens put up to protect the till staff, everyone assiduously keeping their distance. Our trolley was wiped over and disinfected by a lady in a mask at the door. Most commendable.
However, I read on Mumsnet yesterday that Lidl are not bothering particularly, as you say, and should be avoided at all costs.
Are people completely daft? It's blooming obvious that these measures should be strictly put in place.
We got some extra supplies for a poor young woman in our village who has a sick child of two and is alone. She has little money and we're all supporting her. We left our offerings on her doorstep, knocked and drove away.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 29 Mar 20 - 09:12 AM

https://covidnearyou.org/

Cool and informative map.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: G-Force
Date: 29 Mar 20 - 09:17 AM

I suppose you get what you pay for. Pile'em high, sell 'em cheap, kill 'em off.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 29 Mar 20 - 09:19 AM

It might be cool and informative to you, but I can't get past that stupid Captcha page in spite of four attempts to spot bears in extremely indistinct photos. So bugger it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 29 Mar 20 - 12:05 PM

Weird. I had no trouble getting in at first but now there are no data.

Interesting article on why no ventilators:

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/29/business/coronavirus-us-ventilator-shortage.html

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 29 Mar 20 - 05:16 PM

I think Boris Johnson should have recommended masks & should not be asking posties to deliver his letters.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: mg
Date: 29 Mar 20 - 06:32 PM

we all need to wear masks or some face covering. make our own so we are not accused of robbing them from nurses. it should be mandatory. it would slow down the spread. there is research. google it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 29 Mar 20 - 06:44 PM

Most masks don't work, except as a money-spinner for spivs. A false sense of security isn't exactly what we currently need.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 30 Mar 20 - 12:04 AM

Shit. John Prine.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 30 Mar 20 - 03:23 AM

Again, Iains, you quote all those numbers without saying how common they are in the general population

There are a few things going on there.
1) how likely are you to contract COVID-19? - social distancing apart (pun intended) - it is no respecter of status, be careful!
2) If you can't be careful, be lucky
3) If you can't be careful, have a healthy/lucky lifestyle.
4) If you can't be careful, be young (I am working on that one)
5) Some of the people we rely on like doctors and nurses (+ police, firemen etc) may be vulnerable yet answer the call. And pay the price. It has happened.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 30 Mar 20 - 06:59 AM

Steve, I guess that masks are less effective if we are in close proximity to someone without one and do not help with surface to hand transmission so if someone takes of their masks before washing their hands it does kind of negate any benefit.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 30 Mar 20 - 07:03 AM

I wish the media would be a bit more discerning when reporting individual health announcements and wait for peer validated announcements. We are getting so many mixed messages.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 30 Mar 20 - 07:58 AM

The secret to peer into the future is to scrutinize the past.

In 1919-1920 people grew weary and stopped the very same social distancing measures we use today. As a result when the second wave arrived it was more catastrophic than it needed to be. And again with the 3rd wave.

Their past is our future.

Our own behavior will exaccerbate the outome but does not cause the 2nd and 3rd wave.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Rain Dog
Date: 30 Mar 20 - 09:33 AM

Steve Shaw posted a copy of the email he sent to Lidl "I simply couldn't understand the wild-west approach to the crisis that seems to be prevailing at this store."

I thought that you did live in the wild-west. Here in the calm south east we do have a Lidl at an out of town location. Not been to it myself as I don't have a car plus it would mean travelling up north.

Stay safe everyone.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 30 Mar 20 - 12:27 PM

The secret to peer into the future is to scrutinize the past.

Usually. But it relies on people looking for the similarities. As I find when drawing analogies in discussions like in this parish. Similarities are ignored or denigrated by comments that show the differences and by implication the analogy is dismissed.

History is an analogy for the future. It is different now, we know more (aka more intelligent?????) now.

If we are more intelligent - we will see the similarities as warnings and differences as boundaries/borders to the similarities.

FWIW History can show there danger of a second wave of epidemic, as we relax. I fear, not predict.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 30 Mar 20 - 02:10 PM

Virginia is now under stay-at-home orders.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 30 Mar 20 - 02:22 PM

Steve Shaw posted a copy of the email he sent to Lidl "I simply couldn't understand the wild-west approach to the crisis that seems to be prevailing at this store."

It's not so wild in Bude! Very civilised. I received what looks like a very standardised reply today saying that they're getting on with it, sort of thing. Getting on with what everybody else was doing a week or more ago...

I'm not proud and I use Lidl, Aldi and Poundland as well as Waitrose... the Fire Tree Nero d'Avola at £4.49 at Aldi is the best value red I've found in years.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 30 Mar 20 - 02:50 PM

An historian pointed out the fact that cities that carried out parades suffered the most. Today that was New Orleans.

The rest of the country is fueled with new infections by, of all things, Basketball pick up games. TOO BAD there are no public service announcements that the young would listen to. Even if they do, there is an element of defiance or possibly pay back.

The mitigation bucket has lots of holes in it with beaches, stores, homeless, prisons, first responders - (the list is long) , hospitals and elder care facilites.

But its the only bucket we have.

Red, fear is a fine mitigating factor.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: leeneia
Date: 30 Mar 20 - 04:36 PM

Yesterday a columnist wrote a vivid and worrying description of what it can be like to have a moderate case of Covid 19. He wrote of lying in bed for a long time, shivering and terribly cold. He even dreamed of riding in a frozen landscape.

But now I ask myself, how about an electric blanket, hot drinks, hot water bottle, chicken soup, hot shower? Was there not one person on the earth who would lend a helping hand? We're not talking about a destitute or derelict person here.

Nonetheless, what he wrote certainly firmed my resolve not to get this virus.
================
I'm often cold at night, esp. my feet and legs. I ordered a big heating pad from Dr. Leonard's catalog, which concentrates on heating those very same feet and legs. Its control goes from 1 to 10, and I only have to put it on 1 or 2. Yet I am sleeping much better than I have in a long time.
==========
A couple of months ago, I asked for a hot water bottle at my local Walgreen's, and they didn't know what I was talking about. They had them.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 30 Mar 20 - 05:15 PM

100

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 30 Mar 20 - 05:21 PM

”But now I ask myself, how about an electric blanket, hot drinks, hot water bottle, chicken soup, hot shower? Was there not one person on the earth who would lend a helping hand? We're not talking about a destitute or derelict person here.”

Those were the last things he needed - he was shivering and felt cold because he had a fever, a.k.a. a high temperature. The shivering caused by a fever is called ‘Rigors’ and the treatment, perhaps counter-intuitively, is to cool the patient - often by using a fan to cool them down.

Electric blankets, hot drinks, hot water bottles, would increase the fever and result in him feeling even colder.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Senoufou
Date: 30 Mar 20 - 05:25 PM

My sister is still very ill with the virus, and she describes being raging hot, and an inability to breathe as if one is suffocating with a very heavy weight one the chest. Incessant coughing and great weakness.
Add to this, she lives all alone in a Scottish village in Tayside.
I expect all sufferers have differing symptoms, depending on their state of health before they succumbed.
Bless her, she's still talking about volunteering once she's better, as presumably she'll have immunity. But is it certain that one can't get it twice?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 30 Mar 20 - 07:17 PM

When it feels like a 250 lb person is sitting on your chest is when a ventilator can lessen the stress.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: mg
Date: 30 Mar 20 - 09:16 PM

please everyone..make your own masks and don't be afraid to be the first to wear them. i will try to post some good epidemiological links later. i get most of my information from following epidemiologists and virologists on twitter and there don't tend to be links. start following epidemiologists. this is what i came across..google for yourselves...Israel on the verge of making masks mandatory. germany about to make mandatory in supermarkets. Czechoslovakia already mandatory. several asian countries mandatory but i don't know which ones. it has been idiotic to read these comments that they don't work. if they work by 4% that is good. Of course, wash them daily and hang in sun if possible. Don't count on your bus neighbor washing her hands. People don't. It is not to save yourself...it is to collectively save others.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: mg
Date: 31 Mar 20 - 12:11 AM

Davide Capodanno
@DFCapodanno
The rapid pace of knowledge on #COVID19 leads to revisit your beliefs every 5 minutes. Surgical masks are the most typical example: we went from mocking the few who had them up to the current belief that we should all wear masks for months when things go back to pseudo-normality.

from twitter. was lots on twitter yesterday and more coming right now. find epidemiologists on twitter and follow them if you have anything you think is profound to say. (he is not an epidemiologist but an Italian cardiologist).

please do due diligence and research this. there is no downside i can think of from clean, homemade masks. there is group protection. don't just wear them..pass the word. ask people why they are not wearing something.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: mg
Date: 31 Mar 20 - 02:36 AM

https://www.yahoo.com/gma/top-chinese-health-official-warns-114801914.html

https://www.yahoo.com/gma/top-chinese-health-official-warns-114801914.html

we will have allowed so many people to die over this foolishness. we surely should have figured out we were being lied to. if the reason was to protect a scarce supply, they should have removed the costco masks from the supply going to medics etc. and they should have told the truth...if they work for the nurses, they will work for people in general, but it is more important to protect the nurses. of course it is. they could then say, make your own. make extra. you must wear them in shops and on the bus. bus drivers are now dying. being a smartass here or elsewhere about this is cruel and unnecessary,

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 31 Mar 20 - 03:52 AM

the treatment, perhaps counter-intuitively

Well I'm no medical expert, but the experts I see/read tell me that the high temps are the bodies evolved response to slow down the virus because it struggles at higher temperatures.
Indeed the time honoured advice of lemon, honey & an aspirin is forwned on, because acetylsalicylic acid is vaso-dilatory** which cools you down, thus lengthening recovery.
Yer pays yer money and takes yer choice.

** so is whisky (or whiskey) - but then who cares?.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 31 Mar 20 - 04:07 AM

In case anybody doesn't look into the UK politics thread I've taken the liberty of repeating DtheG's link HERE
Everybody should be fully aware what is happening
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 31 Mar 20 - 04:15 AM

toilet rolls reward for finding missing cockatiel

Living in interesting times!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Senoufou
Date: 31 Mar 20 - 04:24 AM

I see that there are now 165 cases in Ivory Coast, mostly in Abidjan. Husband is frantic with worry for his numerous family. No 'lockdown' as such, just a curfew and mosques/schools closed. But people are out on the streets, going to markets etc.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 31 Mar 20 - 09:28 AM

Merde, Senoufou.

I think Virginia has canceled my annual tripping naked hippie springtime Float Trip (it is Memorial Day weekend and stay-home is till June 10). Merde all over again.

Face masks keep you from *giving* but not from getting germs. Worth it.

Texas has ruled the abortion ban to be unconstitutional and unenforceable so that is something.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: mg
Date: 31 Mar 20 - 11:01 AM

Nurses are not afraid of giving the virus to their dying patients. They are afraid of getting it. And I was wondering if dogs could be used to sniff out fever and this illness. They are being tried out in several countries I believe.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 31 Mar 20 - 11:16 AM

Alabama also. I joined the ACLU as soon as Trump was sworn in, and have kept that membership going.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 31 Mar 20 - 11:44 AM

”Well I'm no medical expert, but the experts I see/read tell me that the high temps are the bodies evolved response to slow down the virus because it struggles at higher temperatures.
Indeed the time honoured advice of lemon, honey & an aspirin is forwned on, because acetylsalicylic acid is vaso-dilatory** which cools you down, thus lengthening recovery.
Yer pays yer money and takes yer choice.“

Well, I was speaking from personal experience, as a patient with high fever and severe rigors on a significant number of occasions over the past fifteen years due to life-threatening infections, of the treatment that was given to me. I was shivering uncontrollably and very painfully to the point of exhaustion, but the things I desperately wanted - heat, warmer bedding, etc., were refused by the medical staff at QMC Nottingham and, instead, thin bedding and a fan were used to reduce my fevers on each occasion. Whilst it’s true that a high temperature is part of the body’s defence against bacterial or viral infections, very high temperatures - >40C - are, in themselves, life-threatening and need to be reduced.

But don’t just take my word for it - scroll down to the last section of the article.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 31 Mar 20 - 01:53 PM

Re (NOT) funding charities in trouble from covid19, in a good nation in a good United Nations there would be no need for private (competing) charities where, if a celebrity gets involved e.g., some get more than they need & others not enough.

And re news of garden centres in trouble - good, if they are selling exotics rather than the native flora that our native fauna EVOLVED WITH; some photos of Levenshulme Allotments, with native gardening advice here

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 31 Mar 20 - 04:01 PM

Well I'm outraged that my local garden centre is closed whereas Bude Morrisons and B&M, both of which have more or less separate mini-garden centres, can carry on regardless. That just isn't right. I'm with Titchmarsh on this. Unless the policy changes I'm boycotting all supermarket gardening departments.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Senoufou
Date: 01 Apr 20 - 04:00 AM

Our local Morrisons has a small garden centre attached, but it was fenced off and closed when we went there on Saturday. I wanted bags of compost and some red geranium plants to 'do' our tubs in front of our house.
Husband prefers scarifying the lawn and pressure-washing the patio (menz and macheenz) but we ladeez like to plant and tend.

I suppose none of this is what the Authorities would call 'essential purchasing' though.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Apr 20 - 07:11 AM

Pressure-washing the patio is a filthy job. Mrs Steve would be welcome to it!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Senoufou
Date: 01 Apr 20 - 07:39 AM

That's very true Steve. He gets soaked to the skin, covered in gunk and manages to splash it all up the conservatory windows. But he seems to enjoy doing it (thank goodness!)
At this very moment he's fence-painting and his black face is covered in Ronseal Medium Oak sploshes, not to mention his old Arsenal football shirt (he's gone off them for some reason)
Being outside in the garden and busy is very therapeutic during this pandemic.
I feel sorry for people trapped in a high-rise flat in a city centre.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 01 Apr 20 - 10:23 AM

I love rock'n'roll songwriter gone.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 01 Apr 20 - 12:36 PM

You want him dead? :^/ make commas common. make comas rare. Compulsive food, wine and compost shoppers stay home for 2 weeks.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Senoufou
Date: 01 Apr 20 - 01:08 PM

My poor sister just sent me a brief email. She's much worse, can't sleep, is boiling hot and extremely weak. Her local vicar is bringing her food. This is about 2 weeks now. What has upset me is that she's given the vicar a list of hymns for her funeral. She can't speak on the phone as she's lost her voice. We're so very worried.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 01 Apr 20 - 01:26 PM

Oh, dear, dear Senoufou. Je pense à toi et à elle.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: fat B****rd
Date: 01 Apr 20 - 01:32 PM

Thinking of you as always. Eliza x

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Senoufou
Date: 01 Apr 20 - 01:48 PM

Thank you so much both of you. It's hard being so far from her, and knowing she lives alone. It seems this virus goes on and on for maybe weeks.
Her vicar contacted 111 on her behalf, but they said she can't be admitted to hospital for several reasons. She's elderly, is managing to breathe although with difficulty, and they're short of places anyway.
She's spent all her working days as a hospital doctor and yet there's no place for her now in her hour of need.
All we can do is carry on praying.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 02 Apr 20 - 03:55 PM

Obesity is apparently a factor but hard to separate from the issues obesity gives you.

Marsalis père.

New Orleans should not have had Mardi Gras but, who knew, then.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 02 Apr 20 - 04:30 PM

Finally, the BBC is suggesting masks, perhaps covering themselves by saying the WHO is now suggesting a sneeze or cough can carry further than earlier thought - as mentioned a couple of weeks ago, seeing those of other nations that have coped relatively well wearing them was enough to convince me.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 02 Apr 20 - 08:49 PM

What is this about it fighting it off not conferring immunity? I had been counting on immunity.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 02 Apr 20 - 10:18 PM

Medical supplies from the federal government is being delivered to private companies who then have states and other countries bid on them.
I wonder how George Patton would feel if FDR had let Sherman tanks be put up for auction for even the Germans to bid on?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: mg
Date: 03 Apr 20 - 02:15 AM

general honore, one of the few people who seems to know what he is doing on this, has spoken on the private bidding. It is disgusting. Lawyers need to comb through law books to see how high we can hang them.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 03 Apr 20 - 10:33 AM

They are going back and forth on xhloroquine.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 03 Apr 20 - 03:27 PM

The Govenor of Georgia only learned this week that there is a pandemic of non sympmtomatic jock itch carriers that spread the illness. Or something like that.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 04 Apr 20 - 09:14 AM

Apparently with billions of people staying home there is less pollution and there are fewer earthquakes!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 04 Apr 20 - 05:58 PM

Ok did that orange asshole *really* steal a shipment of medical masks and ventilators heading for Germany?

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/03/mask-wars-coronavirus-outbidding-demand

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 05 Apr 20 - 07:49 AM

In this age of favoring the economy over the life spans of people, by the businessman/fascist tactics of the new conservatives, it is actually neccessary to remind YOU that living IS AGING!

While the wealthy ruling class repeat and insist that "the cure must not be worse than the problem", YOU MUST NOT give in to the nonsense that your survival is unimportant compared to doing business.

With enough repetition/hypnosis people can be lured to the cliffs like lemmings. Its happened before. It sounds like it will happen again.
You may not need to be reminded that aging is living but the young are more easily indoctrinated than you.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 05 Apr 20 - 08:00 AM

DO NOT STOP ISOLATION TOO SOON.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 05 Apr 20 - 10:27 AM

Right. I am arguing with the idiots in my various meetup groups who are still meeting up.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 05 Apr 20 - 10:35 AM

Coronaservatives are not the boss of you.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: keberoxu
Date: 05 Apr 20 - 10:59 AM

If you are disgusted with astrology, stop right here, then move on.

This is from New York astrologer Susan Miller, and at the end of the post
a link will be made to her website.
The post, however, will be short and to the point.

Re: Coronavirus TIMING in the calendar year 2020
Three dates:

April 4, 2020

(May 13)    June 30    (September 12) , 2020

November 12, 2020   


Explanation:
The calendar year 2020 and the time cycle for the coronavirus pandemic
will not be a simple event with a rise, one big peak/top, and a fall back towards 'normalcy.'

The pandemic cycle will have TWO high peaks, not one,
and inbetween there is a false low, with one lowest point.

First pandemic peak: April 4, 2020 ... but not the last.

False pandemic 'low point': June 30, 2020;
the pandemic will appear to drop starting May 13,
and will not rise very much before/until September 12.

November 12, 2020 will see the pandemic peak for the SECOND time, and strongly, too.


'Apparent retrograde motion,' an astronomical phenomenon, gets the credit
for bringing three date markers, instead of one, into this cycle.
And the real culprit is the planet Pluto.

The 2020 Coronavirus Outlook

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: gillymor
Date: 05 Apr 20 - 11:27 AM

This is hardly the time to be posting claptrap like that.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 05 Apr 20 - 03:44 PM

I don't know, even toe nail clipping future casting has its place.

For example thousands of rental cars went up in flames at a florida airport today. My toe nail clippings predicted it. Wink Wink nudge nudge News

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 Apr 20 - 04:08 PM

Yeah, I met a bloke today who said there's no virus, we can't prove it, and that it's all a big conspiracy. You appear to be in bed with lunatics of that ilk, keberoxu.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Helen
Date: 05 Apr 20 - 05:02 PM

Worldometer data and charts for COVID-19 Coronavirus Pandemic

If you want to know more data on a specific country click the hyperlink on the country name on the left hand column. Not all countries have a hyperlink. A useful column for comparison of countries in the spreadsheet is Deaths/1 million population.

For the last two weeks Australia has been using social distancing and non-essential business shutdowns and social isolation. People are expected to stay at home and only go out for essentials like food supplies, medical appointments and essential work. A lot of people are suddenly working from home, including my Hubby.

If you look at the charts most of the negative data are showing a flattening of the curve or even a minor decline.

Unfortunately a decision was made in mid March to allow a cruise ship to dock and passengers disembarked and went to their respective home areas, despite a notification by the medical officer on board advising that some of the passengers and crew were found to be infected with COVID 19. This has been the main source of infections in Australia and contact tracing has been conducted in most of the cases to trace the various infections to contact with someone coming in from overseas. Some contacts have been within the community, however, and these have been more difficult to trace.

The important thing to focus on is that the social distancing and isolation, and the shutdown of non-essential businesses appears to be having a positive effect.

By comparison, look at the U.S. data and the negative charts all show rising cases and rising deaths.

I would suggest that if your government does not tell you to socially isolate yourself then think about doing it for yourself if at all possible.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 Apr 20 - 06:42 PM

Funny, innit. We get all hoity-toity about our governments and their failings, etc, and all judgemental about wankers we see sunbathing on the beach...

Then something hits you in the guts. Yesterday, a bloke I knew personally died of the bloody thing. That's the first time for me. It's a shuddering thing is that. He was a brilliant musician and I once played a duet on the harmonica with him. There's actually a thread about him above the line. His name is Ted Crum and he was one of the loveliest men you could wish to meet. Damn... :-(

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 05 Apr 20 - 06:56 PM

Well shit, Steve Shaw. So sorry. My cousin and her daughter are recovering, but I fear for Senoufou's sister.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: keberoxu
Date: 05 Apr 20 - 07:40 PM

Has anyone besides me seen this site?

A Mask For All: requires a 3D printer

I don't know who has a 3D printer where I am ...
having said that:
this thing you can download, for free if I get this right,
and the 3D printer will make it
and you assemble it.
The mask frame has a place where you can insert filter material,
thus you can clean the mask when not in used,
and replace a used mask filter with a new clean one.

What do you all think?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 05 Apr 20 - 09:34 PM

Marianne Faithfull.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 06 Apr 20 - 09:10 AM

And why are the testing tigers in the zoo? Madeleine would say pooh pooh.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 06 Apr 20 - 09:44 AM

Our true character shines through masks
But Bank robbers still wear skimasks
While some Red necks wear bandanas
Trumpists proudly wear no masks
Kid masks have smiling bananas
but Democrats wear N-95's

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 06 Apr 20 - 11:41 AM

I got a purple-ish silk scarf. No idea where my kelly green one went.

Plays havoc with my claustrophobia, though.

I only wear it when I am out of my house but indoors (doc's office, grocery store). Somehow that last bit came out to the tune of the Beverley Hillbillies (swimming pools, movie stars).

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 06 Apr 20 - 12:38 PM

Just heard it is at my good friend's old folks' home. Merde.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 06 Apr 20 - 03:24 PM

And Virginia is allowing distilleries to ship to people's homes to avoid trips to the liquor store!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 06 Apr 20 - 03:30 PM

In Wash DC the mariquana dispensories are praised by the mayor as being an essential store.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 06 Apr 20 - 03:33 PM

Boris Johnson moved to Intensive Care (BBC News just now).

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Apr 20 - 04:07 PM

It's at my mum's care home too. She is 91 and has COPD.

The news about Boris is terrible. Get well, mate...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 06 Apr 20 - 05:13 PM

I was just about to post about Boris. When did he last shake hands with Trump?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 06 Apr 20 - 05:21 PM

And Oklahoma has partially stopped the ban on abortions.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 06 Apr 20 - 10:51 PM

A friend of the devil is a friend of mine.
I hope Boris does well in the Horse spittle.
A failure to act is his only sad crime
We can hope his breathe won't get too brittle
What this means is that Covid 19 has stunned
his ace2 receptors deep in the lungs.
The air sacs (avioli) have the ace2 receptors.
If the virus stays in the nose the case may stay mild
but being well behaved is not in virus nature.

ITS OFFICIAL In Chicago the black community is suffering a double
infection rate and is dieing at 7 times the rate of white communities.
The cause is probably education and the nature of their employment.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 07 Apr 20 - 12:05 AM

DC too.

Bad Supreme Court decisions about in-person voting in Wisconsin and I think simewhere else.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Senoufou
Date: 07 Apr 20 - 03:46 AM

I live in fear of hearing that Abidjan cases escalate. Most of the people there are poor, ill-nourished and living in very close proximity, several to a room etc. They are all on curfew, but can go out during the day and mix freely, which seems mad to me.
Also, medical care is practically unobtainable there.

I see that most of the major supermarkets are now allowing only one person to each trolley (no couples) so I'll have to stay in the car while husband does the actual shopping armed with a list.

I hope Boris Johnson pulls through. (and indeed anyone in an ICU)
I read today that two-thirds of those put on a ventilator will die from the virus. Luckily my sister is off hers now and on a drip instead.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 07 Apr 20 - 03:55 AM

Good news, Sen. I hope she’s on her way to a full recovery.
I’m also in the same camp as most others re: Boris Johnson - I’ve never wished I’ll health on anyone, and I wish Mr. Johnson a full and speedy recovery.
Stay well dear lady!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 07 Apr 20 - 04:18 AM

very high temperatures - >40C - are, in themselves, life-threatening and need to be reduced.

As I always say, "life ain't binary". But the advice to the general idiot in the street, currently for COVID-19, is "to avoid ibuprofen and asprin", because they are vaso-dilatory.
If you are in hospital, it is a different context, you have the extended knowledge of experts, who have thermometers and are not afraid to wield them.

Some experts advocate Tylenol which would appear to be nothing more than Paracetamol which has been cited as not much better - and is also antipyretic BTW. Though is not anti-inflammatory which is a plus apparently.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Apr 20 - 06:23 AM

Acetaminophen and paracetamol are the same thing, as is Tylenol, which is just a brand name in the US.

Well I've been taking diclofenac (Voltarol) for many years for back pain. It's an NSAID but the advice is to continue taking it, and I am doing. I have better things to worry about.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 07 Apr 20 - 09:10 AM

https://www.technologynetworks.com/immunology/videos/the-coronavirus-outbreak-explained-through-3d-medical-animation-332089

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Jack Campin
Date: 07 Apr 20 - 09:35 AM

The problem with NSAIDs is their effect on the immune response to the virus - they drastically reduce it. Paracetamol and microdose aspirin are ok, pain-relief or anti-inflammatory doses of aspirin/NSAIDs seem to be very dangerous right now. Use dihydrocodeine or similar if you really need it. (No idea about gabapentin or amitryptiline).

I haven't seen any research on fhe effects of fever reduction. My take on it is that fever is an anti-viral response, so you want to just let it happen unless it gets dangerously high - and with COVID-19 it rarely seems to get that bad.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Apr 20 - 09:45 AM

No narcotics for me, thanks. I had a terrible experience with tramadol - and I only took it for three weeks. Not only that, it didn't work.

Subject: VIRUS DENIERS on TV and radio
From: Donuel
Date: 07 Apr 20 - 09:51 AM

https://www.inquirer.com/health/coronavirus/coronavirus-republicans-denial-fox-news-trump-war-on-science-20200315.html



https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2020/04/dr-drew-coronavirus-supercut-restored-to-youtube-after-copyright-takedown/

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 07 Apr 20 - 10:20 AM

At the intersection of Disinformation and Hate there are hard core Trump advocates that will not relent their conspiracies even unto their deathbed. We are going to lose quite a few extremists to covid 19.
We are also losing black citizens at a death rate 7 times higher than other communities for a similar but different kind of disinformation and distrust.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 07 Apr 20 - 10:25 AM

It took me several days to get off of Tramadol after taking it for about 3 weeks for the knee surgery. I had to cut the tablets to taper off of it. It was somewhat helpful for the muscle pain (nothing is completely effective). Is coughing with coronavirus "productive" - do you want to keep coughing? Codeine cough syrup is pretty effective with heavy coughs; I prefer taking guiafed. Are people having to sleep propped up?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 07 Apr 20 - 10:52 AM

Article on what might or might not be sn actual symptom: https://slate.com/technology/2020/04/coronavirus-wild-symptoms-correlation.html

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 07 Apr 20 - 11:59 AM

A morning productive cough is normal to me.
A dry cough is normally bronchitis,allergies,asthma...
A dry cough with fever should be watched.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Helen
Date: 07 Apr 20 - 02:36 PM

Donuel said, "...losing black citizens at a death rate 7 times higher than other communities..."

This is what worries me. The people who cannot afford medical services, the people who are on or near the poverty line, the people who are targeted by the racists, they are all of the people who seem to be fair game in Donald Trump's policies and strategies. I keep seeing in my head the media scenes of New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina and what I saw was a country abandoning its people in crisis to a great degree, and most of the people in those media images were black people.


A note on productive coughs: it's a medical term meaning that the cough is "producing" or ejecting phlegm from the lungs. If you can clear the lungs it will help ease the symptoms. Dry coughs tend not to be productive coughs.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 07 Apr 20 - 04:01 PM

The racial parameters are not measured in the hospital but are garnered later by calling the morgue. So the figures could be unreliable bu t I fear not. I believe I can see the social and economic reasons. The psych reasons for not trusting whitey and not giving a fuck goes around and comes around. Poverty is a powerful killer.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 09 Apr 20 - 07:58 AM

And don't bury John Prine down in the cold cold ground.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: gillymor
Date: 09 Apr 20 - 08:48 AM

Yep, Mr. Prine made it clear how he wants his remains disposed of long ago:

"Please don't bury me
Down in that cold, cold ground
No, I'd rather have 'em cut me up
And pass me all around"

"Throw my brain in a hurricane
And the blind can have my eyes
And the deaf can take both of my ears
If they don't mind the size"

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 09 Apr 20 - 09:21 AM

WHAT IS THE AFTERMATH?


I admire thinking ahead. Here are the best macro thinkers on dealing with the now and future.

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/03/19/coronavirus-effect-economy-life-society-analysis-covid-135579

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 09 Apr 20 - 11:12 AM

Also posted on the Cause thread


Blicky

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 09 Apr 20 - 01:21 PM

Another of my cousins has it. This one is in the DC area, the others were in Austin.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 09 Apr 20 - 03:53 PM

The personal becomes dangerous.

Deborah Tannen is a professor of linguistics at Georgetown and author, most recently, of You’re the Only One I Can Tell: Inside the Language of Women’s Friendships.


On 9/11, Americans discovered we are vulnerable to calamities we thought only happened in distant lands. The 2008 financial crisis told us we also can suffer the calamities of past eras, like the economic meltdown of the Great Depression. Now, the 1918 flu pandemic is a sudden specter in our lives.


This loss of innocence, or complacency, is a new way of being-in-the-world that we can expect to change our doing-in-the-world. We know now that touching things, being with other people and breathing the air in an enclosed space can be risky. How quickly that awareness recedes will be different for different people, but it can never vanish completely for anyone who lived through this year. It could become second nature to recoil from shaking hands or touching our faces—and we might all find we can’t stop washing our hands.


The comfort of being in the presence of others might be replaced by a greater comfort with absence, especially with those we don’t know intimately. Instead of asking, “Is there a reason to do this online?” we’ll be asking, “Is there any good reason to do this in person?”—and might need to be reminded and convinced that there is. Unfortunately, if unintendedly, those without easy access to broadband will be further disadvantaged. The paradox of online communication will be ratcheted up: It creates more distance, yes, but also more connection, as we communicate more often with people who are physically farther and farther away—and who feel safer to us because of that distance.


A new kind of patriotism.

Mark Lawrence Schrad is an associate professor of political science and author of the forthcoming Smashing the Liquor Machine: A Global History of Prohibition.


America has long equated patriotism with the armed forces. But you can’t shoot a virus. Those on the frontlines against coronavirus aren’t conscripts, mercenaries or enlisted men; they are our doctors, nurses, pharmacists, teachers, caregivers, store clerks, utility workers, small-business owners and employees. Like Li Wenliang and the doctors of Wuhan, many are suddenly saddled with unfathomable tasks, compounded by an increased risk of contamination and death they never signed up for.


When all is said and done, perhaps we will recognize their sacrifice as true patriotism, saluting our doctors and nurses, genuflecting and saying, “Thank you for your service,” as we now do for military veterans. We will give them guaranteed health benefits and corporate discounts, and build statues and have holidays for this new class of people who sacrifice their health and their lives for ours. Perhaps, too, we will finally start to understand patriotism more as cultivating the health and life of your community, rather than blowing up someone else’s community. Maybe the de-militarization of American patriotism and love of community will be one of the benefits to come out of this whole awful mess.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: mg
Date: 09 Apr 20 - 11:41 PM

except that the military (composed of both men and women) is increasingly a part of the response to this, and is used to doing things fairly quickly and efficiently. We have a lot to learn from them (us).

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 10 Apr 20 - 07:00 AM

Patriotism is imho the wrong metaphor. Patriotism would make it right of Trump to steal Germany's masks. Fuck the idea that the citizens of any one country deserve to live more than those of another, sorry.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 10 Apr 20 - 09:15 AM

Loop hole allows debt collectors to seize pandemic relief checks and social security checks from those in pandemic need.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 10 Apr 20 - 09:49 AM

Just heard on bbc news that the BCG (old tuberculosis vaccine) might work. That would make me happy, my sisters and I all had that. The BCG, not consumption.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 10 Apr 20 - 01:57 PM

Males are twice as likely to get infected. The reasons for that are social and the extra X chromosome in females. Breast milk may provide a bit of protection.

The line outside the grocery store was about a quarter mile long.
Distancing and one in one out policy is why.

Drivers are pent up and definetely out for themselves with a me first atttude.

No hamburger. No cleaning products. No frozen foods.

They had milk and cookies.

Grocery baggers are dieing despite being only in their 20's.

The supply chain is suffering.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 10 Apr 20 - 02:17 PM

Perhaps, too, we will finally start to understand patriotism more as cultivating the health and life of your community, rather than blowing up someone else’s community. Maybe the de-militarization of American patriotism and love of community will be one of the benefits to come out of this whole awful mess.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 10 Apr 20 - 02:55 PM

Men are not more likely to catch it, but they are more likely to die of it.

Also this: https://wsvn.com/news/us-world/smoking-weed-and-coronavirus-even-occasional-use-raises-risk-of-covid-19-complications/

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 10 Apr 20 - 02:56 PM

And this:

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.02.23.20026864v2

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 10 Apr 20 - 03:05 PM

Males are twice as likely to get infected. The reasons for that are social and the extra X chromosome in females. Breast milk may provide a bit of protection.

So I just need to find a compliant young mum then ;)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Senoufou
Date: 10 Apr 20 - 03:41 PM

With regard to the BCG (protection against TB) vaccine, my sister and I both had it done at 14yrs old, but she recently got Covid.
By the way, she's home at last, very weak and a bit low, but thankful to be back in her Tayside village once more.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: fat B****rd
Date: 10 Apr 20 - 04:20 PM

Good to hear, Eliza x

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Senoufou
Date: 10 Apr 20 - 04:42 PM

Thank you very much Charlie!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 10 Apr 20 - 05:21 PM

Oh Senoufou quel soulagement.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 10 Apr 20 - 06:04 PM

It is reccomended to not go shopping or to the drugstore this week of the peak. They didn't have apples or lettuce or tomatos or cabbage or meat anyway.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Senoufou
Date: 10 Apr 20 - 06:13 PM

Merci bcp Mrrzy, c'est vraiment un énorme soulagement.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Thompson
Date: 11 Apr 20 - 06:45 PM

We're having an advance viewing of the horrors that are coming our way if we don't reverse the climate crisis. However, people forget fast. They'll just start driving again as soon as this is over, and soon it will all be over.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 11 Apr 20 - 09:45 PM

Now now there is hope with the young

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 12 Apr 20 - 04:56 PM

Trump says he'll base decisions on "facts and instincts" - I haven't laughed that hard in weeks.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 12 Apr 20 - 07:10 PM

instinct and fact is like going with his gut and underwear for proof.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: mg
Date: 13 Apr 20 - 01:00 AM

how is iran doing? i have not heard anything for a while and the charts that i look at don't show current status.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Helen
Date: 13 Apr 20 - 02:13 AM

Hi mg, this data is updated daily and if you click the link on the name of the country you are interested in it will show more detailed data and also charts. I've been looking at this every day.

COVID-19 Coronavirus Pandemic

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 13 Apr 20 - 02:17 AM

The cause is probably education and the nature of their employment.

It has been pointed-out that the lower paid/out of work are represented at a higher percentage in the African-American community, and there is a lifestyle dimension too.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 13 Apr 20 - 06:09 AM

worrying opinions on the use of ventilators

Basically some respected medics in the US & Italy are saying that what they see is that COVD-19 causes a lack of oxygen, rather than pneumonia per se. And ventilating with positive pressure does cause lung damage and the sedation has side effects also. It is treatment, a patch, not a re-fit with new parts!
The bottom line is that COVID-19 is new and we are learning, and we do what has worked before. What is needed is not necessarily what was done before.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 13 Apr 20 - 08:35 AM

Mr Red
Ventilators are one means to oxygenate blood and remove CO2. It is not the best but is more available and cheaper.
When ventillated;
TOU CAN NOT EAT
YOU CAN NOT TALK
THE CHEAPEST NOURISHMENT IS GLUCOSE DRIP :(not good for diabetics)
20%+ effective in saving life
Sedation or medical Coma is not required but is considered more comfortable.

You've seen the oxygen hoods used as an alternative or intermediary treatment.
Mucus/ (different kind of sputum) from Covis 19 is thicker but not like a fluid suffocating pnumonia.
The X ray of Covid damaged lungs looks more cotton like than dark fluid filled lungs with other pnumonias..
There are attempts to drain lungs.
There are a bevy of medications being tried.

Yes there is room for specific improvement to address damage and symptoms. Standards of care is being treated like a one size fits all.
This is a common problem in all areas of medicine. Perhaps a novel alternative will prove promising by a risk taking smart doctor.

Or you could ask the Stable genius and self proclaimed scientist Steve Shaw for assistance. He is the one who condemened my early pandemic warning in January and did nothing for 2 months.

The clues are there for all to see but the next effective treatments are immunity plasma and vaccines.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 13 Apr 20 - 08:47 AM

If this was WW2 we are at the end of the beggining.
We have yet to discover 'radar' and 'enigma machine'.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 14 Apr 20 - 07:30 AM

The US is #1
   Woo Hoo !
The UK is #2
in viral infections

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 14 Apr 20 - 07:36 AM

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 14 Apr 20 - 09:11 AM

Weirdly enough lying on your stomach improves your lung function and O2 saturation, if you're sick and having trouble with breathing.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 14 Apr 20 - 11:41 AM

tru nuff

If you are far more comfortable resting on your left side, you may have a heart valve disorder. (or acid reflux or sore hip...)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Apr 20 - 12:05 PM

It would be nice if medical recommendations and diagnoses on this forum come exclusively from qualified medical professionals. Cheers.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 15 Apr 20 - 09:36 AM

Mine do. I just don't post the link. You can look it up yourself, keeps boredom away.

Our abysmal failure is now being blamed on WHO to the point of defunding. I am ashamed of my government, again.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 15 Apr 20 - 10:11 AM

Deflection of his own guilt by the Orange-Utan (sic) currently stinking-up 1600 Pennsylvania Ave., DC 20500.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 15 Apr 20 - 05:02 PM

Virginia has extended its closure of nonessential businesses orders for 2 more weeks. Does not alter the stay-at-home order.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 16 Apr 20 - 08:44 AM

Now Covid virus has been found in nasal passages for up to 21 days after regaining health and getting positive antibody testing.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: gillymor
Date: 16 Apr 20 - 06:44 PM

"Sorry, Peons, Stay-at-Home Rules Don’t Apply to Ivanka Trump And Jared Kushner" -Vanity Fair

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 16 Apr 20 - 09:58 PM

My source of inside information has dried up. This does not bode well.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 16 Apr 20 - 10:51 PM

Oh dear.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 17 Apr 20 - 06:57 PM

RESDEMIMIR WORKS (ebola drug)

Oxychloroquin causes more harm and is stopped by several nations.

China revises death toll by 50%

!0 times the number of citizens have Covid 19 antibodies than early tests revealed. Immunity even with antibodies is now in question.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 17 Apr 20 - 08:37 PM

Resdemivir cnn

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 18 Apr 20 - 01:01 PM

Latest from UK, on being questioned whether the government would lift the no recourse to public funds rules for illegal migrants so that those who are displaying symptoms feel safe to seek medical help if displaying symptoms rather than remain in the community the Communities Minister whose name is totally unmemorable stated that the government has no intention of doing so, and it would be down to individual local authorities to find the money for making provision if they so wish. We have a minister who is putting its hostile environment ideology before public health.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 18 Apr 20 - 07:51 PM

Ok this is from a fox affiliate, but they quote science: https://www.fox10phoenix.com/news/researchers-discover-new-coronavirus-symptoms-feet-lesions

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: keberoxu
Date: 19 Apr 20 - 01:54 PM

From the Washington Post:

Europe resistant to apps for tracking spread of coronavirus

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 19 Apr 20 - 02:18 PM

Nieman-Marcus goes bankrupt.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 19 Apr 20 - 02:23 PM

Also some post-pandemic advice:

https://www.cnet.com/how-to/5-things-not-to-do-when-coronavirus-quarantine-lockdown-end/#ftag=CAD-00-10aag7d

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Iains
Date: 20 Apr 20 - 07:22 AM

Have we all been had?

https://off-guardian.org/2020/04/17/8-more-experts-questioning-the-coronavirus-panic/

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 20 Apr 20 - 08:08 AM

Exercise is good:https://www.dailyprogress.com/news/uva/exercise-an-effective-weapon-against-pandemic-uva-study-finds/article_b4725588-29d8-5d83-a06b-bed9fad60778.html

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 20 Apr 20 - 08:19 AM

I'm gaining weight. I don't do superfluous excercise.   I don't even copy and paste if links are not a blue clicky.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: gillymor
Date: 20 Apr 20 - 08:41 AM

"Have we all been had?"

You have, guido jr., many times over.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: gillymor
Date: 20 Apr 20 - 08:44 AM

Squats a compound exercise you can do anywhere.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Iains
Date: 20 Apr 20 - 09:07 AM

Gillymoor I have every confidence in my opinions. I am disappointed you continue the poitless exercise of ad hominem attacks. Are you of the leftward persuasion also?
I wonder what the the collective name for a plurality of experts should be?
A contradiction of experts perhaps?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: gillymor
Date: 20 Apr 20 - 09:09 AM

2i is dissapointed, boo-frickety-hoo.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 20 Apr 20 - 01:10 PM

Gillymoor I have every confidence in my opinions.

That is what Mr Dunning & Mr Kruger found commonly.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: David Carter (UK)
Date: 20 Apr 20 - 02:04 PM

Please people, stop posting misinformation. If you have information that a particular drug is effective, or ineffective, post a link to a publication in a peer reviewed journal and don't post at all. And Iains, the link in your post of 20 Apr 20 - 07:22 AM is complete crap from a bunch of tinfoil hat merchants. John Oxford used to have some credibility as a virologist, but in this case he should re-read what he wrote and reflect as to whether he was wise to say it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 20 Apr 20 - 02:22 PM

What *is* the group name for experts? A panel?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 21 Apr 20 - 05:48 AM

A pressure of

As in has-been drips under........................

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 21 Apr 20 - 07:31 AM

Posting actual news about the pandemic is practically thread drift at this point but there is actual news as you are awash in all virus news shows 24/7. The word to the wise today is remdesivir

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 21 Apr 20 - 08:56 AM

The virus is basically the same the world-over.

In fact one of the positive things about it, in terms of working on a possible vaccine, is that it shows very few & minor mutations wherever it's been tested (unlike common 'flu strains). This is thought to be because of its virulence, if it wasn't more virulent then we would probably see more mutation.

The reason that some otherwise healthy people succumb to the virus, is due to viral load - nothing to do with Johnson not being present at COBRA meetings or what this government has or has not done. If you expose anyone to a high-enough level of viral organisms, or expose them frequently to these organisms, then the viral population in effect overwhelms the immune response. This is what we see in healthcare workers.

If you put someone in an environment where lots of people (or things) around them are infected, or they are coming into close contact with someone (or something) with the virus frequently, then their viral load increases - nothing to do with Johnson not being present at COBRA meetings or what this government has or has not done. That's why distancing & hygiene are so important.

Viral load is person-specific. It doesn't spread. Someone with a higher-viral load doesn't shed the virus at a greater rate again nothing to do with Johnson not being present at COBRA meetings or what this government has or has not done.

The reason why isolating yourself is important if you're infected, is as much to keep yourself safe, as to avoid passing it on to others.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Apr 20 - 09:13 AM

You may well be right about viral load. But I don't know why you attached Boris's non-attendance at those meetings (confirmed by Gove) to it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 21 Apr 20 - 09:14 AM

Um, of course higher viral load means more virus-shedding. One sneeze from a low-load has fewer viri than one sneeze from high-load.

Bavaria has canceled Oktoberfest.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Apr 20 - 10:12 AM

Hmm. Once the virus has incubated and you've become symptomatic, or even before that point, the initial virus load would no longer be particularly relevant. And the plural of virus is viruses.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: David Carter (UK)
Date: 21 Apr 20 - 11:14 AM

Donuel, that is a study without a control group, of 53 patients. The number at the end who died was consistent within statistical errors with the Chinese studies without the drug. The article mentions that someone else plans to carry out a controlled study of 600 patients. That might give useful information, but not yet.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: David Carter (UK)
Date: 21 Apr 20 - 11:20 AM

Bonzo:

"The virus is basically the same the world-over."


Is that right? It may be, but I have seen no study of regional variation in the virus. The Wikipedia page on SARS-COV-2 talks about the difference between it and pangolin viruses, but nothing on regional variation or lack of.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: David Carter (UK)
Date: 21 Apr 20 - 11:22 AM

Bonzo again:

"The reason that some otherwise healthy people succumb to the virus, is due to viral load - nothing to do with Johnson not being present at COBRA meetings or what this government has or has not done. If you expose anyone to a high-enough level of viral organisms, or expose them frequently to these organisms, then the viral population in effect overwhelms the immune response. This is what we see in healthcare workers."

Again, can you point to a study to support this? A paper in Lancet maybe?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 21 Apr 20 - 12:50 PM

No, they are wise words from a medical consultant in the family, no more, no less. I don't do studies, I only wear a minimal size anorak !!!!!!!!!!!!

Subject: Flu ain't the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 21 Apr 20 - 02:31 PM

I wouldn't blame anyone for being impatient. Instant gratification is ingrained in our culture, machines and behavior.
Looking into an ebola drug is thinking outside the box.
Doing the double blind experiments takes a very long time followed by more time. What if there is a connection, what if there isn't?

The mysteries abound and confound.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 21 Apr 20 - 03:05 PM

"The virus is basically the same the world-over."

Is that right? It may be, but I have seen no study of regional variation in the virus. The Wikipedia page on SARS-COV-2 talks about the difference between it and pangolin viruses, but nothing on regional variation or lack of.

There has been research into regional variations. They use techniques that were used to prove archeological migration patterns "out of Africa" and all that. The report I saw was in the Telegrope, and it showed a correlation for Europe & Australia. China was different enough to throw a spanner in the homespun theories of transmission routes. I can't see a Tory bias making that up! The Telegrope is not that subtle.

AND

Yer viral overload results in an over-active immune response where the knowledgeable (on more considered TV) use words like cytokine storm. However you look at it, the body itself attacks you. Hence the temperature.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 21 Apr 20 - 05:15 PM

At first there was a rumor about a couple variants of covid 19 then they said it appears fairly stable and not susceptable to quick mutation. I'm a spectator like everyone else.

The culture war right wingers are ignoring stay at home advisories.
Those politicians who can be bought to open venues like the Vegas Strip and new Shopping Malls are making money. The true red Trumpers are going full goose bonkers to expose themselves to the virus. I will be a spectator to thier mass die off 3 weeks after their grand opening.
The highest fatality rates, which are still only estimations, is about 2%.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 21 Apr 20 - 07:17 PM

This just in on Onion news
More Republicans dieing of the pandemic than Democrats
is proof the virus has a bigotry against the right and is a never Trumper.

Militia General Ratner:
This liberal deep state bio warfare against the far right will not stand. "lock and load - or is it load and lock"

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 22 Apr 20 - 02:29 AM

My day off - hooraaaaaaaaaay!!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 22 Apr 20 - 05:40 AM

Is that the day you go to work?




I'll get my face mask......................

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 22 Apr 20 - 07:13 AM

No, I work Monday, Tuesday, Thursday & Friday - at home of course at the moment via Teamviewer to our office server. Not the most satisfactory way of working at the moment, because file transfer speeds have been slow this week.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 22 Apr 20 - 10:00 AM

If someone is put on a ventillator due to Covid 19 their chance for survival is only 20%. It is a rare enough event to recover, some hospitals have a protocol of celebrating a recovered patient's release with applause at the exit to the music of Rocky.

Those who are ventilated are put in a medical coma which sometimes leads to blood clots and pulmonary embollisms from the lack of movement. This results in leg amputations when clots are found early.

This 'coroner' virus is a brute but so is the standard care for serious cases.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 22 Apr 20 - 12:06 PM

And now this: https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2020/04/first-u-s-coronavirus-fatality-found-three-weeks-earlier-than-previously-known.html

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 22 Apr 20 - 12:14 PM

Trump should extend his temporary freeze on immigration to a PERMANENT one - respecting Native American/Amerindian/First Nation "Land Rights"
.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mossback
Date: 22 Apr 20 - 12:27 PM

Just what the world needs - more crap "poetry"[sic].

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 22 Apr 20 - 12:46 PM

David Carter UK,
the concept of 'Viral Load' was initially my opinion of one possible factor in infection as reasoned from a occams razor simplistic POV.

Age and Underlying conditions remains a known primary factor.

This 'load' factor is untested to my knowledge, so blame me for the speculation. I can not prove this load theory but I do not see that thinking should be discouraged.
^^^^^^^

The US Attorney General Bill Barr says if people sue to be free of what he calls house arrest, the governmnt will side against strict States and side with plaintiffs.
Bill Barr is on the side of genocide

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 22 Apr 20 - 01:04 PM

SING ALONG

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 22 Apr 20 - 02:26 PM

Also this is likely why that giy had his leg amputated: https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2020/04/22/coronavirus-blood-clots/

Also survivors may be left with badly trashed kidneys and hearts, not just lungs.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: mg
Date: 22 Apr 20 - 06:16 PM

it's bad for sure. a ray of good news this morning on twitter..out of a yale lab. look it up yourselves or don't believe me. your choice. said that tests via saliva vs. nasal swabs were superior in results. It seems it would also cut down on personnel. I wonder if all the genealogy labs working with saliva kits could be pressed into service or at least provide expertise. Would not require as much exposure of personnel.

I can not imagine that viral load would not be a huge factor. Constant reexposure, such as in a nursing home, must be really bad. there have to be explanations for the high number of deaths both of staff and residents, athough I do believe many were slow to institute lockdowns etc.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 23 Apr 20 - 09:12 AM

Not just the bottoms of the feet: https://kfor.com/news/covid-toes-puzzling-condition-a-possible-coronavirus-symptom-mostly-seen-in-young-people/

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 23 Apr 20 - 10:47 AM

My local drug store is locked up. Nobody there to staff it?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 23 Apr 20 - 12:23 PM

This might be helpful, though not exactly new news: info on how long the virus lives outside people:

https://www.webmd.com/lung/how-long-covid-19-lives-on-surfaces

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 23 Apr 20 - 12:45 PM

While you don't have to eat meat, how long does virus live on raw refridgerated meats?

We don't know but Drs have said That Covid is a respiratory/eye/nose throat threat, its safe to eat Covid.

They really don't know, they just make best guesses.
Handling raw meat should be done VERY cautiously

Lots of meat packing plants are closed due to mass infections.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 23 Apr 20 - 03:42 PM

The packers, not the meat, are infected.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 23 Apr 20 - 03:49 PM

Elizabeth Warren just lost a brother to the virus.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 23 Apr 20 - 06:08 PM

Have you done experiments on how long the virus lives on moist raw meat?

A covid vaccine started human trials today. It contains the protien of the corona spikes.

There are about 70 entities developing vaccines.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 24 Apr 20 - 02:03 AM

UK human Trial in 2 Universities started.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 24 Apr 20 - 06:54 AM

Within thirty seconds of my arriving in the fruit and veg aisle in Bude Morrison's yesterday, a masked man and a masked woman, not with each other, barged within one foot of me at the bagged lettuce shelf. An unscientific sample of two, maybe, but it made me suspect that mask-wearing may not be the panacea...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: gillymor
Date: 24 Apr 20 - 07:18 AM

I hope everyone puts a shot of Lysol in their coffee this morning per the suggestion of the Idiot in Chief.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Apr 20 - 07:29 AM

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/donald-trump-drink-inject-disinfectant-bleach-us-dettol-rb-lysol-094417426.html

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 24 Apr 20 - 08:13 AM

I don't do the experiments but the reason the packing plants closed is the workers being too sick to pack, not the meat being contaminated.
I have already posted a link to how long this virus lives on various things. Dead meat is not a live host.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Apr 20 - 08:20 AM

I gotta hunch that napalm destroys the corona virus better than lysol.
Ask your Dr.if this is good for you.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mossback
Date: 24 Apr 20 - 10:21 AM

Stephen Fry Reveals How Right-Wing Media Crippled America’s Coronavirus Defense

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/stephen-fry-fox-news-trump_n_5ea23e27c5b669fd8921e3a3

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 24 Apr 20 - 12:59 PM

My toes are officially curled. It's in the eyes, like ebola.

https://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Researchers-found-coronavirus-in-a-patient-s-eyes-15223616.php

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Apr 20 - 01:09 PM

I have noticed a great deal of pink eye among those interviewed on TV
Nurses, doctors, recovered patients etc.)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: gillymor
Date: 24 Apr 20 - 01:28 PM

Now twitler is claiming that his disinfectant discourse last evening was sarcasm directed at reporters which was clearly not the case. There is no end to the mendacity.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Apr 20 - 01:32 PM

Oh yeah? In their own words

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Apr 20 - 07:32 PM

Local news (npr) said that in our area over a dozen emergency responses were made to people who had applied various disinfectants to their bodys

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Apr 20 - 07:59 PM

20% increase in disinfectant poisoning

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 25 Apr 20 - 04:02 AM

Interesting to see where Agent Orange got his duff info from...

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/24/revealed-leader-group-peddling-bleach-cure-lobbied-trump-coronavirus

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 25 Apr 20 - 05:57 AM

Arsenicum Alb might be considered helpful, despite idiot NHS doctors scorn of homeopathy!!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 25 Apr 20 - 05:59 AM

Ah, you’re a qualified doctor and medical research specialist, as well as an accountant, Bonz?

Who knew?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: gillymor
Date: 25 Apr 20 - 08:15 AM

Mercifully the White House reports that the Disinfector in Chief is going to pare back appearances at the daily task force "briefings" after turning tail before answering what would have been highly embarrassing disinfectant questions for him at last night's truncated "briefing".
Don't drink bleach.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 25 Apr 20 - 01:20 PM

Kim jong un is apparently probably dead.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 25 Apr 20 - 02:33 PM

Over on the UK Politics thread, I made a mistake when I replied to a post, not realising that it was a joke. As it happens, my reply there is more or less appropriate here:-


Never set any store on information that includes the word "apparently".

DC

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 25 Apr 20 - 03:12 PM

Apparently probably is surely an oxymoron!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: gillymor
Date: 25 Apr 20 - 03:26 PM

I wonder if the NK's sent Kim out with one of the anti-aircraft gun salutes that he was so fond of. Poor trump loses his soulmate.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 25 Apr 20 - 03:47 PM

Two rumours circulating - (1) Kim Jong Un is dead, and (2) he’s in a vegetative state after an operation to implant a stent went wrong. (nytimes).

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 25 Apr 20 - 03:58 PM

He's been in a vegetative state his whole life. So what's new.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 26 Apr 20 - 12:46 PM

CDC adds symptoms: https://abc7chicago.com/health/cdc-adds-6-new-possible-symptoms-of-covid-19/6130502/

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 26 Apr 20 - 12:50 PM

Posted this on wrong thread earlier, oops.

https://www.vox.com/2020/4/23/21232665/north-korea-kim-jong-un-coronavirus-sick

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: gillymor
Date: 26 Apr 20 - 05:07 PM

A Spoonful of Clorox by Randy Rainbow

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 27 Apr 20 - 08:16 AM

https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2020/04/24/strokes-coronavirus-young-patients/

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 27 Apr 20 - 09:42 AM

Not yet news but will be soon: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/04/27/covid-19-quickly-kills-some-while-others-dont-show-symptoms-can-genetics-explain-this/

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 27 Apr 20 - 10:17 AM

It's got elements of hemorrhagic issues, young folks having strokes and apmutations, scary af:

https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2020/04/we-still-dont-know-how-the-coronavirus-is-killing-us.html

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 27 Apr 20 - 03:00 PM

Thats why I thought resdemivir was smart. ebola was hemmoragic.

An app mutation sounds like tech theft.

Most of our genetic information is unknown. They used to call it junk dna. It may contain info to combat long extinct threats. Most of the unknown dna has since been identified as instructions to make specific protiens.
Its not the number of our genes but the info inside them. Some worms have more genes than me.

Wouldn't it be great to just turn on the correct gene to battle covid 19 or find it and CRISPER it into your system? This would even give your descendants immunity. This kind of genetic medicine is only a possibility, not a reality.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 28 Apr 20 - 10:09 AM

The opposite of hemorrhagic, oops, my bad:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/podcasts/post-reports/the-mysterious-clotting-in-covid19-patients/?itid=hp_audio-homepage-low-mweb_pr-main-player-low%3Ahomepage%2Fstory-ans

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 28 Apr 20 - 10:34 AM

Also inflammation of the blood vessels in children: https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/27/health/children-covid-19-illness-intl-scli-gbr/index.html

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 28 Apr 20 - 11:40 AM

Virus are not alive like flora or fauna. Nor are they life but rather exist in a grey zone of biota. Are they dead or alive ?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 28 Apr 20 - 03:03 PM

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 28 Apr 20 - 03:10 PM

300

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 28 Apr 20 - 03:56 PM

Well, viruses contain protein and nucleic acid, they can reproduce and they are subject to natural selection. Debating as to whether they are alive or not is a bit pointless.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 28 Apr 20 - 06:01 PM

Debating as to whether they are alive or not is a bit pointless.

But do viruses have rights?
DC

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 28 Apr 20 - 07:26 PM

Meanwhile dogs are getting it too. Besides cats, I mean.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 29 Apr 20 - 04:14 AM

In NZ they are selling home deliveries of drinks called Lock Down

She be right, mate.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 29 Apr 20 - 08:20 AM

Hmmm... Smokers not at higher risk?

https://slate.com/technology/2020/04/coronavirus-smoking-nicotine.html

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 29 Apr 20 - 11:34 AM

And now hives.

https://news.yahoo.com/amphtml/covid-toes-hives-skin-conditions-133004928.html

I insist that my starting to get hives again after years is a sympton of stress and inactivity!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 29 Apr 20 - 11:41 AM

Aren’t hives those things that bees live in?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mossback
Date: 29 Apr 20 - 12:08 PM

Nope. Them are skeps.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 29 Apr 20 - 12:14 PM

Nah, skeps are this big steel containers used to dump rubbish in....

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Rain Dog
Date: 29 Apr 20 - 12:19 PM

I always thought it was a hive of activity not inactivity.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 29 Apr 20 - 06:15 PM

Resdemivir makes progess reducing Covid symptoms by 4 days. Fauci gives it a thumbs up.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 29 Apr 20 - 06:32 PM

2 things in the Telegrope today.

1) they say experts are predicting the second wave will come in the winter. Sorry NZ, you have it licked, fer now, but............ There is a feeling that summer warmth and humidity will suppress COVID-19. And 'flu & colds (which sometimes are coronaviruses) typically show a seasonal variation.

2) the biggest vaccine manufacturer in the world is starting production on the Oxford Uni version (currently in human trials), switching from mumps etc. The Indian company is privately owned and the billionaire owner is able to make the bet not having sareholders/dividends to concern him. If he wins, he wins big. The Indian market is big enough on its own. Mind you, as I understand the methodology, it takes months to get the first batch.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 30 Apr 20 - 01:54 AM

Wiki on Remdesivir (re COVID-19)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Senoufou
Date: 30 Apr 20 - 04:57 PM

I had quite a disturbing email from my sister yesterday. In it she explained she can't speak as her throat is so sore. Her lungs are very painful and she can hardly walk without gasping for breath. She isn't sleeping well and is terribly worried that the virus has damaged her permanently. She first developed it about five weeks ago, and was discharged from the hospital two weeks ago, after having had ventilation and being on a drip.
She used to be so active and fit, but she fears her life has become a limited existence of tottering around in a feeble state.
I've heard that it can have long-term/permanent effects post-virally.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 30 Apr 20 - 06:14 PM

Well that's difficult to say as the virus has only been around for four or five months. Take this as an optimistic remark.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Senoufou
Date: 01 May 20 - 05:47 AM

Thanks Steve, I will. As you say, the virus hasn't been around long enough for the after-effects to be scientifically assessed. Anecdotal evidence doesn't carry much weight in my opinion. But being a retired doctor, she can see the gravity of her state, which is sad.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 01 May 20 - 09:59 AM

Forces à ta sœur, Senoufou.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 01 May 20 - 10:36 AM

I see Trump is back to claiming the virus originated in the Wuhan Institute of Virology (which, if i understand correctly, closed abruptly about the time we began to hear about the virus beginning to become serious in China).

Curiouser and curiouser...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Senoufou
Date: 01 May 20 - 11:12 AM

Merci bcp Mrrzy. J'ai soucis pour elle franchement, elle plonge en désespoire.
It is curious Backwoodsman. If that Virology place was so insecurely managed, it should be permanently closed and the 'resident' viruses killed off. But what Trump says gets madder and madder doesn't it? I'm afraid his cheese has completely slid off his cracker!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mossback
Date: 01 May 20 - 02:58 PM

Its not "curious" at all. Just President Lying-Sack-Of-Shit desperately trying to shift blame for his serial fuckups to anyone and everyone he can think of.

And the brain-dead Trumpist dickheads will believe his conspiracy theory bullshit.

Be afraid.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: fat B****rd
Date: 01 May 20 - 03:58 PM

Sending late best thoughts Eliza.
Charlie x

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 01 May 20 - 04:04 PM

Understood but Senofou is using the word curious in a most wonderful way as in 'discovery' or seeking discovery.
Multiple organ damage may occur but there may be treatments for even that as in stem cell tretments from ones own body.
More time is needed.

Beware of rhetorical questions Mossback

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Senoufou
Date: 01 May 20 - 04:32 PM

Thank you so much Charlie, your kind thoughts really help to reassure me.
At least my sister is eating properly - she has lots of batch-cooked meals in her freezer which she made long before the virus struck.
I see that Korea are now saying people cannot get Covid19 twice after all. That's encouraging isn't it?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 01 May 20 - 05:28 PM

Ooh that would be great.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 01 May 20 - 05:50 PM

Fauci has been working for decades to make a flu vaccine for ALL flu by working with the rod protein all flus share.

btw the White house has blocked Fauci from testifying in Congress

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 01 May 20 - 06:20 PM

"promised 100k tests a day by the end of April.

On 30th April, 122,347 tests were completed.

Promise made. Promise delivered"

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mossback
Date: 01 May 20 - 06:29 PM

Beware of rhetorical questions Mossback

Beware of reality and factual information, Don - you're sliding into Trumpism.

Bozo: Bullshit Stated - Bullshit Delivered.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 May 20 - 07:12 PM

"On 30th April, 122,347 tests were completed."

Not so, Mudcat's Croydon Eye. A third of those tests were sent out by post and no-one knows how many were either received on time or actually carried out.   Comment is free but facts are sacred.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 02 May 20 - 02:30 AM

Well done @MattHancock   All the doubters vanquished and the lefties now will have to find another issue to spread doom and gloom #testing

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 02 May 20 - 03:34 AM

Many BAME are suffering COVID19 (& rickets) in England (& New York) due to mass economic/CAPITALIST immigration in defiance of EVOLUTION - i.e., darker skin DOES need more sunlight for enough vitaminD to be healthy & we are too far from the equator for them; my poem, from WalkaboutsVerse on "Repatriating"

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 02 May 20 - 03:42 AM

I'm determined to come out of lockdown with new stuff. I’ve just signed up for an online archeology course

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Senoufou
Date: 02 May 20 - 03:50 AM

My husband had slight rickets when I first met him; his legs are a bit curved. He hadn't had a good diet from infancy (just white rice and a few vegetables).
The sun in his homeland is very strong of course, but it didn't seem to rectify the lack of vitamin D. He takes supplements now, and eats plenty of vitamin D-rich food.
Bonzo, archaeology sounds extremely interesting! I agree it's a good idea to profit from the Lockdown and study something.
(for me - Crumpetology?)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 02 May 20 - 03:57 AM

Archaeology eh, Bonz? A very appropriate course to be studied by an Anachronism.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 02 May 20 - 04:21 AM

Think about the wording!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 02 May 20 - 09:29 AM

Bame?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 02 May 20 - 11:22 AM

Don't ask, he'll just send more bad poetry your way.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 02 May 20 - 11:33 AM

BAME:- Black, Asian, minority ethnic.

i.e. non white.

DC

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: The Sandman
Date: 02 May 20 - 12:18 PM

bonzo , i notice your posts are a trifle dogmatic

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 02 May 20 - 12:40 PM

Hows this for dogmatic

1. Oh my name it is nothin'
My age it means less
The country I come from
Is called the Midwest
I's taught and brought up there
The laws to abide
And that land that I live in
Has God on its side.
2. Oh the history books tell it
They tell it so well
The cavalries charged
The Indians fell
The cavalries charged
The Indians died
Oh the country was young
With God on its side.
3. Oh the Spanish-American
War had its day
And the Civil War too
Was soon laid away
And the names of the heroes
I's made to memorize
With guns in their hands
And God on their side.
4. Oh the First World War, boys
It came and it went
The reason for fighting
I never did get
But I learned to accept it
Accept it with pride
For you don't count the dead
When God's on your side.
5. When the Second World War
Came to an end
We forgave the Germans
And then we were friends
Though they murdered six million
In the ovens they fried
The Germans now too
Have God on their side.
6. I've learned to hate the Russians
All through my whole life
If another war comes
It's them we must fight
To hate them and fear them
To run and to hide
And accept it all bravely
With God on my side.
7. But now we got weapons
Of biological dust
If fire them we're forced to
Then fire them we must
One push of the button
And a shot the world wide
And you never ask questions
When God's on your side.
8. Through isolation days
I've heard old war cries
between the blues and greys
Reds say $ is above lives
Some blame it on the yellow
You'll have to decide
Who rings most hollow
had God on his side.
9. So now as I'm coughin'
I'm weary as hell
The confusion I'm feelin'
no tongue can tell
I hear myself sayin
if God's on our side
He'll stop the next war
and won't let it hide.

Walkabout Don

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 03 May 20 - 05:38 AM

"bonzo , i notice your posts are a trifle dogmatic"

So they are! Our greyhound in her lockdownness decided to dig a hole in the lower level of our garden this morning until I bribed her away with treats!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 03 May 20 - 08:27 AM

Ah, thanks. Like POC.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 03 May 20 - 09:09 AM

Kids being potty trained are virtually immune to Covid 19 so Trump suggested older people could shit their pants for similar results :^/

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 04 May 20 - 09:14 AM

Happy (silent) hypoxia

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/may/03/happy-hypoxia-unusual-coronavirus-effect-baffles-doctors

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 04 May 20 - 12:08 PM

The coming pandemic -Austrailian documentary version
Is highly informative!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 04 May 20 - 12:10 PM

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/may/03/happy-hypoxia-unusual-coronavirus-effect-baffles-doctors

good catch Mrrzy

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 04 May 20 - 06:16 PM

Also this, which I find encouraging:

Hey I can do blickies again!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 05 May 20 - 06:21 AM

47D11 go team go

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: gillymor
Date: 05 May 20 - 08:23 AM

Trump's push to prematurely open up could be deadly:

NYTimes

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 05 May 20 - 08:30 AM

I heard it will magically disappear in April
Is it April yet?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 05 May 20 - 09:44 AM

Children have been being misdiagnosed, rather than not getting it, as it seems to present differently:

Blicky

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 06 May 20 - 09:57 AM

It's not news yet but interesting research is being done on twins and siblings, seems symptomology roughly 50% genetics so far...

Blicky

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 06 May 20 - 11:27 AM

The twins and sibs cited in this article lived together in the same environment and had underlying health risks.

“These deaths alert people to the fact that this could be genetic, but when people live together they share an environment as well,” Spector said. The upshot is that twins who live together are more likely to have similar lifestyles and behaviours, from diet and exercise habits to how quickly they seek medical care. Twins are not generally less healthy than the wider population. . . . “When twins or siblings tragically die with Covid-19 that captures our attention, but that doesn’t mean there’s any particular reason to think twins or siblings are at greater risk.”

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 06 May 20 - 12:37 PM

Fatsos beware.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mossback
Date: 06 May 20 - 02:27 PM

" Live And Let Die."

You can't make this shit up.

HEIL TRUMP!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 07 May 20 - 11:20 AM

Argh. My uncle is dying of old age and his old folks' home won't even let his children come say goodbye, let alone meeeeeeeee.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 07 May 20 - 05:07 PM

Latest lunacy from a USAian - a federal judge in the US has ordered Massachusetts authorities to allow gun shops to reopen, suggesting a rule to close them during the coronavirus crisis imposed an “improper burden” on the constitutional rights of citizens.

Gun shops were closed in March along with other businesses deemed non-essential.

However, some purchasers, retailers and gun rights groups sued, arguing it was an unconstitutional ban on acquiring firearms and ammunition for self-defence purposes.

US district judge Douglas Woodlock said he would direct the state to allow gun shops to reopen on Saturday with social distancing measures.

Absolute bollocks

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 08 May 20 - 01:39 PM

Seriously.

Also this:

Apparently blood thinners help, not with preventing it but with surviving it: blicky

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 08 May 20 - 04:54 PM

Guess who makes the world supply of blood thinners?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 08 May 20 - 05:08 PM

The realistic number of those infected in the US is somewhere between a minimum of 10 million and a maximum of unknown.

The stated infected numbers are arrant nonsense.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 08 May 20 - 06:46 PM

There is no "world supply" of blood thinners. Go chew some willow bark, or eat a lot of garlic, or befriend an organic chemist...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 09 May 20 - 03:48 AM

Wise thoughts concerning care homes:

"With and without irregularities what did they expect to happen to the geriatrics? Attendees can't keep social distance if they have to wash them, feed them, move them, changing sheets, medicating...
Doctors and employees don't live there... they have to move, they are potential virus carriers.

Just like us if we go visiting "unnecessarily"

And we can also infect being asymptomatic!"

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 May 20 - 05:16 AM

That's all true except for the fact that we're not allowed to visit. I used to see my mum four times a week. I haven't seen her now for two months. The other hazards you mention are very difficult to reduce.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 09 May 20 - 09:18 AM

The US relies on China for 90% of antibiotics.
https://www.cfr.org/blog/us-dependence-pharmaceutical-products-china

When it comes to Heparin
https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CHRG-110hhrg53183/html/CHRG-110hhrg53183.htm

The US will not join or speak to the 8 Billion Euro vaccine quest.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 09 May 20 - 09:45 AM

Siegfried lost Roy

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 09 May 20 - 09:48 AM

Anyone heard of Hydronium ? H₃ O+

I was listening to a Youtube video about Lithium Ion batteries and the guy who developed GM's batteries until 7 years ago when he went to china to develop Lithium Ion for CATL. A big fish in battery technology who also majored in biology as a student.

The subject came up about Tygrus (Troy, Michigan) who had an improved method of obtaining it. No mention of volumes or cost.

But what was said is that it is benign to Eukaryotes (anything built from cells with a cell wall - like us) and kills 99.999% of viruses, in one minute (he pointed out kill was a misnomer but you get the idea). What was not said was its effect on bacteria (non eukaryotic), which I would compare to penicillin in that if it kills so many bacteria there are side-effects, like the shits.

My point here is: "is this the disinfectant that Twitler referred to?". Him being limited on any subject that doesn't include him.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 09 May 20 - 10:16 AM

Tygrus on LinkedIn

About Us
Tygrus is a platform technology company that has innovative, proprietary chemistries and systems for use across a wide range of industries from water and industrial waste stream remediation to industrial cleaning solutions and food processing.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 09 May 20 - 01:50 PM

Sounds like hydronium could also make a wet battery heavier than lithium. I'm spitballing like Trump.

Most water will have some hydronium in it

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 10 May 20 - 12:50 PM

An NHS worker we know, when asked - if the NHS Nightingale hospitals are empty, why are Covid 19 patients in our private hospitals, replied that maybe because it limits the travel of the virus. If people isolated as locally as possible, maybe it contains the virus to the area that they are in. Rather than taking the virus to another area where the virus already is too, and making the virus stronger there.

A lot of sense in that.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 11 May 20 - 02:41 PM

Shanghai opens Disneyland singing "its a microscopic world afterall"

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 11 May 20 - 04:35 PM

New symptomogies here.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 11 May 20 - 04:52 PM

More than four months of clinical experience across Asia, Europe and North America has shown the pathogen does much more than invade the lungs. “No one was expecting a disease that would not fit the pattern of pneumonia and respiratory illness,” said David Reich, a cardiac anesthesiologist and president of Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City.

It attacks the heart, weakening its muscles and disrupting its critical rhythm. It savages kidneys so badly some hospitals have run short of dialysis equipment. It crawls along the nervous system, destroying taste and smell and occasionally reaching the brain. It creates blood clots that can kill with sudden efficiency and inflames blood vessels throughout the body.

Talk about a moving target.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 12 May 20 - 02:40 AM

Covid toes
it can present with skin problems, a bit like chilblains I have heard.

We have seen almost a hive-like rash ............ It’s hard for us to know if this is a viral manifestation or an immune response

- Right Oh, right toe.






I'll get my surgical gown.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 12 May 20 - 02:47 PM

Cytokine Storm

How an immune system has evolved, developed, how efficient, super efficient or lacking all play a role in the response to Covod 19. It is not surprising that various immune reponses act differently.

Sorry that merely understanding this does not help.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 13 May 20 - 05:31 AM

It attacks the heart, weakening its muscles and disrupting its critical rhythm.

weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeell I would dispute the contention that we would not expect it to affect any of our muscles. Ask anyone who had ME/Yuppy 'flu/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. The virus (Epstein Barr, Cocksackie B, etc) lives in the muscles and every time you get a cold the muscles weaken. It re-awakens the virus. FWIW Glandular Fever is a manifestation of the Epstein Barr virus and that is a chronic condition.

In the 80s, my doctor thought it was psychological, I insisted on a second opinion, I had the tests, and the specialist said "you had a virus". "Which one?" says I. "We don't know".

Thanks - but that is what I told the bloody doctor in the first place.
3 years later I saw a TV prog and my evidence fitted about ½ of all symptoms. In a syndrome you don't get them all.

My solution at the time was to fight it, eg run up stairs and get the pain at the top, not on each step. Apparently fighting psychologically is deemed a good methodology. But how fit would I be now without that burden? Who knows, you habituate to the new norm, like a poorer short term memory. It is what it is.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 13 May 20 - 09:24 AM

Men have more of an enzyme that helps Covid to enter cells of the heart kidney and lungs.

Avoid buffets like the plague.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 13 May 20 - 08:32 PM

Good News - The death toll was overestimated by half according to Trump and Dr. Birx.

The 'inflated' death total included people who only had the virus but died from falling down stairs, or that they were going to die anyway and didn't die directly from Corona virus.

Dr. Fauci said the opposite. The numbers are under estimated.

Trump responded "I like the numbers where they are, I don't want the numbers to double. Dr. Fauci is unacceptable."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Ebbie
Date: 14 May 20 - 12:52 AM

Donuel, I sometimes enjoy your posts but among the things for which I am grateful is that you are not a journalist. Your reporting is specious.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 14 May 20 - 01:27 AM

Since Dave Berry is retired I gotta do my own Dave Berry.
By using anachronistic facts, the absurdity shines even brighter.
Hey Ebbie this milk smells funny...you drink it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 14 May 20 - 09:53 AM

Barry, dude.

Loud talking:https://m.jpost.com/health-science/loud-speech-can-leave-coronavirus-in-air-for-up-to-14-minutes-study-627972/amp

Blicky

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 14 May 20 - 01:46 PM

Former CDC Intel Officer Dr. Rishi Desai on Why It's Hard to Get a Grip on the Coronavirus Pandemic

It is 50 minutes long, but one thing caught my attention. The doc was saying the virus, when it finds its way to the bloodstream, results in a reduced ability for the blood to transport oxygen. Which supports the contention I have seen elsewhere (and posted here) that ventilating, per se, is not that effective.

And Sir Peter Piot (formost authority on pandemics!) has done videos on the effects of the virus that he has only just got through, er still recovering!
He tells of kidney damage, lack of strength, and more.

When you put it together with the lack of oxygen in the blood, - organ damage is understandable. Peter Piot is saying "You don't want this disease".

I believe him, I believe him!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 14 May 20 - 01:51 PM

lack of oxygen in the blood, and headaches? wasn't that one of the symptoms?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 14 May 20 - 04:08 PM

There is a benefit to putting patients in a coma with a ventllator but it benefits doctors and nurses in terms of being able to tend to people who are conscious and breathing. It is true that sometimes forcing air into sore lungs is beneficial.
It is partly a matter of emotional relief. Some people are stressed hearing a baby cry. Hearing 200 people choking to death is stressful.
I would not condemn anyone who has to make survival choices when there are so few choices one can make.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 15 May 20 - 07:56 AM

Good views of US data here

https://graphics.reuters.com/HEALTH-CORONAVIRUS/USA-TRENDS/dgkvlgkrkpb/index.html?utm_source=digg

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 15 May 20 - 08:19 AM

And international pretty graphs here

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 15 May 20 - 07:39 PM

Lets decide not to rush to a vaccine
When Gerald Ford was President we had an epidemic of swine flu. They rushed a vaccine to market in only six months. We got to see Gerry get his shot on TV. Something else was brewed inside the eggs that grew the vaccine. It was a rare nerurological disease called petite Barr syndrome. I got the shot in the morning and by the time I was doing the dishes after lunch the brew reached my motor nerves. It was as quick as a light switch. One second I'm wiping a dish and suddenly I was on the floor with the odd sensation of no sensation of controling my muscles. I thought of my cello teacher who was struck by polio for his lifetime. It was months before the reason for my collapse was reluctantly made clear. I had time for many thoughts and wonders.
The biggest wonder was discovering the automatic switch to somehow raise myself back to standing on my feet.

It was similar to being shot at but missed. But thats another story.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 17 May 20 - 09:32 AM

And what about llamas? You guys hear about this?

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/may/16/llama-coronavirus-antibodies-study-benefits

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 17 May 20 - 12:54 PM

Interesting that Croydon University Hospital now only holds 50 coronavirus cases - down from 250 a short while ago, thus proving success of lockdown.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 17 May 20 - 01:30 PM

Good news, that.

Interesting advice here:

https://www.inverse.com/mind-body/are-you-wearing-gloves-a-mask-to-the-shops-you-might-be-doing-it-wrong/amp

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 18 May 20 - 05:55 AM

https://www.inverse.com/mind-body/are-you-wearing-gloves-a-mask-to-the-shops-you-might-be-doing-it-wrong/amp

From what I am hearing, vitamin D is generally helpful in limiting the widespreadness/severity of a lot of viruses. My question is regarding the correlation between the seasonal variations of 'flu-like infections and vitamin D production when sunshine is more prevalent. I feel sure it has been well researched, - enough for me to get the tablets, despite the sunny days we are experiencing. Lockdown means I am indoors much more. And dosage levels and toxicity are far apart with vitamin D, apparently. eg 15 µg cf 100 max safe recommended, though even that is not widely certain.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitamin_D#Immune_system

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 18 May 20 - 06:53 AM

"Croydon University"

Surely the juxtaposition of these two words is an oxymoron...? :-)

I should think that the government is hoping against hope that summer will largely nobble the virus, at least for a time. It isn't easy to work out why some viruses are seasonal. Sunshine and Vitamin D may be a factor but it's hard to pin down as such. I suppose high UV levels will help to shorten the viability of viruses on outdoor surfaces, including human skin and clothing, and in aerosols. As they say in Tesco, every little helps.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 18 May 20 - 07:29 AM

What are the results of the pandemic?:

The US is 4.3 % of the global population

but has 30% of the deaths from Covid globally

Today
Global deaths      315,000
United States deaths 95,000

WE ARE #1

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 18 May 20 - 08:44 AM

Go

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 18 May 20 - 08:45 AM

Oops twitchy.

Canada crashed plane doing thank-you flyover, oops. Let's just all clap at 7pm, ok?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 19 May 20 - 08:21 AM

Dr. Agent-Orange MD at it again, recommending Hydroxychloroquine and boasting that he takes it to prevent being infected by Covid-19.

And Americans seriously propose to elect this completely insane geriatric to be their President again?

God Help America!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mossback
Date: 19 May 20 - 09:25 AM

With any luck, the dumb bastard will kill himself.

Unless, of course, its simply one more lie to gull his moron cult members.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 19 May 20 - 09:34 AM

Ha! What’s one more lie amongst the myriad that have gone before...??

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 19 May 20 - 09:58 AM

Speaking of lies...

https://www.cnn.com/interactive/2020/05/world/worldometer-coronavirus-mystery/

Blicky

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 May 20 - 11:40 AM

For weeks I've been trying to stave off the issue of a dodgy tooth until this lot is over. So far so good. When I was at the B&M (aaargh) checkout this morning with my two bottles of mouthwash, the woman told me excitedly that, as long as I kept using it, I wouldn't catch Coronavirus. Poor woman.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 19 May 20 - 12:00 PM

Good luck with that tooth!

John Glenn's widow, at 100. Merde.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 19 May 20 - 01:06 PM

If you see a rabbit during their outbreak let me know

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 19 May 20 - 09:28 PM

Just whay we need. Rabbit Ebola.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 20 May 20 - 02:32 AM

Dr. Agent-Orange MD at it again, recommending Hydroxychloroquine and boasting that he takes it to prevent being infected by Covid-19.

‘This will kill you’:

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 20 May 20 - 07:21 AM

Dr. Strangevil declared the highest number of infections and death has earned the USA a Badge of Honor.

Also down is up. evil is good, death is best and ignorance is genius.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 20 May 20 - 11:32 AM

Oh for cryin' out loud.

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2020/05/trump-worlds-most-coronavirus-cases-badge-of-honor-good-bad-thing.amp

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 20 May 20 - 11:43 AM

And worse: https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2020/05/national-guard-deployments-to-fight-coronavirus-will-end-day-before-benefits-kick-in.html

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 20 May 20 - 11:55 AM

And different:

https://www.cnn.com/2020/05/20/europe/coronavirus-mink-netherlands-testing-intl/index.html

The bat at the Mudcat Tavern is happy to read this.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 20 May 20 - 01:31 PM

Somebody help me out here....

One of the legitimate uses for hydroxychloroquine is the treatment of lupus. But lupus patients are having a hard time getting their prescriptions filled because of a shortage caused by people using the drug as an unproven and very dubious treatment for COVID-19.

What I would like to know is this:

Hydroxychloroquine is a regulated prescription drug. The only way to get it is if a doctor signs a prescription. So how are enough people getting hold of it to create a shortage? Are doctors not ethically barred from prescribing potentially harmful drugs when there is no evidence that they will benefit a patient? Has advertising prescription drugs to the general public so broken the system that a patient feels he has a right to simply tell a doctor what drug to prescribe? And does the doctor then just write the scrip, consequences be damned?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 20 May 20 - 01:39 PM

You probably don't know many doctors, Royals, Reality TV stars, CEO's or Congressmen.
They can all be surprisingly stupid.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 20 May 20 - 03:48 PM

You're right, Don. I guess I tend to believe that doctors are inherently intelligent and moral creatures. Probably watched too many episodes of "Marcus Welby, MD."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 20 May 20 - 04:04 PM

If you'd watched M*A*S*H you'd know there are quite a few Frank Burns out there.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 20 May 20 - 07:32 PM

While there were more screw ups on ER, my fav is House MD.
IRL how many docs prescribed OXY, Celebrex, Farixa (causes genital gangrene) or worse things...

There are more doctors who do not listen - than virus in 1 pound of soil. I can't prove that but you get my point.
Nurses are not hired to hawk snake oil, skin creams or Hydroxy cut.

And while I'm ranting, Covid 19 has exceeded the number of symptoms one disease should have. Its being more of a hog than Swine flu. :<[

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 21 May 20 - 08:23 AM

The Navaho nation in New Mexico is the largest hot spot in the country

My father married a pure Navaho
My people were ashamed where ever we go
The Indians said I was white by law
The White Man always called me "Indian Squaw"
Half-breed, that's all I ever heard
Half-breed, how I learned to hate the word
Half-breed, she's no good they warned
Both sides were against me since the day I was born
We never settled, went from town to town
When you're not welcome you don't hang around
The other children always laughed at me
"Give her a feather, she's Navaho"
Half-breed, that's all I ever heard
Half-breed, how I learned to hate the word
Half-breed, she's no good they warned
Both sides were against me since the day I was born
We weren't accepted and I felt ashamed
Nineteen I left them, tell me who's to blame
My life since then is reservations
But I can't run away from what I am
Half-breed, that's all I ever heard
Half-breed, how I learned to hate the word
Half-breed, she's no good they warned
Both sides were against me since the day I was born
Si-lence, that's all that I hear
Si-Lence, with no intensive care
Si-lence, cuz the virus killed them all
Now one side's against me till the day that I fall

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: mg
Date: 22 May 20 - 01:51 AM

I am very concerned about people just blowing off hydroxychloraquine and chloraquine (I will combine them here and call them HX) because trump endorsed it. And might profit from it. Of course he will. Although I would bet he would profit more off the very expensive remsivir??? HX is taken by millions of people per year. It has been around since the 1940s. It works in synergy with zinc and vitamin d is a good supplement. They know what the safety parameters are in a non-diseased population, in a population with malaria and a population with lupus or RA. They don't know parameters of it taken with other medicines, vitamins, etc. They don't know everything about treating other diseases yet. They probably do not know the optimal dose. They probably don't know at what stage of the disease it is most effective, and the varying doses needed per stage. Many countries that use it believe earlier will prevent advanced stages in many people. So there is much that is known and much that is not known. You do have to throw spaghetti at the wall in a violent, fatal pandemic. They say doctors and pharmacists are getting prescriptions for themselves and families and contributing to the shortage. They should protect the supply for people with lupus, although faced with a painful but not immediately fatal disease vs. imminent death, it would be a hard choice. I have read, confirm for yourself, that it is very cheap, broadly manufactured, manufactured in places with high standards, such as switzerland etc. Producing too much would not be a problem because it could be used for malaria. Read up on the usage in other countries. Read what doctors say. Keep Trump totally out of the picture. If he says applesauce works you can bet he has cornered the applesauce market and will profit. Ignore trump, read what the doctors say, and ask again and again how many of these terrible heart problems are they actually seeing ? Some to be sure. Should give EKG first if there is time. There has not been time to do everything perfectly. Giving it to someone to prevent malaria vs. giving it to someone on death's door is two different things. Read everything you can and don't politicize this and write off what seems to be a life-saving medicine. And I am not really into abuse and I will as usual screen through to be sure I don't read what one person has to say and be cautious about others.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 22 May 20 - 07:10 AM

When you are first told there is nothing you can do but hide, it is reassuring to do somthing. I wouldn't take away anyone's symbol of hope be it prayer or an inoculous promise of help.

The trouble begins with harmful promises. If a low dose non injurious treatment by green laser light, the same one at strength used in surgury, was proven to help I too might take the risk. When a treatment was proven unsafe in the hands of people who think more is better I would not take the risk.

Overall, trusting a Shaman, disabled president or a hunch is not the way to go for the enlightened.

You are free to choose to be enlightened or an idiot. Some people do not have a choice.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mossback
Date: 22 May 20 - 10:13 AM

I am very concerned about people just blowing off hydroxychloraquine and chloraquine .......write off what seems to be a life-saving medicine.

There. Is. No. Evidence. That. Either. Drug. Is. Of. Any. Value. In. Treating. Coronavirus.

Has nothing to do with the opinion of the turd in the White House.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 22 May 20 - 11:53 AM

Exactly, Mossback.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 22 May 20 - 03:57 PM

NOT exactly .
Resdemivir is an anti viral drug developed in the fight against Ebola and has the scientific 'blessing' of Dr. Fauci and others. It is known when it is most efficatious, as it blocks viral infection of additional cells.    Let the trumpers buy up all the hydroxy and leave the resdem for us. :~}

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 23 May 20 - 06:48 AM

the problem with any drug that people think will work. It can become the de facto, the go to, and people en mass may not look to other things. Like ones that have some evidence-based efficacy.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 24 May 20 - 08:42 AM

It does weird clotting things to placentas: https://www.cnn.com/2020/05/22/health/placenta-covid-19-wellness/index.html

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 24 May 20 - 03:16 PM

Your mission if you decide to accept it, is to finesses a quarter to half a million people to kill themselves for the benefit of the treasury dept. We will disavow any knowledge of your mission.
Operation 'reopen' should prove more ambitious than the failed self deportation and build the wall missions. We suggest you begin by fomenting war betwen the govenors.
This post will self destruct in one view.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 24 May 20 - 07:03 PM

I've been looking at various data sites, and Virginia seems to have about a third of the average/typical death rate, roughly .02 to everybody else's .06.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 24 May 20 - 09:30 PM

No proof but Virginia probably lies better. It is nearly impossible to get the # of infections perfectly between (.02-.03) even with perfect testing. But its better to be lucky than right. My county has more dead than the entire state of VA?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 26 May 20 - 11:03 AM

Charlottesville itself has 4%.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 26 May 20 - 07:27 PM

localities are harder to manipulate than fed controled numbers from the states. Egad I sound like a conspiracy dude.
You do relize Trump has the pandemic numbers official classified.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: An Buachaill Caol Dubh
Date: 27 May 20 - 05:31 AM

The President of Austria, Alexander van der Bellen, has been fined for breaking the country's current rules re. Corona virus "lock-down". According to the BBC, a policeman noticed the President and his guests at a Restaurant after midnight, although such premises have to close by 11pm. The President has both apologised, and agreed to pay the fine and reimburse the Restaurant's owner should he too be fined. How different from the home lives of our own dear leaders. He should have worn a very expensive and distinctive waistcoat, so that the Polis would know his place.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 27 May 20 - 05:45 AM

Asa Hutchinson "americans need to be disiplined to face reopening"
???
We NEED to reopen our churches, brothels, tattoo parlors and casinos
No matter what people want

Twitter has begun to add fact checking links to Trump Tweets in the interest of public health and safety.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Senoufou
Date: 27 May 20 - 01:35 PM

Well, my poor poor sister has regressed considerably. (I got an update this morning.) Her lungs are filling up all night long and she's fighting for every breath, so isn't sleeping. She can hardly dress herself with the exhaustion and weakness.
Anyone getting fed up with staying at home and social distancing etc should read her emails. They're heartbreaking. If people could only see what this illness can do, they'd obey the rules and support their continuation as long as necessary.
It isn't just 'surviving' the thing, it's the possibly permanent damage to one's health that is very concerning.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 27 May 20 - 01:45 PM

I've not heard of such an extensive exerience of covid 19 before.
Did she mention anything about reinfection or other diagnosis?
May she
get well soon ALREADY!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Senoufou
Date: 27 May 20 - 03:48 PM

Thank you so much Donuel.
I've heard of many people who just can't seem to get rid of the lung problem. I sometimes look at Mumsnet (mainly women's comments) and there's a thread there called 'Covid Lungs'. The thread has filled to the 1000 maximum several times, with countless women still struggling several weeks/months after contracting Covid19.
I think, from what my sister has said, that the virus actually damages the lung tissue, and this can cause lasting health problems.
All the more reason for everyone to Stay Safe, stick to Lockdown and obey the rulings. It's tedious, but these health repercussions are so much worse.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Jack Campin
Date: 28 May 20 - 07:57 AM

This makes an interesting point - loud music in pubs is a hazard, since it forces people to shout, which spreads the virus. The same must go for all gatherings with high amplification.

Superspreader events

I found the recent accounts of spread in American meat packing plants interesting - they say it's because they're noisy and workers have to shout. When I worked in one of the biggest abattoirs in the world in the 1970s, NOBODY shouted - you walked up to people if you had something to say. The reason being that it was SO noisy that shouting was hopeless.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: fat B****rd
Date: 28 May 20 - 09:47 AM

Sending best thoughts as always, Eliza
Charlie X

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Senoufou
Date: 28 May 20 - 10:59 AM

Thank you so much Charlie!
She has always been such a powerhouse of energy, with many activities and physical sports, and it's so worrying how weak and helpless she's become. I thought she was nearly back to normal, but now this.
At least she is very popular in her Scottish village in Tayside and everyone is rallying round with deliveries and support.
It's a dire warning isn't it to do everything one can to avoid getting this blooming Lurgy?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 28 May 20 - 05:06 PM

J'en suis navré(e) ma chère Senoufou! I had been worrying. I hear truly nasty things about recovering after being really deeply ill with this virus, permanent organ damage, horrible stuff. La pauvre. And poor you, too.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: leeneia
Date: 29 May 20 - 03:26 PM

Jack, thanks for the comments about noisy environments and shouting. Along those lines, I'll mention that the bishops of my church are against resuming services, and one reason is that people singing can send germs 26 feet. Surely they must mean opera singers, but still...

I have read that another problem with the packing plants is that the workers are so close together.
================
Senoufou, I'll say a prayer for your sister. I hope her former athletic and energetic activities provide a strong foundation of good health which will enable to overcome this new challenge.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 29 May 20 - 03:36 PM

Senoufou we send our best wishes to your sister.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Senoufou
Date: 29 May 20 - 03:46 PM

Thank you Mrrzy, leeneia and Bonzo for your kind wishes. It's lovely to have your support on here. I'm many hundreds of miles away from my sister, and her daughters too are far away in Edinburgh and can't get to see their mum. She said in her e mail that she can't even talk on the phone.
Obviously, many people recover well,and others have no symptoms and don't realise they've had 'it'. I'm not sure about this 'easing of the lockdown' which the UK government is setting in motion.
People may do as they wish, but I'm a bit scared to expose myself to catching Covid19 and will probably continue to stay away from public places.
I sincerely hope everyone on Mudcat stays safe too.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 30 May 20 - 08:20 AM

Los Vegas prostitutes are now offering curb side pick up.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 30 May 20 - 10:26 AM

And the bat from the Tavern is happy to read about pangolins again!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 02 Jun 20 - 05:16 AM

If you remember the pandemic it continues at a 11% rise. There is no flattening of a curve.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: keberoxu
Date: 02 Jun 20 - 11:09 AM

"Surely they must mean opera singers ... "

Remember, Leeneia, that a solo singer is one thing,
but a choir/chorus of singers is quite another.
Ask the music director of a really serious church choir
or of a community or professional chorus --
don't take my word for it.

Where I am staying, once or twice a week
a chorus director, professional caliber, pays a visit
and he and I talk about many things.
He can tell you
that choruses of singers throughout this great land
are being silenced because of the fear of coronavirus.

There are some tragic stories out there ,
the director told me one such,
about a chorus rehearsal with no masks or handwashing or anything,
as a consequence of which
four chorus members died of COVID-19
and many more were stricken.
If what Eliza/Senoufou is relating applies to these people,
some of them will find it difficult to impossible
to sing the way that they used to sing.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Thompson
Date: 02 Jun 20 - 06:17 PM

I'm very sorry to hear about your sister, Senoufou. If she lies on her front (though maybe not while sleeping - I don't know?) it's supposed to give the lungs a better chance to fill up with oxygenated air than if she's lying on her back.

If anyone is interested in donating a fiver, there's a collection for the Navajo and Hopi people - it's probably linked in this piece here about how Irish people are donating in large numbers, as a kind of pass-it-on payback for the decency of the Choctaw, who collected money and sent it to us during the Famine.

What one reliable authority here, Luke O'Neill, is saying is that it's almost impossible to catch the virus outdoors, but people should mask up when indoors; shouting, running and sweating make you puff out more nasty virusy breath if you're infected.

I've also heard that the majority of infections are caused by 'super-spreaders', which is supposed to make limit the infection easier, though I don't see how unless they're incarcerated like the unfortunate Mary Malone, 'Typhoid Mary'.

Subject: E: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: mg
Date: 03 Jun 20 - 07:47 PM

I am in no way recommending this so check it out yourselves, but someone sent me something about lying over an exercise ball relieving some of the lung stress. it was put out by a physical therapist.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mossback
Date: 03 Jun 20 - 09:34 PM

About as effective as chloroquine.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 04 Jun 20 - 07:52 AM

The protests cannot be good for curve-flattening...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 04 Jun 20 - 07:54 AM

Just read George Floyd tested positive on autopsy.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Senoufou
Date: 04 Jun 20 - 08:47 AM

Thank you Thompson for your kindness. I expect she has tried various positions/ways to improve her breathing (she's a retired consultant anaesthetist, so knows about O2 levels and so on). Her latest e mail yesterday said she has used a pulse-oxymeter thingy, and her levels are quite low. Also, her lungs are filling up again, but she's managing to clear them each morning by heavy coughing.
She's naturally quite depressed at the thought that she might never regain the robust health she enjoyed recently before this virus (she's a lot younger than me).
Please everyone, keep vigilant and try to prevent ever catching the blooming plague!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 Jun 20 - 10:18 AM

George Floyd was symptom-free and the virus played no part in his death. Needs saying.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Senoufou
Date: 04 Jun 20 - 12:14 PM

Exactly Steve. Insinuating perhaps that 'he would have died anyway'?
Sister has just e mailed this afternoon to say she tottered out to her car (Ford Focus) to go for a brief spin and recharge the battery. She felt uplifted to see the Scottish countryside, and stopped at a re-opened garden centre, bought one or two plants and went home.
Breathing a bit better, but the weakness still debilitating.
This may be an improvement - sincerely hope so!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mossback
Date: 04 Jun 20 - 12:58 PM

Insinuating perhaps that 'he would have died anyway'?

That precise canard - that "people would have died anyway" has been and still is a major Republican talking point.

The "party of Lincoln" (yeah, right) really has devolved into absolute shit.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 04 Jun 20 - 01:06 PM

It was just a new datum. Nothing about cause of death. He may have infected the cops, though.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 04 Jun 20 - 05:05 PM

Oh great - my blood group (A-) is way more likely to suffer respiratory failure, if infected, than others.

https://www.news-medical.net/amp/news/20200603/Blood-group-type-may-affect-susceptibility-to-COVID-19-respiratory-failure.aspx

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 04 Jun 20 - 06:02 PM

better quarantine those cops

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 07 Jun 20 - 03:37 PM

Just to let you know this is a telephone call a friend received today. Be aware folks.
‘Good morning, I'm calling from the NHS track and trace service. According to our system, you are likely to have been in close proximity to someone who has tested postive for COVID-19. This means that you now need to self-isolate for 7 days and take a COVID-19 test.'
'OK. Can you tell me who that person was?'
'I'm not able to tell you that. That is confidential information.'
'Right. Um... so ....'
'But you do need to be tested within the next 72 hours. So can I just get the best mailing address so that we can send a kit to you?'
'Ok (gives address)'
'Thank you - and I just need to take a payment card so that we can finalise this and send the kit to you.'
'Sorry - a payment card? I though this was all free?'
'No - I'm afraid not. There is a one-off fee of £500 for the kit, and test results. Could you read off the long card number for me, please, when you're ready.'
'No - that's not right. This is part of the NHS so there's no charge.'
'I'm afraid there is. Can you give me the card number please - this is very important, and there are penalties for not complying.'
Puts phone down.
This is how scammers work. And vulnerable people will fall for it.
Don't fall for it...!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 07 Jun 20 - 04:05 PM

Wow. A$$holes.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 08 Jun 20 - 04:21 AM

Just read George Floyd tested positive on autopsy.

He was also "said" to have had COVID. Either way, if so, his lung function would have been depressed, and was vulnerable.
I saw a picture of a man who was said to have been knocked over by police in the current protest and left to bleed to death. Avoidable deaths both.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 08 Jun 20 - 06:21 AM

I saw a picture of a man who was said to have been knocked over by police in the current protest and left to bleed to death.

If you are referring to the 75 year old in Buffalo, all the reports that I have read say that he is in a serious but stable condition. Has he died since?

We must be careful about spreading false news, even if it is unintentional.

DC

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 08 Jun 20 - 10:12 PM

Although nothing seems topic related lately, he is in serious but stable condition. He hit hard enough to bleed from his ears and a small laceration.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 09 Jun 20 - 06:51 AM

The notion of the amount of viral load is being addressed as to the degree of serious infection. The viral load shedding is highest at the onset of the earliest symptons. It is still transmitted by an infected asymptomatic person but not as high.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 09 Jun 20 - 08:06 AM

Has he died since?<>

On reflection the caption may have read "left to bleed to death". The picture was certainly a lifeless looking person face down, and no one in attendances. Death is not a word you ignore. And the caption does imply something.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 10 Jun 20 - 10:50 AM

And the O blood group is less likely to get it at all. Goes along with A- being more likely to develop serious complications if they get it. Many sources, google ABO blood coronavirus.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 14 Jun 20 - 11:43 AM

Wonder why NIH yanked its funding but anyway:

https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/06/nih-halted-study-unveils-its-massive-analysis-bat-coronaviruses

Oddly near a Bats Make Tequila thread in my newsfeed:

https://www.cnn.com/2020/06/14/world/bat-facts-cnn-special-coronavirus-scn/index.html

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 15 Jun 20 - 06:19 PM

A ship's doctor on a corona quarantine Pirate vessel
has pleaded for more help struggling to lower the aRrrrr rate...




.. if that amuses anyone, it'll be a mudcatter...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: gillymor
Date: 15 Jun 20 - 07:07 PM

President Bonespur has come up with the cure for the pandemic. Who knew it would be this simple.

trump-on-coronavirus-if-we-stop-testing-right-now-wed-have-very-few-cases if any

He must have had a 3 Lysol lunch.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 15 Jun 20 - 08:14 PM

Pfr... Snicker.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 16 Jun 20 - 06:33 AM

I'm surprised you did not know that Trump hollowed out NIH of its pandemic research. He then zeroed out funding to WHO.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Jun 20 - 06:48 AM

Why the R rate is bullshit: suppose I was the only person in Cornwall with Coronavirus. I then give it to three people in my house. The R rate in Cornwall is then 3. So let's lock the whole country down again.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 16 Jun 20 - 03:37 PM

An old steroid was found to reduce mortality by 1/3 among the sickest patients according to a finding at Oxford University.
Way to go UK
The steroid is a dextro...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Thompson
Date: 17 Jun 20 - 01:50 PM

Today had the highest figures worldwide as it rages on in Brazil and the US.
Vitamin D is said to increase resistance to the virus; mushrooms are one of the few vegetarian foods that can make this vitamin - if you expose them to sunlight for 15 minutes.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 17 Jun 20 - 06:19 PM

I posted to this and it went into the ether, so here goes again, quite likely not verbatim:

If you want your vitamin D, stick your bare arms, bare legs and bare arse into the summer sunshine for fifteen minutes. There's no charge, and you can save the mushroom money...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 17 Jun 20 - 06:27 PM

By the way, mushrooms are commonly grown in a medium containing animal manure. Just thought I'd mention it in case any vegans are reading...

Sticking your bare skin into the summer sunshine for a quarter of an hour daily is totally vegan, and fairly sensual...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 18 Jun 20 - 01:27 AM

Texas' big-city mayors ask Gov. Greg Abbott for power to impose face mask rules

The mayors of nine of Texas' biggest cities urged Gov. Greg Abbott in a letter Tuesday to grant them the "authority to set rules and regulations" mandating face masks during the coronavirus pandemic.

As COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations continue to climb in Texas, an executive order from Abbott bans local governments from imposing fines or criminal penalties on people who don't wear masks in public. When the order went into effect, orders from counties and cities requiring masks became toothless. The mayors wrote that many people in their cities continue to refuse to wear face masks and that "a one-size-fits-all approach is not the best option" when it comes to regulating the issue.

The letter is signed by Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner, San Antonio Mayor Ron Nirenberg, Austin Mayor Steve Adler, Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson, Fort Worth Mayor Betsy Price, El Paso Mayor Dee Margo, Arlington Mayor Jeff Williams, Plano Mayor Harry LaRosiliere and Grand Prairie Mayor Ron Jensen.

The letter asks Abbott to consider allowing each city's local officials to decide whether to require the use of face coverings in order to prevent the spread of the virus.

On Tuesday, the state reported a record-breaking total of 2,518 patients hospitalized with the virus. The seven-day average of new cases has also reached new heights in recent days.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 18 Jun 20 - 09:07 AM

The blood group data has hit the mainstream news. A is more susceptible, both to the virus and its complications, and O is more resistant.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 18 Jun 20 - 09:37 AM

Risk factors are just another underlying condition and is more speculative than a guarantee.

Suppose an America devoid of any scientific knowledge or heads up about a pandemic but with its present population. Infection would reach about 60% of 370 million people. Death rates would be several million.

While my scenario is impossible, it could be worse.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 18 Jun 20 - 06:22 PM

In my neihborhood they are doing stem cell research to combat the cytokine storm to help the sickest victims.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 19 Jun 20 - 07:52 AM

Covid messes with Texas as hospitals see 95% increase in patients

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 20 Jun 20 - 12:44 PM

Almost 1 in 100 have had or have the virus in the US.
That is so generalized that it doesn't mean your area applies.

The comedian Bill Mahre generalizes further that Americans are not healthy enough to deal with the virus well because of diet. On Meal Time with Bill Mahre I think he goes overboard with his polemics.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 20 Jun 20 - 01:07 PM

Eviction freezes are starting to expire State by State.
Its not just about food and health security alone anymore.
Congressional action is needed.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 20 Jun 20 - 05:52 PM

There's a guy here who reckons house prices in the US are rising because: 1) low interest rates are encouraging buyers (millennials) & 2) sellers have taken there's of the market unwilling to allow potential COVIDers to breach the shelter in place. Demand higher than supply, up goes the price.

And I can't see that mechanism being any different in the UK.

So we may see an overheated market, with a swift readjustment. Now wasn't that what happened in 2008? Co-factors are different but the effect will be the same. Second wave (COVID), double dip recession?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 20 Jun 20 - 06:01 PM

In 2008 the watch dogs colluded with real estate to make any loan with a pulse. Then bundle the mess as an investment.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 20 Jun 20 - 06:40 PM

At the Trump Rally there are optional masks
Mandatory: temp taking

The snack shops have optional Milk of Amnesia
Mandatory: all drinks are laced with oxytocin

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: keberoxu
Date: 25 Jun 20 - 12:04 PM

The actual news report of this family tragedy is here: one birthday party, 18 people ill with COVID-19, two elderly parents in hospital

This is what Stilly River Sage has been prophesying for months now.


My summary of the story, for those who care to read it:
A middle-aged volunteer EMT is married to a doctor, and is part of
a large family, including his parents in their 80s.
Their adult nephew wanted to host a surprise birthday party, in person,
for their daughter-in-law, turning 30.
So of course the EMT and his doctor-spouse were invited.
The middle-aged couple
"refused to go to the party due to safety reasons."
The EMT is quoted saying:
"We knew this was going to happen,
I mean this whole time this has been going on,
we've been terrified."

Today, this couple, having avoided the event, are in good health.
But the EMT's parents are in the hospital, and may not make it.
Grandma, meaning the EMT's mother,
"stopped by the party to drop something off."
She was there long enough to become infected with coronavirus,
and she then went home,
where her husband became infected.
Grandpa is now in ICU, on life support, and
thisclose to "being put on a ventilator."

Quoting the report:
"Among those infected are two young children,
two grandparents,
a cancer patient,
and [the EMT's] parents, who are in their 80s ...
18 people in the family have tested positive for COVID-19."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: mg
Date: 25 Jun 20 - 05:00 PM

read up again about zelenko protocol. Warning...he is not a handsome model type of doctor and that goes against him unfortunately. Read about the people who have been saved with his protocol, zinc plus hcq plus azt plus perhaps vitamin d. read about the non rich countries around the world who have fought the plague with this protocol..countries that will not have a chance with more expensive drugs. read about the faked studies that are the basis for the slander against the protocol..where they gave six or more times the usual dose..and are said to have used a drug with a similar name to HCq. Ooops..so many of them died..it is supposed to be administered when symptoms erupt..not near death. Go on twitter and follow every single doctor and epidemiologist you can find, especially those from other countries. Read countries that have defied WHO. Follow the money that leads to more expensive drugs and vaccines. Follow the political hatred towards trump..justified usually but not here. Do not give heed to what newscasters, politicians, movie stars and home schoolers have to say. We are talking.HCQ by itself has known risks and they are rare and it is a nonpatented, easily produced, inexpensive drug. Now, you of course have to look at interactions with other drugs and other disease states and underlying conditions and stage of disease but they shut down studies that are trying to sort all this out. It is a very complex situation, corrupted by well, corruption of some sort. We are permitting the deaths of thousands of our own citizens..not pretty deaths either...and contributing to death and disease of millions of non-americans. I will not give links People will have to look at this by themselves. It is rapidly evolving, befouled research and it is too complicated. So find experts and follow them.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mossback
Date: 25 Jun 20 - 05:31 PM

Great, Mary. More voodoo, unscientific "medicine". You working for Trump now, or for Pence?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 25 Jun 20 - 05:41 PM

And per the CDC, the number of cases is probably 10x what we thought. Good news, actually, as it makes the death toll 10x smaller, percentage-wise.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mossback
Date: 25 Jun 20 - 05:44 PM

OK, Mary, I did what you asked & looked up the so-called Zelenko Protocol & Dr Zelenko on half a dozen responsible websites.

Didn't take too long to discover that Zelenko is a not too bright lying blogger pushing unsubstantiated, fact-free, harmful bullshit.

Just what we need in these times of crisis- another lying sack of s*** like Trump conning suckers with pseudo-science.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 25 Jun 20 - 05:45 PM

Also, this:


Blicky

Fox News and their ilk caused a lot of the problem....

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mossback
Date: 25 Jun 20 - 05:47 PM

it makes the death toll 10x smaller, percentage-wise.

Yup - a mere 150,000 and growing in the U.S. alone. Good news indeed.

Damn near cause for celebration.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 25 Jun 20 - 06:03 PM

Governor Abbott in Texas is realizing he's going to have to start acting like Cuomo in New York. This "opening up Texas" train is off the rails.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mossback
Date: 25 Jun 20 - 06:59 PM

Don't canonize Cuomo just yet, Gilly.

In my immediate area 80% of the businesses are not complying with the mandate that customers wear masks and about 25% don't enforce the mask rule for their employees as well as their customers.

These businesses have been reported, weeks ago, and nothing has been done.

Nor has Cuomo made masks mandatory, period, with penalties attached for non-compliance, as should be done.

Stay tuned: theres going to be a resurgence of Covid-19 in New York, they'll have to shut the whole damn state down again - and I hope that'll make the anti-mask morons happy.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 25 Jun 20 - 07:17 PM

I'm not exactly anti-mask, but I don't wear a mask unless forced to do so (as in my medical centre). I don't know whether that makes me a moron. The reason I won't wear a mask is that I think that at best, any benefit will be far outweighed by the improper wearing of masks, the inadequate and gappy nature of most masks I've seen and the complacency which an awful lot of mask-wearers appear to be afflicted with. Wear your mask if you want. But you'll have to pass a law before I'll join you.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mossback
Date: 25 Jun 20 - 08:23 PM

Its not about you, Steve.

Its about protecting OTHERS who might become infected by someone not wearing a mask.

Its about being responsible and considerate of other folks.

Best,

Greg

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 25 Jun 20 - 08:33 PM

"Greg"...?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 25 Jun 20 - 08:35 PM

Er, and that's the unsettled science...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Jeri
Date: 25 Jun 20 - 08:45 PM

It's Greg. He probably just forgot about "Bill".
But what he said... the mask is to protect OTHER PEOPLE if you're an asymptomatic carrier. If you don't care that you may kill other people accidentally, don't wear a mask.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 25 Jun 20 - 11:09 PM

Steve, it's a stubborn stance and ignores the solid amount of information that indicates that wearing masks does protect you and others.

I'm pretty sure Mossy was simply yanking chains with that signoff.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 26 Jun 20 - 01:46 AM

Oh I don't know SRS, although I think I'd opt to wear a mask if going out and it being my decision, things are blurred to me. Fwiw, I' try to copy a bit of what the WHO had as "interim guidance" on 5th June. I'm too tired to try and go back and find the link and don't know if it has been updated since.

First off, I'll try to present one table:

Table 2. Examples of where the general public should be encouraged to use medical and non-medical masks in areas with
  known or suspected community transmission
    Situations/settings                         Population                                       Purpose of        Type of mask to consider
                                                                                                 mask use          wearing if recommended
                                                                                                                   locally
  
    Areas with known or suspected               General population in public settings, such      Potential         Non-medical mask
    widespread transmission and limited or      as grocery stores, at work, social               benefit for
    no capacity to implement other              gatherings, mass gatherings, closed              source control
    containment measures such as                settings, including schools, churches,
    physical distancing, contact tracing,       mosques, etc.
    appropriate testing, isolation and care
    for suspected and confirmed cases.
  
    Settings with high population density       People living in cramped conditions, and         Potential         Non-medical mask
    where physical distancing cannot be         specific settings such as refugee camps,         benefit for
    achieved; surveillance and testing          camp-like settings, slums                        source control
    capacity, and isolation and quarantine
    facilities are limited
  
    Settings where a physical distancing        General public on transportation (e.g., on a     Potential         Non-medical mask
    cannot be achieved (close contact)          bus, plane, trains)                              benefit for
                                                                                                 source control
                                                Specific working conditions which places
                                                the employee in close contact or potential
                                                close contact with others e.g., social
                                                workers, cashiers, servers
  
    Settings where physical distancing          Vulnerable populations:                          Protection        Medical mask
    cannot be achieved and increased risk
    of infection and/or negative outcomes       •     People aged =60 years
                                                •     People with underlying comorbidities,
                                                      such as cardiovascular disease or
                                                      diabetes mellitus, chronic lung
                                                      disease, cancer, cerebrovascular
                                                      disease, immunosuppression
  
    Any setting in the community*               Persons with any symptoms suggestive of          Source control    Medical mask
                                                COVID-19
  *This applies to any transmission scenario

Now I'll try to give what they see as pros and cons:

Potential benefits/advantages
The likely advantages of the use of masks by healthy people in the general public include:                                                   

• reduced potential exposure risk from infected persons before they develop symptoms;                                             
• reminding people to be compliant with other measures. However, this can also have the reverse effect (see below);                                                         
• potential social and economic benefits. Amidst the global shortage of surgical masks and PPE, encouraging the public to create their own fabric masks may promote individual enterprise and community integration. Moreover, the production of non-medical masks may offer a source of income for those able to manufacture masks within their communities. Fabric masks can also be a form of cultural expression, encouraging public acceptance of protection measures in general. The safe re-use of fabric masks will also reduce costs and waste and contribute to sustainability.                              
                                                                  
Potential harms/disadvantages
                                                                     
The likely disadvantages of the use of mask by healthy people in the general public include:                                    
                                                                     
•    potential increased risk of self-contamination due to the manipulation of a face mask and subsequently touching eyes with contaminated hands;(48, 49)
•    potential self-contamination that can occur if non-medical masks are not changed when wet or soiled. This can create favourable conditions for microorganism to amplify.
•    potential headache and/or breathing difficulties, depending on type of mask used;                                 
•    potential development of facial skin lesions, irritant dermatitis or worsening acne, when used frequently for         
    long hours;(50)                                                
•    difficulty with communicating clearly;                        
•    potential discomfort;(41, 51)                                 
•    a false sense of security, leading to potentially lower adherence to other critical preventive measures such as physical distancing and hand hygiene;                           
•    poor compliance with mask wearing, in particular by young children;                                                
•    waste management issues; improper mask disposal leading to increased litter in public places, risk of contamination to street cleaners and environment hazard;
•    difficult communicating for deaf persons who rely on lip reading;
•    disadvantages for or difficulty wearing them, especially for children, developmentally challenged persons, those with mental illness, elderly persons with cognitive impairment, those with asthma or chronic respiratory or breathing problems, those who have had facial trauma or recent oral maxillofacial surgery, and those living in hot and humid environments.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 26 Jun 20 - 03:49 AM

Its not about you, Steve. - quite!

Most clinical looking masks have gaps but at the sides, deflecting the breath to the side and backwards. On face-to-face meetings that is a plus.

The real problem with masks is the way they are worn. I see mothers deliberately cross the loops to enhance the gap at the cheeks. While their children have them under their chins because of the restriction in breathing. Not even the bus drivers wear them, most of whom are nearing or over retirement age, though the older of that group seem to have disappeared currently. Not that I have observed many, I walk the 5 miles to town and not along the road where possible. Has anyone noticed how fat (ie vulnerable) a lot of bus drivers are?

My masks fit around the sides better, but then I chose carefully from the internet pictures and had them printed with my artwork advertising my website. Wearing on the bus is OK, but I wouldn't want to walk far in them. But if I take a bus it s because I am tired and the mask weighs heavy then.

FWIW the UK deaths graph has bottomed, and looking pretty flat at around 120/day mark (rolling average). The coming weekend may reveal something, numbers plummet Sunday/Monday which must be an artifact of reportage. I keep a spreadsheet and the FFT shows a strong spike at 7 and 3.5 days which is obvious on the daily graph.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 26 Jun 20 - 05:27 AM

With mask - 3% infection   Without mask 17% infection.
oversimplified yes, since factors like viral load is even more important/

3 days before symptoms a carrier will be most infectious. Thats why health are workers treating the people with symptoms are as protected as they are.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 26 Jun 20 - 06:28 AM

With mask - 3% infection   Without mask 17% infection

Meaningless.

Here in Cornwall there is no mask-wearing culture, so most people are clearly stubborn, accidental people-killers. You have to wear them on buses (which are as rare around here as rocking horse shit anyway) and trains (nearest railway an hour's drive away) and if you go the doctor or hospital. The nurse at our medical centre gave me a sort of papery mask that she said I can use over and over again. I'm puzzling over the hygiene aspect of that, even though I'm an assiduously hygienic sort of chap myself. Two days ago in Morrisons a mask-wearing woman brushed past me to get a bag of frozen peas. Yep, made physical contact. I've had a fair number of similar and unwelcome close-ups like that with mask-wearers. Mask-wearers are far more likely to ignore the other cautions, it seems to me, though I haven't done any counts. You see masks worn under the nose, etc. If they make masks compulsory, yet don't give people loads of free masks, a lot of people are going to reuse masks that they shouldn't be reusing. There plenty of negatives that you mask-zealots are ignoring. Oh, and by the way, this county, full of those stubborn accidental people-killers, has the lowest infection rate in the country. We don't know of anyone who has had the disease and neither does anyone else we know. Well, we did hear of an outbreak in a care home 30 miles from here...

I am not anti-mask. A couple of you are so pro-mask that your posts are beginning to sound a bit evangelical. The fact is that the efficacy of masks in many settings is questionable. There are downsides, some dangerous, that you are ignoring. I don't laugh at people who wear masks and I'll wear a mask when I'm ordered to do so, and I'll do it properly. The case for the defence rests.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 26 Jun 20 - 09:08 AM

Everything could be meaningless. But be that as it may
"wear the damn mask"

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 26 Jun 20 - 09:15 AM

Whatever your figures are, they are meaningless in the way you put them. It's about time you learned the good manners to express things in a way that doesn't do the discourtesy of forcing us to do a whole load of unnecessary mental processing. What you do is not clever, even if you think it is.

I've just got back from Morrisons, busy as it's Friday. Again, I didn't do a count, but I should say that fewer than one person in ten were wearing masks.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 26 Jun 20 - 09:19 AM


Here is a fascinating graphic on long-term issues.

https://www.visualcapitalist.com/whats-at-risk-an-18-month-view-of-a-post-covid-world/

The mask is to protect others. Every little bit helps.

And yes, a death rate of half of one percent *is* better than a death rate of 5%.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 26 Jun 20 - 09:25 AM

You have no more idea than I do as to how much or how little mask-wearing helps. There are many negatives, as has repeatedly been pointed out in this thread. Anyway, I've just bought a pack of five, just in case someone decides to force me to wear one.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 26 Jun 20 - 09:31 AM

And I do have to wonder how you get to be "a senior risk analyst"...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 26 Jun 20 - 09:48 AM

Um, there *are* data on masks helping.

There is also this:

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/06/dudes-who-wont-wear-masks/613375/?utm_source=digg

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: gillymor
Date: 26 Jun 20 - 09:49 AM

If Prez Jackass had been following his own CDC guidelines and wearing a mask in public and not disparaging their use all this time we'd have fewer deaths and fewer people soon to die and get sick. Of course that pales in comparison to number he killed with his politicization of and slow reaction to the virus.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: gillymor
Date: 26 Jun 20 - 09:56 AM

I'll amend that last sentence to read:
Of course, at this point that pales in comparison to the number he killed with his politicization of and slow reaction to the virus.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 26 Jun 20 - 10:07 AM

OK, so show me data supporting mask-wearing that doesn't have confounding factors.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: gillymor
Date: 26 Jun 20 - 10:10 AM

I'll go with a real scientist in Dr. Fauci every time.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 26 Jun 20 - 10:30 AM

Plenty of real scientists have expressed doubts.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 26 Jun 20 - 10:56 AM

Steve is indeed healed and back to his same old self
regretably.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 26 Jun 20 - 11:17 AM

Jon, your list makes the case basically - the only two "cons" that make any difference are the possible misuse and self-infection. That is always a risk with masks like this. The rest is for fussy users and are excuses for not wanting to wear one, not reasons why they shouldn't. Big difference.

It is now MANDATORY in Tarrant County, Texas, to wear a mask if you go into a business. Places are putting up announcements and saying they will offer a disposable mask to people who arrive without, but that no one can go in without a mask. This is in the most Republican county in Texas, as one poll revealed, yet it starts this evening at 6pm and runs through early August. The local officials are now finding themselves in the same place as New York City a couple of months ago and are finally taking it seriously. So don't bother with the "can't articulate clearly" or "waste management" excuses, just wear it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 26 Jun 20 - 12:03 PM

CDC adds 3 new symptoms:

Congestion or runny nose
Nausea
Diarrhea

Posted: Apr 24, 2020 / 10:44 AM PDT / Updated: Apr 24, 2020 / 10:44 AM PDT

SAN FRANCISCO (KRON) – The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Friday expanded the list of coronavirus symptoms, which may appear anywhere from two days to two weeks after exposure.

Here is the updated list of coronavirus symptoms from the CDC:

Fever
Cough
Shortness of breath or difficulty breathing
Chills
Repeated shaking with chills
Muscle pain
Headache
Sore throat
New loss of taste or smell

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 26 Jun 20 - 12:21 PM

This virus grows stronger with our laziness, division, exhaustion and ignorance. Without people who are willing to sacrifice their life to believe mr trump we would be on the downward curve but instead we are at the all time high in infections and deaths.
There are no viruses that attack only the stupid but it helps.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 26 Jun 20 - 01:28 PM

Everybody knows the boat is leaking
Everybody knows the captain's drunk

The negative postive test is flawed by a third. The antibody test is not much better. Then that data gets massaged further for national reporting.

The Pense pandemic task force is 99.9 % pure refined gourmet bullshit. The more bullshit the less time they leave up the graph showing that the worst area is the southern border. Then they put you to sleep and you wake up refreshed 48 minutes later.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 26 Jun 20 - 03:10 PM

Weird, I only copied the symptom list. It seems to have pasted the whole page. Sorry!

Live now first coronavirus task force briefing in months, on CNBC and likely elsewhere. Pence's head is so far up his ass it's coming out of his neck.

Ooh I am proud of that phrase.

---

Some of that extra text the page loaded into your cursor was removed. But those symptoms were reported in April and that doesn't seem to have changed. --mudelf

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 26 Jun 20 - 04:20 PM

Your view may be coloured by the fact that your state is in the middle of a terrible coronavirus crisis, Maggie. My view may be coloured by the fact that we don't know anybody who's been infected and that Cornwall has the lowest infection rate in the country. So you want masks and I can't be arsed. Can we agree that we both get it?   ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Jeri
Date: 26 Jun 20 - 06:53 PM

Steve, if you search for "studies on wearing masks to prevent covid-19 transmission", you'll find loads of information. I'd post links, but I think you're smart enough to do your own research.

In any case, preventing Covid-19 infection may not be as important to you as it is to people in the US, since we've got rates of infection through the roof. Even so, it's worse in some states than others. I suppose if you don't have to worry about accidentally killing someone, you don't have to think about wearing a mask.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 26 Jun 20 - 08:09 PM

Preventing infection is pretty important this end. My 91-year-old mum is in a care home six miles from here and we are all obsessed with making sure that they don't have an outbreak. We've been a bit shit nationally concerning all this here, but not as shit as you your end, it seems. But here in Cornwall we have done incredibly well. And we still don't have a mask-wearing culture. Live with that. We do.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Jeri
Date: 26 Jun 20 - 08:48 PM

"Live with that."
As you're far away, and couldn't kill me or anyone I care about if you were infected, you just do whatever makes you happy.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Jun 20 - 04:39 AM

Well I suppose that I could wear a mask all winter too to make sure that I don't kill anyone by giving them flu, another disease that is infectious before symptoms show...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 27 Jun 20 - 07:09 AM

By doing nothing, more people will get sick and die yet this is becoming the official policy in the US which is now passing its earlier all time high infection rate. This is because of the judgment that " we must not make the cure worse than the disease". So we open too early, force certain workers into infection chambers at work, roll back testing and contact tracing, have unmasked political gatherings inside and not support people who are unemployed. Go to crowded events andparty We must decide if we should try to save those who succumb to the virus at all if there are not enough beds, PPE or medical treatment.
We must not make treatment worse than the effect on the economy.
So go ahead and take no personal responsibility. DO NOT WEAR A MASK.
Be a fancy free Steve. You don't have to chant 'Lets do nothing' but just be sure to take no social respodsibility.
Not caring for the sick and dieing is easier than it sounds. It is the last intrusion on our lives. All that wasted money is saved. WE DON'T NEED TO BURY THE DEAD. That has shown to work best with ovens.

Gas is cheap now, so take a flight and smirk. That reciculated air in a hypo baric pressure tube is less dangerous than an infected TSA agent. :^/

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Jun 20 - 07:24 AM

Do try not to be so bloody daft.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 27 Jun 20 - 09:20 AM

Thanks elf! Yeah, I posted the new ones separately.

Underlying condition risk factors have changed, per the CDC. Pregnancy is in. Age is out.

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/need-extra-precautions/people-at-increased-risk.html?CDC_AA_refVal=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cdc.gov%2Fcoronavirus%2F2019-ncov%2Fneed-extra-precautions%2Fpeople-at-higher-risk.html

Blicky

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Jeri
Date: 27 Jun 20 - 09:49 AM

Steve lives in a country where the rates have come way down, because nobody is as dangerous as what passes for the US federal government. I'm not entirely sure they aren't actively trying to kill citizens.

The fact that he's on the same bandwagon as the white supremacist Trumpers is just a coincidence. If the UK doesn't advise people to wear masks in public, then he doesn't need to. They only have had 309K cases and 43K deaths. No big deal.

Promoting not wearing masks in a country with 2.5 MILLION cases and 127,000 deaths is what idiots and/or killers do. But that's not what Steve was suggesting, I believe. I think it's personal, and *he* just doesn't want to wear a mask.

Personally, I find it's easier to avoid going anywhere when I can and wearing a mask when I can't is best.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Jun 20 - 10:15 AM

Not nice to make that little bandwagon slur, Jeri. You seem to be on Donuel's gas oven bandwagon. In a post yesterday I tried quite hard to be clear that I recognise the different situations our two countries are in, using Cornwall, where I live (very few cases) and Texas (major crisis). I also said that I am not anti-mask, and that I do possess masks. I've said that there is no mask-wearing culture round here, which, with our risk level low and getting lower, is perfectly understandable. I have said that I will (and do) wear a mask if required to do so. Along with many other people, I do have a lot of doubts about the efficacy of masks in many situations: misuse, improper reuse, false sense of security, ineffectiveness in part. Mask evangelists do not have a monopoly over the truth of the matter, though you would think so, reading some of the rather moralising comments here. I've said that I don't sport a mask myself but that I don't laugh at mask wearers. I support all the government advice on social distancing, travelling and visiting or meeting people and I stick to it all assiduously. There is no advice to wear a mask unless you use public transport. I shop for vulnerable people. My hands have never been cleaner or more sanitised, and my standard of personal hygiene, as I've said, is high. If you think that puts me in league with white supremacist trumpers or the purveyors of mass extermination, well you'll just have to go on thinking it, won't you.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Jeri
Date: 27 Jun 20 - 11:19 AM

I'm not going to fight, Steve. I don't need that.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 27 Jun 20 - 11:39 AM

Funerals in the age of Covid 19 are lonely affairs no matter what the cause of death. So if we are going to have one, let the wake be now.
"For he was a folly good jello, for he was a folly good jello
For He was a folly good JELLO
which he always did deny".

Thanks everyone for tolerating the final episode of The Steve Diversion Hour , he always loved those so much, "Its always about ME" Diversions were his favourite. His never changing request that others must change was steadfast to the end. Amen

Now back to news: Arizona has broken records of of infection
https://www.fox10phoenix.com/news/arizona-sets-covid-19-records-with-case-treatment-increases1

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Jun 20 - 01:29 PM

If you don't want fights, please don't start them. My response you was civil and consistent, thank you.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Jun 20 - 01:31 PM

To you. I've cleaned my reading glasses.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Lighter
Date: 27 Jun 20 - 01:42 PM

"Citing 'irrational fears' of killer pandemic, Republicans fight face masks in Congress":

https://news.yahoo.com/citing-irrational-fears-of-killer-pandemic-republicans-fight-face-masks-in-congress-204027452.html

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Jun 20 - 04:53 PM

I can't read that. Present the unalloyed facts about masks as we know them to the people, make recommendations and leave it to us. I don't want to know what your politicos think about it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Lighter
Date: 27 Jun 20 - 06:46 PM

The punchline is that the Republican congressman involved is an MD.

He advises his constituents *not* to wear masks - so as to defy the "misrepresentations" of the "media."

Mad, isn't it?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Jun 20 - 08:17 PM

Your politics is stark staring mad, so I tend to pay no heed.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Jeri
Date: 27 Jun 20 - 08:58 PM

The rates in MD are fairly low (IMO) and going down, but Congress itself is a bunch of crossroads. Supposedly, masks are required in committee meetings. I don't know if anyone will enforce it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Jeri
Date: 27 Jun 20 - 09:10 PM

MD as in Maryland, where DC is, but not an MD, as in medical doctor. Politics seem to trump everything, including science, concern for others.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 28 Jun 20 - 03:00 AM

Whatever your figures are, they are meaningless

Hmmmmmm. They tell us that the statement is that wearing masks is better than not wearing. And may I quote (Sir) Peter Piot, director of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, AND who has headed up numerous UN AIDS groups.

"I would be happier wearing a mask at 1 metre, than not wearing one with 2 metre separation".

Having survived he said "after years fighting infectious dieases** - it was COVID that finally got me. Trust me, you don't want it, it causes organ damage"

I'll take my cue from Baron Piot KCMG, FRCP, FMedSci

**notably AIDS and the discovery of the Ebola virus.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 28 Jun 20 - 04:34 AM

Why thank you, Mr Red, for misrepresenting what I posted. Here, for your delectation, is the full quote as you should have reproduced it:

"Whatever your figures are, they are meaningless in the way you put them.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 28 Jun 20 - 04:35 AM

Speech marks optional.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 28 Jun 20 - 07:35 AM

In the US you will see FREE TESTING SIGNS however many people are ending up with bills between $2,000-$3,000 for that free testing depending upon the response of the testee.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 28 Jun 20 - 01:44 PM

I've been banned from going to Europe.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 28 Jun 20 - 11:17 PM

I hope all Americans have been, or at least people trying to come from here.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 30 Jun 20 - 01:26 PM

Yup. Good coverage here.

Most of Europe smart smart smart, US being dumb, to the tune of that South Park about the invention of mormons.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 01 Jul 20 - 09:26 AM

Ok cool new ooky info on the virus itself: not content just to hijack cells into making virus instead of whatever they were making till the cell bursts and releases all that newly-made virus, it gets infected cells to grow tentacles which *inject* virus into neighboring cells even *before* bursting.

https://triblive.com/news/health-now/inside-the-body-coronavirus-is-even-more-sinister-than-scientists-had-realized/

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: mg
Date: 01 Jul 20 - 01:43 PM

a combination of ivermectin and doxycyclin is looking promising. google for yourselves. i am not going to provide links unless i feel fully confident about the quality of the research, which so far has varied between good enough to pretty darn awful to downright criminally fraudulent.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 02 Jul 20 - 02:21 AM

I saw a short video of Dr Fauci being quizzed on why he didn't advocate wearing masks sooner. He was a very capable interviewee. The message was something like "initially we didn't have enough masks even for hospital (etc) workers. Telling people to wear masks would have left hospitals without supplies." The implication was ............ work it out stoopid but he is to careful not to be that obvious.

And FWIW he is definitely taking a pot shot at Twitler if this headline is accurate "Coronavirus: Dr Fauci warns US might not reach herd immunity due to ‘anti-science, anti-authority,..."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 02 Jul 20 - 02:28 AM

New Scientist has loadsa articles on various aspect. One recent one pointed out the research that shows that the virus thickens the blood causing blood clots.

Another reported that after effects can linger a long time. Debilitaion/weak muscles eg.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 02 Jul 20 - 06:09 AM

As the US approaches 100,000 new infections per day and growing exponentially, contact tracing will have no effect.
The runaway models project 1 or 2 million deaths

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: robomatic
Date: 02 Jul 20 - 11:04 AM

I am not (yet) ashamed to be an American.
I am not (yet) ashamed to be an American.
I am not (yet) ashamed to be an American.
I am not (yet) ashamed to be an American.
But that word 'ooky' definitely applies.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 02 Jul 20 - 05:48 PM

I started being ashamed with the torture thing, then had 8 years of shameless Obama, now back to shame, horror, and oh-come-on,-really?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: robomatic
Date: 02 Jul 20 - 07:31 PM

LOL
This is true: I remember being in the elementary school playground; sometimes we formed up for games with the leaders 'choosing' who would be on each team. Sometimes it was not so much a game as gangs forming up for whatever reason. I remember early on developing the principle that whatever the cause, don't form up behind the stupid fat kid. . .

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 03 Jul 20 - 04:46 AM

Ventillators will not be used anymore due to damage.
Oxygenating blood and returning it to the body is much better.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: leeneia
Date: 03 Jul 20 - 12:57 PM

The Kansas City Star had an article today on a 23-year-old man, Shakell Avery, who was in the hospital with Covid for 80 days. For most of it, he was unconscious, flat on his back and breathing with a ventilator. His life was saved by convalescent plasma, an experimental treatment in which antibodies from those who have already survived Covid are given in transfusion form. (The article makes it sound like only one transfusion was required.)

Just so you get a better picture, I will describe Shakell. He is black, he is big, and he wears glasses with light-brown frames. He wears his baseball cap the right way, and underneath it, his head is probably shaved. Shakell has no underlying health problems to explain why his illness was so terrible.

After hospitalization, Shakell needed rehab so he could walk again and even move his arms enough to feed himself. Two days ago he made a 5-minute speech urging other young people to take Covid seriously. Nurses and doctors who had treated him lined up on the sidewalk, all socially distanced, and cheered.

Three things to take away from this:

1. This convalescent plasma sounds really exciting.

2. What is it about Covid that one person can get it and not even know it, and others, like Shakell, suffer terribly? Is it something in our DNA?

3. Keep wearing your mask, keep social distance, stay home as much as you can. And quit worrying about politicians. Your safety is in your own hands.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: mg
Date: 04 Jul 20 - 01:37 AM

there are reports out now..google them yourselves or not..that a new strain of the virus is replacing old strain in US and it is 3-9 times as infections but not more fatal. It could explain some of the huge increase in numbers lately.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 04 Jul 20 - 04:30 AM

What is it about Covid that one person can get it and not even know it, and others, - genes? Lifestyle? Viral load? Luck. Tick any of the above.

3-9 times as infections but not more fatal. - less fatal? - as predicted by virologist-statisticians for years. It is the trend when the system a virus is working in, is working to defeat it. My guess, much like the e. coli O150 bacterium, is that the more benign strains have an ecological advantage. E. coli O150 propagates more slowly than other strains of e. coli so is out-competed for real estate.

Look at homo sapiens for a demonstrable example!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 04 Jul 20 - 10:23 AM

Fascinating info from autopsies:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2020/07/01/coronavirus-autopsies-findings/

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 06 Jul 20 - 07:53 AM

"99% of corona virus infections are HARMLESS!"
Donald Trump yesterday

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 06 Jul 20 - 08:36 AM

If you don't want to spend $30 for the Mrrzy link:
it is about micro clots in the brain, heart, lungs and liver.
The lungs show hundreds of thousands of micro clots
A similar condition may occur with Dengue fever.
A cell that destroys platlets is responsible.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 06 Jul 20 - 04:25 PM

Coronavirus news is not behind the paywall, washpo says...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 06 Jul 20 - 06:36 PM

They lied in this case.
My wife gets it free as a .gov employee

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 07 Jul 20 - 06:29 AM

The new strain of Covid 19 is even more infectious but but not more fatal.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 08 Jul 20 - 11:13 AM

And now hear this:

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jul/08/warning-of-serious-brain-disorders-in-people-with-mild-covid-symptoms

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 09 Jul 20 - 07:22 AM

the other idiot child in charge of a country ravaged by COVID - Balsanaro - has COVID. According to the BBC.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 09 Jul 20 - 07:44 AM

Mrzzy that brain disorder seems highly related to your micro clot post.

I see the same dark circles under the eyes in Brazil's president as Boris Johnson when sick.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 09 Jul 20 - 08:01 AM

Scary shit, yeah.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 09 Jul 20 - 03:03 PM

Going deep into the weeds of biochemistry, a result of Covid 19 infection is a production of super oxidized chemicals which in a sense kills like a disinfectant from the inside out. {irony alert}
70% of fatalities show evidence of the oxidation causing blood clots which can kill many people overnight including the young.
Cause of death is called respiratory but it is bloodclots throughout the body. Covid is acting like a hemmoragic disease like Dengue, Ebola and others on a microscopic scale.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 10 Jul 20 - 08:37 AM

Excellent risk eval chart here

http://www.ezekielemanuel.com/writing/all-articles/2020/06/30/covid-19-activity-risk-levels?fbclid=IwAR2oNoUnjxrHjC1jrWUUYaBybVpYK4cOJuzLBEchi6PtIv4LpsgWxOSmx4o.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 10 Jul 20 - 10:23 AM

My health insurance nurse called me and gave me a contact number if I have questions about doctor or dentist appointments and evaluate how seriously I am taking self isolation.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: mg
Date: 12 Jul 20 - 10:49 PM

some hope is being seen with Leronlimab. google for yourself, or don't. I think even later in progression. Reduces inflammation.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Jack Campin
Date: 13 Jul 20 - 07:29 AM

Today's bad news: stories from two different sources making it look very unlikely that lasting immunity happens. Instead, you can get it again within weeks or months (new infections, not persisting ones) and second time round it will be worse.

This doesn't happen with flu, and the chronic illnesses resulting from covid-19 seem likely be much more wide-ranging, common and severe than with any kind of flu.

Some countries (notably England, Brazil and the US) are going to be in serious trouble in a few months. There is no substitute for actually driving the infection rate to zero as fast as possible.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 13 Jul 20 - 11:33 AM

CDC adds 4 new symptoms:

Congestion, runny nose, nausea and diarrhea

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 13 Jul 20 - 12:33 PM

Jack, can you post the source of that information? Thanks.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 13 Jul 20 - 12:40 PM

immunity?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 13 Jul 20 - 01:18 PM

That's a good start, but it's from April 24, 2020. We hopefully know more now.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 13 Jul 20 - 02:00 PM

Here is something dated 13 July:

https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/07/13/1005103/immunity-to-covid-19-could-disappear-in-months-a-new-study-suggests/

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Jack Campin
Date: 13 Jul 20 - 03:54 PM

Longer-term illness for survivors. MANY survivors, we aren't talking about freakish bad luck.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/stories-53368768

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 13 Jul 20 - 09:12 PM

The USA poses a threat to Europe, Okinawa and the UK with Covid transmission. US military bases have created 100 new infections in Okinawa after they had reached 0 new infections. Wild Kingdom, Disney World and the Epcot Center are open for new infections because Florida is the infection epicenter of the world.

Subject: RE: immunity.?
From: Donuel
Date: 14 Jul 20 - 04:42 AM

The bad news is there are patients who have had Covid twice, months apart. Pure speculation is that they caught two different strains.
As you know we can get a flu varient more than once.

The good news is that there is a short period of immunity after having been infected.

I do not know the frequency of reinfection which is crucial data.

NIH has had a long running (holy grail) research program to make a GENERAL vaccine for ALL flu varients. Close but no cigar.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Jul 20 - 06:51 AM

Not for the first time you are peddling misinformation. There is little or no evidence of people having caught the virus twice, though there's plenty of evidence of fallible testing, for example people being told incorrectly that they are free of the virus who then think they've caught it twice. The body's adaptive immune response to this virus is not well understood and you really need to stop making things up.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 14 Jul 20 - 11:50 AM

First, this is not a flu virus, it's a coronavirus.

Second, there are actual reports, from medical sources (look'm up), of people getting reinfected. Sadly, the plural of anecdote is not data.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Jack Campin
Date: 14 Jul 20 - 12:56 PM

There are quite a few people who've got it again after testing negative repeatedly. There are two explanations. The less scary one is that they got a new infection because the first one didn't confer immunity. The UTTERLY TERRIFYING one is what you're suggesting - because that means anyone who's had it could be a silent carrier, capable of getting sick again and infecting other people at any tome. Which wpuld instantly create a whole social class of lepers.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 14 Jul 20 - 01:19 PM

One of the questions that is asked on the various online surveys being conducted (Boston Children's Hospital has one called "COVID near you" that I've participated in) is they ask if you've had the flu shot. It may be because there is a health reason, some kind of tangential immunity bump, or it may simply be to determine your willingness to take vaccines.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 14 Jul 20 - 05:18 PM

And yay, foreign students without in-person classes get to not go home after all, to spread the virus we are refusing to contain...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Jul 20 - 05:34 PM

Jack, the more prosaic explanation is that a person previously infected who is not clear of the virus has been erroneously told, after a test, that they are clear. Then, when symptoms recur, they think they've had it twice. As the testing is notoriously unreliable (I read somewhere...can't remember now... that around 30% of tests give false results), it behoves us to be cautious about claiming that immunity is either short-lived or non-existent. For a start, that would be somewhat untypical of this type of virus. There is a lot we don't yet know about this, and it would be best to avoid the kinds of wild conjecture we're seeing in this thread.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Jack Campin
Date: 15 Jul 20 - 06:41 AM

Some of the repeat illnesses have been after something like 3 months apparently clear. The consquences of treating everybody who's had it as Typhoid Mary would be appalling.

Long-term immunity to coronaviruses is unusual.

Subject: RE: BS: New neSts on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 15 Jul 20 - 06:50 AM

Steve thats the first time in ages you have made a reasonable speculation. You might not be right but sometimes even a blind squirell finds a nut.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Jul 20 - 09:41 AM

The only nut round here is you.

Jack, the fly in the ointment is always the fallibility of testing. Someone who has "had the virus twice" would (a) have been tested twice, at the right time, months apart, (b) been tested twice via an ultra-reliable test. (a) would be very unusual. (b) is currently nowhere near achievable. Not saying for one second that you can't catch it twice. But this type of virus does generally confer some immunity, if only for a short time, and, let's face it, the disease has only been in the domain of the known for not much more than half a year. "Catching it twice" is, as far as I can see, still in the realm of rumour.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: gillymor
Date: 15 Jul 20 - 07:59 PM

Holy Shit!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 15 Jul 20 - 08:30 PM

Since April the data regarding the pandemic was declared classified by the US Executive branch. This is essentially old news but its good for the people to be made aware of whats going on even if is late in the game. In reality there was virtually more effort and planning that went into hiding info than preparing to eliminate, trace and treat.
First WHO was demonied, now the CDC and Fauci of the NIH is demonied.
Its always someone else's fault on the Trump Show.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: gillymor
Date: 15 Jul 20 - 09:42 PM

Look for a precipitous drop in case and death counts. This is nazism plain and simple.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 16 Jul 20 - 09:32 AM

On the bright side, under the radar there are several signs of hope.
Therapeutics like Resdemivir etc. are arriving before vaccines, rapid low cost saliva tests are a game changer and past exposure to common cold corona virus might help and vaccine trials seem to work.
There is also mono clonal antibodies that will be coming onto market this Fall. They are working and are not a rumor.

New research accounts for 20-50% who have never been exposed to Covid 19 but still have immune cells that react to this new virus. The speculation for that, is that past exposure to normal common cold corona virus' creates a cross connectivity for partial or full immunity. Bear in mind that it is my wife and not I who works for the NIH. There are some things that are considered a 'close hold' and can not be discussed openly but there is real and substantiated progress being made.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 16 Jul 20 - 02:13 PM

The CDC data now goes to HHS under the loyal leadership of a former Cocapoo breeder and groomer.
Like the French underground in WW2 the true patriots will disobey and undermine the occupying enemy.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 16 Jul 20 - 05:16 PM

I hope everybody sends to the cdc as well as hhs.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: The Sandman
Date: 16 Jul 20 - 05:24 PM

Oxford scientists believe they have made a breakthrough in their quest for a Covid-19 vaccine after discovering that the jab triggers a response that may offer a "double defence" against the virus.

Phase I human trials of the world-leading Oxford vaccine have shown that it generates an immune response against the disease, The Telegraph has learned.

Blood samples taken from a group of UK volunteers given a dose of the vaccine showed that it stimulated the body to produce both antibodies and "killer T-cells", a senior source said.

The discovery is promising because separate studies have suggested antibodies may fade away within months, while T-cells can stay in circulation for years.

However the source cautioned that the results, while "extremely promising", did not.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 16 Jul 20 - 06:45 PM

Did not what?

And why on earth is anybody trying to keep vaccine research secret? It shouldn't *be* a hacking issue. This is a *global* problem.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: The Sandman
Date: 16 Jul 20 - 10:25 PM

mrzy the rest of the article was not available without subscription, but there is some optimsm to be shared, so i shared what was available

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 17 Jul 20 - 07:47 AM

yesterday 73,000 new cases per day in the US means that once we hit 100,000 per day the exponential increase will soon spike to a million infections per day. But mediation efforts may still prevent the 'Virus gone Wild' horror movte we are watching. A third of the kids in Florida are infected. How long term it will be is an unknown possibility.
On the bright side the sun is shining.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 17 Jul 20 - 07:53 AM

Should we trust our Dentist regarding transmission?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 17 Jul 20 - 09:13 AM

Depends on your dentist and on you, tjat last.

Apparently it is a thing now, if you don't agree with masks, to wear one made out if lace or something useless for the purpose.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 17 Jul 20 - 09:45 AM

Oh and here are some fascinating data:

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jul/17/covid-19-symptoms-falls-into-six-different-groupings-study-finds-coronavirus

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 18 Jul 20 - 06:34 PM

My toothache is going away with ampicillain. My dentist will be making a round trip to San Fran this weekend so I hope I last a couple weeks until Dr. Drillenfill is clear of infection. The worst case of flu I ever got was from a sick passenger on a flight.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 18 Jul 20 - 08:09 PM

"The worst case of flu I ever got was from a sick passenger on a flight."

You don't know that.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 19 Jul 20 - 04:56 AM

The worst case of flu I ever got was from a sick passenger on a flight.

So far. A week is a long time with Captain Catastrophe at the helm.


FWIW I am hearing that the UK Gov wants (is?) to ignore death that occur 28 days after the patient has recovered from COVID. So if there is no test? And all we hear from the emerging symptoms is that there are lingering symptoms that are not trivial. As reported by Sir Peter Piot, world expert on infectious viruses. He says you don't want it.

Massaging statistics? All those that say NO - bugger off. We don't need you.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 19 Jul 20 - 08:04 AM

Steve, seeing that the sick passenger was seated right behind me and coughed and sneezed all the way with watery eyes I was fairly certain. I woke up after a week to find my wife was uneffected and healthy. But go ahead and feel entitled to know best what I know and feel better than I. I suspect I've judged you too. Grudge not lest you be grudged.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 19 Jul 20 - 09:22 AM

Ok, now, here is something weird going on: apparently many, many fewer preemies. Maybe the lockdown gave pregnant women a break?

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/19/health/coronavirus-premature-birth.html

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Jul 20 - 09:24 AM

You simply couldn't know for sure whether you caught it from him or even whether you had the same disease as him. I sat next to kids in classrooms for decades and was coughed over and sneezed on and handled their snotty books many times. I rarely got ill and there was not one single occasion on which I could attribute any ague I picked up to any particular pupil. You have a habit of making things up and/or expressing conjecture as certainty. That's all.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 19 Jul 20 - 01:41 PM

Oh, Steve Shaw, sometimes you can, indeed, know how you got sick.

Twin A comes home from daycare with a stomach bug. A few days later, Twin B and I and other parent all come down with stomach bug. We got it from Twin A. Who got better and wanted to *play* (they were about 18 months old at the time) while the rest of us wete clinging to life by our buckets.

Niece comes to Thansgiving on a Tuesday night with a stomach bug. By Sunday night, mom, all 4 of us kids and one spouse, all 7 cousins, an ex- and their new spouse, and our 90+-year old guests -only there for the few hours of dinner itself- all had it. In three states. We got it from Niece. The CDC said if it spread beyond the family they would get involved.

So, lay off Donuel. Even if he's wrong about knowing where he got his cold.

That Thansgiving we all got a prize: I got lasy holdout

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 19 Jul 20 - 01:46 PM

Oops went to correct that typo and accidentally prematurely posted.

I got last holdout, as I didn't throw up till I got Mom back to DC from Philly, Sunday night.

Wil [Twin A] got best-dressed thrower-upper, for keeping his nice clothes neat despite getting up to barf every half-hour or so.

Tim [Twin B] got his prize for barfing himself out of an armchair without waking up, not to barf, not when landing in a heap on the floor, but I don't remember the name of the prize.

Anyway. Story of epidemic past...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 19 Jul 20 - 04:20 PM

It does appear that some people develop a body rash either during or after having covid.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 19 Jul 20 - 06:02 PM

Yes rash is a known symptom. Probably to do with the horrible clotting crap.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Jul 20 - 08:29 PM

"Probably?" Stop guessing.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 20 Jul 20 - 02:33 AM

Probably to do with the horrible clotting crap. - it looks like being careful with words and logic didn't work, you should have just gone with definitely and be ready for the unwarranted criticism.

OK. OK. I am ready now.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Jack Campin
Date: 20 Jul 20 - 03:35 AM

It's encouraging that the drugs which show signs if being useful are old and cheap - dexamethasone, heparin and colchicine. (Hydroxychloroquine would have been another, if it had worked better). Not everybody researching treatments is trying to make a fortune for the drug companies.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Jul 20 - 04:37 AM

Well Mr Red, I have a real thing about people who clearly don't know what they're talking about making "authoritative" assertions about medical matters. In this area above all others we should be sticking to the known facts, not casually risk misleading people. "Probably" means "much more likely than not" and, in the context used, is unsupportable.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 20 Jul 20 - 08:30 AM

Europe bans Americans from entry. Even Bermuda has banned Americans.

I started the original thread on the emerging Pandemic, Steve was instrumental in getting it closed. Repeat performances are not welcome.
While I worry, I know how important it is to not give in to despair regarding the pandemic particularly in Trump's America. Tidbits of knowledge as they emerge does save lives.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 20 Jul 20 - 11:35 AM

From my experience not even doctors can give an authoritative assesment of future events. There are best possibilities and risk assesments but no guarantees. The words possibly and probably are practicly fraternal twins and are not everyone's pet peeve.

In one of the infection types, micro hemmorages are the causal problem.
Clotting is diminished but is still a problem in effect. Ergo Heperin is used.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Jul 20 - 03:41 PM

"Steve was instrumental in getting it closed."

Do expand.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 20 Jul 20 - 04:20 PM

"Yes rash is a known symptom."
Strange that the NHS don't seem to mention it.
Nor do America's CDC who show a longer list on their website: Centre for Disease Control
Watch for symptoms
People with COVID-19 have had a wide range of symptoms reported – ranging from mild symptoms to severe illness. Symptoms may appear 2-14 days after exposure to the virus. People with these symptoms may have COVID-19:

Fever or chills
Cough
Shortness of breath or difficulty breathing
Fatigue
Muscle or body aches
Headache
New loss of taste or smell
Sore throat
Congestion or runny nose
Nausea or vomiting
Diarrhea
This list does not include all possible symptoms. CDC will continue to update this list as we learn more about COVID-19.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 20 Jul 20 - 04:25 PM

Of course, as the thread title specifies "News" rather than conjecture. Here's the latest news on a possible vaccine: BBC: Oxford Vaccine

A coronavirus vaccine developed by the University of Oxford appears safe and triggers an immune response.
Trials involving 1,077 people showed the injection led to them making antibodies and T-cells that can fight coronavirus.
The findings are hugely promising, but it is still too soon to know if this is enough to offer protection and larger trials are under way.
The UK has already ordered 100 million doses of the vaccine.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 20 Jul 20 - 05:05 PM

Yes, that is looking promising. Early days, though.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 20 Jul 20 - 05:13 PM

The US infection rate is 9.0% and 1 % of the population has already experienced Covid 19.
The UK infection rate is 0.6% .

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Jul 20 - 05:35 PM

Meaningless.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mr Red
Date: 20 Jul 20 - 05:40 PM

Well Mr Red,

Like shooting (Mudcat) fish in a barrel. Hardly a sport. But in the era of COVID one does what one can............



Meanwhile the Oxford vaccine is going on to bigger trials and the British Gov has ordered 100 million doses for an anticipated distribution in October, we are told today by the BBC. A gamble, for sure, but cf the furlough pay-outs - not too costly. The doses won't all stay in the UK, that was part of the deal.
And back home: front-line workers, care home staff, bin men, shop workers, then maybe old fogies next.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Jul 20 - 08:17 PM

The Oxford vaccine, whilst showing promise, has reached a point at which other potential vaccines have failed, so don't build up hopes.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 20 Jul 20 - 08:29 PM

Not true, when compared with Moderna in the US

Col.Blimp has become Debbie Downer.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Jul 20 - 08:57 PM

Thanks for the gratuitous insult.

"not true." As ever, you haven't done your homework and you're spouting off without having a clue as to what you're talking about. The vaccine shows promise and looks safe. But every scientist working on the scheme would tell you that many potential vaccines have reached this stage of development, then failed at the next hurdle. I invite you to look that up (as I have).

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Jack Campin
Date: 21 Jul 20 - 05:50 AM

From the public statements I've seen, the Oxford team are not claiming much long-term effect. Using it in practice would require dosing a very large proportion of the population very quickly and with a lot of booster shots. There is no precedent for a programme like that. In the US, not many healthcare workers would survive the inevitable massacres by gun-toting anti-vaxxers.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 21 Jul 20 - 12:33 PM

Aaaand we're worse off than we think.

Murrica!

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/21/health/coronavirus-infections-us.html

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 22 Jul 20 - 05:12 AM

At 1,000 deaths per day in the US the 'good massaged numbers' show the US is 10th worse death rate in the world per capita.

The actual numbers are as always a guarded secret or unknown.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 22 Jul 20 - 08:15 AM

Trump announces masks are OK. As a pandemic wartime president is this his Midway where the US gained its first advantage after Pearl Harbor?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 24 Jul 20 - 07:07 AM

And no RNC!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 25 Jul 20 - 06:10 PM

Well, kinda old, and kinda not *this* virus, but interesting!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Jack Campin
Date: 26 Jul 20 - 06:10 AM

You need a sub to read this. Summary: taking proton pump inhibitors (like omeprazole) makes you significantly more likely to get covid-19; the other major class of stomach acid inhibitors, histamine-2 antagonists, pose no risk.

http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/933645

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 27 Jul 20 - 01:23 PM

Blood group not found to relate to risk upon further research.

Here is one study but I recommend researching your own.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Thompson
Date: 27 Jul 20 - 02:07 PM

What clever little creatures humans are. What a pity they're going extinct.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 27 Jul 20 - 06:00 PM

Raise your glass for a toast to Disney and their economic wisdom in reopening in Florida 2 weeks ago. https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/27/health/florida-covid-children-hospitalizations/index.html

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 30 Jul 20 - 09:50 AM

So far though protests do not appear to be causing additional outbreaks. I am surprised, and pleased.

Here is one source.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/jul/22/trump-coronavirus-briefing-black-lives-matter-protests

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Vic Smith
Date: 31 Jul 20 - 06:08 AM

!!! BREAKING NEWS !!!
The government is increasingly worried about the effect that their impetuous knee-jerk reactions to the coronavirus are having in confusing the public. In particular, the decision to have different regulations for different local lockdowns appears to be understood by very few people, certainly not themselves.
In an attempt to deal with this, they are setting up a body of the leading nineteen Conservative politicians. They will meet regularly to deal with the implications of their past, present and future failures in their reactions to the pandemic.
The body will be called the Committee Overseeing Very Idiotic Decisions. It will be referred to by its acronym and its total of members; the thinking is that calling it COVID 19 will give a good ring to it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 09 Aug 20 - 08:32 AM

Jared Kushner was actually put on the task force and made plans for contact tracing. All his plans were actually rejected and his involment is now ended.

I actively discredit the conspiracy theories as our enemy be they foreign or domestic. The news that Hispanic children are 8 times more likely to require hospitaliztion and black kids are 5 times more likely than white kids to need hospitalization has me on more shakey ground as to the possible reality of a racial specfic weapon most valued by racists may actually exist in the form of Covid 19. Proof awaits.

The insanity of gas warfare turning against the users at the whimsey of the wind comes to mind.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 09 Aug 20 - 10:55 AM

Close US bars OR close the schools. Ya can't do both without disaster.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 09 Aug 20 - 11:26 AM

Neck gaiters don't help, fleece makes it worse:

https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2020/08/08/us/duke-university-face-mask-test-trnd/index.html

Blicky

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 09 Aug 20 - 01:11 PM

There are fogging issues with glasses but I've stuck with the N-95's

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 09 Aug 20 - 02:30 PM

Meanwhile, in South Dakota:

Thousands of bikers heading to South Dakota rally to be blocked at tribal land checkpoints

Clampdown comes as fears mount that mask-free bikers headed to large gathering could spread coronavirus to tribal groups

The tribal lands are sovereign, and they can keep the bikers out when their lack of protection and precautions as they travel endanger all in their path.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 10 Aug 20 - 03:20 AM

good news - Australian toddler stranded in India helped home by newlyweds

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 11 Aug 20 - 02:04 PM

Aaand Russia claims to have a vaccine. We'll know in 5 years...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 12 Aug 20 - 02:21 PM

Interesting article on telepsychiatry here. For those of us who miss our shrinks...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 20 Aug 20 - 01:20 PM

Also apparently the loss of smell/taste is brain damage to nerves, not trouble with the taste buds or olfactory receptors. Heard on NPR and seen elsewhere.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 22 Aug 20 - 01:15 PM

I am beginning to lose patience with people not "believing in" science as if it were something subject to faith. Murricans. Sign. Arrgh! Sigh.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: JHW
Date: 25 Aug 20 - 07:34 AM

I've found 'mask-free bikers' a problem. On footpaths a biker may be suddenly there with no attempt at distancing and giving me no time to distance either. Sure a quick encounter is supposedly low risk but they shouldn't even be biking on many such paths.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 25 Aug 20 - 03:50 PM

The curious case of a man getting Covid 19 twice is not conclusive. It could be by 2 different strains OR a mild first case did not trigger an immunity response. The confirmed second infection did not present symptoms. These cases are rare so it may not have any bearing on vaccine immunity response.
npr

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Mrrzy
Date: 07 Sep 20 - 08:07 AM

The long-term lung damage can get better!

https://www.cnn.com/2020/09/06/health/covid-19-long-term-effects-study-wellness/index.html

Blicky.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 08 Sep 20 - 04:31 PM

opinion:
Here comes the mature pandemic. Even with the downsized administration numbers we are at 1,000 deaths a day and 6.2 million contagious infections in the USA. The total number of deaths could double by Jan. 1st. As Rap said the real number of deaths may never be known. Just as people are exhausted by keeping their guard up we will be going indoors, kids to schools, bars to open and gathering at the yule log, all while the number of infections sky rocket. Some call it the second wave. I call it the lingering Trump disaster. LTD

A virus is not political, racist or compassionate but it is nice it spares women and children in some regards.

Subject: RE: BS: What Labor Day plans during COVID-19?
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 08 Sep 20 - 11:55 PM

Sturgis motorcycle rally in South Dakota in August linked to more than 250,000 coronavirus cases, study finds

excerpts:

News comes a week after the first COVID-19 death linked to the 10-day event that drew more than 400,000 people was recorded

The event will cost an estimated $12.2 billion in health-care costs, they wrote.

“In counties with the largest relative inflow to the event, the per 1,000 case rate increased by 10.7 percent after 24 days following the onset of Sturgis Pre-Rally Events,” the researchers wrote. “Multiplying the percent case increases for the high, moderate-high and moderate inflow counties by each county’s respective pre-rally cumulative COVID-19 cases and aggregating, yields a total of 263,708 additional cases in these locations due to the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 09 Sep 20 - 12:29 PM

I moved the above post from a less appropriate thread because I couldn't find this New news one. I've added COVID-19 to the title so searching it easier.

Those fools on motorcycles must have engaged in magical thinking to believe they could get away with such reckless behavior. The governor was all for it, but she and other officials who invited the activity will never be held accountable.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 09 Sep 20 - 01:14 PM

Ah, I wondered at the name change, thanks!

This is such a litigious society I bet there will be lawsuits over this, that Maine wedding, etc...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 09 Sep 20 - 02:32 PM

Breaking News"   Bob Wooward released the tape of Trump admitting he knew exactly how deadly Novel Corona Viris is and purposfully down played the pandemic to Americans.

Donald has killed more than one person on 5th Avenue and gotten away with it. The anger builds at 190,000 deaths.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 09 Sep 20 - 02:37 PM

Washpost: Trump told Bob Woodward on Feb 7 "You just breathe the air and thats how its passed..."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 11 Sep 20 - 12:56 PM

Have just heard from my poor sister and she is really struggling. Her lungs are absolutely messed up, she has tachycardia and her oxygen levels are dangerously low. Her GP has made several appointments at the local hospital for scans and assessments, and she might be admitted as an in-patient. There are now 'Covid clinics' being set up everywhere, as people are finding the after-effects to be serious and even life-threatening, despite surviving the actual virus.
Her lungs fill up alarmingly with fluid, and she mentioned 'bradykinin overload' (she's a doctor so I don't always understand these things) Apparently it's an enzyme which stimulates secretions via the blood vessels into the lungs and one can even drown!!
I do so wish people knew about these post-Covid symptoms - they'd soon obey the safety rules if they knew the actual facts.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 11 Sep 20 - 01:28 PM

Sorry, forgot to say, she caught Covid19 back in March, so about six months ago.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 11 Sep 20 - 03:12 PM

Man, Senoufou, horrible.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 11 Sep 20 - 03:32 PM

It is indeed Mrrzy. She seemed to be getting a little better a few weeks ago, but I think she was reluctant to trouble me with the gory details and make me worry. I just hope they can re-admit her to hospital and get her lungs cleared somehow.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 12 Sep 20 - 11:04 AM

So sorry to hear about your poor sister, I do hope they can help her.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 12 Sep 20 - 01:45 PM

Thank you so much Bonzo.
So ironic, as we thought she was getting along quite well. She said that her GP told her there are about 60,000 people in UK with this dangerous post-Covid lung problem, and so far not much has been discovered as to how to treat it.
Husband is so upset,as she has been very kind and generous to his family, and the last time we were up in Tayside visiting her (two years ago) she was extremely kind and treated us like royalty!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 12 Sep 20 - 08:12 PM

I've read about some steroid treatments being used now, a fairly recent development, of using low cost Rx steroids on people who had the worst cases. I wonder if it would apply to this manifestation as well. Best wishes for her next recovery from this.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 13 Sep 20 - 09:46 AM

Thank you Stilly for your good wishes. I'll mention the steroid treatment to her, it may be that's the answer!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 13 Sep 20 - 01:50 PM

Prior to and during infection it is wise to take vitamin D supplements. The reason why is because Vitamin D SLOWS DOWN a cytocline storm (a monster immune response that attacks the body indescriminatly)

It also speeds up safe healing. Perhaps you see the connection between dark skin people having less vit D production compared to light skinned people and as a result have a higher rate of morbidity and fatality. There are many other factors and influences but vit D is readily available and relatively safe.

Getting sufficient sunshine is even better than supplements.

I heard it on npr

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Ebbie
Date: 13 Sep 20 - 06:39 PM

Well, so far I have lost my last remaining sister and a cousin, in Oregon and Virginia respectively to the virus.

That leaves just one brother and myself alive out of nine children, some of whom died 20 years or more ago. I told my brother that I don't want to be the last one living so he has to take good care of himself for awhile yet. He is a trumper, though, so I don't have too much hope.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 13 Sep 20 - 07:28 PM

thinking of you & your sister, Eliza. I hope she can get into hospital & get some treatment that helps her.

hugs to you, too Ebbie,

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 14 Sep 20 - 03:43 AM

Thank you Sandra, it helps so much to have this support on Mudcat.
And I'm so sorry Ebbie for your losses. A hug from me too.
I think you're right Steve, because my sister was extremely vigilant about her food. She must have been the most correctly-fed person in Scotland, because she always made sure her diet was beautifully balanced and complete regarding all the vitamins, minerals and essential things. (Organic food from farmers' markets etc) She was so active and strong it was phenomenal. Whizzing up mountainsides, playing table tennis for a team, going for ten-mile hikes. etc. So I imagine that the vitamin D levels in her body were as they should be.
I suppose however up in Scotland the sunshine is more scarce, whereas I'm as brown as a berry down here in Norfolk, sunning myself on The Bench. (But not in a bikini -wouldn't want to alarm the locals!)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 14 Sep 20 - 07:42 AM

I am more likely to believe npr than our local dangerous mudcat mask denier.
Personally I don't feel I react well to vitamin D supplements. it feels achey or is a coincidence

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 14 Sep 20 - 12:22 PM

I read recently (forget where) that most vitamin/mineral supplements just go straight through you and aren't absorbed particularly well by the body. But well-chosen food is a better way to boost levels to the optimum.
Perhaps we should just all drink copious amounts of bleach, as advised by the Big Toddler.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 14 Sep 20 - 12:37 PM

Especially calcium.
People who drink bleach briefly complain of heart burn and sore throat. ;^/

Taiwan is the currently world leader in preventing covid infection due to contact tracing and a VP who is also an epidemeologist.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Sep 20 - 08:08 PM

The 07.42 AM post is a troll post, mods, put out here by a liar.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 14 Sep 20 - 08:34 PM

Steve. Stop it. You're stalking Donuel. If you don't like what he posts then don't open the threads where he is participating.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 14 Sep 20 - 08:40 PM

I'm sorry about your siblings, Ebbie. This is such a difficult time for so many reasons.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Ebbie
Date: 15 Sep 20 - 01:52 AM

Thanks for the good thoughts, everybody. It is a difficult for us all, isn't it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 15 Sep 20 - 09:15 AM

Aw, Ebbie, how awful.

I've had 3 cousins [loosely defined] get it, only one of whom, in their 20s, got really sick. My uncle who died of old age had it when he died, but did not die *of* it. My kid's girlfriend's positive test was deemed a false positive after a follow-up antibody test.

But the guy I work with on activism lost his brother, and there's you guys, so I know how lucky I am. I continue to be careful.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 15 Sep 20 - 09:24 AM

Ebbie its OK by me if you're the last one standing.
You are a Fiesty & smart favorite.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 15 Sep 20 - 12:43 PM

I just talked a friend through the process for getting the COVID-19 test through the county. He wasn't sure if the recorded message they sent was phishing of some sort, but it's just a weird way the county sends out messages. Anyway, it helps if everyone is tested, even those who think they couldn't possibly have it. One less question mark for county officials for the time being.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 15 Sep 20 - 02:35 PM

However, test availability may be limited, in which case would-be testees need to be prioritized.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Sep 20 - 08:58 PM

Maggie, he called me a dangerous mask-denier.

I have complied with every mask requirement for many weeks. I have a large supply of masks at the ready in my car wherever I go. I pester all my family to ensure that they always have masks at the ready. I would never break the mask rules. Or encourage anyone else to do so. I do question the efficacy of wearing masks, true, but I do not encourage mask rebellion in the slightest. Yes, I have confronted Donuel about his serial misinformation on a number of occasions in recent times, in threads in which I take an interest. I have always done that in a measured way, I can fully justify every criticism of him that I make (try asking me), and I have no interest in following him around on topics in which I have no interest. Please do not pull me up for "stalking" when I have just defended myself against blatant misrepresentation.

You criticised me very publicly. You are not always right. I have responded equally publicly. You could have done this via PM, and I would have responded civilly in the same vein, but you chose not to. I fully accept that I may have gone for Donuel's jugular a few times too often (though you do appear not to have noticed his trolling needling). If you decide to delete this, as is your right, I would ask you to also delete your post accusing me of stalking this vexatious man. If you don't, be assured that this post will remain in my archive.

Cheers

Steve

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 15 Sep 20 - 09:12 PM

The last time I read any of your posts about COVID-19 and masks, you were still suggesting they weren't necessary in your area and you weren't wearing them. If that's what I remember, that is quite possibly what others also remember. There is a gap in the information supplied. Good for you for wearing masks now.

Following people around from thread to thread and fighting about stuff or insulting others on each of those threads is what gets 1. threads closed and 2. people kicked out of Mudcat. So stop doing it. I've had messages from others about this and decided this is the place and the time to make the case AGAIN that anyone who does this (and there are others, you aren't alone) is going to find a "BONK" message after a while if they don't cut it out. We're trying to improve the general demeanor around here, and it has meant ushering the fighting parties off of the property. There have been lots of second and third chances offered.

This is it. Stay with the thread topic from here on out, please.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 16 Sep 20 - 08:27 AM

So, um, timidly going back to the thread itself..

Indonesia condemns mask nonwearers to digging graves for covid dead:

Blicky

I kinda like that.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 16 Sep 20 - 10:45 AM

Texas is supposedly going to have access to a "$5 five minute COVID-19 test" that will be supplied by the federal government.

$5, 15-minute rapid COVID-19 tests are coming to Texas

A spokesman for the Texas Department of State Health Services said the tests are being allocated by the federal government and that the state was discussing how to deploy them.

"Imagine arriving at your office. You walk through the front door, stop at the front desk, and then take a COVID-19 test. Within minutes you are cleared to begin your work day.

Cheap, rapid coronavirus testing could change how businesses, schools and other places move forward during the pandemic, and Texas is hoping to be at the forefront."

I imagine the only reason Texas is getting them now is because it generally votes Republican and has a GOP governor who was "nice to Trump."

(And on an unrelated note, I hear ABC broadcast a Town Hall meeting it ran in Philadelphia that Trump attended last night and the Independent and Undecided voters really held his toes to the fire regarding his COVID-19 response, and other topics.)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Sep 20 - 11:45 AM

Unfortunately, the more "rapid" the test, the more likely it is to throw up a false result. That includes false negatives. A high proportion of those would arguably be more damaging than not testing at all.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 17 Sep 20 - 06:28 AM

And your paper won't let "readers in the EU" see the article you linked to. Haven't they heard that we've left? Let's hope that their journalism is a bit more accurate...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 17 Sep 20 - 12:21 PM

That paper has a paywall that pops up pretty quickly. Here are snippets of it.

The Food and Drug Administration recently issued emergency use authorization for the BinaxNOW COVID-19 Ag Card rapid test, produced by Abbott, a medical device and health care company.

The company plans to begin shipping tens of millions of rapid tests this month, increasing to 50 million per month by October. That means the U.S. could have the capacity to test more than 1.5 million Americans a day in October.

In the past week, there have been between 588,965 and 911,329 daily tests performed in the U.S., according to Johns Hopkins University. In Texas, the number of daily tests administered over the past week has ranged from about 58,000 to 98,000, according to Johns Hopkins. . . .


Test accuracy
Molecular tests like the PCR, or polymerase chain reaction, test has been the most common test throughout the pandemic. It is taken as a nasal swab, or it can be taken as a throat swab or saliva sample. Those samples are taken to a lab for processing and can take days to produce results.

Antigen rapid tests work differently by looking for a virus’s proteins. Antigen tests deliver results in a few minutes and are administered with a swab from the nose or throat without the need for the sample to be taken to an offsite lab. Because the results come back so quickly, there has been some doubt regarding their accuracy.

Within the first week of symptom onset, Abbott’s new test has a 97.1% positive percent agreement, meaning it is accurate by that percentage when a patient is positive, and a 98.5% negative percent agreement, meaning it is accurate by that percentage when a patient is negative, according to Abbott.

“In order for them to be a practical option, they have to be inexpensive, involve an easy sampling method, be readable in under an hour ideally, and be at least 70 to 80% accurate,” Petrosino said.

Even if Abbott’s test or other rapid tests were less than 70% accurate, they would still be “tolerable,” according to Petrosino because a follow-up test could be administered to double check.

“Highly accurate tests are ideal, but we know that the tests with the greatest accuracy are molecular tests,” Petrosino said. Because molecular tests require a deeper nasal sampling and need to be processed in a lab, they’re more expensive and require more time, according to Petrosino.

“And [it] involves a sampling method that is uncomfortable,” Petrosino said.

More tests to come
Abbott’s rapid test isn’t the only one that has received emergency use authorization by the FDA. In August, Yale School of Public Health was granted authorization for its SalivaDirect COVID-19 diagnostic test. While most COVID-19 tests require a nasal swab, Yale’s test uses a spit sample — one of five saliva sample tests that have received approval by the FDA.

Such a sample can be collected in any sterile container compared with nasal COVID-19 tests, which require extraction kits that are sent to off-site laboratories.

“Providing this type of flexibility for processing saliva samples to test for COVID-19 infection is groundbreaking in terms of efficiency and avoiding shortages of crucial test components like reagents,” Dr. Stephen M. Hahn, FDA commissioner, said in a statement.

Sometimes if you open an article from Twitter it lets you see content.

Dallas Morning News article

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 17 Sep 20 - 05:16 PM

Can't see that.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 17 Sep 20 - 08:30 PM

Dr. Fauci, a basketball enthusiast, said he will play pick up basketball with Chris Hayes when the pandemic allows - as soon as the 4th quarter of this year.^/
He also said he will raise flags if corners are cut on vaccine.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 17 Sep 20 - 09:11 PM

Whaduknow, Fauci is human. He just called Chris Hayes to say he mispoke and he meant the 4th quarter of NEXT year.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 18 Sep 20 - 12:08 AM

“Wearing of eyeglasses is common among Chinese individuals of all ages,” wrote the study authors. “However, since the outbreak of Covid-19 in Wuhan in December 2019, we observed that few patients with eyeglasses were admitted in the hospital ward.”

The observation “could be preliminary evidence that daily wearers of eyeglasses are less susceptible to Covid-19,” the authors speculated.

Does Wearing Glasses Protect You From Coronavirus?

After researchers noticed fewer nearsighted patients in a hospital ward in China, they speculated that wearing glasses might offer some protection against Covid-19.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 25 Sep 20 - 12:05 PM

My [Virginia] governor has it. And he's been careful and sensible.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 25 Sep 20 - 01:54 PM

The news just now said a staffer was found to test positive.

A trip to the dentist yesterday felt like living dangerously, even with all of the precautions they put in place. I'm self-isolating for a week at least just to play it safe.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 25 Sep 20 - 05:26 PM

Our dentist uses Ozone treatment so need for us to self isolate!!

Subject: BS: china and covid update
From: The Sandman
Date: 02 Oct 20 - 05:23 AM

here is a copy and paste of how china has virtually eliminated covid.
   In January 2020, as the epicentre of the Covid-19 pandemic, China was grappling with cases in all 29 of its regions, daily increases in the triple digits, and an impending shortage of medical supplies. To tackle that, China went quick and hard – implementing lockdowns of various degrees of rigour in cities and regions across the country, resulting in about 760 million people being subject to restrictions. Every time an area showed a spike in cases, a lockdown followed.

Fast forward to today and China is on the other side of the pandemic: after weathering 85,307 coronavirus cases, and 4,634 deaths, the country is reporting just a handful of daily cases. On September 23, China’s overall number of active coronavirus cases was 402. The UK, which is hurtling towards a potentially devastating second wave, reported 6,178 new cases.

In May 2020, Xi Chen, an associate professor of public health at the University of Yale, published a study explaining how China’s prompt and decisive reaction – including “quarantines, city lockdowns, and local public health measures” – in the face of the first outbreak of Covid-19 resulted in the avoidance of what he and his coauthors estimated to be 1.4 million infections and 56,000 deaths.

But Chen does not think that all countries should go down that path. “Every country will adopt very different measures based on several things: there are more ways to control [the virus],” he says. “Decisions should take into account elements such as the country’s culture, its social norms, whether people will accept it, and also – very importantly – whether the health infrastructure is good enough to allow more spreading.” He points out that China’s ICU beds for 100,000 people are only half the UK’s, which made more stringent lockdowns inevitable.

Cultural differences matter, too. Regardless of the fact that China is an authoritarian state able to impose restrictions at the drop of a hat, it is an inescapable truth that some cultures are more resistant to limitations than others. Chen cites a recent study explaining how people living in the US’s westernmost states tend to be more individualistic and therefore less prone to observing restrictions than their east coast counterparts. Prime minister Boris Johnson’s remark about British people’s “freedom-loving” nature was crude, but gestured at something that does have an impact.

Johnson’s remarks – an attempt to explain the UK’s less successful handling of Covid-19’s second wave compared to countries like Germany or Italy – were made as he unveiled a new series of measures to stem the virus’s spread. Among the new measures is the requirement that pubs and restaurants close by 10pm; mandatory face mask-wearing for retail workers; hiked fines for Covid-security violations; and the recommendation that workers work from home if they can.

Some rules were met with bafflement: why, for instance would pubs have to close at 10pm rather than shut their doors altogether? And why did the “rule of six” – which allows six people from different households to meet up indoors and out – remain, despite the fact that inter-household spread seems to be one of the reasons cases are climbing up?

The answer is that at this stage every decision is a compromise between what is necessary and what can be done without further pummelling a prostrate economy and fatigued population.

“We know that total lockdowns work – the question is how much restriction do we need?,” says Keith Neal, an emeritus professor in epidemiology at the University of Nottingham. He says that falling back into a full-on lockdown every time cases start growing would exact a different cost: people’s health faltering because of missed tests and operations, and a more widespread deterioration in mental health. Compliance would also likely suffer.

Which is why you don’t want to overdo it. Shutting down pubs and bars might result in people meeting in their homes – which is harder to control. The emphasis, Neal thinks, should be on pubs following the guidelines to the letter. “If pubs follow the rules: service only if you are seated, social distancing – that is all right,” he says. “And pubs that break the rules should get closed first for one day, then for a week, then for a month and so on up to a year.”

According to David Wrigley, deputy chair of the British Medical Association Council, while the 10pm threshold seems “plucked out of thin air” and the rule of six for household mixing “should be reconsidered”, the latest guidelines are at least clear on issues such as face coverings. “Adherence to the rules is the most important thing, but the rules needed to be clearer,” Wrigley says. The government’s repeated changes of tack have been often criticised for being confusing, with the “Stay Alert” slogan singled out as a pinnacle of muddiness.

Will clarity – and minor tweaks to the rules – be enough to bring case numbers back under control? Many experts argue that the government is once again doing too little, too late. But Chen does not believe that repeated China-style lockdowns are going to be the future: they are way too onerous to be triggered as a routine countermeasure. In his latest study, he puts forward a new way of nipping the contagion in the bud, by enforcing different degrees of restrictions in different parts of the country – regions, cities, towns, down to the individual neighbourhood – depending on how bad the outbreak is, and how central to the country’s general movement of people that specific location is. “I don't think a complete lockdown is the optimal choice,” he says.

Gian Volpicelli is WIRED's politics editor. He tweets from @Gmvolpi

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 03 Oct 20 - 11:23 AM

Listening to the new-told lies / With supreme visions of lonelitude

Subject: BS: PHE [uk]shambolic
From: The Sandman
Date: 05 Oct 20 - 03:32 AM

Another example of Conservative shambolism
Coronavirus cases 'lost' in test and trace blunder

Ten-day delay means thousands exposed to virus were not told to self-isolate

Subject: RE: BS: PHE [uk]shambolic
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 05 Oct 20 - 05:48 AM

The "[uk]" is both superfluous, and incorrect.
PHE is "Public Health England" so excludes much of "UK".

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 06 Oct 20 - 11:48 AM

As much as it can be believed these days with the political meddling, the CDC has made the pronouncement that SARS-CoV-2 is spread primarily through the air. At least that was the announcement until the politicians start playing with their message again.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 11 Oct 20 - 09:01 PM

Nearly 10,000 minks die after Covid-19 outbreak at Utah fur farms

"Like humans with Covid-19, the most common symptom for infected minks has been respiratory distress, he said.

“Minks show open mouth breathing, discharge from their eyes and nose, and are not sick for several days before they pass away,” Taylor said. “They typically die within the next day.”

Taylor added that the virus has predominantly targeted older minks, “wiping out 50 percent of the breeding colonies,” while leaving the younger ones unscathed."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 13 Oct 20 - 09:56 AM

Latest casualty of the pandemic: sedation at the dentist. Mine just called to say they can't do sedation as they can't clean the apparatus. So no dentist as no way without sedation but also what? What have they been doing till now? Blowing other people's snot up my nose?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 14 Oct 20 - 02:46 PM

Oh and blood groups are back in the mix. A may not be more vulnerable, but O is, apparently, less so. Feel free to google your own references.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 15 Oct 20 - 03:02 AM

In the UK we always knew it would end in tiers!!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Oct 20 - 07:43 AM

So London, where our son, daughter-in-law and only grandchild live, has been put in Tier Two. My missus has her 70th birthday next weekend. Our plans for even a limited get-together in our house have been shattered. They can't stay in our house and we couldn't meet them anywhere indoors. But anyone from London can come to Cornwall and stay in their second home, or come in their motor home, or stay in a hotel, and they can go to pubs and restaurants. To say that there's something wrong here would be a massive understatement. It looks like Christmas won't happen for us either. I hear that the track and trace system here is managing to contact less than two-thirds of people exposed to infection, whereas the science says that the system can't work unless at least 80% of contacts are traced.

By the way, flu vaccine has run out round here. We have two very vulnerable, elderly friends who can't get it for at least two more weeks.

But this bloody shower will get away with all this, won't they?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Manitas_at_home
Date: 15 Oct 20 - 08:50 AM

The government advice on this is vague beyond belief. If you travel from a tier 2 to a tier 1 area are you bound by the rules of the original area or the new one?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 15 Oct 20 - 09:49 AM

Overall the pandemic has effected my family little. There are 25 million new jobless Americans and 6% more people who have fallen beneath the poverty line. We have no Covid assistance bill or a national response other than individual govenors taking less efficient charge.

The next coming pandemic/war will not be as comfortable or communicative as Covid 19. It will be of a cyber attack variety.
The US and Isreal started it with malware code like Olympic games, stuxnet and Zeus. We infected Iran. Now it has spread globally.
As in all war the credo is "do whatever you can get away with".
Instead of a pandemic where mostly old overweight people are killed the victims will be electric plants nuke plants, banks, hospitals and the internet.

So cheer up, it could be worse :^/

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 17 Oct 20 - 05:52 AM

I look up to Tier 1 because there are no dragons there. I look down on Tier 3 - they know their place!!!!!!!!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 21 Oct 20 - 05:17 PM

Wherever you go, be bound by the rules of where you are. Seems obvious.

Meanwhile mouthwash apparently helps. Also seems obvious.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 23 Oct 20 - 02:45 PM

Some good news about my sister, who got Covid back in March and was left with Covid lungs. She has seemed a little better these last few days, and has been going for walks, gardening and cleaning her house.
She feels quite a bit of hope now that she may end up less wrecked than we thought. She does use her oxygen machine at night though, if her O2 levels drop too much.
I feel so chuffed about this. Fingers crossed that it continues!
Stay safe everybody, and don't take silly risks!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: fat B****rd
Date: 23 Oct 20 - 03:58 PM

Good to hear, Eliza
Sending best thoughts and regards as usual
Charlie x

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 23 Oct 20 - 04:52 PM

Ooh *good* news, Sen!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 23 Oct 20 - 06:05 PM

Thank you Charlie and Mrrzy. It's heartening isn't it? She's been so brave and positive, she's quite a tough lady!
I see our region (Breckland in Norfolk) has some more cases, and the originally low level has gone up a bit. I think it's in a small way due to the return of schools. I can't see any way out of this, unless an excellent vaccine becomes available soon.
Oxford laboratories have perfected an extremely good one, and it's starting tests now. All fingers (and toes!) crossed!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 23 Oct 20 - 08:04 PM

It seems people in the US don't see the death rate clearly. To make the number more real I realized by March we will be at the one year mark for those who lost the Covid battle. The conservative number of dead will amount to more than 10 times the annual automobile death rate.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 24 Oct 20 - 12:16 PM

My fave stat is <5% world population but >20% cases and deaths.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 25 Oct 20 - 04:20 PM

When the news IS the news, as when the Illinois Public Health Director broke down during her announcement of COVID deaths.

Dr. Ngozi Ezike, Illinois’ Public Health Director, on Friday first started sniffing loudly as she announced an extra 31 deaths, taking the state-wide total to 9,418 people who had succumbed to the pandemic.

“These are people who started with us in 2020 and won’t be with us at the Thanksgiving table,” Ezike said, struggling to also announce an extra 3,874 confirmed cases for a total of 36,433.

“Excuse me, please,” she finally said — wiping tears from her eyes as she turned her back to the camera during the live-streamed briefing.

She paused for almost 40 seconds as others brought out tissues to help her compose herself, finally turning back around, saying “I’m sorry” and taking a deep breath before continuing her remarks.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 25 Oct 20 - 04:25 PM

This pandemic would be a trial under any president. I fear it’s more of a trial under no president. No one is truly presiding over our government at this time. We don’t have a Roosevelt fighting off fear itself, we don’t have an LBJ with a flashlight under his chin promising help to New Orleans after a Hurricane, We don’t have Jimmy and Rosalyn Carter in hazmat suits walking through Three Mile Island to show their faith in the scientists that saved the east coast. We don’t even have George W. Bush, who after cowering in the rabbit hole on 9/11, pulled himself together, crawled up out of the ground, went to ground zero and did his level best to do the job of being president, being there for us.

All we have is a real estate pirate, trying to save his businesses and his political future.

    Trump says this country wasn’t built to be shut down, as if any modern country was built for such. There is open talk of having to balance dollars against deaths.It’s true, we might not be able to weather a depression in our time. The last one was weathered by people who were born in the nineteenth century and had seen depression before. The country was largely rural, the supply chains were more localized. But are we to just give up and let people die so their grandkids can waterski?

"I must ask you Mr. Trump. Can our economy and your political ambitions absorb two million dead Americans? Do the math, for once, and ask yourself, “How many people do two million people know?” Two million dead, will leave a lot of living who will remember.

?And to you, Texas Lt. Governor Dan Patrick, I must ask, what if the virus takes one or more of your grandchildren rather than yourself? A virus can mutate quickly. The U.S. has seen quite a bit of coronavirus infections in young adults. Children have died from the virus. You don't get to tell the virus whom to kill. Would you risk burying one of your grandchildren to keep from being called a socialist? I will humbly await your answer, sir."

- James McMurtry

How true!!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 26 Oct 20 - 10:41 AM

heard on the wireless this morning. If people pay Boots £120 each time, people can get a covid test to make sure that they are not risking passing on covid at work or at other places, if they are an asymptomatic carrier.

Surely £5,440 a year is a small price to pay or making sure that our communities are safe. A paltry 40% of weekly salary for those on minimum wage. (irony).

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Lost Chicken in High Weeds
Date: 26 Oct 20 - 11:16 AM

>we might not be able to weather a depression in our time. The last one was weathered by people who were born in the nineteenth century and had seen depression before. The country was largely rural, the supply chains were more localized

This is exactly the point I've been making for decades. I've tried in vain to inform people that the Great Depression should be a major wakeup call for today, you *cannot depend* on "the system" for much of anything, much less *everything*.

And now the COVID-19 ordeal has proven that out in a very relatively *light* way. I mean, we were panicking over toilet paper, hand gel, alcohol, paper towels, stuff like that, and it even got tough to get certain food items for a while, people were going nuts but this whole thing was pretty danged mild compared to the potentials.

"The system" has now become incredibly complex, and with greater complexity comes more potential points of failure. It's now a *global* system, which also means that that failure can come from *anywhere*, triggering a domino effect. So, at some point, something or another is going to trigger collapse, it's just inevitable, there are so many potential causes that one or more of them is bound to happen.

Now, getting back to your point that I quoted, not only were supply chains more localized, but in fact most, here in the rural areas at least, were self sufficient to a significant degree. Essentially *everyone* had their own gardens at the very least, and usually some chickens, a milk cow, often some hogs, a mule, etc. My Dad's family were poor country folk and had those things. The only things needed to be bought were staples like flour, salt, sugar, etc.

These days, essentially "everyone" is entirely dependent on store bought goods for *everything*, and lacks the knowledge to take care of themselves without that availability. Couple that with the sheer population growth since the Depression...the more people there are that are suddenly without, the more desperation and chaos there will be. And also consider the fact that...*people are meat*.

No matter what ever happens with presidents, nothing will stop any of this because the population will never again agree to do what it would take to repair the overall situation. People have no interest in making sacrifices, or willfully altering lifestyle to any significant degree. We won't be seeing the majority reverting to the needed levels of self sufficiency until the situation forces it on those who survive the aftermath.

A hard rain's a-gonna fall, it's just a matter of when, and what the specific initial trigger will wind up being. If it's not some sort of market issue, it'll be a worse pandemic or environmental catastrophe, and the very few who are in any way "prepared" will quickly be overwhelmed and depleted by the masses who are far, far from it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 26 Oct 20 - 11:38 AM

We've moved on a little from this:
From: Mrrzy
Date: 21 Oct 20
Wherever you go, be bound by the rules of where you are. Seems obvious.

But it's not quite that simple. Wales is in lockdown (officially "Fire-break") but non-essential travel is not permitted. So I can't go to England to be covered by rules existing in a lower tier. (Unless it's for work, or essential health reasons)

It would seem to be "You are covered by both the rules of where you are from, and where you're going, so work on it being the more restrictive of the two". But even this isn't necessarily accurate.

The governments (plural) and local authorities do not make it sufficiently clear to be able to identify what the rules are, and whether people are breaking them.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 28 Oct 20 - 06:27 PM

I don't see why it is not that simple. You're in Wales, do Wales. You aren't in England, don't do England. Easypeasy.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 30 Oct 20 - 05:34 PM

The hospital beds are filling and the numbers are climbing steeply. Trump couldn't care less and if he loses the race, is not going to lift a finger to help people before he's out of office; that will be the time he races to enrich himself.

This is old news, that we have an awful president and he is behaving more badly with each passing day. But it bears repeating - and to serve as a reminder that everyone needs to vote. Don't sit home, thinking someone else will do it. Step up and be counted.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 30 Oct 20 - 07:47 PM

Just a reminder that we all are in what is considered to be the first wave. Some confuse peaks with waves. Fauci says normalcy is 1 to two years away. National response is key.
With Trump denial the death toll in America is headed to 1 million. Biden could change half of that.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 02 Nov 20 - 11:32 AM

Y'all reading that AI can identify covid from the sound of a cough? I am not adding my links in here yet. But seen from UK and US sources.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 02 Nov 20 - 12:17 PM

AI is usually a thread killer here, I'm glad you mentioned it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 05 Nov 20 - 10:09 AM

Weirdly enough all 6 of my relatives to catch it are on the jewish side of the family. Are there any data on that? I have not seen anything other than behavior of some orthos being problematic.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 05 Nov 20 - 10:20 AM

It seems like Trump is operating under the assumption that Covid 19 is only fatal to Blacks Jews and Mexicans. IF that were true he would make infection mandatory. :^I

Subject: BS: Bloody UK lockdown Mk 2
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 Nov 20 - 06:40 PM

This is not intended to be a Brit politics thread, more a cri de coeur. We've been locked down again, for four weeks this time, nationwide. People round here can't believe it. We have the lowest infection rate in the country but we can't meet our families and friends. The supermarkets can sell whatever they like but almost all other shops are forced to close, restaurants and leisure facilities have all shut down and the police are threatening to interrogate us as to what we're doing if they see us out and about. Yet schools and universities can carry on as normal, in spite of the fact that infection rates are ballooning in secondary schools and that university students have descended from all corners of the country/globe and spiked infection rates in many university towns. I went into town today and it felt nothing like the first lockdown. Plenty of traffic, supermarkets crowded, streets full of people, and fireworks parties all round this evening. I'm thinking that huge numbers of people are ignoring this latest lockdown and I don't blame them. The approach I strongly feel that should have been adopted from the getgo was one in which the government made a massive effort to educate the public and get everyone onside by persuasion, not edict. I mean, how have we reached a position whereby a supposed democratic government can tell people that they can't leave their house and can't mix with their own close families?

Subject: RE: BS: Bloody lockdown Mk 2
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 06 Nov 20 - 05:08 AM

.... from the getgo ....

{{{{shudder}}}}

Subject: RE: BS: Bloody lockdown Mk 2
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 06 Nov 20 - 05:22 AM

But this is just what labour were demanding is it not! For those retired and not working - they can carry on sloathing at home and whinge, and for those retired and still working as normal - albeit from home like myself, we contribute!!!

Subject: RE: BS: Bloody lockdown Mk 2
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Nov 20 - 05:42 AM

I assume that you are not shuddering because I missed the hyphen out of get-go. I quite like get-go and I shall be using it a lot going forward.

Subject: RE: BS: Bloody lockdown Mk 2
From: Raggytash
Date: 06 Nov 20 - 05:48 AM

Much as I do not like the lockdown, the alternative is a continuation of high mortality.

I have witnessed numerous acts of sheer stupidity including some from my mates who I had thought were intelligent people.

For instance in my local bar where the owners had tried very hard to follow the guidelines one person from my table went to speak to people at another table. He did wear a mask but he wore MINE. When he returned to our table he could not understand why I was a bit miffed.

Subject: RE: BS: Bloody lockdown Mk 2
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Nov 20 - 06:18 AM

The lockdown isn't going to prevent deaths. It's designed to spread them out so that the NHS (near-wrecked by ten years of Toryism) won't be overwhelmed. And don't forget the side effects of lockdowns. The BBC reports that there has bee been a 20% rise in the numbers of babies harmed, even killed, since March. Who knows how many suicides, mental health breakdowns and incidents of domestic violence could be attributed to job losses, isolation and financial struggles. Until last week I hadn't been in a pub, cafe or restaurant since March. On Tuesday last week we went for lunch at a farm shop cafe near us. I was flabbergasted by the total lack of regard for social distancing. The tables were so close together that you could be sitting back to back less than two feet away from someone at the next table, and all the tables were full. Customers were supposed to wear masks unless seated, a rule ignored by almost everyone. It'll be a long time before the hospitality industry gets my custom again. In my view this latest lockdown is a waste of time and a very damaging one at that. But Mrs Steve and I, despite our opposition, are sticklers for the rules.

Subject: RE: BS: Bloody lockdown Mk 2
From: Raggytash
Date: 06 Nov 20 - 06:23 AM

If it retards the spread of the virus it will in turn reduce the number of people who contract it. This in turn will reduce the number of people who will die.

Much as I criticise the government, the actions of the population must be taken into account and to a degree they are also responsible for the high mortality rate.

Subject: RE: BS: Bloody lockdown Mk 2
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 06 Nov 20 - 07:07 AM

I would say to a very high degree. I have just returned from our pharmacy where a man was darting about looking at goods on the shelves and not wearing a mask. As he left I shouted out "he must have a no need to wear a mask ticket, everyone else waiting for medication - all wearing masks, agreed.

Subject: RE: BS: Bloody lockdown Mk 2
From: DMcG
Date: 06 Nov 20 - 07:25 AM

My guess is that people whose areas have had very low number of cases, like Cornwall, are likely to resent the lockdown and will be quite prone to people ignoring the rules.

My anecdotal experience is different.

Because my wife has had a knee replacement 8 weeks ago, we have tried to go out most days for walks to give it exercise. This has tended to be the nearby shore, or National Trust properties, or various gardens, bird sanctuaries and similar. We have found that where we go, people are very good at wearing masks, everyone steps off the paths and walks next to it to get metres of separation, tables are many metres apart and so on. It is very similar in the local shops: people are making an effort to keep apart, to walk the aisle according to one way systems, not to pass each other, to distance at tills and so on.

We did go in for lunch in one pub before the operation where they were only paying lip service to the rules: they had a one way system but no one followed it, the wait staff had no masks, and so on. But that has really been it.

We were a tier 1 before the new lockdown, so we were not especially at risk.

Subject: RE: BS: Bloody lockdown Mk 2
From: Vincent Jones
Date: 06 Nov 20 - 07:26 AM

Yes, lockdown is a bugger. Yes, a more regional approach would be a better approach. Yes, schools and colleges remaining open is a ridiculous exception. Yes, years of Tory government, not to mention New Labour, have done much to knacker the NHS. And yes, the consequences of lockdown other than covid has caused an increase in child abuse, violence against women and suicide.

I'm optimistic enough to think that most people try to do the right thing, and will take note of advice. To keep the R number down, however, requires nearly everyone to do the right thing, but there are enough idiots, conspiracy theorists and others behaving like the bloke in Bonzo's pharmacy to keep R well above 1. I haven't the optimism to think that a government that can't find its arse with both hands could produce a national education programme to nudge such people into responsible behaviour.

Death by covid is lonely, painful, distressing and violent. This lockdown will prevent some of these deaths.

Had the NHS the capacity, and had the government been responsible in the way it built up resources to deal with the pandemic, rather than handing lucrative contracts to their mates, then perhaps the lockdown would not be necessary.

By all means moan about what a bastard it all is, though.

Subject: RE: BS: Bloody lockdown Mk 2
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 06 Nov 20 - 11:42 AM

Apparently, during lockdown one is supposed to develop mental health problems and become depressed. I am not sure how to achieve that. All ideas welcome.

Subject: RE: BS: Bloody lockdown Mk 2
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 06 Nov 20 - 12:28 PM

If anything, my mental health improved and my stress-levels lowered during the first lockdown. Mrs Backwoodsperson commented on a number of occasions how much more relaxed I’d become and how my mood seemed to have lightened generally.

But then, I spent my time keeping busy with things I enjoy doing, rather than moping about feeling sorry for myself.

Subject: RE: BS: Bloody lockdown Mk 2
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 06 Nov 20 - 12:40 PM

Exactly, for me there aren't enough hours in the day!!

Subject: RE: BS: Bloody lockdown Mk 2
From: Raggytash
Date: 06 Nov 20 - 02:18 PM

Fancy doing any painting at my place Bonzo. I've just had a room replastered and it's going to take at least three coats and to be done before Thursday when the carpet fitters are coming!!

Subject: RE: BS: Bloody lockdown Mk 2
From: The Sandman
Date: 06 Nov 20 - 02:21 PM

bonzo if you want to be depressed listen to little pimp the mumble rapper

Subject: RE: BS: Bloody lockdown Mk 2
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 06 Nov 20 - 02:47 PM

No thankyou!!! Just watched Blair Dunlop's brilliant webcast with his band - only £8 to watch.

Subject: RE: BS: Bloody lockdown Mk 2
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 06 Nov 20 - 04:07 PM

I like lockdown..

But then, I was a happily reclusive hermit
long before lockdown
was a twinkle in boris's ballsack...

Subject: RE: BS: Bloody lockdown Mk 2
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 06 Nov 20 - 04:52 PM

”...a twinkle in Boris’s ballsack...”

{{Shudder}} :-)

Subject: RE: BS: Bloody lockdown Mk 2
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 06 Nov 20 - 05:07 PM

BWM - .. well.. he is just frantically tossing off messy policies
all over us and himself...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 06 Nov 20 - 07:11 PM

At this point Trump has so enraged his base against anything to do with sound science or careful personal behavior that such an order would be almost impossible to enforce. But the medical people being interviewed now are using the term "exponential" when describing the rapid spread of COVID-19 in the US population. We could use a good shutdown; stop complaining and see if it works. And maybe saves your lives.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Nov 20 - 08:22 PM

Well thanks for burying my thread, whoever you are, and then polluting it with Trumpism. I suppose I'll have to put up with it, won't I.

Here's a nice piece of supposed lockdown for you. I have a friend who is in what was a Tier 3 area, one of the most infected areas of the country. Their next-door neighbours both have coronavirus. They work in a small school in which nine children are from six families with current coronavirus infections. The school remains cheerfully open. Well what do you think. I know what I think. I think that this lockdown is a bloody waste of time, and a lot worse than just that.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 06 Nov 20 - 09:34 PM

What do I think...???

"Subject: RE: BS: Brexit & other UK political topics
From: punkfolkrocker - PM
Date: 01 Nov 20 - 02:21 PM

I am still inclined to suspect extremist ideological factions of the tories
are determined to exploit covid as an opportunist covert lethal weapon,
targeting the teaching profession..."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 06 Nov 20 - 11:48 PM

It does seem odd that schools would stay open. Even here schools are intermittently occupied, mostly students do remote learning from home.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 07 Nov 20 - 01:21 AM

Neo fascists have deep entrenched fanatical hatred for teachers,
who they consider to be the most evil marxist feminist satanist enemy.

The far right want them all replaced with loyal nationalists,
preferably ex military or football hooligans
with some basic literacy and counting skills
acquired from the common sense university of life...

But definitely none of that dangerous traitorous book-learning intellectualism nonsense..

Loyalist local citizens would immediately target my wife
with coughing infants,
the instant suspicions are planted on social media
of her indoctrinating and recruiting innocent British 5 year olds
for socialist antifa terror squads..

'Play' digging in the school sand pit is obvious training for planting IEDs..

Spying on school children through binoculars is perfectly
excusable if monitoring for suspected marxist training activities..

So in this climate of ideological panic,
Covid is a godsend for exterminating teachers and University lecturers
without the awkward publicity and expense of concentration camps..

. and getting her to spread it at home to me,
would be a free extra points bonus kill for the far right.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 08 Nov 20 - 09:42 AM

Weird conjunction of threads. This was supposed to be for new findings about covid, but hey. Now it is just a bitch about covid thread.

So if there is actual new news about covid, it still goes here, but you'll have to wade through a bunch of other stuff to find it.

But hey, life is good right now, from where I sit on this side of the pond. Go, Pennsylvania.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 08 Nov 20 - 09:57 AM

The closure of many businesses as England shuts down for a month was news, but yes, there does appear to be grousing included with that story.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 08 Nov 20 - 10:47 AM

A question: Is there a new strain of virus that is more infectious or have people become too cavalier? Or isn't the second wave of a pandemic always more dramatic?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: leeneia
Date: 09 Nov 20 - 11:52 AM

Mrzzy wants some news. Here's some.

Science Focus reports that hospitals are getting better at treating patients who are seriously ill. In ICU's the death rate used to be 25%, now it's 7%.

In some patients, Covid infection leads the immune system to go berserk (my term), attacking the body. This may explain deaths in young, fit people, males more than females. This problem may have a genetic basis.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 09 Nov 20 - 01:39 PM

There's talk now of a vaccine possibly becoming available in a few weeks. And there's much discussion on whether people would be prepared to have it or not.
I personally wouldn't, unless it's been thoroughly tested and not just bunged out hastily. Sticking a needle into ones arm and injecting something into ones body which may/may not be dodgy doesn't appeal to me all that much.
Anyone else got any thoughts on this?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 09 Nov 20 - 02:34 PM

Claims of 90% protection still leave one in 10 of the population vulnerable..

.. and apparently it's pot luck who get's which pre-ordered vaccine.

Then there's virus mutations to consider..!!!???

[But hopefully, a future ban on mink farms...???]

Even as a lefty, I've always had serious respect for preppers...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 09 Nov 20 - 04:13 PM

Imma wait at least 5 years before trusting any vaccine.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 09 Nov 20 - 04:33 PM

Vaccines can have dire reactions. I'll never forget my first yellow fever one, many years ago. The night after I was given it, I woke up at about 2am on my back on the kitchen floor with five cats staring at me. Angels and weird creatures were flying overhead and I lay in a puddle of sweat. I think it may have been a 'mild' version of the disease itself. Luckily, the rules for yellow fever vaccination now say that one jab lasts for life (if it doesn't kill you first!).
I don't want Covid obviously, but I'm shielding anyway, and there aren't many cases in our area. Husband says he'll have the vaccine 'like a shot' (pun intended) because he works in a high school.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Nov 20 - 06:11 PM

43000 people have had the vaccine/placebo. There have been no safety concerns. Stop whingeing, vaccine-haters: let's roll it out now and save lives. Actually, vaccine-haters, do carry on. Your refusal puts me higher up the queue. I can suck that up.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 09 Nov 20 - 08:39 PM

Hater..???

..I'm looking for health angles to jump to the head of the queue,
while the tories are continue forcing my mrs to work at school
throughout the pandemic...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 10 Nov 20 - 06:43 AM

From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 09 Nov 20 - 02:34

Claims of 90% protection still leave one in 10 of the population vulnerable..

90% protection is good. Better than most estimates for the Flu vaccines made available each year.
Also, if you vaccinate 90% of the population with a 90% effective vaccine you get 81% resistant. This is higher than the calculated number needed for 'herd immunity'.

If someone is offering a tested vaccine against Covid I'd take it 'like a shot!'

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 10 Nov 20 - 07:48 AM

You have to take it in TWO shots. This kind of rna scrambling vaccine production has never been used on a population before.

The unknowns: are the effectiveness in people prone to severe infections vs. those that would have mild symptoms. Flu vaccines tend to not help severe flu victims.

We don't know about lifetime immunity but are treating it like the temporary flu shot.

Naturally we don't know of long term complications but odds are its way better to take it.

I had a reaction to a flu shot of muscle paralysis but the symptoms were brief - only 5 minutes. (petite barr syndome)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 10 Nov 20 - 07:53 AM

The first average people to have the new vaccine are looking at next summer. (3 seasons away)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 10 Nov 20 - 08:16 AM

The first average people to have the new vaccine are looking at next summer. (3 seasons away)

Maybe, maybe not: Coronavirus: Matt Hancock asks NHS to be ready to deploy COVID-19 vaccine from start of December

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 10 Nov 20 - 08:18 AM

In other new news about the virus, about 1 in 5 folks who recover are then diagnosed with mental illnesses they didn't have before. Possible other brain damage, like not getting your sense of taste back.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 10 Nov 20 - 08:38 AM

So, are the tories going to cancel pre-orders for vaccines that prove to be less effective;
or are they committed to still buy them,
wasting even more public money than the PPE debacle...???

..and if they do go ahead buying and using those more useless vaccines,
who'll be the poor buggers who get those crap jabs...???

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 10 Nov 20 - 09:25 AM

Pfizer got NO money from the US government and is not connected to Trump in any way, I see what Natt Hancock is saying by couching his optiimismism in words like "it is one step among many".
My key word is "average".
It will be another month before Pfizer has more info beyond a simple press release of some data.
If and when a vaccine is cleared to go, the Government will then be involved in manufacture and distribution. (operation Warp Speed)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jack Campin
Date: 11 Nov 20 - 07:54 AM

Awopbopalopbopabimbamboom

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 11 Nov 20 - 08:21 AM

In the US the covid death equivalent is 4 jumbo jets crashing per day killing everyone on board. People prefer to ignore the problem when permitted to do so by leaders. The mobile morgue refridgerated semi truck trailers can only hold 144 corpses each. One day grocery stores will use these same trailers for food.

We are at an all time high exponential infection rate. In some areas 1 in 30 are infected. Other areas vary to 1 in 100. The near vertical rise in infection will continue even if we slam on the brakes as firmly as possible but it will slow only slightly like the largest heaviest ship in the world at full speed.

Looking ahead there is hell to come for at least a year. But it will get better. Some will throw caution to the wind by impatience or accident. You can only improve your odds of staying infection free by 70%, thats only a C- .

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 11 Nov 20 - 09:50 AM

Ok new news again: which do you think is riskiest/riskier/less risky:

1) take a bus with open windows for an hour [I thought this Riskier]
2) sit and eat in an enclosed space at a table for 10, indoors, no windows, 15-30 mn [I thought this Riskiest]
3) participate in a buddhist retreat for a full day, outdoors, with hundreds of others? [I had thought this least risky]

Well there are data! From mid-January in China where the same group from Wuhan did all those things. Video here but in French. But great graphics, worth looking at.

Turned out the worst, and by far, was the bus. One person on one bus infected almost everybody else on that bus, except most of those sitting right at the open windows.

Being at a table, even indoors and unventilated for 15-30 mn, infected few if any, same for being outdoors with people.

Excellent within-group research.

Also, no masks. One mask on that one person could have prevented *all* the infections.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 13 Nov 20 - 07:54 AM

"In the US the covid death equivalent is 4 jumbo jets crashing every day killing everyone on board."

That was early in the week. Now the equivalent ia 6 jumbp jets crashing every single day.
The behavior of the impatient, the teenager, the maskless, the school kids and others are our weakest links to slowing the spread.
By January the death rate is on track to be 2,200 every day.
Since there are no ICU beds available in many states already, the covid dead outside of hospitals will probably not be counted.

I expect a vaccine to work as well as perfect behavior by our weakest links in slowing the infection rate.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 13 Nov 20 - 08:14 AM

Still waiting for news reports of prominent covid denier anti-masker
fatalities from the virus..

Or are they actually the strongest fearless Übermensch
they boast to be...???

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 13 Nov 20 - 05:35 PM

Over 100 secret service members now have it thanks to Trump's campaigns.

But here is some new science on why some people get so sick while others don't.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: robomatic
Date: 13 Nov 20 - 06:03 PM

serious question: what makes one vaccine need to be stored at extreme cold temps but not another?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 14 Nov 20 - 09:15 AM

The ones that go in the deep freeze are faster to make but they don't have a step and expense of adding preservatives to them. The cold is the only way to preserve them. This was explained recently on an NPR news program.

HEALTH AND SCIENCE
California, Oregon and Washington issue Covid travel advisory urging 14-day quarantine

This is a joint program between the three states to try to lessen the infections between them.

The governors of California, Oregon and Washington issued a joint coronavirus travel advisory on Friday urging people arriving to their states to self-quarantine for 14 days and asking residents to avoid all non-essential out-of-state trips.

The Pacific Northwest states said essential travel includes people who are traveling for “work and study, critical infrastructure support, economic services and supply chains, health, immediate medical care and safety and security,” according to a statement.

The Democratic governors also recommended that travelers limit their interactions with only people in their households.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 14 Nov 20 - 09:31 AM

Your president seems intent on taking as many followers as he can
with him when he's finally driven out..

His anti-mask covid denying faithful are like one of those suicidal death cults
who drink fatal poison at their holy leaders bidding...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 14 Nov 20 - 10:20 AM

Masks do apparently protect the wearer too. Good.

Multiple sources.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 16 Nov 20 - 09:49 AM

old news, but......

On 16 March, primary care magazine Pulse reported doctors were receiving out-of-date PPE that had had its 2016 use-by date covered with a sticker saying "2021".[211] In response, the government offered reassurance that this was safe.[212] Earlier in the month, in response to a survey of Pulse's readership, two of five GPs reported they still did not have PPE to protect them from coronavirus.[211] Some of these concerns were raised with Johnson during Prime Minister's Questions, to which the Prime Minister replied the UK had "stockpiles" of PPE.[213] The same day, the Doctors' Association UK (DAUK) reported NHS staff felt they were being put at risk due to lack of PPE.[214]

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 17 Nov 20 - 05:22 PM

Can you include those footnotes?

Fauci is doing a webinar here at UVA tomorrow. PM if you want the link. Noon mudcat time.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 19 Nov 20 - 07:31 AM

These are the good old days right now.

In 3 months we will see a massive effect of a near doubling of deaths and xponential growth in infection before the 'Biden' effect will take hold.

Nature has its lag time in the growing cold AFTER the shortest day of the year. It has a lag time in pandemics as well.

This is the time to redouble your own safety protocols, no matter how tired you are from it already.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 19 Nov 20 - 12:24 PM

To offer support to that statement, here is NPR looking at the state of unemployment insurance in the US.

12 Million To Lose Jobless Benefits The Day After Christmas Unless Congress Acts

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 22 Nov 20 - 08:06 AM

Without a vote on the budget the government is slated to shut down Dec. 11. We have been open on a flimsy continuing resolution as usual.

At the rate of ~200,000 new infections per day we are at a ~million new infections per week. (in the USA)
Some areas are using tent hospitals and mobile morgues.

Subject: BS: The other pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 28 Nov 20 - 07:52 AM

NYT best seller on the pandemic

Government denial of the disease was tied to the sedition act and jailed publishers. They were allowed to print only positive messages like wear a mask. This may be why there is no literaure from those times.

Hemmoragic symptoms of bleeding from the eyes and mouth and a dark pallor made determining race unlikely. Psychosis was also a symptom.
Woodrow Wilson had those symptoms while in France and attending peace treaty talks.

Old people were vitually immune, kids under 5 had death rates equal to all causes of death over 20 years. People 18 to 45 had the next highest death rate.

People knew it was not the flu. The book uses the disease event records in many US cities and how Philly and San Fran fought back.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 28 Nov 20 - 10:59 AM

You can soon listen to the author on a pbs link. I listened to it live today.

Even my little county is now gearing up with mobile morgues.
The nation has gone from 13 million infections to an expected 100 million infections by inauguration day.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 01 Dec 20 - 06:44 AM

The freedom of religionists, scofflaws, trumpists and brainwashed who don't wear masks should be encouraged to wear 'Faithmasks' for holiday services this year.    They would have a cross etc. on the mask.

I'll get me PPE

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Dec 20 - 07:05 AM

The people who are brainwashed are the people who feel safe in a mask. And I do wear a mask.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 01 Dec 20 - 07:27 AM

I never doubted that. I understand the hair splitting involved.
Masks themselves are not 90% effective but they do reduce an infectious viral load RISK by 90%. Thats often good enough to help.

Don't sweat the single virus particle.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Dec 20 - 09:23 AM

You have no evidence for that assertion. And even if it were true, it would be confounded by the routine mass misuse of masks: off with it, on with it. Stash it under your chin. Reuse it 'til it almost stinks. Stuff it in your pocket. Fiddle with the front of it. Scratch your nose through it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 01 Dec 20 - 09:49 AM

Stop quibbling. There is a lot of evidence now that masks are saving lives. That they protect both the wearer and anyone nearby, especially if that anyone is also wearing a mask. Google it.

Dr. Gupta from the University of Washington last night on MSNBC reiterated, the best are the three layer cloth masks, two-layer will work fairly well also. And three layer surgical masks.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 01 Dec 20 - 11:03 AM

Hey antimaskers, are you drinking and injecting enough disinfectant to ensure you survive the pandemic...???

Have you considered ingesting antifreeze to get you through the winter...?????

A poisonous substance a day, keeps marxist feminist Satanist health scientist approved anti American masks away...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 01 Dec 20 - 12:00 PM

Injecting bleach into the mouth is a common step in a root canal procedure.

I don't know if its true, it just feels true: People with excruciating back pain are in general argumentative over stupid shit...

I wear a N-95 with a 2 or 3 layer mask outside to seal the edges.

I also have a heavy duty gold visor air tight helmet used for oil well fires. I haven't had the occaision to use it yet. Besides I don't have the insulated oxygen tank or rebreather but I have the fireproof pants and coat.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Dec 20 - 01:12 PM

I challenged Donuel's assertion by questioning his lack of evidence. You make your assertion, telling me to google it, by telling me to "stop quibbling." You do have form when it comes to your rather aggressive mask promotion. In fact, there is little evidence that masks outside hospital settings save many lives. There are plenty of googlable reports (try the BMJ and the Royal Society, the first two that I saw when I obediently googled it) that conclude that the negatives outweigh whatever positives there are (as ever, I tend to avoid what newspapers or popular science magazines say). Much of what you can read about this, on both sides of the argument, is no better than informed opinion, which is not evidence. You certainly can't present direct evidence, in terms of numbers, that masks are saving lives, as you assert. I can't present evidence to the contrary, either. However, it's patently obvious, just by observing people's behaviour, that poor compliance with the rules for how masks should be used is rife. Not only that, it's highly likely that mask wearing gives a false sense of security to many people. I've noticed (without actually looking for trouble) that quite a lot of mask-wearers ignore social distancing in shops and neglect to clean either their hands or supermarket trolley handles on their way in. It's likely that they are largely the same people who misuse their masks. Once again, I'm simply questioning the efficacy of mask wearing in the community. I'm not an anti-mask campaigner or a rebel and I cheerfully do what most people do, i.e., wear a mask where required. If I feel sceptical about other people's assertions, I put my hands on my hips and say, where's your evidence? I don't accuse them of quibbling. Cheers.

---

This post contains unsubstantiated opinion and untrue information about the safety involved in wearing face masks during the time of COVID-19.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 01 Dec 20 - 01:33 PM

Steve - I can't say my scepticism is too different to yours..

I'll put up with the discomforts of wearing masks,
in the absence of any other better proven tangible self defense
against the potentially lethal mass morons in society..

Where we differ, is I'll keep doubtful negative opinions on masks quietly to myself.

When liberal/lefty smartarses like us air our doubts publicly,
all that does is further legitimise and enable
the selfishly undisciplined far right libertarian anti masker covidiots...

They love it when we sound like we agree with them...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Dec 20 - 01:47 PM

Well I doubt that too many of those are here, and, if they do put their heads above the parapet, we'll take them on. Incidentally, I don't think that expressing doubt in a measured way or asking for more evidence is being "negative ..."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 01 Dec 20 - 02:11 PM

Depends how it's expressed..

Maybe I spend far too much time late at night
'researching' malignant crackpot far right, and dodgy misguided liberal,
youtube channels...???

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Dec 20 - 04:02 PM

Be like me and watch Spooks repeats on Drama. I didn't understand it then and I don't understand it now but I love it...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: The Sandman
Date: 01 Dec 20 - 04:37 PM

stilly river sage, can you provide us with the evidence please. i wear a mask but there is lots of conflicting stories about their success in stopping the spread of covid 19,perhaps some masks are more effective than others lets have the data

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jeri
Date: 01 Dec 20 - 04:58 PM

Dick, do you need help with a Google search? Try going to this magic website, and type in the words "proof that masks work" (you can copy and paste that). After that, you can pick the links of hits you want to read.

I hope this helps.

Oh - try going to the links to WHO (World Health Organization) of CDC (Centers for Disease Control) first. They're usually pretty informative.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Dec 20 - 05:05 PM

Think about it, Dick. You can justifiably claim that a mask will stop some droplets (though what then happens to the trapped viruses in those droplets is fully at the mercy of the mask owner). What you can't claim is that wearing masks saves lives or that not wearing masks kills people. Your opinion can lean one way or the other, but evidence cannot be available, and claims either way are specious. Now what time is Spooks on...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Dec 20 - 05:13 PM

Maybe a difference twixt you and me, Jeri. You google "proof that masks work." I googled "evidence for mask wearing." We can both find opinion (not proof) either way, and I admitted that. You seek confirmation bias...?

Subject: RE: BSilly shit on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 02 Dec 20 - 06:14 AM

No I don't.

I did assume the unspoken foundation of all Covid 19 threads was about helping people.
For example you can not get Covid 19 from vaccines. Yes your arm will ne sore and you may even get a short term fever but that is your immune system working.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 02 Dec 20 - 07:27 AM

No you don't what?


Controlling people's lives, throwing millions out of work, wrecking thousands of small businesses, telling folk they can't leave their homes, shutting down schools for months, telling them they can't see their families for many a long month, trapping and isolating old people in care homes*, threatening the mental health of millions... Yep, it's all about "helping" people, innit...

*Yep, I'm biased. Since early March and through to late October I saw my profoundly deaf mum just a handful of times through a perspex screen. Before that I used to go to her room in the home to sit with her four or five times a week, and I'd take her out for drives and shopping and cups of tea. At least I was allowed to be at her side in hospital as she died.

I don't want to be in a world that thinks it's fine to treat people like this.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 02 Dec 20 - 07:57 AM

Man points vial of pandemic virus at Jack "Your inconveinence or your life".......Well?...
Jack finally says "I'm thinking".

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 02 Dec 20 - 08:33 AM

Yep, this pandemic is a bit inconvenient, innit..

Just to think.. we are all descendants
of the survivors of that century ago pesky flu bug...

How many, 100 years from now, will be able to say the same thing
about their great grandad and granma
being sensible or lucky enough to stay alive during covid...???

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 02 Dec 20 - 09:00 AM

In another thread Donuel bemoans the misuse of the word incredible. I think you are both misusing the word inconvenient.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 02 Dec 20 - 09:18 AM

Steve - we've all been buggered raw by this last year of pandemic.

I've not see my mum since February,
and have some really difficult decisions hanging over me,
to make about her with adult social services.

My own health has deteriorated due to being stubbornly reluctant to risk setting foot in my GP surgery.

The UK vaccine news just announced today may be a genuine positive game changer,
but naturally enough I distrust any 'good news' trumpeted from our tory govt..

However I'm not convinced a more honest and transparent Labour govt
would have performed much better during pandemic,
and not needed to make similarly drastic draconian decisions
for our own safety and longer term chances of survival...?????

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 02 Dec 20 - 09:40 AM

While I am not claiming immunity from the syndrome called Covid fatigue
you guys are showing all the initial symptoms. Your blamegame won't kill anyone but letting down your guard will. When common sense is compromised mistakes are more easily made. Take care and stay safe all.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 02 Dec 20 - 09:54 AM

We have always lived by calculated risk anyway. I broke quarantine over tooth pain and my wife over a death in the family. To each their own.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 02 Dec 20 - 09:59 AM

"My own health has deteriorated due to being stubbornly reluctant to risk setting foot in my GP surgery."

I'm in exactly the same boat.

I'm not sure what a Labour government would have done different and I think it's pretty pointless to surmise. The dreadful clampdowns and long-term misery the country is enduring - along with a huge number of deaths, especially of the elderly - are squarely the fault of this Tory government. The lockdown was delayed, therefore needing to be more severe, the NHS was unready and under-resourced, they sent untested old people back into homes from hospitals in droves, the rollout of testing was scandalously bad, PPE provision was crap, billions have been wasted on a track-and-trace that is totally unfit for purpose, beaches and resorts were allowed to be swamped by tourists from all over the country, a useless tier system, unpoliced of course, led to another lockdown... Any bets on the vaccine rollout being efficient and fair?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 02 Dec 20 - 10:15 AM

Steve - I want a vaccine asap, but...

.. by the time my demographic 60 - 65 gets called in for a jab,
I'm hoping it is truly safe and effective.

.. and not just 'safe enough' for boris to blow his own 'Britain first in the world' trumpet fanfare..

Pragmatic me can understand the tories trialing the over 80s as mass guinea pigs for pre xmas tory good cheer PR..,
but I'm concerned NHS and care home/social workers
are also being hurriedly used as lab rats for this first run of Pfizer/BioNTech Covid vaccine...???????

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 02 Dec 20 - 11:11 AM

Anybody taking vaccine for covid in the next, oh, 5 years *is* being a lab rat / guinea pig / experimental subject.

My dad used to warble If you have to take vaccine, take it orally / for you know the other way can most painful be...

I am looking forward to the data we will get from these experiments, though. No other way to test that I can think of. And with my lack of risk factors I got time before the jabs roll around to me, so thanks to all y'all willing to be guinea pigs for the likes of me.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 02 Dec 20 - 11:24 AM

The shingles vaccine was surprisingly achey. Mrzzy you are not a lab rat to take covid vaccines, but you do risk contamination in manufacture. However in a perfect world you would be paid $50 grand to take it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 02 Dec 20 - 12:00 PM

Geez, Louise, some of you are being willfully stupid about masks.

Scientific Brief: Community Use of Cloth Masks to Control the Spread of SARS-CoV-2

Masks Save Lives

Facemasks: What the Data Say

Masks Save Lives.org

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jos
Date: 02 Dec 20 - 12:15 PM

It is reported today that “Health Secretary Matt Hancock offered to get vaccinated live on television to help convince people the coronavirus jab is safe.”
Those who remember an earlier minister, John Gummer, being shown feeding a beef burger to his daughter to persuade people that eating beef would not give them bovine spongiform encephalopathy [“mad cow disease”], may be less easily convinced.
I am not aware that his daughter became ill as a result, but 177 British people not only caught the disease, but died from it,

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 02 Dec 20 - 01:52 PM

Sorry, Maggie, but only the first source you quote isn't either popular "science" or tendentious evangelism. The first one seems to hinge on viruses invariably being spread in airborne droplets. The actual size of a virus particle is hundreds of times smaller than the ones captured by the best particle-trapper cited in the article, and you are ignoring what I said about the aggravated spread of virus from improperly-handled used masks. And an infected person, out and about not knowing that they are infected, would pollute their mask within seconds of putting it on. Yes, masks stop some droplets. But then what? Whip it off, chuck it on the dashboard until you get to the next shop. Then put it back on, using your fingers on the fabric to bend the wire back round your nose. And not all virus will be in droplets, and droplets evaporate. I'm not campaigning to get rid of masks and I wear a mask according to the rules wherever I go. The really wilfully stupid thing is to look at data with the intention of getting it to prove what you already believe. As I said a couple of posts ago, any one of us can easily find sources that claim that masks are a good thing and others that claim that masks are a bad thing. There is plenty of scope on both sides for getting it wrong, which is why vacuous unqualified statements such as "masks save lives" get my goat somewhat. I know how hard it is to be totally neutral and even-handedly sceptical when looking at data, but that's the way I was trained. Ask Joe about me, him and God...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 02 Dec 20 - 05:42 PM

For god's sake tie your goat down and give it RFID chips and back up tracking devices. No one should get your goat with proper precautions.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 02 Dec 20 - 11:33 PM

Given that it takes 5 years to test for vaccine side effects yes, everyone taking these vaccines is an experimental subject.

Covid claims the life of 94yo Valéry Giscard-d'Estaing, who was president of France during most of my adolescence, when I still lived in francophonie.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 03 Dec 20 - 05:16 AM

I had a bad side effect from a vaccine. It was short and I am alive.
Every calculated risk you take is an experimental journey in life, a temporary state, so believe as you wish and be a happy alive lab rat.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 03 Dec 20 - 05:42 AM

Donny - you do obsess about throw-away details in other folks posts .. dontcha...

There'd be less 'lab rat' anxiety and suspicion about the first to be distributed vaccine,
if conniving amoral callous tory politicians were not at the forefront of bigging it up...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 03 Dec 20 - 05:47 AM

It would be a very good idea if persons here who wish to stand out from the crowd refrain from rattling on about the side effects of vaccines. Anything more than a sore arm or a whiffy headache for a day or two is extremely rare. About one person in a million (a stat I haven't made up) might respond adversely to egg albumen protein in a vaccine, and that's about it. Vaccines save millions of lives every year and can wipe out deadly diseases such as smallpox and polio altogether. Millions of children have had their lives protected and been steered away from permanent disabilities by the measles vaccine. If you want to feel special, this is one area in which you need to feel special all by yourself, in private.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 03 Dec 20 - 07:41 AM

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/12/03/pfizer-vaccine-covid-biontech-safe/

"What exactly is the Pfizer vaccine, who will get it, and is it safe?
Here is what you need to know about the coronavirus jab approved for use in the UK"

yeah.. it's the telegraph.. but.. it seems ok enough for a starter...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 03 Dec 20 - 08:04 AM

Can't read that unless I join their club...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: The Sandman
Date: 03 Dec 20 - 08:27 AM

Jeri has spoken, it must be true

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 03 Dec 20 - 08:30 AM

Er, that game ain't worth the candle, Dick...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jeri
Date: 03 Dec 20 - 09:29 AM

I'm sure most people know this. The "side effects" of many vaccines aren't from the vaccine itself, but from your body's reaction to it. It's the immune system kicking into gear, recognizing and reacting to the bad stuff. It lasts for, at the most, 2 or 3 days. There's a chance you could be incubating the virus before you got the shot. With the flu shot, there's a chance you'll be infected with a strain of flu the shot doesn't immunize you against. I don't know that that has anything to do with the various Covid-19 immunizations, because I believe they're a different type of shot. It's still gonna be about your own immune system.

And I HAVE SPOKEN. (again)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 03 Dec 20 - 10:10 AM

Them wot know try to predict which flu strain or strains might be prevalent in the coming flu season and include them in the vaccine. I have the flu jab every year and never have any reaction at all (I haven't caught flu since I started having it and I had caught flu a good number of times before that, and I'm not talking man-flu here). Mrs Steve can get a slightly sore patch on her arm for a day or three.

Currently in this nation of ours there's a lot of mad, unwarranted glee about the vaccine(s). The fact is that most people aren't getting it for months, not to speak of the fact that we have a regime that shows utter ineptitude at every stage of dealing with this virus. Let's hope it doesn't lead to complacency. On top of that, we're getting a load of vox pop nonsense on the telly involving ignorant scaremongering about the safely of the vaccine. We appear to be living in a tabloid world.

ALSO SPRACH ZARATHUSTRA...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 03 Dec 20 - 11:11 AM

This.

CDC director: Winter could be 'most difficult time in the public health history of this nation'

The U.S. could see another 200,000 coronavirus deaths in the next three months if people don't take mitigation measures such as mask-wearing and physical distancing seriously, according to the head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

"The reality is December and January and February are going to be rough times. I actually believe they're going to be the most difficult time in the public health history of this nation," largely because of the stress to the health system, CDC Director Robert Redfield said Wednesday during a U.S. Chamber of Commerce event.

The coronavirus is surging across the entire nation, and the health care system is being strained nearly to the breaking point in many states. At least 270,000 people have died, including nearly 2,600 on Tuesday, the highest single-day death toll of the pandemic so far.

Redfield said 90 percent of hospitals are in the red zone, with more than 90,000 people hospitalized.

"I do think unfortunately, before we see February, we could be close to 450,000 Americans dead from this virus," he said, but added the country is not defenseless.

"The truth is, mitigation works. The challenge with this virus is, it's not going to work if half of us do what we need to do. It's not even going to work, probably if three quarters of us do what we need to do. This virus really is going to require all of us to really be vigilant," Redfield said.

The CDC head said one thing that has disappointed him is the inconsistent messaging and politicization over mask wearing.

"The time for debating whether or not masks work or not is over. We clearly have scientific evidence," Redfield said, pointing specifically to a CDC study in Kansas that showed areas with mask mandates saw a decline in COVID-19 transmission, while those without a mandate saw a 100 percent increase.

Redfield said he thinks one of the most "painful" lessons from the pandemic so far is to make sure there's "harmony" among messaging.

"When you really want to get everybody on board, you've got to have clear, unified reinforced messaging. And I think the fact that we were still arguing in the summer about whether or not masks work was a problem," he said.

Redfield did not address the fact that much of the inconsistent messaging and politicization has followed a lack of central leadership. There was no national testing strategy, and no national policy on masks or other public health measures, only recommendations.

States have been left to figure it out for themselves, resulting in a patchwork of differing responses across the country. At the same time, much of the politicization has come from President Trump and others in the administration, who have prioritized the economy while downplaying the pandemic and the benefit of public health measures from the start.

Trump repeatedly promised a vaccine would be ready before the Nov. 3 election, despite what public health officials said. At one point in the fall, Trump phoned Redfield directly to contradict the director's congressional testimony on vaccine distribution and the efficacy of masks.

Redfield drew scrutiny in March when he showered Trump with praise during a visit to the CDC headquarters, and the president inaccurately proclaimed any American who wanted a COVID-19 test could get one.

Then in April, Trump insisted Redfield dispute his comments to The Washington Post that the winter would be especially challenging because of the combination of flu season and COVID-19. The CDC director acknowledged he had been accurately quoted.

Guidance on who to test for COVID-19 was changed to recommend against the testing of people who had been exposed but were asymptomatic, and top communications officials in the Department of Health and Human Services came under fire for trying to control the content and timing of the CDC’s weekly scientific reports on the pandemic.

There are several helpful links to other parts of this story if you follow the link at the top.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 03 Dec 20 - 11:55 AM

That Telegraph link opened on my PC,
and I definitely aint signed up with 'em..

Yesterday I had to walk to town centre and back
for my twice monthly potential suicide mission
leaving my safe-house bunker to the post office..

This time hardly anyone was wearing masks,
and young men were defiantly maskless inside the post office.
Despite notices stating illegal to not wear a mask on premises...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 03 Dec 20 - 12:06 PM

A local poll showed that in Wash. DC 72% do not want the Covid 19 vaccine shots.

Chocolate city, as its called, is a mostly black population so I suspect a 'Tuskeegee effect' is the fear most blacks have in their mind. Unvaccinated blacks may produce a 'Magic Johnson effect' and cause some white people to be even more wary of blacks.

Obama will be vaccinated on TV. Same with Biden and Trump wants credit for the whole thing.

It is unfortunate that paranoia may rule the day here and abroad that can only inssure more infection and death for a longer time.

I will prefer innoculation to infection.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jeri
Date: 03 Dec 20 - 01:40 PM

I'll get the vaccine when I can. I think the worst thing it can do is not work.
I wonder if, in the USA, at least, if we'd been better at wearing masks and social distancing, we could have greatly reduce the number of people infected. We have a federal government that doesn't want to do the job, and a number of folks who won't wear a mask, and the bottom line is we have a society full of people who don't give a shit about others.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 03 Dec 20 - 02:54 PM

J e r i
You know full well we had a President who didn't give a shit about people and even encouraged people to not wear a mask, had no national response and prferred to push the issue onto all the govenors to scavenge against each other.

Thats why we are #1 with 3,000 deaths a day this week.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 03 Dec 20 - 03:17 PM

Thanks to the modern marvel of the internet,
too many fukwit Brits have been convinced trump
is also their glorious crusading leader...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 03 Dec 20 - 04:20 PM

All other vaccines were tested for years, and nasty side-effects removed, before said vaccine ever got to market. *That* is where the guineapigging is. Imma wait 3-5 years, if I can. Mind you I am not an essential worker, so I can afford to wait.

And isn't every symptom a body reaction to something, and not that thing itself?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 03 Dec 20 - 05:08 PM

You are scaremongering. The urgency of the situation has galvanised research workers and the approval system, and corners have not been cut. The science has been utterly amazing. If we waited for your suggested five years, millions more people may die. There's far too much of your kind of bollix being propagated and it's very worrying that it's spreading like wildfire from social media on to community forums like this one. Your choice: don't have the vaccine and let the rest of us move up the queue. Fine by me.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jeri
Date: 03 Dec 20 - 06:07 PM

The problem is when people are afraid of the vaccine because they think may have bizarre side effects. Vaccines stimulate the immune system. If you're afraid they might make you hallucinate, grow a second head, OR CAUSE AUTISM, it's not just ignorant, but destructive.

The worst thing I believe that can happen is it won't be effective. Other things are soreness at the injection site, maybe more of your arm, flu-like symptoms (the immune system response), and... that's pretty much it.

So if you're afraid to get the shot, don't get the shot. Just keep wearing a mask and keep avoiding crowds, or being physically close to people you don't know well, an keep doing that until the virus isn't circulating very much. And don't try to frighten people who don't have an issue with the vaccine. At worst, it could kill people. (Nobody is probably paying attention, anyway. Strange people on a strange little music forum.)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 03 Dec 20 - 06:22 PM

I completely agree with all that, Jeri. The only thing is that the scaremongering about vaccine safety is rife on social media, and the companies are slow when it comes to removing it. I read a piece somewhere today that the scaremongering is spreading to community forums like this one. Two people here have already bigged up their scares about vaccine safety. It's unfounded, it's irresponsible and it's not on. Even on this strange little music forum. If you're scared of the vaccine, good for you. But those fears are not founded on any known science, so (to be less diplomatic than you), these guys need to shut up and keep their irrational fears strictly to themselves.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 03 Dec 20 - 06:24 PM

On the one hand I never trust UK tory politicians,
so the rush to be world beating first with vaccine approval
is tainted by my attitude on that..

On the other, I suspect USA might take too long to approve vaccines,
because of fears of that American enthusiasm
for mass class law suits...???

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 03 Dec 20 - 08:03 PM

The vaccine approval process in the US is not the same as in the UK. In the US, raw data is required, whereas in the UK reports from the vaccine developers are accepted. The difference is a few days. Dr Fauci, who had initially dissed the UK approach as too fast, has now recanted and accepted that our approach is sufficiently rigorous. Whilst I would always accept that the Tories seek hubris as their goal, I think that the rapid progress in approving the vaccine is wholly to the credit of the scientists in this country, not the bloody Tories. They do like to bathe in reflected glory....

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 03 Dec 20 - 09:15 PM

Trump called the head of the FDA to the White House this week apparently to harangue them about approval of vaccines. I presume the FDA head will push back. It needs to be done in an orderly fashion, and this won't be one of the usual FDA fuckups, when the rules have been so diluted on other things they do that what they do is meaningless. It often has to do with dollars being cut to agencies like this so they can't do what they're supposed to.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 03 Dec 20 - 10:41 PM

I am not telling anybody else to wait. I am personally not comfortable taking an as-yet-un-fully-tested vaccine. I am not afraid I will become autistic or grow a second head. I would just prefer to wait for data on what the effects *are* -or aren't.

This from an Embassy brat in the 3rd world in the 60's, regularly punctured, I was, and glad of it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 03 Dec 20 - 11:28 PM

I'm nearly 62..

Over the last half century no men in my close family
have yet survived long enough to get to 70.

So knowing our luck, no matter how hard I try to stay alive,
I'm fatalistically resigned to reality
that any other cause of death is out to get me
well before a covid vaccine is proven conclusively safe..

Therefore, considering the prevailing most likely threat of immediate premature fatality..
.. it kinda inclines me to risk a jab asap...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 04 Dec 20 - 12:32 AM

An inside look into the effective Covid vaccines;
Neither vaccine contain dead corona virus or 'living' covid virus like in the old vaccine making methods.

A new method of reproduction of the RNA in one segment of the virus that comprise only the little spikes on the virus body are being used.

This has been a new technique that has been researched for some time to make one vaccine against all flu varients by using only part of the tail or head of the flu virus. There are so many different types of flu
that progress has been slow, but here in town Dr. Fauci has soldiered on to solve the universal flu vaccine puzzle at NIH down the street.

Perhaps one day the universal flu vaccine will owe a debt to the success in the covid vaccine but the general new technique started here.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 Dec 20 - 06:00 AM

The only "risk" attached to approved vaccines is that they won't work as well as predicted. Just think: half the people in the trials received a fake "vaccine" that was totally ineffective. The streets are not strewn with the corpses of either of the two cohorts. if you're offered the vaccine the responsible thing is to take it. You may just be contributing to herd immunity. Don't take it, maybe catch the virus and spread it around a bit? You think that's a respectable stance? Down to you, of course. Free country.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 04 Dec 20 - 06:26 AM

Perhaps you heard of the first ever 'new messenger RNA vaccine'.
Now you know the rest of the story.
As for the complainers, they couldn't stop if they tried.
In the meantime we can try to commiserate with them and calm some fears.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 Dec 20 - 09:45 AM

There are lots of people round here, especially among the more elderly, who are saying that they will refuse the vaccine. Well I've decided that I'm not letting that pass. Anyone who sez that to me is in for a bollocking. I've been bollocked here for casting doubts on the efficacy of mask-wearing even though I wear masks wherever I'm supposed to. If I'm wrong about masks, which I may well be, at least I'm not behaving irresponsibly. In my book vaccine-refusers would be much worse.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jeri
Date: 04 Dec 20 - 11:41 AM

Steve, did you look at the links Stilly River Sage posted? here.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 Dec 20 - 11:59 AM

I did, and I responded at 01.52 pm yesterday. I doubt whether you'll agree with any of it, but hey ho. As I keep saying, I have my opinions and I'm neither a mask rebel nor an anti-mask campaigner. Just a doubter. As it happens, I've just come in from wearing the damn thing for hours this afternoon, just like everyone else. As I think there's a chance that masks may in many circumstances do more harm than good, I think it's fine to voice those doubts. With the approved vaccines so far, on the other hand, the science firmly supports both their efficacy and their safety. Many vaccine doubters are campaigning against vaccines and many are loudly grandstanding their refusal to have it. Now that's what I CALL irresponsible.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 Dec 20 - 12:03 PM

Sorry, it was the day before yesterday. Tempus fugits faster than I thought...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 04 Dec 20 - 12:19 PM

Remember - vaccines are useless if they are not used to vaccinate, and it's all we've got, so all the doubters should stop pretending to be doctors!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 04 Dec 20 - 01:16 PM

Bonzo your level headed common sense approach adds no controversy or angnst to the global pandemic discussion. ?:*/

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 Dec 20 - 01:48 PM

Not bad from someone who hails from the Socialist Republic of Croydon... :-)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 04 Dec 20 - 02:23 PM

I told you all bonz seems to be gradually mellowing
and going slightly more centre lefty...

That'll annoy him when he realises...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 04 Dec 20 - 03:23 PM

Not in the least, I am enjoying our upgrade to superfast BT Halo 3!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 05 Dec 20 - 12:32 PM

Just ran across this metaphor. Swiss cheese model of pandemic transmission: sure, the Mask slice has holes, but combined with handwashing and social distancing and all the other slices with their holes, you end up with no holes going all the way through. And don't let the Misinformation Mouse nibble any one layer away: sure masks aren't a 100% effective barrier but so what? They are only one slice of our model. Anyway:

Blicky.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 Dec 20 - 12:46 PM

What "misinformation"?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 05 Dec 20 - 12:55 PM

Super-gluing lips, nostrils, and eye lids is an option
for improving the effective level of mask protection..

Top charlatan Scientist have yet to agree on the benefits of gluing shut ear holes,
and the remaining bodily entrances..

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 05 Dec 20 - 01:58 PM

Steve Shaw, read the article. Well- explained there.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 05 Dec 20 - 02:16 PM

Since catching up on this thread today,
I've been walking around with cheese stuffed up my nose.

It's a 110% effective miracle protection against covid..

I can prove this because I can still smell cheese...!!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 Dec 20 - 03:19 PM

I did read the thing end to end, and I found it rather shallow and unnecessary. We don't need to be patronised by a facile metaphor into realising that multiple strategies are needed from all of us to fight the virus. Just give us the unadorned facts. His clever yarn called for far more mental processing than hard facts ever would. And he seemed to be implying that measured naysaying (Steve's take on masks???) could be misinformation. As one of my favourite lecturers used to say if we got a bit flowery in our essays, what we don't need is empty cleverness. Great message, misfire delivery. That's all.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 05 Dec 20 - 03:35 PM

Nicely put, dude.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 05 Dec 20 - 03:39 PM

Steve - which smelly cheese do you recommend to work best
as anti covid nasal plugs...???

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 Dec 20 - 04:23 PM

You're asking the right man. I am a massive cheese aficionado as it happens. But which cheese? Well now. A firm Westcountry farmhouse cheddar would both be not smelly enough and would be a lamentable waste of cheese. I once bought a disgustingly overripe Brie at the pannier market in Barnstaple (bloody delicious). It ticked the stinky box...but it was very soft, too snot-like... I'm not a Stilton man, pongy though it is, and it can be a bit crumbly, which wouldn't fit the bill ("fit the bill"...cheese up nose...see what I did there?) So, for good stink, wide availability and good nostril-friendly texture, I'm going for...

Saint Agur!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jos
Date: 05 Dec 20 - 05:14 PM

I don't even like eating Saint Agur, never mind plugging my nose with it. (And as far as the adverts go, trying to tell the English how to pronounce it, well the do nasty things with my synaesthesia.)

How about a nice strong Gorgonzola?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 05 Dec 20 - 05:52 PM

Bound to be tory ministers with connections in the dairy industry,
who will be contracting billions of £££s of public money
to produce sub standard PPE cheese plugs...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 Dec 20 - 07:44 PM

Any man who hates Saint Agur is tired of life...

A Gorgonzola piccante would indeed fit the bill. Use a small amount then email me for a killer pasta sauce recipe with chicken breast, double cream and the rest of the pack...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jos
Date: 06 Dec 20 - 08:27 AM

Can I use chicken thighs instead of chicken breast?
Chicken breasts don't taste of much, really.

And why don't you just post the recipe, here or in the 'Recipes - what are we eating?' thread, instead of wanting an email, then everyone can enjoy it?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Dec 20 - 08:30 AM

I might have already done it in the recipes thread but I'll check. Warning: it's a real rib-sticker... Thigh meat great, by the way.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 06 Dec 20 - 10:12 AM

The price of tea in China is going up.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 06 Dec 20 - 10:16 AM

It seems that shaming politicians for breaking their own rules is a futile effort. Every day or two I read about someone who decamped for some far away luxury location. I suspect the California politicians who were scolded a few days ago were at the same meeting as these Texas legislators, a week-long 50-people meeting in a Maui luxury hotel. "But ethics watchdogs have long criticized the conference, calling it a junket that hands lobbyists a captive audience of state lawmakers." The industry representatives and corporate sponsors paid $10,000 each to attend. I can't manage to post a link to the ePaper version of this story and it isn't in the html side of things yet.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 07 Dec 20 - 06:13 AM

State data shows my particuler neighborhood is a hot zone.
Latins here are not mask compliant.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: robomatic
Date: 07 Dec 20 - 10:16 PM

I have read that Catherine the Great got a cowpox / smallpox vaccination in the early 1800s. Apparently it was not done in public and the vaccinating doctor was prepared to flee if things did not go well.

Things went well.

On tonight's news I heard that Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip may be 'first adopters' with the new vaccine. Maybe there will be a public presentation. If only Lucy Worsley can make it!

Maybe Rudy Giuliani can recover some of his lost sparkle with a similar presentation from his hospital room.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 08 Dec 20 - 12:42 AM

Trouble is.. in this bonkers internet conspiracy era..

.. even if high profile folks do big PR for vaccines
by getting media event jabs,
conspiracists will immediately insist there's no proof
the injection was anything more than vitamins or any other harmless placebo...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 08 Dec 20 - 06:17 AM

I can't see it at present, but there was (maybe not in this thread) a question about whether the virus could by promulgated by farting.
I saw a post on Facebook today which seems to answer this: Facebook

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 08 Dec 20 - 06:29 AM

Telegraph today (page 9)
English pubs in Tier 2 with live music evenings have started making them all-ticket events.
In Tier 2 areas, live music venues are allowed to operate at 50% capacity and serve alcohol to ticket holders at the bar, without them having to order a main meal as well."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jos
Date: 08 Dec 20 - 07:28 AM

"... even if high profile folks do big PR for vaccines ..."

I assume "high profile folks" means people who are successful at sports, or who appear on television programmes with high viewing figures.

If so, the chances of my recognising them (or even having heard of them), let alone being persuaded to follow their examples, are vanishingly small.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 08 Dec 20 - 07:51 AM

..apparently liz and phil are being lined up for a PR jab job...???

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: robomatic
Date: 08 Dec 20 - 10:34 AM

The English are effin' awesome.


NPR reports the first two jabs went down this morning in England:
DECEMBER 8, 2020.

First was a 91 year old pensioner.

Second was a guy named William Shakespeare.

Already been dubbed: "TAMING OF THE FLU"

God save the queen!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: robomatic
Date: 08 Dec 20 - 10:58 AM

On the local news I heard there might be as many as tens of thousands of vaccine doses headed to Alaska that might be available as soon as next week. Now there are half a million folks all over the state so I reckon the doses will be apportioned to:

* Health Professionals
* Elderly and At-Risk Health Situations
* Native and Bush Community.

Since a double dose is the standard treatment, that amount of doses will be absorbed relaively quickly even if, as I understand, a high percentage of my fellow Alaskans will not be eager to undergo vaccination. But it will establish a good base of people who will be examples of folks who got the shot early and did not get sick.

Good news!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jos
Date: 08 Dec 20 - 11:23 AM

A few days ago there were reports, and pictures, of Russians being administered the Sputnik covid 19 vaccine in Moscow.

The BBC news service said that "Russia is starting its Covid-19 vaccination programme, with clinics in the capital Moscow inoculating those most at risk from the virus.
Its own vaccine Sputnik V, which was registered in August, is being used."


This morning BBC Radio 4 news reported that a 90-year-old woman was the first person in the world to receive a covid 19 vaccine outside of a trial as part of its development.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Dec 20 - 06:44 AM

Just a snippet from today's Guardian: rich western nations with 14% of the world's population have bought up 53% of the vaccines. Canada, for example, has bought enough vaccine to vaccinate everyone in the country five times over.

That news has caused me to completely lose interest in where I might be on the UK priority list...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 09 Dec 20 - 09:27 AM

And the Pfizer vaccine has, through this field-testing by just giving vaccines to the populace, already been found to be too dangerous for people with -wait for it- bad allergies. One blicky.

I was *not* fearmongering. These vaccines are untested for anything other than efficacy.

This is a new *type* of vaccine. We have *no clue* what injecting rna can do. When they first started the polio vaccines hundreds of children got polio till they figured out how to use viruses in vaccines. And that is just an example.

People who are not frontline workers, like me, can afford to wait, though. Not at all saying it isn't worth the risk if you are such a worker. Just saying it *is* a risk.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 09 Dec 20 - 10:42 AM

It can be argued that SARS-CoV-2 is more of a risk.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jeri
Date: 09 Dec 20 - 12:26 PM

From CNN, there were two health care workers, who carried an adrenaline auto-injector who had anaphylactoid reactions. The vaccine is supposed to stimulate the immune system, people with serious allergies have overly vigilant immune systems. This isn't a surprise reaction, but it would be good if they could reduce the possibility of a reaction.

It was close enough to "fear-mongering" for me to think of it as such. the "we have *no clue* what injecting..." is bullshit. They have a clue that it will provoke an immune response. I think most of us are fairly inured to most irrational fear of the unknown (to them, at least).

As for "People who are not frontline workers, like me, can afford to wait, though.", we don't have a choice in the US. I'll get the vaccine whenever I can, but I figure I'm not at the top of the list.

Those of us who aren't afraid will hopefully be enough to protect those who won't, or don't, get the shot from being infected, but it's pretty far off.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 09 Dec 20 - 03:39 PM

The Pfizer/BioNTech and the Oxford AztraZeneca vaccines have both been tested on >20,000 people.
The normal number of people tested for medicines licencing is anything between 300 and 3,000
These are not untested vaccines.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 10 Dec 20 - 10:49 AM

According to waste water testing, Boston will have a 500% spike next week.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 10 Dec 20 - 04:33 PM

Well in Kent we now have 6 of the top 10 infected areas in England. The rates are continuing to rise. By the end of the week we might have all 10 of the most infected areas in England.

Matt Hancock has announced the testing of all schoolchildren. Didn't anyone tell him that we have had the Kent test for years?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 11 Dec 20 - 07:05 AM

While we were lulled into propogandized sleep, China has vaccinated 9 million people. They are also poised to vaccinate the middle east, Africa, South America and Mexico, Russia and South East Asia.

Meanwhile back on the farm Trump refused Pfizer's intial offer for 100 million doses so we are at the back of the line for them. We will face an intentional shortage with less effective vaccines. Supply and demand will raise prices?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 11 Dec 20 - 07:14 AM

Trump thinks it's more important to execute people than to vaccinate.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 11 Dec 20 - 02:04 PM

Correction China has innoculated only 1 million.

When I brought up the vaccine with black neighors, they laughed.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 13 Dec 20 - 06:45 AM

The Dead are rising, cases climbing and the vaccine cavalry is coming.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 14 Dec 20 - 12:38 PM

Covid-19 Live Updates: U.S. Begins Vaccine Rollout, With Shots Given in New York

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 14 Dec 20 - 01:19 PM

And now we have a new strain of the virus with most cases of it appearing in the south east. Experts seem to think that might be an explanation of quick spread of the virus here in the south east of the UK.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 14 Dec 20 - 01:26 PM

My question is - THE VACCINES DO REQUIRE A SECOND 'BOOSTER' SHOT, BUT WHEN WILL WE LEARN IF FUTURE BOOSTERS ARE REQUIRED? accidental caps

Does the varient have a name yet?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Allan Conn
Date: 14 Dec 20 - 02:42 PM

Or it could just be that the variant happens to be most common in the area where there has been this new upsurge. They don't really know. There are variants arising though so it is not a first. Scotland had a variant a bit earlier in the year and there was a Spanish one too recently if I recall. Sure there have been more.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: robomatic
Date: 14 Dec 20 - 10:21 PM

The predicted amount of vaccines has arrived in Alaska. Vaccinations begin tomorrow!

Way Cool.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 15 Dec 20 - 08:18 AM

"These vaccines are untested for anything other than efficacy."

That's not actually true. It's the kind of assertion that gets red-card3d by Twitter when the Great Loser makes it.

Adverse reactions by people with strong allergic vulnerabilities are not exactly unexpected in this kind of situation. You always need to have a look out for them, as was done in this case.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 15 Dec 20 - 10:31 AM

I listened to a radio program yesterday talking about various philosophical and statistical topics to do with COVID, and have decided that the "it's my body" argument can be shot down. Just as people aren't allowed to smoke in public buildings (even it if its their body they can't bring their smoke in) they are similarly not allowed in with bare faces. We don't want your germs or your smoke in here.

What a sorry excuse for a spouse when her husband ignores her request that people wear masks and they all get sick and her mother dies. I think I'd be ready to move away from that community by now.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: robomatic
Date: 15 Dec 20 - 03:13 PM

Mrrzy is correct that the mRNA vaccines are a new type. But I think the facts as we know them indicate that it is a far more targetting toward the virus type of vaccine and a far less body interfering type of vaccine. One of the reasons the new vaccines must be kept so cold is that the critical part of the vaccine is extremely delicate. It is there to do one thing and it will fall apart otherwise. The other reason is that there are no real additives to this vaccine the way normal vaccines have been formulated, hence it is really not as likely as the 'normal' vaccines to complicate the human resistance.

I think the mRNA vaccines are probably the safest ever prepared or manufactured precisely because of the technology behind them. They are a game changing technology.

This is Dr. McCoy territory.

Meanwhile, I believe the AstraZeneca vaccine is more of the 'normal' non RNA type and does not need to be stored at very low temps. It does have some additives as did the familiar forms of vaccines in the past.

I think a lot of initial reluctance to be inoculated in the immediate future comes from several main sources:

1) A feeling to 'not be first' along the lines of "Early bird gets the worm, second mouse gets the cheese."

2) People who may associate the virus AND the vaccine with Donald Trump.

3) People who are going to get the Chinese or Russian vaccine and may not feel these have been well vetted.

4) People who through cultural isolation or stigmatization have reservations to any organized medical community.

I think far more than 50% of the population will accept the vaccines in the near future.

Vaccines have a two hundred year history, going back to cowpox/ smallpox in Europe, perhaps longer in other parts of the world. They have had complications and problems historically, but they are true human-made miracles.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 16 Dec 20 - 08:57 PM

Vaccines come from science... Non-overlapping magisteria with Trump.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 16 Dec 20 - 09:14 PM

RNA messenger vaccines against all forms of flu has been sought and have failed for over 12 years. Then again it is an entirely different kind of virus that mutates yearly. Perhaps what is learned recently will give a 'shot in the arm' to flu research.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: robomatic
Date: 17 Dec 20 - 12:33 PM

You may have heard of the Iditarod dog sled race. The basis of the race is a commemoration of a run via dogsled of serum. Via Wikipedia :

"The most famous event in the history of Alaskan mushing is the 1925 serum run to Nome, also known as the "Great Race of Mercy." It occurred when a large Diphtheria epidemic threatened Nome. Because Nome's supply of antitoxin had expired, Dr. Curtis Welch refused to use it and instead sent out telegrams seeking a fresh supply of antitoxin. The nearest antitoxin was found to be in Anchorage, nearly one thousand miles away. To get the antitoxin to Nome, sled dogs had to be used for part of the journey, as planes could not be used and ships would be too slow. Governor Scott Bone approved a safe route and the 20-pound (9.1 kg) cylinder of serum was sent by train 298 miles (480 km) from the southern port of Seward to Nenana, where just before midnight on January 27, it was passed to the first of twenty mushers and more than 100 dogs who relayed the package 674 miles (1,085 km) from Nenana to Nome. The dogs ran in relays an average of 31 miles (50 km) each, with no dog running over 100 miles (160 km)."


Listening to the radio this morning I've heard of vaccine being sent from Anchorage to Seward via delivery van and into another area via floatplane. That has to be somewhere in Southeast Alaska since all our other outdoor water is solid right now. It is not totally impossible that the vaccine might find its way onto a dogsled, and if I hear of that happenin, I'll be sure to mention it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 17 Dec 20 - 01:43 PM

Great movie, Balto.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 17 Dec 20 - 02:15 PM

Any movies about dogs made for adults or older children - count me in...

.. is trump a dog, cat, or animal cruelty, kinda guy...???

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 17 Dec 20 - 02:17 PM

.. even h1tler loved a dog...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: The Sandman
Date: 17 Dec 20 - 05:15 PM

No plan for vaccine certificates to be used to restrict what people can access or do
Hiqa’s advice to NPHET comes after the government outlined its national vaccination strategy yesterday.
Wed 2:51 PM 16,135 Views 58 Comments
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Image: Shutterstock/PhotobyTawat

Updated Wed 4:29 PM

THERE IS NO plan that vaccine certificates will be used to restrict what people can access or do in Ireland in the coming months.

Health Minister Stephen Donnelly said yesterday that vaccine certificates which could prove who has received the Covid-19 injection are “under consideration” by the government.

As part of the vaccine roll out implementation plan, the high-level vaccine task force said the vaccine administration process could include the production of a vaccine certificate after someone has received their doses.

There has been speculation that those who do not get vaccinated could be restricted in what they can do, in terms of attending large events or travel.

However, a spokesperson for the minister today said:

“It is not envisaged at this stage that the vaccine certificate, which is a medical record used to keep track of which vaccine has been given to a person and on which dates, will be used for any other purpose, such as travel or restricting access.”

The World Health Organization (WHO) does not recommend countries issuing “immunity passports” for those who have recovered from Covid-19 but said it is looking at prospects of deploying e-vaccination certificates.

The task force report, published yesterday, states that ”the design of this certificate and the scope of how it will be delivered (eg. physically, digitally or both) is currently being progressed with a number of stakeholders, including the EU”.

Head of the task force, Professor Brian MacCraith said that whether a certificate would be physical or digital is under consideration, but added “the language being used is very careful.

“It’s a vaccination certificate of proof of vaccination, nothing else.

“There are also discussions at an EU level of perhaps a single model across the EU 27 for example, but it’s under consideration within the IT infrastructure discussions and as you might imagine it’s not a particularly challenging thing to create in its simplest configuration,” he said.

Hiqa advice

Today, the Health Information and Quality Authority (Hiqa) has said trust, communication, and knowledge will be core tenets to help influence and improve the uptake of Covid-19 vaccinations in Ireland.

In advice issued to NPHET after reviewing international evidence, Hiqa said that the campaign to vaccinate Irish people should be largely based on consensus rather than penalties and enforcement.

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Here's what'll happen when you go to get your Covid-19 vaccine

Hiqa also stressed in its advice that potential barriers to equitable access to vaccines should be minimised and said that, given the unique situation of Covid-19, evidence from other vaccines such as seasonal flu is likely to have limited applicability to the situation we’re in now in terms of uptake, preference and behaviours.

Yesterday, the government announced details of its National Covid-19 Vaccination Strategy.

It will see at-risk groups prioritised for the early rollout of Covid-19 vaccines, before it ramps up to groups within the wider population.

Dedicated mass vaccination hubs will be set up, while details around a person’s path from appointment to innoculation were also explained.

In considering its advice, Hiqa noted that concerns may be raised about how mRNA vaccines (such as those made by Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna) work as well as the rigour of the approval process from the European Medicines Agency (EMA).

Presenting information clearly and accurately on these topics was said to be an important factor in building trust with the public on the safety and efficacy of these vaccines.

During a meeting of its Covid-19 expert advisory group, Hiqa said: “It was noted that the majority of individuals do not have an inherent bias for or against a vaccine, but need to be assured and informed in terms of the evidence for potential benefit or harm relevant to them or their family.

    There was agreement among [group] members that any policy aiming to maximise uptake of the Covid-19 vaccine needs to focus on trust, communication and knowledge. There is a need for communication to reassure the public of the process of vaccination approval by the EMA. While timelines have been shortened, processes have been carried out in parallel rather than sequentially and are robust. All vaccines, including the new Covid-19 vaccines, undergo the same rigorous evaluation process by regulatory authorities.

Hiqa’s advice also pinpointed the importance of healthcare workers in this process.

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It said that in advance of any vaccination programme, healthcare workers should be provided with the necessary information for them to make informed decisions for themselves and also act as a trusted source of information for others.

Key figures within local communities, such as GPs, pharmacists, and religious and sports leaders were also pinpointed as important to provide with evidence-based information to help with engagement with the community.

“Evidence in relation to the effectiveness and safety of Covid-19 vaccines obtained through ongoing surveillance should be made available in a proactive, open and accountable manner to maintain public trust,” Hiqa added.

With additional reporting by Christina Finn
TheJournal.ie's coronavirus newsletter cuts through the misinformation and noise with the clear facts you need to make informed choices. Sign up here:

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Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 18 Dec 20 - 05:26 AM

A quarter million new infections a day doesn't matter to folks in Idaho. Demonstrators against a mask mandate carried signs of "99% survival is not an emergency". The mask mandate was withdrawn.
Way to go Idaho.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 19 Dec 20 - 10:56 PM

You guys, esp the UK folks, reading about Britain having a new variant that is more transmissible and mutates faster?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 19 Dec 20 - 11:30 PM

boris is proud to make Britain the first in having a world beating virulent new variant...

take that johnny foreigner...!!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 20 Dec 20 - 04:45 AM

Keir Starmer consistently demands much harder and longer restrictions, while also slagging off the government for the associated economic damage. And the media are letting him get away with these contradictory statements entirely!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 20 Dec 20 - 06:55 AM

https://www.bbc.com/news/health-53325771

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Dec 20 - 07:19 AM

We have a house full of presents for my lad's family who were coming for the five days at Christmas and we've bought in all the food. We haven't exactly seen a lot of them this year as it is. They have our one and only precious grandchild. But they are now in Tier 4 and they're 250 miles away. So that's stuffed that. We're not even allowed to drive to deliver presents. Don't talk to me about contradictory messages, Bonzo (though I agree about how bloody useless Starmer is) when your man said one thing last week then at point blank notice banned everything he said the next. Government by confounded buffoon.

And I do know that millions are in the same boat...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 20 Dec 20 - 08:08 AM

Yes, Johnson does have a lot to answer for and he will always cover himself with his scientific advisor line. I never have liked the man, but I don't envy his position one bit!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jos
Date: 20 Dec 20 - 09:12 AM

It seems we are not allowed to move into or out of Tier 4. But what about going through it without stopping? If you live south of Berkshire and you were planning to have Christmas dinner with a relative north of Berkshire, are you expected to make a much longer journey to go round it? Or hire a private helicopter?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 20 Dec 20 - 11:43 AM

I think the short answer is Just Stay Home. Life is more important than any holiday.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Allan Conn
Date: 20 Dec 20 - 12:44 PM

Depends what is meant by stay at home? We have been basically self isolating for a fortnight already and the in laws have been doing the same. They live within the same region so we can still drive and spend Xmas Dinner with them. Just can't sleep over now! Admittedly we are lucky in that all three in our household can work at home and we are in a low prevelance area. We haven't been in a pub for 8 months or a shop for about 6 weeks. Basically we are pretty safe to frm a one day bubble. So not a one size fits all situation

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Dec 20 - 12:52 PM

You can drive through a Tier 4 area to get to a lower-tier place, Jos. When you get there, you have to obey the tier rules of that area, or, if you live in higher tier, the rules of your tier apply.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 21 Dec 20 - 12:25 PM

I just read that March 2020 was the first March without a school shooting [US] sinve 2002.
Thanks?

Subject: RE: BS: New rumors on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 21 Dec 20 - 01:48 PM

There are rumors that the mutated spikes of the Corona virus have mutated enough to make the mrna vaccine less effective - according to the reported rumors. How much less? Not even the rumors dare say.

A rumor yet to be rumored portends that this rumored varient will require a new shot every year like the flu.

Why this is a rumor is because I do not trust the Trump appointed US Surgeon General. Additionally I do not trust Donald, Steve, myself, Boris or Vladamir. :^/

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Allan Conn
Date: 21 Dec 20 - 04:15 PM

The news being reported here by the scientists is that they believe the variant is more easily transmitted. They do not believe that the virus is any more dangerous to the individual. And as yet they say there is no evidence that the vaccine would not be effective against it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 21 Dec 20 - 04:19 PM

It 'just' means a lot more infected people ill and dying at the same time...

Thank you, any infected selfish twats fleeing London to the South West for xmas...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jeri
Date: 21 Dec 20 - 04:33 PM

What Allan said. Rumors there are rumors about rumors are... the only time I've heard that shit is from Donuel.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Dec 20 - 04:49 PM

Let's stick to new news in this thread. "There's a rumour that..." is both scaremongering and weasel words, frankly.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 21 Dec 20 - 05:37 PM

Don't worry pfr. The new variant is on the way west,street by street. Look how it moved through Kent and is now moving through Sussex. Onward and westward.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 Dec 20 - 09:28 AM

The term "new variant" is the latest instrument of control. See through it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 22 Dec 20 - 09:35 AM

If only they could control it.Enjoy your freedom while you can. Tier 4 is coming for you.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 22 Dec 20 - 10:24 AM

I voiced my skepticism about the announcement by our Surgeon General and sarcasticly call it a rumor. If you want to call what he said 'news' about a mutated strain having less effectiveness in preventing disease from a vaccine - that is up to you.

Jeri, I don't trust you either. Why on Earth should I?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 22 Dec 20 - 10:39 AM

Come to think of it I consider most 'News' to be rumor.
The better we get the science on one side exact the better the economic side will become. The problem is the science can't always be exact. Today I heard Dr. Fauci outright lie but it was about
Santa so all is forgiven. I think people drift here but I don't see anyone deliberately lie to others except about themselves.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 22 Dec 20 - 11:42 AM

I see that some of the pubs in Herefordshire (tier 1 but for how long) are insisting that the local is for locals only.

"You're not from around here are you?"

Sky news just said that there has been a record number of new cases in today's figures.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 22 Dec 20 - 11:46 AM

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 22 Dec 20 - 01:16 PM

Scientists now considering children as a main factor for spreading new variant..

Teacher's better start organising their funeral plans
for when boris insists on keeping schools open in the new year...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 22 Dec 20 - 03:57 PM

The experts I have heard, all say "We THINK the varient will respond to the existing vaccines". A few say "It may be slightly less effective".
Without enough time there is no settled science.

Being more contagious is better than being more harmful or deadly.
To counteract the varient the ball is in our court of our own behavior.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 22 Dec 20 - 04:14 PM

"Being more contagious is better than being more harmful or deadly."

Up to a point. Being more contagious means you end up with more people needing hospital care,which unfortunately means a number of those patients are going to die.

Here in Kent (the car park of England), the hospitals have been practically full since last Friday. Other operations and procedures have had to be cancelled.

Back in October,before the national 4 week lockdown, rates were low. In Dover they were in the low double figures. Then they started to rise. They continued to rise during the lockdown. After lockdown we moved to tier 3. The rates kept rising. Then on Saturday they moved us to tier 4. The rates are still on the rise.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: mg
Date: 22 Dec 20 - 04:34 PM

some infectious disease scientists are asking us to do a daily sniff test to see if our sense of smell is working..it proves nothing one way or another but it is an indication, along with daily temperature taking. if your nose works fine with a sniff of something like lemon, pinesol, peppermint etc...you could be free of virus..or not. If all of a sudden you can not smell consider it a hint to get tested if possible. I personally have supplies on hand that follow the zelenko protocol for quercetin. Read up on ivermectin. Yes it is for deworming horses. Do what you want or not. Be abusive or not.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 Dec 20 - 04:49 PM

"The experts I have heard, all say "We THINK the varient will respond to the existing vaccines". A few say "It may be slightly less effective".

Despite what you are being told, scaremongering is apparently in your blood. "The experts I have heard" is classic weasel words. Why don't you just read the news properly before you post. Maybe you just want to stand out from the crowd. Unfortunately, you stand out in the wrong way.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 22 Dec 20 - 04:54 PM

.. seriously, been doing the sniff test several times a day for months..

Never thought the wife's farts would one day potentially save our lives...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 Dec 20 - 05:01 PM

I have to do the sniff test every time I put a mask on. They make my nose itch like mad so I have to find a secluded spot somewhere near the fish counter so that I can scratch and sniff unobserved. This morning in the convenience store I had to suppress a sneeze by pinching hard the bridge of my nose just above the mask. Can't think that I was being strictly legal there....

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 22 Dec 20 - 05:08 PM

Rain dog I know
mg I use cinnamon for a test

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jos
Date: 22 Dec 20 - 05:32 PM

In spite of many restrictions on our liberty, I don't think sneezing, or in your case, Steve, not sneezing, are illegal.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 Dec 20 - 07:47 PM

Yebbut what's the protocol if you're in a shop with a mask on and you have an irresistible urge to sneeze? I just about managed to suppress it, but I'm an epic no-reason sneezer and it WILL happen again...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 Dec 20 - 08:35 PM

Rather than attending to the Donuel/Mrrzy axis rumourmongering thing, read this eminently sane piece from the Guardian, contributed in very measured style by someone who is more than qualified to know what she's talking about. It was published today. As ever, sorry for my stupidity in being unable to do a proper link. You'll get there by googling well enough.

"Here's what we know about the new variant of coronavirus"

[Sharon Peacock]

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: robomatic
Date: 23 Dec 20 - 01:53 AM

So, in this part of Alaska, which is north and west of Ebbie, We've been delivered Moderna doses in addition to the Pfizer (I almost wrote it as "Pixar"). Vaccines are being administered to medical personnel and sent to the bush to take care of elements of our native population. And for the latest two days, numbers of brand new cases have gone down.

So, as well as can be expected.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: The Sandman
Date: 23 Dec 20 - 02:15 AM

is it correct that the vaccine does not prevent the spread of the virus or stop you from getting it , but boosts the immune system to fight against it, if this is the case it is useless other than for people who have a weak immune system. so effectively it is not a proper vaccine?
please not these are questions.
vaccines as i understood the meaning of the word such as polio and tb prevented you getting the disease
is this more newspeak

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: The Sandman
Date: 23 Dec 20 - 02:18 AM

that should have read please note these are questions

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Allan Conn
Date: 23 Dec 20 - 03:06 AM

The Pfizer vaccine seems to stop up to about 95% of people from becoming ill with the disease. They still don't really know if it stops you actually being infected or stops you being able to transmit the disease. That is seemingly because the trials were designed to look for symptomatic covid-19 and confirmed infection. I think likewise with the Oxford trials which seemed to show a bit less efficacy however no-one on the Oxford trials group of people became seriously ill or needed hospitalisation. So how good they are at stopping infection - or if they even do stop infection - will be known in time.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Manitas_at_home
Date: 23 Dec 20 - 04:11 AM

A normal vaccine works by 'priming' your immune system. If I have this right the vaccine is a small dose of 'dead' virus and the immune system reacts to this by producing antibodies so that the body is ready for the 'live' virus. The new forms of vaccine work by introducing only part of the RNA of the virus. It's still your immune system that does the work.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Dec 20 - 06:02 AM

No vaccine can stop you from getting infected, if by that you mean stopping the germs getting into you (vaccines don't create a magic bubble round you). The virus may still get into your cells, but your immune system will prevent it from getting a foothold. The question that remains to be answered is whether there's a phase in which your antibodies are protecting you whilst at the same time you can still transmit viruses to other people. It's a question that must arise with all vaccines I should imagine. But, generally, vaccines work well, so let's be optimistic, eh? .

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Manitas_at_home
Date: 23 Dec 20 - 08:04 AM

Just found this https://www.facebook.com/photo?fbid=742521735347&set=pcb.742521830157

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jos
Date: 23 Dec 20 - 08:16 AM

That suggests that people who have had the virus, and recovered, don't need the vaccine.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Dec 20 - 09:11 AM

That's only as maybe. It's known that immune response memory is not the same for every infection. We haven't had the long time period as yet to know how long immunity lasts for coronavirus. An optimist might say for life, a pessimist might say for just a few months. Testing recovered people for antibodies would be a great way of finding out if only the antibody level in the blood stayed high, but it doesn't seem to, but that doesn't necessarily mean that immunity has been lost. The science is on a steep learning curve.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 23 Dec 20 - 12:57 PM

Further English counties / regions put into tier 4. Have to ask why the whole of Sussex was not tier 4 earlier.

Here in Dover they have not put us into tier 5 yet,we just have to put up with a large part of the town gridlocked. Any resident needing an ambulance will have a long wait.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 23 Dec 20 - 02:13 PM

Further English counties / regions put into tier 4. Have to ask why the whole of Sussex was not tier 4 earlier.
Further areas (mainly in S.E. England) will be put into Tier 4 from 26 December

Here in Dover they have not put us into tier 5 yet,we just have to put up with a large part of the town gridlocked. Any resident needing an ambulance will have a long wait.
There is no Tier 5. Even Scotland with 5 tiers only goes up to Tier 4.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 23 Dec 20 - 02:25 PM

There is no tier 5 yet Nigel.
If you care to remember, there was no tier 4 until the day they announced it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 23 Dec 20 - 02:29 PM

Here in Dover they have not put us into tier 5 yet, suggests that there is a tier 5 that you could be put into.
"They haven't created a tier 5 for us yet, but I'm sure they will" would have been a clearer message.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 23 Dec 20 - 02:38 PM

Well let's hope it is no higher than 5.
Back in those dim and distant days when Kent was in tier 3 and some innocent souls had not dreamt of tier 4,I said to my sister that I expected Kent to go into tier 10. Way to go yet.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 23 Dec 20 - 03:06 PM

But there is no tier 10... gotcha.. you made a mistake...!!!

Nigel - haha.. beat you to it...


Thankfully, pedantry is not quite as virulent as covid.. yet...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 23 Dec 20 - 04:46 PM

Damn. There I was thinking I was doing well by not mentioning the new 'new variant '

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 23 Dec 20 - 04:49 PM

Does anybody know anything about the nanoparticles in the vaccines?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: robomatic
Date: 23 Dec 20 - 04:59 PM

This article in Salon magazine talks about the background to the new mRNA vaccine and mentions nanoparticles.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Dec 20 - 05:51 PM

"mRNA being short for 'synthetic messenger RNA."'

No it isn't. mRNA stands for messenger RNA. Your article tries hard, but at the end of the day it's a popular science piece, and it contains a fair number of daft analogies. At least, it avoids scaremongering, unlike a couple of our correspondents here.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 23 Dec 20 - 07:46 PM

Yeah, glad info is getting to readers of Salon, though.

This is pop sci too but it is more sci.

My question, though, was about what the nanites do that makes the vaccine work, not what might be wrong with having them there, but this was all that popped up.

Thanks.

I know we have real scientists here who can explain without drowning out info with jargon. Maybe one of them would chime in...

And nanites is a Star Trek reference, but it is shorter than nanoparticles.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 23 Dec 20 - 07:50 PM

Ooh better one sorry rushing

How nanotechnology helps mRNA Covid-19 vaccines work.

---

Link added by mudelf

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Dec 20 - 08:31 PM

Just like with Donuel, scaremongering is in your blood, isn't it? Just knock it off, will you. We know you're special without your having to prove it to us every other day.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 25 Dec 20 - 11:28 AM

Apparently it may be the nanoparticles that are giving some people the allergic reactions.

Also, people who already have facial cosmetic implants, apparently, are more likely to so react.

I am not including blickies for these as the findings are easy to research.

Subject: RE: Lyr Req: Coronavirus Songs (COVID-19; Pandemic)
From: Donuel
Date: 26 Dec 20 - 01:02 PM

prediction

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mr Red
Date: 27 Dec 20 - 06:56 PM

I saw a YouTube video from a Doctor (he has several on COVID) where he was saying the Astra-Zeneca/Oxford vaccine would turn out to be the most effective. Because:
1) Old technology.
2) Claimed efficacy would probably improve with larger data, whereas the others may well fall due to distribution logistics with storage temperature needed.
3) $3/4 a shot means the take-up world wide will be greater. And it has to be a world solution, we are a flat earth (commercially speaking).

& I would add that the Serum Institute in India (the biggest make of vaccines) turned over all their production to the A-Z/O vaccine long ago. A gamble now paying off. India is a big market.

I see several of this parish have had the call to arm. Things is moving fast.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 28 Dec 20 - 05:15 AM

That was good news. US hospitals are now running out of Covid treatment supplies. The sick are on their own.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 28 Dec 20 - 08:30 AM

COVID https://www.politico.com/cartoons/2020/03/26/cartoonists-around-the-world-take-on-a-global-pandemic-000141?slide=10

https://www.politico.com/cartoons/2020/03/26/cartoonists-around-the-world-take-on-a-global-pandemic-000141?slide=10

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: mg
Date: 29 Dec 20 - 10:18 PM

interesting reports on nasal vaccines..that would be great..potential bottlenecks for vial, needles etc. removed. people hate getting shots..more would probably take nasal. not sure of refrigeration requirements..

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 30 Dec 20 - 01:15 AM

This faster spreading COVID-19 virus has been discovered in Colorado in a young man with no history of travel. Not surprising.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Allan Conn
Date: 30 Dec 20 - 02:13 AM

Oxford vaccine given approval today and seemingly supplies for up to 4 million shots ready to be rolled out and of course because just needs to be kept in fridge it can be distributed from GP surgeries and straight to care homes. Or I suppose maybe like the flu vaccine which here in Kelso was also done in a local concert hall. Two shots. Possibly up to 12 weeks apart as decision is to get at least one shot to as many folk's as possible. In the trials no-one who received at least one shot contracted severe symptoms or was hospitalised.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 30 Dec 20 - 02:56 PM

Dawn Wells (Mary Ann on Gilligan's Island) died of COVID-19.

Dawn Wells, best known for playing the girl-next-door castaway Mary Ann on the iconic CBS comedy series Gilligan’s Island, died Wednesday morning in Los Angeles of complications due to Covid-19. She was 82.

Wells, who was Miss Nevada in the 1959 Miss America pageant, beat out 350 actresses for the role of Mary Ann Summers. She also appeared in more 150 series and several movies during her career as well as on Broadway.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 30 Dec 20 - 03:01 PM

Aw.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 30 Dec 20 - 03:11 PM

wot a surprise..

tory govt insist on reopening primary schools on Monday,
but will not prioritise front line school staff over age of 50
for protective vaccines...

.. making the most of their last chance to kill off expensive higher salaried older unionised anti tory voting teachers...!!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 30 Dec 20 - 03:40 PM

One step forward and two steps back.
Tories have always been 2 bit hacks.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 31 Dec 20 - 01:46 PM

So..

this evening's news..

South East England increasing covid crisis, Hospitals at bursting point and overflowing..

South East covid patients being transported cross country to South West England intensive care beds..

That's nice for us innit...!!!

Exporting their new variant risk to our Hospitals and medical workers;
and filling up our intensive care beds
so there's no more space for us when we get infected by them...

Nice to think how many of 'em were brave bold anti mask covid deniers...???

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 01 Jan 21 - 03:01 AM

Tut tut tut pfr.

It is the National Health Service.

Local hospital beds for local people?

Local comedians for local people?

No more hospital care for drinkers, smokers, drug users and mushroom users?

Pfr.When did that change to parochial folk rocker.

Happy New Year to you and the rest of the mudcatters. Stay safe and beware the new 'new variant' heading your way.

Tier 5 anyone?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Allan Conn
Date: 01 Jan 21 - 03:41 AM

I kind of agree with Rain Dog on that. If people need treated then they need treated. Folk in rural areas shouldn't be too complacent. We often have lower rates - but also tend to have less capacity - so could well also find ourselves being treated outside our regions. Just several weeks ago here in the Scottish Borders we were like our neighbours in Dumfries & Galloway and had very low rates at about 30+ per 100,000 - but it has since rocketed to about 170 per 100,000. We could well find ourselves taken up to Edinburgh for treatment when just really days ago we thought we didn't have a problem and the local hospital was under no pressure. It is about pulling together when too often folks look for others to blame. You even heard the suggestion here among some that the fault for the increase was the doctors and health workers from the Lothians coming to help at the Borders Hospital. Gratitude eh???

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Jan 21 - 04:50 AM

Well here in the Westcountry the ethos has been to be very compliant with the rules and the infection rates have been lower than in most other places. Yet for months we've been tearing our hair out as we've seen masses of tourists pouring in untrammelled since the summer right to the end of October, the vast majority from urban areas with far higher rates than ours. I can go out now and see camper vans, motor homes, cars with roof boxes and occupied second homes in blatant contravention of the rules. We are all being told not to travel and major hospitals are few and far between (one in Cornwall for half a million people). So the resentment at the idea that sick people from all over the place may be wheeled in because of the running down of the NHS and the gross mishandling of this pandemic is perfectly understandable. Innit.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 01 Jan 21 - 06:36 AM

Hospital provision between Taunton and Bristol
has been severely reduced in the recent few years.

Tories were already dismantling capacity at Weston super Mare hospital
before it was stricken with emergency covid deaths
and temporarily closed earlier in the summer
when lockdown was eased.

North Somerset locals were attacked by Bristol newspapers
for justifiably protesting about that inevitable result
of summer tourists flooding back...

Do not resuscitate now applies to elderly patients hospitalized for chest pains
and other common potentially serious ailments..

The hospital is now already that desperate for available beds...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 01 Jan 21 - 06:41 AM

Usual tory divide and rule, and distract, tactics..

In the summer it was cities versus country & coast;
now also pitting south east versus south west...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 01 Jan 21 - 06:51 AM

Well one bit of good news is that rates have started to fall, albeit slowly, here in Dover. Remains to be seen if they will increase again after the Christmas and New Year holidays.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 01 Jan 21 - 03:18 PM

Posted this in the wrong thread earlier.

'I see that the new 'new variant' has been designated 'Variant of Concern'by Public Health England.'

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 01 Jan 21 - 03:36 PM

Next lever tier will be 'Variant of oh fuck !!!!!!!'...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 01 Jan 21 - 03:49 PM

It used to be rare, when one heard about someone who thought they had COVID. A friend got tested back in April for something that was so rare it was almost impossible to find a test. This week I learned of a friend whose husband brought it home from work to her; they are recuperating. My next door neighbor [foolishly] went to church on xmas eve and learned a couple of days later that the pastor had COVID, so they're laying low. No symptoms, and they're an older couple so it needs to stay that way. I've seen her twice briefly on the porch to hand over something (a gift, and later baked goods). Such a brief encounter and only one time on the porch neither of us had a mask. She has several relatives who have reported it, one was on a ventilator.

This news is going to continue to be grim as we wait out the 14 days period after New Year's Eve when people still foolishly got together indoors for extended periods of time. Texas hospitals are full and patients with other problems are being sent out of state to hospitals with room for them.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 01 Jan 21 - 04:20 PM

Close members of my wife's family in Wales have covid..

Apparently one of their student kids brought it into the house.

Parents are in their 50s, and so far seem to be recovering ok
from a very unpleasant illness...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 01 Jan 21 - 04:31 PM

The family of 5 who live next door to us all have covid. Two are teachers, one primary and the other secondary.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 01 Jan 21 - 04:33 PM

A further 20 patients being transferred from Kent hospitals

https://www.kentonline.co.uk/medway/news/kent-is-completely-overwhelmed-240101/

I cannot manage a blue click easily on this smartphone

---

Added for you. ---mudelf

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 01 Jan 21 - 04:35 PM

My wife is still under orders to return to front line infant school teaching
on Monday.
With no enhanced PPE provided, or priority for a vaccine...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Jan 21 - 07:57 PM

Great start to what is supposed to be a better New Year, eh! The motor homes are still around, the lights are on in the second homes, saw a bunch of eight people having a huddled picnic on the sea front here in tier 3... It was so bloody cold that I was tempted to go up to 'em and tell 'em that they'd catch pneumonia out in this weather...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: keberoxu
Date: 02 Jan 21 - 11:07 PM

Hardly new, but still quotable, is
a Tweet from Dan Rather, December 2020.

So, let me get this right.
The criticism of Dr. Jill Biden is
that she's not a "medical doctor"?
Says a bunch of people who have been
ignoring medical doctors
about a pandemic that has killed over 300,000 Americans?
Can someone invent a hypocrisy mute button?

17 December 2020

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: mg
Date: 03 Jan 21 - 02:07 AM

from california...43 cases of covid in emergency department staff..or perhaps including other staff..they are saying someone wearing a christmas tree costume..with a fan to keep it inflated..perhaps spread it. if so...probably the stupidest thing i have heard. Google it..if it is true..the basic story is true..it is beyond belief.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 03 Jan 21 - 05:55 AM

Whilst I agree 100% that measures must be put in place to keep teachers safe, so also must accountants - who provide an ignored essential service, be kept safe by extending the tax return deadline to 28 February or even 31 March, to allow remote working which is very much slower.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 03 Jan 21 - 07:16 AM

Yep, first things first, eh, Bonzo? Put accountants first in line for the jab! Very timely of you to post that, as I've just read that 1% of the population owns 25% of the wealth...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 03 Jan 21 - 11:58 AM

None of our clients fall into that category. It doesn't matter whether you are in the 1% or the 99%, if you are required to complete a tax return, the deadline is 31 January.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jos
Date: 03 Jan 21 - 12:09 PM

HMRC send me emails from about April onwards telling me that my tax return is due and urging me to hurry up and send it in - even though I don't need to do it until January. It isn't as if it comes as a surprise.
Mine is very straightforward - it takes me about a day, and then I check it again the next day before sending it in. If it was so complicated I needed an accountant I would give him or her the figures in plenty of time so there would be no need to extend the deadline.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 03 Jan 21 - 01:13 PM

I wish many of our clients would do that, always last minute and only send half of the information!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 03 Jan 21 - 01:31 PM

Bonz - perhaps this year they are waiting to see if they snuff it from covid,
before bothering with the hassle of tax forms...???

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 03 Jan 21 - 05:05 PM

Here's that story about a costume with a fan spreading COVID-19.

A well-meaning gesture at a California hospital may have backfired this Christmas: To celebrate the holiday, an emergency room employee at Kaiser Permanente San Jose briefly wore an inflatable costume to work on December 25. Hospital officials are now looking into whether the costume's fan may have splayed infectious particles across the emergency department.

Between December 27 and January 1, 44 hospital employees at Kaiser Permanente San Jose tested positive for COVID-19.

"Any exposure, if it occurred, would have been completely innocent, and quite accidental, as the individual had no COVID symptoms and only sought to lift the spirits of those around them during what is a very stressful time," Irene Chavez, the hospital's senior vice president, said in a statement to ABC7 News.

She added: "If anything, this should serve as a very real reminder that the virus is widespread, and often without symptoms, and we must all be vigilant."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 04 Jan 21 - 06:26 PM

New news is just the old news again here in the UK. Back to full lockdown in England.No real surprise there.

Yet again I have to ask who is in charge of pr/communication for the Government? Who ever it is they are doing a pretty poor job.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 04 Jan 21 - 08:13 PM

Here in Australia's biggest city we have a couple of big hotspots & some lockdowns, but folk from these clusters have gone about their business not knowing they have covid so other suburbs & country towns are at risk. States have locked their boarders against travellers from other states. Country towns have been mainly covid free so far. Today's news - People in Broken Hill (1200 km from Sydney), Orange (250km) and Nyngan (550km) urged to come forward for testing after man travelled for camping trip.

Finally our state Premier has ordered (rather than strongly advising) mask to be worn on public transport & inside shopping centers, shops & other premises. Folk with medical conditions that make wearing a mask difficult or dangerous are exempt, but of course some folk know rules don't apply to them. They have god?-given rights, but as a cartoonist put it "Your right not to wear a mask ends at my nasal passages."

Where to buy reusable face masks in Australia – and how to make your own

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 05 Jan 21 - 09:52 AM

Los Angeles County has had to tell its ambulances not to even bother transporting people "with little chance of survival" and to conserve O2. Giving people no chance of survival. Great.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jeri
Date: 05 Jan 21 - 11:51 AM

It's part of a military type of triage, because in wartime, resources are limited. The "expectant" triage category, which doesn't typically exist in "normal life", is when a patient is expected to die without heroic intervention. They're dealing with reality, which sucks. Look to all those "we don't believe Covid is real", or "we're tired of wearing masks and distancing" people for the reasons.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 05 Jan 21 - 12:21 PM

I know what you mean but denial rivals survival.

Denial is always the first response

An Alzheimer syndrome seems to accompagny covid infection beyond the mildest symptoms and even compromises blood brain barriers.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Charmion's brother Andrew
Date: 05 Jan 21 - 12:54 PM

Here's a CBC News piece about a Newfound folksong parody that's on-topic. ;)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 05 Jan 21 - 01:49 PM

She's not a crazy person...

Neither are all the not crazy people leaving not crazy
comments of support for her...

Just understand they are not the crazy folks.. WE are...!!!!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 06 Jan 21 - 08:10 AM

Boris announced on Monday evening that all schools would be 'closed tomorrow' except for the children of key workers. Since my husband is a full-time school cleaner he was left wondering if he'd be needed or not. His team of cleaners comprises about fifteen people. Not a peep from his school either on their website or by phone. So he went in as usual yesterday, the date term was supposed to start.
There were only ten pupils (secondary school and sixth-form college) so he did some 'deep-cleaning' and was sent home a few hours early.
He was told to keep going in, and next week all the cleaners will be split into pairs per day. His day will be Fridays.
I can't see how this is protecting anybody. None of the ten pupils have been tested and are not wearing masks. The teacher/s are still being exposed to possible infection. And my husband has only been given a little paper mask to wear.
I'm terrified he gets Covid, and I'm surprised his Union (Unison) hasn't spoken up about this.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 06 Jan 21 - 08:47 AM

not a good situation for anyone. I hope it improves, but from what I've read about UK situation, it is not good.

best wishes & hugs to you both

sandra


Prime Minister's speech, 5th Jan

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 06 Jan 21 - 09:01 AM

We CAN pretend that new varient virus are not 70% more contagious/
We can pretend that virus won't continue to mutate.
We can pretend there is no such thing as virus'.

In our teenage years it was normal to feel almost immortal.
In our heart we all enjoy pretending.
The crazy people don't know they are pretending.
Sane people just pretend quietly and in private moments.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 06 Jan 21 - 10:56 AM

Apparently.. [ie, I switched TV on near the end of a news item, so missed most details]..

Covid deniers had to be ejected from a sterile ICU area of a UK hospital
after invading to photograph 'proof' that the virus is a hoax...!!!?????

When are these fukwits going to get prison time,
instead of minor reprimands,
or petty fines that will probably be paid by crowd funders..

If the worry is prison will make martyrs of them,
surely there are other ways to really punish such covidiot wankers...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Jan 21 - 11:16 AM

It's not unlikely that the new variant is becoming prevalent due to natural selection. Another point is that London, along with other parts of the south-east the main focus of the variant's explosive spread, was, until recently, under very mild restrictions (Tier 2), which are now regarded as having been ineffective. New variant that was maybe SLIGHTLY more transmissible, huge crowded city, indulgent restrictions regime, a penchant for many Londoners to pile down to Cornwall and Devon for their late holidays...As with everything, nothing is simple and nothing can be ascribed to a single factor. My hunch is that the variant IS more transmissible, but that only a fool would put a percentage on it, and we must use that to explain its spread only when we take all those other issues into account.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 06 Jan 21 - 11:17 AM

Thank you very much Sandra.
As I understand it, being black increases the chances of being very ill/dying from the virus.
I suppose the schools are being treated as childcare centres so that the parents can go to work.
But secondary school pupils are surely capable of looking after themselves at home? My sister and I did while our mother worked, even during the school holidays.
I also feel sorry for the teachers.
At least the supermarket Morrisons is giving all 'frontline workers' a 10% reduction on their bill at the checkout, on production of the ID badge. Husband proudly shows his badge and the lady always says, "Stay safe!"

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jeri
Date: 06 Jan 21 - 11:37 AM

Maggie got it right. I see it more like you have certain people you hate, designated adversaries, and so it's fair for you to make personal attacks.

It's not. While you're a member here, the personal attacks, the "stalking" will be deleted.

That's the last I'll say about it. Tangential, but mostly off-topic.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 06 Jan 21 - 11:59 AM

It may seem non sequitur to leave Jeri's post after several others were removed, but these two can serve as a reminder that the running battles from one thread to another are not acceptable.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 06 Jan 21 - 12:20 PM

The scariest stat I saw today was loss of smell and taste in 86% of mild cases.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 06 Jan 21 - 12:23 PM

I can't agree with you Steve.
Here in Dover along with most of Kent,rates were low before the 4 week lockdown in November. I have said before that the rate in Dover was in the low double figures.
During lockdown the rates started to rise in Medway, Swale and Thanet, the north and north east areas of Kent. Some people thought the rise in Swale was connected to the number of prisons there. Others put it down to lack of social distancing.
The rates then started to increase through Kent. We ended lockdown and went into tier 3 and then tier 4. The rates continued to increase. In all this time I did not notice any major change in people's behaviour. I would watch the local news each night and was puzzled by the continuing rise. I watched it sweep through Kent and then continue westward into Sussex. Something was amiss. I think that it is safe to say that it is more transmissible, worryingly so. I think that the authorities were slow to react. They certainly had more information than I did.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 06 Jan 21 - 02:36 PM

Over a 1000 covid related deaths announced today in the UK. Highest daily rate since April

Surrey and Sussex hospitals declare major incident due to large number of covid patients being treated.

Heard today that vaccine will start to be issued here in Dover and Deal from week starting 11th January.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Jan 21 - 05:53 PM

My surmise is that the new variant IS more transmissible, and I haven't said that it isn't. But someone here has put an arbitrary figure of "70% more contagious" which was a rehashed comment made by one quasi-maverick bloke in the UK and which is a claim bereft of evidence. The responsible thing is to base our opinions on credible facts. It is not responsible to jump on a titbit of a unsupported comment made by one person and use it to tell people of more measured opinion that they are pretending. That's all. And there's no need for you to disagree. I'd be quite happy to be wrong.

The infection rate here has burgeoned. It is a cold winter. Ten million people in London and around were in an ineffective tier until not long before Christmas. The government failed to call a firebreak at the October half term. Instead, we had a panic-stricken December lockdown...in which schools were allowed to stay open, fer chrissake. Secondary schools in particular are known to be virus pits. All through the autumn, people from the most infected areas were allowed to go on holiday in droves. Here in Cornwall, where rates have been low, we were swamped with tourists from the biggest and most infected urban areas right up to the beginning of November. It was actually phenomenal. Round here today, the roads are as busy as ever. In the March lockdown, in contrast, there was no traffic. Yesterday, in a supposed lockdown, in a three-mile drive from Bude to my house, I saw five motor homes and a camper van, on the first day of a supposed lockdown, and the locals round here can tell you of second homes still occupied.

Yes there is a variant that may be - probably is - more transmissible. That variant first exploded into action in London and around, a big crowded city that was still enjoying it pub and cafe culture. But when you're trying to get your head around the parlous state the country is in, to use "a more transmissible variant" as the exclusive explanation as to why we have so many infections is just what this benighted government wants you to think. Nice way of diverting the blame away from them. In all probability, it is just one factor among all the others I've just listed. Let's not be taken in, and let's go with all the caveats that you can pick out in this post, if you bother to look.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Jan 21 - 06:36 PM

One supposed lockdown too many there. Oops...

Subject: positive update on Marianne Faithfull
From: keberoxu
Date: 12 Jan 21 - 05:33 PM

The interview in Mojo magazine is obviously from months back,
as is usual with periodicals like this one.
I got a look at a copy on a newsstand today,
but the interview goes back to the last calendar year.


"She Walks In Beauty" is going to be her latest record album,
a tribute to the English Romantic poets.
Marianne Faithfull is still mourning the loss of
producer Hal Willner.
Like her, he contracted COVID-19;
unlike her, he did not recover, and died last year.

Faithfull made the recording after being released from hospital.
COVID-19's immediate effects
were the loss of short-term memory, lung function, and her voice.

She stated in the update interview
that her lungs were very badly affected,
but that they are healing now,
adding,
"My short-term memory is affected.
But I'm told that when you have coronavirus as badly as I did, that happens.
But your memory comes back,
and mine is coming back.
And my lungs are coming back too.
I've made a beautiful record."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 15 Jan 21 - 10:45 AM

Life insurance is SNAFU due to virus
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-12-02/covid-unknowns-leave-survivors-fearing-life-insurance-rejection

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Thompson
Date: 15 Jan 21 - 11:20 AM

Ireland, having had the second-best figures in the world for months, allowed everyone to come home and go out and socialise over Christmas, and now has the second-worst figures in the world. People are absolutely raging, those of use who are not in hospital.
Here's the graph of what our outbreak looks like (today anyway; the graph may change in time on the website as it doesn't seem to be dated).

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 15 Jan 21 - 12:44 PM

We are told to anticipate 90,000 new deaths over the next 3 weeks.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 15 Jan 21 - 05:28 PM

Does the NRA going bankrupt belong in this or the Not About The Virus new news thread?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 15 Jan 21 - 05:56 PM

It belongs in the Trump era news, for one. But it's good news wherever one reads it!

Subject: RE: De-clutter & Fitness in a Pandemic: 2021
From: The Sandman
Date: 19 Jan 21 - 04:22 AM

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000rcnl d
Irish Times
ventilation is key to stopping the spread of Covid-19
Clean air far more important than clean hands
Thu, Oct 8, 2020, 00:55
Orla Hegarty

Covid-19 has meant hard choices and serious consequences, with an escalation in restrictions and enforcement. But, if the rules aren’t being effective, could the rules be wrong? Last week the HSE gave a briefing about recent outbreaks. One case resulted in the infection of four restaurant staff and six people at another table; another cluster involved 14 of 27 students in a class. It was confirmed that Nphet guidelines were being followed, but when asked how this could have happened the HSE response was that “this virus is very unpredictable”.

This week there are 31 outbreaks in nursing homes and 25 in communities where people live in close proximity. A cluster from a cafe in Cork resulted in 57 infections; and of the 28,000 cases nationally up to the end of August, more than one in 20 were workers in meat plants.

All of these outbreaks follow very similar patterns to other countries and they all happen where crowds gather in very specific conditions – indoors in poor ventilation.

What is sidestepped in public health advice is that “super-spread events” are clear-cut and can be prevented. “Super-spread” is defined as an occasion where five people or more become infected, and up to 97 per cent happen indoors, according to research from Japan.
High-risk conditions

Moreover, just 10-20 per cent of those carrying Covid may be causing 80 per cent of new infections and it happens in known high-risk conditions. So, public health advice to “halve all contacts” is unlikely to halve the new cases when the majority of contacts are low-risk and where these known super-spread conditions are permitted, even at Level 5. Evidently, targeted prevention in specific locations is the only way to significantly reduce new cases.

In Ireland, a drop in cases coincided with warmer temperatures when activity moved outside and buildings were ventilated freely. Recent household infections have been attributed to people disregarding the rules, but perhaps it was the weather that changed rather than their behaviour? In the absence of public health warnings, most people are simply unaware that opening windows can reduce or eliminate the virus spread in their homes and cars.

Conversely, in meat plants ventilation is reduced in summer when air is recirculated to operate at 10 degrees. Research from Germany confirms that airborne virus in these conditions infected workers as far as 8m apart. At another super-spread event in Washington, one person at a choir practice infected 52 of 61 others, two of whom died. Increasing ventilation and shortening the event would likely have halved the infections. It is known that singing, shouting, exercising and even talking can increase the virus in the air.


Spread is airborne

It is now believed, from these and other cases, that most spread is airborne, that there is no safe distance in a poorly ventilated room and that conditions can move from low- to high-risk within 15 minutes.

Recent research spans environmental engineering, particle physics and virology and points back to how Ireland beat tuberculosis with space, sunlight and fresh air. In the last century disease – Spanish Flu and TB – changed the way that buildings were designed and it will again now.

Yet, while international research is providing answers, we still have “rules of thumb” for two-metre distancing and two-hour duration, now understood to be unsafe oversimplification. Without a science-base, these rules are resulting in unknowing high-risk behaviour on the one hand, and unnecessary social isolation and business closures on the other.
Higher indoors

All along, building ventilation has been hiding in plain sight in different rules for indoors and out. Covid-19 is a respiratory virus, it is caught from breathing. In the open air, the virus is diluted and dispersed in the air, but inside, aerosols, the particles small enough to remain in the air, can linger, spread and build up to dangerous levels, similar to cigarette smoke. Ventilation is key to prevention because the risk of breathing in Covid-19 is 20 times higher indoors.

Air quality in buildings can be measured, managed and monitored, so improving ventilation reduces or eliminates these risks.

Active and targeted prevention of specific high-risk conditions, such as in meat plants, direct provision, overcrowded housing and schools is key to both keeping buildings open and people out of hospital, without compromising the health services or the economy.

Last February, Japan identified ventilation as critically important to preventing conditions for super-spread. Public health advised avoiding the 3 Cs “closed spaces, crowded places, and close-contact settings”. With a population of 126 million, the total number of deaths from Covid-19 in Japan is just 1,578 which is lower than in Ireland with a population of five million, with 1,806 mortalities.
Critical weapon

Comparisons between countries, are very difficult but the arguments in favour of ventilation as a critical weapon are compelling, and now confirmed by public health advice in other countries. What will it cost in lives and businesses for Ireland to wait for more proof, particularly when fresh air is free?

The HSE is soon to employ 500 contact-tracers to track future Covid-19 patients, asking where they went and who they met. But, how many people are employed to look at our houses and buildings to prevent tens of thousands of people becoming infected in the first place?

Escalation of this pandemic is not inevitable. Science-based rules, targeted public health advice, risk assessments and enforcement are critical now, not loose rules of thumb.

There is little cost in moving outside, spreading out into safer rooms, avoiding crowds, re-setting ventilation systems, and opening windows.

Clean air is far more important than clean hands.

Orla Hegarty is assistant professor at the School of Architecture UCD

R

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: pattyClink
Date: 20 Jan 21 - 01:48 PM

Thanks, Sandman. I'm seeing a lot of people not 'getting' that ventilation is a really big deal; busy scrubbing doorhandles and taking their temp, while foraying into poorly ventilated indoor venues where the virus is lurking. Next issue, we have no process to 'rate' buildings as to their safety.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 23 Jan 21 - 10:59 AM

There are a lot of individual obituary threads for musical people who have died of COVID-19. One non-musical but very well known, at least in the US, is talk show host Larry King.

Larry King, the longtime CNN host who became an icon through his interviews with countless newsmakers and his sartorial sensibilities, has died. He was 87.

His son, Chance, confirmed King's death Saturday morning.

King hosted "Larry King Live" on CNN for over 25 years, interviewing presidential candidates, celebrities, athletes, movie stars and everyday people. He retired in 2010 after taping more than 6,000 episodes of the show.

A statement was posted on his verified Facebook announcing his passing.

"With profound sadness, Ora Media announces the death of our co-founder, host and friend Larry King, who passed away this morning at age 87 at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles," the statement said. "For 63 years and across the platforms of radio, television and digital media, Larry's many thousands of interviews, awards, and global acclaim stand as a testament to his unique and lasting talent as a broadcaster."

The statement did not give a cause of death.

He was hospitalized and in the ICU in recent days, but he had a number of health issues over the years. I suspect the conclusion will be that his death was COVID-related.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 24 Jan 21 - 09:23 AM

I already read it was.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 29 Jan 21 - 10:19 AM

Attack of the varient viral mutants VVM is well underway.
The great city of London is now added to apoint of origin story like Wuhan. Maybe in came from Feltwell in Norwich or Gravesend
Some doctors are more concerned about the English varient than all the others. My question is will the new varients continue like the flu on an ongoing annual basis?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 29 Jan 21 - 10:27 AM

Mrs Bonzo had the Oxford jab this afternoon, and also a nice little outing in the back of the car for our greyhound who is housebound at the moment with a nasty skin infection - rear left leg heavily bandaged and she has to wear a big cone to prevent licking the bandage.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 30 Jan 21 - 09:56 AM

Donuel:
They also have found that covid 19 is 90% likely to be lab produced and from a scientific point of view was never a conspiracy theory but a reasoned finding
We can only guess at your 'sources' (if any) as you provide no links.
However:
A research paper claiming to prove that the coronavirus was cooked up in a laboratory has been widely dismissed by mainstream scientists.

The paper, which was posted online earlier this week and hasn’t been peer reviewed, says that “unusual features” of the virus’s genome suggest “sophisticated laboratory modification rather than natural evolution”. The authors allege that the modification of one or more bat viruses was carried out in a Chinese government laboratory in Wuhan.

From New Scientist, September 2020

---

This response to several now-deleted COVID-19 conspiracy theory posts and responses is left because it provides a useful link. ---mudelf

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 30 Jan 21 - 11:17 AM

Thats the spirit Nigel - not that you can agree with me BUT that a truthful post regarding scientific findings, unencumbered with political spin or orthodox dogma, can be more helpful than believing a convenient lie.
Orthodoxy is a finding plus excessive time. Its time to take a critical look at all the facts assembled over a year. Critical thinking is easy when you don't care how it reflects on us or feel any need to sugar coat a damn thing.

Perhaps you even looked up the evolutionary virologist scientists I mentioned earlier.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 30 Jan 21 - 11:40 AM

Donny - Life is too stressful;
and spare time is too limited
to be wasted constantly trying to make sense of your lengthy self indulgent posts...

Please try to communicate more effectively,
with consideration for any of us struggling
to search for the meaningful gems in your stream of consciousness drivel...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Thompson
Date: 30 Jan 21 - 05:52 PM

pattyClink - While ventilation is important, another factor that's recently been recognised is that humidity is death to the little scamps. Don't let your home get too dried out. (I don't know how to measure humidity, unfortunately, but reckon that giving the washing a final dry on racks and radiators probably helps.)
bonzo3legs - Sympathies for the greyhound. I used to have a dog that had big trouble with eczema and it turned out to be mainly triggered by milk. My current adored-one gets diarrhoea from milk.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 31 Jan 21 - 10:52 AM

Science by press release is not science. But its all most of us have.
Varients do have changed binding sites that makes original vaccines less effective.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 31 Jan 21 - 01:49 PM

Captain Tom Moore now has Covid. He was admitted to hospital with pneumonia, and a few days later it was confirmed he now has Covid too.
The man is 100, and was knighted by the Queen for his indomitable efforts to walk around his residence to raise money for the NHS.
So ironic.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 31 Jan 21 - 01:54 PM

"Varients do have changed binding sites that makes original vaccines less effective."

This is fake news. You absolutely have to STOP doing this.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 31 Jan 21 - 03:45 PM

I've just learned that Captain (SIR!) Tom Moore was actually vaccinated, which goes to show that one can still contract the virus after having the jab. Hopefully however this may make his illness less severe.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 31 Jan 21 - 04:00 PM

I've just learned that Captain (SIR!) Tom Moore was actually vaccinated,


The BBC are reporting that he had not yet received the vaccine because of the medication he was on for pneumonia. He is not in intensive care so, hopefully, he may recover.

DC

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 31 Jan 21 - 04:19 PM

Ooops Doug, you're quite right, he hadn't received the vaccination. My mistake. I read it on Mumsnet, but the poster must have been misinformed.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Allan Conn
Date: 31 Jan 21 - 06:42 PM

Also depends when he was vaccinated? It doesn't give you instant protection. The protection builds over a couple of weeks or so. So I take it someone who only got the vaccine say a few days ago would be susceptible. Plus of course the efficacy is not 100% in any of the vaccines.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 31 Jan 21 - 07:11 PM

Yeah, right, Sen, misinformed. Well done for clearing that one up. Here's the thing with me that pisses me off bigtime. There are two lots of people living round here near me, good friends for donkeys' years, who I like a lot, who suck in this kind of blatant misinformation and for whom it is bias confirmation, as they are already readily susceptible to conspiracy theories. They are easy and gullible recipients and the misinformation fed to them is put out lazily and with no evidence to support it. On the other hand, we who have to counter this nonsense have to work so bloody hard to dig out the evidence in order to be persuasive enough to negate it. It is not a level playing field. What I'm saying, for example, is that some git on Mumsnet is implying that the vaccine doesn't work because Capt.Tom has been vaccinated but still got infected. Fake news. We have someone here saying that vaccines are less effective against new variants (I tried to spell that last word correctly). Fake news. I'm getting bloody sick of it, to be honest. I'm biased because I have that stupid uphill battle with the nice people round here who I know. But please let's not see Mudcat get infested with this stuff. Please?

And best wishes to the admirable Capt. Tom, a man I admire greatly.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 01 Feb 21 - 07:52 AM

..... that some git on Mumsnet is implying that the vaccine doesn't work because Capt.Tom has been vaccinated but still got infected.


Be careful, Steve, that you you don't fall in to the trap yourself, of reading what you want to read rather than what is actually written. A poster here repeated a piece of misinformation, taken from Mumsnet, that Capt. Sir Tom had been vaccinated. The conclusion that

"..... that one can still contract the virus after having the jab"

May have come from Mumsnet but, equally, may have Senoufou's own opinion.

Wherever that conclusion came from, it doesn't necessarily follow that it is implying that the vaccine doesn't work. It may have been expressing a note of caution that, since none of the vaccines claim to be 100% effective, vaccination does not make us invincible and that mask/distance/hygiene precautions should still be followed.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 01 Feb 21 - 08:24 AM

My take on Capt. Tom becoming infected,
is that even at his level of importance, frailty, and protection,
someone has been too bloody careless...???

Is a hasty investigation being conducted...?????

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 01 Feb 21 - 11:11 AM


"Varients do have changed binding sites that makes original vaccines less effective."

This is fake news. You absolutely have to STOP doing this.

Sorry, Steve, but if you've been listening to people talk about how the vaccine evolves, that is exactly what is happening. The way these things bind, the part of the virus shell that does this part, has changed, making them "stickier" and harder to eradicate with a vaccine or various treatments so far attempted. And it means several of the vaccines (Johnson & Johnson, in particular) are less effective.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Feb 21 - 11:24 AM

Maggie, please read his completely unqualified sentence again. Not for the first time your criticism of me is out of order.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Feb 21 - 11:38 AM

Well, Doug, the Mumsnet thread was deleted with a message from headquarters that a thread speculating about Captain Tom is inappropriate. But you can read enough from the results from googling "Mumsnet Captain Tom Vaccination" to see that there was indeed much misinformation and unwarranted speculation going on, with implications that the vaccine (which he hadn't had) was ineffective. Always worth a double-check before adopting attack mode.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Feb 21 - 11:52 AM

And I've said this before and I'll say it again. Jumping on snippets of "information," especially those coming from journalists who are after scoops, taking them out of context and sounding alarms, is a practice that's rife all over the internet and we should squash it firmly when it rears its ugly head on Mudcat. The work on the efficacy of all the current vaccines in the face of variants of the virus is ongoing and is in its infancy still, relatively speaking. It takes time to amass sufficient field data on this, and some of the vaccines are hardly out of the starting block, and some of the variants are very new, or at least newly-discovered. We need to to be patient and we need to be sceptical about sources until we have checked, checked and checked again. Sweeping statements about vaccines (plural) being less effective, etc., of the kind we've seen here say a lot more about their propagators than they do about the science.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 01 Feb 21 - 12:02 PM

So Steve you are not interested in truth as much as condeming my sentences. I am in favor of your freedom but not when you attack truth. For that, a hard rains a gonna fall.
If your goal is to hurt me, its never gonna happen. (unless you visit)
Which would you prefer:
To never read my words again.
OR
Be pain free from all your conditions for the rest of your life.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Feb 21 - 12:19 PM

I'm interested in facts. On this topic it's vital that we avoid propagating misinformation in the guise of facts. And if we don't yet know all the facts to sufficiently support a claim, then that claim should remain under wraps. If we post speculation we should be crystal clear with our caveats that we are indeed posting speculation. It also helps if we can stay cool.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 01 Feb 21 - 12:24 PM

Ok interesting article here on Australia&s response. My Tazzie sister's life is normal.

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/01/world/australia/perth-lockdown.html

Blicky.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 01 Feb 21 - 12:31 PM

I am surprised that you see that as 'attack mode', Steve.

I tried Googling "Mumsnet Captain Tom Vaccination" but all I got was an opening page with a couple of messages wishing him well and subsequent pages, each with a message saying that the thread had been deleted. The message acknowledged that the majority of posters were wishing him well, but said that posts speculating on his health or other aspects did not seem to be in the spirit of the site right now.

There was nothing that I could find that told me anything about discussion on the effectiveness of the vaccine. Perhaps you could provide a link?

DC

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Feb 21 - 12:59 PM

No I can't. The two earlier threads were deleted, but I was able to see the first couple of lines of a few posts when I googled as I told you, which were indicating, or criticising, speculation about him and his vaccine. Maybe you could try that, or maybe it's too late. The third thread, which I've read but which is now being deleted *as I understand it), avoided mention of the vaccine (maybe because there was so much dispute in the first two threads, who knows, and that it is now clear that the efficacy of the vaccine is irrelevant to discussions about Tom).

Here's the Mumsnet HQ message that announced the deletion of the third thread:

" YetAnotherBeckyMumsnet (MNHQ)    Mon 01-Feb-21 17:30:33

Hello everyone. We are getting a lot of reports about this thread. As several posts have been deleted and many more are continuing to break our Talk Guidelines, we have decided to delete it now as it's really not making anyone look good at this stage."

I completely agree with that sentiment. I've said more than once that speculation put up as fact, sweeping statements and scaremongering in discussions about coronavirus are not only harmful but they also bring this website into disrepute. "Not making anyone look good," right?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 01 Feb 21 - 01:13 PM

"Which would you prefer:
To never read my words again.
OR
Be pain free from all your conditions for the rest of your life."

I'd prefer you to be more disciplined & considerate,
and resist persistently swamping serious threads
with your excessive egotistical indulgences.

It's tiresome having to wade through it all
every time I find a few spare minutes
to catch up on these debates..

Try better at communicating your points more concisely...

Not every thread needs to be "The Donuel Show"...!!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 01 Feb 21 - 06:37 PM

Your comic relief is tolerated pfr but your contribution to pandemic relief is poor or absent.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Feb 21 - 07:50 PM

The third Mumsnet "Tom" thread was duly deleted but there's yet another one running now. There's a lot of unjustified speculation about the holiday he took in December and about his family and what's happening to him in hospital, though there a lot of holding-back going on that wasn't there before. I think we can do better.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Feb 21 - 08:42 PM

Apropos of the effectiveness of the various vaccines against new variants, here's what the Health Editor of BBC News Online posted today. Not the last word, just a single source, but far more sober, sane and balanced than some of the more hysterical stuff flying around. Please hang on the words and reflect that I've refrained from highlighting what I thought are the most germane points (I was tempted, but we can all read).

I'd also add that vaccines that appear to lose efficacy can relatively easily be tweaked in a fairly short time. No panic, no amateur dramatics needed, just patience and intelligent concern. Once we've had the vaccine we should thank a scientist, and a good way of doing that is to show enough respect to look their stuff up before sounding off with sweeping statements and flailing around in all directions.

All viruses, including the one that causes Covid-19, constantly mutate into new versions or variants.

These tiny genetic changes happen as the virus makes new copies of itself to spread and thrive.

Most are inconsequential, and a few can even be harmful to the virus's survival, but some variants can make the virus more infectious or threatening to the host - humans.

There are now many thousands of variants of the pandemic virus circulating. But experts are concerned about the South African variant, or 501.V2.

Is it more dangerous?
There is no evidence that the South Africa variant causes more serious illness for the vast majority of people who become infected.

As with the original version, the risk is highest for people who are elderly or have significant underlying health conditions.

But there are concerns it can spread more readily and vaccines may not work quite as well against it.

What do experts say?
The South African variant carries a mutation called E484K, among others.

It's different to the recently discovered UK or Kent variant that scientists have also been studying in the UK.

Both variants appear to be more contagious, which is a problem because tougher restrictions on society may be needed to control the spread.

While changes in the new UK variant are unlikely to harm the effectiveness of current vaccines, there is a chance those in the South African variant may do so to some extent, say scientists.

It is too soon to say for sure, or by how much, until more tests are completed, although it is extremely unlikely the mutations would render vaccines useless.

Scientists have tested the Pfizer Covid vaccine against one of the mutations found in the South African variant, called N501Y, using blood samples from 20 people.

In that preliminary study, vaccination appeared to work against the mutated virus.

More studies are needed though.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: robomatic
Date: 01 Feb 21 - 08:51 PM

Considering the title of this thread is specifically related to 'news' it invites folks to reproduce within thread things that pass for news. Unfortunately 'news' is not facts.

Two quotes, one by a famous guy, one not:

In a documentary about himself and his life, physicist Richard Feynman said: "I know how hard it is to actually KNOW something."

And this guy I knew who was a project runner on the Alaska Pipeline was being briefed while walking through a facility and remarked to the guy: "Is this relevant or is it just information?"

Listening to Dr. Fauci I am constantly reminded that the experts and researchers on the frontiers of medicine are still learning about this particular incarnation of coronavirus. That means the reactions and treatments of the disease are also subject to change including the vaccines. To date Dr. Fauci has been consistent to get vaccinated because that limits transmission and transmission limits the spread of mutations in the virus.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Feb 21 - 09:40 PM

I think that what you say about Dr Fauci chimes very well with the general tenor of my BBC piece. "Experts" are frequently derided, and often, when invoked generically, are the victims of weasel wordery, but in this pandemic we have really needed the real experts to calm us all down. They do that best by telling us how little we actually know so far and by being measured in their cautions to us. What we don't need is scary non-experts, who abound, who think they own the truth when in reality they simply want to make themselves stand out from the worried crowd, ending up worrying the crowd even more - if we let them...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 01 Feb 21 - 09:40 PM

"Your comic relief is tolerated pfr but your contribution to pandemic relief is poor or absent."

That's an improvement..

Please try to continue restraining yourself to quickly read and discounted
snappy one-liners like this..


Btw.. when you invent a proven to work miracle cure for covid,
then you might have earned the right to posture
as the superior 'Big I Am' of pandemic relief..

However, until then you are no more important here then any other BS poster
with a keyboard and an arse to sit on...

Also remember many more folks are much closer to death on the front line than you are..

Key workers and their families live in real daily fear..

For us, this is not just an intellectual academic game
for scoring ego points against forum rivals.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Feb 21 - 09:42 PM

Alleluia, Scrumpyshire bro...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: The Sandman
Date: 02 Feb 21 - 03:24 AM

Why should anyone shut up , fortunately we have free speech and we are also free to ignore others comments, and make our own decisions.
Further more i do not think a TD should be sacked for saying the virus is no worse than the flu. I may disagree with him or i may not ,but starting to sack people for having a different opinion is a step towards Fascism and Totalitarinism, People are turning on each other .But the fact health services have been run down and cannot cope with … See more

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: The Sandman
Date: 02 Feb 21 - 03:26 AM

.But the fact health services have been run down and cannot cope with a pandemic is the fault of those who govern us.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jos
Date: 02 Feb 21 - 04:46 AM

TD?

I've done an internet search, and looked down through fifty threads, but perhaps it was in a post that has been deleted. Could be 'truth denier' I suppose.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: The Sandman
Date: 02 Feb 21 - 06:04 AM

td is the irish equivalent of MP.What does TD mean in Ireland?
Teachta Dála
Deputy. Member of the Dáil; also known as a TD (Teachta Dála) Dáil Éireann. The Lower House of the Oireachtas; known as the Dáil for short. Dissolution.Jun 18, 2019

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 02 Feb 21 - 06:17 AM

I don't think anyone's telling anyone to shut up, Dick. Maybe suggesting that it would be a good idea to post with restraint and try to not say daft things... Suggesting being the operative word...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Thompson
Date: 02 Feb 21 - 07:26 AM

Jos, it's kind of embarrassing if people appear to be proud of their ignorance. If you don't know what TD stands for, and what its meaning is, just ask.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jos
Date: 02 Feb 21 - 07:48 AM

I'm not proud of my ignorance, just very frustrated. Often I just look things up and all becomes clear, but not on that occasion.
I know the words Taoiseach and Dáil Éireann, but hadn't ever come across Teachta Dála.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: The Sandman
Date: 02 Feb 21 - 08:21 AM

Steve , you have misunderstood me, i am not actually refrring to mudcat,
I am referring to what i have seen with my eyes here in ireland, and on the virtual world of facebook,
people in supermarkets accosting and verbally insulting non mask wearers., and getting so worked up that they get close and forget about the 2 meter rule,. the sensible thing is just to give non mask werers more than 2 meters, but to go up to them and shout in their face is stupid .
people on facebook who suggest that people who suggest that the virus is no worse than the flu should be fined[] i am surprised they have not suggested capital punishment.
it is simple, someone not wearing a mask in a building give them more room, problem solved .

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: The Sandman
Date: 02 Feb 21 - 08:33 AM

The right to speak FREELY and have different opinions, is something that does not exist in totalitarian regime.
MP and TD,
have all sorts of opinions on abortion, capital punishment taking the vaccine, so what, I do not have to agree with them, just because they represent a constiuency,
but their right to freedom of speech is what distinguishes democracy from totalinarism

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 02 Feb 21 - 09:41 AM

Well I seemed to have unleashed a furore of vituperative comments!
I merely wanted to express my concern for the admirable and brave gentleman, since he has had pneumonia and now Covid. I conveyed in good faith (since I read it on a post on Mumsnet) that he had had the vaccine. But I now know that he hasn't.
I do not believe that the vaccine does not protect one from the virus, I merely wondered how/why he had contracted it.
I am due to have my injection on Sunday at our local surgery.
My 'opinions' are generally rooted in Science and The Truth.
I am reasonably intelligent enough not to get enmeshed in Conspiracy Theories or ignorant suspicions.
I hope this clarifies my stance. So you can stop piling on!
Eliza

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 02 Feb 21 - 10:26 AM

No-one's piling on, Senoufou. I actually congratulated you for clearing up the confusion, lest ye forget! Your post opened up another avenue for discussion, that's all. I learned quite a bit about Mumsnet while I was at it. A good few people over there could use a bit more steely focus!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 02 Feb 21 - 10:49 AM

I agree Steve that it's rather a mixed forum, but some of the threads are very funny and raise a laugh (much needed at the present time)
I don't post on there though (I'm not a 'Mum'!)
I don't know yet which vaccine I shall be given, but I just have to trust it will be as near 100% effective as possible. However, I'll still wear my mask when at the supermarket, and socially-distance myself.
Our village has had a few cases now, and one death. Very worrying and sad.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 02 Feb 21 - 11:13 AM

Sadly, Captain Tom has just died. :-(

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 02 Feb 21 - 11:19 AM

Rest In Peace Tom. A long life well-lived to the very end.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 02 Feb 21 - 11:27 AM

For the first time in six weeks I've just ventured more than four miles from my house (it has to be four miles because that's where the nearest big shop is!), all of ten miles to go to a country store to get my seed potatoes (was that allowed?). Paid a visit to the adjacent Waitrose while I was there. Pleased to say I wasn't stopped or remanded in custody. :-) Round here, there's no issue with mask compliance. I've never seen a shopper not wearing one. We're like that in the Westcountry. Keeping two metres apart and ignoring shop one-way systems is a different issue. That's apparently caused a good few spats in shops but so far I haven't reacted out loud. Biggest issue for us locals in these parts is second-home owners. They are simply not allowed to be here, but lots of them are, and the police, to their credit, respond quickly to complaints.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 02 Feb 21 - 11:46 AM

I live in a West country town where it is not too contentious
to claim objectively,
that we have a significantly larger population of ignorant arrogant chavs and scum..

(It's ok, I'm allowed to use these derogatory words, I could have been one of them if it wasn't for grammar school)

Hence a serious problem of non-compliance with masks, distancing, and use of sanitizer,
in and around town centre shops..

These are the people who have been and still are prime targets for malignant far right/libertarian internet influencers...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 02 Feb 21 - 11:47 AM

Sir Tom Moore another COVID-19 victim.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 03 Feb 21 - 08:13 AM

Ist jab arranged for Saturday afternoon!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 03 Feb 21 - 12:58 PM

Yay bonzo.
I obviously get the impression that the UK is doing a better job with the pandemic than the US.
Unfortunately they caught a bad break with the mutation varient.

Cartoon of s guy watching the boob tube and visibly clutching his arm armchair; ...mutants of the original variants of the mutants of these varients of the....

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Allan Conn
Date: 03 Feb 21 - 02:10 PM

Depends what you mean by better job. I think our overall death rate is as bad, possibly even worse than the US, when you look at it per head of population. We do seem to be getting on well with vaccinating though!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 03 Feb 21 - 05:33 PM

Yay Bonzo!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 03 Feb 21 - 06:32 PM

Sometimes I think I'm a parrot. There is no need for any scaremongering over new variants or vaccines. There will be ups and downs and vital tweaks to be done and bulking-up of adapted vaccines to do. That's all within spec. The science is doing incredibly well. We were staring into the abyss a few months ago. That is no longer the case. So let's just cut out the doom-laden new-variant-yadayada statements and look to a better future, eh? Anyone who wants to stand out to be gloomily different, please do it in your own bedroom, along with your other private bedroom talents.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 03 Feb 21 - 08:56 PM

Yes Sir, we live to obey your rules of redacted truth, Sir.
You sir and the headmaster have total dominion over our perception of truth sir. We live to obey sir. You are not a parrot sir. No kidding sir.

I have seen people panic over voter fraud and baby eating cannabals and even drink the Kool Aid of death so panic does exist sir.


thank you for protecting us from that kind of panic sir.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 03 Feb 21 - 09:09 PM

So you think there IS a need for scaremongering then?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 04 Feb 21 - 08:01 AM

Getting excited about having my jab on Sunday evening. But worried about why my husband hasn't been sent for. An elderly friend in our village said she asked the injecting person about her husband, and the lady offered to give him his jab then and there! Apparently, someone hadn't turned up so they had a 'spare' jab, which would spoil if not given within hours.
Maybe I can persuade the nurse to 'do' mu husband too. He's so at risk cleaning in a school and being black. (BAME, or black, Asian, Middle Eastern, are more vulnerable)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 04 Feb 21 - 08:04 AM

In spite of not thinking much about this clapping malarkey, I have to confess I did go outside yesterday evening and clap for Captain Sir Tom. Everyone else was out there too. I'm afraid it brought tears to my eyes. I thought about all those sad deaths, not just his. Tragic.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 04 Feb 21 - 08:15 AM

I loved that there was a national clap. And I love the phrase "national clap."

Meanwhile the CDC director said increasing data suggests the UK coronavirus variant may be deadlier than the original strain.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 04 Feb 21 - 08:30 AM

Yes it is what mutations can do in the realm of evolutionary science.
The only acknowlegement and behavior change for me is following the recommendation of Dr. Fauci, is to wear TWO masks. I use an N 95 with a cloth mask over that in public. Pithy perhaps but erring on the side of caution.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 Feb 21 - 10:25 AM

Here we go again. The evidence for the UK variant being "deadlier" is very limited and based on a small cohort. Maybe it isn't, maybe it is. By a bit. As for evolution, the trait that is being favourably selected for has nothing to do with "deadliness." It's changes in the spike protein which makes it easier for the virus to get into cells. In the larger scheme of things, a disease making itself more deadly is generally disadvantageous; if too many hosts are killed, or die too quickly (from the pathogen's point of view), then opportunities for its own dissemination become more limited. Not a good tactic. We need to avoid doom-laden posts, and the easiest way to do that is to ignore casual media snippets and dig deeper into the facts. And we are now in a context of very effective vaccines that stand a good chance of negating all this pessimism, something neither of you mentioned. I hope that was polite enough.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 04 Feb 21 - 11:51 AM

I forgot to mention that I'm having both jabs in part of the main stand at Crystal Palace Football Club, which has been given over to a vaccination centre.

Oddly enough, we received a huge backlog of mail this morning including invitations dated 22/01/21 for myself and 19/01/21 for Mrs Bonzo to have covid vaccinations - too late, Mrs Bonzo had her first jab a week ago. and she arranged mine on line 2 days ago!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Allan Conn
Date: 04 Feb 21 - 11:59 AM

Steve is right in that scientists were not happy when the PM announced that it was more deadly. It was a small amount of data and only suggested that it 'might' be more deadly - but also it 'might' not be.

Certainly doesn't seem to be showing so here in Scotland. Hospitalisation and infections in general are increased from the initial spring first wave of the pandemic. However the figures for those in intensive care here are less than they were in the first wave. The new variant is endemic here and does not appear to be causing more of the evry serious illnesses than before!!! Though of course they are also better at treating the condition now than they were initially.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 Feb 21 - 12:02 PM

"... I'm having both jabs in part of the main stand at Crystal Palace Football Club..."

I should ask them to do them in your arm if I were you...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 04 Feb 21 - 02:08 PM

More deadly because while it may not make people any sicker than the original SARS-CoV-2 (the same percentages without symptoms, with symptoms, and deaths) it will spread to more people so there will be a greater number in each group, meaning a greater number will die.

The weak spot in the US response now is the available number of vaccine doses, but the numbers that must also be considered the the number of doses sent around the world. Rich countries hogging the supply leave poorer countries much more vulnerable and allow for the further mutation of the gene that will eventually come back and bite everyone in the ass. There used to be a formula for the number of doses sent to poorer countries outside the US, but of course Trump trashed it along with the science committee that looked into pandemic issues. All of that has to be rebuilt quickly.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 Feb 21 - 02:11 PM

That is not what Mrrzy meant. What I said is the current position.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 05 Feb 21 - 12:37 AM

That is so last month—I don't know what month you and Allan are living in, but here in the US in February the strain from the UK is considered to be a big problem, along with the South African and Brazilian ones because they may spread faster and kill more people than the current main strain before enough people can be vaccinated. If it is just as deadly as the strain we have now, but it moves faster, then it WILL kill more people. (code typo fixed)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 Feb 21 - 04:59 AM

Well this month there's a lot of optimism flying around here. The one thing the government has got right is the vaccine rollout. It seems that there's good news every day about the efficacy of vaccines too, even in the face of "new variants." Our grim numbers are going down fast, could be faster of course, the one fly in the ointment being the apparent greater transmissibility as nature selects variants with more effective spike proteins. We are getting better. That's so this month here. And it wasn't what Mrrzy was saying, was it?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 05 Feb 21 - 08:38 AM

NPR also reported today that it is likely that the number of people actually capable of transmiitting the virus is likely 10x higher than the reported number of cases.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Thompson
Date: 05 Feb 21 - 09:11 AM

The UK variant is apparently far, far more infections, and by the same token it's deadlier because it's infecting more people who are vulnerable. In Ireland it's now accounting for three out of every four cases.
And will this mean that "only those who would have died anyway" will die of it? Probably not. One sample figure snapped out of an Irish Times story today: "36 priests died in April last year at the height of the pandemic compared to 12 in 2019, eight in 2018 and 14 in 2017. Between March and August last year 135 priests died compared to 79 priests died in 2019 in the same six-month period." (The story is about the Health Service Executive doing a special drive to vaccinate elderly clerics, who are particularly hard hit.)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Charmion
Date: 05 Feb 21 - 09:14 AM

Here in Ontario, I don't think I have a hope of getting jabbed before late summer, although I'm 66 years old and asthmatic. Both the federal and provincial governments crank out anodyne propaganda while the news media publish scare stories
about vaccine supply. The only part of the so-called plan that inspires confidence is that isolated aboriginal communities are high in the priority list, presumably because of their abysmal housing situation (no place to quarantine anyone) and lack of health-care personnel and facilities.

Okay, maybe I'll go and count my blessings again. I'm 66, asthmatic but otherwise healthy, and quartered in a comfortable, warm, dry, uncrowded house located in a city that has not only a hospital, but also an intensive-care unit and ambulance service.

But I still think at least two levels of government are trying hard to snatch a cock-up from the jaws of success.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 05 Feb 21 - 09:17 AM

Change of plan - our GP surgery telephoned yesterday evening inviting me to have covid vaccine which is just 5 minutes drive away with easy parking compared with 30 minutes drive and difficult parking at Crystal Palace, so arranged for Tuesday and appointment at Crystal Palace FC cancelled.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Charmion
Date: 05 Feb 21 - 09:28 AM

According to CTV News,
the British and South African variant strains of the virus have surfaced in Canada, but the numbers so far are small -- fewer than 300 cases. The Brazilian version has yet to arrive.

But who's being tested? Compulsory testing and quarantine of people arriving at airports began only a few days ago, and road traffic continues to flow over the Canada-US border. Many major outbreaks are linked to warehouse complexes and "fulfillment" centres, and that's no coincidence.

So staying home is still very much a thing well into the foreseeable future.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 Feb 21 - 10:37 AM

The science is telling us that the UK variant is 30-70% more catching. Evidence for the mutation causing more serious illness is very thin. Of course, if it's more catching it will infect more people and will kill proportionately more people. That's how the facts and figures go. The context in the UK, and I'm not wanting to sound smug, is our very good vaccine rollout, so the above numbers game will get more and more sidelined. In a couple of weeks' time almost all in the most vulnerable groups will have been vaccinated, their first jab at least, and the stats for first jab alone providing good protection look optimistic. I'm three months too young to be in those cohorts, but I won't have to wait long. Mrs Steve is getting done tomorrow. It's in the same town as Waitrose, so I can legitimately drive the ten miles to take her there and do the shopping. :-)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 05 Feb 21 - 11:11 AM

The code in my last post was wrong and dropped out the rest of the statement:

That is so last month—I don't know what month you and Allan are living in, but here in the US in February the strain from the UK is considered to be a big problem, along with the South African and Brazilian ones because they may spread faster and kill more people than the current main strain before enough people can be vaccinated. If it is just as deadly as the strain we have now, but it moves faster, then it WILL kill more people.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 05 Feb 21 - 11:58 AM

There's a long article in the NY Times about why political entities in the US aren't doing a better job of getting vaccines out. They forget that just two weeks ago we got a new president after the last one deliberately made things complicated by trying to deny some states, and by not attempting, some could say even blocking, a national policy for vaccination. I see by the chart on the front page of the Times that my county is still at extremely high risk, with average of 1,721 new cases reported each day. We're watching the sausage be made before our eyes; instead of looking away, we need to carefully do what we can to help.

My county has an online form for volunteering to help with the COVID response, so once my second dose has had enough time to become totally effective, I'll go ahead and volunteer.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Thompson
Date: 05 Feb 21 - 12:49 PM

Someone was asking about extra deaths in Ireland. There's someone tracking rip.ie in which most, but not all, death notices appear (many people don't put notices in the papers, or on rip.ie) and they were about 50 a day extra notices in April, at our peak, and about the same this month in this second peak. That's a huge number of extra deaths in a country with a population under 5 million.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 Feb 21 - 04:00 PM

Your problem is that your vaccination programme isn't up to speed as yet. Otherwise, what you say is correct (I'm tempted to say "at last," but I like you too much! ) ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 Feb 21 - 06:27 PM

And that was to Maggie's 11.11 job! :-)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Allan Conn
Date: 05 Feb 21 - 06:46 PM

Re about what month I am living in. No-one suggested it wasn't a problem that the variant is more infectious. The suggestion was that it is more deadly. That is that it is more deadly to any individual who has it than the old varient was. As Steve says the evidence for that is very flimsy and the PM was criticised by scientists for blurting it out. Re my comments about people in intensive care in Scotland. That is fact. The new varient is endemic here and more people were infected, and more were hospitalised than last spring. However less people ended up in intensive care here. About 75% to 80% compared to the Spring. Here in the Borders we went from Level 1 with about 35 cases per 100,000 to about 400 cases per 100,000 in a short time. However the same social distancing measures work on this varient and we have it back down to about 65 again. All the time the vaccine is rolling out.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 Feb 21 - 07:19 PM

Cheers Allan. We live in a country with the best vaccine rollout at the moment. That doesn't mean that we should feel either smug or that we should wish to indulge in schadenfreude. It means that, having been one of the worst-hit countries on earth, we are at last seeing the light. Early days still. For the last couple of days I've heard that every signal is positive. Well, perhaps we're not quite there with the numbers of new infections and the numbers in hospital, but we're winning, slowly. Our context should always be the world situation, and that is not good and it should dampen our optimism. But the vaccines are great and that's where we should place our hope. There's a lot of gloomy negativity in this thread. That's entirely understandable in countries that are still struggling. But we have to live in hope, and press our governnents to do the right thing. I'm looking forward to a normal barbecue summer, dammit.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Allan Conn
Date: 05 Feb 21 - 07:57 PM

I can hardly believe that about 25,000 or so are to attend the Superbowl. Think of all the people travelling and mixing for no necessary reason. In the spring we learned our lesson here in the Borders. Again they got on top of it quickly but were initially the highest infection rate in Scotland. This is a rugby area and many folk went to Italy for the game. Then down to Cardiff and that game wasn't cancelled until most of the Scots were down there. It was blamed for much of the initial surge. One of my friend's uncles contracted it along with some of his friends. He died. They have no proof but were convinced they contracted it on the Cardiff trip.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: keberoxu
Date: 06 Feb 21 - 03:18 PM

I concur, Allan.
I'm not so gaga for Tom Brady and the Gronk
that I would attend a super-spreader event to watch them.

I figure reason doesn't even enter into doing such a thing,
it must be driven by sentiment and emotion.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 16 Feb 21 - 12:20 PM

Just been out to the Post Office.
Hardly anyone bothering to wear masks..

Then I realised, the streets from my home to town and back
reeked of skunk smoke;
which is normal round here..

Maybe this is something for health scientists to research,
perhaps why the South West has lower infection rates...???

Are most of the tiny covids floating in the air around us
getting too stoned to be bothered infecting us...???

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jack Campin
Date: 16 Feb 21 - 02:33 PM

Looks like British pubs are done for.

they can't avoid spreading it

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 16 Feb 21 - 04:20 PM

I've been rather worried at the sight of quite a few people in supermarkets not wearing a mask. I know they're 'exempt' but surely they present a risk and should get someone else to obtain their food for them?
We were stopped at the door of a Tesco and challenged for being two people together, in spite of being well-masked. I explained that I have a heart condition and need my husband to lift things and push the trolley. He needs me to translate and direct the purchases as his English is a bit dodgy, so we were allowed in. But non-mask wearers are far more risky I would have thought?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 16 Feb 21 - 04:32 PM

With the availability of clear visors which sit on a headband and cover the whole face without blocking the airway, as an alternative to masks over the mouth and nose, I can't see the need for exemptions on medical grounds.

DC

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Feb 21 - 05:09 PM

We've seen nothing but full mask compliance in Bude and Launceston.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 04 Mar 21 - 11:40 AM

Aparently blood groups are back in the mix, with A being at higher risk after all, which is what they said at first then backed off from.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 Mar 21 - 12:28 PM

The study that pointed the finger at blood group A was carried out in Vancouver on 95 patients already critically ill. Group A patients were more likely to need ventilation.

95.

These people were already victims of the virus, so that study had nothing to do with the risk of getting infected. I submit that there was enough there for a hypothesis, nowhere near enough to reach a science-informed conclusion.

The other study, a survey of people in Denmark, showed that people in the study who were group O appeared to be less likely to become infected. Other blood groups showed no differences.

I wasn't able to find the stats for these studies, and I have to cook the tea in a minute.

Neither study informs the desirability or otherwise of getting vaccinated. They are of passing interest. As Mrs Steve is A+, I'll pass it on (she gave blood this morning, as it happens). I guarantee that no eyebrow will be raised. As for me, I'm a Tony Hancockian AB negative, but I don't brag about it. Nobody wants my blood...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 05 Mar 21 - 06:01 AM

In the US culture wars against virus protection, the Biden response to the pro virus efforts by the Texas govenor has politizied of all things the Neanderthals. Along with the cave men of antiquity, Transgender Mr. Mr. Potato head and Dr. Seuess have now entered the culture war faith based fray.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 07 Mar 21 - 02:16 PM

From Bloomberg Opinion: How Covid's Toll Compares With Other Things That Kill Us

Stacking up the disease's impact on young and old against other causes of death in the U.S., including influenza, heart disease, car accidents and drownings.

Over the past year the death toll from Covid-19 has been compared to deaths from lots of other causes, ranging from seasonal influenza to war to heart disease to car accidents to swimming-pool drownings.

At 500,000 and counting, U.S. Covid fatalities are now a lot higher than annual deaths from most of those other things. They’re also much higher than any short-term infectious-disease outbreak since the 1918 influenza pandemic, which killed an estimated 675,000 people in the U.S., the proportionate equivalent of 2.2 million in today’s more-populous country. The 1957-1958 influenza pandemic killed an estimated 116,000, the equivalent of 223,000 today. HIV/AIDS has killed an estimated 700,000 Americans, but over four decades.

The overall number isn’t the whole story. Eighty-one percent of U.S. Covid fatalities have been people 65 and older. There’s nothing unusual about this age profile — in fact, the different age groups’ share of Covid deaths is strikingly similar to their share of deaths, period.

There are lots of tables for comparison.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 08 Mar 21 - 11:38 AM

https://www.nih.gov/sites/default/files/research-training/initiatives/activ/2020_NIH_Antiviral_Summit_Report_508.pdf

This info is about antiviral therapeutics that some people may need for years.

New rules by CDC regarding returning to pre pandemic behavior based on who is and is not vaccinated. https://www.businessinsider.com/cdc-guidance-what-can-covid-19-vaccinated-people-do-2021-3

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mr Red
Date: 09 Mar 21 - 02:44 AM

I can't re-find the Youtube video on the fact that H1N1 almost not circulating during COVID. But there is one out there if you can find the search terms.

Basically the different families of human virus don't co-exist in one body. Maybe not totally true, but for most healthy and many unhealthy people that would be the case. The statistics are fuzzy at the population level because of the distancing measures, but in one body the evidence is clear. H1N1 is not a problem at the moment, and the research, such as it is, has not come up with firm conclusions.

Interferons in the nose generated during a viral attack that is well under way may be too much for a smaller viral load in its initial stages, is one postulation. Or maybe like plants secreting unctuous stuff to deter competition, who nose? (sic).

no, I don't know what they are either!

Subject: BS: So much Good News!
From: Donuel
Date: 09 Mar 21 - 06:32 AM

Good Grief there is so much good news it feels alien. However guarded there is so much change this month that hope feels giddy with promise.
What can be done will be done outside be it music, ball games or friends and family reunion. Gigs, cheers and hugs to all.
After being darkest before the dawn here comes the sun, vaccine relief and good times.

Subject: RE: BS: So much Good News!
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 09 Mar 21 - 09:05 AM

Hedgehoppers Anonymous:

It's good news week
Someone's dropped a bomb somewhere
Contaminating atmosphere
And blackening the sky

It's good news week
Someone's found a way to give
The rotting dead a will to live
Go on and never die

Have you heard the news
What did it say?
Who's won that race?
What's the weather like today?

It's good news week
Families shake the need for gold
By stimulating birth control
We're wanting less to eat

It's good news week
Doctors finding many ways
Of wrapping brains on metal trays
To keep us from the heat

It's good news week
Families shake the need for gold
By stimulating birth control
We're wanting less to eat
It's good news week

Doctors finding many ways
Of wrapping brains on metal trays
To keep us from the heat
To keep us from the heat
To keep us from the heat

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 09 Mar 21 - 10:30 AM

Yesterday the CDC said that fully vaccinated adults may, beginning two weeks after the second shot, gather indoors without masks or social distancing. And may gather with low-probability to infection people like small children. When out in public still wear masks and still stay socially distant.

CDC Says It's Safe For Vaccinated People To Do These Activities

In Texas, after tomorrow (March 10), all of that is a big crap shoot. The Governor lifted all of the restrictions on people, so those who are still being cautious need to do so while avoiding people who aren't being cautious. And look: it's time for Colleges and Universities to have Spring Break. Southern beaches are a classic destination so Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, and Texas, look out.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 09 Mar 21 - 01:55 PM

Good news on the financial Covid relief bill is promising as well as Biden's full speed ahead with the vaccination delivery.

Nigel is your brain collection large?? Tin foil and metal trays do not help preserve or control excess heat from degrading brains. What you do in the field is use a small kit with syringes and some basic solution reagents You can then go in and anesthetize the animal and set up a little field station to embalm the brain in formaldehyde right there. Gycerine and sodium benzoate in a zip lock baggie with no air also works in a pinch. ;^)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 11 Mar 21 - 12:33 PM

8.4 million Americans are long haulers.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 11 Mar 21 - 06:27 PM

Here is a fascinating look at covid denial, from 6 months' of MIT listening in on them online.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 11 Mar 21 - 07:14 PM

Almost all initial new introduction of knowledge is greeted with denial.
We are hard wired with some protection to the lie but repitition breaks down that denial surpringly quickly.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mr Red
Date: 12 Mar 21 - 03:55 AM

I bumped into a local ceilidhnaut last week and we chatted about the dance possibilities (mostly lack of) and as we parted she handed me a broadsheet called "the Light" (a truthpaper) - politely taking it and secreting it in my knapsack. There was a hint of evangelical religion about it, but the evengel was anti-vax & paranoia about mendacious Gov statistics (OK, but I prefer healthy sceptisism on Gov offerings). Re: people dying after vaccination, ignoring that statistically/law of averages there are going to be some no matter what.

Britain has its fair share of AltFactsers but it is hard to see people you know being so misguided in the logic department. And unable to even offer more than "Well I have been shot and I didn't fall over" with a smile on my face.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 12 Mar 21 - 04:52 AM

There are as many as THREE direct anti viral therapeutic medicines (anti body) that will save a patient from death ONLY IF THEY ARE ADMINISTERED IN TIME.

however they do not not have them for the varints yet.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Mar 21 - 06:25 AM

Do tell us more.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 12 Mar 21 - 11:55 AM

This was discussed by Anthony Fauci on The Rachel Maddow Show last night. He said they're only effective if they are administered very early. The problem is that they require an IV setup and the research now is to render these drugs into more easily administered forms. The best and easiest would be a pill to take by mouth as soon as possible, but he said it looks like the companies are aiming at intramuscular or sub-cutaneous administration as a shot. But he kept going back to the early testing being needed to administer these treatments. They only have snippets of the program on the Maddow Blog, but you may find the bit I'm talking about. (Her regular program is available over cable or online services.)

Subject: BS: Covid passport
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 04 Apr 21 - 09:45 AM

Covid passports are an excellent idea, of course they are bound to be disliked by people who have something to hide!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 Apr 21 - 11:14 AM

I don't agree with you. If and when we get case numbers very low (we live in hope, keeping a wary eye on Europe's third wave) we won't need them. By then, the only role of vaccine passports would be to nobble vaccine deniers. I don't like vaccine deniers but I don't want the government to enact laws that are matters of somebody's principle rather than matters of pragmatism. It is not against the law to refuse a vaccine, and passports would discriminate against people who are not lawbreakers. They would also discriminate against people who, for one reason or another, are fearful of the vaccines. We already know that there is a large disparity in proportions between the vaccine-worried in white and black communities, for all sorts of reasons. Vaccine passports would readily be seen as carrying racist connotations. On top of all this, it would be unconscionable to introduce them before everyone has been offered a vaccine. We are a long way from that aspiration at the moment and it's looking like it'll take a lot longer than the government's promised deadlines.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 04 Apr 21 - 05:32 PM

But it has has taken an incredibly short period of time to vaccinate 30 million adults. I would not want to sit next to an unvaccinated lady or man at a gig, in the cinema or theatre.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 05 Apr 21 - 03:57 AM

I'm pleased to see that the UK government will offer to deliver 2 free covid tests to everyone once lockdown starts to ease more substantially!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 Apr 21 - 05:47 AM

So you'd be happy to sit next to someone in the cinema who has "tested negative" using an extremely unreliable test? You'd be happy to stand next to someone in the mosh pit with a "vaccine certificate" granted by a government that has killed tens of thousands of people via sheer ineptitude and which has wasted £37 billion on a useless "world-beating" no-track-and-no-trace "system"?

I've got a better idea: stay at home, spend your flicks dough on a nice bottle, and watch a film on the telly. Butterkist make nice popcorn. One day, you can go to the flicks feeling unconditionally safe. It will come.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 05 Apr 21 - 06:22 AM

My view?
Let the pubs re-open in full. There will be different groups of customers:

The vaccinated: Not really a risk to themselves or others (but take precautions if going home to someone not vaccinated)
The yet-to be vaccinated: Assume everyone else is contagious and take reasonable precautions.
Those unable to be vaccinated (for health reasons); continue to take extreme care
Those who choose not to be vaccinated; Your fate is in your own hands, don't expect others to avoid you for your protection.

Of course the pubs should continue with current good hygiene systems and spacing (where possible) at least until the 'yet-to-be' group have had a chance to get a vaccine.
In the future we can expect a 'new norm' where masks may be a fact of life, and everyone will take a bit more care for themselves and for others. But I haven't seen signs of that in the mass evening gatherings in the last week or so. Reopening the pubs might reduce these mass gatherings.

From the above you may gather that I'm missing the pubs (and the pinball machines)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 05 Apr 21 - 07:32 AM

We don't do pubs so irrelevant to us. Yes we watch our films on TV, no need to enter a cinema.

What is a "mosh pit"???

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 05 Apr 21 - 07:34 AM

The Pfizer vaccine is supposedly effective for the varients including the aggressive UK varient.
I hope that research is not exaggerated.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 Apr 21 - 07:39 AM

It'll be a while before I venture back into the pub. I'm all for a cautious reopening. I'm also all for everyone starting to take personal responsibility. If numbers can stay low for the next couple of weeks, and if the vaccination programme stays good, I want to see all government restrictions lifted. So I don't agree with you about masks. If shops, buses and trains want to carry on making us wear them, that's fine, but I want to see all government-decreed control measures disappear. This government is enjoying the current controls over us a little too much for my liking, and vaccine passports are another symptom of that. Let's have a closer look at that:

That bloke sitting next to Bonzo at the flicks. He has a vaccine passport. Either he's (a) had the virus and has antibodies, or (b) he's had the vaccine and has antibodies, or (c) he once had a test and tested positive or (d) he's had a negative result very recently. I suppose there could be an (e): he obtained his passport fraudulently. But let's have a bit more faith in human nature...huh?

(a) We don't know whether previously-infected people can get the virus again. We don't know how long antibodies last in the bloodstream. We don't know about how easy it is to catch a different strain of the virus. Etcetera.

(b) No vaccine is 100% effective. We don't know how long vaccines protect us for. Ditto re antibodies from (a).

(c) No test is anything like 100% reliable. The lateral flow test, the one I assume (correct me if I'm wrong) we're all going to get as a freebie, is notoriously unreliable. With both tests, false negatives are entirely possible. A false positive is, arguably, even more dangerous, as it could have you thinking that you've had the virus when you haven't, lulling you into a false sense of safety. And just because you tested negative today doesn't mean you won't get the virus tomorrow.

(d) See above. Even two tests a week, bearing in mind that the test is unreliable and that we'd be relying on competent self-administration (a dubious assumption), wouldn't be enough to ensure safety. And then we will be relying on people who test positive, possibly inaccurately and possibly who feel perfectly well, fessing up and condemning themselves to even more solitary confinement. I'm not even clear if or how the ongoing testing can be incorporated into a certificate. Maybe I've got that bit wrong.

We will be safe when infection numbers are very low. Vaccine certificates, predicated on stacks of information laced with all these doubts, will not make us safer. Then there's the potential for fraudulent practice. My view is that vaccine certificates are less about our safety and more about continuing government control over our lives. A government that has shown serial gross incompetence. Call me Mr Suspicious. I care not a jot.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 05 Apr 21 - 09:24 AM

"which has wasted £37 billion on a useless "world-beating" no-track-and-no-trace "system"?

Not correct. Allocated 37 billion over 2 years. Might have spent about a third by now.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 05 Apr 21 - 10:03 AM

Interesting article by Sarah Boseley in The Guardian about the discovery of the Kent variant.

The Covid detectives

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 Apr 21 - 10:32 AM

Er, the allocation is £22 billion in the first year and another £15 billion in the second. Unless the government does a U-turn, all that money will be spent. And knowing how costs for any government project usually balloon, I suspect it will come to a lot more than the £37 billion. I'm quite happy for you to reread my post as saying "is wasting" rather than "has wasted" if it bothers you.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 05 Apr 21 - 11:05 AM

I dread to think what corbyn would have wasted billions on!!!!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 05 Apr 21 - 11:05 AM

What bothers me is the lack of information and lazy and inaccurate reporting in the media. I agree that it could well cost a lot more, especially if they are hoping to increase the amount of testing.

Latest reported figures on the cost are that £5.7 billion was spent up to November 2020

Public Accounts Committee

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 Apr 21 - 11:23 AM

At least Corbyn would've taken Johnson on over the gross mishandling of the pandemic instead of Starmer's hopeless "Yeah, well, hmm, OK, we sort of support you but you should really have done everything a bit sooner blah blah..." There's been no opposition to a man who's caused tens of thousands of deaths and created a human scrap heap, the upshot being that he's now nine points ahead in the polls. Electing Starmer was the worst bloody move Labour have ever made. I tried to tell you...

Anyway, it's a pandemic thread. We could always take this outside.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 05 Apr 21 - 11:57 AM

No, time for Sainsbury's Harvest Grain bread cut 2cm thick, Lurpak butter and Sainsbury's Strawberry Conserve!!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jos
Date: 05 Apr 21 - 12:17 PM

Home made crusty bread and home made strawberry jam would be a lot better.

Does someone in this thread have shares in Sainsbury's and Lurpak?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 Apr 21 - 12:34 PM

Bonne Maman for me every time. On toast. And use the Lurpak to grease your bike hubs. We only buy a local Cornish unsalted butter.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 05 Apr 21 - 12:43 PM

We don't do home made any bread, we leave it to the bakers who know what they are doing!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jos
Date: 05 Apr 21 - 01:15 PM

In that case, I recommend Marks and Spencer's French loaves.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 05 Apr 21 - 02:19 PM

I heard about the worrying situation in Chile,in the questions following the UK Covid briefing this afternoon. Despite having a very good vaccination program they are seeing a rise in covid cases.

A cause of concern and a reminder that we do need to progress cautiously.

Chile lockdown

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Apr 21 - 05:03 AM

Fitzgeralds sourdough baguettes (a few minutes in the oven to finish 'em off) are very nice. The two-packs of Morrisons ciabattas (75p or two for a quid) are excellent. I warm them in the oven too.

It's all very well the UK bucking the trend of third waves in a lot of other countries, but we are nowhere near strict enough about our borders at the moment. A "traffic-light system" is the next bloody stupid Johnson idea...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Apr 21 - 06:05 AM

And do we think that Boris Johnson will look closely at what's happening in Chile and be informed by it? Of course he won't. Not listening and learning has been his consistent modus operandi since all this started. In Chile they were too quick to let people travel around the country. Too quick to allow foreign holidays. Too quick to reopen gyms and cinemas. Watch this space...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 06 Apr 21 - 07:10 AM

"Everything he's doing, he's doing in order to control us ever more."

"And do we think that Boris Johnson will look closely at what's happening in Chile and be informed by it? Of course he won't."

So do you want him to relax the restrictions or not? They are going to have to be relaxed sometime and that will always involve an element of risk.

My local have said they are thinking of reopening next week. It remains to be seen if that makes financial sense or not. Then again many small businesses are facing financial ruin due to the current situation.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 06 Apr 21 - 08:04 AM

Gold medal know alls!!!!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Apr 21 - 08:13 AM

If we want to stop new variants getting into the country, and if we want to prevent another wave, we have to close our borders. Overwhelmingly, that means stopping foreign holidays. I don't think anyone has the right to go on holiday to anywhere on earth at the moment and risk bringing the virus into the country. A foreign holiday is absolutely a non-essential. I know that some people have relatives overseas. That's just too bad. The risks of foreign travel are not just a risk to those families but are a risk to the whole country. My mum died in a care home in October and for the last nine months of her life I could see her for one hour every two weeks through a plastic screen, having visited her five times a week before that. There was no vaccine then and we had to accept that situation in order to keep everyone safe. What do you think, Rain Dog? There are things that are crucial we do, and there are things being used to control us that are no more than pissing round the edges. As for your question, I want government controls over masks, "non-essential shops" (that's a laugh, that is, when I can buy papers, paint, Easter eggs nail polish, pots and pans and God knows what else in Morrisons), bloody "rules of six" and going to people's houses to be removed. They are becoming blunt instruments of government control and have little to do with our safety any more. I want us all to take personal responsibility for our post-lockdown behaviour and I want to see lots of government advice and information. Advice, not edicts. No divisive and discriminatory vaccine passports, no piddling around with traffic lights. If a shop or cinema insists that I wear a mask, or prove my jabs, that's the shop or cinema, not the government, and I'll probably vote with my feet. But the threat from overseas is critical. We can and should close our borders to casual travel. I know the lorries have to come and go. But that can be checked and that should be it. We have to do the crucial things but we should want our freedom back, pronto.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 06 Apr 21 - 08:21 AM

LOTS of leaders suffered from premature isolation
and late libertine quarantine.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 06 Apr 21 - 09:23 AM

Like you, I believe that all of us should take personal responsibility for our behaviour and safety. Like you I did not wear a mask until it was made compulsory to do so. The reason that I am happy enough to keep wearing a mask now is for the safety of others,primarily the staff, not myself. I only spend a short time on the premises, unlike the staff who are there for the length of their shift.

Do masks lessen the chances of catching or passing on the virus? I think that they do. Do you think NHS staff working on covid wards don't need to wear their masks? During your recent visits to hospital, did you think the staff treating you should be wearing masks?

It is easy for me to make my own decisions but it is a lot harder to make those decisions for others.

Yesterday after the briefing, someone asked a question about going on holiday. It seems to happen after all the briefings. Some seem to think that the future can be predicted rather than waiting to see what the evidence tells us. Of course you can understand all those working in the travel industry worrying about the future. The government has already spent an unprecedented amount of money helping out various businesses. How much longer can they do that for?

I do think they should be wary of relaxing travel restrictions. Of course variants can, and most probably will, arise here in the UK. The link to the Guardian article that I posted was very informative about that.

As to the passport/certificate they are talking about, we cannot be sure what is going to happen. Yesterday Boris said they would not be required from either the 12th April or the 17th May, but we all know how quickly he changes his mind. It would not surprise me if some businesses insist on customers having them in order to get in,especially if they want to get more in at one time. I would not like to see that but can understand why they might do it.

Damned if you do and dammed if you don't. I don't envy those who have to make those decisions, either advisers or politicians.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 06 Apr 21 - 11:02 AM

This is HUGE news!

Researchers Are Hatching a Low-Cost Coronavirus Vaccine

A new formulation entering clinical trials in Brazil, Mexico, Thailand and Vietnam could change how the world fights the pandemic.

From the article (a big middle chunk of it, in case it can't be read outside the US):

But simply injecting coronavirus spike proteins into people is not the best way to vaccinate them. That’s because spike proteins sometimes assume the wrong shape, and prompt the immune system to make the wrong antibodies.

This insight emerged long before the Covid-19 pandemic. In 2015, another coronavirus appeared, causing a deadly form of pneumonia called MERS. Jason McLellan, a structural biologist then at the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth, and his colleagues set out to make a vaccine against it.

They wanted to use the spike protein as a target. But they had to reckon with the fact that the spike protein is a shape-shifter. As the protein prepares to fuse to a cell, it contorts from a tulip-like shape into something more akin to a javelin.

Scientists call these two shapes the prefusion and postfusion forms of the spike. Antibodies against the prefusion shape work powerfully against the coronavirus, but postfusion antibodies don’t stop it.

Dr. McLellan and his colleagues used standard techniques to make a MERS vaccine but ended up with a lot of postfusion spikes, useless for their purposes. Then they discovered a way to keep the protein locked in a tulip-like prefusion shape. All they had to do was change two of more than 1,000 building blocks in the protein into a compound called proline.

The resulting spike — called 2P, for the two new proline molecules it contained — was far more likely to assume the desired tulip shape. The researchers injected the 2P spikes into mice and found that the animals could easily fight off infections of the MERS coronavirus.

The team filed a patent for its modified spike, but the world took little notice of the invention. MERS, although deadly, is not very contagious and proved to be a relatively minor threat; fewer than 1,000 people have died of MERS since it first emerged in humans.

But in late 2019 a new coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2, emerged and began ravaging the world. Dr. McLellan and his colleagues swung into action, designing a 2P spike unique to SARS-CoV-2. In a matter of days, Moderna used that information to design a vaccine for Covid-19; it contained a genetic molecule called RNA with the instructions for making the 2P spike.

Other companies soon followed suit, adopting 2P spikes for their own vaccine designs and starting clinical trials. All three of the vaccines that have been authorized so far in the United States — from Johnson & Johnson, Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech — use the 2P spike.

Other vaccine makers are using it as well. Novavax has had strong results with the 2P spike in clinical trials and is expected to apply to the Food and Drug Administration for emergency use authorization in the next few weeks. Sanofi is also testing a 2P spike vaccine and expects to finish clinical trials later this year.

Two prolines are good; six are better

Dr. McLellan’s ability to find lifesaving clues in the structure of proteins has earned him deep admiration in the vaccine world. “This guy is a genius,” said Harry Kleanthous, a senior program officer at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. “He should be proud of this huge thing he’s done for humanity.”

But once Dr. McLellan and his colleagues handed off the 2P spike to vaccine makers, he turned back to the protein for a closer look. If swapping just two prolines improved a vaccine, surely additional tweaks could improve it even more.

“It made sense to try to have a better vaccine,” said Dr. McLellan, who is now an associate professor at the University of Texas at Austin.

In March, he joined forces with two fellow University of Texas biologists, Ilya Finkelstein and Jennifer Maynard. Their three labs created 100 new spikes, each with an altered building block. With funding from the Gates Foundation, they tested each one and then combined the promising changes in new spikes. Eventually, they created a single protein that met their aspirations.

The winner contained the two prolines in the 2P spike, plus four additional prolines found elsewhere in the protein. Dr. McLellan called the new spike HexaPro, in honor of its total of six prolines.

The structure of HexaPro was even more stable than 2P, the team found. It was also resilient, better able to withstand heat and damaging chemicals. Dr. McLellan hoped that its rugged design would make it potent in a vaccine.

Dr. McLellan also hoped that HexaPro-based vaccines would reach more of the world — especially low- and middle-income countries, which so far have received only a fraction of the total distribution of first-wave vaccines.

“The share of the vaccines they’ve received so far is terrible,” Dr. McLellan said.

To that end, the University of Texas set up a licensing arrangement for HexaPro that allows companies and labs in 80 low- and middle-income countries to use the protein in their vaccines without paying royalties.

Meanwhile, Dr. Innis and his colleagues at PATH were looking for a way to increase the production of Covid-19 vaccines. They wanted a vaccine that less wealthy nations could make on their own.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 06 Apr 21 - 11:04 AM

From 9 April anyone will be able to access free, rapid lateral flow tests (LFDs) for themselves and their families to use twice a week, in line with clinical guidance. The significant step, alongside the vaccine rollout, will pave the way for businesses and society to reopen after lockdown.

The regular testing will be delivered through multiple streams including: an online home ordering service, workplace testing programmes, community testing programmes provided by local authorities, collection at local PCR test sites, testing on-site at schools and colleges, and a new ‘Pharmacy Collect’ Service which will provide an additional route regular testing.

Rapid testing is currently only available for those most at risk and for those needing to leave home for work. As one in three people with covid-19 do not experience any symptoms, the new regular rapid tests will help prevent and contain outbreaks so a more normal way of life can resume. Since LFDS rapid testing was introduced, over 120,000 positive cases of covid-19, that would not have been found, have been identified.

Dr Susan Hopkins, Covid-19 strategic response director at PHE and chief medical adviser to NHS Test and Trace, said: ‘I encourage everyone to take up the offer of these free rapid tests, they are quick and easy to carry out in your own home.

‘Rapid testing helps us find Covid-19 cases that we wouldn’t otherwise know about, helping to break chains of transmission. These tests are effective in detecting people that are infectious and therefore most likely to transmit infection to others. They are another tool we now have to help maintain lower infection rates.’

The government has already introduced a scheme for regular rapid Covid-19 tests in the workplaces of 50 or more staff, to provide safer working environments for sectors where employees cannot work from home. Already 100,000 UK businesses have registered their interest.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 06 Apr 21 - 11:29 AM

Thanks for that long article, Stilly, but put a link to it in the vax thread too, wouldja?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Apr 21 - 01:02 PM

To be clear, I want government instruments of control to be removed. If a shop, a bus driver, a publican or a cinema asks me to wear a mask, I will not refuse to comply but I may or may not decide to go elsewhere. If a hospital or care home asks me to wear a mask, I'll comply cheerfully for now. But it's them asking me, not an entitled Etonian buffoon telling me. It should be up to me or the shop, not Boris Johnson. The government, instead of making edicts, should be bombarding us with all the information we need in order to make informed choices as to our behaviour. It has always been the case that a shop, etc., may lawfully refuse to let me in without giving a reason. That's how it should be. We should protest constantly and loudly against edicts that say we can't visit our friends and relatives. We can decide among ourselves, in the light of good information, what we should be doing. We need to develop an ethos of personal responsibility. The last person on this planet who should be imposing "responsibility" on us is a scruffy clown who doesn't even know how many children he's sired. But we need to close our borders to all casual travel. The danger is that he's going to piffle around with his petty controlling yet allow leaky borders. Fatal. Literally.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 06 Apr 21 - 02:12 PM

That is good news Stilly. The more vaccines that get approved the better. The UK have ordered 60 million doses of the Novavax,which is awaiting approval in the UK. It will be manufactured in the UK.

The biggest problem with all the vaccines is the lack of manufacturing capacity. I am not aware of any country hoarding vaccines. The majority are using them as soon as they can. I seem to recall that the US was storing AstraZeneca vaccine,pending approval. I don't know if that is still the case.

Here in the UK the government have funded a vaccine manufacturing centre. The hope is that it will be ready to start making vaccines later this year. Once that is up and running they will be able to start shipping vaccines abroad.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 06 Apr 21 - 03:01 PM

Steve, I am not a fan of new laws being introduced. Ordinarily I think that we have adequate laws available which just need to be applied.

However. Do you think that the government was wrong to bring in the lockdown? To close schools etc? If it was left to personal choice I think it is safe to say that the NHS would certainly have been overwhelmed due to the second wave. The Kent variant spread like wildfire as it was.

Then again Boris is not making these decisions on his own. There will be scientists telling him to do it as well.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 06 Apr 21 - 03:54 PM

Clearly the decisions should have been left entirely to the keyboard warriors of Mudcat who think they know it all!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Apr 21 - 04:03 PM

He doesn't listen to scientists. He is far more a fan of British bulldog Quasi-Churchillian Boris exceptionalism. The lockdowns so far have happened because he has been serially behind the curve at every juncture, making each wave much worse than it need have been. Didn't learn from what happened in Italy, preferring to cheerily tell us that we'd beat the virus in twelve weeks. Sent untested old people from hospital straight into care homes, killing thousands. Encouraged all sorts of shenanigans in the summer, eat out to bloody help out, didn't see the autumn wave coming until it was too late, and still didn't listen. You think he finished with making mistakes? I should bloody coco... Passports...Traffic lights...Here we go again...

Those scientists who he won't listen to have done all the good work for him. They're all in pharmaceutical companies. He just wears a white coat and a silly hat.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 06 Apr 21 - 07:50 PM

They have got things wrong but when a lockdown was needed were they wrong to insist on it?

When people wanted to travel to the west country, were the government right to say you should not make unnecessary journeys?

If you met one of those visitors to the west country would you have agreed with their personal choice?

I don't know if you took advantage of the eat out offer in the summer. Was it wrong for others to do so?

In the scheme of things having to wear a mask comes low down on the list of rights to be given up. Closing businesses, curbing both domestic and foreign travel, curbing people's right to meet up are rather more important rights to give up. Are you saying the government were wrong to insist that we follow those rules?

At least they haven't brought in a curfew. I guess we have that to look forward to.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Apr 21 - 08:52 PM

No I did not do the eat-out thing. Now what did I just say? I said that I don't want edicts. I want the government to give us all full and abundant information and advice. Tell us what the science really says. Better still, put a sock in Boris's stupid mouth and get the scientists to tell us. The government encouraged us to go and dine out. Was that the sort of advice you think I meant? People came to the Westcountry in droves last year. The whole place was overcrowded between June and the end of October, all the accommodation full and the place crawling, literally, with extra day trippers who couldn't go on their foreign hols or cruises. No-one was advising them not to come. The risks were played down. We got away with it until half way through September, and then the numbers started going up. It was another SIX WEEKS before there was any clampdown. The science was there and the science was ignored. The upshot of that delay was the dreadful winter that we've just had, far worse than it should have been. Thank God that the vaccine rollout has staunched it. So where was the information, the advice, the urging, last mid-September? You go to a place heaving with people and you think, well, it must be OK because we haven't been advised not to come here. Then when we do finally get the edicts, it all suddenly seems so arbitrary. In the last few weeks the Westcountry has been just about the safest place in the country. But the blunt instrument of lockdown has hit us just as badly as in the worst-affected areas. The only reason we need to wear masks round here is because no-one is telling people that coming here from all over the place from next week onward isn't sensible. "Try to stay local." What does that mean? I read somewhere it means stay in your local authority area. For me, that means I'm OK driving two hours to Penzance or Land's End! As for those masks, I disagree with you. They are the single most visible manifestation of government control. Have you ever seen anyone checking that the masks people are wearing are clean? Not a paper one worn every day for a week before chucking it? The front not touched? Never been hitched under the nose or chin? Never been stuffed in your pants pocket next to your ten-pound notes, bank cards and tissues? No big gaps? Nobody cares about any of that. All they care about is that half your face has something shoved over it. Never mind the quality, feel the control.

Tell us what we need to know, about the disease, the transmission, the risks, how to be safe, the vaccines. Give us good advice predicated on real scientific information. We'll do the rest, at least as well as we are doing now. There's little or no social distancing going on here in Bude, and round here we generally behave ourselves. No-one told Morrisons to limit numbers, to make the aisles wider, to institute a one-way system. No-one takes any notice of the one-way arrows painted on our crowded, narrow pavements. You can't enforce arbitrary edicts in a country used to being a democracy. So let's make sure they are ditched. With no rules but good advice we certainly won't do any worse than we do now, and a more positive ethos founded on personal responsibility may even mean we do it better. And I'll always have a mask with me.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 07 Apr 21 - 05:21 AM

I am still unsure if you agree with the use of lockdowns or not? They could hardly operate on a voluntary basis could they? You are no longer working but for those that are, a voluntary lockdown would have been confusing.

With regards to my previous comment about a curfew, I forgot that they introduced a 10 PM closing time last summer. That did not make a lot of sense to me.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 07 Apr 21 - 05:25 AM

Unfortunately, Steve, your idea of "Tell us the science and let us decide how to react to it" would not work.
Some would isolate themselves indefinitely, others would go out and party with the masses.

Without the first lockdown there would have been no second peak. The first one would have just rolled on, overwhelming the NHS and (possibly) increasing the death toll.

Unlike you I believe that Boris is listening to the scientists. But he also has to look at the need for the country to come out of this at the end without being a total wreck. We need to keep businesses open, or capable of being re-opened. Boris has the job of balancing the health and financial needs of the country.

You seem to think that, given the necessary scientific information, your part of the country could manage itself, without the influx of tourists (who keep the economy of the West Country going) then you go on to say There's little or no social distancing going on here in Bude, and round here we generally behave ourselves. It seems that you don't believe that your countrymen are capable of following the science.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Apr 21 - 06:06 AM

Let's not talk past each other here. The lockdowns we have had were massively more severe and lengthy than they needed to have been purely because of government incompetence and refusal to listen to the science. Given prompt (key word, Boris) and, OK, maybe short, sharp action, as we saw in some other countries, this country could have been running at near-normal for most of the last twelve months. I think everyone would have understood that, and subsequent behaviour, informed by proper advice and accurate information, would have been at least as good as in any lockdown or ridiculous and ineffective tier system. Instead, we are heading for a crippling recession, austerity like we've never seen, mass unemployment, increasing child poverty and physical and mental ill-health on a scale that could even rival or dwarf the pandemic. As for "overwhelming the NHS", you presumably mean the NHS that these Tories have run into the ground for a decade? That one? The same Tories who did nothing when they were starkly warned, four years ago, that the NHS in its then state was in no position to handle a major epidemic?

As for this:

"Without the first lockdown there would have been no second peak. The first one would have just rolled on, overwhelming the NHS and (possibly) increasing the death toll."

You can't know that numbers wouldn't have fallen anyway during the summer. There were still low levels of disease around all summer, but the country had a free-for-all apropos of staycationing (sorry) and we got away with it for two or three months. But the September warning signs? Ignored. Cornwall was still heaving during the late-October half-term.

As for us Cornish not following the science, we can't. We wear these dodgy masks that keep the controllers happy. But we can't socially distance. There's no room. No room in Sainsbury's, no room in Morrisons, no room in Boots, no room in the co-op. No room on the pavements.

And here's the next crackpot scheme. Vaccine passports, or whatever Boris wants to call them (a poll tax is a poll tax however you try to dress it up...) won't be needed in the most dangerous places of all, bus stations, railway stations, tube stations, on buses and on trains. Do me a bloody favour...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 07 Apr 21 - 07:59 AM

If *any* lockdowns had actually been "more severe than necessary" you would no longer have covid where the lockdown was. But you do, so they obviously weren't, duh.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Apr 21 - 04:27 AM

If you can be arsed we could take that argument to the Brit thread. Carry on here and we'll be getting a bollocking.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 08 Apr 21 - 11:43 AM

The predominate strain for the hospitalized infections in the US is the UK strain. Its a bad'n.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 08 Apr 21 - 02:00 PM

It is certainly more virulent. First became noticed here during our November lockdown. Cases just kept going up and up despite the country being in lockdown.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 08 Apr 21 - 06:09 PM

Its the first I mentioned the predominence, why are you respondsible/defensive?
My actual estranged brother Steve is fully Magatized. Believes everything Trump and Q says and thinks others are deluded. Although he lives in a Spanish speaking country he is even anti immigrant. He welcomes the vaccine but alcohol abuse is breaking his bones from falls yet he still thinks he is OK.
Many share his perseverence which I call mental illness.
Anti Vaxers go one step further into the void.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 08 Apr 21 - 06:32 PM

I was responding to this sentence:

The lockdowns we have had were massively more severe and lengthy than they needed to have been purely because of government incompetence and refusal to listen to the science.

What did I not understand?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Apr 21 - 08:49 PM

You said "lockdowns more severe than necessary" and that is patently not what I said. I said "The lockdowns we have had were massively more severe and lengthy than they needed to have been purely because of government incompetence..." The government's incompetence caused lockdowns that were longer and more severe than they otherwise would have needed to have been. I didn't say anything about their being more severe than necessary. The severity was necessary because of government incompetence.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Apr 21 - 08:52 AM

I have a nasty feeling that things are going to go pear-shaped in the UK. We are short of vaccine. Under-50s vaccination is largely on hold so that older people can at least get their second jab. Our local vaccination centre is closed. Larger centres in Devon and Cornwall are closing. Vaccine fear is building up because of this nonsense about clots and Astra Zeneca. The country is opening up on Monday. We can go abroad in about six weeks' time. Sports venues with large crowds will be permitted. Instead of closing our borders to all except essential imports and exports, we are instituting a complicated "traffic lights" scheme in order to mollify the big hitters in the leisure travel industry (please don't tell me it's for any other reason). We may be able to go to pubs, clubs and footie matches if we can show that we're vaccinated (not 100% reliable, and no guarantee that we're not still spreaders), have just been tested (scarily unreliable), or have had the disease (prove it). A fake vaccination passport will also do the job. All the big nations round and about are having a big third wave. The Channel is 21 miles wide.

It's madness. We haven't learned a thing. The one thing that will nobble this country is foreign travel. All just to keep EasyJet and Virgin happy and to let Brits get Guinness, fish and chips and skin cancer in the Med.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 09 Apr 21 - 09:54 AM

"The one thing that will nobble this country is foreign travel."

That is just not the one thing. You cannot rule out the emergence of a more serious variant in the UK. We do not have to abroad to get one of those.

Weather permitting, and providing my local opens, I might pop out on Monday for a pint in the pub garden.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Apr 21 - 12:06 PM

We can't help new variants but we can minimise the risks of getting them. Encouraging good public behaviour by putting out frequently-updated information and advice, and closing the borders to all leisure travel in and out, and keeping the vaccination programme on track, are the ways to avoid a third wave. There's a third wave 21 miles away from us right now. We should be doing the things that we CAN help. If we let people in and out of the country in droves, we WILL get a third wave. Enjoy your pint. I have Prosecco and Negroamaro. That'll do me for now.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 09 Apr 21 - 12:54 PM

Indeed Europe is not having a good time of it. Only 21 miles away from me,cases of infection are 500 and more per 100,000. Here in Dover for the week up to 4.4.21 it was 9.3 cases per 100,000

Yesterday because of favourable weather conditions, the French coast was clearly visible to the naked eye. Not far away at all.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Apr 21 - 06:13 PM

Well I hate lockdowns and I'm a lucky bugger compared to most. I live in a low-infection area and I have no kids to school and I have a big garden, etc. I'm retired and my savings are better than ever because I'm in the second year of not going on a couple of foreign hols, and I haven't been to a restaurant for a good (expensive) blowout for 13 months. All I want is for this thing to go away. I believe that we Brits will respond positively to good information and advice from the government. I believe that we don't want any more lockdowns. We want our pubs, flicks, restaurants and theatres back. We've bloody well had enough. But we need some savvy people at the helm who'll stop pissing around with stupid schemes that pander to Tui, Virgin, Ryanair and EasyJet. We seriously need to stop leisure travel both in and out of the country. If we do that properly, this thing will end sooner rather than later. If we kowtow to this ridiculous government traffic light scheme, we'll be enduring this misery for many more months to come. Remind me in a year that I said that, and if I'm wrong I'll eat my hat. Just remember that we have a buffoon at the helm who never learns.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 10 Apr 21 - 06:18 AM

Mrs Bonzo is in the cripples' queue for her second jab right now at our surgery. Average age must be 85+!!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 10 Apr 21 - 06:44 AM

Our entire surgery was being used for covid jabs this morning!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 10 Apr 21 - 10:15 AM

Right, Steve Shaw. And I countered with Had any lockdowns been even long *enough* they would have worked. They didn't, so they weren't long enough, let alone too long.
Again, what are you claiming *I* misunderstood?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Apr 21 - 01:14 PM

*sigh.* This is what you said:

"If *any* lockdowns had actually been "more severe than necessary" you would no longer have covid where the lockdown was. But you do, so they obviously weren't, duh."

That looks like you were quoting me from the post before yours. But that is not what I said. My simple point was that lockdowns were longer and more severe than they need have been because of government incompetence. I didn't make any comment as to whether I thought the government were imposing lockdowns that were more severe "than necessary". Fer chrissake.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 10 Apr 21 - 02:08 PM

lockdowns were longer and more severe than they need have been because of government incompetence. I didn't make any comment as to whether I thought the government were imposing lockdowns that were more severe "than necessary"
Longer than needed, but not longer than necessary. That seems to be a distinction without a difference.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Apr 21 - 03:27 PM

You're getting there, Nigel, but what I really meant has still evaded you. "Longer than should have been needed" would have cut it. Now chaps. If I carry on with this I shall have to start questioning my own sanity. Feel free to argue the point in my absence.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 10 Apr 21 - 10:53 PM

Oh, ok, you weren't wrong, you just didn't mean what you said. I can live with that, not always being limpidly clear in my phrasing either.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 11 Apr 21 - 07:06 AM

I said precisely what I meant. Vexatious reinterpretations are entirely down to you. I hope they give you pleasure.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 11 Apr 21 - 08:07 AM

Steve:
Maybe you're 'getting there'.
You're getting there, Nigel, but what I really meant has still evaded you. "Longer than should have been needed" would have cut it.
Implicit in your above comment is that you did not make your meaning clear previously, and are only clarifying it after that lack of clarity has been pointed out to you.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 11 Apr 21 - 08:25 AM

Implicit in my comments on this is that I'm trying to make it clear that what I was supposed to have said I didn't actually say, as should have been apparent straight away when Mrrzy put a phrase in quotes that clearly did not come from me, despite the implication that it did.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 11 Apr 21 - 08:41 AM

Yes, it did. I copied it from your post of 17 April 06.06 am.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 11 Apr 21 - 09:08 AM

I have NEVER said that lockdowns "had actually been 'more severe than necessary,'" never never never, not in that or any other post. That's all you, even though you put it in quotes as though it was me. So you did not "copy" it from any post of mine.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 11 Apr 21 - 10:12 AM

It has been fourteen months now, but the FDA is finally recommending to health care providers that they can now cease reusing disposable respirators:

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is recommending health care personnel and facilities transition away from crisis capacity conservation strategies, such as decontaminating or bioburden reducing disposable respirators for reuse. Based on the increased domestic supply of new respirators approved by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) currently available to facilitate this transition, the FDA and CDC believe there is adequate supply of respirators to transition away from use of decontamination and bioburden reduction systems.

The FDA recommends that health care personnel and facilities:

Limit decontamination of disposable respirators. Decontaminated respirators and respirators that have undergone bioburden reduction should be used only when there are insufficient supplies of new FFRs or if you are unable to obtain any new respirators.
Transition away from a crisis capacity strategy for respirators, such as decontamination of N95 and other FFRs.
Increase inventory of available NIOSH-approved respirators—including N95s and other FFRs, elastomeric respirators, including new elastomeric respirators without an exhalation valve that can be used in the operating room, and powered air-purifying respirators (PAPRs). Even if you are unable to obtain the respirator model that you would prefer, the FDA recommends that you obtain and use a new respirator before decontaminating or bioburden reducing a preferred disposable respirator.

This begs the question why were all of these devices disposed of after one use if they can be satisfactorily decontaminated? Think of the materials that go into these devices and the cost of purchasing new. If they made them a little more sturdily, could they routinely be decontaminated as a regular matter of practice? How does the cost new compare to the cost of decontamination protocols? It used to be that everything was cleaned and sterilized (in the 1970s I worked at Ellis Island, the old immigrant processing station. In the long-closed hospital there was an early 20th century room-sized autoclave with doors that sealed like the doors in a submarine).

Of course technology won't all return to that of 100 years ago, but aside from the bloated overhead of management staffing in health care institutions, the cost of equipment and materials is also inflated. It is what the market, up till now, would bear.

I suppose the answer comes down to human nature - will the humans given the job of decontamination be given the proper instructions and adequate pay incentive to do the job thoroughly and correctly 100% of the time? We'd waste a lot less material if this were the case.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 11 Apr 21 - 02:26 PM

Yes, I did. Here is the whole paragraph with header from 07, not 17, April, copied part in bold, emphasis mine:

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw - PM
Date: 07 Apr 21 - 06:06 AM

Let's not talk past each other here. The lockdowns we have had were massively more severe and lengthy than they needed to have been purely because of government incompetence and refusal to listen to the science. Given prompt (key word, Boris) and, OK, maybe short, sharp action, as we saw in some other countries, this country could have been running at near-normal for most of the last twelve months. I think everyone would have understood that, and subsequent behaviour, informed by proper advice and accurate information, would have been at least as good as in any lockdown or ridiculous and ineffective tier system. Instead, we are heading for a crippling recession, austerity like we've never seen, mass unemployment, increasing child poverty and physical and mental ill-health on a scale that could even rival or dwarf the pandemic. As for "overwhelming the NHS", you presumably mean the NHS that these Tories have run into the ground for a decade? That one? The same Tories who did nothing when they were starkly warned, four years ago, that the NHS in its then state was in no position to handle a major epidemic?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 11 Apr 21 - 05:31 PM

Well far be it from me to end this fun, but here's precisely what you said:

"If *any* lockdowns had actually been "more severe than necessary" you would no longer have covid where the lockdown was. But you do, so they obviously weren't, duh."

I did not say that, despite your quote marks. Anyone can check that (including you). You ascribed a meaning to my statement that I patently did not intend (it really isn't hard, this stuff..)

If you truly think that "The lockdowns we have had were massively more severe and lengthy than they needed to have been purely because of government incompetence" means the same thing as "more severe than necessary" then your level of literacy is, disappointingly, somewhat lower than what I've credited you with. Eat more low GI carbs is my advice. :-)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 11 Apr 21 - 07:05 PM

From: Mrrzy
Right, Steve Shaw. And I countered with ......

From: Steve Shaw
*sigh.* This is what you said: ........

From: Mrrzy
Oh, ok, you weren't wrong, you just didn't mean .......

From: Steve Shaw
I said precisely what I meant. ......

From: Steve Shaw
........... a phrase in quotes that clearly did not come from me, ...........

From: Mrrzy
Yes, it did. I copied it ..........

From: Steve Shaw
I have NEVER said .....



So, there really is something in this world more boring than reading about COVID-19.


DC

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 11 Apr 21 - 08:32 PM

Couldn't agree more, Doug. I no longer have an actual arse, as it was bored off me umpteen posts ago. But do bear with me. I'm being charitable to Mrrzy here, as well as Nigel, tangentially, by giving them something to live for. This lockdown malarkey is tough, and one does have to indulge the less fortunate...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: robomatic
Date: 12 Apr 21 - 12:33 AM

Just when the shorelines and roadside bushes are filling up with castoff single use masks, come Will i am
and the new powered fans bluetooth noise cancelling high tech mask.

Rejoice, we are truly (some kind of) saved. If only so many masks were now causing an environmental hazard along with the thousands of supermarket bags that we once again get for free in the checkout because we are not expected to shop with reusable bags during Covid.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 12 Apr 21 - 01:24 AM

Oh, yes, Steve Shaw, I live for you. I especially like that sharp left dancing turn you take whenever you realize you have been shown -again- to be wrong about something.

Sorry, the rest of y'all. Want to talk about pairs of X chromosomes?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 12 Apr 21 - 01:42 AM

So have we exhausted new COVID news and are now reduced to bickering?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 12 Apr 21 - 02:01 AM

Concern in China about expressing concern about the efficacy of Chinese vaccines

Efficacy of Chinese Vaccines

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Apr 21 - 06:21 PM

So today in England we've had the Great Release. Shops, gyms and swimming pools reopened. Pub gardens heaving. Massive queues from 7 AM outside Primark (for Christ's sake). Shopping centres are absolutely stuffed with people. Traffic jams on the M5 coming down to Cornwall. My town, Bude, almost gridlocked with holidaymakers. We have vox pops on the telly bleating about how much we all need all this, and now. Need to get in your bloody motor home and come to Bude. Can't live another day unless you can come to your chalet in a holiday park in Newquay (which has hundreds of other chalets, all identical with yours), or queue outside Primark because you can't wait one more day to replace your Bangladeshi slave-labour knickers. Celebratory clips of people having their hair cut or their faux-blondness renewed at long last. I don't get that. I look like the wild man of Borneo right now and I'm sporting the look as a badge of honour. We've had a national orgasm today, and it's worrying.

There should never have been this lockdown. The government should have put all its energy into creating a national ethos of responsibility, by giving information, advice and by constant urging. Instead, the country thinks today that the thing is all over. That we're in the sunlit uplands.

Well we are not. The vaccine has not yet been rolled out to under-50s. In countries still struggling with the virus, it's the under-50s who are now being hard hit. But we've leaned hard compressing the spring but have suddenly let it go. We are in for another wave. Doomed. Watch this space...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 13 Apr 21 - 01:14 PM

Just ponder on this for a minute...

2020 - We just have to stay in for a couple of months.
WW II - You have to leave your loved ones and might never see them again.

2020 - But my kids need some fresh air so we're all going to the park.
WW II - Your kids have to be evacuated and live with random good samaritans for their safety.

2020 - I can only Facetime my family and friends I can't see them.
WW II - I have written letters, I'm hoping they're received and I get a response this year.

2020 - I am trying to order my food shop online, it's taking ages to get to me I need, alcohol, and all the other foods I'm craving.
WW II - Are you coming to queue-up in the line for our rations-potato soup every day of the week?

2020 - The government hasn't said we can't go out, they just said we can but only once to exercise so I'm going to go meet my friends and do what I want.
WW II - I'm not going out just in case a bomb drops so I will stay in listening to some music quietly because the air raid siren might go off.

2020 - Netflix needs to sort the streaming out I can't even watch a series without it crashing.
WW II - We are sitting in the dark around a candle playing cards keeping as much light in as possible so the warplanes don't see us from above.

2020 - Every man for themselves, so I'm going to stock-pile as much as I can because we are more important than anyone else, never mind the elderly that gave us this freedom.
WW II - I'm so grateful for this community, everyone is helping each other out when and where we can, we must stay strong.

This is the perspective that we should have, we don't know how LUCKY we have it and people still aren't listening.

Stay in, it really is that simple!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 13 Apr 21 - 01:19 PM

"Stay in, it really is that simple!"

If only it was. How would your dog go for a run?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 19 Apr 21 - 01:17 PM

News to do with the COVID era, but it's an adjacent story. Traffic deaths rose in 2020 despite the lower traffic.

The Emptier Roads of 2020 Were More Lethal

Preliminary data from the National Safety Council shows a 24% spike in the U.S. traffic fatality rate, with drivers traveling faster and more recklessly with fewer people on the road.

When the pandemic swept across the U.S. in March 2020, vehicle traffic was largely stilled in major cities. Hazy skies over Los Angeles and New York City cleared up with the loss of tailpipe pollution. Quieter residential streets made room for pop-up walking and cycling corridors. As millions of commuters stayed home for months, safety researchers hoped that less overall driving throughout 2020 would also mean fewer U.S. traffic fatalities — a faint silver lining amid a much-larger Covid-19 death toll.

But that last benefit did not come to pass. “We saw the opposite,” said Maureen Vogel, the communications director at the National Safety Council, an advocacy group. As many as 42,060 people died on U.S. roads last year, or 8% more than in 2019, according to preliminary data released by the NSC. Combined with a 13% decline in vehicle-miles traveled, the rate of death on American roads jumped 24% year over year — the sharpest spike the NSC has measured since 1924, Vogel said.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 19 Apr 21 - 04:50 PM

A new test for hospitals to determine immune responsess of the newly infected and predict severity. It is fom Marylnd.

Drivers here are goin faster on emptier roads

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: keberoxu
Date: 20 Apr 21 - 06:34 PM

New news it is not, just an update. (sue me)

Last year, during the lockdown,
the Boston Marathon was postponed.
A great fuss, as it was unprecedented.

This year, as well, we have Patriot's Day week in April,
with ... no traditionally scheduled Boston Marathon.

This year's Boston Marathon will instead happen in October,
and the event is being publicized, with registration and all,
over the radio stations already.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 21 Apr 21 - 02:33 PM

If it is new, it is news. If it is an update, then it is an update.

This morning the New York Times published Nation Faces ‘Hand-to-Hand Combat’ to Get Reluctant Americans Vaccinated

Half of American adults have received at least one shot of the coronavirus vaccine. Now comes the hard part: persuading the other half to get it.

State health officials, business leaders, policymakers and politicians are struggling to figure out how to tailor their messages, and their tactics, to persuade not only the vaccine hesitant but also the indifferent. The work will be labor intensive, much of it may fall on private employers — but the risk is clear: if it takes too long to reach “herd immunity” — the point at which the spread of the virus slows — worrisome new variants could emerge that evade the vaccine.

“If you think of this as a war,” said Michael Carney, the senior vice president for emerging issues at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation, “we’re about to enter the hand-to-hand combat phase of the war.”

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 21 Apr 21 - 02:37 PM

And while I'm at it, there is this:

Amy Klobuchar takes aim at 12 vaccine misinformation influencers

People like "Dr." Mercola who used to simply offer alternative information about medical stuff are now batshit crazy lunatic fringe purveyors of anti-science trash, with the COVID vaccines in their mangled messages.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 22 Apr 21 - 04:27 PM

! Pregnant women are advised to use Pfizer vaccine.
2 Long haulers note slight improvement after vaccination regarding brain fog.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 22 Apr 21 - 04:32 PM

India is facing some of the worst crimes of pandemic including rampant stealing of vaccine and medications while infection rates climb.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 23 Apr 21 - 11:48 AM

Two weeks ago I got my first haircut in 14 months, and I left behind about 10 inches of hair because I had to cut to shoulder length after wearing it longer for a while.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 25 Apr 21 - 10:52 AM

India has a prime minister equally as foolish as Trump was when he was running things here. Modi allowed a lot of huge religious events to go forward earlier this spring and now, to absolutely no one's surprise, the virus has exploded into the population. The cremation sites are running non-stop, making me wonder if the air quality and deforestation that are now a part of this epidemic will make people even more miserable (bad air and floods). Enlarged photo.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 25 Apr 21 - 12:06 PM

From the New York Times Millions Are Skipping Their Second Doses of Covid Vaccines

Millions of Americans are not getting the second doses of their Covid-19 vaccines, and their ranks are growing.

More than five million people, or nearly 8 percent of those who got a first shot of the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines, have missed their second doses, according to the most recent data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. That is more than double the rate among people who got inoculated in the first several weeks of the nationwide vaccine campaign.

Even as the country wrestles with the problem of millions of people who are wary about getting vaccinated at all, local health authorities are confronting an emerging challenge of ensuring that those who do get inoculated are doing so fully.

The reasons vary for why people are missing their second shots. In interviews, some said they feared the side effects, which can include flulike symptoms. Others said they felt that they were sufficiently protected with a single shot.

Those attitudes were expected, but another hurdle has been surprisingly prevalent. A number of vaccine providers have canceled second-dose appointments because they ran out of supply or didn’t have the right brand in stock.

Troubling news.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 25 Apr 21 - 12:12 PM

The video that plays at the beginning seems to be unrelated to the story.

Spanish man charged with infecting 22 people with COVID-19

MADRID -- A Spanish man with COVID-19 symptoms who coughed on work colleagues and told them “I’m going to give you all the coronavirus” has been charged with intentionally causing injury after allegedly infecting 22 people.

Spanish police said their investigation began after a COVID-19 outbreak at the company where the 40-year-old man worked on the Mediterranean island of Mallorca.

Days before the outbreak, the man showed COVID-19 symptoms but refused his colleagues’ suggestions to go home and self-isolate, police said in a statement.

After work, and showing no improvement, he went for a PCR test before visiting a gym and returning to work the next day. Though his superiors told him to go home after he allegedly had showed a temperature of 40 degrees Celsius, the man refused.

He walked around his workplace, lowering his face mask and coughing on people, saying “I’m going to infect you all with the coronavirus,” according to police.

At the end of the day, his PCR test came back positive. His colleagues were then tested, with five returning positive results. They in turn infected family members, including three infants, police said. At the gym the man visited, three people tested positive and also infected family members.

None of those infected required hospitalization, police said.

A judge charged the man, who was not identified by police, and released him on Saturday evening to await trial, Spain’s Europa Press news agency reported.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 25 Apr 21 - 12:15 PM

Gum disease linked to severe COVID-19 outcomes

The start of the story:

One of the more perplexing things about COVID-19 is its wide range of outcomes in people who get the disease. A new study from researchers at McGill University in Toronto, Canada, finds a link between gums with inflammation and infection and COVID-19 complications and deaths.

The study finds that people with periodontitis are 8.8 times more likely to die of COVID-19.

In addition, such individuals are 3.5 times more likely to require hospitalization for COVID-19 and 4.5 times more likely to require a ventilator.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 27 Apr 21 - 02:21 PM

I read that on gum disease too, thanks.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 28 Apr 21 - 03:43 AM

I believe that there has been previous research on a link between periodontitis and heart disease. Not sure that any firm link has been established.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 28 Apr 21 - 07:18 PM

Raindog there is a connection particularly with tooth and pericardial infections. (heart lining infections)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jack Campin
Date: 29 Apr 21 - 11:00 AM

Arundhati Roy on the horror in India

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 29 Apr 21 - 06:28 PM

Periodontitis has been linked to Subacute Bacterial Endocarditis (not pericarditis) for well over 50 years - nothing new: anyone with mitral or aortic valve disease is given prophylactic antibiotics before any dental treatment, although our lecturers used to tell us that just brushing your teeth sends off a shower of bacteria into your bloodstream!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: The Sandman
Date: 30 Apr 21 - 03:47 AM

I would like to make a call for tolerance of others views on the pandemic.
i have noticed one mudcat member who is threatening to block any facebook user who has a different view to him on the pandemic.
i have had my first vacc ,but i respect those people who have decided for religous or other reasons not to be vaccinated that is their choice, they are a minority and should not be victimised. i do not want to live in a totalitarian society, . the establishment rules by division

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 30 Apr 21 - 04:32 AM

Quite so, Dick, but blocking someone on Facebook is a choice in the same way as not taking the vaccine is a choice. Telling the world that you're not having the vaccine is also a choice, as is telling the world that you'll block a vaccine-refuser. Whilst it's a free country, I'd suggest that vaccine-refusers would be better served if they kept it to themselves. All too often, they go large with their prejudiced and ill-informed views, and the last thing we want, in my opinion, is for their vexatious assertions to be sowing doubt and fear. There's nothing tolerant about that.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: The Sandman
Date: 30 Apr 21 - 04:58 AM

it is not as simple as that. i have seen people who do not weara masks attacked verbally in supermarkets by budding fascists who then forget about the two meter rule when they harangue the non mask wearer, really silly behaviour, if someone does not want or has a good reason for not wearing a mask give them distance,
we still do not know how effective masks are although they reduce the risk to some extent.if vaccination is effective we hopefully will not need to wear masks
while i do not think this has been planned it has been an unintentional experiment in controlling people dividing people and ruling. meanwhile the pharmacuetical c0mpanies have been profiting, small businesses have suffered but multi national capitalism gets stronger. we do not need over zealous fascists going around haranguing people the majority of people are getting vaccinated

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 30 Apr 21 - 05:43 AM

There is never justification for haranguing non-mask wearers. The reasons for some people being exempt are never visibly apparent. I'm fairly deaf, and that doesn't show either. I'm thinking of wearing a big badge that says SPEAK UP. As for the vaccines, if you don't want them that's fine, though you could be misinformed. That also doesn't show up unless you crow about it telling everyone that Bill Gates wants to control us all, etc. If you do that kind of thing you deserve what you get, in my opinion.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 30 Apr 21 - 05:46 AM

Fascist this and fascist that.

I have not seen anyone challenged by a member of the public for not wearing a mask. Mask wearing in shops is fairly good on the whole here.

While I do not condone anyone for being verbally aggressive about non mask wearing, none of us know why they do it. They might have lost a relative to covid, lost their business because of covid or lost their job working for a fascist big business because of covid.

Now if you want to talk about fascist behaviour. I had 2 visits to a & e last month. Had a fascist security guy take my temperature, had to wait behind fascist lines on the ground, asked questions by another mask wearing fascist, told where to walk to and where to stand while waiting. Most of the staff were wearing fascist uniforms. And then they ended.up giving me two fascist prescriptions for stuff that made little to know difference.

Do have to say that the staff and patients were all pleasant apart from their fascist behaviour.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: The Sandman
Date: 30 Apr 21 - 09:02 AM

as i have said i am taking the vaccinations,i do not know whether gates is behind this but i doubt it. i find it an intersting psychological comment when people have to anno8nce on facebook they are blocking anyone who disgrees with their view on covi 19, it looks to me they are trying to show power, why announce it

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: The Sandman
Date: 30 Apr 21 - 11:54 AM

rain dog it is not fascist this or that, but very specific behaviour during the pandemic[haranguing non mask wearers whilst forgeting about social distancing[ which i have seen ] is totalitarian in nature] your bizarre remark about the wonderful Underpaid nhs staff is nor relevant. the sort ofbehaviour i have described is reminscentto me of the people who as soon as they put on a uniform seem to become power crazy. the vast majority of people are getting vaccinated . the astra zeneca vaccine delay in the eu was not a fault of the eu ,it was the fault of the manufacturers not producing as many or supplying as many to the eu as promised ..they are now being sued.
now that vaccination is progressing it is time for governments and people to chill out a bit.
i too was in and e 10 days ag0 i had a small stroke the staff were pleasant and efficient.
your attempts at humour are not very funny

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jack Campin
Date: 30 Apr 21 - 03:17 PM

I usually challenge people who won't wear masks in public. They are putting other people's lives at risk and I have NO obligation to be in any way polite to them. I want them out of the door, and fuck their "exemptions".

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 30 Apr 21 - 06:27 PM

Me too, Jack Campin. I ask if they fotgot it. Loudly but politely.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 30 Apr 21 - 07:14 PM

I am definitely no mask advocate. My opinion is that they don't do any good and that they are used as a blunt instrument of control. However, we live in vulnerable times and I think that putting on a mask doesn't hurt. We bite the bullet.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: The Sandman
Date: 01 May 21 - 03:13 AM

jack campin do you do this whilst goose stepping. aggression meets with agression. jack campin mussolin would love you

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 01 May 21 - 03:49 AM

Australia has just made it illegal for its citizens to return home from India

Australia bans its own citizens from returning home

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Allan Conn
Date: 01 May 21 - 03:55 AM

There is breaking the rules and breaking the rules - but all through the pandemic there has also been a number of rabid don't do this or don't do that type people.

One local FB user during the first lock down vented from her house in St Boswells that "it is like Piccadilly Circus out there......counted over 30 people go past in the last half an hour.............and some have backpacks so obviously going further than allowed"

I thought the obsession of sitting at your window counting how many people were going past was weird in the extreme. And 30 people in 30 minutes is hardly Piccadilly Circus anyway. And backpacks are good for putting things like coats and cameras etc in even if not walking that far. You were allowed to go for an hour's walk even at the height of the first lock down here so no-one was necessarily breaking any rule. Yet this person thought everyone should stay in their homes like prisoners just because she was.

Then there was another who went to Lidl but saw the big queue and decided to not bother - so she went home and vented about all the sefish b******* going shopping for their drink and BBQ food etc. Yet they were only doing exactly the same as she intended doing. Shop!

There has been some strange behaviour though on the most part folks have been great.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: The Sandman
Date: 01 May 21 - 04:35 AM

mrzy, do you know if you spoke to me loudly and politely. i might do the hokey cokey

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jack Campin
Date: 01 May 21 - 05:28 AM

It's going to be impossible to contain the new Indian variants to India - it's just too big and too linked with the rest of the world.

What the rest of the world can do is not fuck their response up as badly as India has done. The American South looks like flushing itself down the same toilet.

The UK coped with the smoking ban fairly well - hardly anyone flouts it and the change was quick. Mask refusal is much more dangerous and happens much more often. And the tobacco industry didn't put up that much of a fight. The implication is that whoever's backing mask refusal, as a collective thing, is a more effective and better organized enemy of the mass of humanity than even Big Tobacco was.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 01 May 21 - 09:23 AM

Shake it all about, then snort it [grin]?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 02 May 21 - 12:25 PM

I have not seen anyone challenged by a member of the public for not wearing a mask. Mask wearing in shops is fairly good on the whole here.

and


There is never justification for haranguing non-mask wearers. The reasons for some people being exempt are never visibly apparent.


I have to disagree with both of these remarks. People do challenge non-mask wearers here, because at this point it is obvious to most people that we're doing the heavy lifting in trying to prevent this pandemic from spreading and these freeloaders are the ones who are going to keep it going for a lot longer than needed.

If you can't wear a mask, then don't go out. Take care of business out-of-doors or have things delivered. Don't wander around stores and other places where your presence is entirely discretionary with no mask. The lion's share of unmasked people are scofflaws and Trump supporters who think their freedom to spread disease outweighs the good of the society at large.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 02 May 21 - 12:57 PM

So someone who genuinely can't wear a mask is confined to quarters? Sheesh... And the other thing is that you seem to be assuming that not wearing a mask is THE cause of the spread. Well I disagree. The reasons this is a global pandemic is that international travel has been allowed, and don't get me started on lax procedures in shops, public transport and care homes. This virus spreads from country to country via international travel and from person to person when lots of people congregate in crowded places. Round here, everyone complies with the mask-wearing obligation. But mask-abuse is the norm. A paper mask used for day after day. Ill-fitting masks. Mask stowed under the chin. Noses scratched through a mask or sticking out over the top of the mask. Discarded mask litter everywhere. Mask wearers thinking that keeping your distance doesn't matter as long as your mask is on.

It's notable that island countries with sparse populations (Australia, New Zealand) have been only lightly affected. Also, they have been very strict apropos of their borders. Cornwall, where I live, is a big county with a small population. Our case numbers have consistently been been among the lowest in the country. Take a clue from all that. The occasional mask rebel you see (hardly any round here) probably isn't infected anyway. It would take an awful lot of mask rebels to pose much of a threat, even if masks did work. I don't think masks do much good at all and I haven't seen strong evidence to the contrary. I am not even remotely a mask rebel, not because I don't think that masks are almost useless but because I don't want to make anyone I encounter in a shop to feel insecure.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: The Sandman
Date: 02 May 21 - 01:39 PM

The lion's share of unmasked people are scofflaws and Trump supporters who think their freedom to spread disease outweighs the good of the society at large.
well there are not many trump supporters in ireland but there are some non mask wearers some of them have had both vaccinations, Maggie you are ignorant of the situation in ireland

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jack Campin
Date: 02 May 21 - 02:56 PM

The most prominent agitator for mask refusal in Ireland is Dolores Cahill of the Irish Freedom Party. Whose politics is straight-out delusional Trumpism.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 02 May 21 - 03:00 PM

Dick, no, I haven't been to Ireland, I haven't researched COVID around the world, so in the context of a TRUMP remark you can safely assume I'm speaking of the United States. And we were speaking of INDOORS, where everyone should still be wearing masks. In the US those of us who have been fully vaccinated can go without masks out of doors in open settings with small vaccinated groups.

Steve you can rant on about global travel being at fault but when it comes down to it, people in close contact with people is how it spreads, wherever they are from. It is a courtesy to others to still wear the mask indoors even if you are fully vaccinated. There are break-out cases where vaccinated people can still catch COVID-19. They can be sick for many days, most likely at home. They can still possibly spread to others.

As the Instagram and Twitter hashtag says, #WearTheDamnMask

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: The Sandman
Date: 02 May 21 - 04:18 PM

it is also spread by lack of ventilation in buildings, hospitals, schools, supermarkets, they need to be redesigned too, masks are only part of the solution and are not as important as ventilation, some hopitals need to be redesigned specifically to deal with viruses, regardless of masks.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: The Sandman
Date: 02 May 21 - 04:39 PM

no offence intended, maggie, hopefully we will meet in heaven playing the harp but not just yet

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 03 May 21 - 08:04 AM

Simply put in a time of pandemic you have to imagine yourself differently. I believe most of us have. Those who can not, deserve to be shunned and distanced be it for academic, ignorant or imagined reasons.

That goes for for some in the CDC to the most dysfunctional Trumper.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 03 May 21 - 09:38 AM

A month old but does not appear to have been mentioned here.

Nature 7th April 2021

"As COVID-19 cases surge again in the United States, coronavirus variants are on the rise. But researchers fear that the country is ramping up surveillance of the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 too slowly, allowing these variants — which evidence shows1,2 could make vaccines less effective — to spread undetected in one of the countries hit hardest by the disease.

Laboratories supported by the US government have doubled the rate at which they are sequencing SARS-CoV-2 genomes over the past two months. Still, the number of genomes that the country shared in the online genome repository GISAID in March represented only 1.6% of its positive COVID-19 cases that month. And the United States lags behind at least 30 countries in terms of the sequencing it has done throughout the pandemic, according to GISAID data"

Full article here

Why US coronavirus tracking can’t keep up with concerning variants

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 03 May 21 - 09:42 AM

I saw several articles this morning that say the US will not reach herd immunity.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 03 May 21 - 10:08 AM

From The Guardian today

"New Zealand’s customs agency has fired nine border workers who refused to get the Covid-19 vaccine. The country has required all frontline border workers to be vaccinated by the end of April.

In February, the prime minister, Jacinda Ardern, said the government would not be making the vaccine compulsory for frontline staff, and that those who declined the vaccine would be moved into backroom roles.

But no other work could be found to redeploy the nine workers who were in fixed term employment at the maritime border, Jacinda Funnell, Customs’ deputy chief executive for people and capability, said."

New Zealand fires nine border workers who refused Covid vaccine

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 03 May 21 - 10:36 AM

double mutant variant

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 03 May 21 - 10:43 AM

Donuel:

Simply put

Are you capable of doing that. I usually find you as incomprehensible.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 03 May 21 - 11:29 AM

The whole herd immunity thing was put succinctly on a radio interview today. During a pandemic we live in a time of great personal sacrifice for the greater good. Too many people don't understand that, or have decided the political response is their approach rather than an altruistic attitude. Simply put.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 03 May 21 - 04:05 PM

What is the remedy when someone offends an entire country or world?
Facebook is about to review their decision to deplateform Donald Trump. Florida adds its 2 cents by signing a law to fine Faceebook $250,000 if they deplateform anyone without warning and other things...
what to do what to do?!
signed, the incomprehensible one :^?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 03 May 21 - 05:52 PM

299 people in the US are confirmed to have died of COVID-19 yesterday. One day total is the equivalent of an airliner crash, but it passes by barely remarked on.

There are a lot of people out there not pulling their weight when it comes to protecting others. And so many have died that the tragedy of deaths now is that they are viewed as business as usual.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 03 May 21 - 06:20 PM

In this country we have had mixed messages from the top for well over a year. There has been massive confusion about what you can or can't do, what's legal and what's illegal, starting or ending on this date or that. We've had a labyrinthine four-tier system of restrictions that even the politicians didn't understand. We've had hubris from Johnson about defeating the virus in twelve weeks. We've had Tory little-England exceptionalism. We've had a government test and trace app costing tens of billions that doesn't work. You can be in trouble with the law if you fail to self-isolate when the app tells you to, but you don't even have to have the bloody app! We've had delayed lockdowns that have cost thousands of lives. We've had untested sick people sent from hospital into care homes. Tens of thousands of old people have died as a result. We are currently talking up the shining possibility of foreign holidays and our borders are way too porous and quarantine has, at times, been de facto voluntary.

So I don't want to hear about ordinary people being blamed. Of course, there will always be a few. Round here, people all comply valiantly with all the rules when they can, but it's often impossible, in free-for-all supermarkets for example. Everybody round here wears a mask when required. The people in this country have been very good about this. So I'm not accepting blame. It might be different in America, I wouldn't know. But we have leaders who are supposed to lead, not confuse us. We have done it in spite of our leaders. I want to see them promoting a national sense of communal responsibility, predicated on sound, clear advice and abundant information. There has been little sign of a coordinated effort to do that. So put the blame where it truly lies, not on a few renegade non-mask wearers.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 03 May 21 - 06:55 PM

New York Times review of Michael Lewis's book The Premonition - A Pandemic Story

New York Times review

It was an extract from the book in The UK Sunday Times that surprised me with the news of the genome tracking in th US

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 03 May 21 - 08:41 PM

We will have to agree to disagree about who spreads it. There is plenty of blame to go around though your pronouncements suggest any other opinion is tepid. There is PLENTY of information here in the US, but unfortunately the Resident of the White House for four years was averse to science and facts. And his followers have piled on in arguing against common sense personal behavior. Those individuals are definitely part of the problem. Modi in India is a Little Trump on a much larger stage. He bears a considerable part of the blame, and it trickles down through his chosen administrators if they dismiss medical facts.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 03 May 21 - 09:12 PM

Raindog, thanks for posting it first. Prmonition is worth its weight in gold.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 03 May 21 - 09:16 PM

And your pronouncements about the efficacy of masks, even going so far as to say that people who genuinely can't wear them shouldn't leave their houses, are made with such certainty that you make other opinions look more than tepid. I'm quite happy that we can disagree on this, but you must accept that flaccid leadership in your country, my country, India, Brazil and elsewhere, and leaky national borders, have played a massive part in making this a GLOBAL pandemic. You can hit out at mask rebels all you like but you won't stop them from being rebels (by rebels I mean refusers, by the way, not reluctant compliers like me), and, as I sort of said before, out of a hundred or two mask rebels it could be that one or none will actually have the infection. That doesn't remotely make them right or safe, but we need to get a grip on where the real problem lies. It is terrible leadership and mass movement of people, mostly for slight reasons, across international borders. This virus doesn't have wings. And at least on this side of the ocean compliance with the rules has been generally pretty good. The people have done well, we have few cases compared to most other countries but our government is seriously adept at throwing away the advantage, as it seems about to do again apropos of allowing foreign holidays both in and out of the country. Unfocussed blaming ordinary people is futile and negative and won't change anything for the better.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jeri
Date: 03 May 21 - 09:17 PM

WTF is a "prmonition"!?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 03 May 21 - 11:01 PM

A typo.

And again, Steve, we must agree to disagree because I think your view discounts the incredible impact individual participation can make when people resolve to do things effectively to protect themselves and those around them. Now enough already.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: The Sandman
Date: 04 May 21 - 01:58 AM

i agree with Steve Shaw.
INDIVIDUAL PARTICIPATION is infentiisimal compared to well thought government strategy. ventilation of buildings design of buildings to deal with viral infection etc.. is just as important as wearing a mask[a mask that may have been handled or dirty etc ]

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 May 21 - 04:27 AM

Are you reading my posts, Maggie? Did you see the bit that said And at least on this side of the ocean compliance with the rules has been generally pretty good. The people have done well? How does that compute with "I think your view discounts the incredible impact individual participation can make when people resolve to do things effectively to protect themselves and those around them," pray tell?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 May 21 - 04:32 AM

By the way, in a discussion forum in which I'm putting my point of view in a direct yet polite and carefully constructed manner (which is what we are supposedly here to do), I think that trying to shut someone down by telling them "enough already" comes across as somewhat jarring and even just a tad authoritarian...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 04 May 21 - 05:20 AM

"WTF is a "prmonition"!?"

I had a feeling that Donuel was going to spell it like that.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jos
Date: 04 May 21 - 06:32 AM

As typos go, I really like Sandman's 'infentiisimal'.

It made my morning (I'm easily pleased), and I had no problem understanding it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 04 May 21 - 07:05 AM

Stilly River Sage posted:
"299 people in the US are confirmed to have died of COVID-19 yesterday. One day total is the equivalent of an airliner crash, but it passes by barely remarked on."

There have been a number of discussions here in the UK about number of covid deaths or number of excess deaths.

The following article in today's Guardian was a sobering read.

"A 30 year old American is three times more likely to die at that age than his or her European peers. In fact, Americans do worse at just about every age. To make matters more grim, the American disadvantage is growing over time.

In 2017, for example, higher American mortality translated into roughly 401,000 excess deaths – deaths that would not have occurred if the US had Europe’s lower age-specific death rates. Pre-pandemic, that 401,000 is about 12% of all American deaths. The percentage is even higher below age 85, where one in four Americans die simply because they do not live in Europe"

Why do Americans die earlier than Europeans?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 May 21 - 07:05 AM

Whether I spot my own typing errors depends on whether I'm not wearing my reading specs (lethal), using my iPhone (severe), both those at once (which generally means I'm posting whilst still in bed, leaning up on one elbow), or using my iPad mini (mild to moderate). It's rarely worth picking anyone up for their little peccadillos, unless, of course, they're having a go at me for mine. Then it can become open season, as Nigel will tell you... ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: The Sandman
Date: 04 May 21 - 07:25 AM

amny way i now have marked 3 people on this forum, who i reckon would love to put on a uniform and start goosestepping

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jack Campin
Date: 04 May 21 - 04:34 PM

INDIVIDUAL PARTICIPATION is infentiisimal compared to well thought government strategy. ventilation of buildings design of buildings to deal with viral infection etc.. is just as important as wearing a mask[a mask that may have been handled or dirty etc ]

Most public buildings put up in the last generation have terrible air circulation when aerosolized pathogens are the issue. The timescale we are dealing with is months, not decades. Masks can work that fast, rebuilding can't.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: The Sandman
Date: 04 May 21 - 05:09 PM

yes but we have had the pandemic for over a year , governments could have done it months ago. plus provide evidence of mask effectiveness, before you make such a statement.
yes, i wear a mask but i am not sure or have seen evidence of EXACTLY how effective masks are , have you?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 May 21 - 05:36 PM

Take a me too from me, Dick.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 04 May 21 - 05:55 PM

Stve and others say they have near perfect mask behavior which is all well and good. What irks me is his sour attitude about the whole thing.
I suspect the subject is more inflamatory here but maybe not.

And here are the wayward missing e,e,e's that perform poorly on this keyboard.

!!!!!!!!!!!!

Whoa, I think that was more Chinese rocket debris that just cratered in the backyard.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 04 May 21 - 06:05 PM

So when I went to a&e the other month would it have been ok to refuse to wear my mask?

Would it have been appropriate to say to the staff, why are you wearing those masks when there is a lack of evidence as to their efficacy?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 May 21 - 06:22 PM

We don't behave like that because, to put it as simply as I can, and not for the first time, we are in this together and we have no wish to make anyone else feel uncomfortable, insecure or vulnerable. It's a function of our accepting (contrary to many an accusation here) the fact that other people may not share our views, and may be even required to wear masks as part of their jobs. I don't go around feeling all hoity-toity about being "forced" to wear a mask. Like everybody else, I just put the bloody thing on then forget it. I have two friends who refuse to wear masks (and who think Bill Gates is out to get them), and I am extremely critical of them. Right?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 May 21 - 06:30 PM

I'm rather pleased that my sour attitude irks you. I would much rather suffer from a sour attitude than your broadcasting of the fact that you appear to want the world to see you as a confounded and unstable idiot almost every time you post. Perhaps, after the last couple of days of your shameful posting, you would consider refraining from making any further stupid comments about me. You have nothing to say that I want to even remotely engage with apropos of the substantive issues of this and other threads, so let's just settle for that and avoid each other, please.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 04 May 21 - 07:53 PM

I worked in hospital operating theatres and other departments nearly 50 years ago: we all wore masks: surgeons, anaesthetists, nurses, theatre assistants, porters: no-one, but nobody at all was exempt. You just got used to it, wearing them all day, with maybe a new one after lunch if you got a break at all. So I am slightly sceptical of some modern-day claims to be exempted from wearing masks now: e.g. whole gangs of teenagers going into the local Co-op for their lunchtime fast food fix, ALL claiming they can’t wear masks as they have asthma!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 May 21 - 08:18 PM

Well shops are entitled to refuse entry to non-mask wearers, to anyone at all actually, though it could be said that putting unfair burdens on shop staff, to require them to challenge customers, is a step too far. I agree that mask exemptions should be rare. It's hard to conjure up a sensible notion of some way of having instant identification of exempt people, a badge or sticker for example. However, I'm viscerally opposed to obliging anyone to publicly display an affliction. I'm deaf enough to struggle badly at supermarket checkouts when the shop is noisy and there's music on the tannoy, but I'm damned if I'm going to walk round town with a badge advertising the fact. I must be living in a very unrepresentative area, because I haven't seen this mask fake exemption problem round here.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 05 May 21 - 09:10 AM

It is well-documented that masks help. How much they help is irrelevent. They help.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 May 21 - 09:35 AM

That's as maybe. How much they help, if at all, can't be teased out from all the confounding factors such as social distancing and lockdown measures such as restricting indoor visits, closing pubs and restaurants, etc., and now vaccination. It's impossible to do a controlled experiment to isolate masks from all the other factors in order to glean their efficacy, but we can at least adopt a sort of precautionary principle. When you say they help you are speaking in hope, never from science. Which doesn't necessarily mean that you're wrong. Just don't go thinking that a mask makes you so safe that you can be all blasé. The people who breach the distancing rules in the shops round here are all wearing masks. What should I make of that, d'ye think? None of this is really the point. The point is that, whatever we think, we should stick a mask on when it's legally required. That way, no-one need feel more threatened or vulnerable than they need to. Fine by me. I'm have mask, will travel at all times. Sorry if I sound like Mr Spock.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 May 21 - 09:43 AM

Incidentally,

"It is well-documented that..."

Look up "weasel words" on wiki. Goes nicely with "it is widely recognised that..." "experts have shown that..." "everyone knows that..."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jeri
Date: 05 May 21 - 01:59 PM

There are numerous studies out there, but Steve (and anyone) is capable of searching for them. Living in the USA with its conspiracy theories and batshit crazy ideas, you can't dissuade people who believe that praying to little baby Jesus will prevent Covid because they're crazy. You can't convince people who rely on faith-based "medicine" that they're wrong, becausethey're crazy. You can't convince people who won't listen that "well documented" means there have been studies out the wazoo proving masks are effective that you're right, because they don't WANT to believe it. It's disappointing (I'm actually surprised), but there's a time to give up trying. Argument never changes anyone's mind.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: The Sandman
Date: 05 May 21 - 02:10 PM

Jeri it sounds like you are saying everyone who disagrees with you is crazy. Governments have had a year to redesign buildings , redesigm schools and hospitals, do we not pay politicians to govern and have long term plans , instead of which in the uk we have someone who is more concerned about redesigning a house in downing street , than governing responsibly planning to redesign some hospitals and schools to be effctive at spreading viruseses , how long do governments need?
of course its easy for governments to abdicate responsibilty and say everyone will have to wear masks and do nothing in a year to ventilate public buildings, its just passing the buck to the public.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jos
Date: 05 May 21 - 02:21 PM

"governing responsibly planning to redesign some hospitals and schools to be effctive at spreading viruseses"

Leaving aside the delightful typos, wouldn't making hospitals and schools "effective at spreading viruses" be irresponsible?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: The Sandman
Date: 05 May 21 - 02:51 PM

yes, very funny. you understand my point to make hospitals effective at preventing the spreading of viruses.
governments are passing the buck to ordinary people instead of doing their supposed job to protect the people is the job that they are supposed get paid for
if you are more concerned about typos, that reflects on your persona

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 May 21 - 04:05 PM

And, Dick, it appears from their posts that Maggie, Jeri and Mrrzy have swallowed the propaganda from governments making it sound like we're all responsible for this pandemic because we don't wear masks (or because we don't like masks, or because we don't trust masks) hook, line and sinker. Nothing to do with governments' gross incompetence in their mishandling of things, of course, as I've listed several times. "There are numerous studies out there" is more weasel words. There have been no studies, and can't be any studies, that isolate mask-wearing from a number of confounding factors, as I said earlier. That is not unwishful thinking. That is science. Anecdotal "evidence" doesn't get over the high bar required by science. Anyway, my mask is always with me and I comply with all rules. That's what we should be doing, no messing. But we can still discuss masks, can't we.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jack Campin
Date: 05 May 21 - 04:38 PM

Governments have had a year to redesign buildings , redesigm schools and hospitals

I once had a summer job standing up on a mobile scaffold with a glue brush and a roll of tape sealing leaks in the airconditioning ducts of a large glass cube modern hospital (50 years ago, but the design is not very different now). If one minor quality control glitch could give me a job for two months imagine what completely replacing the airflow systems of every glass cube building on earth would take.

It can't be done. But mask wearing is doable

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 May 21 - 05:01 PM

Jaysus, Jack, and here was me thinking that you were only 49...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: The Sandman
Date: 05 May 21 - 05:27 PM

if the nhs had not been deliberately run down and starved of money. it could have been done, mean while field hospitals standing empty.[more government incompetence]
it can be done if the government has the will instead they spend the moneyon other things .
jack when was the last time one fever hospital designed to cope with viruses was built.
we have a pandemic and the government of the uk is like nero fiddling while rome was burning ,
of course new hospitals can be built, but the conservative party has not and will not build them, they have spent billions listed below but not built one virus designed hospital designed specifically for virus pandemics HERE
The government failed to provide transparency when hastily awarding billions of pounds worth of contracts during the covid-19 pandemic, the UK’s public spending watchdog has concluded.

The National Audit Office (NAO) said that the government had failed to provide adequate documentation showing how some key decisions were reached, including why particular suppliers were chosen or how potential conflicts of interest were handled.

Some contracts were awarded after work had already begun, many were not published in the timeframe they should have been, and some conflicts of interest were not disclosed, a report1 by the auditors found.

The investigation into government procurement during the pandemic found that the government awarded over 8600 contracts worth £18bn (€20bn; $24bn) by 31 July, with most of these (£16.2bn worth) awarded by the Department of Health and Social Care and its national bodies.

Contracts totalling £10.5bn have been awarded without a competitive tender process, the NAO found.

Gareth Davies, the head of the NAO, said, “While we recognise that these were exceptional circumstances, it remains essential that decisions are properly documented and made transparent if government is to maintain public trust that taxpayers’ money is being spent appropriately and fairly. The evidence set out in our report shows that these standards of transparency and documentation were not consistently met in the first phase of the pandemic.”

Personal protective equipment (PPE) accounted for 80% of the number of contracts awarded (over 6900 contracts) and 68% of the total value (£12.3bn). The Department of Health and Social Care awarded contracts to 71 suppliers, worth £1.5bn in total, before its process to assess and process offers of support of PPE was standardised, the NAO found. Examples of contracts awarded retrospectively after work had already been carried out included £3.2m to Deloitte to support procurement of PPE on 21 July 2020.

The government also established a “high priority lane” to assess potential PPE sources referred by officials and politicians that were deemed more credible. About one in 10 suppliers processed through the high priority lane (47 out of 493) obtained contracts, compared with less than one in 100 suppliers that came through the ordinary lane (104 of 14?892). The NAO also found that sources of referrals to the high priority lane were not always documented, with one supplier, PestFix, added in error without a referral.

A clear trail of documents to support key procurement decisions was sometimes missing, the auditors said.

The NAO also reported that many of the contracts awarded have not been published in a timely manner. By 10 November 2020, details were still missing for 55% of the 1644 contracts worth more than £25?000 awarded up to the end of July 2020, and only 25% were published within the 90 day target.

If a similar situation arises again, the government should identify and manage potential conflicts of interest and bias earlier in the procurement process and ensure that basic information on contracts are published within 90 days of award, the auditors concluded.

Meg Hillier, chair of the Commons Committee of Public Accounts, said, “Even in an emergency, public procurements need to get the basics right. Clearly, too many didn’t.

“The mistakes revealed by this report are likely to be only the tip of the iceberg.”

This article is made freely available for use in accordance with BMJ's website terms and conditions for the duration of the covid-19 pandemic or until otherwise determined by BMJ. You may use, download and print the article for any lawful, non-commercial purpose (including text and data mining) provided that all copyright notices and trade marks are retained.
https://bmj.com/coronavirus/usage

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jack Campin
Date: 05 May 21 - 05:51 PM

I wasn't just thinking of hospitals. Our local education authority has been replacing old schools (with windows that open, so every classroom was independently ventilated) with big glass boxes sold as "community hubs" and funded by PFI (the Blair/Brown scam). My wife went to Pilates classes in one. The windowless room they got had NO air inlets at all - it just used whatever air flowed through the cracks from neighbouring rooms or in the door when you opened it. If you used it now you'd be inhaling viruses that had drifted the length of the building through at least two other rooms.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 05 May 21 - 09:22 PM

A new problem needs a solution regarding graduating doctors being left out in the cold because of residency requirments. There are not enough residencies to go around.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 08 May 21 - 11:36 AM

NYC is still storing 750 covid vidtims in deeo freeze refridgeration trailers while poorer families are trying ti resov the burials.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 09 May 21 - 09:24 AM

I wonder if Biden's infrastructure plan innvolves virus-proofing hospitals. That would be a great idea.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jack Campin
Date: 11 May 21 - 08:08 AM

Bad news from India:

Mucormycosis

Massive underreporting

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 12 May 21 - 08:34 PM

Are ‘covid nails’ a sign you had the virus? Experts weigh in.

At this point in the pandemic, the coronavirus’s devastating effects on the human body have been well documented. But unusual symptoms that may be connected to the virus continue to crop up, including “covid toes,” “covid tongue” and hair loss.

Now, news reports and social media posts have documented visible changes in the nails of some covid-19 survivors, most commonly in the form of horizontal grooves. Dubbed “COVID nails” by a U.K.-based epidemiologist who tweeted about the markings earlier this month, the anecdotal reports have prompted assertions that it could be a way to tell whether you’ve had the virus.

The changes are a result of "Beau's lines" - “a temporary interruption in the nail growth.”

Twitter post by Tim Spector about "COVID nails" included has some oddball responses.

News reports and social media posts aren't science. Consider this a source of anecdotal coincidences that could lead to something but are more likely to mean nothing.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 May 21 - 08:52 PM

I've had horizontal grooves on my nails for decades.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jack Campin
Date: 13 May 21 - 12:42 AM

Two new outbreaks in Scotland, after the number of new cases had been reduced to near zero.

One at a secondary school in Elgin, the other at a primary school in Midlothian.

Given the much too rapid reduction in precautions in schools across the UK, I expect there will be more.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: The Sandman
Date: 13 May 21 - 05:37 AM

all the more reaon scotland and the uk should be ventilating schools, or even starting to build new schools. building new schools also boosts the economy if you accept keynsian economics

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 13 May 21 - 10:14 PM

Today for the United States, the CDC lifted the mask wearing for fully-vaccinated adults outdoors, indoors, with fully-vaccinated adults. They are still required on rapid transit, in businesses that require masks, when flying, and in health care facilities. They are advised in really crowded buildings, at large sporting events, in mixed-vaccination crowds.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 13 May 21 - 11:59 PM

What is Long COVID and how do you treat it?

It sounds like an incredible number of people are dealing with this.

Although most people who are infected will develop mild or moderate symptoms -- or none at all -- scientists are now researching another way COVID-19 continues to stagger and show up, sometimes for months or even a year.

"Long COVID," also referred to as "Long-Haul COVID or Post-COVID syndrome" is a condition where a person continues to experience symptoms of COVID-19 after their body has cleared the virus. Long COVID is under the umbrella of Post-COVID conditions, which the CDC describes as "new, returning or ongoing health problems" caused by the disease more than a month after infection.

News of potential COVID "long-haulers" in the US has been circulating for more than a year, and experts are still working on collecting data to best assess who's at risk of developing the syndrome. Right now, research suggests even those who have mild cases of COVID-19 can develop Long COVID. One study found that 27% of patients with COVID-19 who hadn't been hospitalized had persisting symptoms, and another found that about 75% of patients who had been hospitalized developed Long COVID.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: The Sandman
Date: 14 May 21 - 01:20 AM

politicians and governments across the world should be looking at long term ways of dealing with this virus . programmes similiar to roosevelts new deal need to be implemented whereby certain numbers of new schools and public buildings are redesigned and built ,so that people in buildings are less liklely to spread the virus

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 14 May 21 - 06:20 AM

In the US THE GARGANTUAN POLIITIZATION OF MASKS IS OVER.
The CDC has lifted the mask mandate!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jack Campin
Date: 14 May 21 - 08:02 AM

An anti-airborne-virus public building programme would risk becoming another Maginot Line - generals preparing for the last war. Climate change means the infrastructure might need to cope with insect-vectored disease, extreme wind storms, snow loading on roofs, flash flooding, forest fires, breaks in transport and communication links from sea level rise and storm surges, breached contaminant stores... the safer option is to hold back on massive investment until we know what we're dealing with.

Better not to destroy what we already have. Ols schools work okay and are flexible to upgrade. It's like trees - old trees soak up far more carbon than young ones; cutting and replanting is always nett destruction.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jeri
Date: 14 May 21 - 10:07 AM

First off, it will take a while for me to feel ok with NOT wearing a mask in public.

The question was asked at the President's news conference (I THINK it was, anyway) about "how do we know if other people not wearing masks have actually been vaccinated?" The answer, to paraphrase, was "it's THEIR problem". If they're vulnerable and want to risk it, they can."
There are some folks who CAN'T be vaccinated, and so could be infected, but they're probably wearing masks.

A big "so what?!" sort of squashes the tendency to mind everyone else's business.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jack Campin
Date: 14 May 21 - 10:21 AM

An article by the German virologist Christian Drosten was circulated a few days ago. His take is that virtually everyone who isn't vaccinated will get it. There is always going to be a large enough core of unvaccinated (and possibly unvaccinatable) people to keep the virus in circulation.

The "core model" was developed as a description of gonorrhoea - the ultra-promiscuous keep it going by playing pass-the-parcel with germs and every so often a bystander gets pulled in. Surprising to see it turn up again with anti-vaxxers playing the role of hookers.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 14 May 21 - 11:29 AM

The wording also said that you should wear a mask in businesses that still require masks. They may have a workforce that is younger and not yet fully vaccinated and want to protect them. Like Jill Biden quipped the other day, she felt naked being in public without the mask. I'll be looping one around my neck to have handy (as I do every morning when I'm getting ready to go out). There are a lot of unvaccinated people here and you can catch the virus after being vaccinated, so I'll err on the side of caution for a while longer.

Jeri, I recently got some fabric for making Pride masks this year. I'll send you some when they're made. (I also have black with music, yellow with chickens, black with dinosaurs, and a bunch of other leftover prints.)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jack Campin
Date: 15 May 21 - 04:22 AM

12 people are responsible for most of the world's Covid misinformation

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 17 May 21 - 09:14 AM

A prudent person is aware that fully vaccinated people are not all immune to all varients for all time.

Certain situations are ideal for infections and therefore make continued use of masks a wise decision.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jack Campin
Date: 17 May 21 - 10:32 AM

I have no personal fears about getting Covid now, as I'm fully vaccinated. But I'm in a minority, so I still wear a mask in indoor public spaces like buses and shops. It sets an example.

We are heading for in Scotland again, with the Indian variant getting imported thanks to the Johnson regime sucking up to Modi and a fascist/unionist riot in Glasgow last weekend spreading it as far as possible from the currently worst affected district in the country. Bottom line is that the British junta is using biological warfare against us. The death toll could well end up higher than what Saddam Hussein inflicted on rebel cities with poison gas.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jack Campin
Date: 18 May 21 - 02:07 PM

Not Donald Trump this time.

Oxygen up your bum

If you're a rat or a pig anyway.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jack Campin
Date: 23 May 21 - 06:30 PM

Johnson stopped English schools from finding out about the risks of the Indian variant:

Guardian article

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: leeneia
Date: 25 May 21 - 05:30 PM

I get a magazine called 'The Week.' It reports that some people have trained honeybees to detect Covid in humans. It remains to be seen if the method is practical.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 25 May 21 - 08:43 PM

Dogs too.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 01 Jun 21 - 12:20 PM

From The Guardian today

"Coronavirus variants are to be named after letters of the Greek alphabet instead of their place of first discovery, the World Health Organization has announced, in a move to avoid stigma."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 01 Jun 21 - 12:47 PM

Stupid idea, winkie wankie wokie nonsense!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jos
Date: 01 Jun 21 - 05:28 PM

Never mind the w-w-wie nonsense or otherwise, a b c d, or alpha beta gamma delta, are MUCH easier to remember.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jack Campin
Date: 02 Jun 21 - 10:16 AM

It's now "variant alpha" but it will always be the Ashford Horror to its friends.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 15 Jun 21 - 03:52 PM

People have been looking into the smell-and-taste connection with Covid-19, and found an interesting relationship between the "supertaster" genetics and likelihood of severe covid. I found one thing on it in todays WashPo health section, but there are surely others.

Blicky.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 15 Jun 21 - 04:09 PM

"Never mind the w-w-wie nonsense or otherwise, a b c d, or alpha beta gamma delta, are MUCH easier to remember."

No it's not. Even our Indian neighbours are not surprised about the Indian variant, they always say how dirty it's become there, no social distancing at all.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 15 Jun 21 - 10:47 PM

Blicky that actually goes to the article, wups

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Jun 21 - 04:41 AM

"Even our Indian neighbours are not surprised about the Indian variant, they always say how dirty it's become there, no social distancing at all."

So-called variants of this virus arise via mutations, and that process has nothing to do with cleanliness or social distancing. I'd remind you that an earlier variant that took the country over arose in Kent. I'm assuming that you don't regard the people of Kent as egregiously filthy rule-breakers...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jos
Date: 16 Jun 21 - 05:57 AM

I was relieved to hear someone yesterday on the radio talking about getting the vaccine "into people" - NOT "into arms". In the whole interview arms were not mentioned.
I am not just an arm. I am a person, free to think, free to act, free to make decisions for myself.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 16 Jun 21 - 08:07 AM

I would imagine there are lockdown rulebreakers everywhere!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 16 Jun 21 - 09:27 AM

Jos:
Yes, the vaccine jabs are going into whole people, not just 'arms'.
Of course, there are other common sites for injections.
Can we assume that for the anti-vax people "injections are not going into arses!"

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 16 Jun 21 - 11:31 AM

Johnson LIED again during PMQs stating that the delta variant did not exist until24th April, so was the patient who was diagnosed wit it on 1st April faking his or her own infection?

Apparently before 24th nobody in India had it either but it was another variant which Johnson called the Kappa variant, and another called the Gamma variant.

This means that up to 24 April, what more than 340,000 people in India was diagnosed with as not the Delta variant but something else. This means that before India was placed on the red list, nobody brought a single case to the UK.

I thought Id put the record straight as Boris Johnson is the planets leading expert on covid, and knows more than the WHO, every country's heath service, every genome mapping laboratory and put together.

Either that, or he could be a LIAR as I suggested earlier, and in that case all tory voter must never be allowed near a polling station ever again.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 Jul 21 - 07:37 PM

So we will not have to wear masks after July 19. Alle-bloody-luja. Masks should never have been forced on us in the first place. The masks that most people wear are dangerous and insanitary. I for one will never wear a mask ever again unless forced to. I suppose I'll have to have keep one in my pocket for a while in case some deranged imbecile insists on my wearing one. I can't bear to see photos of young schoolchildren wearing masks. Completely inhuman. I don't know what the world's coming to when we can force people to hide half their faces, for reasons for which there is no evidence, for fifteen months. The one massive move towards restoring humanity will be to tell people that they can ditch their horrid masks. Bring it on!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 06 Jul 21 - 12:27 AM

Thank dog you weren't in charge of deciding what and wasn't going to save lives during the pandemic. You can be as happy as you want thinking you don't have to wear one again, but don't FOR A MINUTE think they had no significant roll in slowing the spread and saving lives. What you call "torture" much of the world calls freedom from disease.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Jul 21 - 03:51 AM

You can't produce a shred of real evidence that would confirm your assertions.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Jul 21 - 05:40 AM

Incidentally, "what you call 'torture'" sounds like you're quoting me. To my recollection, I haven't said that wearing a mask is torture. Cheers.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 06 Jul 21 - 08:50 AM

Nice to know that antivaxxers will have different rules from sensible folks who have been double vaccinated!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 06 Jul 21 - 10:41 AM

I have stuff to do this morning - maybe later. There is research, Steve, lots of solid research looking at the efficacy of wearing masks during COVID-19. But you won't look, because that would mean you have to question this silly opinion and admit you were wrong when the articles show up. I'd try Google Scholar first, if I were you.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: leeneia
Date: 06 Jul 21 - 11:43 AM

The same woman has been cutting my hair for 15 years. She is sensible and trustworthy. Two weeks ago she told me that her husband has cousins in SW Missouri who are Trumpers and anti-vaxxers. At the time, they had a one-year-old baby in intensive care with Covid.

Was their defiance worth it to them, I wonder?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 06 Jul 21 - 12:54 PM

SRS
I think we're often like his annoying 5th graders.
I can imagine tiny tortures were learned and exchanged for decades in his career. He's bad at admmiting being wrong and desperately claims others are wrong/unscientific in response. Its a waste to spend a shred of time presenting factual evidence or risk assesment factors.

Highly mistaken gripers of our time are Jim Jordan, Rand Paul and Trump. SS is thankfully not even in their league.

On the other hand how embarrassing if Fauci was wrong and SS is right!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Jul 21 - 01:10 PM

I assure you that I do look things up, Maggie. I look for evidence that has to get over a very high bar. As I said, controlled experimental studies are not possible apropos of mask-wearing so the "evidence" is mostly observational and can't account for confounding factors. Laboratory testing of masks, for example, can't replicate the way people put them on, take them off, touch them, reuse them, wear them under their noses or chins or stuff them in their pockets alongside their ten-dollar bills, used tissues and loose change. On top of that, however strongly one wants to advocate mask-wearing, it is impossible to deny that huge numbers of masks are not only worn incorrectly, making many very likely insanitary and dangerous (not only because of Coronavirus), but they also give many people a false sense of security (sure, all observational, but very easy to observe). On that basis, it is not possible to make a good case for mandatory mask-wearing, and it is equally not possible to turn it into a valid moral issue, in my opinion. However, make disposable masks freely available everyone, alongside a public information campaign recommending face coverings, and you would very likely get most people wearing them and not abusing them, abuse which happens when you are forced to wear them and resent it. But I'm not a mask rebel and I never break the rules. I'm just saying what I think. A statement to the effect that "masks saves lives" simply can't be supported with sound evidence, which would clearly need to be numerical and would not need to be mere best-guesses or estimates. Only a controlled large-scale study could safely conclude that, and such a study would be unethical. Sorry if that makes me sound like Mr Spock.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Jul 21 - 01:14 PM

It would be very good if you could actually address substantive points in people's posts, Donuel, rather than making unwitty and unclever little snipes. Think you can manage that? For a change??

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 06 Jul 21 - 01:23 PM

Leenia, I bet that the issue of being a trumper or antivaxxer is NOT the main issue that is important to the Missouri couple. Its the Race issue that reigns over their life. The other little issues pale in comparison even if it raises other risks. Trump is only their current great white hope. Anyone else who could better satisfy their immediate racial concerns and fears could be preferred over Trump. Is it worth their child's illness? No but they were in for a penny, in for a pound.
I say diversity is good for everything and everybody but some can't see it that way because of legacy or poor teaching.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 06 Jul 21 - 01:31 PM

Google Scholar: face masks efficacy during COVID-19 raw results.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 06 Jul 21 - 02:03 PM

The Pfizer is still effective in preventing severe illness from the Delta varient but the effectiveness rating goes down to 90 %.
Non symptomtic Covid contagiousness among the vaccinated is extremely rare. So if a vaccinated parent is carrying non symptomatic Delta even non vaccinated kids are almost never infected.

US asians 80% vaccinated
blacks 30%
overall 68% (the red states still lag behind)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Jul 21 - 06:36 PM

Well, Maggie, you post sources without comment. I've perused some of them and they largely confirm what I've been saying about the evidence: that most of it is observational, that randomised control testing is not possible because of the ethical deficiency of having an "unprotected" control group. Making real-life extrapolations as to efficacy from laboratory testing of various types of masks is not justified. Everything depends on how people use or misuse the masks, and that includes replacing them with clean ones at extremely frequent intervals. That largely does not happen. Just walk around your town and watch what people do. By the way, medical sources, rather than independent scientific sources, have a dog in the fight in that their need, as they see it, to protect their health service takes high priority. Recommending masks, to them, is a way of playing safe and they won't be adopting the same level of objective rigour as independent scientists would do. Now I am not saying that I KNOW that masks don't work (though I THINK that they are next to useless, a very different thing). But I am saying that compelling people to wear masks is in no way justified by scientific evidence, and that governments enforcing mask-wearing are acting beyond morality in my opinion. My view all along has been that the role of governments in this pandemic should have included giving public information, advice and guidance (and free masks). I suggest that a good campaign along those lines would have resulted in a very high level of public compliance, without the potential resentment (and cheating) that enforcement would cause. Neither you nor I can ever know whether doing this, that or the other, or not doing, would cause more deaths, because the alternatives can't be simultaneously tried.   And, one more time, when you force people to wear masks you are forcing 99 people out of a hundred who are harmless to others to do something that is useless for them and useless for others. I can't see how anyone can think that that's right. Advice and persuasion, never coercion.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 07 Jul 21 - 03:30 AM

June 2021 - covid cases 8,000ish per day, PM decides that the time is not right to fully relax public health measures.
July 2021 - 28,000 cases a day, expected to rise to 50,000 by 21 July and 100,000+ by the end of the month, PM decides that public health measures must end whatever the outcome.

Does this mean that the 'science' Johnson has been guided by is a detail analysis of the likely headlines in the popular press. Surely then it makes sense to make murdoch head of the NHS .because as far as the government is concerned he is a worlds leading expert on health.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Jul 21 - 04:45 AM

It's an inconvenience all right. But I think the point that the increase in cases is no longer matched by similar increases in serious illness and death, thanks to the vaccines, is sound. A similarly sound point is in the question, if we don't do it now, when will we do it? Can we really go on like this for ever? If we have to live with the disease, there will always be spikes, as with flu in winter. So let's get everybody vaccinated. Information, advice and vaccination have got to be the way forward in my opinion, not constant resort to repressive restrictions.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 07 Jul 21 - 05:31 AM

We can continue to open-up tourism, retail and hospitality, etc, but relaxing public health measures such as wearing masks, checking into venues with NHS app is downright bizarre, and threatens to undo the benefit of the sacrifices we have made for nearly a year and a half. it is like saying that it should no longer be necessary to wear seatbelts because wearing seatbelts has reduced the number of deaths in road accidents.

Taking half a minute to scan a barcode and use a hand gel dispenser is hardly onerous. Also if people are no longer required to use face coverings on public transport, shouldn't the driver then be held personally liable for people spreading covid in tube/train carriages and on buses?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 07 Jul 21 - 10:42 AM

...... and use a hand gel dispenser is hardly onerous

I always made an effort to find and use the hand-gel each time I went into a shop. Sometimes this meant several applications in one shopping trip. This resulted in my skin drying out and cracking at the side of my finger nails. It was really painful, especially when eating citrus fruit or anything pickled. The solution was to use copious amounts of hand cream when I got home but it took a long time to clear up.

I still use the hand gel but a little more judiciously. If I am shopping round and go into several shops to compare prices without touching anything, I will use it in the first shop then maybe once again later in my tour. I think I am clued up enough to make these decisions for myself.

DC

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 07 Jul 21 - 10:44 AM

Leave it to Steve - he makes irrational statements, I post a link to answers, and he choses to misrepresent the papers in the results. Asking me to prove he's wrong, he's not interested in proving he's correct, he keeps pushing the same tired politically-motivated line.

Well, Maggie, you post sources without comment. I've perused some of them and they largely confirm what I've been saying about the evidence: that most of it is observational, that randomised control testing is not possible because of the ethical deficiency of having an "unprotected" control group. Making real-life extrapolations as to efficacy from laboratory testing of various types of masks is not justified.

BS. Just nonsense. A point made here says that the efficacy of masks can't be taken in isolation - you also need to consider social distancing and handwashing, etc, but given the severity of the pandemic, each is equally important. Here are some abstracts and highlights from the top few papers in that list that came out in 2021:


An evidence review of face masks against COVID-19 January 26, 2021    https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2014564118

Abstract
The science around the use of masks by the public to impede COVID-19 transmission is advancing rapidly. In this narrative review, we develop an analytical framework to examine mask usage, synthesizing the relevant literature to inform multiple areas: population impact, transmission characteristics, source control, wearer protection, sociological considerations, and implementation considerations. A primary route of transmission of COVID-19 is via respiratory particles, and it is known to be transmissible from presymptomatic, paucisymptomatic, and asymptomatic individuals. Reducing disease spread requires two things: limiting contacts of infected individuals via physical distancing and other measures and reducing the transmission probability per contact. The preponderance of evidence indicates that mask wearing reduces transmissibility per contact by reducing transmission of infected respiratory particles in both laboratory and clinical contexts. Public mask wearing is most effective at reducing spread of the virus when compliance is high. Given the current shortages of medical masks, we recommend the adoption of public cloth mask wearing, as an effective form of source control, in conjunction with existing hygiene, distancing, and contact tracing strategies. Because many respiratory particles become smaller due to evaporation, we recommend increasing focus on a previously overlooked aspect of mask usage: mask wearing by infectious people (“source control”) with benefits at the population level, rather than only mask wearing by susceptible people, such as health care workers, with focus on individual outcomes. We recommend that public officials and governments strongly encourage the use of widespread face masks in public, including the use of appropriate regulation.


Face masks against COVID-19: Standards, efficacy, testing and decontamination methods June 2021 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cis.2021.102435

Highlights
• Universal face masking as a low-cost strategy to mitigate virus transmission

• Interdisciplinary systematic review on face masking against COVID-19

• Standards for various face masks and their fundamental filtration mechanisms

• Empirical methods for determining mask integrity and particle filtration efficiency

• Decontamination methods that allow for the reuse of traditionally disposable masks



Why does the spread of COVID-19 vary greatly in different countries? Revealing the efficacy of face masks in epidemic prevention   January 14, 2021   DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0950268821000108

Abstract
The severe acute respiratory syndrome-coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) is highly contagious, and the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic caused by it has forced many countries to adopt ‘lockdown’ measures to prevent the spread of the epidemic through social isolation of citizens. Some countries proposed universal mask wearing as a protection measure of public health to strengthen national prevention efforts and to limit the wider spread of the epidemic. In order to reveal the epidemic prevention efficacy of masks, this paper systematically evaluates the experimental studies of various masks and filter materials, summarises the general characteristics of the filtration efficiency of isolation masks with particle size, and reveals the actual efficacy of masks by combining the volume distribution characteristics of human exhaled droplets with different particle sizes and the SARS-CoV-2 virus load of nasopharynx and throat swabs from patients. The existing measured data show that the filtration efficiency of all kinds of masks for large particles and extra-large droplets is close to 100%. From the perspective of filtering the total number of pathogens discharged in the environment and protecting vulnerable individuals from breathing live viruses, the mask has a higher protective effect. If considering the weighted average filtration efficiency with different particle sizes, the filtration efficiencies of the N95 mask and the ordinary mask are 99.4% and 98.5%, respectively. The mask can avoid releasing active viruses to the environment from the source of infection, thus maximising the protection of vulnerable individuals by reducing the probability of inhaling a virus. Therefore, if the whole society strictly implements the policy of publicly wearing masks, the risk of large-scale spread of the epidemic can be greatly reduced. Compared with the overall cost of social isolation, limited personal freedoms and forced suspension of economic activities, the inconvenience for citizens caused by wearing masks is perfectly acceptable.


This in particular helps because it has a good photo illustration of with and without masks, and types of masks:

Protection From COVID-19: The Efficacy of Face Masks February 5, 2021 doi: 10.3238/arztebl.m2021.0119

Abstract
Background
Since the beginning of 2020 the SARS-CoV-2 virus has spread to nearly every country in the world. The mainly airborne pathogen has led to large numbers of deaths, principally in elderly and vulnerable segments of the population. Protective vaccines have recently become available, but it is not yet clear whether and when population-wide immunity will be achieved. The existence of evidence for the protective effect of masks covering the mouth and nose is a topic of public debate.

Methods
A selective literature search was carried out in PubMed. Data from the German Robert Koch Institute and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention were also taken into account.

Results
When talking, as many as 20 000 droplets ranging in size from 20 to 500 µM are released every second. According to PCR tests, the amount of virus exhaled is highest immediately before the onset of symptoms. No randomized trials have been conducted on the effect of masks covering the mouth and nose. A meta-analysis of 29 studies on infection with SARS-CoV-2, SARS, or MERS revealed that type N-95 masks (corresponding approximately to FFP-2), surgical masks, or similar multilayer cotton masks can greatly reduce the infection risk for the wearers (RR 0.34 [0.26; 0.45], with moderate heterogeneity [I2 = 48%]). Model experiments and case reports suggest that masks covering the mouth and nose afford considerable protection against transmission of SARS-CoV-2 and other airborne diseases by reducing release of and exposure to potentially infectious droplets; in addition, infections that do occur take a milder course. A limitation of the studies analyzed is that in most cases, this effect cannot be viewed in isolation from the protective impact of other measures (distancing, hygiene precautions).

Conclusion
It can plausibly be assumed that consistent use of masks covering the mouth and nose can play an important role in containing the spread of SARS-CoV-2.

Since the outbreak in Wuhan (China) in early 2020, SARS-CoV-2 has spread into a pandemic. The pathogen is mostly transmitted via the respiratory route. It has caused many deaths, especially in older and vulnerable populations. Vaccines have become available recently, but it is not known how quickly vaccinations will help to establish immunity at the population level (1). The most important protective measures against infection with SARS-CoV-2 include:

Adhering to safe minimum distances

Complying with hygiene measures, and

Wearing a face covering over nose and mouth (mask).

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Geoff Wallis
Date: 07 Jul 21 - 02:07 PM

SRS,

Have any of the studies which you've cited/cut-and-pasted from been subject to peer review?

If not, they're speculative and/or advisory with qualifications at best and nugatory at worst.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 07 Jul 21 - 02:56 PM

Maggie, I don't think I was being irrational.by advocating enabling opening up society by continuing with personal preventative measures. We have around 28,000-29,000 new cases per day in UK compared with Czech Republic with around 105-110.

At the same time the UK is talking about charging people for antigen testing in order to discourage people from taking responsibility for public health even further.

It is almost as if johnson has taken trumps place on the dark side.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 07 Jul 21 - 03:28 PM

Now 32,500/day.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 07 Jul 21 - 03:44 PM

Getting information on the pandemic is a bit like living downstream from a dam that is rumored to have a huge crack in it. Instead of asking if the rumor is peer reveiwed you should get your ass up to the dam to see for yourself. If you see a crack with water coming out, get the fuck out. Don't debate, don't hesitate. Its your fate to google Conspiracy or Dr. Fauci or just move upstream.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 07 Jul 21 - 04:18 PM

Geoff Wallis, I am retired from an academic research library where I worked with peer review papers we published for the university. I dig up papers in scholarly sources. Did you follow any of the DOI: numbers to see where they come from? I thought not.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 07 Jul 21 - 04:37 PM

Certain sources like the National Science Foundation have their idiocyncracies. For example while announcing new discoveries some labs are succint but have their hand out for a grant so they have the same three justifications they know the NSF is looking for.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Jul 21 - 06:50 AM

"Leave it to Steve - he makes irrational statements..."

You are not entitled to make offensive remarks (and more than just this one) then delete my carefully-argued responses and regard yourself as fair-minded. You have taken to deleting stuff simply because you don't agree with it. If I'm irrational, you are immature. I've responded to your points about masks without insulting you and, unlike you, I commented on your links. The science regarding masks is not settled, there is room for polite disagreement but you don't want views other than yours to be considered. Please do your job properly.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 08 Jul 21 - 07:50 AM

Steve I am sure you were careful regarding your remarks but again I remind you that in the US it is seen through the lens of ignorant no mask anti vaxxing Trumpists. They are not helping anyone.
On again off again lockdowns are more frustrating imo.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Jul 21 - 08:38 AM

I don't know how many more times I have to tell you that I am not a COVID-denier nor an anti-vaxxer (I was first in the queue for my jabs), that I respect people who wish to continue to wear masks and that I have NOT ONCE broken a mask rule, or any other rule. Never mind seeing things through your US lens (a well-recognised failing of your country). Just read what I say and respond to that, civilly and in a measured fashion. Injections of emotion into debates about the science lose you the argument there and then. I love to be disagreed with but I don't like to be called silly, irrational or the purveyor of bullshit simply because you don't agree with me. And then deleted so that readers of the other point of view can't see what I've said to cause such responses. That's all.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 08 Jul 21 - 01:06 PM

You can suspect all you want, but you're not offering anything other than your own high opinion of yourself.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 08 Jul 21 - 01:20 PM

Enough of one-upping each other. Steve, if something is disputed and an answer is provided, then it doesn't make sense to remove the remark being answered to. In response to your accusation, no, your remarks weren't removed.

I don't know who Geoff Wallis is, but he, I am sure, knows how to use copy and paste to put in a link if it hasn't been made a hot link for him. Unpleasant? It takes one to know one, apparently. Any more speculating about moderation and your posts will be deleted.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Jul 21 - 06:14 PM

You deleted a long and carefully-prepared post of mine, simply because it got your goat because you don't agree with me about masks. Not because I was rude or offensive to you (as you feel free to be with me...), but because, well, you don't agree with me about masks. Because, in some weird way, you think that if I were the world boss I'd be a mass-murderer because I don't think masks are much use and that rigorous science has yet to support mask-wearing. In spite of my repeatedly telling you that I respect anyone who wants to wear masks and that I've been as mask-obedient as anyone you know, even those with haloes over their heads. I can't delete you but you can delete me. Fine. Well I do know Geoff, and, though he doesn't post very often in this section, and though we are far from conspiratorially in league with each other, I can assure you that he is articulate, thoughtful, measured and erudite. As I said, Maggie, please do your job, unpaid though it be, properly.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jeri
Date: 08 Jul 21 - 08:12 PM

I think the chance that this thread will ever prove worth the moderation, or even the time it takes to read it and select what points you want to fight about, is close to zilch.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 08 Jul 21 - 10:07 PM

I don't delete things that I disagree with. I delete things that are extremely rude, that go against the general Mudcat community standards, and the bickering and personal attacks. It used to be a regular thing that posts would disappear from when you hit "send" to when the page reloaded. That still happens on occasion. And I'm starting to see a few double posts that the system used to have all of the time until that glitch was fixed. Maybe it's unfixed.

---

Edited note: The last time you had something deleted on this thread was May 6, when you were duking it out with Donuel.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 08 Jul 21 - 10:15 PM

Justice, understanding and fairness is already in short supply.
When everything is about you, the world feels like there is even less justice, understanding or fairness. The more you repeatedly hector about a minor slight, if there even is one, the less empathy the world will extend. These are things we should have learned in kindergarten. You might think the squeaky wheel gets the oil but sometimes it just heats up, catches fire and destroys itself.

Pfizer recommends a third shot for maximum immunity to Covid.










There feels like there is little understanding

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 08 Jul 21 - 10:24 PM

I'm already seeing prompts to get this year's flu shot, as of July 1. I don't know if it is even in the pharmacy yet.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 09 Jul 21 - 03:42 PM

Covid booster shots are good for seniors who show waning immunity after 6 months. The FDA hasn't any final reccomendations on the booster yet.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jack Campin
Date: 09 Jul 21 - 05:09 PM

Anti-vaxxer'a droop

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Jul 21 - 09:17 AM

I have had the NHS COVID-19 app until now (which alerts you if someone who has tested positive has been hanging around you, detected by Bluetooth on both persons' phones), but I've deleted it. I haven't been "pinged" (i.e., ordered to self-isolate) due to a close COVID contact, but I was ordered to self-isolate for 10 days when I reported a high temperature (which turned out to be the start of a dose of cellulitis). I went for a proper test (not those free ones you can order which are unreliable), which proved negative, so the app then let me off the hook. Well I've had both my jabs now and I really don't want to know any more if an infected person has been near me, and I certainly don't want to be told to lock myself away for 10 days. The government is thinking of tinkering with the app to make it "less sensitive," in an attempt to stop people from deleting it. I mean, for chrissake...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 10 Jul 21 - 11:43 AM

The Delta variant is becoming the most prominent in many US communities now, and it's beginning to sound like those places are having to cycle through the hyper-vigilant activities (distance, masks, staying out-of-doors). I haven't heard of any shut downs so far.

That ED side effect was discussed on the news but I can't find it on the site that I think carried it. It points to the long term vascular problems associated with COVID-19. I guess you couldn't call this a part of "long COVID," though. Just thinking out loud. . .

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jos
Date: 10 Jul 21 - 03:06 PM

I haven't got the NHS app, and I haven't got a 'smart' phone so I couldn't have it anyway. My phone is a means of communication, not a means of control.

I am particularly concerned by suggestions that people might not be allowed into bars and restaurants (or theatres, concerts etc.) without having the app in order to prove they have been vaccinated. Supposedly, this would be a measure to encourage young people to get vaccinated. The real effect would be to force many people to have a smartphone and an app, through which their whereabouts and even some of their behaviour could be traked and traced.

Maybe I am being paranoid. But then again, maybe they really are out to get me along with the rest of us.

In any case, by the time I had paid for the smartphone, I would have spent the money that I could have used going to the pub, eating out or going to a concert, so I am NOT going to do it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 10 Jul 21 - 04:14 PM

Fortunately I don't get offended by blasphemy, but . . .
I have had the NHS COVID-19 app until now (which alerts you if someone who has tested positive has been hanging around you, detected by Bluetooth on both persons' phones), but I've deleted it. I haven't been "pinged" (i.e., ordered to self-isolate) due to a close COVID contact, but I was ordered to self-isolate for 10 days when I reported a high temperature (which turned out to be the start of a dose of cellulitis). I went for a proper test (not those free ones you can order which are unreliable), which proved negative, so the app then let me off the hook. Well I've had both my jabs now and I really don't want to know any more if an infected person has been near me, and I certainly don't want to be told to lock myself away for 10 days. The government is thinking of tinkering with the app to make it "less sensitive," in an attempt to stop people from deleting it. I mean, for chrissake...

I'm guessing that "for chrissake" is intended to mean "For Christ's sake".
Someone who claims to be totally atheist should not use this expression!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 10 Jul 21 - 05:10 PM

”I'm guessing that "for chrissake" is intended to mean "For Christ's sake".
Someone who claims to be totally atheist should not use this expression!”

It’s a strange phenomenon, Nigel. I have a rabidly-ætheist friend who frequently appeals to “Baby Jesus, forgive me!”. Weird or what?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jos
Date: 10 Jul 21 - 05:37 PM

I believe 'Goodbye', which atheists might use without a second thought, means 'God be with you'. To be more secular, one could say 'Fare well', but somehow that has an air of finality about it, as if you are not going to meet again.
But at least 'God be with you' doesn't specify which god you mean (unlike references to 'Baby Jesus').

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Jul 21 - 05:41 PM

Just like Richard Dawkins, I have never claimed to be a "total atheist." Anyways, that's a bit off-topic as it happens... By the way, Nigel, blasphemy me arse!

I may have deleted the NHS COVID-19 app, but I still have the regular NHS app, with which I can order my prescriptions, etc., and that one contains my vaccination history, so I can show anyone who wants to know that I've had two jabs.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 10 Jul 21 - 07:49 PM

Swearing is swearing. I'm an atheist also, and don't worry about the origins of many of the curse words in use today.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Jul 21 - 07:58 PM

Thank God for atheism is all I can say...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jos
Date: 11 Jul 21 - 02:37 AM

To be on topic – it seems you can catch two variants of covid at the same time. Only one recorded case so far, but not everyone's infection gets tested, so it's possibly more common.

On swearing, I remember a very self-righteous neighbour complaining about the language she had heard in the street, saying:
"I was so shocked. I have never heard such language before in my life, and I don't know what those words mean!"

Yeah ... right.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 11 Jul 21 - 10:48 AM

It is legal and appropriate for Steve to get a booster vaccine as soon as now. But we still have a delay over here.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 11 Jul 21 - 11:05 AM

No it isn't. And I only had my second jab six weeks ago.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 11 Jul 21 - 11:14 AM

We're we're time last week that the legal requirement to wear masks would end on the 19th. We were told that we are "expected" to wear masks after the 19th. This government knows not its arse from its elbow. More to come...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 12 Jul 21 - 04:49 AM

The Government makes as much sense as that last post ;)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Jul 21 - 05:24 AM

Nigel, I corrected it, the corrected version DID appear here, but someone deleted it and left the "wrong" version in place! It should have started "We were told last week..."

---

Mea culpa. Tried to put the correction on the right part of the statement. Sorry. ---mudelf

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 14 Jul 21 - 10:47 AM

I correctly deduced that anyway.
Tennesee has banned outreach and information promotion on all vaccines.
That'll learn em.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 14 Jul 21 - 09:47 PM

Starting with Missouri the outbreaks are in crises and have maxed out care. Secret vaccines are being offered since vaccination is so unpopular there. This time would qualify as a massive global second wave.
2 more to go is my guess.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 16 Jul 21 - 07:41 AM

https://www.theonion.com/what-to-know-about-the-delta-covid-variant-1847213234

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 16 Jul 21 - 08:57 AM

Steven Colbert on global Covid news

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 16 Jul 21 - 11:23 AM

From that Onion piece:

Q: What should we do to curb its spread?
A: All the same things we haven’t been doing.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 16 Jul 21 - 11:25 AM

something lighter - Competition challenges Sydneysiders to recreate artworks during lockdown

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 16 Jul 21 - 11:31 AM

Sandra, I've always loved the photos of people recreating famous paintings. These are very clever and you know they kept the kids entertained and connected for the time it took to consider which work and then to stage it. (And this is shared to my Facebook friends!)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 16 Jul 21 - 02:32 PM

cool

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: robomatic
Date: 16 Jul 21 - 06:16 PM

Apparently the subject of the top 12 main sources of misinformation on vaccines and Covid came up in today's (Friday 20210716) White House Press briefing and the FOX interlocutor pretty much accused the White House of spying on these people's social sites, unaware that much has already been made public about these internet liars.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 16 Jul 21 - 09:12 PM

thanks, stilly

Sydney's covid outbreak

Australia's vaccination "stroll-out"

Percentage of the population fully vaccinated by country we're at the bottom, 40th in the list with Iceland at 73.89%, Australia at 10.11%

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 19 Jul 21 - 06:49 AM

Writ large is the phrase thats writ large today. Everyone's getting infected with the Delta variant writ large. Delta is more contagious writ large. But anti vaxers are blind to whats writ large. The most absurd little big lies are writ large for them. Olympic money makers will not attemd. Facebook executives are in quarantine. Politicians get vaccine in secret. Writ large are the lies of yesterday that discourage common sense today. 99% of all the new tomb stones from Delta Covid are of the cult of the antivaxers. The USA has an embarrassment of riches that greedily bought all the vaccines so the world has very little for a priviledged few. Now the cure goes to waste while the crazies wait. People die as the world waits.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 19 Jul 21 - 07:45 AM

There could be vaccine
for all the world's nations
unless deadlier new mutations
have another trick in their bag.

I do not think virus can think

but the flu was the big loser last year.
Will it get stronger in retaliation
is something thats not very clear.
But it won't matter whatever your flag.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Jul 21 - 07:26 PM

Well yesterday was Freedom Day. So this morning I went to the funeral of a dear friend at a local village church in searing heat. There was plenty of room in there. Everyone was wearing a mask, but, in view of the oppressive heat and the prospect of 45 minutes suffering with my sinuses, I quickly removed my mask. Five minutes after that, two of our erstwhile friends, who are COVID deniers, swanned in without masks. So that made three of us. Once the service had started, the vicar (Doug - we go back an awful long way, Doug and me...) invited us to wear masks but said it was up to us. A few minutes after that, it was time for the first hymn. Doug told us all we could take off our masks to sing. Well, well, I thought. You sit there being all quiet with masks on, then you take them off to do some superspreading singing...

By the time we got to the second-last hymn, around half of the people in church hadn't bothered to put their masks back on. I hope that this will be the way things go from now on. There's always a mask in my pocket, and I wish it a long and interrupted sojourn therein... It was a lovely, heartwarming funeral, by the way.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: robomatic
Date: 20 Jul 21 - 10:32 PM

My sympathies for your loss. My religious community has yet to get together in the concrete and I've lost track of where they meet in the abstract (online).

When I go out up to maybe a quarter of the folks I see are wearing masks. Our community is officially not required to wear them, but many establishments have a sign that they want them warn by the uninoculated. We're getting news that most of the new cases are among those who did not get the jab and I won't be surprised if there is a return to more mask wearing.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Jul 21 - 04:19 AM

"Long and interrupted" started off as "long, uninterrupted..."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 21 Jul 21 - 07:19 AM

There is talk of a Marshall Plan for the US to vaccinate the world.

Shall we go alphabetically or Allies first?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 22 Jul 21 - 05:08 AM

Here in the Land of Oz we've had a vaccine "stroll-out" "run" by our federal government (our Prime Minister is/was a proud friend of Trump!)

In a recent report Australia was 40th (the lowest) in % of population vaccinated.

When the Govt finally decided to create ads encouraging vaccination, they were so so inept they were ridiculed, so other organisations made their own ‘We wanted a vaccine ad based on hope’: arts and community sector PSAs fill government ‘vacuum’ After the heavily criticised federal fear-based campaign, two new Covid ads made on shoestring budgets are getting thousands of shares

PSAs??? = Public service ads as opposed to commissioned ads, advertising agency work

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 22 Jul 21 - 06:27 AM

Book of the week on BBC Radio 4 is Vaxxers by Professor Sarah Gilbert and Dr. Catherine Green.

The gripping inside story of the making of the Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine. Read by Samantha Bond and Debra Baker.

Book of the week - Vaxxers

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Allan Conn
Date: 22 Jul 21 - 04:59 PM

Crossed the border today to go to Berwick in Northumberland. Northumberland has infection rates about 3 times of the rate here in the Borders plus of course masks are not compulsory there now. So I was wondering what Tesco would be like. We still have to be wary as although my wife is double vaccinated she has an impaired immune system so regarded as vulnerable. I was surprised though because every single customer in Tesco appeared to be still wearing masks.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 Jul 21 - 05:22 PM

I've shopped in four different supermarkets yesterday and today. Yesterday in Morrisons, about a quarter of shoppers were not wearing masks (unlike me...). Today in Truro Tesco, at least a third of shoppers were unmasked (I was one of them). in Sainsburys it was about one in four. In M&S, the same. I haven't worn a mask today. There has been no issue in any shop, and the signs at the entrances make it clear that it's now a personal choice. I have a new mask in my pocket and will always respect direct and polite requests to don it, but, by a couple of weeks' time, I'm hoping to ditch it and to never see a bloody mask ever again.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the US Delta COVID
From: Donuel
Date: 22 Jul 21 - 06:05 PM

The Delta wave should peak in October without changing current behavior.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Allan Conn
Date: 22 Jul 21 - 06:06 PM

I must admit I was surprised that no-one seemed to be mask less. Wonder why the difference?? I suppose levels of infection might make a difference. Northumberland has way above average infection rates whereas Cornwall is a bit below average. Plus I suppose much of Berwick's hinterland is Scottish. So masks are not just heavily encouraged here it is the law too. Not going to change behaviour just because the shop is in England. I suppose the fewer folk there are not wearing masks then the more likely one is to keep it on. Still amazed everyone was donning them though.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 Jul 21 - 06:35 PM

Well Cornwall has a fairly high level of cases and there are droves of holidaymakers here already. You can hardly bloody move on our roads. But I honestly don't give a flying shite. I've had two jabs and if I'm a threat to anyone it's a bloody small threat compared to that posed by unvaccinated clubbers and unvaccinated school kids. So sod it, no more bloody masks for me.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 23 Jul 21 - 06:56 AM

Cliff driving is putting stress on many State resources to recover and treat the victims of cliff driving. Cliff driving advocates say they prefer dangerous freedoms to safe mandates. The Mayor of Withering View Georgia says he will nix any moves to ban cliff driving but at the same time do not expect any ambulance or hospital care.
Now that many children are perishing inside SUV's that take the 'plunge' it is surprising that the fatality numbers are still going up.
The anti cliff driving folks blame a lack of common sense that drives people to kill ones self and others. Bill Barnone, a cliff driver survivor and internet influencer says on Facebook "You can die from safe driving. There is nothing like driving over a cliff. I don't give a flying shit".

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 23 Jul 21 - 08:45 AM

Some things are hard to believe.

An Australian activewear firm has been fined £2.6m (5m Australian dollars) for claiming its clothing "eliminated" and stopped the spread of Covid.

Lorna Jane had advertised that its clothing used "a groundbreaking technology" called LJ Shield to prevent the "transferal of all pathogens".

BBC News

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 23 Jul 21 - 09:04 AM

If you are vaccinated but get a breakthrough Delta infection, will you make more Covid antibodies?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Jul 21 - 10:11 AM

I take it that you equate driving off a cliff with removing my mask. If so, contemplate for a moment what a truly brainless analogy that is.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Allan Conn
Date: 23 Jul 21 - 11:08 AM

When we were at Berwick yesterday there was a massive cruise ship anchored off the shore and passengers were being ferried into Berwick to then be put on buses for excursions. Cruises would normally go up the Forth for Edinburgh and often bus excursions come down to my home town of Kelso. It seems that there was no stop between Liverpool and Newcastle because they are currently banned from coming to Scotland because of the covid restrictions so Berwick was added. It turns out though that the bus excursions were still coming into Scotland - just from an English port. The destinations were St Abbs, Coldstream and Kelso. I thought that was a bit cheeky of the organisers but seemingly there were in the rules as long as the groups kept to their bubbles and did not enter any premises. Saying that you'd think the organisers would have had the gumption to change the excursions to Alnwick and Lindisfarne. At least folk would have been able to get a cup of tea.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Jul 21 - 07:53 PM

Nuttin to do wit you Steve. I think responsible folks should weigh conditions and circumstances for mask wearing.
As for vaccine deniers they are either fickle or fatal to others.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Jul 21 - 08:08 PM

What does increase transmissability is singing in crowds indoors.

All things being equal - they aren't :"(

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 24 Jul 21 - 08:15 PM

You lost your courage there, didn't you, Donuel. Shame.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Jul 21 - 08:35 PM

You've convinced me that pfr has more common sense.
Enjoy your weekend.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 25 Jul 21 - 11:45 PM

here in Greater Sydney we're in lockdown, but we also have "Freedom marches" where up to 4000 people marched down the main streets of Sydney, shoulder to shoulder, not a mask in sight. Sydney Covid crisis could take months to recede Similar marches were held in other cities,

On a lighter note, here's a comment heard on the radio this morning - There aren't enough villages for the idiots we produce.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 27 Jul 21 - 07:43 AM

From The Observer newspaper.

Jeremy Farrar is the director of the Wellcome Trust, a former professor of tropical medicine at the University of Oxford and a member of the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage). He has just published his account of the Covid crisis – Spike: The Virus v the People - in which he attacks the government for delaying a lockdown last autumn and describes the scientific and medical efforts that went into combating the pandemic.

Jeremy Farrar Q & A






Spike: The Virus v the People: The Inside Story
By Jeremy Farrar with Anjana Ahuja

Observer review

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 28 Jul 21 - 09:18 AM

Why Is Covid Testing Down So Much?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 01 Aug 21 - 09:20 AM

We sure are living in strange times


From the BBC website

YouTube has barred Sky News Australia from uploading new content for a week, saying it had breached rules on spreading Covid-19 misinformation.

It issued a "strike" under its three-strike policy, the last of which means permanent removal.

YouTube did not point to specific items but said it opposed material that "could cause real-world harm".

The TV channel's digital editor said the decision was a disturbing attack on the ability to think freely.

Sky News Australia barred for week by Youtube

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 01 Aug 21 - 10:33 AM

Pfizer and Moderna raise prices of Covid jabs for EU, reports say

Pfizer Inc and Moderna Inc have raised the prices of its Covid-19 vaccine in the latest European Union supply contracts, The Financial Times reported on Sunday.

The new price for the Pfizer shot was 19.50 euros (£16.64) against 15.50 euros (£13.22) previously, the newspaper said citing to the portions of the contracts seen.

The price of a Moderna vaccine was $25.50 (£18.33) a dose, the contracts show, up from 19 euros (£16.21) in the first procurement deal but lower than the previously agreed $28.50 (£20.49) because the order had grown, the report said, citing one official close to the matter.

The Guardian

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 02 Aug 21 - 02:33 AM

Encouraging news on the BBC this morning. I might even think about taking a train up north to London in the next few weeks.


Tests have found no traces of Covid-19 in swabs and air samples of four major railway stations and intercity train services, Network Rail has said.

Two lots of testing took place at London Euston, Birmingham New Street, Liverpool Lime Street and Manchester Piccadilly station.

Heavily touched areas such as escalator handles were swabbed, while hour-long air samples checked for airborne virus.

Tests were repeated on trains running between the stations.

No Covid traces found in railway stations or trains

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 02 Aug 21 - 05:25 AM

Just for a bit longer I'm not going into pubs, theatres or open-plan restaurants and I won't be going on buses or trains (I'm lucky - I don't have to). I don't wear a mask any more unless I'm asked to in person. So far, that's happened in Specsavers and in the minor injuries unit in our local cottage hospital (idiotically, I scalded my arm reaching over a boiling kettle...). I still keep one about my person.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 03 Aug 21 - 08:25 AM

https://robinsonlab.cellbio.jhmi.edu/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/SciAm_2021_07.pdf


scroll down to 30 - 39 to read Life new and improved regarding artificial protein vaccines that makes the impossible possible.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 03 Aug 21 - 09:44 PM

I am back to wearing a mask indoors. Just in case.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 04 Aug 21 - 07:39 PM

If Louisiana was a separate country it would have the highest infection rate in the world. If Florida were its own nation it would be 4th in global infection rates.

Texas and Florida infections amount to 1/3 of new US Delta infections.
The Florida Govenor Santis has handcuffed local and State schools from any mask wearing mandates. While he is at it I suggest he bans seatbelts, airbags, gun safeties, FDA testing and all laws regarding explosives to maximize freedom for his base. But seriously, half of the no vaxers still consider the vaccine more dangerous than Covid.

"There is no cure for stupid"
quote: Larry the Cable Guy

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 04 Aug 21 - 07:45 PM

Not enough prominent anti vax/mask activist fukwits are dying..

Or they are, but their deaths are being witheld from mainstream news coverage...?????

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 04 Aug 21 - 08:02 PM

.. though there could be another explanation...???

anti-vaxxers visiting ER and 'secretly' getting vaccinated

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 04 Aug 21 - 09:18 PM

oh go on then.. here's another...


This plumbs new depths of stupid.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 05 Aug 21 - 05:00 PM

The fukwits may think their ranks can only be diminished by 1% but it can rise much higher with Delta so pfr has an interesting point.
Darwin awards are in order.

By the way pfr is radical but too level headed to be a punk anymore. Punks act certain ways: They're loud and angry, or else they're arty and clever. They yell and make unpleasant noises and put safety pins through their bodies and belongings. And you...well, sorry, but you're actually pretty normal. You don't have a schoolboy voice and you'd feel stupid spiking your hair or pulling on bondage trousers. The punks sneer at most everything that came before them, but your sneer doesn't show much at all in text, and you certainly don't see any reason to stop loving the Kinks and Syd Barrett. Truth is, you are too old to be a punk-- so what are you going to do? Quit the squit? Or be hard core folk on your rocker :}.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 05 Aug 21 - 11:21 PM

The US will announce its strategy to provide a booster shot for citizens in 30 days. If you have two shots already it may take until 2022 to bet your booster. It may even be tailored for the Delta variant.
Of course the WHO is asking to curb those efforts and give the vaccines to the world instead.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 06 Aug 21 - 10:06 AM

I believe responsible folks should weigh conditions and circumstances for mask wearing.
The problem is that self centered judgmental people falsely believe they are respondsible.
We are now dealing with the Delta variant and should be on a war footing again and wear masks indoors. Yes we had a brief breather but that is over now. You are not just protecting yourself and the elderly but also the young and children. Its doing our part.

Global Policy such as exporting the manufacture of vaccine will also slow the progress of variants since only 1% of poor nations are vaccinated.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Aug 21 - 10:35 AM

You wear a mask if you want to but there's no need to preach to anyone else about it. I respect your desire to wear a mask but it doesn't give you the right to pontificate to other people. The things you claim for masks can't be supported by evidence.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 06 Aug 21 - 12:45 PM

Spake Steve Shaw, nonpontificatingly.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 06 Aug 21 - 02:17 PM

I believe responsible folks should weigh conditions and circumstances for mask wearing.
The problem is that self centered judgmental people falsely believe they are respondsible.

I accept that the use of language may be different in US. But the above statements may need clarification. 'Responsible' is one of those words which can be read in two conflicting ways.
The person who causes a problem may be responsible for it. The person who avoids causing a problem can do so by acting in a responsible manner.
Please act responsibly by making your meaning clear ;)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Aug 21 - 03:36 PM

Right, Mrrzy, so you're a mask person. I can respect that. I said just that, remember? So how am I pontificating? I challenged the advocacy for masks over its lack of evidence. If you have such evidence, real evidence, let's be having it. Sideswipes don't cut it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 06 Aug 21 - 06:12 PM

Nigel you are invariably right and almost hysterically funny.

God damn the preacher man

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 06 Aug 21 - 06:28 PM

Since I would prefer to have a booster instead of offering a stranger a vaccine in Timbuktoo I too am self centered. :=[

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Aug 21 - 06:28 AM

Given the will we can do both.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 07 Aug 21 - 07:39 AM

There is the problem of a lack of vaccine production facilities around the world. That is something that needs to be looked at as soon as possible. We do not want to be facing the same problem when we have the next pandemic.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: mayomick
Date: 07 Aug 21 - 08:56 AM

The impact of long covid on cognitive function is often overlooked by media reports. The more severe the disease, it seems , the greater effect the disease will have on things like IQ ,reasoning, problem solving, spatial planning .
According to a Lancet article published last month, “people who
recovered from COVID-19, including those no longer reporting symptoms, exhibited significant cognitive deficits ." The report noted that
“score reduction for the hospitalised with ventilator sub-group was greater than the average 10-year decline in global performance between the ages of 20 to 70 within this dataset. It was larger than the mean deficit of 480 people who indicated they had previously suffered a stroke.”
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/eclinm/article/PIIS2589-5370(21)00324-2/fulltext

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 07 Aug 21 - 10:12 AM

AND that could lead to long term care ...so...
Should the unvaccinated pay more for health insurance?
I think so.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Aug 21 - 06:37 PM

Should the obese pay more for diabetes treatment? Should smokers pay more for lung cancer treatment? Should boozers pay more for liver transplants?

The answer is no, if you regard your country as civilised.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 09 Aug 21 - 06:13 AM

Voluntary risky behavior is penalized by insurance companies.
There is a big difference between; age we can do nothing about and cigarette smoking, choosing the vaccine and refusing the vaccine.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 09 Aug 21 - 09:26 AM

Delta 88
is not you grandfather's old mobile Corona
virus.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 09 Aug 21 - 06:02 PM

We are living in strange times.

From The Guardian newspaper.

Confused anti-vaccine protesters stormed what they thought was a major BBC building on Monday, apparently unaware the corporation largely moved out almost a decade ago.

Rather than target the BBC’s news operation, which they hold responsible for promoting Covid-19 vaccines, a handful of protesters gained access to Television Centre in west London, which is now predominantly rented by ITV to film its daytime shows such as Good Morning Britain and This Morning.

Full story here

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 09 Aug 21 - 08:02 PM

confusion reigns.


A headline article says 'man didn't believe in covid' & left Sydney which is in lockdown & travelled to a covid-free regional area to inspect property so 4 local government areas are now in lockdown.

... The infected man was reported to have been travelling with two relatives and had not been wearing a mask, socially distancing or checking in to venues using QR codes, according to Byron Bay Mayor Michael Lyon. Mr Lyon said he had been told the man had waited until he was sick before going to hospital. "I've heard he didn't believe in the virus. From what I understand, he is not cooperating," he said ...

covid doesn't worry if folks don't believe in it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 10 Aug 21 - 07:26 AM

Global warming deniers, Fire deniers, antivaxers and Mask deniers can be found right here in this thread. Often with great frequency, if you haven't noticed. Its a mixed bag but arrogance, ego and narcissism is a human trait. You can call it strange times but my POV was and is business as usual. One member reminds me of gentleman Senator Ron Paul.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 10 Aug 21 - 08:03 AM

My quest has been to be honest while not losing a sense of humor.
I do not hope to panic folks but having studied the 3rd Reich perhaps more than the average person I have to conclude 'There is no bottom to human nature'.
The thin veneer of civilization is not as deep as people think.
It is no more than the onion skin thickness of our atmosphere.
Where we are today, there is no 'away'
there is no 'bottom' we can fathom.
Donuel

"Mistakes?
I've had a few
but then again
too few to mention."
Frank Sinatra :

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 10 Aug 21 - 09:26 AM

"Mistakes?
I've had a few
but then again
too few to mention."
Frank Sinatra :

Talking of 'mistakes', you can't get away with misquoting lyrics on a music site:
"Regrets, I've had a few"
And while it was sung by Sinatra, the words aren't his:
Songwriters: Claude Francois / Gilles Thibaut / Jacques Revaux / Paul Anka

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 10 Aug 21 - 09:48 AM

Another one bites the dust after claiming vaccines and COVID are a hoax.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 10 Aug 21 - 10:13 AM

SRS: I can't get that page, I get a notification:
This site is currently unavailable to visitors from the European Economic Area while we work to ensure your data is protected in accordance with applicable EU laws.

It seems that although they are a "News channel" they have yet to catch up on the fact that UK is not part of the EEA, nor governed by EU laws.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 10 Aug 21 - 11:09 AM

Nigel you are my fav pedantic literalist.
I know Sinatra didn't write the American Songbook lyrics.
I know you know that.

Deniers are criers in the end.
They made claims they can't defend.
When its way too late they want vaccine.
When told no their last words, are obscene.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Aug 21 - 04:13 PM

Nigel, Donuel has long needed to make accuracy, whether in reporting science or in quoting people, part of his "quest," a target as yet unfulfilled. That's the second time in a few days he's been picked up for blatant misquoting. Donuel, there is nothing pedantic about efforts to correct your egregious misquotes. Just try to get it right first time.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 11 Aug 21 - 12:22 PM

Pleeeease wear an N-95 mask for your protection. Not cloth or paper.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 11 Aug 21 - 05:22 PM

From the latest issue of Private Eye.

A cartoon about mask wearing.

Private Eye

Subject: RE: BS: systemic challenges of the pandemic
From: Donuel
Date: 12 Aug 21 - 10:10 AM

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK221522/


M&M's are back. Mobile morgues are back in business.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: robomatic
Date: 12 Aug 21 - 09:10 PM

I've started masking again. I see more people of all ages doing it indoor public areas. Outdoors I do not mask. The State is not requiring it and the municipality just elected a pro-business type who is also a vax agnostic (believes its up to the individual and is himself unvaccinated).

To me it's like being in a leaky lifeboat with bailing optional.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 13 Aug 21 - 03:55 AM

I agree wholeheartedly with you Steve. We are both double-vaccinated and would gratefully accept any booster or anti-Delta vaccine offered perhaps in the autumn.
Being vaccinated protects oneself but also others, and prevents yet another case being admitted to hospital in need of ventilation.
The thing is, I have always been convinced that vaccines are a Good Thing. As a youngster, I was only too pleased to be vaccinated/immunised against smallpox, polio, TB and anything else on offer. Also, travelling around Africa as I have done, thank goodness for the yellow fever jab, not to mention meningitis, typhoid, cholera jabs etc etc etc. I've had 'em all! I've swallowed dozens of anti-malarials too (Malarone). I'd probably be dead if I hadn't.
I have never had serious jab side-effects except for the first yellow fever one.
We are still wearing masks in supermarkets, and surreptitiously social distancing. But I understand that some people find mask-wearing very difficult.
Look, my poor sister is still struggling with long Covid (eighteen months now!) although she is improving slowly. If you knew what she has been through, you'd have any jab going. (She got Covid at the very start, before jabs were available)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 13 Aug 21 - 06:40 AM

If masks are not compulsory we should fully respect people's wishes to not wear them. I was asked to don my mask in our medical centre and I complied cheerfully. I do wear a mask in our tiny village shop because the lady who runs it, who we've known for years, always wears one and we have to stand very close in there. I think that comes under the heading of just being respectful of people's feelings of vulnerability. I went into a big bike shop the other day and the chap immediately demanded that I donned a mask. When I told him I didn't have one with me he tried to usher me to the door and said we could chat outside. Well he doesn't have to let me in his shop and I don't have to buy his stuff. Fine by me.

I don't feel the same at all about people who refuse the vaccine. Vaccines are THE way out of this. We can all wear masks for ever more and the thing will never go away. My whole face is a big part of my humanity and, unless I'm ordered otherwise by the law, the world can see it. All of it, thanks. But vaccine-refusers don't get my respect at all.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 13 Aug 21 - 10:20 AM

Masks may or may not be effective protection...???

But short of personal hermetically sealed full face bio-hazard helmets,
they are the only meagre defense most of us have readily available...

But even if they are a useless placebo,
they do serve a valuable purpose
as a visible social symbol that wearers respect their own life,
and the lives of neighbours and total strangers...!!!!!

I see maskless strangers on trains and in shops,
and am automatically wary of them.

On face value, they are in my estimation
demonstrating callous selfish contempt for me and all others
in their vicinity...

My opinion of them is probably true for the greater majority.
I reserve my apologies for the tiny minority who are unable to mask up for genuine health reasons.....

btw.. I absolutely detest the discomfort of mask wearing.
But it is my decision to endure it out of respect for other people..

.. and a tiny petty futile protest that a bloke who looks like me,
easily mistaken for an old right wing street thug,
will defiantly mask up in a small west country town of tory voting anti-mask right wing street thugs...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 13 Aug 21 - 10:25 AM

"But it is my decision to endure it out of respect for other people.."


.. and obviously for my own self preservation..

if a properly worn mask provides even minimal protection...???

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 13 Aug 21 - 11:16 AM

Sometime last year I saw a cartoon - unmasked bloke ranting, masked bloke holds out his hand & says "Your rights stop at my nasal passages"

Most of us are masked & follow instructions/health orders.

Sydney & large parts of Australia are in lockdown as delta is running riot in the land of Oz & of course the immortals, the Freedom fans, the nutters & the selfish don't care!

Some people are defiantly travelling about trailing covids & infecting country regions which have not had infections before. This bloke is now in a small regional hospital as are his 2 teenage children who he took with him on his trip, all unmasked, all in hospital.

Others are refusing to wear masks or follow health instructions/orders. QR codes are used everywhere to sign in to shops & businesses, but the newest news is fake QR codes. Hold phone up at code, click & walk thru ...

Freedom's just another word for nothin' left to lose
Nothin', it ain't nothin' honey, if it ain't free ...'

sandra

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 13 Aug 21 - 12:10 PM

I give respect to pfr. It helps giving respect if you ever want to expect respect. Good thing I don't expect a thing. I hate masks, but I bear it and wear it. Its more than a small sacrifice.

The people I saw on my tour were reluctant to ever go back to masking.
The mutant variant is killing kids as young as 3 weeks.

The mutant variant of the Reptillian invasion of humanity I thought was the flying spaghetti monster but Q and others are doubling down on the reptiles.

I wish the antivaxers here knew that General George Washington demanded everyone in his army was vaccinated against small pox.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: keberoxu
Date: 13 Aug 21 - 01:23 PM

erm, sorry to ask, Sandra, but
what "bloke' ?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 13 Aug 21 - 03:23 PM

Wearing masks and social distancing had the added benefit over the last year of reducing and almost eliminating many childhood seasonal illnesses, and the converse is true. As soon as the mask wearing decreased, some of those childhood illnesses returned with a vengeance.

Texas children and children’s hospitals are under siege from two viruses: RSV and COVID-19

More children are being treated in Texas hospitals for COVID-19 than ever before, and an unseasonable outbreak of respiratory syncytial virus is adding to the stress on children’s hospitals.

More children are being treated in Texas hospitals for COVID-19 than ever before. But there’s a second factor that is putting pediatric hospitals on the path to being overwhelmed: an unseasonable outbreak of respiratory syncytial virus, or RSV, a highly contagious virus that can require hospitalization mostly among children 5 years and younger and especially infants.

During the last year, RSV was largely dormant, which experts believe was due to people masking up during the pandemic. Now, in just the last several weeks, thousands of Texas children have tested positive for the virus.

In addition, the delta variant of COVID-19 appears to affect unvaccinated children more often than previous variants. It’s unclear if children are also becoming sicker from it than from other variants of COVID-19. And with the regular flu season approaching, medical experts are concerned over how hospital capacity could be affected.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 13 Aug 21 - 03:27 PM

It's Time To Up Your Mask Game (updated from February 2021).

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 13 Aug 21 - 04:49 PM

I don't know what happened there. There was definitely text there when I previewed the post but it disappeared when I pressed submit!

Let's have another go.


I wish the antivaxers here knew that General George Washington demanded everyone in his army was vaccinated against small pox.

Edward Jenner inoculated a 13 year old boy in 1796 with the cowpox virus as a protection against smallpox. The first proper smallpox vaccine was developed in 1798. George Washington died in 1799. He must have been very forward thinking in the last year of his life.

DC

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 13 Aug 21 - 05:08 PM

https://www.statesman.com/story/news/politics/politifact/2021/08/02/did-george-washington-mandate-vaccines-smallpox-continental-


I wish the US took on Rupert like you guys.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 13 Aug 21 - 06:39 PM

Up your mask game all you like (still no scientific evidence, I see). Almost every mask I see here in Bude is ill-fitting/worn badly/taken off, hitched down then up, frequently touched/serially reused (if you ask anyone round here, they'll cheerily tell you that they keep their same disposable mask going for day after day - and who wouldn't, when you have to buy them? Shall I say that again?)

I'll take lessons from any mask aficionado who changes their mask for every shop, bus or train. Who never touches the front. Who never, ever wears their mask round their chin. Who checks that their mask can't leak. Who launders their cloth masks every day, several times, and who carries a whole wad of clean ones for every eventuality. Who ditches their paper masks after every use, without fail, no matter how brief. If you do all these things, your mask still is probably no use. Fall down on any one of them, and your mask is a potential danger to the public. And we don't know who you are. About one person in a hundred is infected at any one time. Therefore a mask edict forces 99 people in every hundred to wear a mask for absolutely no useful purpose, and the one-in-a-hundred person is quite likely staying home anyway, and/or is still leaking masses of viruses through their badly-worn mask (my university definition of a virus started with "a non-filterable particle..."). Great, so it's claimed that we can prevent childhood diseases by wearing masks. I suppose we can prevent flu, colds and all manner of other ailments by wearing masks. Let's leap to the logical conclusion to all this by saying that everyone should wear a mask, all the time, for ever more.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 13 Aug 21 - 08:34 PM

I was skeptical of masks right from the start..
.. and still don't trust the majority of pro maskers
to wear them competently and safely..

However..

As soon as right wing arseholes started politicizing masks,
it was in my bolshy nature to definitely decide to wear them defiantly about the streets of my tory wanker infested small town,
where they acted thoughout the entire pandemic as if every day was "freedom day"...

Btw..

"I'll take lessons from any mask aficionado who changes their mask for every shop, bus or train. Who never touches the front. Who never, ever wears their mask round their chin. Who checks that their mask can't leak. Who launders their cloth masks every day, several times, and who carries a whole wad of clean ones for every eventuality. Who ditches their paper masks after every use, without fail, no matter how brief. "

.. that'll for most points be me then, I'm that scrupulously OCD..

But it's not in my nature to insist I know best
and order other folks about..


serves 'em right if they are right wing morons hell bent on winning their Darwin awards...

.. good riddance...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 13 Aug 21 - 09:25 PM

I'm a leftie. Unfortunately, I'm also a scientific type of chap who is innately sceptical about stuff until I see proper evidence. Not hearsay or follow-the-herd. It can be uncomfortable knowing that you're seen as a bedfellow with right-wing Tory types, but their motivations are never mine.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 13 Aug 21 - 09:42 PM

So, dismiss the good advice because YOU haven't been convinced that it really is good advice. That doesn't sound leftie to me.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Aug 21 - 03:46 AM

"Dismiss" is the wrong word, as is "good," and I'm not clear that we are using "leftie" in the same way either. Whether the advice is good or bad is moot. Far better to persuade your fellow citizens to get vaccinated.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 14 Aug 21 - 09:30 AM

Ignoring evidence in favor of ones own bias is a common unscientific mistake. A true mask expert wears two masks in which the outside mask is always an N 95. I am still ignoring precautions against a surface contact infection.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 14 Aug 21 - 09:43 AM

Donuel, a true mask expert would probably know the N95 is an American standard, and as far as I can make out, slightly inferior to the EU FFP3 standard.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Aug 21 - 05:29 PM

The bias all lies in the minds of mask supporters, who, understandably, adopt the precautionary principle, in spite of the lack of real evidence (which neither Donuel, Maggie nor anybody else is able to provide). That is a very respectable position, and, as I've always said, one that I do respect. When the law told me to wear a mask, I wore a mask, every time, without demur. I am not a denier or a rebel. But, when masks are voluntary, which they have been for almost all of my life, I'm not going to wear one. I've had my jabs and I'm in good health. If I feel poorly I'll stay at home and not emerge until I've had a lateral flow test. I have a good supply of the test kits, I've tested myself twice and been ok both times (I've had two of the other type of test too, ditto). I comply with the rules and do even more. I'm seventy and am a bit chesty, but I want to live out my life normally, which means you can see my face laughing, smiling, frowning and sticking my tongue out at you. I won't miss the opportunity to do the sotto voce swearing. Wear you mask if you want to and I'll support you. I won't be wearing one, but I don't expect similar respect from the sanctimonious mask aficionados. Too bad.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 14 Aug 21 - 07:18 PM

I share some of your doubts on the efficacy of masks, Steve, but I also don't think they do me any harm providing I refresh them frequently, which I do. So I will keep on wearing them where they are advised as long as that is the official position. At the same time, I had a meal in a pub last weekend and sat unmasked for a couple of hours. I even went to the bar more than once when I saw it was quiet. I didn't lose any sleep about having put myself in danger as it was quiet enough to maintain social distancing.

When we were first required to wear masks in shops, I used to snatch the mask off as soon as one foot had passed through the exit. It wasn't long before I found myself half way up the car park before I remembered that I still had the mask on. Now, I can't be bothered to take my hands off the trolley before I get back to the car.

As far as people not seeing my face, with my looks, I could be doing the world a service.

DC

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Ebbie
Date: 15 Aug 21 - 03:10 PM

Juneau, Alaska, is experiencing a spike in reported covid cases, even though the town as a whole is more than two-thirds vaccinated, a much better rate than Alaska as a whole.

After dithering for months - as I reported on the 'Cat- as to whether I dared get the vaccine because of many bad reactions to many medications (I finally realized that if I reacted badly to the vaccine, that would affect just one person, but if I caught the virus not only could I have a bad reaction but I could also infect multiple people- well, it was a no-brainer, and I got the J&J jab the next day). I'm glad I did.

I wear a mask whenever I leave my apartment, even when I'm walking my dog outdoors. I wear it as a statement: Take the virus seriously!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: mg
Date: 15 Aug 21 - 04:28 PM

you can still infect people vaxed or not. i would continue all practices that you already have and amp them up. see what your vitamin d level is and adjust if you can. huge correlation between levels and virulence of disease. there are early and prophylactic medicines and vitamins you can take. google dr. pierre korry.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 15 Aug 21 - 05:06 PM

Way to go mg. About american N-95 masks I know they come in a multiple of grades and sizes.

Just because some people think everybody else is crazy and they are the only sane unbiased person doesn't mean they are crazy, it means they are delusional.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Aug 21 - 06:53 PM

Vitamin D, etc., has got nothing to do with this. For decades we've been told that massive doses of Vitamin C protects us against colds. My old dad believed that, he still caught colds and he got heartburn from the vitamin tablets to boot. The virus gets into your cells no matter how vitamin-rich you happen to be.

I'm perfectly sane, I don't think for one second that I'm the only one who is, and I'm not delusional. I follow the science. The science says, overwhelmingly, that getting the vaccine is the way out of this. The science around the infectivity of vaccinated people is highly uncertain. The science around masks isn't there. I've asked here repeatedly for evidence but all I've had is that stone-age thing of observational stuff with no regard for confounding factors, largely from "scientists" who suffer from confirmation bias, the true curse of real science. And I seem to be in a very small minority when I refer to the mass misuse and the mass misunderstanding of masks, which can and does lead to a false sense of security and actual danger to the public. Wear a mask, I respect you for that. I should expect the same when I demur, but some of you are so certain that you're right that I almost think that some evangelist or other has been getting at you. Speaking of evangelists, I'll say it again: millions of Americans are refusing the vaccine because their preachers are instructing them. I've kept all the rules but you still have a go. Your silence over the millions of you yanks who are refusing the vaccine, a step that threatens the whole planet, is deafening.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: mg
Date: 16 Aug 21 - 12:04 AM

you have read differing reports than i regarding vitamin d. i am for vaccinations, although the way we got to them cost hundreds of thousands of lives by denying people access to safe, cheap, early treatments. Still a huge problem. I support vaccinations but I would like to see a bit more respect for those who choose not to vaccinate, especially their teenage boys. There are scary reports out there. There are consequences for vaccines and we need to be brutally honest and demand them anyway i guess.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Aug 21 - 04:30 AM

Well choose your sources carefully. For example, you could look at the overview of vitamin D in relation to Coronavirus in the highly-respected BMJ (British Medical Journal). In sum, it says that evidence for vitamin D efficacy is sparse, inconsistent, weak and often in disregard of confounding factors. Additionally, you are bigging up out of all proportion the risks of vaccines and you are defending refusers. Demurring at the only thing that will get us out of this whilst promoting ineffective measures is the recipe for prolonging this pandemic.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 16 Aug 21 - 04:36 AM

I heartily agree with having the greatest respect for science and for proving theories with solid scientific data.
The thing is, this is a fairly new situation, a worldwide pandemic, and
the available vaccines (thank goodness for them!) haven't been around long enough for virologists to ascertain their effectiveness against all mutations of Covid.
There are far too many variables - ethnicity, age, even climate, 'herd immunity', which conditions aid transmission etc etc etc. Only time and careful virological research will give us answers.
I once knew a chap who was a tutor in the Virology Department of Glasgow University (in the Sixties!!) He was extremely informative about viruses and all the research then was fairly new stuff. Little did we imagine in those days that a pandemic of this magnitude and danger would affect the entire globe!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Aug 21 - 08:26 AM

That's all very true. But the vaccines are doing a damn good job and they are tweakable. They are the only hope of defeating the virus, unless it eventually defeats itself, which seems unlikely. What is important is that we don't allow ourselves to be sidetracked by snake oil remedies. All they do is help to perpetuate the crisis by allowing people to feel far more secure than is justifiable. We simply can't have the recommending of evidence-innocent vitamin remedies, the criticising of non-mask wearers yet the defending of people who won't take the vaccine. In the vast majority of cases there is no moral defence for vaccine refusal.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Charmion
Date: 16 Aug 21 - 09:03 AM

I got the jabs, but I still wear a mask when indoors with other people whose immunization status I don't know.

The jabs are for me, but the mask is for everybody else. I have no way of knowing whether I'm shedding the virus, and I don't wish to find out that I am through contact tracing.

Also, the mask makes parents of small children feel safer.

I'm cool with that.

And when the boosters are available, I'll be right there at the front of the line. With a mask in my pocket, if not on my face.

Here in lovely, leafy Stratford, Ontario, the mask is now something of a fashion statement. I have a purple one from the University of Western Ontario, and two made up in tartan: Perth County, which is green, and Maple Leaf, which is red. (I also have plain white and black ones for when I don't want to attract attention.) Big chain stores such as Canadian Tire and Sobey's issue their staff with trademarked masks. The Bank of Montreal not only put all its staff in blue masks with the bank logo, it also required them to think of an alternative "thanks for doing business with us" gesture so they don't have to shake hands. The young fella who handled my husband's estate account does the namaste thing; I saw another do an "air dap" with a customer. And it's now the polite thing to swing wide when you meet people on the street; nod, smile and wave when you do it, and they nod, smile and wave back.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 16 Aug 21 - 12:12 PM

"Do-si-do your corners now,
pass then side to side.
If they're not mask-wearers,
Pass them extra wide!" ;)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 16 Aug 21 - 06:11 PM

After I moved to Glasgow from Edinburgh, I actually lived almost next door to the Virology laboratories of their university, and the chap I knew gave me a 'guided tour'. It occurs to me that had this been Wuhan in the 21st Century, I might have been exposed directly to Covid (if that is in fact where it all started)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: mg
Date: 16 Aug 21 - 11:54 PM

If I come across ineffective measures I will be sure to denounce them. In the meantime, use everything at our disposal. That would include vaccines, ineffective measures that might be miracles, masking, ventilation. There were some very, extremely effective measures that were originally taken, used by many countries, and then blocked. Some countries that were using them successfully are developing countries, the same ones that can not obtain enough vaccines. It was saving their populations. It still can, although more difficult in later stages of disease than in earlier variants. As one doctor (I follow many, many doctors) said, the worst that can happen is that everyone will get dewormed (ivermecting..oh no..it is a dewormer for horses. Great. Animal trials.) This would not keep people from better treatments because there are not many they can be kept from that are not banned. Follow the money, follow the politics, and be aware that there is evil in the world that will take advantage of damn near everything. Vaccinate, treat early, mask, ventilate, strengthen immune system, isolate if you can.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 16 Aug 21 - 11:59 PM

In the US Delta infections are up 700%.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 17 Aug 21 - 06:23 AM

From The Guardian newspaper.

"New Zealand will go into a national lockdown on Tuesday night, after detecting one case of Covid-19.

The entire country will be at alert level 4 – the highest level of lockdown – for at least three days from midnight, and the regions of Auckland and Coromandel for four to seven days."

Though later in the article it says:

"Ardern said New Zealand would not know if the case was Delta until its genome was sequenced – but that the government would be working under that assumption until informed otherwise. Data released by the Ministry of Health on Monday showed 100% of Covid-19 cases detected at New Zealand’s border in recent weeks had been Delta."



New Zealand to go into national lockdown

Subject: RE: US news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 17 Aug 21 - 08:41 AM

The viral load of Delta is 1000 times greater than 19.
That translates into one person infecting 5 instead of 2.
The blessing is the vaccine that keeps severity of infection to a minimum. A "booster" a 3rd vaccine shot - is currently suggested 8 months after the second shot but may likely become standard for all.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 17 Aug 21 - 05:24 PM

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has tested positive for COVID-19. He's on monoclonal antibodies and had been vaccinated - for all of the grief he's giving everyone for wanting to mask and social distance, it would serve him right to get the opportunity to face the ICU and see what he's allowing others to go through.

https://www.kxan.com/news/texas/texas-gov-greg-abbott-tests-positive-for-covid-19/

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 17 Aug 21 - 09:40 PM

latest from New Zealand New Zealand health authorities have recorded four new COVID-19 cases, one of which is a worker at Auckland City Hospital. The country was plunged into lockdown yesterday after recording its first community case of COVID-19 in six months ...

latest from Australia 33 new local cases in my state, most are in Greater Sydney, but too many are in regional & remote areas, including areas with high indigenous populations. Health services in regional & remote areas are not as good as in the major population centres.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 18 Aug 21 - 04:25 PM

One of the earlier pandemics is HIV. I hear a new innovative mrna vaccine for AIDS is now ready for trials.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 19 Aug 21 - 02:18 AM

From The Guardian newspaper.

"Fully vaccinated adults can harbour virus levels as high as unvaccinated people if infected with the Delta variant, according to a sweeping analysis of UK data, which supports the idea that hitting the threshold for herd immunity is unlikely.

There is abundant evidence that Covid vaccines in the UK continue to offer significant protection against hospitalisations and death. But this new analysis shows that although being fully vaccinated means the risk of getting infected is lower, once infected by Delta a person can carry similar virus levels as unvaccinated people."

Jabbed adults infected with Delta ‘can match virus levels of unvaccinated’

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Aug 21 - 07:08 AM

The experimental mRNA vaccine referred to targets HIV. You can't have a vaccine for AIDS any more than you can have a vaccine for a headache and sore throat. The clue is in the last letter of the acronym.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 19 Aug 21 - 02:24 PM

Alabama is the first state to run out of ICU beds.
Other states still have beds available in parking garages and tents which is still better than waiting room casulaties while they wait for beds.
Some Heart attack victims can not find a hospital for 100 miles.
Mobile morgue semi trucks are again stacking bodies like cord wood.
Fortunately child deaths from DELTA number only in the low hundreds - 358 nation wide.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 21 Aug 21 - 03:44 PM

I made mask wearing more delightful by putting a finger tip drop of lemon extract from the grocery store, I dabbed it where the mask covers the chin inside and out.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 21 Aug 21 - 03:56 PM

Is catching Covid now better than more vaccine?

There are marked differences in your immune system after a natural infection with coronavirus and after vaccination.

Which is better?

Even asking the question bordered on heresy a year ago, when catching Covid for the first time could be deadly, especially for the elderly or people already in poor health.

Now, we're no longer starting with zero immunity as the overwhelming majority of people have either been vaccinated or have already caught the virus.

It is now a serious question that has implications for whether children should ever be vaccinated. And whether we use the virus or booster shots to top up immunity in adults. Both have become contentious issues.

"We could be digging ourselves into a hole, for a very long time, where we think we can only keep Covid away by boosting every year," Prof Eleanor Riley, an immunologist from the University of Edinburgh, told me.

Prof Adam Finn, a government vaccine adviser, said over-vaccinating people, when other parts of the world had none, was "a bit insane, it's not just inequitable, it's stupid"

BBC

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Aug 21 - 04:17 PM

Touching the front of your mask is mask abuse.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 21 Aug 21 - 05:13 PM

By Jove Steve is jovial lately. Itsa full moon and Jewpeter is in conjugation with Saturn.

Catching covid once vaccinated is better than it was before vaccination
Beware of Dr. Quack's natural cures

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Aug 21 - 05:35 PM

Don't preach to me about masks then tell me that you blob something on the front of it, inside and out!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 22 Aug 21 - 12:49 PM

How can 'blobbing something' on the inside & outside of a mask cause a problem? Specifically if you do so immediately after sanitising your hands.
Without using aids (which would also need sanitising) it is impossible to put a mask on without touching it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: mg
Date: 22 Aug 21 - 12:56 PM

Could someone please explain to me why people get upset when people wear masks below their chin When they don't need to have 1 on at all. It might be a matter of personal aesthetics. But I don't understand it from any sort of germ point of view. Certainly more sanitary to just pull your mask up and down when needed than to take it all the way up and stuff in the pocket or purse or whatever.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 22 Aug 21 - 07:25 PM

Too many good people who choose positively to wear masks will prove to be
too stupid to wear them safe and effectively...


.. and folks wonder why I've ended up a misanthropic humanist hermit...???

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 22 Aug 21 - 10:13 PM

The rare times a mask is very helpful is when you or another person suddenly sneezes beneath a mask when carrying a viral load in a crowd. Other times is a bit of a crap shoot.
Nigel, its not about 'blobing' anything, its about an unfortunate obcessive psychopathy. I found peppermint too intense.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 23 Aug 21 - 12:28 PM

Donuel:
You may have failed to notice that I wasn't criticising your comment!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 23 Aug 21 - 12:57 PM

I fully realize, always assume my posts are with a smile.

People here heard on FOX that a deworming medicine for horses and cattle is good for Covid. The CDC had to make announcements to stop it. They were flooded with poisonings.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 23 Aug 21 - 08:27 PM

https://www.amazon.com/Ivermectin-Cure-Covid-19-19/dp/1257633252/ref=sr_1_4?dchild=1&keywords=covid+cure&qid=1629764482&sr=8-4
Shame on Amazon for selling this!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 25 Aug 21 - 04:10 AM

Why "Shame on Amazon"?

If a book is published the publisher is entitled to advertise it on multiple market places (including Amazon). At least they included an 'editorial review':
Disclaimer. We have made every effort to make certain that all information is factually correct, comprehensive, and up-to-date. However, this book should not be used as a substitute for the knowledge and expertise of a licensed healthcare professional. You should always consult your doctor or other healthcare professionals before taking any medication. The drug information contained herein is subject to change and is not intended to cover all possible uses, directions, precautions, warnings, drug interactions, allergic reactions, or adverse effects. The absence of warnings or other information for a given drug does not indicate that the drug or drug combination is safe, effective, or appropriate for all patients or all specific uses.

Unfortunately there is, as yet, no cure for stupid.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 25 Aug 21 - 04:27 AM

Did you read the review?

"Reviewed in Canada on August 10, 2021

I thought it was the product, so I returned it. ordered 10 , arrived 9."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 25 Aug 21 - 06:19 AM

book: Asprin, a cure for stupid?
Unfortunately Asprin does not have as good a safety record as the mrna Covid vaccine.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 25 Aug 21 - 01:59 PM

For people who had the Johnson and Johnson vaccine and then got a second Pfizer vaccine jab 6 months later made a correct decision.
Johnson boosters 6 months later give a robust immunity advantage as well.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 25 Aug 21 - 06:48 PM

Political analist Chai Komanduri made a nuanced observation;
"The methods the GOP employed in denying climate change have been used by the anti vax movement, which hops on any uncertainty in science to claim a certainty in opposing science".

THE RIGHT IS WARY OF LEFT WING SCIENCE LIKE EVOLUTION for religious reasons
What next, is Galileo wrong?
Not even the unvaccinated pandemic and rise in child death seems enough to disuade them.
I wish there was a reset button for our species.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 26 Aug 21 - 09:49 AM

1 in 5 covid deaths are in Florida. 47,858 total deaths in FL.
All the gulf states are hit hard anoung the unvaccinated sending hospitals over 185% capacity. Good news from that region may take until October.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 26 Aug 21 - 09:59 AM

A friend shared on Facebook this week that her niece was admitted to the hospital for emergency surgery; they're so strapped for staff and supplies that in her bedding they didn't have any pillowcases, they had a towel wrapped around the pillow. Everyone is hoping she gets out of there okay and not just for the surgery recovery reasons.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 26 Aug 21 - 10:17 AM

fingers crossed

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: gillymor
Date: 27 Aug 21 - 07:59 AM

Here is what the FDA has to say about Ivermectin-
"FDA has not approved Ivermectin for use in treating or preventing COVID-19 in humans. Ivermectin tablets are approved at very specific doses for some parasitic worms, and there are topical (on the skin) formulations for head lice and skin conditions like rosacea. Ivermectin is not an anti-viral (a drug for treating viruses)."

The article-https://www.fda.gov/consumers/consumer-updates/why-you-should-not-use-ivermectin-treat-or-prevent-covid-19

I'm not a big fan of censorship but until some legitimate studies have been done to prove the efficacy of this drug I propose the moderators remove any posts touting it's usage for COVID19. As Nigel pointed out we have safe and effective vaccines and encouraging people to use this unproven drug while shunning vaccinations will contribute to the continuance of this pandemic. As it stands some internet surfers could light on the pro-Ivermectin posts here and place their health and the health of others in danger.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 27 Aug 21 - 10:19 PM

I just went through and removed several posts with the links and discussion of that pseudo-medical discussion of Ivermectin and possibly using it for COVID-19.

Its human application is for certain intestinal worms and head lice; it would be reckless to leave that initial post and the politely skeptical responses in place.

Please don't share more sources, "authoritative" or not, about using Ivermectin; there is a blossoming of fake medical sites right this minute producing this kind of information and you're only going to end up landing on those fake news sites if you try to look for actual research into the product.

gillymore's post stands as the lone remaining post on the topic. As I listened to Rachel Maddow discuss this tonight I planned to come back and remove all of this - gillymore beat me to the common-sense punch on the topic.

Let's move on.

Thanks.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 28 Aug 21 - 08:56 AM

It takes a great deal of skepticism to get past the worst of the fraudsters when it comes to medical misinformation: there is a group called "the dirty dozen" who do it all in their own names, but the rest are sneaky. The takeaway from this latest episode is that we can safely assume that hard-hitting medical news stories aren't being generated by the free regional magazines distributed in grocery store racks.

No one needs to leave the Mudcat site over a tiff in the BS section, and everyone gets sucked in by these things at times. They're calculated to get past your common sense defenses. But if the party who first posted decides to leave, we're sorry, and hope you continue to post your wonderful music contributions above the line.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 29 Aug 21 - 04:16 AM

Sorry SRS delete as you please but if you are going to suggest that sites like the

Oxford University or the BBC (or for that matter the page I gave before which is linked to in the BBC article) are fake. I guess I should be out of here too.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 29 Aug 21 - 05:51 AM

Having been a somewhat busy chap for the last week, I blinked and missed this (I don't even know who's jumped ship). I can see no good reason for prohibiting the linking to genuine sites that provide neutral reporting of this issue, as Jon has said. There's a danger of being misinformed, true enough. But there's also danger in being uninformed.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 29 Aug 21 - 06:51 AM

From The Observer newspaper.

Covid cases in England are 26 times higher than a year ago.

Covid cases 26 times higher in England

"Simon Clarke, associate professor in cellular microbiology at Reading University, said that in the week ending 20 August, the ONS estimated that 756,900 people in England were infected with Covid-19, which equated to one person in 70.

“This time last year, the ONS estimated that 28,200 people in England were infected. That is the equivalent of one person in 1,900 being infected with Covid-19. That means that community infections are 26 times more common now than they were a year ago, when the population was unvaccinated and the country was three months into its reopening.”

The fact that deaths and hospital admissions from Covid-19 are a fraction of their levels at the height of the outbreak in Britain demonstrates the protective power of the vaccines – more than 60% of the UK population has had two jabs."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 29 Aug 21 - 10:15 AM

BBC and Oxford University aren't the lunatic fringe like the original post was, but if you try to search on the topic you're going to mostly hit the scam sites, boosted to catch attention. No one is going to resolve anything about a drug used on head lice anytime soon, so move along. This was another drug in the panoply of Trump's "cures," coming to the surface again now.

From the New York Times: At a Children’s Hospital, a Wave of Young Patients Struggling to Breathe

At Children’s Hospital New Orleans, where the intensive care unit has been jammed with Covid-19 patients, scenes like this have played out unrelentingly over the past month. Nurses raced around monitoring one gut-wrenching case after another. One child was getting a complicated breathing treatment known as ECMO, a last resort after ventilators fail, which nurses said was almost unheard-of for pediatric cases. About a half-dozen others were in various stages of distress.

“We all thought, ‘Well, thankfully it’s not happening to the kids; none of us would be able to stomach that,’” said Mark Melancon, a longtime nurse at the hospital, recalling previous stages of the coronavirus pandemic. “Fast forward to now, and it’s happening with the kids.”

Mr. Melancon said that until this summer, the hospital had treated only one or two Covid-19 patients at a time. Now, a procession of patients require constant attention, their oxygen levels often dipping precariously low without maximum intervention.

As children’s hospitals in many parts of the United States admit more Covid-19 patients, a result of the highly contagious Delta variant, federal and state health officials are grappling with a sharp new concern: children not yet eligible for vaccination in places with substantial viral spread, now at higher risk of being infected than at any other time in the pandemic. Nowhere is that worry greater than in Louisiana, which has among the highest new daily case rates in the country and only 40 percent of people are fully vaccinated, putting children at particular risk as they return to school.

Add the category 4 Hurricane Ida ready to make landfall on New Orleans this afternoon, when people will be needing to see high ground and shelters, and you have another Katrina-style disaster looming. Most American large hospitals are set up with their own power plants now, but the impact will still be serious.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 29 Aug 21 - 10:29 AM

Here's the classic scenario parents (of children too young to currently vaccinate) fear. Taken in the context of the children's hospital filling up (previous post) and you have a waking nightmare.

Unvaccinated, unmasked teacher spreads Covid-19 to elementary school students, CDC reports

The CDC said that some of the affected children at the Marin County, California, school went on to infect other students, their siblings and their parents.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 29 Aug 21 - 10:45 AM

No one is going to resolve anything about a drug used on head lice anytime soon, so move along.

I won't move along just yet.

A positive outcome for the use of the drug may be unlikely and it may well be shown to be ineffective, but, if it was as easily reduced to the simplicity you give above, I don't imagine research scientists from Oxford University and other agencies such as our NHS getting involved in a national trial.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 29 Aug 21 - 12:31 PM

Remember.. even American 'Liberal progressives' are still Americans...

America rules by American rules...!!!


The rest of us just have to put up with their world dominating power and innate superiority...

But we stil loves 'em...


btw.. I'm still out bogged down in the real world of family health problems..
and have also not kept up with recent weeks of Mudcat Soap Opera..

So which much loved regular cast members have dramatically exited the show...???

.. Daresay as usual some will make an unsurprising return in future episodes...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 29 Aug 21 - 12:56 PM

The last lyrics from Hotel California Come to mind:

You can check-out any time you like,
But you can never leave!

I think we have the case of someone who has simply checked out for a while. (Heck, Dick checked out last week and I spotted him posting in BS this morning. Quick turnaround!)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: gillymor
Date: 29 Aug 21 - 02:02 PM

For the record I wasn't taking issue with anything Jon posted, I appreciated his links, it was the posts prematurely promoting Ivermectin as a proven cure for the virus that I found irresponsible and potentially dangerous.

---

The links Jon posted weren't the problem, it was the ongoing discussion of the rest of the post. Reference to the original story was removed and he had discussed that also. This thread needs to shift back to the original topic and stop discussing moderation and arguing about misinformation. ---mudelf

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 30 Aug 21 - 10:53 AM

Regarding booster shots; Maryland made rules that the immuno suppressent may get a booster now, but some hosptals do not consider diabetes included in that group but CVS drugstore does so I went ahead and got a drugstore booster.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 30 Aug 21 - 11:39 AM

One of the reasons store pharmacies are able to distribute the Pfizer vaccine is because the company came back and changed the storage model. In mid-May this report was issued:

FDA In Brief: FDA Authorizes Longer Time for Refrigerator Storage of Thawed Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 Vaccine Prior to Dilution, Making Vaccine More Widely Available

Making COVID-19 vaccines widely available is key to getting people vaccinated and bringing the pandemic to an end. Pfizer Inc. submitted data to the FDA to support storage of undiluted, thawed vials of its COVID-19 vaccine for up to one month at refrigerator temperatures. This change should make this vaccine more widely available to the American public by facilitating the ability of vaccine providers, such as community doctors’ offices, to receive, store and administer the vaccine.

Additional Information
Based on a review of recent data submitted by Pfizer Inc. today, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration is authorizing undiluted, thawed Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 Vaccine vials to be stored in the refrigerator at 2°C to 8°C (35°F to 46°F) for up to 1 month. Previously, thawed, undiluted vaccine vials could be stored in the refrigerator for up to 5 days.

Pfizer Inc. submitted data to the FDA to demonstrate that undiluted, thawed vials of its COVID-19 vaccine are stable at refrigerator temperatures for up to 1 month.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 30 Aug 21 - 03:59 PM

Bringing the pandemic to an end involves making vaccines available world-wide, not just in rich western countries. It also involves persuading everyone to get vaccinated. There are large parts of your country with alarming-low levels of takeup. You have preachers in the Deep South who are more or less ordering their flocks to reject the vaccine. You have a big problem. The Pfizer storage news is good, but on its own it fixes very little.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 30 Aug 21 - 04:35 PM

I did not know about storage rule changes Stilly. Thanks
Steve I had that conversation with the pharmacist and pleaded guilty.
There is slow progress on the global front.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 30 Aug 21 - 07:53 PM

We will live with this virus for years, if not decades, if not forever. We will control its worst effects with vaccines, and vaccines alone. Not with social distancing, not with fear, not with lockdowns, not with outrageous and immoral diktats about not being allowed to mix with our own families and our nearest and dearest, not with masks. Definitely not with masks. We roll out vaccines to the world and we persuade everyone to take them. There is absolutely no other way of getting back to normal life as normal human beings.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 30 Aug 21 - 08:10 PM

We got past the Holocaust, we will get past this.
What people become normalized and accustomed to is beyond belief.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 30 Aug 21 - 09:01 PM

and stuff all anti mask madness.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jeri
Date: 30 Aug 21 - 09:01 PM

We'll always have Covid around. We'll find better treatments. More people will get vaccinated, and some people who refuse will die, but it will always be here. I'm just hoping the rabid anti-vaxers will go away.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 30 Aug 21 - 09:46 PM

We will outlive quite a few of those antivaxxers, at this rate.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 31 Aug 21 - 08:40 AM

The safe travel recommendation for the US has been reversed.
EU has placed new travel restrictions on the US.

I do not know the status on the US Canadian border.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 31 Aug 21 - 09:53 AM

My daughter is preparing for a trip to Italy at the end of September. Her plans for Japan were scuttled months ago, this is the substitute. Who knows if she'll get to go anywhere after four more weeks pass.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 31 Aug 21 - 12:21 PM

We are not banned from EU at this time. There are only obvious
recommendations to steer clear of our unvaccinated.
The vaccinated can still be carriers and can get sicker than they may expect. Delta packs a big punch of transmissabilty.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 31 Aug 21 - 07:13 PM

Another varient has emerged from South Africa.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Sep 21 - 06:04 AM

From the website statista.com (google "Number of administered coronavirus (COVID-19) vaccine doses per 100 people in Africa as of August 28, 2021, by country")

Fifteen African nations have fewer than two people in every hundred even partially vaccinated. At the bottom of the pile is the DRC, with a population of 105 million, one in every thousand of whom have received any vaccine. Taking Africa as a whole, around seven people in every hundred have received any vaccine.

We are not safe until everyone is safe. We've hardly got started.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 02 Sep 21 - 10:15 AM

Meanwhile, in highly educated countries, this nonsense continues to happen: Sydney Covid patient in Westmead hospital after overdosing on ivermectin and other online ‘cures’
Patient, who suffered vomiting and diarrhoea, part of trend hospital is seeing of people taking unproven substances

I read yesterday that the GOP radio host Rogan was COVID positive and was taking all of the Trump-approved medications, and Ivermectin.

#ShakesHead

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 02 Sep 21 - 10:55 AM

Australia has a small but vocal collection of nutters & anti vaxxers. A member of the ruling (rightwing) party in our federal parliament is one of the noisiest & has just left his party to join one even further to the right. This party is owned by a billionaire who spent $60 million on misinformation & outright lies last federal election & did not gain a seat, leading to the IKEA shop in his neighbourhood putting up a ginormous poster above their building saying he could have bought a seat from them for $39! Craig Kelly’s move to Palmer’s United Australia Party

Someone recently said on Sydney radio We don't have enough villages for the idiots we are producing & a local cartoonist produced a great cartoon on that theme on 31st August

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 03 Sep 21 - 07:53 AM

At last, sanity prevails (at least on this matter)

From the BBC

EU and AstraZeneca reach deal to end vaccine row

"The EU and UK-Swedish drug-maker AstraZeneca have settled a row over a shortfall in coronavirus vaccines that affected the European rollout earlier this year.

AstraZeneca has agreed to deliver 200 million doses of its vaccine, which had been promised under a contract, to the EU by the end of March 2022.

The deal puts an end to the EU's pending action in the Belgian courts.

The EU said this week that 70% of adults had been double vaccinated."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 03 Sep 21 - 10:29 AM

The US allowed 15 million doses of Pfizer to expire
but there are reasons and excuses
just like everything else
that ends in tradgedy

Pyroclastic clouds burned villagers to a crisp
The hurricane hit our cities like a fist
Red tide poisoned fish and folks alike
A Billion viral graves are about to spike

Once in a lifetime, twice in a week

The astroid was just a sliver
the creek's now a mighty river
The smoke made noon look like midnight
The crops all died of blight

Once in a lifetime, twice in a week

Fever and fits from small ticks
It hit a 100 in the Arctic
Permafrost began to burn
marked a point of no return

Once in a lifetime twice in a week.

Extinction became redemption
from the pain to come
It wasn't bleak for everyone
It was a golden age for some.

Once in a lifetime twice in a week

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 03 Sep 21 - 11:14 AM

You don't need hindsight to see how stupid are some of the alternative faux-remedies, yet people announce to the world what they're taking instead of the vaccine. We live in an era of willful stupidity.

Streaming podcsts personality Joe Rogan is one of those idiots.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 03 Sep 21 - 02:20 PM

Will things ever return to 'normal'?

From The Guardian

Anti-vaccine protesters try to storm London offices of medical regulator

"Police have prevented anti-vaccine protesters from storming the headquarters of Britain’s medical regulator during violent clashes in east London.

At least four officers were injured and arrests were made during a confrontation as hundreds of people gathered outside the offices of the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) in Canary Wharf.

Police drew batons and called for reinforcements as protesters attempted to force open the door of the regulator’s offices, with security guards looking on from inside.

Some of the crowd who had gathered at Canary Wharf were later involved in another confrontation outside the Science Museum vaccination centre in Kensington, west London."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 03 Sep 21 - 06:59 PM

Raindog I scanned the crowd and identified about a half dozen women.
All the rest could have been suffering from testosterone poisoning?

Political protestors are usually religiously motivated and have decided to be bioterrorists, especially against children, in their anti vax crusade.

Forgive them for they do not know what they do.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 04 Sep 21 - 07:35 AM

It is said that politics today is the new religion.

The new varient of concern is called the mu varient.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 04 Sep 21 - 12:15 PM

From The Guardian newspaper site.

"An Oklahoma doctor has said overdoses of the anti-parasitic drug ivermectin, which many believe without evidence can prevent or cure Covid-19, are helping cause delays and problems for rural hospitals and ambulance services struggling to cope with the resurgent pandemic."

Oklahoma hospitals deluged by ivermectin overdoses, doctor says

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 04 Sep 21 - 12:36 PM

That reminds me, I need to give the dogs their heartworm monthly medication this weekend. Ivermectin.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 04 Sep 21 - 02:57 PM

Triage - Automatically send to the bottom of the list:
anti vax toxic substance self medicaters,
who are hell bent on winning
their Darwin awards...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 05 Sep 21 - 08:50 AM

i am on a varient hunt.
The Columbian 'blue' varient seems to have some vaccine resistance but little is known yet. Not all varients gain prominence.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 05 Sep 21 - 09:21 AM

The Present and Future of COVID Variants
Experts stress testing, vaccination amid delta surge

In fact, variants have continued to develop and spread since the emergence of delta. The World Health Organization has designated variants Eta, Iota, Kappa, and Lambda “variants of interest” and is tracking 13 additional variants that originated in the U.S., Brazil, the Philippines, Indonesia, Colombia, and other nations.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 05 Sep 21 - 10:14 AM

A future of perpetual varient whack a mole...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 05 Sep 21 - 11:11 AM

Shit, I have never won at whack a mole.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 05 Sep 21 - 06:30 PM

From the BBC.

"Brazil and Argentina's World Cup qualifier was abandoned just minutes after kick-off on Sunday after Brazilian health officials objected to the participation of three Argentine players they believe broke quarantine rules.

The visitors walked off the pitch at the Corinthians Arena after the officials came out to stop the game.

The dramatic intervention came hours after Brazil's health authorities had said four England-based players for Argentina had to quarantine."

Brazil v Argentina abandoned after visiting players accused of Covid violation

++
Vaccine passports in nightclubs and other indoor venues in England will be required at the end of this month, the vaccines minister has confirmed.

Nadhim Zahawi said it was the right time to start the scheme for sites with large crowds as all over-18s will have been offered two jabs by then.

Asking people to show certificates with Covid vaccination proof has been criticised by venues and some MPs.

Mr Zahawi said it would ensure the economy could remain open."

Covid-19: Vaccine passports to start in England this month

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 05 Sep 21 - 07:40 PM

Australia - COVID vaccine certificates can be forged within 10 minutes due to 'obvious' security flaw. Near-perfect forgeries of the federal government's COVID-19 vaccine digital certificate can be made in 10 minutes using free software, a member of the public has discovered. Richard Nelson, a software engineer in Sydney, has found an "obvious" security flaw in the Express Plus Medicare app allowing him to make vaccine certificates with any name and date of birth and featuring the background animations meant to prevent forgery. (read on)

As I don't have a smart phone I printed mine out, the background is just the Oz coat of arms, now all I need is a 10x8 photo frame to carry it around! I also have in my wallet the little cardboard appointment folder the medical centre gave me after my first vaccine. It has 2 stickers signed by the nurse giving details of each injection.

sandra

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 07 Sep 21 - 10:48 AM

I noticed this story this morning: The W.H.O. lists Mu as a ‘variant of interest.’

Whack-a-mole indeed.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 07 Sep 21 - 02:07 PM

345 children in Texas were hospitalized with COVID-19 on Saturday. Just Saturday.

Meanwhile, data from the CDC. . .

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 07 Sep 21 - 05:02 PM

From The Guardian.

Judge reverses order forcing hospital to treat Covid patient with ivermectin

"Judge cites lack of ‘convincing evidence’ that drug is effective, siding with hospital that refused to administer medication.

On Monday, Judge Michael Oster of Butler county issued an order that sided with West Chester Hospital, citing a lack of “convincing evidence” that the drug – used in small doses in humans against external parasites such as headlice, and in larger doses for animals including cows and horses – could significantly improve the patient’s condition."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 07 Sep 21 - 05:50 PM

Years ago a flawed paper was written by someone who fabricated the data that had to do with childhood vaccinations that might have mercury and autism. It was rubbish, it was withdrawn, the authors censured, but it continues to live a life of its own in the hands of anti-vaxxers.

It turns out there was a similar paper to do with Ivermectin that was withdrawn for data and ethical problems, but that continues to be the source of a lot of the misinformation about Ivermectin and COVID-19.

Huge study supporting ivermectin as Covid treatment withdrawn over ethical concerns

The preprint endorsing ivermectin as a coronavirus therapy has been widely cited, but independent researchers find glaring discrepancies in the data

An excerpt from the Guardian article:

The study found that patients with Covid-19 treated in hospital who “received ivermectin early reported substantial recovery” and that there was “a substantial improvement and reduction in mortality rate in ivermectin treated groups” by 90%.

But the drug’s promise as a treatment for the virus is in serious doubt after the Elgazzar study was pulled from the Research Square website on Thursday “due to ethical concerns”. Research Square did not outline what those concerns were.

A medical student in London, Jack Lawrence, was among the first to identify serious concerns about the paper, leading to the retraction. He first became aware of the Elgazzar preprint when it was assigned to him by one of his lecturers for an assignment that formed part of his master’s degree. He found the introduction section of the paper appeared to have been almost entirely plagiarised.

It appeared that the authors had run entire paragraphs from press releases and websites about ivermectin and Covid-19 through a thesaurus to change key words. “Humorously, this led to them changing ‘severe acute respiratory syndrome’ to ‘extreme intense respiratory syndrome’ on one occasion,” Lawrence said.

The data also looked suspicious to Lawrence, with the raw data apparently contradicting the study protocol on several occasions.

“The authors claimed to have done the study only on 18-80 year olds, but at least three patients in the dataset were under 18,” Lawrence said.

“The authors claimed they conducted the study between the 8th of June and 20th of September 2020, however most of the patients who died were admitted into hospital and died before the 8th of June according to the raw data. The data was also terribly formatted, and includes one patient who left hospital on the non-existent date of 31/06/2020.”

There were other concerns.

“The main error is that at least 79 of the patient records are obvious clones of other records,” Brown told the Guardian. “It’s certainly the hardest to explain away as innocent error, especially since the clones aren’t even pure copies. There are signs that they have tried to change one or two fields to make them look more natural.”

People who don't do a close reading on papers like this end up spreading the wrong information. And a lot of people apparently didn't read very carefully.

This article was published July 15, 2021 in The Guardian

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 08 Sep 21 - 07:54 AM

Yes a UK doctor lied about the vaccine autism threat and it spread like wild fire.

How do crazy ideas develop? Sometimes a grain of truth like this
could be read by a screen writer and base a comedy series BRAIN DEAD https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4877736/
about a parasite causing the brains of consevatives to go insane, to one day 2 years later turning into the magic parasite killing Ivermectin to be a cure for Covid.
I am kidding about this series of events but all it takes is one little lie to capture millions.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 08 Sep 21 - 08:28 AM

Based on my experience with 12,000 hypnosis subjects I am certain people are more than predisposed to a 'lie' than most people would expect. An evolutionary adaptation could be the weakest link in our psychology and be the fatal flaw which reverses rational thought in human beings. I have long warned that without being educated to our own likelyhood of hypnotic programing we are ever prone to its negative effects.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Sep 21 - 08:37 AM

Yes, one little lie or the propagation of misinformation can spread fake news like wildfire, true enough. Something that Mudcat posters could reflect on.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 08 Sep 21 - 09:18 AM

That is why stupid people react poorly to sarcasm.
In text you can not hear the 'sarcastic inflection'.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 08 Sep 21 - 09:34 AM

Pot, kettle.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 08 Sep 21 - 09:39 AM

The chaos of uncertainty combined with stupidity will make this Fall the most challenging time in the coming 'Multidemic' of flu combined with Covid variants and common colds spread by schools.

We found that the spit tests are not accurate and sequencing is best.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 08 Sep 21 - 12:26 PM

THIS IS YOUR BRAIN-THIS IS YOUR BRAIN ON DRUGS
DRUGGIES USE NEEDLES
50 years of anti drug propoganda later it is stuck in some brains.

So what do antivaxxers hear; This is your brain, this is your brain on vaccines. Just say No!

People have been conditioned to not even respect the lives of drug users.

I suggest -THIS IS YOUR DEAD BRAIN ON COVID because it was not vaccinated.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 08 Sep 21 - 12:43 PM

Long-COVID is certainly a one-two punch against the brain and lungs of the sufferers.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Sep 21 - 01:23 PM

Donuel and Mrzzy, you are both guilty of generating misinformation and/or scaremongering in this thread, so your little sideswipes are, shall we say, not exactly appreciated.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jeri
Date: 08 Sep 21 - 01:40 PM

Steve, while I'm pretty sure you already hate me, I'll share this anyway.
I once complained to an acquaintance that a person kept saying things on Mudcat that were stupid, and annoying, and I felt like I had to do something about that.
He told me "Don't play with trolls".
I said, "But he's so wrong and what he says shouldn't be allowed to stand unchallenged."
He said "Don't play with trolls."

While people may not BE trolls, when they provoke an emotional response in you, the messages are trolling. Don't play.

And me, I'll shut up and f*ck off in accordance with imagined reaction to this. Please carry on.

(My "troll" was Martin Gibson, if anyone remembers.)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Sep 21 - 01:45 PM

Jeri, I absolutely don't hate you. There are times when I don't understand you but that's par for the course in this two-dimensional world. Actually, I even think I once told you that I loved you... ;-) You're right about those two. I didn't need to react, did I. I should just have said grrr, preferably internally...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jeri
Date: 08 Sep 21 - 03:00 PM

Shhhh. Don't let anyone else know. ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 08 Sep 21 - 06:41 PM

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/last-pandemic-science-military-60-minutes-2021-09-05/

Both bad news and good news coexist.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Sep 21 - 06:47 PM

Good news, bad news and fake news.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 09 Sep 21 - 02:32 AM

.. and... Darwin Awards news...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pd8P12BXebo&t=3s&ab_channel=TheNewYorkTimes

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Sep 21 - 04:28 AM

Powerful stuff there.

I'm not a fan of forcing anyone to have jabs for this or for flu. We've allowed anti-vaxxers and other assorted nutters to throw us behind the curve. We need a massive campaign of public education about this disease with full information and persuasion to the fore. Billboards, radio, telly, ads online...Videos like this one are great - but shove them in front of people, don't hide them on YouTube. I do find it puzzling that there has been a lot of compulsion behind mask-wearing (questionable at best and quite possibly useless) but not behind vaccination (THE only way out of this). But education and persuasion, never compulsion. Compulsion engenders revolt and goes against the grain of democracy. Thin end of the wedge...?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 09 Sep 21 - 07:02 AM

Yes the price of stupid is so expenive now it is unaffordable for the unvaccinated who are 99% of the currently infected. The main cause is that some people do not like being told what to do, tough, there are some things you have to do to live.
It is tough being told you now have to die because of your vaccine resitance.

The news here is grim with a quarter million childhood infections, 1 in 4 of all infections. We tried to pretend we turned a corner but in reality we are in the middle of pandemic times and are entering a seasonal multidemic battle with flu as well.

We can easily recognize who contributes new important and unimportant news on the pandemic and those who merely carp about others here. True contributors include links to factual studies and stories. I suggest the 60 minutes story link holds water but you are your own judge.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 09 Sep 21 - 10:59 AM

Stop the bickering.


This video from an exhausted and discouraged nurse should be required viewing by all who think refusing the COVID-19 vaccines is only about their rights. You might have to click through and turn on the volume, but it is well worth listening to.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Sep 21 - 11:05 AM

The 60 minutes link is just unscientific bullshit. That's my opinion. No more than that. Let's not be taken in.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 09 Sep 21 - 11:21 AM

Perhaps you're not familiar with Sixty Minutes. It is considered a reputable, and at times hard-hitting mainstream news program from CBS, a major American television network. It has been on for decades, and is not "unscientific bullshit."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Sep 21 - 12:02 PM

I am referring exclusively to the item linked to, which has a bloke claiming that he has a magic bullet for all viruses or something. He hasn't. We have a programme this end called Panorama, generally reputable if occasionally amateurish, which is also capable of generating bullshit every now and again. It happens. Let's take a look. They did an experimental, untested procedure on a woman nearly dead with sepsis. Completely unethical. Presumably, the experiment withheld the standard emergency antibiotic treatment for sepsis (otherwise they wouldn't have known what had worked...). She recovered in four days (we're told). Fairly rapid recovery from sepsis isn't that unusual. He also claims to have the 1918 flu virus to hand. He hasn't. It's a reconstructed version thereof. We all know about mutant strains these days, don't we? I won't go on. As I said, let's not be taken in. Your man is of interest only. He is by no means the prospective saviour of the world.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 09 Sep 21 - 11:22 PM

Steve, your dismissal is not going to fly. You don't know as much about the science as the scientists who were interviewed do. Please stop making assumptions about programs you're not familiar with and about the science you clearly don't have the total grasp of. I trust the reporting from CBS far more than I trust your "I don't think so, it looks like bullshit" pronouncements.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 10 Sep 21 - 03:32 AM

I just heard yesterday from my neighbour that there are three cases of Covid in our (small) village. I was shocked really (so was she) so my husband and I have decided NOT to go to our village fete tomorrow. It's called the Lyng Fling, and comprises a carboot sale, vintage tractors, a fire engine and some Police horses, plus bric-a-brac stalls. It's all outdoors, but there will be children running around and crowds of people.
We had intended to go wearing our clinical masks, but I'm too scared now. Not worth the risk.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Sep 21 - 06:54 AM

I gave you a couple of instances from the piece that are highly dubious. I could have quoted more. I'm not dissing the whole five decades of your investigative journalism programme. But here you have a man claiming to have a magic bullet to end all pandemics forever. And you are not even a teensy bit sceptical? I don't think you've read it. I have!

By the way, my background is in biological science. So, just a guess, if you think I don't know as much about the science, etc., it's a fair bet that you know even less. And one deeply-ingrained aspect of scientific endeavour is that one's first reaction to a new idea is scepticism. It then behoves you to delve deeper to look for substance. Well I read the piece and found the substance to be highly dubious, and I gave you just two examples among more that I noticed. OK?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Sep 21 - 07:15 AM

I think I'd go and show my face, Eliza, but I might avoid anything indoors or crowding round stalls. Outdoors is pretty safe by all accounts. And you have been jabbed! Nothing would prevent me from having a go at the coconut shy...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 10 Sep 21 - 07:17 AM

Yesterday NIH had a 4 hour mass meeting via computer regarding the quarter million infected children and other topics. The weight of the pandemic fight is on NIH since the CDC is now considered broken.
Steve you hate bad news, I post speculative good news and you hate that so I don't care that your crumugeonhood has caused you to be separated from other rationl people. Your use of the word 'we', as if you speak for all Brits, is practically delusional. But having a foil is useful in conveying facts unto other people so you serve a good purpose, just not the one you think.

I was not on the enormous NIH meeting yesterday, I only know those who were. The quarter million infected kids I reported the day before was finally confirmed yesterday. Be it one day or twenty years before the event some may not like my presience, deduction or means of 'knowing'.
Horatio, wise up.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Sep 21 - 07:42 AM

I'm sorry to have to say this, but you have just betrayed the anti-Brit sentiment that has been very thinly veiled through this thread. My use of the word "we" has had nothing to do with speaking for a cabal of Brits (which I never do) and it is very dishonest of you to level that at me. Furthermore, your "news" is never to be relied on without a thorough check. You told us that 99% off infections are in unvaccinated people. That is blatantly untrue, yet that post is still here, unchallenged until now. Yet I'm under attack from two of you for questioning a piece about a man who claims he can end all pandemics for ever. This will undoubtedly be deleted, but I'm watching like a hawk to see whether your untruths and your dishonestly-expressed anti-Brit nonsense also go, along with your accusation of my irrationality (you of all people...) In this neck of the woods you can politely disagree with someone, giving your reasons (which you seldom if ever do) without insulting them. Why don't you try it some time.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 10 Sep 21 - 08:53 AM

Yeah me of all people who you have singled out.
I simply do not accept I am ALWAYS wrong and you are always right.
I don't accuse or blame you or dear old England. Nor is it merely you alone that may harbor an iota of the remaining Victorian arrogance that your parents recalled and taught you but I do not know. -what aboutism goes here-

You may not be the 'pan know itall' or the ultimate organic snopes.com you claim.

now contribute something beyond yourself and stop fussing.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Sep 21 - 09:04 AM

What were your motives for making the false claim that 99% of infected people were unvaccinated? That's not me fussing. That's me challenging your Trumpist-style fake news, mate.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 10 Sep 21 - 10:02 AM

Donny - Victorian Brits may have neen 'arrogant'..
well over a hundred years ago...

But NOW that 21st Century Yanks have surpassed them
as the arrogant dominant ubermensch of the world,
it is so amusing to read your 'ugly American' hypocrisy...


Btw.. maybe British scientists might just adhere to a traditional higher standard
of evidence, sceptisism, and professional integrity...???

Though it's a good job we are allies in the fight against fukwit anti vaxxers...

[who do seem to be mostly American,
inflicting their toxic influence on Western civilisation via worldwide social media...]

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 10 Sep 21 - 10:27 AM

I RESPECT YOUR POV PFR BUT OUR CIVIL WAR IS 100 YEARS AGO BUT EFFECTS US DAILY;
The past has not passed and effects us today. Yes we are allies in a multitude of ways. I may disagree with one of your compatriots but all of Britain is not my enemy as some may wish to impune. I have an affectionate curiosity about England which is quenched here.
I hope the challenge to the 99% understanding is just an equivalent of a wrong number. It is what our president calls it but is not accurate to a tenth of 1% or even 1%.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 10 Sep 21 - 10:28 AM

99+% of those hospitalized and dying are unvaccinated. The infection of vaccinated people (percentage-wise) is a moving target, but the percentage of those in the ICU on ventilators IS NOT.

There isn't an anti UK sentiment in this thread, and making one up to make your case isn't a way to win points in this discussion.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 10 Sep 21 - 11:33 AM

Btw...

"fuckwit
A person who is not only lacking in clue but is apparently unable or unwilling to acquire clue even when handed it on a plate in generous portions."


https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.urbandictionary.com/define.php%3fterm=fuckwit&=true



Now that Biden is cracking down hard on anti-vaxxers in his presidential speeches..
He should allow himself the freedom to make liberal use this precisely defined
most appropriate term
when referring to anti-vaxxers...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Sep 21 - 11:40 AM

"99+% of those hospitalized and dying are unvaccinated..."

That isn't what he said, Maggie, and you know it. He said that 99% of infected people are unvaccinated. And he didn't qualify it. It's fake news writ large, Maggie. It's what Donuel does out of sheer habit.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 10 Sep 21 - 12:05 PM

It was only a few weeks ago that it wasn't "fake news" - the science revealing break-through cases is moving. This is a new occurrence in an novel health pandemic and you're slicing it a bit too thin. The lion's share of sick people are unvaccinated.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Sep 21 - 12:59 PM

One thing that's been crystal clear in this pandemic is that "sick" and "infected" are absolutely nothing like the same thing. I'm not slicing anything thin. I'm remarking upon a blatant inaccuracy from a chap with form in that area. In a crisis during which the truth has regularly been a victim, I think we should insist on it whenever we humanly can.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 10 Sep 21 - 02:04 PM

It's a pandemic...!!!

I'd agree it's wiser to be equally tuff on both enemies and allies
if they do not respect objectivity and truth;
carelessly spreading misinformation...


Allies talking unscientific bollocks in public are a liability,
and a tactical gift to the enemy...

We are the ones who need to be the more stringently sensible,
and try our best not to be seen as fukwits
by the wavering undecided as yet unvaccinated...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Sep 21 - 02:12 PM

Couldn't agree more. Olé!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 10 Sep 21 - 03:03 PM

Dr. Klotman's Video Message - Week 77 Issued today, Sept. 10, 2021.

Baylor College of Medicine's Dr. Paul Klotman reviews the numbers, projections, the latest on vaccine efficacy, fear associated with the delta variant and the latest science.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Sep 21 - 07:01 PM

He's a sane voice all right, Maggie. I got half way through, got his message then had to stop to do other stuff. I'll try to remember as close as I can to what he said half way through, that "the only chance we have is to vaccine our way out." Spot on. We will never mask our way out or social distance our way out, not from now on. We must tell everyone how to be sensible, to know how the thing is spread but to allow everyone their freedoms to live normal lives. The playing field has changed, and it's all about vaccines. Unfortunately, unlike here, tens of millions of your countrymen have yet to realise that. Even Joe Biden, bless him, is sounding desperate about it. And let's not be parish-pump about it. We are not safe until the world is safe. And that means vaccinating everyone, everywhere.

A dear friend of mine has a lovely daughter, now in her 20s, who has achieved amazing things in the Royal College of Music. Next week she's playing the solo part in Mozart's clarinet concerto with our local orchestra. I won't be going because I don't want to be up close and personal with hundreds of other people for two hours in our local hall, not while the case rates are so high round here. It breaks my heart, but the risk just isn't worth it as far as I'm concerned. .

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 14 Sep 21 - 09:11 PM

a lighter note - T-shirt competition inspires Sydney's lockdown creativity for a good cause

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 15 Sep 21 - 04:04 AM

I think we'll be offered booster jabs fairly soon. We have both had two jabs of Astra Zeneca, but apparently the boosters might be a different vaccine. We're both wholeheartedly 'up for it' and will be thankful for the opportunity to safeguard our immunity. Husband being black and working in a school (while the pupils are present) is at risk, as am I, being elderly and with a heart condition, so 'Bring It On'!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 15 Sep 21 - 06:21 AM

My third jab was mildly sore just like the first two.
When Isreali data is combined with global data, Moderna was slightly better than Phizer and Az.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 15 Sep 21 - 09:36 PM

If memory serves, Dick Army in the dead of night inserted language into a bill giving amnesty to vaccine makers that protected them from being sued by concerned parents that were misled by a UK doctor over mercury content as a preservative. Dick Army was a Congressman who supported the Tea Party loonies on the far right. 24 years ago the hybrid seeds of the wierd right and whacky vaccine conspiracies were planted in the politics of America. Jenny McCarthy and other wierdos kept up thier campaign for years. Today when vaccines are even more important the murky history of anti vaccinators has reached a critical mass. Dick Army went on to be a hero of the Tea Party, although Dick was working against their vaccine conspiracy. He was surely rewarded by big pharma and was a pioneer of groups that were historically insurrectionist friendly like the Tea Party.
I do not give him the credit for the white nationalist nazis or KKK aspects of the current Republican strategy and he did not know how far his Newt Gingrich antics would be amplified but he did start a political fire in the Capitol that night at 3AM. To me it supports Chaos theory about how a small flap of an insect's wings could grow into a deadly storm.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 15 Sep 21 - 10:41 PM

Dick Armey is from Texas, he represented the district that touches Fort Worth on the north and covers much of Denton County. No surprise there. He was/is a jerk.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 16 Sep 21 - 07:43 AM

1 in 500 Americans have died from Covid. Hospitals in the South, Alaska, and even Virginia are so full that trauma and standard care for heart attacks and strokes are absent or limited.
I have made speculations about scenarios that have magnified antivaxxer sentiments but I hold Facebook and Trump most culpable for resistence to vaccination. Face book for amplifying OUTRAGE and Trump for his lies and behavior.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jack Campin
Date: 16 Sep 21 - 03:57 PM

Live fast, die young and leave a good looking corpse, as the biker saying goes.

The Sturgis crowd might have to settle for two out of three.

How an embalmer sees it

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 16 Sep 21 - 08:24 PM

Being inside for a year has been associated with an increase in nearsightedness in children. The study I heard about was with third graders. Take'm outside sometimes, apparently...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 17 Sep 21 - 01:59 PM

New York City now requires proof of vaccination if you want to dine indoors. Three women from Texas decided to beat up the hostess who asked for proof of vaccination.

Tourists Attack N.Y.C. Restaurant Hostess Over Vaccine Proof, Police Say
Enforcement of a city policy requiring proof of vaccination to dine indoors began Monday. Days later, a hostess at Carmine’s was assaulted after asking three women for their vaccine cards, the police said.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 17 Sep 21 - 02:08 PM

Caught On Video: Carmine’s Hostess Attacked After Asking Tourists For Proof Of Vaccination

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 17 Sep 21 - 10:23 PM

FDA advisory panel backs coronavirus boosters only for the elderly, those at high risk
The twin votes Friday represented a heavy blow to the Biden administration’s sweeping effort to shore up nearly all Americans’ protection amid the spread of the highly contagious delta variant.

Chances are this won't open, they deploy the paywall pretty quickly. But here are the high points:

WASHINGTON — An influential federal advisory panel overwhelmingly rejected a plan Friday to give Pfizer COVID-19 booster shots to most Americans, but it endorsed the extra shots for those who are 65 or older or run a high risk of severe disease.

The twin votes represented a heavy blow to the Biden administration’s sweeping effort to shore up nearly all Americans’ protection amid the spread of the highly contagious delta variant.

The decision was made by a committee of outside experts who advise the Food and Drug Administration.

In a surprising turn, the panel first rejected, by a vote of 16-2, boosters for nearly everyone. Members cited a lack of safety data on extra doses and also raised doubts about the value of mass boosters, rather than ones targeted to specific groups.

Then, in an 18-0 vote, it endorsed the extra shot for select portions of the U.S. population — namely, those most at risk from the virus.

That would help salvage part of the White House’s campaign but would still be a huge step back from the huge plan proposed by administration a month ago to offer booster shots of both the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines to nearly all Americans eight months after they get their second dose.

Friday’s vote was just the first step. The FDA itself is expected to make a decision on boosters in the next few days, though it usually follows the committee’s recommendations.

The offering of boosters is also subject to approval by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. A CDC advisory panel is expected to take up the question on Wednesday. The CDC has said it is considering boosters for older people, nursing home residents and front-line health care workers, rather than all adults.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 18 Sep 21 - 06:05 AM

Boosters are going to be offered to over-50s this end (as well as vulnerable groups, etc.) six months after the second jab. The thing is, we have scant knowledge at the moment about how long immunity lasts. I'm thinking that getting the world vaccinated should have a higher priority than giving boosters in rich western countries. We won't be safe until we're all safe.

But I'll still be accepting my booster...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 18 Sep 21 - 06:09 AM

On a lighter note, when I clicked your link I got this message:

Thank you for being a patron of the Dallas Morning News. Unfortunately, our site is unavailable to European Union visitors...

Clearly, news of brexit hasn't yet percolated through to the Dallas Morning News!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 18 Sep 21 - 09:23 AM

The Dallas Morning News isn't on view to most of the US unless you are a subscriber. But considering that Dallas is the center of the universe, they should address that issue of readability around the planet.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 18 Sep 21 - 10:43 AM

Sydney, Australia-Man leaves Hospital after fighting COVID-19 for 399 days A Sydney man who spent 399 days in hospital recovering from COVID-19 has urged the community to get vaccinated, saying the virus is real.

Sixty-nine-year-old David Avila Mellado was admitted to Westmead Hospital last year on July 29 after getting infected. Earlier this month, he was finally able to go home.

"I start with the COVID, I was in a coma for a few weeks, I came back here, didn't know my name didn't know nothing," he said.

"But now I can say my name. I can say thank you." (read on)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 18 Sep 21 - 01:57 PM

There are children with long haul Covid. There is a propensity for white matter damage to the brains of those who have intellectual deficits from the disease.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 18 Sep 21 - 03:13 PM

The good news is, covid is nature fighting back against far right religious Americans
and their international devoted social media followers..

The bad news, is it leaves the survivors even more of an uncontrollable deranged danger
to the rest of humanity - and our planet...


.. Sadly as in all wars, there are too many innocent collateral damage victims

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 18 Sep 21 - 03:39 PM

You assume virus has political proclivities. The sad part is true.
However the war part is too anthropological. 1 out of 3 ain't bad.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 18 Sep 21 - 04:22 PM

.. maybe covid is an apolitical virus...???

But if it is seen as an antibody of our planets immune defense system,
then it is very effective at taking out over-confident belligerent pathogens
which place too much faith in god and guns...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 18 Sep 21 - 09:33 PM

One of the protestors in a recent "freedom' march wore a shirt saying 'God is my vaccine' ...

No doubt she had received her babyhood & childhood vaccinations as she appears to be of an age when every parent lined up & anti-vaxxers did not exist.

Recently I saw a 1950s photo of a gi-normous ward full of iron lungs with a nurse sitting next to each one.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 19 Sep 21 - 06:15 AM

From The Observer

To mask or not to mask? Opinion split on London underground


"Studies suggest masks cut Covid-19 transmission by up to 80%.Although there is disagreement about how much protection different types of mask offer the wearer, the science indicates that pretty much any covering protects the community from the wearer. It is this uneven interdependence that means masks are extremely effective at revealing hypocrisy.

Few places demonstrate the contested role of the mask more clearly than the London underground system. “Face coverings must be worn for the full duration of journeys on the TfL network, including inside our stations and bus stations,” states the Transport for London website, which also lists no less than 11 categories of exemption. This message is continually repeated over loudspeakers, and on advertising hoardings within underground stations.

Yet as many as half the travellers on the system are now ignoring this stipulation. On Friday, I travelled from Queen’s Park to Oxford Circus on the Bakerloo line. When I got off, there were 40 people in the carriage – only 16 of whom were wearing masks."


In my local Morrisons i would say about a third of the customers now wear masks. The non mask wearers include people of all ages.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Sep 21 - 06:41 AM

"The science indicates..."

Yep, I read this too. That assertion, without enlarging on the "science" referred to or giving a link (which the article didn't), is weasel words.

The reason that this assertion should never be made is that it is impossible to gather scientific evidence for the efficacy of public mask-wearing without it being fatally clouded by confounding factors. "Masks save lives," and comments along those lines, are the absolute negation of science.

I wear a mask where I'm legally obliged to, and I would wear one if travelling on the Underground (which I may be doing quite soon as it happens), as the rules require. I don't break rules and don't advocate test anyone else should. But the usefulness of mask-wearing by the general public is either a matter of opinion or received wisdom. Take your pick.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Sep 21 - 07:01 AM

That, not test. By the way, ""studies suggest..." is also weasel words.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 19 Sep 21 - 09:24 AM

Moderna seems to have the best no-hospitalization numbers...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 19 Sep 21 - 10:25 AM

Weasel words to you, science many of the rest of us. Ignore masks at your own peril.

I attended an event in a large open indoor arena space yesterday and I'd say about 50% or a little more were wearing masks. I wore a mask the whole time.

The stastics show that one in every 500 Americans has now died of COVID-19. As the pandemic progresses, it will continue to affect unvaccinated adults (anti-vaxxers, Trump supporters, and those who simply have not been able to get to a vaccination location), and children (I consider them politically neutral at this point, they are under 12 and a vaccination isn't available for them yet). So there will be a continued thinning of the willfully-stupid population. As many people get their information and opinions in their personal political news silos, this isn't something to celebrate. Hopefully Biden's insistence upon the next push of vaccinations by large employers and government contractors will break up the surging spread.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Sep 21 - 10:51 AM

You're confused. According to all the punditry, any "peril" will be faced by the people who come into contact with the maskless me, not me: "Masks protect others from catching coronavirus from you," as they say. Still, as I'm fully vaccinated and I feel well, I suppose I'm probably one of the 99 in every hundred people who are supposed to wear masks pointlessly. We can't go on like this. The people who are truly imperilling you in your country (less so in mine, though they're there) are the tens of millions of vaccine-refusers. They're my target too. Keep pushing masks, though, and we'll be wearing them forever. If coronavirus is here to stay, which I suppose it is, that's what will happen.

As for the science, there isn't any that can get over even a low bar, and I've looked and looked, begod. There can be be no controlled experimentation, and confounding factors are rife and irremovable.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 19 Sep 21 - 11:35 AM

I went on vacay right before Delta got a strangle hold and had maskless outings. But I would rather be "confused" and be a bit safer than to be as certain as Steve and possibly suffer extreme inconvenience. So I mask for myself and my neighbor and make encounters 70% safer.
Lab creation of Covid 19 is an argument that has become scientifically more robust. The animal theory has as little/no confirmation as the biblical talking snake and has remained stagnant. Deliberate weapon production has no evidence but an accident during wicked research is more possible.
When will we know? It would take a whistle blower, espionage data interception, or a discovery of 2 more segments of other unrelated deady virus.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 19 Sep 21 - 12:00 PM

Steve, you need to stop characterizing others' understanding of science based upon your own. There is no confusion here. Masks protect me, and protect others. End. of. story.

Breakthrough cases of COVID-19.

Your Health: I Got A 'Mild' Breakthrough Case. Here's What I Wish I'd Known (via National Public Radio, Sept. 12, 2021)

I was just one more example of our country's tug and pull between fantasies of a post-COVID-19 summer and the realities of our still-raging pandemic, where even the vaccinated can get sick.

Not only was I sick, but I'd brought the virus home and exposed my 67-year-old father and extended family during my first trip back to the East Coast since the start of the pandemic. It was just the scenario I had tried to avoid for a year and a half. And it definitely was not the summer vacation I had anticipated.

Where did I get it? Who knows. Like so many Americans, I had loosened up with wearing masks and social distancing after getting fully vaccinated. We had flown across the country, seen friends, stayed at a hotel, eaten indoors and, yes, even went to a long-delayed wedding with other vaccinated people.

I ended up in quarantine at my father's house. Two rapid antigen tests (taken a day apart) came back negative, but I could tell I was starting to feel sick. After my second negative test, the nurse leveled with me. "Don't hang your hat on this," she said of the results. Sure enough, a few days later the results of a PCR test for the coronavirus (this one sent to a lab) confirmed what had become obvious by then.

It was a miserable five days. My legs and arms ached, my fever crept up to 103 and every few hours of sleep would leave my sheets drenched in sweat. I'd drop into bed exhausted after a quick trip down to the kitchen. To sum it up, I'd put my breakthrough case of COVID-19 right up there with my worst bouts of flu. Even after my fever cleared up, I spent the next few weeks feeling low.

Of course, I am very lucky. I didn't go up against the virus with a naïve immune system, like millions of Americans did until vaccines were widely available. And, in much of the world, vaccines are still a distant promise.

"You probably would have gotten much sicker if you had not been vaccinated," Francesca Torriani, an infectious disease physician at the University of California, San Diego, explained to me recently.

You've Had a COVID ‘Breakthrough Infection’—Can You Really Spread It to Others? (via Yale Medicine, published August 11, 2021)
Experts stress that vaccination is the best way to prevent infection—and transmission.

COVID-19 breakthrough infections—where a fully vaccinated person becomes infected with the coronavirus—are occurring across the globe, due, in large part, to the highly contagious Delta variant. Here in the United States, many Americans are concerned for their unvaccinated loved ones, including children and those who are immuno-compromised—and given this news, for themselves as well.

Many of us believed that the COVID-19 vaccines offered complete protection from infection, not just from severe disease and death. And though these breakthrough cases are relatively rare, they are a reminder that the pandemic is far from over.

Apart from getting sick, there is also worry that with the Delta variant, a fully vaccinated person who becomes infected may spread the coronavirus to others. According to recent reports from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), this can happen—a finding that may be a game-changer, affecting decisions on how to safely go back to school; return to the office; attend concerts or theater and sporting events; and even whether it’s safe to date.

“The CDC data comes at a critical time, when cases—mostly due to the Delta variant—are on the rise in the U.S. Areas with low vaccination coverage are being hit especially hard with the highest daily case rates in months,” says Yale Medicine infectious diseases expert Jaimie Meyer, MD, MS. “Even though many people were ready to throw away their masks and get back to ‘normal’ life this summer, the latest spikes show us that the pandemic persists. We have to use the CDC data to reassess our understanding of our personal and community risk.”

5 Things Vaccinated People Need to Know About Breakthrough Infection (via Houston Methodist, a large hospital and medical system in Texas, Published August 17, 2021)

COVID-19 Delta variant cases are rising — especially among the unvaccinated — causing a rapidly growing surge for our communities and our hospitals.

But, you're vaccinated, so does the Delta variant really mean anything for you?

Unfortunately, yes.

"The new Delta variant spreads much easier than versions of the virus we've seen previously. The good news is that, in terms of preventing severe disease, this variant is still largely susceptible to vaccination. However, no vaccine is ever 100% effective at preventing infection, and breakthrough infections are occurring," says Dr. Drews.

This is OK, though, since vaccines aren't the only safety measure we have to protect ourselves from getting sick and spreading illness.

"It's once again time for each of us to take action towards flattening the curve — even those of us who are vaccinated," says Dr. Drews. "This means putting our masks back on and taking other precautions we've seen make a difference throughout this pandemic."

So, as we take on this new COVID-19 surge, here are five things vaccinated individuals need to know.

1. What the numbers say about your risk
"Breakthrough infections are occurring, but the truly good news is that vaccinated individuals who do get COVID-19 are much less likely to be hospitalized than those who aren't vaccinated," says Dr. Drews. "The death rate is also much, much lower for vaccinated individuals."

According to CDC data, vaccinated individuals are:

8 times less likely to get COVID-19
25 times less likely to be hospitalized with COVID-19
25 times less likely to die of COVID-19

"This is welcome news since it reaffirms that the vaccines are very successful at their primary job — preventing serious disease," says Dr. Drews. "In fact, recent estimates suggest that COVID-19 vaccines have saved a quarter of a million lives and prevented more than 1 million hospitalizations."

In most cases, fully vaccinated people who do get infected with the virus are asymptomatic or experience only mild symptoms. So, while the vaccines aren't perfect, they're pretty darn close.

"The major concern about breakthrough infections during this surge is that fully vaccinated people can inadvertently spread COVID-19 to others, and it may be hard to determine how common this is," warns Dr. Drews.

This is why it's so important for all of us to take precautions right now.

"We must all take steps to not only prevent getting sick, but also prevent spreading COVID-19 to someone more vulnerable — even if that person is vaccinated and his or her risk is lower than it was previously," adds Dr. Drews.

2. What's risky, what's still safe and when to wear a mask
With COVID-19 cases rising by the day, you might be looking for help understanding what's still safe and what's risky again.

"If you're vaccinated, you can still feel relatively safe gathering indoors with a small group of vaccinated individuals," says Dr. Drews. "You'll want to be more cautious when a larger group is involved or you are in an indoor public space."

If cases are high in your area, Dr. Drews recommends moving large gatherings outdoors, as well as taking extra precautions indoors when you don't know the vaccination status of people around you.

As for those extra precautions, here are six times and places to start wearing a mask and social distancing again:

• While running errands
  
• In an indoor public space
  
• Attending a worship service
  
• While using public transportation (including during domestic travel)
  
• In a hospital, clinic or doctor's office
  
• Visiting with someone who is high-risk

"You may also choose to be more judicious about traveling and spending time in indoor spaces where wearing a mask and maintaining your distance are challenging — such as at bars, restaurants and group exercise classes, for instance," recommends Dr. Drews.

There is a lot more to each of these articles.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Sep 21 - 12:04 PM

I have no certainties and you won't find any in that post. Even if the science re masks became miraculously strong (which it can't, for reasons I've given, but hey ho), there STILL wouldn't be any certainties. There never are in science. The science behind global heating is rock-solid but still there are no certainties. Ironically, you make this assertion, which is unsupportable by evidence, as a certainty: "So I mask for myself and my neighbor and make encounters 70% safer." Like to tell me how you arrived at that??

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Sep 21 - 12:29 PM

"Steve, you need to stop characterizing others' understanding of science based upon your own. There is no confusion here. Masks protect me, and protect others. End. of. story."

That's as far away from any understanding of science as it's possible to get.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 19 Sep 21 - 12:29 PM

I don't bother with statistics...

Obviously, no certainties..

But I just continue voluntarily wearing masks, using anti bac hand gel, and social distancing,
based on a well informed reasonable probability it just might
help keep me, my loved ones, and any strangers I encounter
safe and alive...

It is a pain in the arse, and masks are uncomfortable,
and likely mostly an ineffective effort,
but there are worst things in life to endure..

It's my free independent choice.

The real sheeple are all the easily manipuated brainwashed conformist alt right / relgious death cultists...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Sep 21 - 12:31 PM

A good, sound, sane post. The difference between us is that I exercise MY free choice by wearing masks when compulsory. My arguments are not rebellion.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 19 Sep 21 - 01:01 PM

..But I also wear masks as my futile protest in a tory town centre of mostly maskless inconsiderate morons...

Considering I look more like an old working class ukipper, than a lefty SJW..

I'll do whatever I can to confuse the gammon buggers who might presume I'm one of theirs...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Sep 21 - 01:53 PM

Well I know I run the risk of being associated with such types, but I am not of them....

Here's where I am:

I don't think masks do much good, if any.

In fact, I think that the majority of mask-wearers are guilty of mask-abuse (using the same mask for days, in and out of their snot-rag pockets and contaminating their notes and coins, left festering on the dashboard, down-up-down-up, fiddled around with, scratching nose through...), any or all of which renders masks potentially worse than useless...

I want to show my face and I want to see others' faces too.

If one in a hundred of us is infected, then 99 in a hundred are wearing masks for no good reason and are not protecting anybody.

I'm sick of seeing mask-litter everywhere I go...even in Bude...

I've seen plenty of examples of mask-wearers being complacent. Coming up close, reaching across me in shops. I can honestly say that not one single unmasked person has ever done that to me, and I don't do it to other people.

Finally, there can't be good science with regard to mask efficacy. I won't repeat myself again on that one. We wear masks mostly because "higher authorities" are constantly pushing them. And they have no better evidence than we do.

I've kept every rule on this to the letter ever since the first lockdown. I won't rebel. But I'm wondering what kind of a country we're turning into when we are told that for months on end we can't be in the same house as our loved ones, we can't have Christmas, we can't go here and there and that we must hide the one physical attribute that is the most human of all, our faces.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: DaveRo
Date: 19 Sep 21 - 02:48 PM

punkfolkrocker wrote: I don't bother with statistics...

Statistics is (are?) interesting.

For example, in the UK, we know the number of vaccinated people but not the number of unvaccinated people, so some claims are misleading:
Take care with claims about unvaccinated case rates

When masks became no-longer compulsory on trains around here we bought some higher spec (FFO2) ones.

The other day I was in a busy art gallery and realised I had to sneeze. Do I sneeze in my mask or what?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 19 Sep 21 - 06:14 PM

Whatever the stats...

It is an objective fact that too many folks I encounter
who seem sensible and considerate enough to wear masks,
are too inept at wearing them effectively and safely..

I can guess there is a factor of passive aggressive deliberate misuse,
from those anti maskers so timid of breaking compulsary mask wearing regulations
that they comply by defiantly wearing them wrong with their noses poking out...???

Then there are the many good folks who do agree with wearing masks
but still fail to do it properly.
They are a frustrating liability...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 20 Sep 21 - 12:31 AM

Steve, when the bickering is removed, it really isn't a good move on your part to continue the conversation. Your view on masks has registered and been rejected. Leave it at that. You combine science and opinion as if they are the same thing, and dismiss those who have a very good reason for wearing masks to save their health and lives. "It could be that masks are incredibly effective. But I don't think so." STOP RIGHT THERE. Just give it a rest.

No more.

Most of us don't agree with you, but as you come in and argue again and again how it doesn't work, you feed into the arguments of the antivaxxers, and we're just not having that here. I don't want to close this thread, but my options are to block you or stop the conversation.

It's in your court. We'll see how this goes in the morning.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 20 Sep 21 - 04:05 AM

I agree Stilly that bickering on and on and on serves no purpose really. And perhaps it would be better if people could just 'agree to disagree'.
We always wear a mask (paper ones that we throw away after use) Our lovely neighbour gets multi-packs of them for us in a Poundsavers shop when she visits a nearby little town.
But we don't mind at all wearing one. (Cheeky husband says it 'improves me'!!) However, we very much respect the views and feelings of those who can't bear having their noses/mouths covered and who believe there is no benefit. Each to his own. But we personally need to protect ourselves, being a bit vulnerable.
Same as getting a vaccine/booster etc. We wouldn't 'harp on' to anyone about it, but just quietly (and thankfully) whizz off to our local surgery to get the latest offering (booster soon!)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Sep 21 - 04:28 AM

Well I haven't dismissed anybody. I've said repeatedly that I respect the wishes of those who want to wear masks, and that I would personally never break rules. I think that's a respectable position. Please don't misrepresent me then go for the last word. On the issue of masks, that's me done now. OK?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 20 Sep 21 - 07:20 AM

No, Steve is merely forthright and speaks his mind without timidity.
We all have our different characters on here, and for me, it makes it all the more interesting!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Sep 21 - 07:45 AM

Cheers for that, Eliza! I agree with you, and, naturally, I'm not at all biased! ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 20 Sep 21 - 08:28 AM

Hee hee Steve!! Careful, you might end up buying the Daily Mail and voting Tory (Quick! Send for an ambulance!!)
I often feel that Mudcat is rather like a lively staff-meeting in a school. There's the young student teacher tentatively making a tiny comment, the Head Teacher trying to keep things moving along and squashing the strident teachers. Then the airy-fairy Arts teacher who side-tracks the discussion with aesthetic remarks. Not to mention the Politics/Economics person who knows an awful lot and wants to enlighten the others.
Me? I'm the dotty old tea lady. "Tea and crumpets anybody?" (yap yap yappity yap)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Sep 21 - 08:43 AM

You forgot to mention the science teacher... ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 20 Sep 21 - 08:56 AM

Ah yes, the Science teacher! Has had a very extensive education, knows and updates everyone about many interesting topics in the world of Science, and enjoys gourmet dinners with fine wine.
Actually I had a Physics teacher who was a rampant misogynist and despised his female pupils, a Chemistry teacher who also taught rugby (ferocious chap) plus a really lovely Biology teacher who knew how to teach with enthusiasm and insight. Thanks to them all I passed with Grade 1 in all three subjects.
My favourite though was a very camp, gay English teacher, Mr Shearn. He read out to us all the poems and quoted Shakespeare with feeling. He acted out the parts as if he was on stage. I was fascinated by him and got an 'A' at A level thanks to his dedication.
It takes all sorts eh? (innit?)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: robomatic
Date: 20 Sep 21 - 02:36 PM

In Alaska, I've only associated with a few people, all vaccinated and careful, and while there was a Summer stint without masks, the onset of the Delta variant along with a substantial unvaccinated population in the State and a consequent loss of spare beds in the local hospitals has led to renewed mask self-mandate, the 'self' part of it being that Anchorage has elected a Mayor who is not into the whole 'action' response to the pandemic. Likewise the Governor is no better. They both owe their electinos to the right wing pro-business people (who are not the same thing, but if you campaign carefully you can get a majority).

And the folks I assoiate with now have other associates who have been marked by Covid infections. This has lowered the degrees of separation we have experienced from the disease.

Meanwhile due to some youtube presenting with other folks, all of whom were declared vaccinated, I'd been exposed to some people I know but haven't socialized with for over a year. Anyhow, about twelve days after starting the project I awoke with a sore throat and a slight temperature. My regualar friends suggested I get a Covid test and I agreed, although I suspected I was fighting off a non-Covid virus. I was able to look up among the various test options in town and register over my cellphone. Then I took a fifteen minute drive to a church parking lot where there was a line of cars. As I have found in Alaska, things were run very efficiently. There were two health aides at once taking samples from cars, and things moved faster than I expected. They promised to post results within 48 hours and it was more like 30 hours. And it was negative as I expected.

looking both around the world and back in history, it seems that the level of variation in response and experience is not that exceptional. There are many photos you can find of people wearing masks during the Great flu pandemic, but many not so garbed. The medical establishment then was far more primitive than that of today. And if you look at the Israeli situation, it seemed to start out so progressively and has deteriorated sharply with many vaccine deniers and breakthrough infections, and I believe that most other countries have their version of non-vaccinated at various levels of fantasy and mistrust.

Wishing everyone well and coming back to the standby slogan: "Keep Calm, Vaccinate, Mask-on".

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 20 Sep 21 - 03:35 PM

A pandemic related thread? How odd. I was expecting a market crash post next.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 20 Sep 21 - 04:47 PM

Steve Shaw:
If one in a hundred of us is infected, then 99 in a hundred are wearing masks for no good reason and are not protecting anybody.

There may be many wearing masks to protect themselves from the 'one in a hundred' who is infected yet doesn't wear a mask. The one infected person in a hundred does not necessarily know that they are infected.
So the other 99 are not wearing masks for 'no good reason'. They are protecting themselves, and by doing so are are protecting others by avoiding some of the risk of catching Covid.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Sep 21 - 05:08 PM

Nigel, I've undertaken to not discuss this. You've seen the post. So it's rather unfair of you to challenge me, frankly. I completely disagree with you, but that's as far as I'm prepared to go for now.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 20 Sep 21 - 08:32 PM

yada yada yada
Lets get back to whats important, his feelings
In the land of the annoyed when the Earth and life was destroyed
in novel new ways as it has been for billions of years,
Manunkind could 'end' in a pyramid myriad of alerts and fears.
There were digital attack alerts, domestic terrorist alerts and climate
fire flood and tsunami alerts even Hawaii flirted with nuclear alerts.
What I will miss in advance, are mysteries and histories left unknown,
not just human mysteries but of whales wondering about the space
between our fingers and the dark of the deep.
Secrets of all life that time will forever keep.
Mutations won't drive evolution into a rapidly changing world
as much as our exogenetic genes from our past that turn back on.
Life may spread by pan spermia and death may spread by space virus.
We don't really know what is next for us.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Sep 21 - 08:37 PM

Complete bollocks (which started with yada yada trolling). Still, as long as you're enjoying life.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 21 Sep 21 - 06:38 AM

Its worse than the Spanish flu.

Hard nose, red nose
some cut it off
When science is denied
the gift of life is lost

When loved ones died
of course we cried
from the terrible cost
of nature's holocaust

Here is the cure
"But I'm not sure"
Please take it anyway
"Perhaps I should just pray"

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 21 Sep 21 - 10:14 AM

Nigel stated facts, Steve, he didn't challenge you. And if anyone else states facts you can take it from me now that they're simply stating facts, they're not here to challenge your opinion.

Update: JUST STOP the arguing and discussing moderation. You've said the same thing over and over and this won't end well if you keep it up.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 21 Sep 21 - 11:29 AM

Statistics can be shocking and factual. In the US we are burying a pandemic victim every 35 seconds.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 21 Sep 21 - 12:01 PM

Here in the UK we just bury them once.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 21 Sep 21 - 12:06 PM

Robomatic, another shocking statistic is from Alaska that reported more deaths than births for the first time in our recorded history. One statistic means next to nothing but a myriad of statistics start to tell a tale that is incontravertible.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: DaveRo
Date: 21 Sep 21 - 04:10 PM

Donuel wrote: ...another shocking statistic is from Alaska that reported more deaths than births for the first time in our recorded history

Unsurprising. The population increase in the US is very low - about 0.35% in 2020 (ref). It suggests to me that the mean age of the population of Alaska is increasing a bit more than other states.

Bear in mind also that most Covid deaths are brought forward a year or two, and births are the result of, er, sentiment, 9 months earlier. So it depends on the period that the statistic applies to.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Sep 21 - 06:00 PM

Vaccines are the only way out of this. Boris says that his priority is to protect the British people via booster jabs. The World Health Organisation calls for the west to suspend boosters in order to get the rest of the world jabbed all the faster. I know who's right.

But I'll still take the booster when offered...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 22 Sep 21 - 05:58 PM

Rain Dog, best guffaw in weeks!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 Sep 21 - 06:29 PM

Yeah, don't ask me why, but Raindog's quip reminded me of that yarn about Bono (the most pretentious man on the planet apart from Sting, or possibly Geldof): "At a U2 concert in Glasgow, Bono asks the audience for some quiet. Then in the silence, he starts to slowly clap his hands. Holding the audience in total silence, he says into the microphone, 'Every time I clap my hands, a child in Africa dies.' A voice from near the front pierces the silence: 'Well, stop clapping your fucking hands then!' "

Anyway, enough of the diversions. Back to the substantive. Joe wants the world vaccinated. He's yet to tell us how it can be delivered, but I like the sentiment. The way out can only be by vaccination, and we are not safe until everyone's safe.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: robomatic
Date: 22 Sep 21 - 07:00 PM

Good Bono joke.

That kind of humour is on display in a good show to watch during the Covid Continuation: Ted Lasso. It celebrates the mutual appreciation between our two sides of the Atlantic Ocean, where an American football coach is hired to manage a Manchester UK football team. I'm quite enjoying it.

The local headlines have been focused on our sad rate of Covid infection, which apparently leads the nation in per capita cases. According to the Daily News, people have died due to lack of availability of treatment room and proper medical equipment. Because of our low overall population the death count is very low. Most people I interact with are healthy, masked, or both. Our schools are open for now. The epidemologists are calling attention to the likelihood that Alaska lags the other states, so they hope our numbers start to decline within a week or so after the Labor Day celebrations.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 22 Sep 21 - 09:38 PM

All Idaho, Alaska and Montana hospitals are on [crises status].
translated: The entire state is on a kind of DNR where a triage of patients will now deny hospital service to those who are judged to probably not survive. This will apply to all patients whether they have Covid or not.
The mantra of the right that safety standards be it masks, vaccines or other mitigating procedures is a 'personal matter' is clearly not true.

I suppose this is happening due to the thin healthcare network in those states as well as the overwhelming pandemic numbers. I'm sorry, people are more than just numbers.
This development is a challenge for gallows humor comedians but I'm sure it can be done. I imagine 'crises status' might work well all the time to save money, time and suffering for patient's families, besides the dead don't pay hospital bills reliably.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 22 Sep 21 - 11:57 PM

Washington Governor Criticizes Idaho Leadership: “Stop Clogging Up My Hospitals”

Washington Governor Jay Inslee (D) criticized Idaho leadership, saying that Idaho Governor Brad Little’s (R) disregard for the Covid-19 pandemic is “clogging up” Washington’s hospitals.

“Today in my state, Washington citizens in many cases cannot get heart surgery, cannot get cancer surgery that they need, because we are having to take too many people of unvaccinated nature and unmasked, many of whom come from Idaho, and that’s just maddening frankly,” Inslee told MSNBC.

“So we are calling for Idaho and the leaders there to lead and take some commonsense measures,” Inslee continued. “I’m disappointed the governor of Idaho has spent more time trying to reduce protection by reducing vaccine usage instead of concentrating on this, and then clogging up my hospitals.”

Inslee proceeded to criticize the Republican Party in its entirety.

“Unfortunately, that entire party, the other party, is not helping out, pulling on the rope here. Many states are in the same position and many governors will experience the same frustration I have. So it’s time for people to start pulling on the rope and do an American duty. Get vaccinated, have useful use of masks where appropriate. If we do these things, we know we can best this pandemic,” he said.

Health care workers are exhausted as Idaho’s Covid-19 cases continue their upward trajectory.

“The numbers continue to increase, and we expect them to continue to increase,” said Dave Jeppesen, the director of the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 23 Sep 21 - 03:37 AM

I'm looking at the state government COVID regulations page & there it is - a bald statement, but oh, how so true what with anti-vaxxers & "freedom" marchers around. COVID-19 RULES IN NSW

It also rules in other places around Australia.

In Melbourne, Australia's 2nd largest state capital "Freedom" marchers have taken over in the past few days. Yesterday they occupied the
Shrine of Remembrance

As someone said recently, we don't have enough villages for the idiots we are producing.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 23 Sep 21 - 04:08 AM

There was a village built of crumbling clay and rotting wood, and it squated under a broiling sun like a sick and mangy animal that wanted to die. This village had a virus shared by its people. It was the germ of squalor, racism and hopelessness. Those who claimed faith had lost their faith. For the faithless the hopeless and the misery laden, there is time, ample time, to engage in one of the pursuits of men. They began to destroy themselves. Every person had their own side, their own facebook page and harbored in the safety of annominity, their savory hate.
Gradually that hate grew openly and expressed itself beyond the digital world into the streets, into the school board meetings and into their guns with bullets. The only reward was the self satisfaction of owning or disgracing the other side. There was the sickening competition of the number of the dead. The only good dead were the 'other' ones. Sadly your own tribal dead were the real people, the decent folk who hated all the right folks.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 23 Sep 21 - 05:47 AM

The US has more than 2,000 agonizing Covid deaths per day.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 23 Sep 21 - 08:20 AM

There seem to be several youngsters with Covid in our village, quite a few in our street. And what puzzles me is that their siblings are happily strolling down our road to board the school bus to the high school, or moseying down to our little village primary school. I would have though all members of a 'Covid household' should be quarantined until they all test negative?
Since my husband cleans at the same school, I'm worried he may be exposed to these 'carriers'. He seems to believe that the two jabs he's had are magic and he'll never get Covid! The pupils are all around him during the afternoons, and he's cleaning toilets etc. He promised me he always wears his mask and visor.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 23 Sep 21 - 09:25 AM

Confidence is emotionally good. The odds of a vaccinated death is much less than 1% percent but getting the variant (Breakthrough infections) can go up as much as ~20%.

J&J says 2 shots brings their protection up to 100% but the other vaccines don't go that high.

at least thats the NIH propoganda I have been taught.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Sep 21 - 09:29 AM

Perhaps you could run that by us again, this time in plain language...?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 24 Sep 21 - 10:12 AM

That's perfectly good and clear English. And this morning Walensky over-ruled the board and included people in high-risk (exposure) jobs to get the booster also.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 24 Sep 21 - 10:34 AM

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/sep/24/absolutely-madness-melbourne-teenagers-reveal-they-are-behind-leading-covid-tracking-website (clicky didn't work - dunno why, can you fix it please Stilly.

It turns out one of the most authoritative Covid-19 tracking sites in Australia is run by three teenagers.

The trio, who have been running CovidbaseAU, became part of their own statistics after getting their first doses of the Moderna vaccine in Melbourne.

The identities of the brains trust behind CovidbaseAU had not been public before Thursday afternoon, when 14-year-old Wesley with Jack and Darcy, both 15, tweeted a photograph of themselves ...

Nick Evershed, the data and interactives editor at Guardian Australia, said CovidBaseAU had done impressive work collating hard-to-find information.

“There has been a few occasions, particularly with the numbers around vaccine imports and supply, where I’ve cross-checked my numbers against theirs,” he said ...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 24 Sep 21 - 12:44 PM

Guardian clicky as above

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 24 Sep 21 - 01:04 PM

I take all Donuel's post with a pinch of ivermectin.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 24 Sep 21 - 01:18 PM

That makes horse sense to me...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 24 Sep 21 - 01:43 PM

Many aspects of this discussion - we've seen them somewhere before.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 24 Sep 21 - 07:35 PM

thanks, Nigel, when I posted the link the last few letters were left off - several times. Each time I re-posted, I made sure the entire URL had been copied, but it still left them off.

One Of Life's Little Mysteries!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Sep 21 - 10:02 PM

Raindog I am a spectator like everyone else but on this issue I have a front row NIH seat. If you want Nobel prize winners you should seek another website.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 27 Sep 21 - 09:43 AM

I believe we are all biased to negative news. This is compounded by a confusion between evolving research, actual data and the fears and conspiracy speculations of the insane or those with a political agenda.
The Martin Gibson's in society, whacko people with a MD after their name and narcicists go to great lengths to give the illusion of points of view and bogus authority that can beguile even highly intelligent people to believe that the negative news is larger than it is. People I know actually begin to think in terms "if all those doctors say...then it must be true". This week the conspiracy crowd has surpassed all of its previous damaging rhetoric. It is so perverse, not even I will repeat it.

Life, liberty and happiness. If you don't have life you can't have liberty, if you can't have liberty you can't have happiness. Save your life by staying alive with vaccines.

So its time to get the flu shot again, get it, and get it early.
Its actually less reliable than Covid vaccines but more likely to help you than facebook. imo
And don't forget the good news is much larger than you can even imagine despite the bias to nocticing bad news.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: The Sandman
Date: 27 Sep 21 - 10:54 AM

i have never botherd with the flu jab it is one instance where i would prefer to build up my immune system mind you i have not had a bath for 25 years so most people smell me and run,
but each to their own

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 27 Sep 21 - 11:25 AM

.. on the other hand...

When I started getting the flu jab 2 or 3 years ago,
that was a positive turning point in my life..

Prior to that I could count on most Januarys or Februarys being wiped out by a nasty bout of Flu..

It was even worse for the years I was actively keeping fit and strong in the gym..

Apparently that healthy lifestyle weakens resistence to winter bugs...???

===========================

"This week the conspiracy crowd has surpassed all of its previous damaging rhetoric. It is so perverse, not even I will repeat it."

Donny - don't be so precious...!!!

If there are new strains of conspiracy theories,
this is the thread were we need to be alerted to them...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 27 Sep 21 - 11:49 AM

Simply the data as you will, I won't do it for you.
viral mutation rates

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 27 Sep 21 - 11:53 AM

OK the new conspiracy https://www.techtimes.com/articles/265811/20210924/anti-vaccine-facebook-groups-imploring-people-stay-away-icu.htm

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 27 Sep 21 - 12:09 PM

Donny - ok..Thanks...

'Knowledge is power'...!!!'

For a lifelong pacifist, I have big respect for military maxims

.. Best of all "Know thy enemy"...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 27 Sep 21 - 01:20 PM

As a pacifist I favor the elixer of peace similar to the ancient Greeks at Elysium. Old solutions can be repeated. However there is wisdom in the Art of War when it comes to conflict and conflict avoidance.
We are doing amazingly well so far in our struggle for health.
That people often do not like being told what to do is a rock in our sock.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 27 Sep 21 - 01:33 PM

Article in The Guardian today.

How the US vaccine effort derailed and why we shouldn’t be surprised

Low vaccine rates may be the predictable outcome subject to entrenched social forces that have diminished American health and life expectancy since the 1980s, health researchers say

The Guardian

"The story is one example of how the United States purchased enough vaccines to inoculate its entire population, and even potentially embark on a round of booster shots, but health professionals found lacking another essential element essential to a successful vaccination campaign: trust.

That lack of confidence garnered the United States an unenviable distinction – in mid-September it became the least vaccinated member of the world’s seven most populous and wealthy democracies, or “G7,” which includes Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy and Japan."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 27 Sep 21 - 01:40 PM

Let's see if this goes through, it's a New York Times article to subscribers: Red Covid is an article that complements the Guardian article linked above.

With the death count rising, at least a few Republicans appear to be worried about what their party and its allies have sown.

In an article this month for Breitbart, the right-wing website formerly run by Steve Bannon, John Nolte argued that the partisan gap in vaccination rates was part of a liberal plot. Liberals like Biden, Nancy Pelosi, Anthony Fauci and Howard Stern have tried so hard to persuade people to get vaccinated, because they know that Republican voters will do the opposite of whatever they say, Nolte wrote.

His argument is certainly bizarre, given that Democratic politicians have been imploring all Americans to get vaccinated and many Republican politicians have not. But Nolte did offer a glimpse at a creeping political fear among some Republicans. “Right now, a countless number of Trump supporters believe they are owning the left by refusing to take a lifesaving vaccine,” Nolte wrote. “In a country where elections are decided on razor-thin margins, does it not benefit one side if their opponents simply drop dead?”

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 27 Sep 21 - 02:04 PM

And then there's this—We Need to Rethink Our COVID Testing Priorities

Rapid antigen COVID tests are cheap to produce, easy to use, and can report results in a matter of minutes. They’re a powerful tool for stopping the spread of COVID because they allow people to test frequently and, if results are positive, quarantine immediately rather than waiting one to five days for a PCR test result. So why hasn’t the U.S. embraced rapid antigen tests more fully? Michael Mina argues that the country has overlooked the power of rapid antigen tests because we’ve been consumed by a singular focus: vaccines.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 27 Sep 21 - 02:41 PM

It seems you have to sign up to read all of the New York Times article.

I did read the Nolte article. It reads like a spoof piece but unfortunately it is not. I did search further on Nolte. It would appear he has been vaccinated and urged others to do so as well. That seems to upset some of his twitter followers.

Article from The Atlantic on the same subject.

The Conservatives Who’d Rather Die Than Not Own the Libs

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Sep 21 - 03:34 PM

I agree that frequent testing is a big part of the fight. As far as I know, lateral flow test kits (not the same thing, I know) are still freely available here. There have been rumblings from the government that perhaps we should be paying for them. Bad move. I have a small stash of them in a cupboard. They have been accused of being unreliable. Well I've used them twice now and I regard meself as a fairly rigorous chap when it comes to carefully following orders. They are not especially easy to use, at least for the first couple of times. I suspect that they're quite reliable - when used correctly.

But, and I don't mind saying it again, it's all about getting the world vaccinated. I looked earlier at the state-by-state vaccination rates in the US. I noticed, broad brush, that many of the states below 50% vaccination are in the south/Bible Belt. I'll let you tell me the reasons for that.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 27 Sep 21 - 04:58 PM

One result of not testing and not vaccinating is that Idaho morgues are running out of space for bodies as covid-19 deaths mount.

Yes, after a few views, various newspapers require subscriptions. The Washington Post is only $4 a month after a free six month trail if you have Amazon Prime. The Times is pricier. But try a different browser or go in and clean out your cookies to reset the monthly allowance. I subscribe to The Atlantic also, so tend to post a lot of their stuff also.

Here's a bit from the link above:

Dave Salove has watched his morgue fill with bodies. Covid-19 victims have poured into the funeral home he runs in Boise, Idaho, in recent weeks, as the state contends with an unprecedented spike in deaths driven by the delta variant of the coronavirus. His 16-slot refrigeration room is over capacity. Other funeral homes have neared a tipping point, too.

Intent on avoiding the makeshift morgues that cropped up in the Northeast during the pandemic’s first wave, Salove this week brought in a refrigerated trailer to hold the growing number of dead. By Friday, there were seven corpses inside, up from two the day before. Six more were on their way from another facility.

“I’d barely gotten it installed, and we had to start using it,” Salove said. “Right now, we are seeing that spike.”

As covid-19 deaths reach record highs in the state of 1.8 million, hard-hit areas are struggling to keep pace with the surge in victims. Some hospitals, funeral homes and coroners say they’ve been pushed to the limit. Some morticians have even started embalming bodies that wouldn’t normally need the procedure so they don’t have to refrigerate them, the Idaho Statesman reported.

The backlog is so bad in some places that people have had to wait weeks to cremate their loved ones.

“We’re so far behind on cremations,” said Lance Cox, owner of Bell Tower Funeral Home in Post Falls, Idaho. “That’s really how it impacts the families the most. You can bring in backup refrigeration options in an emergency, but you can’t bring in a backup crematory.”

The dire situation in Idaho, one of the least vaccinated states in the country, is another grisly illustration of what happens when a state fails to contain infections.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 27 Sep 21 - 05:21 PM

.. So we bemused Brits can only surmise state governers and other powerful American politicians
have been immunised against being arrested for corporate manslaughter / murder...???

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 27 Sep 21 - 06:51 PM

Sandman why didn't you say you were a frog?
Florida Govenor De Santis has committed virtual murder for some and favortism for the wealthy to get vaccinated first.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 30 Sep 21 - 08:38 AM

Alabama has joined the more deaths than births club.
The pregnant are urged to get vaccinated immediately since they are 70% more prone to Delta infection.
Russia is angry at you tube for removing their fake American anti vax videos. Finally harrassment and attacks on health care heros are growing due to the misinformation campaign.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 30 Sep 21 - 09:05 AM

Pregnant women are no more prone to catching the delta variant than anyone else, but they are more likely to develop severe illness. Let's stick to the facts.

Alabama has one of the lowest vaccination rates of any US state. Mississippi is another. The reasons for this need to be urgently addressed. Unvaccinated people are a huge threat to everyone.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 30 Sep 21 - 10:30 AM

When the big sports stars finally get the vaccination a few more reluctant folks may follow along. A Few NBA Players Aren't Ready To Take The (COVID) Shot

LeBron James got the vaccine recently. That may help.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: gillymor
Date: 30 Sep 21 - 12:11 PM

Color me skeptical but I'm sure a major consideration for the legacy-chasing King James was the prospect of not being allowed to play in Brooklyn, San Francisco and perhaps some other NBA arenas due to local ordinances if he went unvaxxed. Imagine the impact he might have had if he'd been promoting vaccinations back in the spring. I agree with Kareem Abdul-Jabbar's hard line- "There is no room for players who are willing to risk the health and lives of their teammates, the staff and the fans simply because they are unable to grasp the seriousness of the situation or do the necessary research,"

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 01 Oct 21 - 07:57 AM

In these glum times I've watched the smart become dumb and the dumb become insane.
I've watched the smart assume what is truth to them and deny research
without evidence and hold dear to their initial opinion.
I've seen the dumb change their minds 180 degrees about vaccines
in order to support their white priviledge candidate.
They are willing to abstractly die for their hateful cause.
Mostly I see the old hold onto brittle beliefs.
The good news is that 9 out of 10 have not lost their minds.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 01 Oct 21 - 11:32 AM

Whatever his reason, he changed his mind and got the jab and has told people they should also.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: gillymor
Date: 01 Oct 21 - 03:22 PM

If he had come out with his tepid endorsement of vaccines earlier in the year it would have saved a lot of black lives considering how hard their community was hit by the virus and how much pull he has in that community. I'm not quite ready to canonize him.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 01 Oct 21 - 05:32 PM

I never even thought about Trump just then but instead a familar crumudgeon. The first alerts to pandemic risk were for the elderly, but now the virus is more uniform in infection with a few exceptions.
Trump deliberately lied to improve the financial gains for his investments and the economy at large. Toward the end he was just about the same insane guy he started as. The continual lie was his golden goose, until most of us saw it was sick. imo

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 01 Oct 21 - 07:22 PM

Did we really get our 7 Trillion dollars worth of defense from the Defense Department?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 02 Oct 21 - 02:09 PM


The summer coronavirus surge has started to ebb, but delta’s danger remains

A nationwide decline in new infections and hospitalizations is fueled by sharp drops in Southern states that were hit hard by the highly contagious delta variant. Hospital admissions nationwide crested above a weekly average of 100,000 in early September and are still at levels not seen since the winter, before vaccines were widely available. New infections plateaued in the first half of September, averaging above 150,000 daily, and are now on track to slip below 100,000.

And down the page a bit:

The pandemic marks another grim milestone: 1 in 500 Americans have died of covid-19
In places like Tennessee, Alabama, Mississippi and the Carolinas, the latest wave appears to be following a similar pattern of a sharp spike followed by steep plunge seen in the United Kingdom, India and other places battered by delta. Epidemiologists say this pattern suggests the virus is rapidly burning through pockets of unvaccinated people before hitting a wall.

And this:

Experts including Rubin are now paying attention to states in the North and Upper Midwest that are starting to see cases and hospitalizations creep up, which was expected after schools reopened and people gather indoors with few restrictions as chilly weather returns. Case upticks alone are not cause for alarm if hospitalization spikes do not follow, experts said. Public health leaders have largely accepted the novel coronavirus will never be vanquished, instead turning into an endemic threat such as the flu and other respiratory viruses.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 03 Oct 21 - 09:56 AM

The social changes Covid is causing may call for a change in Maslow's hierarcy of human priorities;
Air, water, food, shelter, vaccination locator and companionship. :^/

PS: SRS, Now that I no longer see Steve Shaw posts on my page I have noticed you sometimes respond defensively to his posts that follow mine. I do not wish to have any reminder of nonsense and would hope you might either ignore or remove what you consider misinformation. A Steve free enviorment helps me think more clearly without narcisist distraction. Thank you for expanding condensed observation into larger forms and website confirmation. Amos advised me repeatedly to show other site confirmations. I finally try more often as time allows. Experts with dyslexia often claim there is no cure but I say they are mostly wrong, with practice it can get much better.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 03 Oct 21 - 12:36 PM

:-)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 03 Oct 21 - 01:49 PM

It's one dyslexic to another Don, though I think the version you have is more pronounced.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 03 Oct 21 - 09:27 PM

If you are multi lingual you are correct.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 03 Oct 21 - 09:32 PM

Old McDonald was dyslexic
OIOIE...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 03 Oct 21 - 09:34 PM

(And don't blame me for that one. It was a Billy Connolly special....)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: gillymor
Date: 04 Oct 21 - 07:48 AM

classy

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 04 Oct 21 - 06:59 PM

The book 'Think Again' the power of knowing what you don't know, gives guidance to those undecided about vaccine by way of empathy.
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B087ZC68VN/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 05 Oct 21 - 10:03 PM

Covid News: New Study Finds Pfizer Vaccine Provides Strong Protection Against Hospitalization

The upshot of this article about vaccine research says that Pfizer provided 90% coverage for 6 months:

The Pfizer-BioNTech coronavirus vaccine is 90 percent effective at preventing hospitalization for up to six months, with no signs of waning during that time period, according to a large new U.S. study conducted by researchers at Pfizer and Kaiser Permanente.

The vaccine also provides powerful protection against the highly contagious Delta variant, the scientists found. In a subset of people who had samples of their virus sequenced, the vaccine was 93 percent effective against hospitalization from Delta, compared with 95 percent against hospitalization from other variants.

Further on it says:

Data from Israel indicates that the Pfizer vaccine’s effectiveness against infection dropped to 39 percent in late June and early July, down from 95 percent in January through early April. But it remained more than 90 percent effective against severe disease during that time period. . . . Overall, the vaccine was 90 percent effective against hospitalization and 73 percent effective against infection. Among those who were 65 or older, it was 86 percent effective against hospitalization and 61 percent effective against infection.

This talks about how much protection is restored with the booster:

Pfizer says Israel data shows third Covid shot restores protection from infection to 95% as it makes case to FDA for boosters

A third dose of Pfizer’s Covid vaccine six months after a second shot restores protection from infection to 95% in a real-world setting in Israel, according to data submitted by the company to the Food and Drug Administration.

While the effectiveness of the mRNA vaccine wanes over time, a booster shot was shown to elicit an immune response similar to the protection generated after a second dose, Pfizer said in a 52-page presentation released by the agency Wednesday.

This is good news. I got my booster yesterday.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Ebbie
Date: 06 Oct 21 - 04:46 AM

For whatever reason, the state of Alaska is in sad shape with covid. Juneau, its capital, is doing better than the state as a whole but the delta variant is still surging here too. That kind of surprises- and disturbs- me, because we have a fairly high rate of vaccinations.

Does anyone care to venture a prediction regarding the virus's persistence? Back a few months I thought 2021 would be a whole lot better than last year but now I'm not even confident about 2022.

What really bothers me is that the longer we take to get ahead of the virus, the more chance it has to develop more mutations.

Willful ignorance is stupidity and in this country we have an awful lot of willful ignorance. Just this last week I discovered that two groups of people I have liked, one of them in Texas and the other in Florida, are among them.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 06 Oct 21 - 11:12 AM

This week I heard a discussion of the two-month cycle that COVID-19 seems to follow.

Trying to make sense of COVID’s mysterious 2-month cycle

The reasons remain somewhat unclear, and there is no guarantee that the decline in caseloads will continue. But the turnaround is now large enough — and been going on long enough — to deserve attention.

The number of new daily cases in the United States has fallen 35% since Sept. 1. Worldwide, cases have also dropped more than 30% since late August. “This is as good as the world has looked in many months,” Dr. Eric Topol of Scripps Research wrote last week.

The most encouraging news is that the most serious forms of COVID are also declining. The number of Americans hospitalized with COVID has fallen about 25% since Sept. 1. Daily deaths — which typically change direction a few weeks after cases and hospitalizations — have fallen 10% since Sept. 20. It is the first sustained decline in deaths since early summer.

If we're smart we'll be ready for the next cycle. It sounds like there will finally be a supply of rapid COVID tests available in early December (the FDA was initially more interested in a test that needed a doctor's office and 24 hours for the result). I read about people in Europe offering to ship their inexpensive and 98% accurate tests to friends here in the US.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: leeneia
Date: 06 Oct 21 - 12:03 PM

I get a magazine called The Week, and it seems reliable. It just said that the typical cost of a hospital stay for Covid is over $31,000. If a ventilator and ICU are required, cost is over $300,000.

Maybe if we publicized that, we could conquer some vaccine hesitancy. Tell the battlers something they can understand, something that cannot be turned into an emotional issue.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 06 Oct 21 - 04:01 PM

Thats a good idea.
Vaccination rates went way up when employers required employee vaccination or loss of income for refusing. Money seems to matter more than life itself for many.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Oct 21 - 04:28 PM

I'm pro-vaccination and we are fully vaccinated. I can't wait for my booster. But I am implacably opposed to compulsion. What kind of world, what kind of "democracy," do we live in when you can force someone to submit to having a needle containing a foreign substance stuck into him, under pain of losing his livelihood? We have to try much harder to persuade, not force. It would help if we could see all the more clearly how those evil people on social media, and those evil preachermen, are doing so much harm. There may be a few thousand people who you'd like to see lose their jobs for refusing the vaccine. But there are tens of MILLIONS who are being persuaded, in effect, to put your whole country in danger by these charlatans. It's about time we all realised who the real enemy is. Sacking people who have been hoodwinked by those charlatans is nothing more than a perverted form of trumpism. Go after the social media idiots and the preachers. And shame on you if you connive in this by subscribing to Facebook.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Oct 21 - 04:41 PM

And in support of that, here's a piece from todays Guardian. You'll have to google it.

"Facebook is a harmful presence in our lives. It’s not too late to pull the plug on it.
(Jathan Sadowski)"

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 06 Oct 21 - 05:45 PM

Security Warning: health care workers

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 07 Oct 21 - 06:46 AM

The Welsh Assembly voted on Tuesday evening to introduce vaccine passports for certain large events and large night-clubs.
The vote was carried by a single vote, and would not have been passed but for the inability of one Conservative member to log in to vote from the Conservative Party Conference.
I'm not saying that it was a 'stitch-up', but I'm not aware of any important, or contentious, votes being held (in Cardiff) during the course of the Labour Party Conference.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Oct 21 - 07:07 AM

I think that it should be up to individual institutions to decide who can enter or not enter. No more government edicts, please. My "vaccine passport" is on my NHS app (to be clear, not the track-and-trace shambles which I deleted months ago). I'd be more than happy to show it if asked at the entrance to somewhere or other. I never have been asked for that, but I have been asked by two neurotic shopkeepers (out of all the dozens of shops I've been to since the great easing-up of July) to put on a mask as a condition of entry. The irony is that my unasked-about vaccinations are invaluable whereas the scruffy, ancient, just-in-case mask shoved in my cargo pants pocket* is almost certainly useless. But if it keeps them happy...

*As with most mask-shunning folk these days...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 07 Oct 21 - 11:02 AM

When's the last time you had polio, Steve? Smallpox? Both of those have been vaccinated against for decades (Smallpox not any more because it is considered eradicated.)

Measles? Mumps? Rubella? Whooping Cough? Until the last 10 years or so it was standard for children to get these shots before starting school. Now that there are anti-vaxxers around, there are large community breakouts of these preventable diseases.

It used to be that if you were working in food service you had to first go get a chest xray at the county to be sure you didn't have tuberculosis. You can't work around people if you have it. If you do and don't take your medication, they can quarantine or imprison and force you to take the medication.

Typhoid Mary had to be imprisoned because she refused to stay away from food service and kept making people sick.

Don't be silly about the occasional mandatory vaccine. It's for everyone's good.

Did you know they've just approved a vaccination for malaria? WHO greenlights the world's first malaria vaccine — but it's not a perfect shot. If it doesn't become politicized it may save a whole bunch of lives - particularly of children. If nations want to make compulsory a vaccine for populations for something like this, I'll be in line.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Oct 21 - 01:30 PM

I've given you my considered point of view about whether vaccination should be mandatory. It's a respectable point of view shared, quite likely, if not by a majority of people, by a large minority in the UK. Therefore it ill-behoves you to call me "silly." I've told you that I prefer persuasion, along with information and a severe clampdown on damaging scaremongering. And, if anyone is silly, it's your administration (far more than ours, though we're not innocent) who allow Facebook, etc., to be infested with anti-vaccine idiots and for preachers in your Bible Belt to preach about the evils of vaccines and how God will punish the vaccinated. The whole idea is to stop the pandemic. The way to do that is to get the world vaccinated. Nothing else will do. Most of those people you are excoriating for refusing to be vaccinated (and who you'd like to see lose their jobs) are victims of those self-same idiots. So you need to select your target far more carefully.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Oct 21 - 08:41 PM

Just a note on this, by the way:

"When's the last time you had polio, Steve? Smallpox? Both of those have been vaccinated against for decades (Smallpox not any more because it is considered eradicated.)

Measles? Mumps? Rubella? Whooping Cough? Until the last 10 years or so it was standard for children to get these shots before starting school. Now that there are anti-vaxxers around, there are large community breakouts of these preventable diseases."

As a little lad I had all my polio jabs. Smallpox was never on offer unless you were going overseas (which I never did). I caught measles, mumps and rubella, and chicken pox lest we forget, in the days before vaccinations against them were available. My two children, now in their forties, were both vaccinated against measles, mumps and rubella as soon as we were advised to get them done, in spite of idiotic scare stories about the measles vaccine. I made sure that I was always immunised against tetanus too, and I've had my flu jab every year for decades. At present I've had both Coronavirus jabs and am waiting impatiently for my booster as well as this year's flu jab.

I don't care very much to be characterised as someone who sides with anti-vaxxers, thank you very much. Just thought I'd mention it (again). We are, in my view, perfectly entitled to have different perspectives on this. My perspective on compulsion is that it would be undemocratic, and that we in the UK and US have been extremely lazy, and behind the curve, when it comes to giving the public full information and persuasion about vaccines, and that we are severely at fault for permitting social media to allow their members to propagate conspiratorial, scaremongering nonsense about vaccines. I have never subscribed to any of those social media, and I simply can't understand why decent people still have anything to do with them.



:

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 08 Oct 21 - 04:15 AM

Oh Stilly, a vaccine to protect against malaria would be such a godsend! It kills thousands and thousands in Africa, including many known to my husband in Ivory Coast.
I've always been perfectly accepting of an armful of jabs when travelling to the Tropics. Yellow fever (usually obligatory, with a need to show proof) and about five other nasty diseases - cholera, typhoid, meningitis, tetanus etc.
Also had polio, TB etc jabs as a child/teenager. No ill-effects from any of these (except the Yellow Fever one -hallucinations and delirium!)
But I agree with Steve that it isn't ethical to force unwilling people to be vaccinated. However, the rest of us have the right to protect ourselves from being infected by the unvaccinated, so some rules should apply about entry to community events, restaurants, bars, care homes and so on.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 08 Oct 21 - 04:29 AM

Save Australia? Nah, we're right thanks Earlier this week news broke that a small group of protestors in New York City had taken to the streets to express their opposition toward mandatory COVID-19 vaccine jabs for teachers, and given the rise of conspiracy theories and misinformation about vaccines being propagated through social media channels in recent times, that’s not entirely a surprise.

Anti-vaxxers gonna anti-vax! What was a surprise, however, was the fact that this group of disgruntled American citizens were waving Australian flags, and chanting “Save Australia!” as they marched toward the Australian consulate in Midtown, leaving many of us here in Oz wondering, “Wait… what?”

It seems there’s been a rise in discussions on right-wing media platforms about Australia’s ongoing lockdowns and the recent protests in Melbourne that saw a crowd of what can only be described as an intoxicating (and in some cases, intoxicated) combination of riled up genuine tradies and hi-vis wearing anti-lockdown campaigners teaming up to wreak havoc in the CBD, ultimately culminating – much like most Australian wedding receptions – in a rousing rendition of Daryl Braithwaite’s Horses.

Many in the States saw footage of these rioters violently clashing with Victoria Police as further proof that Australia has become an authoritarian state, with only a few brave souls prepared to rise up against mandatory vaccinations and a seemingly endless lockdown.

... The fact that Australia’s COVID-19 death rate is 25.36 deaths per million as opposed to America’s 2107.29 deaths per million is an indication that as grinding as the lockdown measures feel, they’re working. If you disagree, I urge you to nominate a member of your immediate family you’d like to put forward for a preventable death since, if you’re advocating for a virus free-for-all so you can taste sweet freedom ASAP, that’s essentially what you’re asking of a fellow citizen. (read on)

tradies? = construction workers, who were angry about restrictions to their work day. Not all of the demonstrators were tradies, the ones with dusty scuffed work boots were, but high-vis vests were worn by a lot of other people.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Oct 21 - 06:14 AM

Well I read the piece about Australia and the protest. It shouldn't really need pointing out that Oz, and NZ too, are, in effect very remote "islands" with huge distances across oceans to the next place along. Moreover, both countries have sparse populations spread over large areas compared with other western nations. So they've done very well in keeping case numbers low, but they do start with that two-pronged advantage. Just sayin'.

And let's keep very clear in our minds the stark difference between anti-vaxxers and people who object to mandatory vaccination. I'm in that latter camp (I'm not going over it all again), but I am as pro-vaccine as anyone else. In fact, like a parrot I've said a number of times that the ONLY way to control this pandemic is to get the whole world vaccinated. Check my posts for that, you'll find it in them writ large. Saying that I think it's unethical and anti-democratic to force vaccination on people under pain of losing their jobs does in no way align me with conspiracy-theory anti-vaxxers, and it would be nice to not be lazily slurred in that manner. Indeed, I jumped at the first opportunity I had to get my jabs and I can't wait for my booster. If pubs and night clubs and football stadiums wish to exclude unvaccinated people, I'm right with them on that. That's their right. But governments passing laws that allow companies to sack people for refusing the jabs is crossing a red line for me. I live in the real world, and I know that interviewees for jobs in, say, care homes will be asked about their vaccinations and will be rejected if they reveal themselves to be refusers. That's fine by me, but that is the company doing that, not the law of the land, and 'twas ever thus (I'm pretty certain that I was once turned down for a job in the Civil Service because I was a CND activist - the buggers were even tapping my phone! I'm even fine with that decision, though obviously not the phone-tapping...) but a superb lady who looked after my mum wonderfully in her care home for the last two years of my mum's life is now facing dismissal by statute because she doesn't want the jab. That is just wrong.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 08 Oct 21 - 06:45 AM

The malaria vaccine , like many discoveries, began at the NIH. Once the methodology is understood then big phrama can either reproduce results or manufacture. We know the folks involved from 3 years ago. The celebrations happened back in the good ol normal days.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 08 Oct 21 - 07:17 AM

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/10/07/reconciliation-vaccines-election-america-dumb/

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Oct 21 - 09:10 AM

If you're going to link to articles behind a paywall you should at least copy and paste an extract from them. Wot Maggie does.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 08 Oct 21 - 10:35 AM

Heros and thugs
The Heros are, doctors and nurses.
The thugs crap on the capitol floor
Heros save lives, thugs shout curses
thugs say its freedom they savor
Like freedom to not use vaccines
or never use toilet paper
it stinks in their vacinity

The heros are, the teachers and nurses
The thugs threaten and hit folks at school
Teachers live and thugs take hearses.
Some folks are wise and others are...wait for it...Fooled
As the smart grow dumb and the dumb go insane
To say it out loud it feels inane
Smart folks do their research and probe
Thugs put a plug in it and explode.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 08 Oct 21 - 10:39 AM

Now thats a shitty poem.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Oct 21 - 06:31 PM

From today's Guardian.

Lies and conspiracy theories about Covid-19, which have amassed millions of views and are accessible to young children, have been available on the social media platform TikTok for months.

TikTok accounts with hundreds of thousands of followers that discourage vaccination and peddle myths about Covid survival rates were uncovered by NewsGuard, an organisation that monitors online misinformation.

NewsGuard said it published its findings in June and sent them to the UK government and World Health Organization (WHO), but the content remained on the platform.

The revelation comes amid renewed concern about the impact that social media is having on young people, after it was reported that Instagram, which is owned by Facebook, had internal research showing its app was harming teenagers.

As part of its investigation, NewsGuard said children as young as nine had been able to access the content, despite TikTok only permitting full access to the app for those aged 13 and over. Three participants in the organisation’s research who were under 13 were able to create accounts on the app by entering fake dates of birth.

TikTok told the Guardian it worked diligently to take action on content and accounts that spread misinformation.

Some of the accounts seen by the Guardian had posted individual videos containing Covid misinformation that had attracted up to 9.2m views. The misinformation included false comments about side-effects of specific brands of Covid vaccine and misleading comparisons between Covid survival rates and vaccine efficacy rates.

Alex Cadier, the UK managing director for NewsGuard, said: “TikTok’s failure to stop the spread of dangerous health misinformation on their app is unsustainable bordering on dangerous. Despite claims of taking action against misinformation, the app still allows anti-vaccine content and health hoaxes to spread relatively unimpeded.

“This is made worse by the fact that the more anti-vaccine content kids interact with, the more anti-vaccine content they’ll be shown. If self-regulation isn’t working for social media platforms, then regulation, like the online safety bill, has to be the way forward to keep young people safe online.”

I would go further. It's clear that social media have neither the resources nor the will to regulate themselves. I'd like to see Facebook, Instagram and TikTok disappear from the face of the earth. Failing that (and I do try to be a realist...), I should like to see our governments having the ability to instantly pull the plug on them as soon as this kind of content rears its head.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Oct 21 - 06:34 PM

(I hit send by accident there...) ...and their platforms should not be able to be restored unless they paid a bloody hefty fine. The money could be appropriately put towards promoting children's mental health...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 11 Oct 21 - 12:24 PM

The county I live in has a 99% resident vaccination rate, the highest in the country. Kids over 5 will be vaccinated before Xmas.
Speculation News reports";^/ The price to own the illusion of safety, security, and protection against all danger has gone up to 50 billion dollars. While this is good news for Zuckerberg it is anathma for the average billionaire. The fragility of the illusion as well as looming debt ceiling issues has the potential to go as high as 500 billion to own the illusion of absolute protection which will eliminate all but a handful of billionaires.
Dr. Grisley says "The average person only has the illusion of safety via conspiracy theory and on the other hand, Science and/or religion. All the politics and propoganda that deals with the issue is just entertainment. In the distant past the mere greedy quest for power and immortality was just as expensive in adjusted money but now the illusion includes many more probabilites and manmade catastrophes. As a result the safety illusion market is highly unstable and may crash leaving even multi billionaires out in the cold/heat".

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 11 Oct 21 - 12:30 PM

The county I live in has a 99% resident vaccination rate, the highest in the country. Kids over 5 will be vaccinated before Xmas.

Have to wonder what counts as a resident, and whether it's basically a county full of retirement homes if the under 5s make up less than 1% of the residents!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 11 Oct 21 - 01:09 PM

Do you really? If so, double your medication. Kids generally are not property owning residents, drive, vote, have children, pay taxes...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 11 Oct 21 - 01:17 PM

You didn't say that. You said resident. From the day you're born, you are resident in the place you were born in. If you move to another place to live, you become a resident in that place. Let's stick to the facts.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 11 Oct 21 - 03:02 PM

Do you really? If so, double your medication. Kids generally are not property owning residents, drive, vote, have children, pay taxes...

Ah, so the 99% also excludes those living in rented properties, and those living on the streets. Basically you're saying 99% of rich older people have had the vaccine (unless you wish to re-write it all again)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 11 Oct 21 - 05:39 PM

Nigel are you saying a European swallow can not fly with a coconut husk in its talons? Of course not. An African swallow maybe.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 12 Oct 21 - 09:59 PM

Good news for a change. Numbers of Covid deaths are going down but are still about a 1,000 US deaths per day. More good news is a pill that is 50% effective in keeping early Covid infections out of the hospital.
Over a year and a half ago there was a celebration at NIH of a group of folks we know who had succeded in making a Malaria vaccine. It is now being manufactured by Glaxo Smith. NIH does not self promote like the March of dimes, it just finds cures. Which reminds me that the new HIV vaccine is going into test phase. The Omni flu vaccine is still plugging away but won't give up the NIH 100 year commitment.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 13 Oct 21 - 08:12 AM

When the pandemic is far behind us it will not be remembered by the CDC stumbling guidelines in press releases, it will be remembered in the novels, poetry and song. I will remember that I was wrong in believing people would not die for a man named Trump. Supream lies and a 4th Reich movement besieged America to its core values. The rest of the world will remember how long they waited for America to offer the lifelines of vaccine while refusers in America killed themselves and others as they used a virus like a political weapon.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 15 Oct 21 - 11:17 AM

1,000 a day dead is still about 3 airliner crashes every day.

Moderna has been approved by the FDA for a 1/2 dose sized booster shot, next they're considering J&J.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 15 Oct 21 - 01:40 PM

Also mixing Covid vaccines has passed safety tests.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 18 Oct 21 - 08:14 AM

Colin Powell has died from Cpvid although he was vaccinated.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 18 Oct 21 - 10:33 AM

This should be a heads-up to those who think vaccine is enough - it isn't. We still need the whole protocol of continuing to social distance and #WearTheDamnMask! The reason we also had fewer colds in 2020 and why flu rates were at record lows was because of all of the rest of the careful behavior. And wash your hands and keep using the hand sanitizer.

We still need to listen to Fauci—I expect to hear a few interviews with him after this.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 18 Oct 21 - 10:56 AM

I haven't heard anyone saying the vaccine is enough, but I have heard people saying, with complete justification, that the vaccine is by far the most important weapon. At the worst time in the pandemic, before vaccines (and before the delta variant) the UK was averaging well over a thousand deaths per day. We currently have extremely high infection rates, worryingly high, but the daily death toll hovers around 100, often fewer, in spite of social distancing and mask rules having been lifted three months ago, and hospital admissions are also well down. That's the vaccine, rock-solid and unarguable and pretty well quantifiable too. Social distancing, or keeping your distance, is a no-brainer for any transmissible infection and I'm sure that sanitisation plays a part when it can be shown that viruses can be transmitted on hands and surfaces (though it's amazing how many people don't bother any more). I think, but I don't know, that you're wrong about masks. I do admire your certainty.

What is definitely not enough is the obsession with getting all of us in our rich nations vaccinated and boostered whilst virtually ignoring the rest of the world. That won't work, and in the end, will work against us.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 18 Oct 21 - 01:57 PM

I have to say I don't admire your conviction that masks don't work, the "science" behind that belief is squishy, and I find your dismissal of them problematic. This opinion plays into the hands of the anti-vaxxers. I think it's (literally) a dead wrong belief.

Masks not only help avoid contamination to others if we have the virus, and help prevent breathing in the virus from others, they serve as a reminder that we need to keep our distance and watch where we go indoors and what we touch.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: steve_harris
Date: 18 Oct 21 - 02:43 PM

"This should be a heads-up to those who think vaccine is enough - it isn't. We still need the whole protocol of continuing to social distance and #WearTheDamnMask!"

An argument I've heard (in UK) goes like this:
1. Now we have Delta, everyone is going to encounter the virus real soon now.
2. So, getting vaxed is a great idea as it reduces death/hospitalization as well as some infection and transmission.
3. Other mitigations slow the spread and might delay encountering the virus. But it will knock on your door eventually
4. One possible argument for other mitigations is that they help to "flatten the curve" and reduce peak demand for healthcare. But a flatter curve still has the same number of people under it - the whole thing just takes longer
5. Your best time for your inevitable first encounter with the virus is when your immunity is highest. For many people, that's a few weeks after their 2nd vax. I know someone cautious who is waiting for their third "booster" dose before going to Folk Club

Subject: RE: BS: Whats your shortage- is it hype? Supply chain
From: gillymor
Date: 18 Oct 21 - 03:32 PM

My successor, a former employee of mine, told his people last spring that they could not come back to work without proof of vaccination or, failing that, until the pandemic subsided. His company does finish carpentry in the interiors of large homes, high rises, club houses and cruise ships in the presence of many other tradesmen so it was made clear that opting out of the vaccination was not negotiable if they wanted to keep working. He's a one man operation with no HR dept. and doesn't have time to be a nurse maid though he gets along very well with his people. His crew of about 15 or 16 all got vaxxed as soon as they could. Libertarian ideology might be appealing to armchair philosophers but in the real world it doesn't keep you, your workmates and your family safe. Now if you want to continue this you should take it to the COVID thread. I'm done.

Subject: RE: BS: Whats your shortage- is it hype? Supply chain
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 18 Oct 21 - 04:00 PM

So tell me how sacking people who still won't get the vaccine after they've been sacked and who then keep on going out into the big wide world is going to make that big wide world safer. It might make your workplace safer (or it might not) but you will have solved nothing in the wider scheme of things. I can see a case for being stricter with people who work with the vulnerable. Otherwise, try to remember that we live in a democracy, and, generally speaking, democracies don't try to force people to have needles stuck in them. Always persuasion, never compulsion. Information and education are the way to get doubters to agree to be vaccinated. We don't do very well with that, do we, preferring to let Facebook make gazillions    and completely neglect their social responsibilities via the peddling of conspiracy theories and downright lies by its members.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 18 Oct 21 - 04:17 PM

" I think, but I don't know, that you're wrong about masks."

Gets the response:

"I have to say I don't admire your conviction that masks don't work, the "science" behind that belief is squishy, and I find your dismissal of them problematic. This opinion plays into the hands of the anti-vaxxers. I think it's (literally) a dead wrong belief."

So you think that when I say "I think, but I don't know..." it expresses a conviction, do you? Well I'm amazed at this apparent lack of understanding of plain English. You also misuse the word "belief" and I think you know it. One more time: mask-wearing (which I think should be voluntary in almost every circumstance beyond hospitals and care homes: in no way do I oppose or dismiss that) and vaccination are separate issues. At best I'm lukewarm about the one and a hearty supporter of the other. if you see any anti-vaxxer using my opinion about masks to support their case (you never will, but hey ho), well you know what to say to them.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jeri
Date: 18 Oct 21 - 04:41 PM

I wish I could find data on the difference in the rate of covid infection between schools that mandate masks and those that don't. It's out there, I've heard it, but I don't know where to find it. There IS a big difference that indicates masks are effective.

Otherwise, when it comes to beliefs, It doesn't do any good to try to convince other people they're wrong.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 18 Oct 21 - 04:58 PM

The thing about beliefs, Jeri, is that they don't have to be predicated on evidence. Science and belief are generally at odds should any conflict surface. I can be persuaded by evidence. Beliefs can be interesting...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 18 Oct 21 - 05:17 PM

Jeri at least you tried to provide evidence. There are cretins who never provide any for their stated opinion.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 18 Oct 21 - 06:46 PM

Such a helpful remark, Donuel.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 18 Oct 21 - 07:47 PM

Any evidence comparing schools, by the way, would be observational only (in other words, not based on controlled experimental investigation). Schools are diverse places in every way, and confounding factors would abound. It's no good turning a blind eye to this: every observational study I've seen with regard to masks has been confronted by this issue, and only the best of them even bother to admit to it. Another obstacle to credibility is small sample numbers. Observational studies on human behaviour can do little more than suggest further investigation. They can rarely lead us to rock-solid conclusions informing future action. I'm not saying that observation is useless. It's a valuable scientific tool, and for millennia it was the only tool we had. The potential pitfalls are huge. Observational science told us that the sun goes round the earth.

Subject: RE: BS: Whats your shortage- is it hype? Supply chain
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 18 Oct 21 - 08:26 PM

This is from today's Guardian. It's about how our crisis-ridden care sector is about to be struck by another lethal blow once the compulsory vaccine rule comes in next month:

Carol Thomas, a retired health academic who lives with multiple sclerosis, is about to lose not just a carer but a companion because of the government’s “no jab, no job” policy.

Unless the policy is changed, which looks unlikely after the health secretary, Sajid Javid, this month told unjabbed care workers to “get out and get another job”, the 62-year-old’s days of being cared for by Debbie Vickers are numbered.

Vickers, who has more than a dozen years’ experience in social care and the NHS, has become a friend as well as someone who hoists Thomas in and out of bed and undertakes the most personal of care for the former professor at Lancaster University’s faculty of health and medicine.

But she is among tens of thousands of care home staff in England declining the vaccine who now face redundancy. Guardian analysis of the latest NHS data reveals the decision to make full Covid-19 vaccination a “condition of deployment” from 11 November is on course to force up to 38,000 staff out of care homes for older people, deepening a staffing crisis which is already causing care home closures and discharge backlogs in hospitals.

As of 10 October 12% of staff in older adult care homes were still not fully vaccinated, rising to more than one in five in areas including Birmingham, Manchester, Stoke and Hackney in London. A small number of these may be able to apply for medical exemptions.

Vickers said she was “no anti-vaxxer”. Her decision comes because of an earlier adverse reaction to a flu jab. She may get a few weeks’ grace, but she still faces redundancy from what Thomas believes is an ethically wrong and practically illogical “insulting, discriminatory blanket ban”.

Many see the value in care workers being vaccinated, given Covid was involved in the deaths of 42,732 care home residents in England and Wales to the start of October. But with 105,000 care staff vacancies in England exacerbated by a slump in foreign workers arriving to fill the low-wage roles, operators are calling for a pause on the strict policy, which not does not apply to NHS staff.

Now tell me who you think is being irrational here...

Subject: RE: BS: Whats your shortage- is it hype? Supply chain
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 18 Oct 21 - 08:51 PM

The caretaker should get the shot anyway. The COVID vaccine is not in any way related to a flu shot. Her bad, but it's a double-whammy, really too bad for the woman she works for who is dependent on the care she provides. I have no sympathy for that home health care worker, and the vaccine should be mandatory. She's risking several lives by not being vaccinated - she could infect her employer who sounds even less likely to survive COVID. Reckless endangerment in the workplace.

Subject: RE: BS: Whats your shortage- is it hype? Supply chain
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 19 Oct 21 - 03:46 AM

I said I'd tell you when I disagreed, Steve. Seat belts are compulsory. Crash helmets are compulsory. Walking round town with your tackle out is banned. I cannot see a reason not to make Covid jabs compulsory unless there is a medical exemption.

Now this discussion should probably be taken to another thread. Although that is not compulsory

Subject: RE: BS: Whats your shortage- is it hype? Supply chain
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Oct 21 - 04:31 AM

Dave, seat belts and crash helmets are not intrusive into the body (interesting that we never made cycle helmets compulsory...the winning arguments against compulsion were quite intriguing...). An injection forced on you is tantamount to assault. The sacked unvaccinated person is still free to circulate among the public to their heart's content. The risk is merely spread around, not eliminated. Far better to use reassurance, persuasion and countering information to the scaremongering stuff that made them refusers in the first place. We are well behind the curve on that and it's lamentable. I actually regard that as yet another government failure. What we agree on is that we would far rather see the carer get the vaccine. Democracies don't force people to have needles stuck in them.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 19 Oct 21 - 05:25 AM

Meanwhile in the state of Victoria in the land of Oz - https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/anti-lockdown-protester-accused-of-5g-tower-fire-plot-to-capture-premier-20211014-p5905y.html - An anti-lockdown protester accused of lighting a phone tower on fire because it carried 5G allegedly told police he dug a large hole in his backyard to imprison Premier Daniel Andrews ... A police prosecutor told the Melbourne Magistrates’ Court on Thursday evening that Mr Glover answered a September call-out in a chat group on encrypted messaging app Telegram called “Hoodlums of Melbourne Special Ops” ... “I’m down for special ops only if I get to burn something down.” The chat group’s administrator responded: “Those 5G towers would make a nice fire”, to which Mr Glover allegedly replied, “my thinking exactly, I’ve made preparations already” ... (suspend disbelief & read on)

I can't do a blicky as there seems to be a problem on the paper's website - creating the blicky in both firefox & chrome leads to a 14 year old unrelated article on the site, very weird. Both URLS start with www.theage.com.au/national/ & then go off in very different directions.

One Of Life's Little Mysteries.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 19 Oct 21 - 07:33 AM

I've just been reading up about the eradication of smallpox. Vaccination was worldwide, and in many places compulsory.
I was vaccinated as a child, and so was my husband in Cote d'Ivoire. We both have the small scars on our arms to prove it.
By concerted efforts around the world, smallpox was more-or-less eradicated, although there are from time to time very tiny outbreaks. I understand there is a large stockpile of vaccine, ready to tackle any future smallpox.
I realise the two diseases are not identical, but surely the history of smallpox eradication by dedicated vaccination should be an encouragement to introduce compulsory Covid jabs for all? It's such a tiny procedure, not painful, not dangerous. But Covid is bloomin' 'orrible and deadly. Seems obvious to me, but then I'm not a needlephobe or a refusnik.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 19 Oct 21 - 08:41 AM

First came inoculation developed in England for small pox then several lifetimes later Jenner made a small pox vaccine from a variant.
During the cold war the Soviet Union stockpiled TONS of small pox virus as a one two punch for nuclear annihilation strategy.
Eliza you have your finger on the pulse of certain men's insanity.
Lets hope you don't lose your touch.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 19 Oct 21 - 09:13 AM

Anti mask & vax folks do not have a valid point in this time of a global health emergency. Its like suicide and euthanasia are being practiced legally because unstable people are killing themselves and others with Covid. Killing without the permission of the uninfected should be punished as a special form of manslaughter. I approve of euthanasia only with the permission of the hopeless and suffering.

You hear anti mask folks rant against the obvious but they never see their own ravings as insane and/or contradictory.

Subject: RE: BS: Whats your shortage- is it hype? Supply chain
From: Donuel
Date: 19 Oct 21 - 09:21 AM

Anti mandate, mask & vax folks do not have a valid point in this time of a global health emergency.
You see anti mask folks rant against the obvious truth but they never see their own ravings as insane or contradictory. Sometimes the crazy don't know they are.

Subject: RE: BS: Whats your shortage- is it hype? Supply chain
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Oct 21 - 11:34 AM

"Anti mandate, mask & vax folks do not have a valid point in this time of a global health emergency.
You see anti mask folks rant against the obvious truth but they never see their own ravings as insane or contradictory. Sometimes the crazy don't know they are."

This is intemperate. Anti-mandate (a respectable viewpoint, right or wrong) and anti-vax folks (an utter disgrace) are completely different species. I don't know any anti-mask people personally. I know plenty of people who are against the compulsory wearing of masks but who respect the choice of others to wear masks. That's the camp I'm in. You are calling us insane, contradictory and crazy. You claim to know the obvious "truth." Well you don't, and neither do I. You can be a good lad and promote the precautionary principle and be respected for that, or you can insult people who happen not to agree with you.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Oct 21 - 11:52 AM

So Eliza, you're in favour of pinning every refuser down so that they can be forcefully injected. I'm afraid I'm not with you.

I've responded to your rather silly and over-the-top similar post on the other thread, Donuel. Let's just say here that thank goodness I don't know any anti-maskers. I know a couple of anti-vaxxers round here who are weird in at least several other ways as well. They are impenetrable. Vaccine refuseniks are often just vaccine-unsure, vaccine-hesitant or vaccine-scared, or the victims of rumours and scare-stories. Those are the people we need to work on via education, reassurance and persuasion. Sticking needles into them while they kick and scream is simply not permissible. The state does not own people and we must preserve democracy. Those of you who support Facebook via your membership should consider that huge numbers of the refuseniks you are excoriating are refuseniks because of the sheer irresponsibility of the organisation which couldn't exist without you. Perhaps you could reflect on that before offering condemnatory opinions about people who just might be harbouring reasonable points of view that don't happen to concur with yours.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 19 Oct 21 - 12:08 PM

Democracies don't force people to have needles stuck in them.

Bull. My kids had to be vaxxed to go to public achool. I have to get vaxxed to travel. Loads of vaxxes are compulsory.

And should be.

If people won't do it voluntarily yes democracies can make them.

And should.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Oct 21 - 12:18 PM

Incidentally, smallpox was eradicated by consent, and by no means everyone was vaccinated against it. I wasn't, and I don't know anyone at all who was (I'm 70, so was definitely of the time when smallpox was widespread). I should also like to point out several crucial differences between smallpox and the current coronavirus. Smallpox is not transmitted from person to person until the blisters appear. Every time, you can see the risk because you can see the blisters. With COVID-19, transmission is possible from people with no symptoms, which could be a third of all infected people. Smallpox is rarely transmitted through the air, unlike COVID-19, with which the air is its main means of transmission. Prolonged close contact in enclosed spaces is usually required for the transmission of smallpox, whereas such close contact and lengthy time periods are not required for COVID-19 to pass from person to person.

In a nutshell, smallpox was never as catching as COVID-19 is. That makes it a far easier (though still not too easy) disease to eradicate. It isn't especially instructive to compare the campaigns against these two diseases.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Oct 21 - 12:27 PM

You made that decision for your children who were too young to decide for themselves. I made that decision for mine, too. I'm amazed that your schools can insist on a child's vaccination. Quite rightly ,the advocacy by schools here is strong, but enforcement is considered to be a step too far. As for travel, there are countries I can't go to unless I'm vaccinated against this, that or the other. Two things: first, you don't have to travel. If you don't, you don't have to get the vaccine. You still have that choice. Telling someone they'll lose their livelihood is somewhat less of a choice, to say the least. Second, it could be the country you're going to that does the insisting.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Charmion
Date: 19 Oct 21 - 12:54 PM

Canadian public schools also require pupils to be vaccinated, and tested for contact with tuberculosis, too. The death toll from polio in particular is still fresh enough in memory to keep that regulation in place, reinforced by the damage done by occasional outbreaks of red measles. People who object to that mandate have to find private schools where the administration shares their opinions -- an expensive proposition -- or home-school their children.

Likewise, if you want to work in a Canadian restaurant, TB testing is mandatory. If you don't like it, tough.

The threat of smallpox is not limited to close contact with the sick in the acute stage of infection; the virus survives in dried exudate on their clothes and bedding. (In quarantine hospitals, all such contaminated materials were burned.) Surely you've heard of the accusations of "germ warfare" levelled against the early British military government in Canada, based on the distribution of contaminated blankets to the neighbouring First Nations. That was in the 1760s, and I don't think that virus has changed its habits.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 19 Oct 21 - 01:30 PM

Among the irrational macho anti mandate and vaccine personalities are the Police. It is the leading cause of death for police officers in the last 2 years. In Chicago many cops are willing to go on unpaid leave for their delusion.
They were willing to lie and claim a religious or libertaian objection exception. Could it be that police have a relationship with death that is quite different from you or me? Probably.
Death Wish 19 might be a psyche disease like a cancer that intertwines between duty, honor, devotion and strength. But not likely in my way of wondering.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 19 Oct 21 - 01:44 PM

I don't think anyone is advocating holding people down and forcing them, Steve. Bit of a straw man then. And surely, your point about not having to travel apples equally to a chosen profession. People in health care can choose another occupation if they don't want to be vaccinated. Yes, yes, I know there is a shortage and that is likely to make matters worse. I am just pointing out that they are not being forced to have the vaccine, just like international travellers can choose not to.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 19 Oct 21 - 02:51 PM

I may sound angry at times but through it all is the foundation of the preciousness of humanity. I know some people do not have any empathy like some are bald and some aren't. Most of us have to care for the empathy free folks despite their unrequited empathy. We can 'knit them a hat' and wish for the best.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Oct 21 - 03:51 PM

Eliza appeared to be advocating compulsory universal vaccination, Dave. You may be talking about coercion with regard to employment, not compulsion, but when your livelihood is at stake the line between them is as fine as can be. I also see a possible legal and moral argument that employers should not be able to alter contracts on this particular issue in a one-sided way. We are talking about sticking needles into people, lest we forget... We can't stop employers declining to take on vaccination refuseniks, but I'm very troubled about the potential ability to sack them.

Yes, Charmion, I know that, but it shouldn't divert from my overall point that the campaigns against smallpox and COVID-19 are not comparable, because smallpox is far less catching and COVID-19 can transmit under cover, which smallpox can't. Different strategies are needed, and smallpox was abolished without compulsion and without universal vaccination. The one doesn't inform the other very well.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 19 Oct 21 - 04:14 PM

Fairy Nuff. I didn't spot the compulsory bit. I do disagree about it being compulsory for all. However, to do certain things there have always been rules. To ride a motorbike, you must wear a helmet. To care for vulnerable people, you must have the vaccine. Overly simple maybe but provides clarity at least.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 19 Oct 21 - 04:25 PM

I mentioned tons of small pox virus had been stockpiled. that is litterally TONS! When you consider how 'light' virus are and that small pox is 50 to 80% fatal it is alot of small pox.

We hear how airplane crashes are miniscule compared to the number of flights ,it doesn't feel that way when I watch Air Disasters tv shows with hundreds of crash investigations. Like Stilly says its 3 giant air buses crashing everyday with no survivors when it comes to Covid in this country alone.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 19 Oct 21 - 04:38 PM

Foolhardy devil's advocate posts abound here lately, supporting the rights of the ignorant to continue being able to infect others.

Vaccines should be compulsory for most public activities, with the occasional MEDICAL excuse. Never a religious excuse.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Oct 21 - 05:46 PM

Well I have no idea what you mean by public activities. I can only guess at the intended scope. Perhaps, instead of calling people with carefully measured and carefully considered opinions, right or wrong, you could stop the kind of misinformation which is constantly peddled here. There is a large error in the post of 04.25pm for example, that can be checked in ten seconds, from a person I never see you criticising. I submit to you that a closely-argued opinion, capable of being civilly disagreed with, is far less damaging than blatant misinformation.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Oct 21 - 05:47 PM

The word "foolhardy" was intended after "right or wrong."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Charmion
Date: 19 Oct 21 - 06:22 PM

Steve, my point is that smallpox doesn’t have to be seen to be a threat.

Indeed, COVID is more contagious. That should make us more cautious, not less.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Oct 21 - 07:09 PM

Yes, I know what you were saying, but you do at least know that the contaminated clothing and bedding came from a smallpox victim, so not hidden in the same sense as COVID-19 being hidden by the fact that it can transmit under cover from asymptomatic people, which could be around one infected person in three. As for needing to be more careful with covid-19, well we can hardly say for ANY potentially fatal infection that we should be more careful or less careful (or more careless) with one than with the other. Ethics, and all that. It's worth contemplating that the mortality rate (a term fraught with difficulty, though probably easier for smallpox as it is such an obvious and prominent infection when someone has it) for smallpox was around 30%, whereas for Covid-19 the mortality rate is in single numbers or less (fraught because we can't simply divide the number of confirmed cases by number of deaths, as many cases go unreported - mild symptoms or symptoms not recognised - or are asymptomatic). That is not in any way an argument for being either more careful or less careful. We must be as careful as it is humanly and practically possible to be. What we are arguing about here is the degree to which each step we take is either not enough, too much, or not required. As there's some evidence that transmission from hands or surfaces is possible (live virus has been harvested from those surfaces), sanitation is a no-brainer. Making every effort to keep your distance and to avoid crowded confined spaces, as we know that airborne is the main means of transmission, no-brainer. Taking the vaccine, far and away the best thing that everyone can do. Walking around with a damp rag on your face, that is infected if you're infected and doing very little if you're not, well I'm not sure about that. We'll never get rid of this virus so we have to decide how we are going to live with it for the rest of our lives. For the rest of our lives, right?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Oct 21 - 04:55 AM

We are in the same pickle here in Blighty as we were a year ago. Case numbers are going through the roof and hospitals are coming under pressure. It seems that as yet unvaccinated schoolchildren are the main drivers of this spike. The death rate is rising but, because of the vaccines, is only a small fraction of what it was last autumn. Like last year, voices abound, including many from in the NHS, which are trying to get the government to act immediately. Like last year, that isn't happening.

Well Johnson told us in July that there was no going back to the restrictions we endured last winter and spring. The big difference from last year is that we have most of the country vaccinated. I think we should push hard to get children vaccinated (via information and persuasion). I don't think we should reimpose *mandatory* bubbles, social distancing and masks. I think we should be organising a massive public campaign which tells people to get vaccinated and how to be careful in public places, and give us the full information about how the virus spreads, what the risks are, how we can protect the vulnerable and what we should do if we feel unwell. The lateral flow test kits are free, easy to get hold of and have been shown to be reliable. I've yet to see a public service ad on TV showing people how to use the kits. All that sort of thing. Ordering people to wear masks, to stay away from their loved ones' homes and cancelling Christmas simply won't wash again with the public. Compliance with the rules erodes away every time restrictions are imposed. They are no longer the way to get people onboard. Just for once I agree with the governments reluctance, but I have yet to see that huge public campaign that I believe would be by far the best way forward. We have to live with this virus for the rest of our lives and we do have to live those lives.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 20 Oct 21 - 06:10 AM

Its simple.
I have an old small pox scar so most of you don't have to have one.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 20 Oct 21 - 06:13 AM

Absolutely fascinating article on how the WHO and some scientists got how the virus spread wrong.

The 60-Year-Old Scientific Screwup That Helped Covid Kill

We know that scientists do get it wrong sometimes and the article shows that once it is wrong, it can be difficult to put right.

What must have happened, she thought, was that after Wells died, scientists inside the CDC conflated his observations. They plucked the size of the particle that transmits tuberculosis out of context, making 5 microns stand in for a general definition of airborne spread. Wells’ 100-micron threshold got left behind. “You can see that the idea of what is respirable, what stays airborne, and what is infectious are all being flattened into this 5-micron phenomenon,” Randall says. Over time, through blind repetition, the error sank deeper into the medical canon.

Once people admit they were wrong through things can be fixed.

ON FRIDAY, APRIL 30, the WHO quietly updated a page on its website. In a section on how the coronavirus gets transmitted, the text now states that the virus can spread via aerosols as well as larger droplets.

I am not qualified to assess the impact of this but I still find the study very interesting.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Oct 21 - 06:44 AM

It's a good yarn, Dave, but it doesn't exactly tell us how our behaviour should be informed by the findings. We get a lot about stuff like her daughter at the gym, her floods of tears, dramatic wakenings, etc., instead. I was kind of waiting for the big denouement, i.e., WEAR A BLOODY MASK! ....but it never came...

Popular science often seems to talk down to people, thinking that they'll only pay attention if mucho colour is added. It's a shame, because it often means that the baby is thrown down the plug'ole with the bathwater...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 20 Oct 21 - 06:49 AM

I quite enjoy the background stuff but then again, I'm a lightweight :-D

Maybe you can find the nitty-gritty by following a Google trail from her Wiki entry?

No good me looking. I'd fall off my chair after the first page!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 20 Oct 21 - 06:55 AM

Husband has just done his lateral flow test (every Sunday and Wednesday) and thank God it's negative again. He has to do nine hours of heavy cleaning work during lesson-times and evenings at the high school, where all the pupils & teachers wear a mask. He's given a mask and a visor plus disposable rubber gloves to perform his work. Being BAME he is more vulnerable to Covid.
When he gets home, he showers and cleans himself, plus changes all his clothes.
I can't imagine how I'd feel if the poor chap had refused any vaccinations. But (thank God again!) he has had two AZ ones and awaits the booster shortly, as do I. Also, he's very determined to wear a disposable mask (as am I) when we go to the supermarket.
Now imagine if he was a refusenik anti-vaxxer, contracted the virus and generously passed it to me. I have a heart condition, am elderly and he could be the cause of my demise.
We both take this very seriously, and feel that everyone should be encouraged to accept the vaccine. And wear a mask. Or risk death after infecting other people.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Oct 21 - 07:00 AM

I have absolutely no problem with people being *encouraged* to do anything, including wearing a mask. As I said, this thing is with us for the rest of our lives, and hands up all those who want to be hiding half their faces for the rest of their lives...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 20 Oct 21 - 07:03 AM

With my face it may not be a bad thing...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: gillymor
Date: 20 Oct 21 - 07:11 AM

The Washington State U. football coach along with 4 of his assistants was fired the other day for refusing to be vaccinated. He had a couple of months to do his research and, after dithering a bit, went for a religious exemption that was denied.

from the BBC

Pat Chun, the AD said "Our priority has been and will continue to be the health and well being of the young men in our team." It was obviously not the priority of their former coach. Let's hope this resonates with other non-vaxxers.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 20 Oct 21 - 07:30 AM

Republicans REJOICE ! Future cures and profits lift hearts.
A Florida man discovers that smoking crack cocaine cures Covid 19. He said "Its way better than Ivermectin". Miami Circuit Court Judge Yahwright did not order the man's Doctor to prescribe huge doses of Cocaine, unlike the Jacksonville judge who ordered Physicians to prescribe Ivermectin. I guess a JD outranks an MD. :^/
https://www.npr.org/2021/09/07/1034947315/ivermectin-ohio-hospital-order-judge

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 21 Oct 21 - 09:21 AM

A passing thought...
We as homo sapiens differ by a tenth to a hundredth of one degree and compared to Chimps differ by 1 full percent.
This not a scientific observation but I have a question that a diversty of 24% of us refusing vaccination has an effect on the species at large. Pandemics have changed us before in terms of those more suited for survival. 24% of us are not dying off but perhaps in a smaller way our DNA will have changes that would not appear without pandemic. Exogenetic factors could in be in play as well as ancient genes turning on or off. We are not seeing a subspecies going extinct but we may be changed in ways as a species we may not know.

26 million kids 5-11 in the US are to be vaccinated. A quarter of them will not get the shot as a result of parental opinion.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 21 Oct 21 - 10:01 AM

While nearly all things are possible, a novelist would have to consider that in the unvaccinated ignorant population there is a possibility that they are more prone to evolutionary DNA responses to pandemic by factors previously mentioned. Yes instead of a curse there could be a blessing in refusing vaccine. No this is not ammunition for conspiracy theorists but is just a very remote possibility that an open mind could consider. Of course the cost is millions of needless deaths in the short run. Bottom line, it was just an interesting thought I hold in personal distain.

I'll get me 'over thinking it' hat.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 21 Oct 21 - 10:27 AM

"We are talking about sticking needles into people, lest we forget"

But it's just a tiny prick.
So small and inconsequential most folks probably wouldn't even feel it going in, or being pulled back out.

It's not like you'd be having a giant dildo rammed up your arse without lubrication.
which is more like the scale of discomfort all this pathetic hysterical anti-needle whining conjurs up...

F@cking snowflakes...!!! [yes, us lefties can use that insulting word as well...]

.. and anyway, there are effective alternative injections in development and practice,
which don't use needles.

Ok, I'm a a bit squeamish about having blood samples taken.
But am never at all bothered by injections..

I'm a big brave boy...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 21 Oct 21 - 10:33 AM

..and I do have an innate 'fear' of needles,
so far as I could never become a junkie...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 21 Oct 21 - 10:35 AM

An interview with a pediatric office nurse today on NPR talked about the contact they expect to have with a group of parents of young children who consider themselves healthy and young enough to not need the shot, many of them healthy enough that they don't have regular physicians of their own to see annually. She thinks the interface of pediatrician's office where they will take their children for the shot is the place the staff can also convince the parents (with logic and science) to get the vaccines themselves. Chances are the pediatrician's offices can't give the parents the shots (though that would save a step if they could.)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 21 Oct 21 - 10:45 AM

We are booked for boosters in the morning!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 21 Oct 21 - 10:54 AM

I was told my mum got the booster and flu jab in her care home recently...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 21 Oct 21 - 11:28 AM

Good for you Bonzo! Hope it goes well.
Wish our surgery would call us in for our boosters, but our second jab was in July - maybe it's a bit early for the booster.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 21 Oct 21 - 11:43 AM

Roll out of the flu jab is a shambles..

Last year our GP contacted us to say we were entitled to a free jab,
right late near the end of the flu season.
We'd already paid for them in Tesco Pharmacy well before xmas.

This year we got texts from GP that we will be notified when available.
That was some months ago.

So last week we just walked into tesco for on the spot drop in free flu jabs.

Now waiting approx 3 weeks for protection to become effective.
Which aint easy with mrs punkfolkrocker working in an infant school...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Oct 21 - 01:03 PM

Yep. Our flu jabs, booked long in advance, have been cancelled - twice. I'm booked in now for Nov 6 but Mrs Steve, who goes to a different medical centre, can't even rebook yet.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 21 Oct 21 - 01:14 PM

Just a suggestion, phone your nearest tesco pharmacy, and ask if they have drop in sessions. Or if you need book online.

If they have an appropriate qualified pharmacist on duty,
my wife got jabbed same day.
I waited until after the weekend.

This on presumption all tescos provide this service...?

Sod waiting for useless gp surgeries...!!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 21 Oct 21 - 01:27 PM

After the holidays I'll be looking at my 4th jab. Self Immune disorders may not make as many antibodies per shot as others might but its still a crap shoot when it comes to beating the odds.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Oct 21 - 04:29 PM

I'll have a pot at that tomorrow, pfr. The only thing is that where we live in pastyshire the nearest Tesco is 20 miles away...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Oct 21 - 04:31 PM

Incidentally, Boots told the missus today that the earliest date for her would four weeks from now. I'll bet that if she offered to go private for £14.99 they'd do her tomorrow. B*ast*ards...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 21 Oct 21 - 04:38 PM

Since June up to today 49 of the 50 deaths from Covid 19 in Washington DC were black. 60% of those deaths were in the black neighborhoods of ward 7 and 8.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Oct 21 - 05:09 PM

The Launceston Tesco does flu jabs, I've just discovered. That's 20 miles. The next nearest is Barnstaple, an hour's drive. These city-slickers don't know they're born...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 21 Oct 21 - 06:01 PM

Mrs G and I get our flu jabs and covid boosters next Wednesday. Hope the cocktail is OK!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 21 Oct 21 - 06:08 PM

picking the vaccine to promote best results

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 21 Oct 21 - 10:27 PM

I got my booster in early September, just walked in and there was no line. But there is an embarrassment of riches here when it comes to vaccine availability. Now if we could just convince more people to take advantage of it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 23 Oct 21 - 06:28 AM

Just has Pfizer booster from a junior nurse at our surgery - would have preferred a senior nurse or doctor.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Oct 21 - 06:46 AM

Why, because she couldn't reach the top of your arm?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 23 Oct 21 - 08:59 AM

”Just has Pfizer booster from a junior nurse at our surgery - would have preferred a senior nurse or doctor.”

I would very much prefer that junior medical staff do the mundane, simple, repetitive jobs like administering C-19 vaccinations, so that the senior, more highly-trained ones are freed to get on with treating patients who are already sick and need their superior skills and knowledge.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 23 Oct 21 - 09:06 AM

No, because she never asked if I was on blood thinning medication which the instruction sheet handed over after the injection stated she was supposed to do, whereas the senior nurse who administered flu jabs recently of course did ask, and aagain when having the first covid jab last February.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Oct 21 - 10:17 AM

Well a senior consultant nearly whipped out my gall bladder until I protested...He'd got me mixed up with somebody else...And it ain't junior nurses who leave swabs and scalpels inside patients...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 23 Oct 21 - 11:35 AM

What do you expect in mere Cornwall??

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Oct 21 - 11:42 AM

Devon.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 23 Oct 21 - 12:13 PM

In mere Devon then!!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 23 Oct 21 - 12:28 PM

Meanwhile, in the race to vaccinate against COVID-19, White House details plan to roll out Covid-19 vaccines for children ages 5 to 11

The Biden administration has secured enough vaccine supply to vaccinate the 28 million children ages 5 to 11 who would become eligible for vaccination if the vaccine is authorized for that age group and will help equip more than 25,000 pediatric and primary care offices, hundreds of community health centers and rural health clinics as well as tens of thousands of pharmacies to administer the shots, according to the White House.

"We know millions of parents have been waiting for Covid-19 vaccine for kids in this age group. And should the FDA and (US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) authorize the vaccine, we will be ready to get shots in arms," White House Covid-19 response director Jeff Zients told reporters at a White House Covid-19 briefing on Wednesday.

Zients continued: "Kids have different needs than adults and our operational planning is geared to meet those specific needs, including by offering vaccinations in settings that parents and kids are familiar with and trust."

The administration is also launching a partnership with the Children's Hospital Association "to work with over 100 children's hospital systems across the country to set up vaccination sites in November and through the end of the calendar year," the White House announced.

The administration also plans to help make vaccination available at school and other "community-based sites" with help from Federal Emergency Management Agency funding.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 23 Oct 21 - 01:04 PM

Retired pediatrician Dr Ros Jones says we should not have another lockdown: "We have 90% of the adult population vaccinated and we're still worrying whether we have to protect the NHS."

While some doctors are calling on the government to initiate “Plan B” in response to rising Covid cases and hospitalisations across the country, others say more restrictions would be “illogical”.

GP Dr Grant Ingrams thinks Covid cases are increasing due to anti-maskers: "I popped into the shop. I was the only person wearing a mask. Here we are in the middle of a pandemic. Everyone seems to say it's fine."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Oct 21 - 01:22 PM

The GP appears to be the victim of received wisdom. After a disastrous spring last year, UK cases plummeted to less than 2000 a week by July (they're currently around 50,000 a week). But all that happened before masks were made mandatory. Now isn't that odd. Of course, we have many a siren voice at present claiming that the current spike is the result of mask-wearing being made voluntary in July. Considering the 2020 experience, you don't have to be Einstein to see that that connection simply doesn't stand up.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 23 Oct 21 - 02:43 PM

By the Niagara River there are people who also say "Com'on in the waters fine".

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 23 Oct 21 - 03:56 PM

I'm sure that Steve Shaw would argue that shit doesn't stink if it suited him!!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Oct 21 - 04:18 PM

Feel free to refute via measured argument, Bonzo!

As a matter of fact, on your point, I remember that great organic gardener, Lawrence Hills, saying that a huge pile of fresh horse manure can actually smell very nice...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 23 Oct 21 - 04:30 PM

My mom once said "She wouldn't say shit if she had a mouthful".
Today people say shit all the time.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 24 Oct 21 - 12:01 PM

. . . and some talk more shit than others!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: keberoxu
Date: 24 Oct 21 - 02:23 PM

Fellow Mudcatter Dave the Gnome has been attempting mightily
to make a working blue link clicky
to articles from The Conversation,
which go into some depth about surviving COVID-19,
in particular the do's and don't's of face-masks.

Let me see if a working link is possible here
(Dave has been trying from the UK thread).


The Conversation: COVID-19 masks FAQs


Dave The Gnome,
I think the above blicky ought to work!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 24 Oct 21 - 11:00 PM

No One Will Stop You From Getting Whatever Booster You Want
The CDC indicated that it would move toward a hands-off stance: Booster-eligible people should stick with one brand, but may mix and match at will.

Mixing and matching vaccine brands is officially on the table in the United States. But that option might soon be billed as the B-list choice.

Last night, CDC Director Rochelle Walensky gave the green light for Moderna and Johnson & Johnson booster shots, the long-awaited follow-up to a similar recommendation given to the Pfizer formulation last month. As the endorsement stands, all who are eligible for an additional jab—which now includes tens of millions more Americans—should be able to pick whatever booster brand they like. But discussions among a panel of experts who advised Walensky hinted at a catch: The agency has yet to issue its final clinical guidance on who, specifically, might want to boost with what—and an early draft of the recommendations suggests that Americans “should” stick with the same brand they got in their first go-round.

Switching to a different shot would be allowed, as was authorized by the FDA on Wednesday; per the draft CDC guidance, people may opt to mix and match based on availability or preference, after assessing their individual risks and benefits. (As a reminder, the FDA’s authorizations tell Americans what vaccines they’re allowed to get. The CDC follows that up with advice on what folks should do with those options.)

The CDC’s stance on mixing and matching, then, could end up being a relatively soft one, neither extolment nor excoriation. That might also be the most practical course of action for the agency, given the variables involved and the lack of clear-cut evidence that could untangle them. But the wishy-washiness of Pick whatever is confusing as hell.

Read the rest at the link

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 25 Oct 21 - 03:21 AM

Thank you keberoxu. Much appreciated

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 25 Oct 21 - 06:58 AM

Gov. DeSantis of FL. is saying that Fkorida would be the sanctuary for police or others who wish to disobey vaccine mandate laws,
DeSantis, a Trump wannabe, is the villain who used to wear a pencil thin moustache.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 25 Oct 21 - 08:07 AM

Stilly, Sat, Night Live said we are entering the 'just wingin it' phase of our pandemic response with our mix and match apecials.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 26 Oct 21 - 10:13 PM

Why people believe Covid conspiracy theories: could folklore hold the answer? Researchers use AI – and witchcraft folklore – to map the coronavirus conspiracy theories that have sprung up. Researchers have mapped the web of connections underpinning coronavirus conspiracy theories, opening a new way of understanding and challenging them. Using Danish witchcraft folklore as a model, the researchers from UCLA and Berkeley analysed thousands of social media posts with an artificial intelligence tool and extracted the key people, things and relationships. (read on)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 27 Oct 21 - 06:14 AM

Just had my booster. Tizer this time instead of Asda Vinegar. Had the flu jab at the same time so I hope all them little antibodies are not fighting...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 27 Oct 21 - 06:21 AM

Hahaha Dave, love it! My very Norfolk neighbour always calls it the Asda Vinegar. But 'Tizer' is even better.
Hope you have no too-troubling side-effects, and well done for being sensible. We're still awaiting our boosters, plus the flu jab.
And still well-masked-up.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 27 Oct 21 - 07:00 AM

For the refusnics who want to wait, how long is long enough?
30 years? Generationally?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Oct 21 - 07:40 AM

Ask Facebook. Somebody'll tell you and Zuckerberg won't notice.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 27 Oct 21 - 08:08 AM

Folklore and Bill Gates be damned, the main cause of distrust and conspiracy about medication is the Oxycontin addiction suffered by millions, while it was said to be non addictive.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 27 Oct 21 - 09:07 AM

Lies about medicine is like lies from politicians.
All Trump and the Brazilion President did was give permission to believe Covid was fake and not mention vaccine as a cure. Like any process of defamation all sorts of ideas can be burned into people.

America used to burn disco records but today good old fashioned book burnings about race theory are virtual and real.
Its a slippery slope when certain book titles to be burned, turns into burning ANY Democratic Jewish sounding scienctific and medical book.
Meanwhile opiate addiction is still ravaging all the Trump states in the midst of a war on drugs.    its crazy


The thing about politicians is that people thought they had good ideas.
The ultimate recipe: Ideas are immortal, just add mortals.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Oct 21 - 09:37 AM

Completely off-topic and utterly inappropriate, but Donuel's misspelling there immediately brought to mind my favourite ancient Dubya joke:


Donald Rumsfeld is giving the president his daily briefing. He concludes by saying: "Yesterday, three Brazilian soldiers were killed."

"OH NO!" the President exclaims. "That's terrible!"

Head in hands, tears streaming down his face, he finally asks, "How many is a brazillion?"



Now back to the fray while I get me coat...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 27 Oct 21 - 11:39 AM

At this point in time only five percent of the population on the continent of Africa have been vaccinated. That probably means a higher rate in North Africa and barely there in the rest of the continent. I think most of the discussion and transfer of vaccines is a nation-to-nation thing, I haven't heard about NGOs distributing the vaccine. There doesn't seem to be a mechanism for individuals to support groups to get the job done.

Accelerating COVID-19 vaccinations in Africa from the Brookings Institute.

Already, regional institutions, led by the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the African Union, the African Export-Import Bank, and the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, have worked tirelessly to obtain much-needed medical supplies, ventilators, diagnostic tests, and personal protective equipment, among other essential materials, in order to shore up Africa’s defenses against the virus. Of course, one of the most effective tools for combating the spread of the virus is the vaccine, of which many versions now exist.

However, this essential tool continues to be out of reach for most Africans: Indeed, the region is far behind the rest of the world in obtaining and distributing the vaccine due to a myriad of challenges, including inadequacy of vaccine supplies, logistics and capacity constraints within Africa, and vaccine hesitancy. Donations of these vaccines from the U.S., Europe, and many other partners—both bilaterally and through the efforts of COVAX—have increased supplies, but those donations are far too few, and the speed of the vaccine rollout is much too slow to truly blunt the impact of COVID-19 in the region, especially as variants continue to accelerate the spread. In fact, as of this writing, less than 2% of Africa’s over 1 billion people have been fully vaccinated. . . .

Both panelists warned that the issue of vaccination has become a global political pain point. Sidibé urged, in response to this trend, that leaders think about medicine as a public good, calling for a conversation around the democratization of health and describing this vaccine inaccessibility as a “denial of the right to medicine.” Binagwaho agreed, warning that politics have begun to overtake the science of the pandemic, leading to a situation where the Western world has become comfortable giving their populations booster shots while only 3% of the developing word has been able to procure any.

Politics, indeed, have become a huge stumbling block. The worst timing of this pandemic is that it happened during the Trump administration. The Know-Nothings Do-Nothings let this get even more out of control than it might have.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Oct 21 - 12:15 PM

A few numbers, my approximations from graphs and lists:

Democratic Republic of Congo, 1 person in 600 has received at least a single dose of vaccine.

Tanzania, 1 in 70,

Ethiopia, 1 in 30.

Nigeria, 1 in 25.

Kenya, 1 in 11.

The populations of the above countries add up to half a billion people.

Saudi Arabia, 96 in 100.

Canada, 78 in 100.

Japan, 77 in 100.

UK, 73 in 100.

US, 66 in 100.

We seem to be living in two worlds.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 27 Oct 21 - 01:44 PM

Steve, I just told that joke last night in a pub. Great minds.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 27 Oct 21 - 10:33 PM

From the New York Times

A cheap antidepressant lowers the risk of Covid hospitalization, a large study finds.

A large clinical trial has found that a common and inexpensive antidepressant lowered the odds that high-risk Covid-19 patients would be hospitalized. The results, published on Wednesday, could open the door to new guidelines for the drug’s use both in the United States and globally.

The drug, fluvoxamine, has been safely prescribed for nearly 30 years as a treatment for obsessive-compulsive disorder. But when the coronavirus started spreading, researchers were drawn to the medication because of its ability to reduce inflammation, potentially allowing it to quell the body’s overwhelming response to a coronavirus infection.

Several smaller studies of fluvoxamine earlier in the pandemic showed promising results, but none was as large or persuasive as the one published on Wednesday by a group of researchers in Canada, the United States and Brazil, outside scientists said. Among nearly 1,500 Covid patients in Brazil given either fluvoxamine or a placebo, the drug reduced the need for hospitalization or prolonged medical observation by one-third, the study found. It was published in The Lancet Global Health.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 28 Oct 21 - 07:57 AM

Mrs Bonzo had an appointment today at our local BMI Hospital with the Professor of Ophthalmology. He looked at the scans of her left eye and identified a blood clot, but not a bleed suggested by our Ophthalmist who performed the scan earlier this week, which he thinks was probably caused by the Pfizer Covid booster, although because of the short amount of time that the booster has been available, there is insufficient available data to be absolutely certain.

The nurse who injected her was supposed to ask if she was prone to blood clots, but instead of a brain in her head, she has a small pea. Mrs B will have to have four injections in her eye - one a month starting today - not my idea of fun!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 28 Oct 21 - 09:49 AM

It simply isn't possible to justify that conclusion based on a single case.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 28 Oct 21 - 11:18 AM

Correct, he did say almost certainly, but until there is evidence of further cases he cannot be 100% certain.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 28 Oct 21 - 11:51 PM

Hoo boy, the macho muchachos who believe the vax will make their balls magnetic, are thinking twice now that the severe vascular effects from Covid 19 causes erectile dysfuntion big time, or small time if you will. This is likely to effect firemen and policemen who fear floppy flaccid one eyed wonder worms more than the vax.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 29 Oct 21 - 06:11 AM

Who have bigger balls - policemen or firemen?











It depends on how many tickets they sell!

DC

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 29 Oct 21 - 06:29 AM

Oh poor Mrs Bonzo! A bit scary to have injections in the eyeball. Hope she can cope, and that the clot is dealt with.
I suppose any sudden health problems people get could be instantly blamed on a vaccination, but as Steve says, this isn't scientific at all.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: gillymor
Date: 29 Oct 21 - 07:14 AM

Magnetic balls on a fire house pole could lead to a serious public safety issue.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 29 Oct 21 - 08:16 AM

You would think that magnetic balls would give these guys a built in compass, but it just points down. btw- if you take the new trademark of Facebook (now Meta) and draw Jeff Bezos' spaceship above or below the new trademark, it becomes porn.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 29 Oct 21 - 08:35 AM

Magnetic balls on a fire house pole could lead to a serious pubic safety issue...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 29 Oct 21 - 08:54 AM

oo-oo a new conspiracy theory...
THE LONG TERM EFFECTS of the m rna vaccine is a swelling of the nose and lips and a progressive darkening of the skin. Dr. Lawrence O. Zoil indicates the vaccine causes a reversal to pre European adaptation to less sunlight.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 29 Oct 21 - 10:42 AM

Too bad about Mrs. Bonzo's eye, but from here it sounds simply like a coincidence. If she hadn't gotten the vaccine she might have eaten an unusual variety of cheese, and that could be the culprit instead but the eye still would have the clot.

Explainer: Correlation, causation, coincidence and more

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 29 Oct 21 - 11:18 AM

It isn't possible to set up an ethical study on mask effectiveness using a control experiment, which is why we can use observational data only, gathered from people who aren't behaving consistently as the scientists might prefer them to. Potential confounding factors are many and serious and can't easily be ironed out, if at all.

I was in the supermarket this afternoon, selecting a head of celery for my soffritto. As I picked one up and turned to put it in my trolley, a woman who I hadn't noticed was reaching across me to pick one up. As I turned, her face was two inches from mine. She was wearing a mask. I wasn't, but ever since all this started I've been sticking to the two-metre rule, or at least trying to. You could easily pick out half a dozen confounding factors from the ways people behave, especially in the ways they use masks.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 30 Oct 21 - 08:09 AM

"Too bad about Mrs. Bonzo's eye" - very "too bad" indeed, so much so that due to considerable pain suffered a few hours after her eye injection, she emailed her Consultant Opthalmogist who without hesitation summoned her to his London consulting rooms, to carry out any further action if needed.

What you must remember here is that as the eyes age, profound structural changes occur, leading to visual impairment and even blindness, which can be brought on by certain types of infection if not dealt with quickly.

Fortunately pain has now subsided and eyesight improved.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 01 Nov 21 - 05:31 PM

China is taking this very seriously -

Shanghai Disneyland is shut down, and 30,000 people are tested, after one COVID case

Shanghai health authorities say they have tested nearly 34,000 people in a single night for COVID-19 at Shanghai's Disneyland.

On Sunday evening, the city suddenly closed Shanghai Disneyland and banned anyone inside from leaving. They also shut down the metro station that services the theme park. The park said they did so to cooperate with a contact tracing investigation after a woman who visited the park Saturday later tested positive for the coronavirus in neighboring Jiangxi province.

Shanghai announced on Monday that all of the guests who had been tested over the weekend came back negative for COVID-19, according to the Associated Press. Authorities said they will have to be tested again, the outlet reported.

Chinese media says an estimated 100,000 people visited the park Saturday and Sunday, all of whom will now need to be tested.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 01 Nov 21 - 06:00 PM

Oh I'm so glad Bonzo that the pain has subsided and eyesight improved - she must have been so worried (and you too of course!)
Hope from now on that things get back to normal. Best wishes to you both from Eliza.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 02 Nov 21 - 06:27 AM

5 million global Covid deaths are documented. All the people who died at home or in obscurity are not included. Estimated real totals is up to 8 million deaths. For example if you are 113 and die of Covid complications you are probably in the additional 3 million group. I'm having trouble converting to how many kilos of dead humans that would be.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 02 Nov 21 - 06:50 AM

We tend to count souls but I suppose there are other scales.
How many in tons or how much in stones, how many new orphans, in lost wisdom or abandoned real estate?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 02 Nov 21 - 09:47 AM

I recently read something about the people left behind - maybe in The Atlantic? Sounds like their kind of topic.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 04 Nov 21 - 05:21 PM

Thank you for your kind wishes Eliza.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 05 Nov 21 - 04:16 AM

Just came across this from my FB feed 7 years ago. Even more relevant in this age of anti vaccine and conspiracy theories. I could have posted it in a number of places but as Covid seems to generate a plethora of demonstrable nonsense, I put it here.

The problem with today's world is that everyone believes they have the right to express their opinion AND have others listen to it.

The correct statement of individual rights is that everyone has the right to an opinion but, crucially, that opinion can be roundly ignored and even made fun of, particularly if it is demonstrably nonsense!


             - Professor Brian Cox

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 Nov 21 - 06:45 AM

Although conspiracy theories are nonsense, and dangerous nonsense at that, it's often impossible to show that they're demonstrable nonsense.

Conspiracy theorists and their ilk are savvy when it comes to articulating their notions in a way that makes it impossible to refute. No-one can demonstrate that Bill Gates has not contaminated the vaccines with microchips, even though the notion is just stupid nonsense. I hear that some believe that there's a supernatural, all-knowing, all-seeing, all powerful being who has no beginning and no end. It's the most ridiculous idea I've ever heard, but I'm still unable to demonstrate that is isn't true...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 05 Nov 21 - 09:24 AM

” I hear that some believe that there's a supernatural, all-knowing, all-seeing, all powerful being who has no beginning and no end. It's the most ridiculous idea I've ever heard, but I'm still unable to demonstrate that is isn't true

Y’know, that sounds very close to a definition of ‘faith’, Steve!. ;-) :-)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 05 Nov 21 - 09:26 AM

I'm rather hopeful about Molnupiravir, a newly-approved anti-viral drug that could help to reduce the effects of already-infected sufferers of Covid19. We paid for my husband's aged African mother in Abidjan to be given Acyclovir, to help her with a very bad attack of Herpes simplex all over her face.
It was swiftly effective, thank goodness.
These anti-viral medications could be a great weapon in the war against Covid.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 Nov 21 - 10:16 AM

But at £500 for a single course...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 05 Nov 21 - 10:27 AM

I know Steve - only the wealthy may survive, while the poor go to the wall eh? Disgraceful.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 05 Nov 21 - 10:55 AM

First Merck, and now Pfizer, have antiviral pills intended to alleviate symptoms and attack the coronavirus.

Covid Live Updates: Pfizer Says Its Antiviral Pill Is Highly Effective

The drug, which has the brand name Paxlovid, is the first treatment purpose-built to attack the coronavirus. The company said it planned to submit data as soon as possible to the F.D.A. for authorization.

Pfizer announced on Friday that its pill to treat Covid-19 had been found in a key clinical trial to be highly effective at preventing severe illness among at-risk people who received the drug soon after they exhibited symptoms.

The antiviral pill is the second of its kind to demonstrate efficacy against Covid. It appears to be more effective than a similar offering from Merck, which is awaiting federal authorization.

Pfizer’s pill, which will be sold under the brand name Paxlovid, cut the risk of hospitalization or death by 89 percent when given within three days of the start of symptoms.

Pfizer said an independent board of experts monitoring its clinical trial had recommended that the study be stopped early because the drug’s benefit to patients had proved so convincing. The company said that it planned to submit the data as soon as possible to the Food and Drug Administration to seek authorization for the pill to be used in the United States.

“The results are really beyond our wildest dreams,” said Annaliesa Anderson, a Pfizer executive who led the drug’s development. She expressed hope that Paxlovid “can have a big impact on helping all our lives go back to normal again and seeing the end of the pandemic.”

The treatment could become available in the next few months, though supplies are likely to be limited at first. The Pfizer and Merck pills are both geared toward patients regarded as high-risk, such as those above the age of 60 or with conditions like obesity that make them more susceptible to severe consequences from Covid.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 05 Nov 21 - 02:49 PM

The 89% effective Covid pill is a blue and white capsule.
Kids are now getting their first vaccine.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 05 Nov 21 - 03:55 PM

once word gets out a little blue tablet cures covid,
anti vaxxers will start swapping worm tablets for massive overdoses of viagra...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 05 Nov 21 - 06:37 PM

swapping little blue pills could (will!) lead to very interesting results ...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: gillymor
Date: 06 Nov 21 - 06:51 AM

A stiffy won't do an anti-vaxxer much good in an ICU but I suppose nurses could use it to play ring toss in their spare time.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 06 Nov 21 - 07:02 AM

They could run the stars and stripes up it - so fitting for a freedom lovin' fighting patriot to take to the grave..

.. if it don't stop the coffin lid closing...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Nov 21 - 02:28 PM

Man went furtively up to the counter in the pharmacy. Leaning across, and looking around nervously, he whispered to the young lady assistant, "I want some viagra. Can I get it over the counter?"

She replied, "Well, you may have to take two..."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 07 Nov 21 - 11:41 AM

These last comments have made me laugh and laugh! So funny!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 07 Nov 21 - 01:02 PM

Biden has pushed out (through OSHA, I think) a mandate that all US companies with more than 100 employees must have employees vaccinated or be subjected to frequent testing. There is pushback from various states' governors.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 07 Nov 21 - 03:42 PM

29 States are bringing lawsuits to stop the mandates.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 07 Nov 21 - 03:53 PM

If I were a religious believer, and told either Biden or trump was satan in disguise,
I'm fairly sure I'd be able to guesss which of 'em..

However, your yank neo-facist evangelical covidiot preachers/internet influencers
seem to have real problems working this one out...???

.. the devil's work is never done...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 08 Nov 21 - 07:07 AM

The Supream Court is bound to support the vaccine or testing mandate.
One person's freedom does not overide everyone else's freedom.
This is not the opinion of the wealthiest Americans however.
They think unlimited cash overides everything.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 09 Nov 21 - 08:21 AM

US opens to the world

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 10 Nov 21 - 07:18 AM

A football player Aron Rogers claims he is allergic to the vaccine but took Ivermectin and then got Covid. He said he was immunized but basicly lied. He said he's gotta be himself despite being attacked by the woke mob but I fear he is allergic to the truth.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 10 Nov 21 - 12:06 PM

1,100 high level NIH employees were asked to volunteer to forgo stay at home work schedules. 6 elected to go back to the office.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: keberoxu
Date: 28 Nov 21 - 02:24 PM

The previous posts, I looked at the most recent ones
and did not see anywhere the dreaded word
Omicron,
although the word turns up on other threads.


It's yet another wave of SARS/COVID infections,
and resulting sicknesses and deaths,
this time with the omicron mutation/variant.

The whole thing is starting to play out with
enough recapitulations and developments
for a Shakespearean play or a romantic symphony, or something.

Two planes from South Africa land in the Netherlands;
diagnostic testing/screening testing for all the passengers,
and it takes hours, and they are all crammed inside the planes;
then they decide to isolate and quarantine,
what was it, sixty-one passengers,
while the rest are let out?

Someday, those who survive this entire experience
will make dramas out of it,
and film them, and people will sit and watch the story unfold again.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 28 Nov 21 - 03:50 PM

Just keep things in perspective. It's a new variant, but, to date, the evidence that it's a faster spreader, or a worse disease, or will nobble our vaccines, simply isn't there. Beware of scaremongering, manipulative politicians.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 28 Nov 21 - 04:11 PM

Beware of the bogeyman if you want but I do not see one.
I see many in the anti vaxxers, mask deniers and twisted liberty screamers.
Beware of the self proclaimed exclusive truth authority with narcisist motives which may include some politicians.

If you hear the dam is leaking it is best check it out for yourself.
When that is impossible things get more complicated unless you rely on an authority. In pandemics my authority is Dr. Fauci.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 28 Nov 21 - 05:06 PM

There is a meme making the rounds that bears consideration:

Sent by a discussion list moderator, they preface the meme by stating "If you're seeing the 'variant started in SA' take, push back on it. It's based in racism."

The statement from Graeme Codrington (I looked him at at TomorrowToday, he's an expert (their words) speaker on the subject of the "Future of Work" and "disruptive change.")

Once again the world's media is reporting: "South Africa has a new Covid variant" as if the variant started here and is infecting us all.

CAN I SAY THIS GAIN, MORE LOUDLY FOR THE IDIOT JOURNALISTS AT THE BACK: South Africa has one of the most sophisticated and advanced infectious diseases infrastructure on the planet. Some of the world's leading epidemiologists work in South Africa. We've had to develop these capabilities to deal with TB and AIDS and other diseases ravaging our continent.

It is no surprise that our medical system is the first in the world to identify new Covid variants. It is no surprise that we led the world in clinical trials of vaccines.

What IS a surprise is how lazy journalists write headlines: "New Covid variant in South Africa." No, this new Covid variant has been found in New Zealand, England, Brazil, France, India, Indonesia, the Philippines and other places. South African scientists isolated, sequenced and understood it first. Report THAT face, but don't start all. . .

The screenshot was blocked at that point. This guy is a Futurist who was sharing his opinion. One takeaway from this, (beyond the racism point made by the moderator who shared this somewhere), is that banning travel is probably already too late, especially if this has popped up all around the world. The fact that it was identified in South Africa may be moot. The fact that it may not have originated there (time will tell) means the safety New World nations might feel by banning travel from a third-world continent is ill-advised.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 28 Nov 21 - 08:54 PM

Absolutely right. I said to Mrs Steve this evening that the constant emphasis on this variant coming from South Africa has more that just a little racist tinge about it. The bloody thing has likely been everywhere for weeks or months. I mean, what percentage of people with this virus are ever tested to see which strain they have?

Let's not be manipulated...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 29 Nov 21 - 01:18 PM

I don't think in those terms so I looked it up. My state is 50% white, Idaho is 82% white and SA is 10% white. You could just as easily conclude that nearness to the Equator is the main factor in Covid variants and black population. Delta was traced to India and Covid to China. Population density and vaccination rates may be more relevant imo regardless of race or climate. It is as meaningless as comparing burka wearing infection rates vs. spring break bikinis.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: keberoxu
Date: 29 Nov 21 - 01:32 PM

The drama continues, regardless of plot thickening or not thickening.

So, meanwhile, back in Amsterdam:
Sixty-one arriving airplane passengers tested positive for COVID.
No specifying which strain of COVID.
All sixty-one were urgently requested to isolate and quarantine in a hotel.

What also is not specified, is if there were additional passengers
whose test results were negative, but who were
spouses or relatives or partners of those who tested positive,
and who have stayed with them in isolation regardless.

Latest AFP update states:
Thirteen of those sixty-one [people] have tested positive for the new Omicron variant.

In the meanwhile, some of these passengers had flown to Amsterdam
in hopes of changing planes and going somewhere else to go home.

One adult couple went so far as to not only leave the hotel --
"In the Netherlands, it is NOT illegal to be outside when you have [positive results from COVID screening]" --
but they bought tickets and got on a plane to Spain
"But when you go into a plane knowing you have it, then it is another story".

Details remain incomplete to the point of being misleading.
It is further stated that
only one person in this couple
had had positive results from the COVID screening test.
Which variant is left unstated.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-1.1.1.596
From: Donuel
Date: 29 Nov 21 - 03:51 PM

The earliest data shows no significant rise in hospitalizations or death rates. These results may only be perspicatious and not a proven scientific fact. Whats good is a protease protection but unknown increased mutation rates are generally bad. So there is no dreadful news today.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 30 Nov 21 - 06:48 AM

Still only anecdotal info with sample sizes too small to have significance.

'News' on the Fox right is a global Biden conspiracy regarding 'Omnichrome' and Dr. Fauci and Dr. Mengele have much in common.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 02 Dec 21 - 10:56 AM

Bipolar and some other mental illnesses have been added to the list of These make covid worse. Great.

One source here: Click.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: keberoxu
Date: 02 Dec 21 - 06:19 PM

For those who are interested, a report on this week's

SNAFU, in the literal military sense of the word, at the Amsterdam airport,
which is going to be a while living down
what this does to its reputation --
the airport, KLM Airlines, ...
at one point the border police patrol were called because
no one else would respond to the passengers' phone calls and texts!
What a mess.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 03 Dec 21 - 05:42 AM

1900:

As there's really not much new 'news' available.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 03 Dec 21 - 06:38 AM

...Except that we have a "new" variant that seems to be running rampant, and Christmas is threatened, and there was a illegal party in Downing Street on the day before Johnson cancelled last Christmas, and Germany is going to enforce vaccination, and Greece is fining people €100 per month if they refuse the jab, and we'll be wearing masks until the day we die (and probably for a few days afterwards...)

So, Nigel, move along there...Nothing to see here...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 03 Dec 21 - 06:41 AM

No new news until enough time has passed to demonstrate an effect on death rates and not just mild symptoms among the vaccinated. That time is usually 2 to 6 weeks.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: keberoxu
Date: 03 Dec 21 - 08:36 PM

As per ANP and the NL Times,
since those Friday (last friday, still in November 2021)
arrivals of a total of 624 passengers on two planes
in Amsterdam from South Africa
(one from Johannesburg, one from Cape Town),
repeated screening and testing this past week
have returned enough negative results that
some quarantined passengers have been released to continue going home.

The quarantine hotel (a Ramada Inn) near the Amsterdam airport
had 44 passengers, all of whom had been screened on arrival
and whose tests had showed positive,
isolated there over the weekend.

On Wednesday test results came back negative for roughly twenty
of the quarantine-hotel passengers, and they were released.
The reports released to the news media
maintain standards of privacy and confidentiality such that
no Omicron figures are given regarding those passengers
whose Wednesday test results were positive
and who remain in quarantine near the airport.

There were about twenty passengers
who were Amsterdam/Dutch locals and were permitted, upon arrival,
to go home in order to quarantine there,
instead of in the Ramada Inn.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: keberoxu
Date: 04 Dec 21 - 01:46 PM

Meanwhile, in Oslo, Norway,
at the same time that Amsterdam was coping with two passenger plane arrivals from South Africa,
a corporate party took place.
All one hundred twenty employees had been fully vaccinated beforehand,
and had in addition tested negative on COVID screening tests just before the party.

Reuters reports that the corporate Christmas dinner,
held at an Oslo restaurant, resulted in
a super-spreader event.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 09 Dec 21 - 03:35 AM

Meantime,“ Conspiracy-Theorists have discovered that DELTA OMICRON is an anagram for MEDIA CONTROL. Just wait until they also discover that it’s an anagram for CILANTRO MODE, CLARINET DOOM, and DEMOCRAT LION.”
@Nora Loretto, Twitter.

…or even EROTIC ALMOND :-) :-)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 09 Dec 21 - 08:31 AM

Like "The masque of the red death", surely the anagram is "DOOM IN CLARET". Wine drinkers beware ;)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 09 Dec 21 - 08:36 AM

Cilantro mode. Ugh.

Bipolar puts me at 2.5xgreater risk of dying if I do get Covid. Schizophrenics, too. Controlling for other risk factors.

Lots of new data coming in.

It attacks fat cells, and the immune system fat manages. Explains why obesity is succh a risk factor.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 09 Dec 21 - 08:38 PM

The conspiratorial power of the anagram is nothing compared to Q anon parents binding the foreheads of their infants to 3 year olds so that the conehead adults will have the appearence of heads twice as big and
intelligent as well as immediately identifying the Q Anon 1st generation pure bloods. BTW The antivaxxers are diversifying their interests to include any preventive strategy regarding oil and gas and woke fake climate change.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: keberoxu
Date: 09 Dec 21 - 08:39 PM

Hostile to fat cells, eh?
Shhh ... somebody might try to profit from it ...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 11 Dec 21 - 02:18 PM

New cool research on olfaction thanks to the covid anosmia thing!

Blicky

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 12 Dec 21 - 03:10 AM

Here in the land of Oz "freedom" marchers were making a nuisance of themselves again

caption on all the photos - Anti-vaccine mandate rally in Sydney which moved from Hyde Park down to Alfred Park where it accumulated in talks and music.

accumulated??? - Some years back the paper got rid of it's proofreaders & other unnecessary staff.

dunno why the last couple of pics show anti-vaxxers carrying Trump banners. Maybe they were the same folk who carried posters about losing their 14th amendment rights recently.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Dec 21 - 04:09 AM

It's important that we maintain the distinction between anti-vaxxers and people who oppose mandatory vaccination. In the latter camp, what's more, there are shades of opinion.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 12 Dec 21 - 05:00 AM

some of our protestors get a tad confused - Trump 2024 in an Australian march? Do people in your country include references to Trump or other topics not relevant to the UK?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Dec 21 - 06:37 AM

I can't recall seeing any of that. I would propose, however, that Trump is relevant to the whole planet. Or will be (again) if those sleepy yanks let him back in...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 12 Dec 21 - 08:35 AM

Olifaction is indeed a critical and relatively undiscovered field. I have met olfactory specialists who know very little.
I suffer from a highly acute sense of smell. Its well into the canine sensory spectrum. A forest or body of water can be overwhelming. The reaction can range from ambrosia to gagging. A well developed sense of smell includes 3D location and 5 part per billion awareness.
I have often said I have dog's sense of the world as well as having 8 canine teeth instead of which 4 were removed. Also my nasal air passage is the size of quarters as a result of deviated septum surgury which chiseled out the bone while I was awake to control blood loss. The feeling of acute smell sensitivity is that certain aromas feel like colors as well as smell.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 12 Dec 21 - 09:22 AM

I am anosmic to a lot of bad smells. Can't tell if milk is off, or mold invades, etc.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Dec 21 - 09:26 AM

I'm normal. Having said that, I find some tangerines that Mrs Steve finds delicious to be too sharp to eat.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 12 Dec 21 - 09:42 AM

anosmic - that's a problem, I imagine? How does food taste?

With practice your sense of smell can be very precise. Years ago I worked for the Forest Service as a fire fighter, and got pretty good at distinguishing what was burning (wood, leaves, grass, duff, etc.) and that extends to household items over the years. I find myself identifying grassfires and such in the area when the wind is blowing just right.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 12 Dec 21 - 06:05 PM

Steve, the Trump pics are the last 2 in the link I posted 12 Dec 21 - 03:10 AM

Online COVID-19 misinformation made fighting the outbreak in Binjari even harder ... The Binjari Community Aboriginal Corporation said much of the abuse they received was from so-called "concerned citizens" from the USA ...

Binjari is a remote indigenous community in Australia's Top End, pop. 195 (2016), 18km from the nearest big town & 300km from the state capital, Darwin

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Dec 21 - 06:22 PM

Yes, I saw that, Sandra. The last thing I want to do is to drag Trump into this thread, but all I was saying is that here in Blighty we definitely don't see Trump as irrelevant. To my mind, he's a massive threat to the planet, especially if he gets in again.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 14 Dec 21 - 07:35 AM

Even a US Supream Court judge is falling for the misinformation from pro lifers claiming the vaccines contain fetal tissue. an example of pro life LIES

The judge believes that a religious exception is therefore needed.

The truth is every drug you have ever taken has been TESTED on HEV 293 cells from 50 years ago to determine safety but they contain no HEK cells. Human Embryo Kidney cells.

Here is an example of drugs that were subject to HEK cell safety tests
https://www.winonadailynews.com/community/houstonconews/lifestyles/frank-bures-fetal-cell-lines-essential-to-modern-medicine/art

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 14 Dec 21 - 08:41 AM

30 common medications that used fetal cell lines during research and development. The list includes acetaminophen, albuterol, aspirin, ibuprofen, Tylenol, Pepto Bismol, Tums, Lipitor, Senokot, Motrin, Maalox, Ex-Lax, Benadryl, Sudafed, Preparation H, Claritin, Prilosec, and Zoloft.

However there are thousands...

Perhaps big pharma is not pleased with the pro life lies.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Charmion
Date: 14 Dec 21 - 09:26 AM

I have a really sharp olfactory sense for a human, and I lose it whenever I catch a bad cold. In fact, that's the worst part of a bad cold for me, even worse than the inevitable slide to bronchitis that follows it. Pure misery. One of the many reasons I dread catching COVID-19, as if the threat of death weren't enough.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 14 Dec 21 - 12:04 PM

Donuel: 30 common medications that used fetal cell lines during research and development. The list includes acetaminophen, albuterol, aspirin, ibuprofen, Tylenol, Pepto Bismol, Tums, Lipitor, Senokot, Motrin, Maalox, Ex-Lax, Benadryl, Sudafed, Preparation H, Claritin, Prilosec, and Zoloft.

Seriously?
Aspirin was first named, by Bayer, in 1899. Were they seriously using foetal cells for R&D prior to that date?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 14 Dec 21 - 01:20 PM

I trust a chef with the best sense of smell. Those without it are probably giving themselves and others heartburn. I suspect your cooking is friendlier than the recipees of he who shall not be named. He said to Jeri that he takes antacids often. -or maybe its all the wine.-

Nigel, perhaps it has been tested since 1899. HEK celle are used in development and safety testing. I think the ancient Greeks used willow bark.

Now there are 2 Supream Court Justices who believe drugs and vaccines contain human fetal tissue.

Extreme opinion alert:
Seeing is believing, or so it is said. To gain social respondsibilty I suggest televising a six year old's last Covid breaths despite being aided with oxygen mask and ventillator. Show hundreds of people from kids to strong young men gasping from not being vaccinated.
Hippa privacy be damned. Make it real to people spouting fallacy.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Dec 21 - 02:04 PM

I think you should indeed name names. That way, you can't be accused of being shifty and dishonest, as well as of frequently losing your nerve, risks you always seem to be taking. I'm no fan of the Good Book, but I understand that the good Lord advised that our speech should be yea yea, nay nay. Read it and learn.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 15 Dec 21 - 07:38 PM

Stevie, happy holidays.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Dec 21 - 07:54 PM

Sod off. Nobody calls me Stevie. Comprenez, dummydonny? And our December holidays are called Christmas. Holidays my fat arse.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 16 Dec 21 - 06:26 AM

Best wishes mr. x
The UK (70% vaccinated) hit its all time high for covid cases.
That means the US is next. My wish is that all mr. x's learn that mitigating factors matter.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 16 Dec 21 - 10:11 AM

Donuel:
The UK (70% vaccinated) hit its all time high for covid cases.
Any reference for that statement?

In the last few days UK has reached a new high for the number of new cases identified. - correct
"All time high for covid cases" - pure assumption based on a lack of knowledge!
As UK is regularly increasing the number of tests administered (especially because of Omicron) it would be surprising if the number of positive tests was not increasing.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 16 Dec 21 - 11:04 AM

My next door neighbor was complaining about a cold last week when we spoke over the back fence. Last night she texted to say she got three tests (Flu, something else, and COVID) and the COVID came back positive. So I'm being cautious and getting a test this morning. I've been around people since I spoke to her with the cold, so need to do my own little contact tracing routine.

This kind of thing should stop people in their tracks. Cancel appointments, don't go shopping, or anything indoors or around people, until the test results are back. I asked for the more sensitive PCR test that takes a day or two for results.

The neighbor is a non-vaccinated Trump supporter. We NEVER talk politics in order to keep the goodwill of the neighborhood up and running (I'm surrounded by Trump supporters - though the folks across the street, they were Biden voters.) After I get what I expect to be negative results I'll drop off stuff on her front porch until she can come out again.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 16 Dec 21 - 12:34 PM

Stevie, who is this We of whom you speak that have no other possible winter holidays?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 16 Dec 21 - 01:03 PM

No religious "Christmas" at my house, but my family celebrates the season and we exchange gifts because we enjoy getting together and exchanging gifts. Sometimes we do it on the 25th, but lately we've been landing the date in January.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 16 Dec 21 - 02:07 PM

Nigel I heard it on MSNBC but I've known them to be fallible.
"Cases are doubling every 2 days in the UK, breaking records".
Or so they say.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 16 Dec 21 - 04:40 PM

In vitro an omicron virus infects respiratory tissue 70% faster than Delta. After 48 hours it has reproduced significantly more virus.
What it does inside of a real person is not settled science.
It is also trending among younger populations. Its a smart and cheeky little bugger.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Dec 21 - 05:07 PM

You are speaking of Christmas, yet calling it something else for pusillanimous reasons of your own, Donald Duckie (and of millions of you yanks). It's Christmas, fer chrissake.

(See what I did there?)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 16 Dec 21 - 05:14 PM

Who is You in that post of 05:07?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Dec 21 - 05:21 PM

Donal Duckie, Mrrzy. Don't worry mate. This isn't, for you, an "Is it I, Lord? " moment...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 17 Dec 21 - 07:41 AM

These posts are evidence of a pandemic fatigue that comes from being told to go back in our cave. Everyone feels it but the stress expresses itself differently in various personalities be it distraction or lashing out. Its a myopic disorder that can and will heal when more degrees of freedom someday return. As you expect some personalities were already damaged before the pandemic and will not change.
All pandemics are different, when you see one pandemic you've seen one pandemic.
I do not know if this fifth wave will be the worst of all or not but accepting change as a good thing does provide new or different opportunities.
we'll meet again, don't know where, don't know when...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 17 Dec 21 - 07:57 AM

Up to now the government here has been giving out lateral flow test kits like sweeties. Something has changed: we are suddenly being urged to test ourselves several times a week and every time we go out to do a bit of social mixing. The upshot of this advice is we can't get our hands on test kits now, temporarily I hope, for love nor money. I'm concluding from that that millions of people have grabbed the kits and are now testing themselves, unlike before when people just like me got themselves a couple of boxes of kits and hardly ever used them (the evidence for that is that up to two or three months ago the government were getting the "mandatory" reporting-back of tests from just one kit in ten that had been given out).

So more kits, more testing, quite likely more reporting-back...and an apparent surge in positives. Anyone see why I inserted "apparent" in that sentence? I think we should hold back on the panic stations until we see over the next few weeks whether there's a concomitant rise in hospitalisations and deaths...

Obviously, all that's from a UK perspective.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 17 Dec 21 - 08:44 AM

Yes, Steve.
That was roughly what I was trying to explain to Donuel.

But I don't think it's the 'home tests' (LFTs) that are driving the current figures. Being home tests they don't feed into the stats for the expansion of Omicron (or 'Omni-cron' per some pundits) because they only give positive/negative. It is only the laboratory tested samples that can be separated into showing which variant is the problem.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 17 Dec 21 - 09:11 AM

I know that, but I'd be interested to hear whether there's a surge in reporting-back from the home lateral flow kits, over and above that ten percent-ish that I mentioned. The headline infection number we're regaled with every day doesn't distinguish between variants.

Whilst I'm no conspiracy theorist, I can't help thinking that the government (with the best of intentions) would rather like us to see the blacker side of things, as that would make us more careful (which would be the best thing, after getting vaccinated).

As an aside (and as I'm a Liverpool fan), three Liverpool players tested positive yesterday so weren't playing last night. It turns out that all three had been double-vaccinated and boostered, and were showing no symptoms. A tiny example only, but a good yarn to put about.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 17 Dec 21 - 09:34 AM

Going into the future our strategy is to give everyone multiple advanced home testing kits and if positive get a prescription from the doctor within days for the antiviral (now red) pill which is very effective. Getting there will be tough but it should work in Theory.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 17 Dec 21 - 10:25 AM

Who is rethinking their holiday plans now? Meee...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 17 Dec 21 - 11:15 AM

Mrrzy:
Don't mention holiday plans. This week I should have been in Washington DC for the world Science Fiction convention - meh!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 18 Dec 21 - 08:58 AM

Nigel that would have been marvy!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 18 Dec 21 - 11:38 AM

I'm waiting to simply go to the grocery store (I need baking powder) until my COVID test results come back (should be in by today). Since next door has it, I got the test. And will be very careful about face-to-face with anyone. I don't know what variety of the virus she has, but she's had a "cold" for a couple of weeks, and just got tested this week. Community Spread is knocking on the door.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Charmion
Date: 18 Dec 21 - 12:13 PM

I called the drug store and asked for a fast-reaction test kit and was turned down flat. I could make an appointment to be tested, and the pharmacist would do it there, but I could not have a kit to do it myself. With a sore throat, stinging ears and groggy head, I did not want to leave the house, I said. "Call the COVID Centre at the hospital if you have symptoms," said the telephone voice.

So I called the COVID Centre at the hospital and got voicemail. "This office is closed until Monday." Don't leave a message, f*** off and go away.

I laid low for three days, drank a great deal of water, and prayed. The grogginess went away, the ears stopped stinging, and the throat ceased to be sore. Dodged that bullet.

But what the hell? Surely the whole point of test kits is to find out if you have the bug before you get near any innocent by-standers?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 20 Dec 21 - 06:30 AM

I've been doing regular home LFTs, and thankfully negative every time. In typical fashion, I only read the instructions on how to do the tests and see the result, and because they were negative failed to read the next page that said I should report the result anyway.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 20 Dec 21 - 06:57 AM

Nigel its a mild hot zone at the convention. If it wasn't for diabetes the risk is small for infection.

Home test kits are available at our grocery stores.
We're going to see our eldest for Christmas and take our chances.
My wife is getting boosted today.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 20 Dec 21 - 08:12 AM

"Don't panic about day to day life regarding Omicron but don't be indifferent about crowds either."
quote: Atlantic mag.

"For the unvaccinated expect a winter of illness and death"
quote: CDC

"St. Peter requires a negative test at the gates."
quote: Donuel

"Trump sues China virus."
quote: The Onion

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 20 Dec 21 - 08:33 AM

I feel safer in Prague where new cases have halved since their peak ar the end of November than I would if I was in London. Mask wearing in public places is something people just do without whinging about it, as is showing covid digital pass.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Dec 21 - 09:32 AM

We are told this end that the lateral flow kits (aka fast test kits) are for asymptomatic use only. So you'd use one before visiting elderly or vulnerable people or going to an event. They are freely available from pharmacies (and from a pop-up caravan in Holsworthy yesterday!) and you don't have to sign for them or anything. That makes the reporting of your results entirely optional! Should I ever test positive I'd make my own isolation arrangements, thank you very much.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 20 Dec 21 - 04:44 PM

I have seen home test kits at my usual grocery store.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Dec 21 - 05:46 PM

Looks like no restrictions added in England before Christmas. Whilst I fully agree with that outcome, if it comes about, the way it's been arrived at is simply laughable. Johnson is trapped between the backwoodsmen in his cabinet (and on his backbenches) and the scientists, and has been stalled into fearful inactivity.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 20 Dec 21 - 06:43 PM

The test came back negative, but I've been looking for a particular brand of kit that is highly effective (the other kits you get two tests and it says to retest a couple of days later to see if the first one was effective.) I prowled the shelves of my local Walgreens and nothing - and then when I got home to get it from Amazon, they were out. And when you search on the test then follow the results you kit the pharmacy information page - they're all out. The one I was looking for is called FlowFlex and I think it's made a few miles from here at Alcon labs.

Looks like a good time to stay home, and buy the less effective test and take it twice. 7 Rapid At-Home Covid-19 Tests—and Where to Find Them

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Dec 21 - 08:04 PM

As I understand it, the lateral flow kits given out here must conform to a high standard. They are reputed to be not as reliable as the PCR tests, but I don't believe that. I think that any unreliability is down to user error/inexperience. Carried out properly, following the instructions on the box, there's no reason why they can't be pretty reliable. Not one hundred percent, of course, but what is?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 21 Dec 21 - 10:10 AM

Essentially you can
pick from column A and add 'of omicron' in any region town or country
A:
Tidal wave
eruption
doubling
sky rocket
surge
gush
rush
outpouring
regurgitation
stream
flow
sweep
swell
billowing
stream
flow
burst
cascade
overflow
brim over
sweep
spout
spurt
roll
swarm
rise
jet
(thinking aloud)
It seems Long Haul dangers includes heart problems akin to symptoms like angina and a host of other yet provable effects which can be a pain in the ass but survivable for >99% of us.
BUT we may be looking at the start of covid burning itself out. The problem is that there have been break through infections of the vaccinated even in people who were previously infected with Covid/Sars2.
Afterall, we did defeat small pox and polio. Therefore I'm still hopeful Covid will someday diminish to flu levels of fatality.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 21 Dec 21 - 12:18 PM

Joe Biden refers to omicrom as a 'wildfire'. Thats a poor word choice imo portraying incineration and hot agonizing pain.

We are still in an anecdotal zone of data but there are indications in South Africa and the US that omicron infection is less severe.
Still the 2 day infection spread is unprecedented for a respiratory virus.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 22 Dec 21 - 01:23 PM

Covid is the 3rd leading cause of death here. A million deaths are too vast and abstract to grieve over for me. Most people here feel it didn't have to be this way. I don't know but if most of us can anticipate a need for more tests around the holidays, then the government could too. Lincoln said that only the government can do the things individual citizens can not do.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 22 Dec 21 - 02:40 PM

Donuel:
Lincoln said that only the government can do the things individual citizens can not do.

Either you're misquoting Lincoln, or on that occasion he was wrong.
Couples can do things individuals cannot.
Sports teams can do things individuals cannot.
Etc. etc.

I would be interested to see the source of your "quote"

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 22 Dec 21 - 07:46 PM

I was reviewing quotes and quips of Lincoln today and the 'quote' is more of a paraphrase that my memory provided.
Over the next 2 months a projection of 140 million new cases of covid are expected. Where are the public service television shows that follow hundreds/thousands of the unvaccinated to their deaths? Show the actual trauma of the covid death. As I said seeing is believing. After a million deaths are we really too prim, proper and polite to hide the reality of avoidable disease suicide?
There were public service ads anf documentaries about drugs but covid is more lethal than Fentanyl.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 Dec 21 - 08:08 PM

There's the beginning of a hint of calming down this end over this omicron thang. It's mild (as long as you've been vaccinated). It seems to not cause an explosion in hospitalisations and deaths. The main problem is that infected people can't go to work, which means difficulties in the health and care sectors (both severely run down by the Tories, but hey ho). I think we won't get any more restrictions (I live in hope anyway). If this variant can spread so damn fast, then I think it could burn itself out very quickly.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 23 Dec 21 - 02:58 AM

I don't think anyone on here is an anti-vaxxer. I know Steve doubts the effectiveness of masks but will wear one anyway. So I don't know if anyone on here can answer my question. Why is their freedom to not have the vaccine or their freedom to not wear a mask any more important than my freedom to go to public places without a major risk of getting the virus?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 23 Dec 21 - 06:59 AM

Hospitalizations are at a breaking point here due to medical staff shortages, available beds and a large unvaccinated population.
Of course there was no supply chain crises as predicted here so just maybe we could dodge this hospital crises.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 23 Dec 21 - 08:22 AM

Steve: I think it could burn itself out very quickly.

Highly likely. Today's BBC radio news says there are reported to have been 1 million cases last week. If that is correct, and it continues doubling every 2 days (unlikely as it would run out of prospective infectees) then a fortnight would mean that the UK population had been affected and were in recovery phase.

Number of available contacts available to be infected must be dropping rapidly, which means that doubling every 2 days cannot be sustainable.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 23 Dec 21 - 10:29 AM

News could have cool water
When the fever runs high
But its got the look of dark clouds
In the sky
The news is in crazy motion
'Til facts calmed me down
It took a little time
But facts calmed me down

When something goes wrong
I'm the first to admit it
I'm the first to admit it
But the last one to know

When something goes right
Well it's likely to lose me
It's apt to confuse me
It's such an unusual sight
I can't get used to something so right
Something so right

When something goes right its hardly reported
Its hardly reported and just goes away
When something goes wrong its talked about strong
Its talked about strong and seems here to stay
I can't get used to something so right
Some thing so right

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 23 Dec 21 - 10:46 AM

Fauci indicated he thought the Omicron surge would occur over about three weeks and then subside. Alas, surging over the holidays when more people are out is part of the problem.

I spoke with my next door neighbor this morning, she sounds really tired, I think she's been sick for about 3 weeks now. I fear long COVID might be what she's experiencing. Timing-wise it seems like she probably caught the more serious Delta version (as an unvaccinated person).

Last week I ordered a set of the rapid tests, but they won't arrive for another couple of weeks. The company must have a backlog of orders.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Dec 21 - 11:20 AM

Well life ain't perfect. When you go out and about, especially in winter, you'll encounter people who have bad colds or even the remnants of flu. Or a dose of the shits (mind that supermarket trolley handle...). They haven't all been well-advised, they are not all being especially careful or kind-hearted, but no-one seriously suggests that they should be made to stay at home. Forcing someone to get jabbed is tantamount to assault. Sacking care workers or hospital workers for refusing the jab is not only wrong-headed (in m'humble) but is also destined to make matters much worse. That Facebook thingie that you defend has done so much harm in putting people off the jab. There wouldn't be anywhere near as many refusers were Facebook et al not to exist. Some people are easily persuaded and easily deluded and 'twas ever thus. Vote Boris, vote Trump, vote brexit. It could be that choosing vaccine-refusers to excoriate is shooting at the wrong target.

Like almost everyone else I'm obediently masking up. There was a woman who appeared to be perfectly able-bodied and sprightly swanning around Bude Sainsbury's yesterday, maskless. I reflected on how indignant I'd felt because she was breaking a rule that I don't agree with and feel is a waste of time...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 23 Dec 21 - 11:54 AM

I don't think I have ever suggested anyone getting forced to do anything, Steve. I asked the question, "Why is their freedom to not have the vaccine or their freedom to not wear a mask any more important than my freedom to go to public places without a major risk of getting the virus?" I don't defend Facebook either. I just said use it carefully. I may withdraw my support unless they either self regulate or get made to regulate fake news in the not too distant future.

My point still stands. Their freedoms are not any more or less important than mine. When the two conflict, who should decide which should be upheld? I would go for the majority but I don't know if that is right. Maybe more will be made of the Covid passes that seem to be being lined up? You can't go to certain countries without getting a vaccination. How about you cannot go to unnecessary events (pubs, nightclubs, theatres, sporting events etc.) without a Covid pass?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Dec 21 - 03:56 PM

What I think about that is that the government should not be implementing a vaccine passport scheme, or whatever else you want to call it. Let individual institutions make their own rules. If a shop or an event won't let me in without proof of vaccination, I'd defend that to the hilt. When masks weren't compulsory, one shopkeeper attempted to shepherd me out of his shop in order to do business outside his door. Another one politely asked me to wear a mask if I had one (I did). Guess which one got my custom. An establishment seen as being too liberal about vaccination requirements would lose the custom of many of the more cautious. I think a voluntary scheme would catch on, and we'd feel that we were doing it ourselves, rather than having stuff imposed by a thoroughly disreputable government. Let's build that ethos. The public have shown in the last couple of weeks a damn sight more responsibility than the gits in Downing Street. That gives me hope. And you never know: this pandemic could, as we speak, be having its last hurrah.

As for Facebook, etc., its self-regulation is, cynically, way behind the curve. Its damage is well and truly done. Your call now, Facebookers...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 24 Dec 21 - 03:21 AM

I am not as sure about a voluntary scheme. People prove to be easily swayed over and over again. As you pointed out, Trump, Johnson, Brexit...

Same with Faceache. I think they should be as regulated as the press, if not more so. Difficult as it is international but, hey, so is the rest of the media nowadays and they have to abide by the rules.

Careful you don't Spoonerise FaceBookers BTW. Maybe that is the real reason for the change to Meta :-)

Merry Christmas

Dave

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Dec 21 - 06:30 AM

The 4th BOOSTER shot is being consicered in Isreal.
In some US circles it is established as beneficial after 6 months but we can't get ahead of ourselves is the opposite camp.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 24 Dec 21 - 06:34 AM

Steve What I think about that is that the government should not be implementing a vaccine passport scheme, or whatever else you want to call it. Let individual institutions make their own rules. If a shop or an event won't let me in without proof of vaccination, I'd defend that to the hilt.

In the absence of a Government backed passport scheme, what would count as 'proof of vaccination'?
You seem to be confusing the Government providing vaccine passports, which can be used in any situation where the business owner requires them, with Government insistence that all businesses (or certain businesses) must require passports.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 24 Dec 21 - 08:46 AM

"There wouldn't be anywhere near as many refusers were Facebook et al not to exist."

Good to see that you have included 'et al'

What next? Close down the interweb?

You don't believe that people should be forced to have the jab. Does that mean you would allow them to tell others via the interweb why they refused it?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 24 Dec 21 - 08:59 AM

Just found the following on the BBC

The anti-vaccination movement that gripped Victorian England

An interesting read.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 24 Dec 21 - 09:38 AM

No confusion, Nigel. My vaccination record automatically updates to the regular NHS app that I've had for years (not that confounded covid-19 one that I deleted long ago). I never have to do anything. It's just there. I think that a club, pub, theatre or what have you has the right to ask you show that you've been jabbed before they'll let you in. I'd like to see the government advising but otherwise keeping their big noses out. I want the government to run the schools and hospitals, to get my bin emptied on time and to fill potholes. That sort of thing.

"You don't believe that people should be forced to have the jab."

As with God, I don't do belief. It's my opinion. My view all along has been that persuasion is the best way to get people to take the vaccine and that the government hasn't done anywhere near enough public campaigning to counter the Facebook (et al) nonsense. Including the nonsensical reasons that anti-vaxxers give for refusing the jab. Take them on, but we can't shut them up. We're not quite China running Hong Kong just yet.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 26 Dec 21 - 08:50 AM

Thurgood Marshall Baltimore International Airport had their cadre of men with machine guns dressed in all black on duty and wore no insignias.
They remind me of Putin troops or Isreali security. There were few passengers.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 26 Dec 21 - 11:21 AM

I heard a part of a story on NPR last week about international travelers at LAX (Los Angeles International in California) arriving at the airport and being offered any of the COVID vaccines if they haven't already had it or the booster if they needed it. No forms, no insurance, just offering the vaccine. Those who were interviewed in the vaccination area at the airport were glad to make use of it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Dec 21 - 07:43 PM

Avoid this post if you require solid science, free of whimsy. Evidence-innocent, this is what I think of current developments.

In the UK, the worst prime minister we've ever had by a country mile has "decided" to take no further action on restrictions at least until after New Year.

Well first, he hasn't decided it at all. His "decision" is predicated on two factors. First, his credibility is completely shot because of the exposing of all the parties that he and his lackeys enjoyed last year while the rest of us were locked down. Indeed, over 500 people died on the very day that he and his mates were having an illegal jolly in Number Ten. So there's no way he can "instruct" us to do anything at all. Second, his right-wing backwoodsmen, at least 100 Tory MPs at the last count, are threatening to undermine not just him but also anyone with aspirations to replace him should they back further restrictions.

Well what I think of that is that the right decision has been reached for all the thoroughly wrong reasons. I can't think that telling us not to mix with our families, or to desist from going to pubs, etc., is now going to make the slightest difference any more. This variant is sweeping through us like mad. One in twenty in London have got it. But it's mild, and most of us have been vaccinated. The only problem that's worse than previous problems (and I don't seek to minimise it) is that many workers in the health service and care sector are off work sick. This isn't the time to bash the Tories for their severe neglect of the NHS, but I heard an NHS manager say that a hospital department that lost just two nurses to coronavirus is in serious trouble. Well why is that? Surely our health service should have far more built-in resilience than that. And that is the direct result of the lack of Tory investment in the NHS, the self-same NHS that the Tories opposed the formation of in the 1940s.

To be totally unscientific, I think that the fact that the variant is so catching and so mild will mean that there's a good chance that it will burn out. So many people will catch it and become immune to it (and the vaccines will help) that, within weeks, the virus will have nowhere to go. It may linger for ever in all our communities, but we will, one day, if we're sensible, not exactly laugh it off but at least learn to live, maskless, with it...

End of whimsy. Feel free to shoot.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 29 Dec 21 - 01:02 PM

To be totally unscientific, I think that the fact that the variant is so catching and so mild will mean that there's a good chance that it will burn out. So many people will catch it and become immune to it (and the vaccines will help) that, within weeks, the virus will have nowhere to go. It may linger for ever in all our communities, but we will, one day, if we're sensible, not exactly laugh it off but at least learn to live, maskless, with it...

The advice from my county health department today:

The C.D.C. has recommended that even vaccinated people should wear a mask in all public indoor places in Tarrant County. This helps protect people who may be particularly vulnerable to the virus and also to prevent spread.

If you feel sick, you should stay home and get tested. If you were in close contact with someone with Covid-19, you should get tested three to five days after exposure. Until you get a negative test result, you can take extra precautions by wearing a mask in indoor public spaces and staying at least six feet apart from other people. If possible, consider also taking these precautions inside your home. If you cannot get tested, it’s safer to take these extra precautions for 14 days after exposure.

If you or someone in your household is older or has other risk factors for severe Covid-19, you may choose to wear a mask in public indoor spaces even when Covid transmission in your area is low. You may also consider upgrading to a close-fitting mask with good filtration, or wearing two close-fitting cloth masks. Regular handwashing also helps prevent the spread of Covid-19 and other diseases.

It's only Wednesday but already three friends' households this week have informed me that they have COVID. I wasn't in contact with any of them, but this is rapidly becoming widespread. It's time to stay close to home for a while.

Dallas County, directly to the east in this conurbation, has declared itself to be Code Red as of today.

Subject: This is not news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 29 Dec 21 - 02:24 PM

The canary in the coal mine right now is South Africa regarding the latest more efficient variant. A future successful variant will make sense in hindsight but predicting what random mutation will or can do is "unpredictable".

"Predicting is hard especially about the future."
quote: Casey Stengle

There is still value in potentialities and likelyhoods. Go for it. I often do. :^/

The scientific method takes longer but works better. If we're guessing...
My guess is that Omicron is neither a blessing or a curse.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 29 Dec 21 - 05:03 PM

Well I note that your county health department has a lot to say about masks but nothing at all about getting vaccinated. Of the one thing that will save us from this, not a word. Boris Johnson is a complete buffoon, but in every one of his public messages he encourages us all to get the booster. The vaccines and the boosters, incontrovertibly, have decimated deaths and hospitalisations. Wear your mask wherever and whenever you like. I wear mine where I'm legally obliged to, end of. There is no scientific evidence that masks are anything more than fiddling round the edges. The lack of balance in your quote is staggering.

Almost all the people in intensive care and/or on ventilators in the UK are unvaccinated. Now that is evidence. On the other hand, we had a maskless summer in 2020 and a virtually maskless one in 2021. In both summers, case rates hit almost rock bottom. As a scientist, I know that I mustn't extrapolate from those obstinate facts, and I won't. But if I'd chosen to, I'd at least have a darn sight more to back me than the mask obsessives ever have.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 29 Dec 21 - 06:25 PM

I just took a quote from the larger page, Steve. You could have probably figured that out, because if they're talking about masks, they're going to also be talking about vaccines.

The county has an aggressive and agile vaccination program - they recently started a vaccine bus operation to literally drive into the neighborhoods where people either can't get out (no transportation) or don't have the time it might take to go somewhere.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 29 Dec 21 - 06:57 PM

Good to hear it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 30 Dec 21 - 06:53 AM

Slowly getting used to the terminology, PCR & LFT
I can understand the use of LFT (or of 'Lateral Flow Test'). Looking at the box for the tests the other option for naming would have everyone discussing this as 'plague'.
I'm glad they didn't start calling the 'lateral flow test' the 'Rapid Antigen Test'.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 30 Dec 21 - 06:56 AM

The most intense viral 'blizzard' is expected for all of January.
Wild and wooly claims are being made including half of child infections having/getting long haul along with hospital staff shortages 20-40% compared to the last surge. Half a million new cases in a day is the most recent report for the US. Such numbers can not be sustained but it hasn't turned around yet. Testing issues along with dire news is producing new policies like not allowing Universities to not allow students off campus to go out on weekends. Mass new year's eve celebrations are being changed. A blowback of some sort can be expected imo. It may be the best of times with new medications but it is the worst of times for some.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 30 Dec 21 - 06:59 AM

Sorry about the accidental double negative.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 02 Jan 22 - 03:26 PM

Omicron is spreading at lightning speed. Scientists are trying to figure out why

So far, omicron's best trick — what helps explain its success more than anything else — is dodging our immunity: the antibodies and other immune defenses put on by the body after vaccination and/or prior infection.

The variant's many mutations on the spike protein allow it to infect human cells more efficiently than previous variants could, leaving many more people again vulnerable. Because of that, "immune escape" alone could be the major reason why the variant looks so contagious compared with delta, which was already highly transmissible.

In fact, omicron has been spreading at a pace that's comparable to how fast the original strain of the coronavirus spread at the very beginning of the pandemic, despite the world's newfound levels of immunity.

"The playing field for the virus right now is quite different than it was in the early days," says Dr. Joshua Schiffer, an infectious disease researcher at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center. "The majority of variants we've seen to date couldn't survive in this immune environment."

and this, further down in the essay:

With so many mutations, it's still quite possible that omicron does have additional advantages that make it more contagious than other variants — advantages that rely on more than breaking through our prior immunity.

Maybe omicron can produce more copies of itself in a cell? Or maybe it sticks to cells more effectively? Or maybe it's better at hanging in the air and staying infectious?

"Any of those things would make the virus more contagious," says Schiffer of Fred Hutchinson.

One key difference emerging with omicron is just how quickly someone who gets infected becomes contagious.

Omicron appears to have a shorter incubation period and that can substantially speed up infections across the population. A study of the Oslo Christmas party outbreak found the incubation period could be about three days, compared with 4.3 days for delta and five days for other variants. A small study from CDC also puts the incubation period at about three days.

"That's actually a fairly significant difference," says Schiffer. This would mean there are many more cycles of infections and less time for people who are exposed to take precautions not to expose others.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 03 Jan 22 - 08:56 AM

The majority of people in intensive care have not been vaccinated or boosted, so it's largely their own fault.............................ah I'm forgetting - they haven't been taking vitamin D capsules
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 04 Jan 22 - 09:07 AM

meanwhile in Australia - ‘A shambolic mess’: the only example Australia is giving the world now is how not to manage Covid, by Dr Kerryn Phelps. We thought the government would develop a Covid strategy for post-lockdown life. Instead, they have chosen to ‘let it rip’ Where did it all go wrong?

How did Australia go from being the envy of the world with our best practice public health measures, low case numbers, a prepared health system and an economy ticking along nicely to what can only be described as a shambolic mess?

... With the new New South Wales premier, Dominic Perrottet, in charge, the chief health officer Kerry Chant was sidelined as the new policy to “let it rip” was rolled out ... In one previously unimaginable act, the premier, in a double act with (Prime Minister) Scott Morrison, announced a lifting of all restrictions including mandatory mask wearing and QR code check-ins.

Despite the warnings that the health system was under pressure and that party season was about to kick off, the message to the community was: “Go out there and spend, head to the pub and get back to normal.”

... As the holiday period approached, many testing facilities would be closed down with little warning, leading to queues stretching for kilometres and waiting times blowing out to hours. In some cases, ill people waited in their cars overnight. Results were taking five or six days to be reported.

... We were all told to go and get rapid antigen tests (RATs). The government resisted providing the tests for free as the UK had done, with Morrison saying he “did not want to undercut businesses”.
When a journalist specifically put to him that “not everyone can afford rapid antigen tests”, the PM casually replied: “Some people can, some people can’t.”
In another throwaway comment that will not age well, he said: “We’re at a stage of the pandemic where you just can’t make everything free.”

... The minimalist approach to pandemic control has hurt businesses more than it has helped, with many cancellations at restaurants and hospitality venues. Supermarkets are now struggling with supplies because employees at every stage of the supply chain are becoming ill. (read on)

covid testing queues & delayed results
=======
My cousin is a manager of a pathology unit in a large hospital & like all her colleagues in the medical world across Australia is overworked & stressed trying to deal with staff absences & massive volumes of tests. Our plan was to meet up after Christmas ...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 04 Jan 22 - 09:31 AM

Delta makes no antibodies for Omicron but Omicron makes a few antibodies against Delta. ???
Its darkest before dawn when you step on the cat. :^/
I didn't, but absent any mice the cats are leaving my socks all over as evidence of their hunting prowess.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 04 Jan 22 - 11:23 AM

Other possible good news is that Omicron does not infect lung cells aggressively in the vaccinated and leaves no lung scaring among the sinus infected.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 04 Jan 22 - 12:10 PM

U.S. Covid-19 Infections Top One Million After Holiday Backlog
States report backlogs of cases after pausing for the New Year holiday

That's from the Wall Street Journal so you may hit a paywall. Here is some of it:

More than one million new Covid-19 infections were reported in the U.S. as global health officials scrambled to increase measures to counter the fast-spreading Omicron variant.

The U.S. reported a record 1.08 million Covid-19 infections on Monday as most states worked to clear backlogs after pausing during the New Year’s holiday. The reports pushed the seven-day average of daily reported infections to 480,273, according to a Wall Street Journal analysis of Johns Hopkins University data. That level is nearly double the peak reached at the height of last winter’s case surge.

Hospitalizations for confirmed or suspected Covid-19 cases reached a seven-day average of 97,855 on Monday, according to data posted by the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services. That is up 41% in the past two weeks but below both the pandemic peak of 137,510 on Jan. 10, 2021, and the smaller peak of 102,967 on Sept. 4, 2021, during the Delta-variant surge. While Covid-19 tests remain in short supply in much of the U.S., testing was less robust last year, complicating comparisons between pandemic surges.

Six states aren't included in those numbers, most of those overwhelmed by the numbers.

"The U.S. seven-day average of daily reported Covid-19 deaths was 1,236 on Monday, according to Johns Hopkins data." This is "relatively unchanged" - for now. Reports of deaths "tend to lag," so the death numbers will be more accurate in a few weeks looking back at this time.

This is just the US - but that article goes on to point out that Europe has also been clobbered.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 Jan 22 - 01:15 PM

We have over 200,000 reported infections in a day. As our population is about a fifth of yours, that makes us about equal. Note the word "reported." Because this is a milder disease, and because most of us have been jabbed, there's bound to be massive under-reporting of infections. If a third of people don't know they have it, and children just get a bit sniffly as they do every winter, and lots of people with mild symptoms won't report, it could be that the reported numbers could be underestimates by a massive amount. That could be good news as it means that the virus may soon have nowhere to go. Of course, a new variant could scuttle any early optimism.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 04 Jan 22 - 06:49 PM

Likely way underreported, I agree.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 05 Jan 22 - 09:29 AM

Holy Cross hospital in town has closed its Pediatic Intensive Care Unit PICU to kids and are filling it with adults. Kids with Covid are going to NICU. There ought to be a SICU - super infectious care unit. :+o
But...Deaths are slightly down.

Testing and quarantine protocols are screwed up now but I don't blame CDC.
In fast and furious times like these it is unlikely to ever get ahead of variants.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 05 Jan 22 - 03:11 PM

According to a report this morning on my Texas public radio station, the "normal" positive rate in COVID tests administered throughout the year (since they have been in place for general access) is around 11%. During the last big COVID surge that level was up to about 22%. Right now in Texas they are seeing a rate of 34% of tests are coming back positive.

There are several regions of the state with ICUs at 100% and they're going to have to start triaging patients (or moving them long distances).

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 05 Jan 22 - 06:39 PM

Compared to this time last year, deaths from Covid are waaay down.
It really looks like a flu shot AND a covid shot every winter will be the way smart people stay healthy depending on emergent varients.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 Jan 22 - 08:48 PM

Well we struck early and obtained a good stash of lateral flow test kits. So far, no positives. But I hear that the government is desperate for us to report all results. Well I'm not going to be doing that. I know what to do if I'm unwell or if I test positive at home. I wouldn't dream of putting myself out and about knowing that I had the thing. I'll monitor myself and police myself, thanks. I don't need a government to be telling me what to do. I need a government to fill the potholes and fix our rotting school buildings.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 05 Jan 22 - 09:50 PM

Too bad you're not cooperating - that could help the government with the contact tracing it needs to do to figure out what is going on in your neighborhood. You should reconsider.

I fill out an online survey every week or two. It's anonymous, narrows down to my zip code for location. And if I am asked or need to take and report at test, I will. Because it's better for my whole community if I do that.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Allan Conn
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 02:38 AM

The idea of reporting all cases I suppose is so that they get an idea of what % are testing positive. Hence the daily figures give you a % of what tests are positive. It helps them with knowing what is going on. So the instructions on the box ask you to report all results whether positive or negative or even if it is a non result.

I imagine they know very well that lots of people just take the test and don't bother reporting it unless it is positive which I suppose is the main thing.

If positive then of course they want to know so that they can contact anyone you have been in close contact with in the preceding days. Up until this week if testing positive then you were supposed to then book a PCR test.

Once registered on the site for the lateral flow test reporting it is actually a very quick process to report test results. Though it does seem to confuse some folk. One of our club members reckons it took him two and a half hours and that he had to register on several sites. Whereas it took my 5 or 10 minutes to register and it is only one site. I suspect because he is in Scotland he thought he needed to register on the NHS Scotland site too - but the instructions on the site are pretty clear that you only do that if you are an NHS or care worker or visiting a care home. Everyone else is redirected to the same shared UK site.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Allan Conn
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 02:59 AM

The daily reported cases are an under-reporting and that is stated on the media. Here in the Office For National Statistics carries out a weekly general survey which is reported widely and this always gives a much higher rate of infection which will be nearer the correct figure. The latest figures are below. Estimated rate in England is one in fifteen people have the virus.

https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/healthandsocialcare/conditionsanddiseases/bulletins/coronaviruscovid19infect

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Allan Conn
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 03:02 AM

https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/healthandsocialcare/conditionsanddiseases

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 04:00 AM

Husband is back at school doing the cleaning. All pupils (secondary school) have to wear masks, and he's in a mask-plus-visor and disposable rubber gloves. His LFT tests have all been negative (twice a week) and he's triple-vaccinated (booster included) But I'm still a bit worried about him - Omicron is rife among youngsters at school. He's very prudent however, and wouldn't take any risks.
My sister up in Scotland is furious with Nicola Sturgeon (nicknamed Wee Burney) because she's tightened up most of the rules and people are restricted. No mixing or socialising, masks all round etc. Sister hopes this will put the SNP crew off Wee Burney's case!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 05:38 AM

Last time I heard, about a week ago, the test result reporting-back was less than 10%. The contact-tracing system in this country has been in fatal disrepute for over a year and millions of people have deleted the app. It's useless. But people are grabbing the test kits in droves and are using them (I'm doing my second test this week in just a mo). People are using the tests to regulate their own behaviour, which is very responsible, and know that reporting- back is a waste of time. For almost two years we've been regaled daily on the telly and in the papers with bogus graphs and numbers about infections and deaths. We want to hear about something different now. People were ultra-cautious regarding the pre-Christmas shopping and hospitality. We simply have to trust people to do the right thing from now on. The publicity about omicron (even though some of it was scaremongering - up to 6000 deaths per week, eh, SAGE? My arse!) has been good. That's how it should be. We know what we should be doing. The main danger is the threat to the NHS (half-scuppered by the Tories even before all this started) by staff absence, which will pass, and beds taken up by bloody idiots who refused to be vaccinated. Oh, and a wreck of a care industry which means that people who are ready to be discharged from hospital can't be released. We wear masks pointlessly because we know how behave when told to, but there's not much evidence of social distancing happening any more. This "crisis" is going to happen every winter for the rest of our lives, so we'd better learn to live with it and be normal again.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 06:34 AM

An excellent reader comment following an article in today's Guardian.

"The current case rate in England, taken as a seven day average, is 2,234 per million.

In Wales, where mask use and other restrictive measures have been in force for longer and are stricter, the case rate per million is 2,865, having been as high as 3,241 within the last few days.

Yet again, evidence that masks and other restrictions are effective in preventing Covid transmission is lacking, yet we are told that we must believe this assertion anyway, because apparently it's as obvious as gravity."

Yet again indeed. Another commenter said that there has never been evidence that masks have significantly reduced infection rates anywhere. There you go.

I've just tested negative, a few minutes ago. Later this morning I'm off to Morrisons to do a bit of shopping. I'll be forced to wear a mask.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 06:57 AM

Can you provide a link to The Guardian article?

Thanks in advance.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 07:03 AM

Despite having held senior positions in several businesses over a 50-year career, and earning a decent supplementary income as a semi-pro singer and musician since I was 16 (still doing it, but far more for fun than the filthy lucre nowadays), I don’t regard myself as being particularly clever, and I wouldn’t pretend to know with any certainty about the efficacy of mask-wearing with regard to C-19 transmission-prevention.

What I do believe, though, is that, by pushing the concept of continued mask-wearing, the powers-that-be are keeping the thought that C-19 has not ‘gone away’, and still poses a threat, at the front of people’s minds. And in that regard, it seems to me to be a very worthwhile tactic. As well as being careful to socially-distance, I wear a mask at all times when I’m in indoor public spaces. I have no idea whether it’s preventing transmission, but I’m certain it’s not making transmission more likely, and that’s a Good Thing, AFAIC.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 07:31 AM

You could be wrong about that. Most people's masks are insanitary after just a few minutes, the outside as well as the inside, and most people are touching them all the time. That's an absolutely ace way of spreading various infections.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 07:57 AM

You make a good point, but the people who touch them all the time would still be likely to touch their mouths and noses, cough, and do that filthy thing of sniffing snot back into their throats, hawking, and spitting it out, that so many seem to do nowadays instead of blowing their noses into a tissue and disposing of it properly.

Dirty buggers will be dirty buggers, mask or no mask.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 09:44 AM

The comment I posted came from someone with the moniker "irreligious" and was posted at the end of the article "This is the action Britain must take to limit the damage of Omicron" written by William Hanage.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 09:53 AM

Here is a link to the article and this one might take you to the comment after a second or two.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Allan Conn
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 10:43 AM

Senofou the idea that there is no mixing or socialising allowed in Scotland is not actually true. Socialising is restricted in pubs etc to three households at a table. So yes some restrictions from the normal but no actual ban. Likewise as far as private houses go the 'advice' is to mix no more than three households at once. That is advice only though!!! It is not in law - just advice. So if you want to have more than three households in your home at once you can without any consequences other than maybe your neighbour's disapproval. Most people seem to be sticking to that advice. There is of course a section of the population who hate Sturgeon - but her overall approval rating is very high compared with almost every other politician here bar Anas Sanwar the Scottish Labour leader who is only a little bit behind Sturgeon. The nickname is not "Wee Burney" rather it is "Wee Nippy" and this is used by a secion of the unionist support. Seemingly a derogatory name the male politicians used to call her when she was a young female member who was regarded as a bit too forceful. I supposed young women members needed to be forceful to get on though.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Allan Conn
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 11:07 AM

I'd say in fact that although the advice is for no more than three households mixing at a time - a lot of people in general are deciding themselves to restrict themselves further than that anyway.

We did have an interesting outcome over our wine club Xmas Party though. As I said above it is only advice to stick to three households. The planned party was many more households than three. So advice was not to hold it but it could still go ahead all the same if we chose to. The membership voted - and I know it is not very scientific but we voted not to hold it - but everyone who voted to actually hold it was English born and had moved to Scotland mostly within the last 10 years or so. It was a small sample of course but it got me wondering if they were still in the mindset of following the advice from Westminster rather than Holyrood even though it is a devolved matter!!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 11:44 AM

If you read down in those remarks the source "irreligious" was citing another reader pointed out that the article was debunked months earlier.

There was good news today about a new COVID vaccine. Any of you who have watched US coverage of the COVID crisis may have seen Dr. Hotez interviewed many times on the news, in particular to do with COVID infections in children.

A Texas team comes up with a COVID vaccine that could be a global game changer

A vaccine authorized in December for use in India may help solve one of the most vexing problems in global public health: How to supply lower-income countries with a COVID-19 vaccine that is safe, effective and affordable.

The vaccine is called CORBEVAX. It uses old but proven vaccine technology and can be manufactured far more easily than most, if not all, of the COVID-19 vaccines in use today.

"CORBEVAX is a game changer," says Dr. Keith Martin, executive director of the Consortium of Universities for Global Health in Washington, D.C. "It's going to enable countries around the world, particularly low-income countries, to be able to produce these vaccines and distribute them in a way that's going to affordable, effective and safe."

The story of CORBEVAX begins some two decades ago. Peter Hotez and Maria Elena Bottazzi were medical researchers at George Washington University in Washington, D.C., where they worked on vaccines and treatments for what are called neglected tropical diseases, such as schistosomiasis and hookworm.

When a strain of coronavirus known as SARS broke out in 2003, they decided to tackle that disease. After moving to Houston to affiliate with Baylor College of Medicine and the Texas Children's Center for Vaccine Development, they created a vaccine candidate using protein subunit technology. This involves using proteins from a virus or bacterium that can induce an immune response but not cause disease.

"It's the same technology as the hepatitis B vaccine that's been around for decades," Hotez says.

Their SARS vaccine candidate looked promising, but then the SARS outbreak petered out. No evidence of disease, no need for a vaccine.

When a new strain of coronavirus triggered the COVID-19 pandemic, Hotez and Bottazzi figured they could dust off their old technology and modify it for use against COVID-19. After all, the virus causing COVID-19 and the virus causing SARS are quite similar.

Hotez says they tried to interest government officials in the vaccine, but they weren't impressed.

"People were so fixated on innovation that nobody thought, 'Hey, maybe we could use a low-cost, durable, easy-breezy vaccine that can vaccinate the whole world,' " Hotez says.

"We really honestly couldn't get any traction in the U.S., but our mission is always to enable technologies for low- and middle-income countries production and use," Bottazzi recalls.

So they turned to private philanthropies. A major donor early on was the JPB Foundation in New York.

"The rest were all Texas philanthropies: the Kleberg Foundation, the [John S.] Dunn Foundation, Tito's Vodka," Hotez says. The MD Anderson Foundation also chipped in.

"When people say, 'Why did we move [from Washington, D.C.] to Texas?' Well, we knew that this was a great philanthropic environment. So this is really very much a Texas vaccine," although there were other, smaller donors from all over the country.

Hotez says that unlike the mRNA vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna, and the viral vector vaccine from Johnson & Johnson, protein subunit vaccines like CORBEVAX have a track record. So he and Bottazzi were relatively certain CORBEVAX would be safe and effective.

"And it's cheap, a dollar, dollar fifty a dose," Hotez says. "You're not going to get less expensive than that."

Clinical trials showed they were right to be confident CORBEVAX would work. An unpublished study conducted in India involving 3,000 volunteers found the vaccine to be 90% effective in preventing disease cause by the original COVID-19 virus strain and 80% against the delta variant. It's still being tested against omicron.

But CORBEVAX is already entering the real world. Last month, the vaccine received emergency use authorization from regulators in India. An Indian vaccine manufacturer called Biological E Ltd is now making the vaccine. The company says it is producing 100 million doses per month and has already sold 300 million doses to the Indian government.

"The real beauty of the CORBEVAX vaccine that Drs. Hotez and Bottazzi created is that intellectual property of this vaccine will be available to everybody," Keith Martin says. "So you can get manufacturers in Senegal, and South Africa and Latin America to be able to produce this particular vaccine."

By contrast, the makers of Pfizer and Moderna, for example, are not sharing their recipe.

One drawback to the CORBEVAX technology is that it can't be modified as quickly as mRNA vaccines can to adjust to new variants.

That forces public health officials to make difficult choices.

"Something which can be adapted the fastest versus something that can be adapted relatively quickly, but then more importantly can be manufactured at a large global capacity and at a cost of production which is much lower," says Prashant Yadav, senior fellow at at the Center for Global Development in Washington, D.C. The thought is some protection may better than no protection.

Of course, the ideal vaccine would have both qualities, and Peter Hotez is at work trying to develop technologies that can do that.

"There's no issue with pushing innovation," he says. "I think that's one of the really positive features of the U.S. vaccination program for COVID. The problem was it wasn't balanced with a portfolio [f]or oldies but goodies."

Hotez is hoping his oldie but goodie will usher in a brighter future for the world.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 12:18 PM

"...up to 6000 deaths per week, eh, SAGE? My arse!"

I thought that was outrageous, but even so I understated it: SAGE predicted up to that many PER DAY!

I think the public should be regaled with facts, and should be told if what they're being told contains estimates, predictions or conjecture. That SAGE statement was mere scaremongering.

"If you read down in those remarks the source "irreligious" was citing another reader pointed out that the article was debunked months earlier."

What article? As far as I can glean, irreligious didn't cite a source as such...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 01:08 PM

Keep reading the remarks.

Fort Worth schools are back in session with students on campus, but as of yesterday, 50 teachers were out on quarantine because they tested positive for COVID. (From WFAA, but they don't have durable links so the story might not appear for long.)

As of Tuesday, 50 of the district’s 5,000 teachers were quarantined due to COVID, according to Fort Worth ISD Assistant Superintendent Michael Steinert.

Since Monday, the district has had 300 COVID reports amongst all staff members. The 300 COVID reports include close-contact reports and COVID positive cases. Not all of those staff members are quarantined, Steinert said.

From the Fort Worth Star-Telegram

COVID is starting to spike among Fort Worth police and firefighters, but the city says it is meeting staffing minimums through overtime and schedule adjustments.

The Police Department said 56 of its roughly 1,600 employees tested positive for COVID last week, a 75% increase from the previous six weeks, but still down from the 104 cases at the end of 2020.

The Fire Department has been hit harder: 116 of the department’s 927 firefighters are out on COVID-related leave.

This mirrors the trend in Tarrant County and across the United States, which is seeing a post-holiday surge of COVID cases fueled by the omicron variant.

The fire department is cutting two weeks from its recruiting classes to push instructors and trainees into service.

Remember when all of the medical students were being pressed into service before they completed their degrees, or their degrees were rushed in order to make them eligible to work? That is still happening across other professions also.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 01:52 PM

Thanks to Steve for confirming which Guardian article he was referring to. Thanks also to Jon for providing a link.

Stilly River Sage, I think you might be mistaken about the comments. Irreligious did not appear to quote a study.

'Unbanned' quoted a report of a study which said mask wearing was an effective means of preventing spread of the virus.

'Comments2go' said that study had been "widely debunked, and completely mis-interpreted."

Study doesn’t show masks cause 53% drop in Covid risk

Apologies in advance if I have read that incorrectly.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 01:52 PM

I've wasted laboriously through all the remarks and I can't find one in which irreligious cites any article.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 01:54 PM

We cross-posted there, Rain Dog. Your post was very helpful - cheers.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 02:07 PM

From the BBC


Covid: Evidence on face masks in schools 'inconclusive'


The government admits the evidence for using masks in schools to reduce spread of Covid is "not conclusive".

The uncertainty is acknowledged in a review used by ministers in England to make their decision to introduce face coverings in classrooms.

The government's own study in the autumn did not provide proof of a statistically significant impact.

The evidence review says other studies have provided mixed results, but taken together suggest they may help.

And the move was backed by the UK Health Security Agency.

The review has only just been published following the announcement on Monday about the return of face coverings in classrooms.

It includes the results of a study in 123 schools in England which used masks and compared that to others that did not during the Delta wave of Covid. The UK is currently experiencing the spread of an even more infectious variant - Omicron - but there is not enough data yet on this one and masks.

Schools where face coverings were used in October 2021 saw a reduction two to three weeks later in Covid absences from 5.3% to 3% - a drop of 2.3 percentage points.

In schools which did not use face coverings absences fell from 5.3% to 3.6% - a fall of 1.7 percentage points.

It said this was not statistically significant and the greater reduction in schools where masks were worn could be down to chance.

The review also acknowledges the use of face coverings could harm learning.

But a full analysis of the costs versus benefits of the policy has not been done.

This is despite 94% of school leaders and teachers saying it made communication between teachers and pupils more difficult.

Some 80% of pupils also said it made communication harder, but 70% said it made them feel safer.

The review said a "balanced judgement" had been made.

Ministers have maintained face coverings have a material impact, but will not be used for a "day longer than necessary".

Susan Hopkins, chief medical adviser at UKHSA, said: "We support the Department for Education's decision to reintroduce the use of face masks in secondary schools temporarily whilst Covid rates remain high."

The Department for Education said the move was aimed at "reducing transmission and disruption to learning".

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 03:49 PM

"...but 70% said it made them feel safer."

Well let's hang into that one for a sec. Now why would we think that 70% of young people thought that? Was it by any chance because they saw all the grown-ups doing it, who told them it would make them safer, who appealed to authority?

It is beginning to seem (to me anyway) that all the waffle we've heard and been told about masks for almost two years is just that - waffle. I've yet to see a single piece of evidence for mask-wearing that can't be demolished by resort to real science. I saw a big hairy bloke in Morrisons this afternoon who was unmasked. There was also a healthy-looking young woman, unmasked, to whom social distancing was clearly an alien concept. And do you know summat? I didn't give a damn!

We shouldn't need to talk about masks. We need to be talking about the arseholes (such as Djokovic) who refuse to get vaccinated. You'd think, wouldn't you, that internet mask-squabblers (who still wear their masks, by the way) were the big problem. Well they're not. It's the anti-vaxxers and the refusers. Most of whom got their motivations from Facebook. Hands up all you Facebookers...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 04:19 PM

Each varient is a game changer so dogma and doggerel have a very short lifespan these days, and so will some people who ignore masking.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 04:20 PM

Neither of them cited an article, they both referred to one. I don't have enough information to reproduce that citation, but the remarks suggesting a set of facts had been "debunked" makes it clear there was an original article and discussion of it.

The District of Columbia and New York City are hit hard by the COVID Omicron variant, but in both places, ICU and ventilator use are down.

From the Wall Street Journal

At Northwell Health, New York state’s largest hospital network, about 10% of recent Covid-19 patients are ending up in the ICU compared with 25%-35% in previous surges, said Mangala Narasimhan, director of critical-care services.

Fully vaccinated patients are staying for an average of four days, Dr. Narasimhan said, compared with almost two weeks for unvaccinated patients. Patients are generally younger, and a greater share is white than during other surges, she said. Officials in the U.K. and South Africa have also reported lower rates of serious illness from Omicron than previous strains of the virus.

But the third big pandemic wave to hit New York is taxing healthcare providers, Dr. Narasimhan and other providers said. She said some colleagues quit in exhaustion. She ended up working over a planned vacation.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 04:59 PM

No-one is ignoring masking, Donuel. Apart from myself, I know four or five people who are opposed to masks. To a man and woman, we all wear masks where required. Doggerel is bad poetry. I don't know whether you knew that. There is only one perpetrator of doggerel on these threads...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 05:37 PM

"We need to be talking about the arseholes (such as Djokovic) who refuse to get vaccinated."

Crikey I'm agreeing with you again!!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 05:42 PM

Dammit, man, you stay in Croydon, I'll stay in Bude... :-) :-)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 11:03 PM

Here is another COVID death that was totally avoidable.

A deputy district attorney from California who regularly spoke out against vaccine mandates has died of complications from Covid-19.

Kelly Ernby, 46, a prosecutor from Orange county, southern California, who recently ran for the state assembly, died after contracting the virus, her family and friends have said.

According to Ernby’s husband, Axel Mattias Ernby, Kelly Ernby was unvaccinated at the time of her death.

“She was NOT vaccinated. That’s the problem,” Axel Ernby said on social media posts.

A month before her death, Kelly Ernby spoke out against vaccine mandates at a rally outside Irvine city hall. The protest was organized by chapters of Turning Point USA, a conservative youth organization, representing members at California State University, Fullerton and University of California Irvine.

“There’s nothing that matters more than our freedoms right now,” Ernby said, according to the Daily Titan, a student newspaper.

The political opposition is taking itself out of play, one case of COVID at a time.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Jan 22 - 05:28 AM

This is a difficult area. At her death she was unvaccinated. That was on top of her anti-mandate stance. If I died tomorrow I'd be known as someone who was ardently pro-vaccination and fully-jabbed and ardently opposed to vaccine mandates. To me, these are entirely separate issues.

We should be campaigning in a concerted way to persuade everyone to take the vaccine. There are very few people who have a good excuse to avoid vaccination. The campaign needs to be two-pronged, first, to undo the serious damage done to public health by Facebook and others, second, to emphasise that getting vaccinated is the biggest contribution you can currently make to the health and safety of everyone (as well as yourself). To hell with the "free speech" of anti-vaxxers. They seriously need to be silenced. The massive achievement of the vaccines can't be gainsaid. And they are safer than going out into the street and crossing the road, drinking a glass of wine, smoking dope or eating burgers.

But forcing people to have the jabs under pain of losing your job is, to me, the wrong way to get people onside. Take them aside, advise them, counsel them, make things inconvenient for them in the workplace if that means making other people safer. I don't think it's the role of states to make rules about mandating vaccines. If I ran a football stadium I wouldn't let you in if you were Novak Djokovic. It's my stadium (or pub, or shop, or festival) and I get to decide who comes in and who doesn't. When it comes to workplaces, every sinew must be strained to persuade. But throwing people of the scrapheap just makes everything worse. It's the ethos, stupid...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 07 Jan 22 - 05:45 AM

Most of the stuff I see on my Newsfeed on FB is very strongly pro-vaccination and pro-mask. I very seldom see any anti-vax/mask material, apart from the occasional anti-vax/mask comment by a nutter trying to stir the shit up on pro-vax/mask thread, and I just laugh at those and scroll on by.

I honestly don’t believe my opinion has ever been changed by anything I’ve read on FB any more than it’s been changed by anything I’ve read on forums like this one, no matter how forcefully others try to preach to me. I have 75 years-worth of life-experience behind me and, over those years, I’ve learned to recognise bullshit and bullshitters when I encounter them.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Jan 22 - 07:15 AM

Just as pro-vaccine and anti-mandate are entirely separate issues, independent of each other, so are anti-vaccine and anti-mask (as you put it). It's not fair to conflate the two (I'm not saying that's what you intended). If you're anti-vaccine you're probably not jabbed and, as such, represent a big danger to society and to yourself. I'm "anti-mask" only in the sense that I think masks do more harm than good, but I'm not anti-mask in the sense that I wish to be militant about it, making people near me in shops, etc., feel vulnerable or unsafe, and I've always said that it's good luck to you if you want to shove a mask on. If you saw me out and about you would never suspect that I'm "anti-mask." I admire your strong-mindedness, but not everyone is like you, and it's clear that millions of people have been adversely influenced by dangerous nonsense peddled on social media, just as they were by things written on the side of a bus. I'm very pleased to see confounded idiots/believers in magic such as Novak getting it in the neck. Having strict border controls apropos of vaccination isn't the same as mandates inside countries. It's more like a pub saying that you can't come in 'ere, mate, unless you're jabbed... Send him home!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 07 Jan 22 - 07:19 AM

Aaaaahh, No-vacc Djockstrap! Can’t stand the arrogant twat.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 07 Jan 22 - 09:32 AM

But Steve: Having strict border controls apropos of vaccination isn't the same as mandates inside countries. It's more like a pub saying that you can't come in 'ere, mate, unless you're jabbed... Send him home!

If the pub can refuse service to the unjabbed, why not hospitals? (and No, I'm not advocating turning away the unjabbed)
If the pub can refuse the unjabbed, can they justify using unjabbed staff? Again, if not, why not the same for hospitals?

Nurses and doctors can have much closer contact with their 'customers' than bar staff do. I would support the idea that being vaccinated be made a prerequisite for working as a health provider.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Jan 22 - 09:50 AM

Sound arguments, Nigel, but suppose we sacked thousands of doctors and nurses for being unjabbed. I think the damage done in that way by exacerbating the staffing crisis would outdo any damage caused by their staying at work. Sometimes it's a toss-up between morals (if you think that enforced vaccination is moral - not for me, thanks) and pragmatism. I always come back to the argument for persuasion, made as high-pressure as you like. And let's not forget that frequent testing of unvaccinated staff is far more possible these days. I still think that unvaccinated people are wrong-headed, but, looking at it long-term, talking them round is the proper solution.

I don't like masks but I'm fully jabbed up and I have a big stash of test kits (wise virgins accumulated supplies well before the panicky pre-Christmas rush). I'm testing twice a week and doing additional tests when I visit anyone's house. Were I to test positive I'd look up the isolation advice and follow it, and tell anyone who I might have infected. As for telling the authorities, they can go to hell.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 07 Jan 22 - 11:16 AM

Stashing tests is immoral in a pandemic imho. Sorry, but there it is. I wouldn't brag, or call it wise. I call that selfish. My opinion.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 07 Jan 22 - 11:28 AM

I'm not suggesting 'enforced vaccination' for anyone. But there are certain jobs for which it should, quite reasonably, be a requirement.

I somehow doubt that it would result in the sacking of thousands of doctors and nurses. If the government made it mandatory for those professions it would probably persuade many to take the step which, ideally, they should have already taken to protect themselves and their patients.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Jan 22 - 11:49 AM

Yes, Nigel, that's a good argument too. In the long run, though, persuading people that vaccination is a good thing and that the Facebook idiots are just that, idiots, seems like a more harmonious way forward, in the first instance at least. And I do think that all hospital and care workers should be vaccinated.

As for you, Mrrzy, I didn't say how many tests I have. In fact, it's enough to test both of us about twenty more times. The nature of our circumstances, which I won't regale you with, dictates that we need to test ourselves a lot because of frequent visits, some as volunteers, to elderly and vulnerable people. We obtained the tests well before there was any suspicion of an impending shortage, so there was no deliberate hoarding going on. I'd like to suggest that you keep your criticisms to yourself until you're apprised of the full circumstances. You could have asked, and I would have told you. Thank you.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 07 Jan 22 - 12:06 PM

Luckily, husband's LFT tests are provided by the school where he works as a cleaner, as are the masks, visors and rubber gloves etc.
I haven't been reading all the posts on here, but has anyone mentioned Novak Djokovic the Serbian tennis player? He's still in quarantine in Australia, apparently he hasn't been vaccinated and stated 'medical exemption' for which he has no evidence.
I think he will be deported from Australia, and miss the opportunity to play in the Open matches.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 07 Jan 22 - 12:08 PM

At any given time a snapshot will show imbalances. This is one of those times. (I have lots of masks here - because I haven't distributed them for a while - I made these three-layer flannel-based cloth masks last year.) I gave my box of two rapid tests to my ex who has had allergies and sinus stuffiness that he refuses to treat with one-a-day medications ("I don't like long-lasting pills.") So I told him that he needs to be able to test himself if he isn't going to treat the allergies and clear up those symptoms. I had another box on order but it's taking Amazon weeks to deliver it. It's looking like another 10 days before the first of two boxes I ordered arrives.

I see my masks pop up all over town, I've given away hundreds of them. (I've mailed quite a few to Mudcatters also!) They are two layers of a tight-weave cotton over a third flannel center (determined to be one of the best filter fabrics for these masks). They are fitted and have ties that can go around the ears or around the back of the head (my preference, much more comfortable) and a lower loop that goes around the neck (no dropping these). I've told friends and family with these that they might want to double mask for a while, wearing a surgical mask under the cloth.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 07 Jan 22 - 12:53 PM

Double masking minimizes my glasses fogging up but remebering to put soap on my glasses works best.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Jan 22 - 12:57 PM

Anyone here can order the test kits online from the government department responsible. They come in boxes of seven tests, they mail you two boxes at a time and they are free. You can also pick them up without fuss from most pharmacies (if they have them), also free and in boxes of seven. I've picked up several boxes from a pop-up testing tent too. There's been little or no rationing that I'm aware of. There has been a rush on them, starting just before Christmas when the omicron surge was underway (in which, as I've explained, I didn't have to participate), resulting in temporary supply issues. As I'm not up for hoarding, I don't know what the present situation is. I live in a remote rural area with few pharmacies per town/village, so we do need to ensure we don't run out. This pandemic will be defeated by infected people staying home, which means unfettered access to the lateral flow test kits, and by getting everyone vaccinated. Everything else is marginal, relative to those two things.

If you feel slightly under the weather but don't have test kits, you'll go out and about just as you would with a cold, and you'll infect people. If you have test kits, you'll use them (which is why you got them in the first place), and a positive result will persuade you to stay home for the requisite number of days. Nothing's perfect, of course. That's the way forward. And getting jabbed. If that's the way we all work, we'll have a good summer this year and, with a bit of luck, a more normal winter next back end. No shit, Sherlock.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Jan 22 - 01:12 PM

"... has anyone mentioned Novak Djokovic the Serbian tennis player?"

He's been mentioned briefly. "No-vacc" Djokovic doesn't believe in vaccination and has tried to use the fact that he had the virus months ago to get an exemption. He also believes that you can purify dirty water via spiritual means. Maybe they should make him drink the water from the toilet in his hotel room. Oh, how the mighty has fallen!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 07 Jan 22 - 02:21 PM

Our Supream Court heard arguments today regarding Biden's emergency vaccine mandate. Since FDR this nation is one of regulations via federal agencies. If the Conservative Court pulls back from Federal agency regulations and throws it back to the States, chaos among all regulations could arise. Mandate deniers know not of what they propose.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 07 Jan 22 - 03:39 PM

"He's been mentioned briefly. "No-vacc" Djokovic doesn't believe in vaccination and has tried to use the fact that he had the virus months ago to get an exemption. He also believes that you can purify dirty water via spiritual means. Maybe they should make him drink the water from the toilet in his hotel room. Oh, how the mighty has fallen!"

The man who likes to play bat and ball for lots of money is an arrogant git, and I shall laugh if he is deported back to Serbia!!! It will certainly save a lot of Australian women wetting their knickers!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Jan 22 - 06:10 PM

Now, now, Bonzo, do apprise yourself of the art of euphemism. What you really meant was "moistening their gussets." Do get it right! Anyway, I won't deny that he's a good player of the game, though I must confess that the only tennis match I watched end-to-end in years was the US Open final between Emma Raducanu and Leyla Fernandez. That was great stuff. I think the men's game has been ruined by the ultra-powerful high-tech modern rackets leading to a predominantly base-line game. When I was a mere stripling and tennis was free to air, Rod Laver was my hero. Those were the days!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Jan 22 - 08:33 PM

It's a bit long-winded, but it echoes what I've been saying about testing. From the Guardian:

The rise of lateral flow tests: are these ‘heroes’ of the pandemic here to stay?

I hope they are!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Allan Conn
Date: 08 Jan 22 - 04:00 AM

I think we have seen three of the all time greatest male tennis players all playing at the same time in Federer, Nadal and Djokovic - which was a bit of a bummer for Andy Murray I suppose. Doesn't mean Djokovic should be given any special treatment by the Aussies though and if he has not the correct certification then he should be out - and I see they are now also looking at other players too. Re Rod Laver yes I think he'd be up comparable with those three. Some folks would only count majors won and he is way below them all on that but he lost about 5 years of playing in Grand Slam tournaments in what would have been his peak years because of being banned because of his professional status. That is a possible 20 Grand Slams where he was not allowed to add to his eventual tally of 11 wins.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 08 Jan 22 - 10:06 AM

I see that you have what you think are good reasons to be stashing, rather than hoarding, tests, Steve Shaw, but my opinion remains as stated.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Jan 22 - 10:45 AM

That's your problem. My actions were completely honest and my conscience is completely clear and, just for your benefit, I've explained myself as straightforwardly as possible. So do yourself a favour and find someone else to attack for absolutely no good reason whatsoever.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Jan 22 - 11:11 AM

I was misled by something I read in a newspaper into thinking that Djokovic had had coronavirus "months ago." It wasn't - it was in mid-December. Dunno whether that makes a difference.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: gillymor
Date: 08 Jan 22 - 11:23 AM

I don't see how NoJoke plays in the tournament even if his exemption is accepted. He got shot down at customs due to public outrage and I don't think those folks would allow him on a Melbourne court after all they've been through. He's just reaping what he's sown.

Some good points about Rocket Rod and it's also worth mentioning that he still holds the record for singles titles and is the only player, male or female, who won all four grand slam events in a calendar year. In fact, he did it twice, both as an amateur and a pro.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 08 Jan 22 - 11:25 AM

To have a different point of view than yours is not an attack.
But then again you are perfectly free to have your own point of view.

Everyone can Debate
its all give and take
Shared ideas can be fun
So don't argue with a gun


ar·gue
/'ärgyo?o/

verb
1.
give reasons or cite evidence in support of an idea, action, or theory, typically with the aim of persuading others to share one's view.
"“It stands to reason,” she argued"
What are your reasons?
"Let me site EVIDENCE..."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Jan 22 - 11:41 AM

Just bloody move on, the pair of you, and quit the obsessive stalking. You're boring.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Jan 22 - 11:42 AM

Not you, gilly!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 08 Jan 22 - 11:46 AM

Back to the subject at hand - in the US we are waiting for the day that some federal agency is supposed to make free home rapid tests available upon request. It's supposed to happen in early 2022. Not a peep so far, however.

It makes sense to have more than just a few tests available, Case in point: an elderly friend who got lucky and didn't catch COVID from the daughter she was staying with last month (who tested positive during the visit) is coming back for more. She texted this morning that the much-awaited great grandson has arrived and she will be in town for two weeks, with a different daughter. The grandson and g-daughter-in-law who had the baby are Trump supporters who haven't been vaccinated. If my friend wants to visit with me, and if she wants to visit with that family with the newborn, she should have a bag full of rapid tests to deploy each day to be sure she hasn't caught and/or isn't spreading COVID. That's 14 tests right there.

I haven't decided yet if we'll have a visit other than an out-of-doors conversation someplace. It is winter in Texas meaning there might be a few warmer days during her stay, so we could eat a meal out-of-doors. But in my house? I'm not inclined to set up that visit.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Jan 22 - 02:56 PM

"It makes sense to have more than just a few tests available"

Absolutely. Responsible people testing themselves, and behaving appropriately according to the results, is at least half the battle in defeating this thing. If you haven't got the test kits, you could be blissfully unaware that you're out and about spreading the virus. Mrs Steve and I use two tests each per week, as per government advice, and extra whenever we visit anyone (not just the elderly). I'm beginning to hope that anyone visiting us would do likewise, though we're not going to insist just yet. Of course, Christmas time is a bit of an anomaly visits-wise, but that will be our regime from now on. Most of the boxes I've got were garnered well before Christmas and we hadn't picked up any more for weeks until Mrs Steve picked up another couple of boxes yesterday. The ready availability of tests here adds to the ethos of responsibility and carefulness.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 08 Jan 22 - 03:16 PM

Anyone here can order the test kits online from the government department responsible.

I've tried several times over the past couple of weeks without success.

Sometimes, like today, right at the start, I get: "Sorry, there are no home delivery slots left for rapid lateral flow tests right now". Other times I have got as far as entering my address before getting told there are no kits available for delivery (in my area?).

I've only got further than that once. That time the system claimed to have sent me a validation email but I didn't receive one. I tried the last step even using different email addresses to try to get an email but nothing came to me.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 08 Jan 22 - 03:42 PM

Yes, I've just tried and got the same response:
"Sorry, there are no home delivery slots left for rapid lateral flow tests right now"
The system doesn't allow you to set an order for when they become available. Clearly a "Fail"

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Jan 22 - 03:53 PM

I haven't ordered any online since November. I'm sorry to hear that. I've got mine from the local Boots, another Bude pharmacy and a pop-up vaccination centre in Holsworthy. I didn't know that the supply problem has persisted.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 08 Jan 22 - 04:12 PM

I have two boxes (two tests each) on order that will arrive via Amazon sometime in the next 10 days. They've slowed down to a crawl on many deliveries lately. It doesn't help that a warehouse was scoured off of the ground in Kentucky, but that businesses selling these tests and many other products have backorders they're still trying to fill.

If the federal government gets involved, one hopes that it includes FEMA personnel or National Guard soldiers operating drive-through pickup spots for those who can get out and pick up tests on their own; the rest will have to be delivered or sent via post. Once the FEMA folks were helping with the vaccination stations in 2021 it began to run more smoothly.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Jan 22 - 05:19 PM

Wow. That is nowhere near the required number of tests.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 08 Jan 22 - 06:11 PM

I know. And that's about $10 a pop to buy those.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 08 Jan 22 - 06:22 PM

I actually did agree that you weren't hoarding, Steve! That is why I switched my verb to Stashing.
My opinion of *hoarding* remained, and remains, unchanged.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Jan 22 - 06:36 PM

Just drop it, why don't you.

I don't know why our tests are free, but they are, and they come in boxes of seven. Until a couple of weeks before Christmas they were being given away like sweeties, then the public enthusiasm for them (blame omicron for that) nobbled the supplies. Temporarily, I hope... We're always on the alert as to whether the government will start charging for them, but I don't think that will happen in the foreseeable future.

Those lateral flow tests are so important.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Allan Conn
Date: 08 Jan 22 - 06:54 PM

Steve there are reports this evening that Boris may be axing free lateral flow tests within weeks. Restricting it to care home settings etc and symptomatic people. The idea has been criticised by both the Scottish First Minister and the Labour opposition at Westminster.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: keberoxu
Date: 08 Jan 22 - 09:19 PM

The "Bristol County" referenced in this network news (NBC) story is
Bristol County, Massachusetts, USA, to be accurate.

A Twitter account shows the television clips.
If you dislike a thread full of comments
that are sarcastic, incredulous, negative, and so on,
then do NOT read the comments that follow on this story.

January 5, 2022: COVID[-19] K9

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Allan Conn
Date: 09 Jan 22 - 04:58 AM

Sounds like the gvt are denying now the story in the Times re the ending of free lateral flow tests.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 09 Jan 22 - 07:09 AM

It seems to be their practice to ‘test the water’ over possibly unpopular policies by ‘leaking’ them via their tame press-mouthpieces, then deny them if they get an adverse reaction. Kind of like an undercover about-turn mechanism.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 09 Jan 22 - 01:05 PM

Allan: Steve there are reports this evening that Boris may be axing free lateral flow tests within weeks. Restricting it to care home settings etc and symptomatic people. The idea has been criticised by both the Scottish First Minister and the Labour opposition at Westminster.

I'm not surprised that the government are denying it. Only surprised that they bother to react to 'rumour'. The fact that The Times have followed up on the rumour does not elevate its status.

Even as worded above free lateral flow tests within weeks. Restricting it to care home settings etc and symptomatic people suggests it is a rumour started by someone who hasn't understood the science. Restricting it to (care home settings and) people who are symptomatic would be a little silly as the NHS tells us:
There are different tests you can get to check if you have coronavirus (COVID-19). The test you need depends on why you're getting tested.

The 2 main tests are:

PCR tests – mainly for people with symptoms, they're sent to a lab to be checked
rapid lateral flow tests – only for people who do not have symptoms, they give a quick result using a device similar to a pregnancy test

From the NHS website Here

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 10 Jan 22 - 05:58 AM

A combination of a varient of delta and omicron in Cyprus seems inevitable. They reported 25 cases.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Allan Conn
Date: 10 Jan 22 - 11:19 AM

Those were my words Nigel just from memory. The article I read being that the suggesion was you would only qualify for a 'free test' if you were symptomatic or in care home settings etc. Yes in the case of symptomatic that would be a PCR anyway. The point it was suggesting - was that the ending of free lateral flow tests would save a huge amount of money. It may well have been an unsubstantiated rumour - or them testing the water - or simply it came up in their discussions and wasn't seriously considered. Who knows? It was relevant to the discussion though.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 10 Jan 22 - 03:45 PM

The quick test here is $25 and the pcr is $100.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Jan 22 - 07:27 PM

You now have to download a "collection code" in order to pick up the test kits from any pharmacy. Each box now contains 20 lateral flow (rapid) test kits and we're allowed one box per household. Still free of charge. We're recommended to test ourselves at home two or three times a week. Every day for a week if we think we've been in contact with an infected person.

There's beginning to be a general feeling of cautious optimism here. The infection rate is high but flatlining and hospital admissions haven't rocketed. The vast majority of hospital admissions are unvaccinated people. Staff absences in hospitals, schools and the care sector are still a huge worry. Many people who are ready to leave hospital can't be discharged because the care sector can't look after them. The general recognition is that omicron is mild and is now passing its worst peak, and that further restrictions won't be necessary. Negative again for me this morning. I'm permanently a bit chesty but I don't worry about things any more. The jabs and the testing are doing the job. I have to wear a mask even when I know I'm no threat to anybody. Bloody annoying is that, but hey ho.

Subject: RE: BS: New ideas about the pandemic COVIDICRON
From: Donuel
Date: 10 Jan 22 - 08:57 PM

For what amounts to an endemic disease like flu that has always been with us, we may soon not be as strict with mitigation efforts and not be as persuaded by emergency efforts to save the public at all costs anymore. Lockdowns forever doesn't seem realistic. Vaccinating the stupid seems to be a failure and may lead to more Darwin awards.
Quarantine time has been reduced by half and booster shots maybe be as frequent as every 3 to 6 months. Scientists are not sure about many factors but one thing they agree upon is that covid is here to stay.

Deltafluicron is a challenge for the best immune systems.


Lyrics
… The more I read the papers
The less I comprehend
The world with all it's capers
And how it all will end
… Nothing seems to be lasting
But that isn't our affair
We've got something permanent
I mean in the way we care
… It's very clear
Covid is here to stay
Not for a year
But ever and a day
The radio and the telephone
And the movies that we knew
May just be passing fancies
And in time the flu
… But, oh my dear,
Covid is here to stay
Together we're going a long, long way
… In time the Rockies may crumble
Gibraltar may tumble
They're only made of clay
But Covid is here to stay
It's very clear
Our love is here to stay
… Not for a year
But ever and a day
The radio and the telephone
And the movies that we knew
May just be passing fancies
And in time the flu
… But, oh my dear
Covid is here to stay
Together we're going a long, long way
… In time the Rockies may crumble
Gibraltar may tumble
They're only made of clay
But Covid is here to stay

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 10 Jan 22 - 09:12 PM

Don't mind these booster shots, myself. It's not like they hurt.

As I went through my teens gamma globulin shots were every 2 years, then every year, then every 6 months, then every 4 months, and they hurt like billyO.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 11 Jan 22 - 05:12 AM

Starting Saturday insurance companies will have to cover the cost of up to 32 covid tests per month.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 11 Jan 22 - 11:16 AM

I woke up with a headache and a sniffly nose this morning. I read in the Guardian of a woman with the same symptoms who was amazed when she tested herself positive. I've just done another test, so two days in a row, and I'm negative. I don't have to recall Mrs Steve from her visit to her 75-year-old friend. So that would have cost me $50 in the US? That doesn't strike me as the way forward...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 11 Jan 22 - 11:39 AM

That would have cost just under $20, at about $10 a pop.

Today it was announced that the Biden administration will require insurance companies to pay for (going forward) or reimburse customers the cost of up to 8 tests per person per month. I'm not sure where this leaves people with no insurance. I think those will be the free ones sent upon request, but there is still a test shortage, so they're not there yet.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 11 Jan 22 - 11:48 AM

"The quick test here is $25 and the pcr is $100."

I'll take YOUR word for it, Maggie! ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 11 Jan 22 - 11:51 AM

I didn't write that, but Don lives in a completely different marketplace than I do, and I shopped around the find acceptable tests that don't cost as much. And my insurance is different than his.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 11 Jan 22 - 12:58 PM

Starting next week a Phizer 4th shot for the immuno compromised will become national policy. Finally, its been 6 months since my last booster.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 11 Jan 22 - 05:31 PM

Anybody else read thay covid in children increases % diabetes?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 11 Jan 22 - 07:08 PM

The rapid test (lateral flow) kits we are currently getting are the ones that swab just the nose, not the throat-and-nose. The latter are now held to be less reliable. Many tens of millions have been taken up and the demand has been huge since omicron moved in. I take that as a good sign. Ordering test kits is a responsible thing to do, and using them to ensure that you don't go out spreading the virus is very valuable. Giving them out for free seems like an excellent investment by the government that will help to save money and human resources for the NHS and will save lives. Now we should be straining every sinew to persuade the unvaccinated to sort their heads out. One water company here has told its unvaccinated workers that their sick pay will be cut to the statutory minimum should they have to self-isolate after contact with an infected person. Vaccinated people no longer have to self-isolate under those circumstances as long as they test every day for a specified period. I don't believe in mandating vaccination, but I do think that unvaccinated people should have only themselves to blame should they be inconvenienced.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 12 Jan 22 - 12:28 AM

Sunday it was reported that some immunocompromised people will be able to get a fourth shot soon. Starting later this week, some at-risk Americans become eligible for a 4th shot.

Some people with a weakened immune system can get a fourth dose of the coronavirus vaccine as early as this coming week, according to recommendations from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that were updated last week.

The C.D.C. endorsed a third dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines for moderately or severely immunocompromised people on Aug. 13, but said this would be considered a part of the primary immunization, not a booster shot.

In October, the agency said those immunocompromised people could receive a booster shot — a fourth dose of vaccine, six months after their third dose. These guidelines were consistent with its recommendation for other adults.

Last week, hoping to stem the surge of infections with the highly contagious Omicron variant, the C.D.C. shortened that interval to five months for a booster shot for Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna recipients.

For immunocompromised people who received a single shot of the coronavirus vaccine made by Johnson & Johnson, the C.D.C. does not recommend additional primary doses, but advises that they get a booster shot of the Moderna or Pfizer-BioNTech vaccines two months after the first dose.

Some people are born with absent or faulty immune systems, and in others, treatments for some diseases like cancer diminish the potency of immune defenses. The C.D.C. estimates there are about seven million immunocompromised individuals in the country.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Allan Conn
Date: 12 Jan 22 - 02:14 AM

Here in Scotland it is the same. Because of a splenectomy in her youth my wife was told her third dose was a third dose and a fourth will be her booster.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 12 Jan 22 - 05:01 AM

Mrrzy: Anybody else read thay covid in children increases % diabetes?
I hadn't heard anything, but there is information Here: DiABETES UK
Which also links to studies American Diabetes Association

Hope this helps

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Raggytash
Date: 12 Jan 22 - 06:05 AM

" I don't believe in mandating vaccination, but I do think that unvaccinated people should have only themselves to blame should they be inconvenienced."

Perhaps unvaccinated people, who can be proved to be the source of infecting another person, could be charged with ABH or GBH or even manslaughter.

For our American cousins ABH is Actual Bodily Harm and GBH is Grevious Bodily Harm in UK law.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Jan 22 - 06:32 AM

I don't think so. You'd have to extend that to anyone with flu or several other lurgies. You can even kill elderly, vulnerable people by giving them your cold, and most of us don't self-isolate with the sniffles. What about people who grab a supermarket trolley, hands unwashed, after a poo in the supermarket bogs? Even if you thought it was right to criminalise such people, you can rarely (though never say never) pin the passing-on of an infectious disease on a particular individual. Incubation periods and all that...

Again, I don't think it should be within the remit of governments to mandate people to be jabbed. I agree with the action of the water company I mentioned because the unvaccinated in the circumstances I mentioned are much more of a threat to the business than the vaccinated, and their action (or inaction) should be seen as a risk that they've brought on themselves. I also think that pubs, clubs, festivals and sports venues should have the right (though not an obligation) to insist that only vaccinated people are allowed to attend. We can do a lot by making things inconvenient for vaccine-refusers without actually sacking them or forcing them to bare their arms. Let them know in no uncertain terms that, overwhelmingly, it's their ilk who are antisocially clogging up intensive care beds. Make them feel like pariahs even. At the end of the day, attritional and firm "persuasion" will probably convert far more to doing the right thing than alienating them via mandating.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 12 Jan 22 - 06:49 AM

Appealing to the conscience of a person without one is a fool's errand.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Jan 22 - 07:30 AM

Many unvaccinated people have now been persuaded to get the jab. Sure, some have been persuaded by threats to their jobs in the health and care sector. Many have been persuaded by the publicity around the infectivity of omicron and the efficacy of the boosters against it. That kind of publicity, together with making the unvaccinated see that general life could become inconvenient for them, is the way forward in my view. We have far, far fewer vaccine dissidents (per capita) than the US. Your point falls.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 12 Jan 22 - 08:21 AM

The online system for getting tests is working for me now. One pack came in the post today and I've ordered another.

I'll try to get the 3 of us tested this evening. I won't need to the nose swabbing (no throat sample needed with the kit I received) for others but I don't think dad would be able to follow the instructions and he would probably also have difficulty handling the bits. I'm not that sure about mum either but we'll do hers together and see where we go from there.

Subject: RE: New nonsense on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 12 Jan 22 - 10:39 AM

Some people are betting that this omicron is the varient to catch for their immune system to make antibodies. They ignore long haul risks and a lack of knowledge.

What if...what about...this just in from twitter...Imagine...in a perfect world...Facebook sez...God declares...there could be...1 out of 10 doctors agree...
that a varient so deadly the virus commits suicide by killing 99% of humans in 6 hours where transmission finally ends with 66 million global survivors who are the very ones who did not catch Omicron>?

This virus business is so fluid we just might get it all wrong from time to time... What do you mean its already plagued by misinformation about misinformation?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 12 Jan 22 - 11:33 AM

This morning I read a NY Times article about the lack of rapid tests for the blind here in the US. Apparently the UK is out ahead of this testing problem. There is an app here for smart phones, but blind people don't all have smart phones.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 12 Jan 22 - 11:51 AM

Sighted people don't all have smart phones either.

The US has more vaccine dissidents than anywhere, I think. Goes right along with the gun deaths imo, we Murricans haz rights, y'all over the pond or anywhere else seem to remember your responsibilities...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 12 Jan 22 - 12:52 PM

A major traffic jam in my two lane neighborhood is caused by thousands of cars trying to get into the Library for free Covid test kits today.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 13 Jan 22 - 06:28 AM

This is the obvious that we know but is worth recording for the record.

These are record breaking weeks of infection. Covid is the leading cause of death for the Police, and a 9 year low of violent death. Missisippi kids are only 5% vaccinated, nursing home infection is at its all time high, food stores are often depleted with staffing problems are 50% down BUT there are indications the peak has been reached like waste water tests in Boston and the stress on hospitals is leveling. A million infections a day was approached and can't go much higher.
Odds are less than 50 50 you get it but the symptoms are 0 to a week of awful flu symptoms without a need for hospitalization.
The unvaccinated die less often than last year but can still die of COVID. The Stevie Wonder song comes to mind over the vax controversies,
SUPERSTITION

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 13 Jan 22 - 08:45 AM

https://www.forbes.com/sites/ajherrington/2022/01/11/study-finds-cannabis-compounds-prevent-infection-by-covid-19-virus/?sh=7a09

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jeri
Date: 13 Jan 22 - 08:53 AM

I have a friend who had it. Her kid brought it home, and the whole family got it. She said it was like a bad cold. She'd been double-vaxed, no booster. The whole family had been, but they're all fine and over it. Of course, when it comes to my friend, she may be down-playing the severity.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 13 Jan 22 - 09:53 AM

No doubt about it Jeri, when vaccinated people have obvious symptoms of omicron they feel like absolute crap for a week. The week after has a run down quality. I have been tested but once so I don't know if I dodged this dirt clod or not. We're all winging this together with a certain feeling of confusion, hope and dread. Fauci said we're all going to get some form of this cold. This is by no means an incentive to deliberately expose ourselves. ...Some do, some don't, for some its just as well.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 13 Jan 22 - 09:58 AM

I still have my sniffly, headachey symptoms and I'm feeling under the weather. A test this morning, my third this week, was negative. Good to know you can still catch ordinary colds!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: gillymor
Date: 13 Jan 22 - 10:34 AM

Thanks for that link to the OSU study, Donuel. I mostly use hemp products that are high in THC but I'll have to look into those other cannabinoids.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 13 Jan 22 - 02:21 PM

Thank Steven Colbert, he mentioned it last night.
Its good to know TX keeps you and Willy Nelson suffiently supplied.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 14 Jan 22 - 03:30 PM

So far so good for my family. Though my disabled daughter who lives nearby had a Covid test show up positive she never developed any serious symptoms. And none of us hadany adverse reactions to the various jabs we've had.

And we've had no problems getting the tests. Half the time with the government site it's just been a matter of tap my NHS number and a kit turns up a day or so later, the other half they've run out, and there's a code to use at a local chemist to get a kit. Though sometimes they've run out, but they always seem to get them in the next day.

I wish other things connected with public services worked as well.

…
I see that in Canada, they've come up with a wheeze that if you aren't duly vaccinated you can't patronise your local cannabis store. That's the way to do it…

I'm afraid I'm getting rather authoritarian about the public menaces who refuse to get vaccinated, and then get Covid and take up beds in hospital that stop other people getting treatment they need. Solidarity!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 14 Jan 22 - 04:14 PM

The New York Times had a story about a particular rapid test called BinaxNOW from Abbott Laboratories that detects about 95% of the cases of Omicron. Other rapid tests are less accurate. And this article was helpful: Which Covid Test Should I Get? When Should I Test? What If I Can’t Find One? Answers About Testing and Omicron. Much of the getting supplies part applies to the US, of course, but some of the information should be globally helpful.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 15 Jan 22 - 06:50 AM

WHO warns to not treat Covid as endemic.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 15 Jan 22 - 04:30 PM

Just to clarify Donuel's comment:
The WHO (World Health Organisation) say that it is too early to treat Coronavirus as endemic. Here 4 days ago

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 15 Jan 22 - 04:58 PM

I heard that too.

Feel better soon, Steve Shaw!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Jan 22 - 06:08 PM

I'm fine, thanks.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 16 Jan 22 - 05:44 AM

Just got a negative test (day2) after returning from sunny Prague.

Feeling grotty with the worst cold I have had for over three years. I do not need to isolate but on the other hand, can't face going out for a day or two.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Jan 22 - 06:19 AM

Negative again this morning. I needed to run the test because I'm off to a funeral in what will be a crowded village church.

Could be that masks etc., will all be dropped next week Alleluja!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 16 Jan 22 - 01:37 PM

I'll still be wearing mine for a while, any time I'm in range of anyone outside my bubble. Dropping precautions right now, while more people are dying every day than you'd get with a huge airliner crashing seems bad timing, especially in a context where Boris Johnson has his back against the wall, and would say and do pretty well anything to fend off his demise. "Let the bodies pile up high"…

…
Here is a very encouraging story in todays Observer.

Texas scientists’ new Covid-19 vaccine is cheaper, easier to make and patent-fre

And good to see a reminder that there are some great people doinggreat things in Texas.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Jan 22 - 02:17 PM

The deaths-from-covid numbers are very suspect in m'humble. "Within 28 days of a positive test" simply doesn't make sense when the disease lasts for far less time than that in most people. The death numbers that make at least some sense are the ones which tell us the number of deaths in excess of what is expected for the season in question. Even those numbers can be confounded by factors such as fluctuating flu numbers and spells of very cold weather, etc. In addition, the stats we get on the telly every night are replete with spurious accuracy, precisely right down to the last person vaccinated, for example. All numbers are ball-park at best, but they are not presented that way. Think of them as benign propaganda, presented in order to keep us cautious.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 16 Jan 22 - 03:21 PM

Those who get COVID and end up hospitalized tend to show up as deaths 21 days later. The time reflects fighting the virus and the SIDE EFFECTS of it. That 21-day lag time is noted on many of the charts showing the growth of COVID this winter, though it doesn't mean that you suffer for 21 days before dying.

Here in the US people are double-masking now, going to the high-end N95 masks, and figuring out how to reuse them (there are several recommended ways to disinfect/sterilize those masks.) Hospitals were running them through autoclaves in 2020, now individuals are figuring out how to do something similar to save the expense of the masks.

Types of Masks and Respirators (from CDC)

The word is (it was well known from early on) that the flimsy cloth masks don't work well and with Omicron they shouldn't be used now. Many of the masks I still see in public are commercially produced lightweight ineffective masks. The earliest ones I made had a slit for putting in a paper filter, I stopped making those fairly soon and shifted to the heavy filtering of the three-layer flannel (inside) 3-D masks. Now those need to go over another surgical or KN95-level mask.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 16 Jan 22 - 07:40 PM

I'd put more trust in the death count of the medical estimates than in hunches, however humble.

If the figures were being manipulated by this government, I'm sure they'd much prefer to do that in a way that helped them declare that the death rate had gone right down, and the whole nasty business with Covid was done and dusted.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Allan Conn
Date: 17 Jan 22 - 02:36 AM

Steve is spot on in that the number that makes the most sense and are less open to how they are collated etc are the excess deaths. The authorities collate the figures in three ways and all are published on the BBC site every day. If you look at the figures for Scotland compared to the UK as a whole then there is a wide variation on the comparisons dependent on what figures you use.

For the Deaths after 28 days of a positive test then Scotland makes up 6.6% of UK deaths; if you look at causes on the death certificate then it is 7.19%; and if you look at excess deaths in total then it is 8.2%.

Quite a variation!! I'd think the obvious one to go on is the excess deaths which shows the impact on Scotland compared to the UK.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 17 Jan 22 - 07:13 AM

I have just been contract traced - seems that somoene tested positive on my flight home and in spite of paying £16 for a day to test (negative result), I still need to take LFTs for the next 7 days. So what was the point of forking out for the day 2 test? At least I do not have to self isolate.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 17 Jan 22 - 08:59 AM

Ugh, A reimbursment plan for tests is what is in the works for providing 'free tests' by the government. crap... more paperwork and delay.

An omnicynic would of course be suspect of death reports no matter what the varient. Cynics should put the lid back on the paint thinner when they hold almost every damn thing suspect ;^/

I think I am looking at Feb 15th for a 4th booster at the latest and this week for the soonest. There is no lack of confusion regarding pandemic decisions. What I have noticed is that the actual vaccine providers do not want to be held respondsible for witholding vaccine but some may have an agenda, we shall see.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 17 Jan 22 - 12:20 PM

I note that the official death total for the UK favoured by this government is 150,000, while the lead statistical agency puts it at 175,000.

Both figures are based on different ways of calculating the total. It is interesting that the government chooses to rely on a method that provides a lower total. And completely predictable.

The excess death rate is a better guide to the true impact of the pandemic, since it includes deaths which were not directly caused by Covid but which would not have been likely to happen if there had been no pandemic. And that would give a higher total than either of the above figures.

Not a very impressive record whichever way you count it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 17 Jan 22 - 12:51 PM

Contact tracing is for after the fact. I know of one that might be coming up - the man is the son of an elderly friend of mine. She now lives with him as they plan about moving to an adults only retirement community (when she will again have her own space). She tested positive yesterday, but he just got on a jet from Dallas to Hawaii. I was told he and his boyfriend have "super filtering masks" but he was exposed, and even with his testing negative the day before the flight letting him board the plane, his 87 year old mother is home alone with COVID. She has had shots and boosters, but they were exposed together and she should be taken for the Regeneron or whatever monoclonal antibody treatment. He could in theory get the treatment also.

I was researching information about reusing the high-end N95 masks for another thread and will post that here also. It was out of curiosity that I started looking, after speculating about how the everyday homeowner might manage to more or less autoclave masks to keep using them.

I found a study that looks into this home heating technique with convection oven. Skimming it and skipping to the bottom, it looks like the ovens had a liquid source for higher humidity and that the tests had a lot to do with how well the masks fit after being treated in a convection oven. A scalable method of applying heat and humidity for decontamination of N95 respirators during the COVID-19 crisis. From June 2020, so ages ago.

This article (from November, 2020) says dry heat can be used to decontaminate FDA allows dry heat treatment for single-user mask reuse (from that article comes this:

The use of dry heat to reduce bioburden is only intended to supplement existing single-user reuse recommendations from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), such as storing a used N95 mask in a breathable paper bag for a minimum of 5 days between each use, according to the FDA.

Bioburden reduction systems can play an important role in the ongoing efforts to help address shortages of filtering facepiece respirators, according to Dr. Binita Ashar, director of the Division of Surgical Devices in FDA’s Center for Devices and Radiological Health.

So maybe just putting the mask away for a few days? Here is one that is quite bizarre - putting the mask in a paper bag inside a pressure cooker (with liquid? with the weight on top?) in the oven. How to Disinfect Your Mask: A Step-by-Step Guide is from June 2020.

And it sounds like some of them can be washed in water - a combination of treatments may turn up in a scholarly journal if I keep looking.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 18 Jan 22 - 08:31 AM

I have seen reports they've found genes involved in whether you'll lose your sense of smell.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 18 Jan 22 - 12:40 PM

MGoH: Here is a very encouraging story in todays Observer.
Texas scientists’ new Covid-19 vaccine is cheaper, easier to make and patent-fre
And good to see a reminder that there are some great people doinggreat things in Texas.

On reading the article it gives the lie to "is cheaper, easier to make, and patent free"
It may become each of those things, the facts say that "it is still in development", and "they do not intend to patent it". Much can happen between now and when/if it becomes a proven, effective, vaccine.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 18 Jan 22 - 02:33 PM

Nigel, that vaccine was tested in India and is now being made for distribution in India by Indian companies, but it can be launched world wide. There is nothing tentative about it, and it comes without a patent. I posted an article about that on January 6, 2022.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 18 Jan 22 - 04:15 PM

Good news! The new site launched (www.covidtests.gov) a day early and it hasn't crashed. And what's more, it is simply a redirect through the US Digital Service to the US Postal Service who take the information and will be shipping the four free tests. This Digital Service was built after the Affordable Care Act rollout was such a catastrophe.

We have to see how the delivery works (that's the part where DeJoy has an influence after he mangled things and still hasn't been replaced by the board of governors). And this is per household - fine for me, but for more than one or two people, inadequate. They're going to have to ramp up pretty quickly.

New York Times: The Biden administration’s new website to order at-home virus tests goes live, a day early.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: gillymor
Date: 19 Jan 22 - 06:07 AM

Thanks, Stilly. I just ordered mine, took less than a minute.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 19 Jan 22 - 09:02 AM

We have had free home LTF test kits here for a long time now, but our government is making noises about ending it. Possibly on the basis if less people test, then less people will have covid!!!!

Home LTF tests help people make informed decisions about wheter to socialise, or go to work, but I am sure tory funders would rather have their entire workforces infected, and any deaths is a price worth paying in terms of the companies profits. Such is the value of human life.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 19 Jan 22 - 10:22 AM

Recently I've had two friends make informed decisions about their activity (stay home, not be around vulnerable family members) and to get to a clinic for attention when their home tests showed positive.

When you think about it, even if your test isn't positive, if you're not feeling good you probably SHOULDN'T go amongst other people, giving them your cold or flu. So perhaps people are giving consideration to spreading whatever they have with the presence of the ability to test.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Jan 22 - 11:20 AM

All restrictions lifted here by next Wednesday. No more bloody masks. Wahoooo!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 19 Jan 22 - 01:05 PM

It figures.
Mask holes celebrate at the pandemic peak by going maskless in Virginia too.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Jan 22 - 01:16 PM

A hole is an A hole.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Jan 22 - 01:21 PM

"359 deaths were reported today, that's people who died within 28 days of a positive test, but some of those may not have died of covid." That was the BBC News bulletin just now.

Well that's the first time in almost two years that I've heard that highly sensible and honest caveat after the death numbers announcement.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 19 Jan 22 - 03:27 PM

Sensible to you because of confirmation bias.

They may have died of complications brought on by COVID. They may have been dying of something else anyway. Whatever spin you want to put on it, anyone who doesn't treat COVID like the deadly pandemic it is is a fool.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Jan 22 - 03:53 PM

Confirmation bias my arse. There is no justification for claiming, as has been claimed in this country for almost two years every day, that a disease that typically lasts about a week or ten days for nearly everyone who catches it has killed everyone who caught it within 28 days of their first symptoms. After ten days, it is not possible to ascribe deaths with any confidence at all directly to the virus. Some terminally weakened, of course, others by another illness that struck them when they were down, others who did not receive adequate treatment (the stories are legion). The current reported death rate as a proportion of omicron-infected people is just about equivalent to the death rate from flu. And even that is based not only on the bogus 28 days but also by neglecting the fact that flu is bloody obvious to everyone who catches it, whereas a third of people infected with coronavirus don't know they've got it and go uncounted, making the true pro rata death rate even lower.

It behoves you to avoid ill-considered accusations of confirmation bias when you clearly haven't thought the thing through. Throughout this pandemic I've often thought that your mask advocacy (which borders on the evangelical), along with your excoriating of those who have bothered to look at what little rigorous science there is on mask efficacy, has been tantamount to the precise thing that you're accusing me of. I've been polite enough not to accuse YOU.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 19 Jan 22 - 04:06 PM

CVS said I had to wait until 6 months passed before a 4th booster.
Walgreens said I had to wait 5 months which is 3 days from now.
Based on this morning's corporate briefing to Walgreens pharmacies.
I'll give the Johnson's a try this time. Its mix and match time, like my socks.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 19 Jan 22 - 04:29 PM

Only yoooou...
can ever think things through
Only you,
can make your dreams come true

When you hold my gland, i understand
The BS that you do
You're your dream come true
You are a one and only you.



I have come to terms with the notion that you get the pandemic you get and not the one you prefer. A pandemic comes with all the human failings, victories and strategic side steps by a virus.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 20 Jan 22 - 06:17 AM

Unfortunately, on this occasion I have to agree with Steve.

Any 'spin' is being applied by those supplying the figures.
As it stands at present, if a man gets knocked down by a bus, and dies in hospital, he is counted among the next day's Covid statistics if he has had a positive test in the last 28 days.

Any person, or government, basing their actions on the statistics provided needs to have a full and clear knowledge of how the statistics are made up, and any reasons that they may be biased in one direction or another.

Contrary to (some) popular beliefs, the sky is not falling.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 20 Jan 22 - 09:10 AM

Denial of Omicron's 70% increase of airborn transmissabilty which is at the upper limit of any virus is -fine- if it makes you personally feel better. As for public policy truth is best.
Rounding up numbers is a respondsible thing to do in times of extreme spread and unknowns. Compared to China you have the freedom to deny or take serious precautions and not be forcibly locked in.

If you feel you have made a great discovery that downplays pandemic, embrace it. It is not going to harm anyone but yourself if your guess is 'Fawlty". The Pandemic is bigger than you.
Fawlty reasoning is Towering regarding the way people have reacted to the invisible threat.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 20 Jan 22 - 09:40 AM

Manuel is willing to believe Facebook, Basil gets embroiled in denying and covering up even rumored infections, Polly tries to talk sense but is worried, Sybil puts things in a familiar frame of reference and Major Gowen soldiers on despite what he reads in the paper.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 20 Jan 22 - 09:49 AM

I am seeing articles differentiating Being in hospital *with* covid and being in hosppital *because of* covid, at least.

My uncle had covid when he died of ild age, for instance.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Jan 22 - 11:51 AM

Quite right, Mrrzy. That distinction is usually buried here.

No-one is talking about "rounding" the numbers. We are discussing how the numbers we are given could be made more accurate. Inflating numbers in order to make us more cautious, etc., is just dishonest. You are misreading what is being discussed here. So what's new. By the way, the 70% increase in transmissibility (which is probably a good stab at it) has never been definitively put down to "airborne" or other transmission strategies in any percentage combination. Let's stick to the science that we actually know (which is what I've been saying all along).

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 20 Jan 22 - 12:15 PM

There are many unreported COVID deaths, this is understood in the medical and the actuarial community.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Jan 22 - 03:02 PM

Yes there are. And there are many, many more unreported cases, including many symptomless ones. In this country millions of us have deleted the utterly useless test-and-trace app. If I catch the disease* I'll deal with it myself, following to the letter the guidelines given by the government. The one difference will be that no policeman will come knocking on my door to check up on me. It's time we were encouraged to take personal responsibility in all aspects of this. Time to edge back to normal.

*Negative test again this morning, which meant I could go out and about.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 20 Jan 22 - 04:14 PM

Steve is right, there are no real time movies of an airborn virus clinging to an aerosol particle and being breathed in to infect a person. Some things are too small to film.
https://www.nbcnews.com/video/fauci-on-whether-there-is-evidence-of-airborne-coronavirus-spread-87157829795

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 21 Jan 22 - 07:43 AM

There are more potential side effect claims of Covid 19, more than I could possibly keep track of.
Yet one more claim is a drop in fertile sperm counts for 60 days after infection. Its possible a cold could have had this effect but the research never went in that direction. The more research the more we will see but it all won't have significance.

The most controversial claim I share is that we kinda did this to ourselves, as a species that is. Bio weapon development never stopped. The holy grail to bio war was weaponizing the common cold. However I have no ambition to belabor or debate such notions.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 21 Jan 22 - 08:01 AM

viral infections/fertlity

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 21 Jan 22 - 11:34 AM

Just read that a sub-variant of Omicron has been identified in UK. No information yet as to whether it is more or less infectious, or is it is a more or less dangerous strain.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 21 Jan 22 - 11:49 AM

More on that:
LONDON/COPENHAGEN, Jan 21 (Reuters) - The UK Health Security Agency on Friday said it had designated a sub-lineage of the dominant and highly transmissible Omicron coronavirus variant as a variant under investigation.

BA.2, which does not have the specific mutation seen with Omicron that can be used as a proxy to easily distinguish it from Delta, is being investigated but has not been designated a variant of concern.

From: Reuters

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 22 Jan 22 - 12:18 PM

In North Texas local health officials are predicting the Omicron cases will rise until the end of the month. But now that more people are using at home COVID tests, they won't know exactly how many cases are out there. Counties are starting to set up self-reporting websites that give enough information for follow-up and contact tracing. Trouble is, it's only in English. I'm not heading into the fray the day after the peak, but it's good to know there is an end in sight. But during this pandemic in my county alone in Texas there have been nearly a half-million cases and over 5,000 deaths. That's the population of a small town. That's the crash of 10 full super-sized jetliners. If it happened all at once I think everyone would be shocked. It would be nice if the doubters could be shocked into getting the vaccines. That would be 25% of the adult population in the US.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 22 Jan 22 - 06:51 PM

Nigel, you also were early to report the child covid diabetes link some time ago. It appears to be serious.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 22 Jan 22 - 06:55 PM

Dropping the requirement to wear masks on crowded tube trains and so at this point forth strikes me as pretty crazy. It may serve it's purpose as "Red Meat" for the potentially mutinous Tory backbenches, but I don't sense there's too much appetite for chucking common sense among most people.

But trusting on people to be sensible doesn't solve the problem of the selfish minority who throw over solidarity for misplaced "individual choice".

Freedom of choice ceases to apply when it involves putting others at risk and reducing their freedom to feel free.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 Jan 22 - 07:39 PM

That is too much black and white. Now I enjoy the luxury, here in north Cornwall, of never having to use public transport (there isn't any that I could use), so maybe I'm a fine one to talk. I have used public transport, briefly, in London during the time when masks were voluntary. I didn't wear a mask. My view on masks is notoriously well-known on Mudcat (though I would never break the law and I always have a mask with me). I test myself at least three times a week. If I test myself negative on Monday morning, then go straight to Morrisons, I will have to wear a mask. I'm no danger to anyone and, as for me, I'm vaxxed up to the hilt. But I still have to wear a mask, because no-one who sees me knows all that. So if I don't wear a mask I'm, unjustifiably, not to be trusted. And I will wear one, cos that's the rules. But I'm doing it for no other good reason bar making other people feel comfortable. In my long life I've done lots of things that make people feel uncomfortable. I've been on demos and held up traffic, I've lain dead in the street to protest against nukes, I helped the Greenham women, I've organised pickets and I've threatened, as the union rep, my headteacher with industrial action. I had the music room closed in my school after finding blue asbestos in the ceiling, disrupting the school for a whole term. I don't mind making people feel uncomfortable. But I wear a mask not because I'm railing against authority if I don't. I'm wearing a mask to make individuals feel comfortable. I'm not protecting them from anything, and whether I'm not protecting myself is my bloody business. So roll on next Wednesday.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 Jan 22 - 07:48 PM

"... I don't sense there's too much appetite for chucking common sense among most people."

One man's common sense is another man's received wisdom. If your opinion is that mask-wearing is the right way ahead, then consider that that is just your opinion. In that circumstance, it ill-behoves you to castigate people who don't share it. Bear in mind that there is little or no rigorous science to show that masks are effective. Provocative but inconveniently true.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 22 Jan 22 - 10:09 PM

Bear in mind that there is little or no rigorous science to show that masks are effective. Provocative but inconveniently true.

You need to get off of that soapbox. We're sick of it. It is provocative and it isn't true. Masks. Save. Lives.

CDC: Use Masks to Slow the Spread of COVID-19
Updated Aug. 12, 2021

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 22 Jan 22 - 11:12 PM

Thanks, Stilly. Sigh.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 04:08 AM

”I don't sense there's too much appetite for chucking common sense among most people”

Unti last night I would have agreed. However, Mrs Backwoodsperson, my son and his partner, and I went out for dinner at a very busy pub/restaurant. In the two-and-a-half hours we were there, I saw only two people using masks when entering, moving around, leaving etc. Those two were Mrs Backwoodsperson and me.

I have a very strong belief that it’s a big, BIG mistake for the government to move to a policy which relies on ‘the Great British Public’s common sense’. The evidence, at least in this part of the Backwoods, seems to be that a substantial percentage of ‘the Great British Public’ have little or no common sense. Well others can do as they like, but we’re not the kind of people who think we know better than virologists, epidemiologists, and public health experts, and we will continue wearing our masks until we believe it’s no longer necessary, and at the moment I’m certain we’re still a long way from that.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 04:23 AM

... Mrs Backwoodsperson, my son and his partner, and I ...

... I saw only two people using masks when entering, moving around, leaving etc. Those two were Mrs Backwoodsperson and me.

... a substantial percentage of ‘the Great British Public’ have little or no common sense.

Have you discussed the lack of common sense with your son and his partner?

DC

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 04:32 AM

Yes. You know me, Doug, and you should know by now that I don’t hide my light under a bushel, when something needs saying, I say it. He is fully aware of my feelings but, at the age of 40, the days when he did as his father told him are long gone.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 04:35 AM

Oops, pressed ‘go’ too soon…

Meant to go on to say that all four of us did a LFT yesterday, prior to our evening out. All negative.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 05:01 AM

Well, as from Wednesday, my personal brand of common sense will consist of testing myself three times a week, keeping my jabs up to date, not going into pubs/restaurants (I want to see those numbers dropping a lot more first) and wearing a mask whenever required by the establishment I'm entering, but not otherwise. I believe that that is showing more than a reasonable level of responsibility to others and to myself whilst trying to get back to a normal life. As for my soapbox, I was reacting to someone who was questioning the common sense of people like me. Not nice.

Here's a bit of cod science for you. In two summers in a row there was no mask mandate, yet numbers went down to almost nothing. Since just before this Christmas there has been a mask mandate, yet omicron has ripped through the country almost untrammelled. Therefore masks are irrelevant. Well, we can all pick out the multiple factors that confound that conclusion. It simply isn't science. Yet the conclusions from the other side of this argument are equally easy to confound. And there's nothing more "soapboxy" than shouting a slogan instead of looking at the science.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 05:08 AM

Over the last few months the message from central government has changed from social responsibility to lifestyle choice. "we are not going to do anything proactive so it is up to the individual to decided whether or not they want to put the lives of others in the community at risk."

Imagine this level of libertarianism applied to other laws....

We are not going to have mandatory speed limits - it will be up to the individual driver to divide whether or not they are prepared to put other peoples' children's ;lives at risk when driving past schools.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 05:09 AM

If a pub or restaurant is fitted with air condition/ventilation then the air breathed out by those sitting and eating will be mixed and distributed to all parts of the room. What benefit will be gained by putting on a mask to move around? It would be better, in my opinion, to keep the one way systems that helped to maintain social distancing. These seem to have been abandoned or completely ignored.

DC

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 05:27 AM

”Over the last few months the message from central government has changed from social responsibility to lifestyle choice. "we are not going to do anything proactive so it is up to the individual to decided whether or not they want to put the lives of others in the community at risk."

And, of course, the true purpose of the government’s approach is to provide themselves with an easy ‘get-out-of-jail-free’ card when it all goes tits-up and infection-rates are on the rise again - “You wanted ‘freedom’, we gave you what you wanted, we advised you to use your common sense, but you didn’t. It’s all your fault, nothing to do with us.”

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 05:59 AM

Thereby hangs the tail.....

THat then becomes tantamount to victim blaming...

"We said you should exercise common sense, and because others around you who grudgingly take public health measures when they are obliged to have made you sick, then you only have yourself to blame. Don't blame us for allowing others to put you at risk" Same argument used by the gun nuts. "It is up to gun owners to choose not to massacre schoolkids, don't blame us for making it easy for them to do so."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 06:20 AM

SPB, speed limits, legal alcohol limits, driving on the left and the like are permanent fixtures that are there by general consensus. Until 2020 I hadn't even looked at a mask, let alone worn one. Yet before 2020 it was not regarded as "libertarian" to swan around without a mask on. If anyone ever gave it a second thought at all, not wearing a mask was the default, the norm. In fact, if I'd gone into Morrisons two Christmases ago with a mask on I'd have got some funny looks. Two years later, the morality police are defining not wearing a mask as "a lifestyle choice" (an irresponsible one at that) or as "libertarian." Well how did that change and who's in charge of making those judgements, let alone definitions?

The general consensus, even among the reluctant, has been to accept the restriction of the freedom to go around with our faces uncovered. I'd like to know now at what point it stops being "libertarian" to go back to the halcyon days of pre-2020. Who gets to decide the turning point? Whether you like it or not, there has to be a time when we have to go from compulsory to voluntary. Neither you, I, BWM nor Boris can finger that moment with any certainty. Of course we never know what's round the corner, a perfectly reasonable point to make. But we can't go on like this. As for millions of us being irresponsible, etc., 'twas ever thus, long before the pandemic, and we have to live with that and try to improve things. Long before this pandemic I was sanitising my hands every time I'd touched a supermarket trolley after I'd read a survey that said that 60% of Morrisons trolley handles sampled had actual traces of shit on them (other supermarkets are available...), but there's no policeman watching people coming out of the jacks to make sure their hands were washed. Quite right too. We live in an imperfect world, and coronavirus, like everything else that befalls us, can't be exempt forever from imperfect decisions.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 08:06 AM

SCS or science, you be the judge. In transitional times and places there will always be opposing forces. Shaw Common Sense never bowled me over.
I tried the Johnson's vaccine yesterday. If a varient specific vax is made it will probably take only a matter of 6 months. The learning curve for mrna is behind us.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 08:11 AM

Questioning somebodies common sense when we disagree with them is neither nice nor nasty,
It's just common sense. Though the very term "common sense" is misleading, since in practice what is being referred to is individual judgements as to what we believe to be true.

The fact that a lateral test shows up negative isn't by any means a 100 per cent guarantee that we are infected and infectious, just an indication that we very likely aren't. And in any case that negative test doesn't show as to someone gets into a crowded tube train.

Failing to wear to wear in such circumstances seems to me a breach of common courtesy.

There are indeed times when we can feel obliged to do things that inconvenience other people or annoy them. Steve gives a set of examples, and most of them are things I've done, and would do again. You do them in the belief that they are in fact in the benefit of the very people you are inconveniencing or snnoying. Failing to wear a mask and social distance do not bein there

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 08:23 AM

Dropped a not in that second paragraph . "Not infected and infectious".

And the last paragraph should conclude …do not belong in there. Such things do nothing to benefit others, but rather they infringe on their right to be safe and feel safe. There will come a time when we can responsibly give up the precautions, but that shouldn't be determined by the selfish political calculations of a corrupt politician trying to save his skin. Solidarity!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 08:48 AM

"Shaw Common Sense never bowled me over."

Thanks for the uncalled-for barb (tediously, yet again). As it happens, I've never assumed a mantle of "common sense" in my life. I once worked with a man on the parks department when I was a student. One day, he roared at me that he didn't need no universities or degrees or exams because HE had a degree in "common sense," vigorously tapping his temple. Six months later (after a sacking for doing a terrible job and absconding to the pub for hours every day when he should have been at work) his alcoholism had killed him. Since then I've always thought that resort to common sense is the territory of rogues and charlatans. I want to make arguments and to be argued back at, thanks. I enjoy that. What I don't enjoy is lazy insults dressed up as argument. As above.

"...a breach of common courtesy." I thought it was supposed to be about protecting people...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 10:02 AM

"...a breach of common courtesy." I thought it was supposed to be about protecting people..."

It's about both. They are not exactly mutually exclusive. Unless there are very strong reasons I believe we have a duty to do both, and see that as an important aspect of the solidarity that we owe to each other.

I quite agree with Steve when it comes to distrusting the term common sense. Just because most people believe something is right or wrong does not imply that I should fall in line - though it may be a reason to reconsider how sure I am in my opinion.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Charmion
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 11:24 AM

Before COVID hit, I thought wearing a mask, especially indoors, was a strong indication of criminal intent in anyone not female, Muslim, and devout.

Circumstances alter cases.

Britain seems to have descended into social chaos on this issue. I believe — don’t know for sure, but it’s logical and consistent with practice so far — that the Ontario Ministry of Health will rescind its mask orders when the hospitals are no longer jammed with COVID patients.

I’m good with that.

At present, very few vaccinated people who catch the disease even need to be admitted, so the vast majority of in-patients with COVID are unvaccinated.

I have read that the current vaccination goal is 95 percent with at least one shot, and the current level (as of yesterday) is 84.7 percent with one shot, 78.3 percent with two and 35.7 percent with three. On Friday, Health Canada approved our first oral anti-viral drug treatment for COVID.

Even when restaurants, hair-cutting parlours and gyms are allowed to open their doors, clients and customers have to show identification and vaccination certificates that are checked with a QR code reader. All business establishments and gathering spaces are limited to 50 percent capacity. Lots of restaurants, bars and shops have gone under, and no one knows when live music will be allowed indoors again.

People here carp and cavil about the rules, and defy them when they think they can get away with it, but there’s very little sympathy when the consequences of defiance come to bite the unmasked and/or unvaccinated in the arse.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 11:25 AM

"Common sense" is all too frequently a term used by people whose attitude seems to be "Well I don't know much about this, if anything at all, and I haven't looked it up, and I don't need to know anyway, I'll leave that to the boffins, etc., but I can still have a valid and loudly-shouted opinion because, well, I've been around, I've got common sense and I'm entitled, innit." Just like the bloke on the park I mentioned.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Charmion
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 11:30 AM

Further to my last, the current lockdown in Ontario seems to be working as intended. Schools opened last week, and business closures will end on 31 January. We’ll be back to the 50 percent rule, with masks, and grateful for it.

Meanwhile, the vaccination campaign is chugging along.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 11:36 AM

..."but there’s very little sympathy when the consequences of defiance come to bite the unmasked and/or unvaccinated in the arse."

Unvaccinated, definitely. Unmasked? You wouldn't know...


"Circumstances alter cases"

I've used this expression all my life and you're the first other person I've seen using it. Kudos!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 11:40 AM

Downtown today there is supposed to be a mass NO VAX demonstration.
Authorities ask to avoid the area. Yesterday was an anti abortion -no exemptions- demonstration.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 12:40 PM

Apparently the antivaxxers are claiming issues with male fertility, but it is covid, not the vaccine, that can reduce male fertility.
Not posting any of the several links where I read that.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 02:18 PM

"Unmasked. You wouldn't know...¡

Precisely. That makes it worse.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 02:33 PM

I wear a mask out of choice. Having read the case for and against I decided that I would rather wear one. Steve has read the same and decided the opposite but wears one when mandated anyway. Neither of us have tried to force our opinions on anyone else so why all the acrimony? It's becoming like a religion. Wear a mask where and when you have to. At all other times the choice is yours. Make that choice by all means but don't try to force your choice on anyone else. Absolutely bugger all to do with common sense and all to do with intolerance and extremism.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 02:38 PM

Donuel: Nigel, you also were early to report the child covid diabetes link some time ago. It appears to be serious.
No, Mrrzy reported it (or mentioned it). I just added links for anyone who wished to read further.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 02:44 PM

Here is an even stranger link!

https://www.perio.org/press-release/new-study-links-periodontitis-and-covid%E2%80%9019-complications/#:~:text=Of%20the%20568%20p

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 03:42 PM

Cheers Dave. I've said all along that I respect your choice to wear a mask whenever you want. I just feel that it's always OK to question what amounts to questionable science. I also see the other side, that it's always OK to respect the precautionary principle. I've also said that all along. But I do feel that adopting the precautionary principle, without some pretty convincing evidence, does not entitle you to force that on others. So if you see me next week in Morrisons without a mask, don't judge me and I won't judge you.

And beware of the evangelists on both sides. They won't get us through this. They just alienate.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 05:55 PM

The trouble is the choice not to wear a mask in a time when thousands of people are being treated for what is a life-threatening disease, and many hundreds are dying imposes upon other people.

Freedom of choice to do things that do not damage other people is our right. But, to quote Abraham Lincoln (among others) "My right to swing my fist ends where your nose begins."

Even aside from the small, but still real danger of infecting others (even in the case where we are properly vaccinated and recently tested), not wearing a mask in a crowded tube train is liable to make some people feel threatened, and it also serves to encourage others to choose to discard their marks. Anti-social behaviour is infectious.

There is no equivalence in such circumstances between choosing to wear a mask, and choosing not to wear a mask. The former has no potential to cause harm to other people.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 07:13 PM

Even aside from the small, but still real danger of infecting others (even in the case where we are properly vaccinated and recently tested), not wearing a mask in a crowded tube train is liable to make some people feel threatened, and it also serves to encourage others to choose to discard their marks. Anti-social behaviour is infectious.

If there is no threat then 'making someone feel threatened' is their problem, not yours.

Those who feel 'threatened' by what should be everyday occurrences can choose to keep themselves 'safe' at home.
Anyone who, genuinely, poses no danger to others, should not be prevented from going about their lawful business.
The fact that some people are over-cautious should be their problem, not someone elses.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 07:16 PM

Sorry!
That last comment looks as if I'm agreeing with Steve Shaw again ;)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 07:40 PM

Great post, Nigel! ;-)

My bottom line has always been that I don't want to make people feel uncomfortable. There's a pet shop in town run by a chap who worries like mad about catching the virus. I wear a mask in his shop irrespective of rules. The same in the Beach House shop at Widemouth Bay where I buy my papers, some veg and my fish (she's a cracking fishmonger). It's a tiny shop, you have to be upclose and personal in there, I've known 'em for donkey's years and I'm not about about to make them feel vulnerable.

Other than that, wot Nigel sez!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 07:46 PM

As for life-threatening, Kevin, the omicron strain is no more life-threatening to fully-vaccinated people than a dose of flu. Quite likely, even less so. I've been over that already. Four or five years ago we had a terrible flu winter in which 30,000 people died in about three months. But not only do I not recall anyone donning masks, I don't recall it being an upfront news item at all.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 08:08 PM

Look at Asian countries where mask wearing is much more commonplace, to block flu and colds spreading.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Jan 22 - 08:26 PM

Does it work? Evidence?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 24 Jan 22 - 08:22 AM

Unfortunately there are a fair amount of people who lack Steve's decent respect for other people. I remember back in the early days of the pandemic walking past a couple while wearing a mask, and the bloke who wasn't in a mask giggling at the sight, and deliberately coughing in our direction as he passed. Clearly he thought this thing was all a joke.

I don't think that making other people uncomfortable or fearful is something we should feel entitled to do if there's no good reason, or that "it is their problem, not yours".

Relaxing precautions and restrictions makes sense, and I look forward to it, but not prematurely. I think that in some respects, notably in relation to mask requirements, it is premature. I believe that the timing of this government is not to be trusted, and that it is very much dominated by the desire of a corrupt politician desperate to worm himself out of a corner.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 24 Jan 22 - 09:19 AM

So who is to be trusted to make the right call on timing? Or isn't there a right call? If we knew that the thing would go away completely, I'd be with you. But the likelihood is that it'll be here forever. So what measure are we going to use? I've seen footage of those countries in Eastern Asia where people routinely walk around with masks on. Well I don't want this country to be like that. I don't think it's a virtuous mindset. I think it's a neurotic mindset. It exudes mistrust of other people. There has to come a point at which we decide that it's up to you. It's already up to you whether you sanitise your trolley handle. It's up to you whether you wash your hands after visiting the khazi, as with after blowing your nose (many healthy people's noses always harbour pathogenic bacteria - look it up). It's up to you whether you sneeze into a tissue or just let rip with glorious freedom. It's up to you if you want to go out and about, mixing with others or going to work, with a cold or flu. And so on. Things we definitely know can be harmful to others. Yet we don't legislate for those things at all. Instead, we legislate for a measure about which there's uncertainty as to its efficacy. We're a bit mad, aren't we?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 24 Jan 22 - 10:31 AM

MGoH:
I don't think that making other people uncomfortable or fearful is something we should feel entitled to do if there's no good reason, or that "it is their problem, not yours".

If what we do makes reasonable people uncomfortable (walking down the street with a firearm or some such) then it is our problem.
Actions taken which are perfectly reasonable, and which don't make the large majority of people feel uncomfortable, may make some people who are at increased risk feel uncomfortable. In that situation they can choose to avoid putting themselves in that position. I still say 'their problem, not ours'.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 24 Jan 22 - 10:36 AM

Who would I trust? Not our politicians, and emphatically not Boris Johnson. And those are the people who have made the decisions in question at present. The medical experts have been pushed into the background, and there have been plenty of reports of their advice being ignored or overruled.

It's worth noting that England is very much an outlier when it comes to relaxing the requirements, both in Europe and within the UK.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Charmion
Date: 24 Jan 22 - 11:04 AM

Steve, I think you're mistaken about mask-wearing in Asian countries if you believe it "exudes mistrust of other people".

A medical mask is worn to protect other people from YOU. That's why the operating room crew wear masks: so they don't contaminate either their sterile instruments or the patient's open wound with whatever germs might be lurking in their respiratory tracts.

In China and Japan, people are revolted by the signs of contagious respiratory disease, such as a snotty nose. (Note to file: When in China, blow your nose privately.) People wear masks as a sign to their neighbours that they're doing their best to keep their germs to themselves.

This cultural practice may be a holdover from the epidemic of pneumonic plague that hit China in the early years of the 20th century. If so, it is a neat parallel to the disappearance of spittoons, and spitting, from public spaces in Europe and North America after the Spanish Flu pandemic, and as measures to conquer tuberculosis took hold in the 1920s and '30s.

The other important reason Asian folks wear masks is, indeed, defensive: it's to avoid inhaling industrial pollution.

Neither of these reasons implies mistrust of other people.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 24 Jan 22 - 11:38 AM

I can remember when all the buses had little notices telling you spitting o the bus was an offence for which you could be fined. I imagine it probably still is, but they don't feel they need to point that out because customs have changed.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 24 Jan 22 - 01:16 PM

Well a snotty nose (especially in kids) is not a sign of respiratory disease. Indeed, it could be me going for a walk on a cold and windy day, or it could be one of those disgusting footballers caught on camera blowing out their nostrils one at a time. However, as I've never been to China or Japan, and never will, I'll take your word for it. The science tells us that respiratory viruses find it much more difficult to spread outdoors. So I'll cling on to my prejudice that widespread outdoor mask-wearing looks just a tad neurotic. Here in the airy and uncrowded winter outdoors of Bude, my visceral reaction to seeing people out for a walk on the clifftops wearing masks is that they are neurotic and that they don't trust anyone (including me). Rather sad, actually.

Negative again this morning. Point taken that a negative test doesn't prove that you're negative, Kevin. I do three tests a week routinely, and extra at the merest sniffle. I can't do better than that to protect other people (I wouldn't go out of the house, nor would Mrs Steve, if either of us tested positive), bar never leaving home.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 24 Jan 22 - 01:23 PM

On the northern buses, Kevin, the p in "Spitting" was all too often scratched out and replaced with a crudely-scratched "h."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 24 Jan 22 - 01:24 PM

Cling to your prejudice but please drop this as a topic here at Mudcat. We all understand your views and are heartily sick to death of you continually harping on them.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 24 Jan 22 - 01:59 PM

It is on-topic and I read into that that "we" means "you." You are being aggressive and offensive simply because you don't agree with me. I'm trying to stay civil.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 24 Jan 22 - 02:27 PM

You keep repeating your opinion in the face of a discussion of the facts of COVID. Your opinion hasn't changed. You're egging people on.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 24 Jan 22 - 02:33 PM

..."are heartily sick to death..."

I'm not like this with you, even though I disagree with you on certain aspects. You need to accept that either, neither or both of us may be right, part-right or wrong. Charmion has just made a good point to counter what I said and I backed down. That's how it should go, but you continually make it difficult.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 24 Jan 22 - 03:01 PM

She made a good point and you keep going. And will bring it up again and again.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 24 Jan 22 - 03:10 PM

If you were in the US you would fall firmly in the Libertarian brand of politics - an unpleasant group that are known for their thumb-in-the-eye approach to politics and social issues. Laisse-faire and the hell with everyone else.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 24 Jan 22 - 04:03 PM

I'm fully-vaccinated, I test myself three times a week, I've obeyed every mandate to the letter and I always wear my mask where required, and often even when I don't have to if it makes people feel more comfortable. Is that the American definition of libertarianism?

As I said, I'll stay civil with you whatever YOU say...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 24 Jan 22 - 04:04 PM

"So I'll cling on to my prejudice that widespread outdoor mask-wearing looks just a tad neurotic."

That doesn't sound too far from the kind of thing Boris Johnson was prone to say about Muslim women who choose to wear a mask .

One benefit of the pandemic has been that by normalising mask wearing to some extent it should have cut down the hostility and suspicion of such women.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 24 Jan 22 - 04:45 PM

That thought's crossed my mind too. Though I'm not quite catching your other point. At least you can disagree politely, which kind of leaves the door a bit wider open. Must be summat to do with being fellow Guardian letter-writers... ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Jan 22 - 06:39 PM

In America politeness does not include bowing and scraping.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 24 Jan 22 - 07:22 PM

Your point being?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 25 Jan 22 - 10:17 AM

point? Your accusation we are being impolite to you is bogus.

Omicron vaccine is already in its clinical trial phase.
The safe bet is that there will be all sorts of varients. Perhaps an endless supply, perhaps not.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 25 Jan 22 - 11:17 AM

Ah, the second of your number to employ the royal "we..." :-)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 25 Jan 22 - 01:50 PM

" Your accusation we are being impolite to you is bogus."

I must have missed that one. Unless maybe I failed to see anything in it to cause offence.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 25 Jan 22 - 11:58 PM

Elton John has it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 26 Jan 22 - 04:04 AM

I heard on Wireless 4 this morning that 99% of cases in the UK are omicron, with delta demoted to 1%. In addition, well over half of those who have had omicron have been infected by covid-19 before.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 26 Jan 22 - 06:50 AM

Apparanty the torygraph is suggesting that Jacinda Ardern has lost control of the pandemic in New Zealand, The accumulated deaths there have reach a total of 46 since the start of the pandemic, and on one day alone there were 219 reported new cases in one day in January.

She needs to bring johnson in to take over managing public health in New Zealand.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 26 Jan 22 - 06:51 AM

I have probably underestimated the angst Brits are having over Boris in charge of the pandemic response. He is now the focus of most of the contradicting attitudes.

The US response is complicated by an age old dislike of big government control even when it is the best way forward.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 26 Jan 22 - 07:18 AM

"Covid as a blood born virus is not suitable..."

Supream ignorant quote from Amy Coney Barrett associate justice for the Supream Court on decideing case regarding vaccine mandate for large corporations. https://www.c-span.org/video/?516920-1/supreme-court-oral-argument-covid-19-vaccine-mandate-large-employers

She decided to overule the mandate for corporation but upheld it for health care workers only.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 26 Jan 22 - 09:47 AM

"I have probably underestimated the angst Brits are having over Boris in charge of the pandemic response."

You probably have not underestimated the angst 'Brits' are having over Boris....

Meanwhile, in a mostly angst free England...

From the BBC

"Retailers Sainsbury's, John Lewis and Waitrose will continue to ask customers in England to wear masks in their shops when Plan B rules end on Thursday.

Rail operators also said passengers would be expected to wear masks when the legal requirement for face coverings in public places is dropped.

However, supermarket Morrisons said its customers would not be expected to.

Those keeping the policy in place said they would encourage, not force, customers to comply.

Plan B rules, imposed in early December to battle the Omicron variant, are being lifted because inflections have peaked nationally.

But the government is still advising people to wear masks in enclosed or crowded spaces and when meeting strangers.

Trade union Usdaw, which represents 360,000 retail workers, has urged customers to continue to "observe Covid safety measures", despite the mandatory requirement for masks ending."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 26 Jan 22 - 09:58 AM

Research has identified 4 factors in whether Covid is likely to become long-term Covid. I quote from the newspaper story about it:
One of the four factors researchers identified is the level of coronavirus RNA in the blood early in the infection, an indicator of viral load. Another is the presence of certain autoantibodies — antibodies that mistakenly attack tissues in the body as they do in conditions like lupus and rheumatoid arthritis. A third factor is the reactivation of Epstein-Barr virus, a virus that infects most people, often when they are young, and then usually becomes dormant.
The 4th is being Type II diabetic but they don't know if that is the only disease involved. The other 3 factors are how a body reacts TO the virus.
Blicky to actual study.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 26 Jan 22 - 11:23 AM

Will Morrisons issue their worker which disinfectant aerosol sprays that they can use on unmasked customers, or is it their duty to put their own lives at risk to continue to serve those who don't give a toss about their safety?

This is something unions should pick up on, and hold a ballot for a national strike is Morrisons do not protect their staff.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 26 Jan 22 - 11:25 AM

I don't think "angst" is quite the right term for what many British people feel in respect of Boris (probably about 60% recent polls indicate can't wait to see him gone, with actual supporters only making up a minority of the remaining 40%). It's more a matter of just not trusting him to be honest in anything. Or competent in his job.

If he got back to being a public entertainer, free from any responsibility, he'd still be quite popular, I think. He can be very funny. A bit of a card.

I'd say that most people here, right across the political spectrum, are quite at ease with the idea of what gets called big government in a time of national emergency. In fact the kind of thing being referred to by that term doesn't need to be organised in a centralised way. A good part of nostalgia still felt about the last war period, including by people born many generations after it, is for a society which was in many ways very authoritarian.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 26 Jan 22 - 11:35 AM

Just to be clear, the good bits of our pandemic response have come from amazing scientists who have developed superb vaccines in record time, the pharmaceutical companies who have bulked them up and got them distributed, the armies of unpaid volunteers who have kept thousands of vaccination and testing centres running, the care workers, doctors and nurses who have selflessly run themselves into the ground in the face of terrible risks to themselves in order to keep the health service afloat, and the British people who, by and large, have followed all the rules and overwhelmingly opted to take the vaccines. The bad bits of our pandemic response have all come from Boris Johnson, who has constantly sent out mixed messages and vacillated over lockdowns again and again, who sent thousands of untested, elderly, vulnerable people back into care homes from hospital (a policy which very likely killed tens of thousands of people), who presides over our NHS and care sector that the Tories have systematically run down for twelve years, who has allowed dodgy deals to be done with his profiteering Tory mates for PPE, and who has partied while the country was suffering at its worst. I'll allow him the furlough scheme, but just watch who will pay for that in the long run. Grudgingly, I'll allow him the rollout of abundant test kits, I could say free, but ditto as to the last point. It won't be him and his rich mates doing the stumping up for sure. He blows his trumpet about the bits he can't justifiably claim for his own yet won't take responsibility for his multiple failures. That's where we are with Johnson.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 26 Jan 22 - 11:56 AM

The best you can say about Johnson is that he didn't actually get in the way of some valuable things happening, without which things could have been significantly worse. That's something to feel grateful for, but I'm not at all sure that gratitude should be directed to Johnson.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Jan 22 - 10:06 AM

I can now go maskless. Unfortunately, I have no shopping to do... Bude will survive to live another day...

Negative this morning, both of us.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 27 Jan 22 - 10:28 AM

One thing that irritates me is when people talk as if the primary purpose of wearing masks was to protect the wearer, so that not wearing a mask was a question of exercising a right to accept a notional risk to oneself. Whereas that sould be completely irrelevant.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Jan 22 - 01:21 PM

You should feel grateful for that misconception. It's probably why the vast majority of people acquiesce in mask-wearing. Even I would admit to at least a passing and visceral feeling of being protected when some unmasked person gets a bit too upclose and personal.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 27 Jan 22 - 02:13 PM

You may be right. I find that rather depressing.

In the last resort I accept that people can have a right to do things that involves even serious risk to themselves. But that doesn't extend to having the right to seriously risk other people.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Jan 22 - 03:21 PM

I'm tested up to the hilt and I'm fully vaccinated. Little or no threat to anyone, frankly. Actually, I think you're confusing rights with responsibilities. My sense of responsibility to others includes the testing, the vaccine, keeping my distance, shopping at quiet times. If I can pull all those off, that's not bad. Fortunately, I don't have to confront public transport...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 27 Jan 22 - 04:27 PM

I'm inclined to see responsibilities as more fundamental in society than rights. Other people collectively carrying out their responsibilities are what my rights depend on. Other people collectively failing to carry outtgeir responsibilities, and my rights are nullified.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Jan 22 - 05:47 PM

Your rights are routinely flouted by people with coughs, colds, flu and unwashed hands. By speeding or careless drivers or by polluters. The philosophical question could be, do you grab these people by the lapels and demand that they respect your rights, or do you, perhaps by public campaigns, appeal to their better nature and try to encourage their sense of responsibility? As soon as you start talking about rights in areas of life which can't (or shouldn't: we don't want the law to be an ass...) be governed by the law, you're in danger of causing polarisation and entrenched positions. Which is precisely what has happened with the mandate for health workers to be vaccinated.

(My view on them is that their arguments against vaccination don't hold water and that they're being idiotic, but I agree with their objections to compulsion).

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 27 Jan 22 - 08:45 PM

Essentially, I don't that anyone can ever have an absolute right to harm other people.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Jan 22 - 09:12 PM

But you were talking about YOUR rights. I was talking about MY responsibility to respect your rights (in areas beyond sensible laws, such as my not sneezing over you or contaminating a supermarket trolley that you may unwittingly use). It's innate in me and millions of others to respect your rights in those ways, but millions of other people don't give a damn. It's those whose better nature we need to be appealing to.

Of course I don't think that anyone has any right to cause you harm, let alone the absolute right. However, if I don't wear a mask in Morrisons tomorrow, not by any stretch of the imagination could it be said that I'm setting out to exercise my absolute right to harm anyone. I'm jabbed and tested to the hilt and I always strive to keep my distance and I always sanitise my hands, hardly the actions of a bloke out to cause harm. It's eminently possible for me to harm someone within the crazy layout which is Bude Morrisons car park by driving into them. But by using the car park it can hardly be said that I'm exercising my absolute right to harm someone. By declining my mask and using the car park I'm simply going about ordinary life, and I have to accept, as do the people I encounter, the rough and tumble that that entails, just as we've always done. Anyway, my mask is always in my pocket, so I'll see.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 27 Jan 22 - 10:25 PM

By "absolute" whatI mean't exactly that - we have a responsibility to exercise reasonable care to avoid causing harm to others. Accidents can happen which are not our fault.

But it is meaningless to talk about having a right to abdicate that responsibility. As meaningless as to talk about having a right of property in another person.

I'd quite accept that you are acting responsibly. But as you said, there are millions who don't give a damn. When they choose to act in accordance with that I do not accept their right to do so.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 28 Jan 22 - 04:59 AM

Some of us with good memories will remember the announcement that our small pox vaccine may have worn off several years ago. Well it has worn off and we have sort of forgotten about that minor detail. We don't see remnants of even the few small pox survivors anymore. Like Joeseph Stalin they died off years ago. (he was horribly small pox scared but his propoganda pictures were all airbrushed.)
Why vaccinate for a disease that doesn't exist?
Because it does exist and when frozen, is very patient.

Looking ahead 'anti vaxxers' would face the delemma of seeing is believing. Compared to the silence of the Covid dead and dieing, small pox is in your face.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 28 Jan 22 - 05:59 AM

Of course not, Kevin, but then we are in the realms of making moral judgements (or simply not giving a damn) rather than either adhering, or not, to imposed rules or laws. We can't micromanage every aspect of life via rules and must rely on "better nature." My point being that people's better natures are there to be appealed to. Maybe we should be trying harder as a society to do that. I'll shortly be venturing to Morrisons with trepidation (mask in pocket...)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 28 Jan 22 - 07:16 AM

Plenty of sensible people still masking-up in the Backwoods branches of Mozzer’s and Tesco this morning. Also in the town centre. Surprised and delighted.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 28 Jan 22 - 08:49 AM

I'd be inclined to call it "sensible and socially responsible". In my opinion, obviously.

I suspect that mask wearing could continue to be quite widespread in our society - as someone in a story in today's Guardian says "i think I'll keep wearing one for the foreseeable. The number of colds and coughs I've had over the past couple of years has gone right down…I like not having a cold."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 28 Jan 22 - 04:31 PM

”The number of colds and coughs I've had over the past couple of years has gone right down…I like not having a cold."

Quite so, Kevin. I haven’t had a cold for two years now - my last cold was early January, 2020. I’m persuaded that, along with the reduction in socialising since the start of the pandemic, wearing a mask in public has contributed to my remaining free from colds and/or other respiratory infections.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 29 Jan 22 - 05:36 AM

What contributes to people of our age not catching colds has everything to do with the fact that we've already had most of the strains that are going round. What helps is the fact that most of us have not been going to pubs, theatres and restaurants. Also, older people mix less with children, major transmitters of cold viruses. Unlike the covid-19 virus, many cold viruses can survive for a long time on all kinds of surfaces. Picking the germs up on your hands then touching your eyes, nose or mouth is a great way of catching a cold. The relative importance of airborne transmission versus contact hasn't been determined.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 29 Jan 22 - 07:49 AM

I'm pretty confident that wearing a mask will have significantly reduced the likelihood of picking up a cold, though I'd imagine other covid related stuff, notably social distancing and pub closures etc will have played a major part. Maybe the medical statisticians will try to measure those kind of things.

But in any case, insofar as people identify mask-wearing as saving them from colds, that is going to encourage them to continue to wear masks. It won't be everyone, but I anticipate that a relatively long consequence of the pandemic will be that mask wearing will have been normalised. Maybe, in the same way you can date a crowd picture by how many men are wearing cloth caps, you'll be able to do the same by looking for masks.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 29 Jan 22 - 09:13 AM

Ok. My last poat was actual news. Nothing since has been. Should there be a different thread for news on the pandemic and leave this one to complain about each other?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 29 Jan 22 - 01:16 PM

Repeat Omicron infection could be long covid, we still don't know.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 29 Jan 22 - 01:26 PM

Regarding the other pandemic, clinical trials of an mrna vaccive for HIV have begun.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 29 Jan 22 - 04:04 PM

New variant, more contagious.

One blicky.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 29 Jan 22 - 04:48 PM

The speed at which these variants are turning up and spreading makes it feel like we're watching water circling the drain and it's getting faster as the unvaccinated and uninfected population level in the tub drops.

We heard about Omicron BA.2 last week. This from today's Dallas Morning News

Researchers confirmed two cases of BA.2, a sub-lineage of the omicron variant, through sequencing at the University of Texas Southwestern on Thursday.

Scientists discovered the sub-lineage in December, shortly after the original omicron lineage, called BA.1, was identified. Recent spread of the sub-lineage led the U.K. Health Security Agency to designate BA.2 as “under investigation.”

Public health experts are monitoring the strain as it spreads in several European and Asian countries. BA.2 is believed to be more transmissible than BA.1, but not much else is known about the variant.

In Denmark, BA.2 jumped from 20% of COVID-19 cases in the last week of December to 45% of cases in the second week of January, according to Danish public health organization Statens Serum Institut.

Fewer than 100 cases of BA.2 have been reported in the U.S., a mere fraction of the more than 660,000 omicron cases detected in the country in the last week, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

While BA.2 has the potential to take over omicron as the dominant variant in the U.S., it’s too early to tell what impact the sub-lineage will have on the pandemic, said Dr. Wesley Long, medical director of diagnostic microbiology at Houston Methodist.

“In the U.S., we have to wait and see what the story is on BA.2 and how it compares to BA.1,” he said. “It’s worth keeping an eye on right now.”

Here’s what experts know so far about the sub-lineage — and what they know about other future COVID-19 variants.

Today we find that it is circulating in at least half of the states in the US.

Here we go again.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 29 Jan 22 - 05:07 PM

The new variant of omicron doesn't seem to be much of a game-changer. Get the jabs (which are more effective against the variant-variant than they are against omicron) and relax, sort of, at least for now.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 29 Jan 22 - 06:59 PM

Omicron and its 'children' are 99.9% of the covid strains in America.
2,000 deaths per day are ebbing.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 29 Jan 22 - 07:32 PM

"The World Health Organization has not labeled BA.2 a variant of concern." (yesterday).

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 30 Jan 22 - 07:46 AM

The variants are going to keep coming, and there could always be one that is more transferable - and even worse, more deadly as well. Which is why it is important to stay ready. And for the UK, to have a government which is capable of being trusted, however unlikely that might be.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 30 Jan 22 - 08:00 AM

So what do you think "staying ready" means?

Work has to continue on the next generation of vaccines...

We can spend the rest of lives forever wondering whether there's an apocalypse round the corner. Or should we try to get back to something resembling normal? Just remember what damage all the lockdowns and restrictions are doing to people's physical and mental health and to the economy - jobs, cost of living, etc., and to children's schooling. The vaccines should be restoring our sense of balance. Staying ready, to me, is overwhelmingly a matter of having up-to-date vaccines and rolling them out. And by public health messages telling us how to help to stop the virus and how to be kind to each other.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 30 Jan 22 - 09:34 AM

All those things. But also to be prepared to move sharply up to much more stringent precautions in future if that proves necessary, and that requires that there should be some possibility that most people put at least some trust in the government.

That has to be true at all times. It was obvious that we could expect a major pandemic at some time - and that's not hindsight, it was what has been widely predicted by experts in the field for decades. In fact it's been clearly obvious since the 1919 hecatomb, or indeed since the Black Death.   

In a way we have been quite lucky with Covid, with its "relatively" low mortality, especially with younger adults and especially children. Next time it could be far worse. Fortunately we are potentially better equipped to respond, thanks to the advances made in developing vaccines. Unfortunately we are collectively all too likely to think it's all done and dusted, and we've a government that is probably eager to encourage us in this.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 30 Jan 22 - 01:42 PM

Before we move to stringent precautions again (I assume you mean more lockdowns, school closures, bans on mixing with friends and relatives, closing down all our cultural outlets, etc.), I think we should take a cool step back and ask ourselves whether all we've done so far has been worth it in terms of reducing deaths, assessed alongside the incredible damage that has been done to people's lives and the economy (which we will be paying handsomely for for years or decades), and whether we want to expose ourselves to that damage all over again. My view, unpopular though it be, is that the vaccines have changed the balance of the whole game, and that we should in future persuade people by public information campaigns to keep their jabs up to date and to use their own judgement and appeal to their sense of responsibility. Anything harsher, all over again, is going to feel like collective punishment.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 30 Jan 22 - 05:30 PM

It is worth remembering that the death rate in this country has been pretty well the highest relative to population in the whole world - and massively higher than any other island.

Maybe delaying introducing lockdown, and relaxing them early, which seems to have been government policy throughout, were in no way factors in that high death rate.   Those were the calls made by the Prime Minister.

On the other hand, the one outstanding success of tge pandemic, the vaccine programme was the achievement of scientists technicians, NHS staff and volunteers, and the good sense of ordinary people, who ignored the attempts of ordinary people, and came for their jabs.

But in any case, that's talking about the past. A very much delayed inquiry into what happened is due to come this year which will help in finding out the truth about those kind of issues. The important thing is to be as ready as possible for whatever may be coming.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 30 Jan 22 - 06:09 PM

One of the things we need to do, Kevin, is to assess the different ways in which countries measure COVID-19 deaths. That is not to say that I want to minimise our rotten record, but comparing like for like is pretty important. I've said before that measuring excess deaths over what would normally be expected on a seasonal basis would be one informative measure, though it would by no means tell the whole story.

An interesting statistic I saw somewhere last week is that approximately half the people in hospital with COVID-19 were actually admitted for something else. I also note that the Beeb, for the last week or more, has been qualifying the "deaths within 28 days of a positive covid test" by saying that some of those may have died of other causes. It took the Beeb at least 18 months to come up with that entirely appropriate caveat.

I had the misfortune to have to spend the day today in A&E in Barnstaple. For several hours I had to watch a silent TV screen that was giving out lots of covid messages. The one that struck me most of all was given by a doctor who was showing us that almost everyone seriously ill in his hospital wards was unvaccinated. That's the kind of message we need to being going large with.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 30 Jan 22 - 06:11 PM

Seriously ill with covid-19, obviously.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 31 Jan 22 - 08:52 AM

It'll be years before that kind of stuff will be sorted out about comparative figures. In fact I
Rather doubt they ever will be. But it's pretty clear our record is pretty bad.

I agree that the most important statistic is the one that you quoted about most seriously ill with covid being unvaccinated.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 31 Jan 22 - 12:07 PM

My country has a half million dead from a self inflicted wound that was inspired by Trump and big government propoganda which is paid for by the corporate private golf club types.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 31 Jan 22 - 01:10 PM

”My country has a half million dead from a self inflicted wound that was inspired by Trump and big government propoganda which is paid for by the corporate private golf club types.”

Don’t forget the NRA types…

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mr Red
Date: 31 Jan 22 - 02:01 PM

I thought the total deaths for the last 2 years in the US was 750,000 plus. Fauci doesn't exaggerate, surely?

Anyway there are researchers calling for proper trials following statistics that hint that CBD can lesson the impact of COVID. Not a miracle cure, in fact the scientist interviewed was quick to point out vaccines, masks, social distance etc, were the primary line of defence.

CBD is known to be an anti-inflamatory, and that will be the focus of research. MSNBC video

And before anyone jumps to the conclusion about marijuana, the answer is NO. THC inhibits the action of the CBDs.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 31 Jan 22 - 03:15 PM

As of today:

WorldOMeter - a site I haven't seen before. [907,956]

CDC Data Tracker [879,971]

A difference of about 28,000 between these two sites.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 01 Feb 22 - 02:58 PM

I don't count the 300-500 thousand deaths that was pre vaccine and the early Trump fairy tales of denials. All the people who got the mandatory 4 vaccines for their kids to go to school and now believe in the facebook vaccine myths are more than confused. That we now bypass incubating virus in 'dirty' chicken eggs, with the mrna method we are actually a whole lot safer.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 02 Feb 22 - 04:47 AM

Professor Ajit Lalvani at Imperial College is involved in intriguing research on natural immunity to covid-19. He was on the Today programme on BBC Radio 4 (at about 8.37 am UK time). He has been investigating people who have been in close contact with infected people (for example, in the same household) but who don't develop the infection. He found that some of those people had memory T-cells effective against covid-19 that could have been generated by previous exposure to common cold coronaviruses (around a fifth of common colds are caused by coronaviruses). The picture is not at all black and white, but there is the basis for further promising research that could, conceivably, lead to a new generation of vaccines that would be variant-proof. Watch that space.

You can google his name and include the word "covid" to get several references.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 02 Feb 22 - 05:47 AM

Regarding NRA types, they are now becoming 'rule by bomb threat types'.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 02 Feb 22 - 07:18 AM

Nice news, Steve Shaw. I had not seen that yet.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 02 Feb 22 - 08:28 AM

rare natural immunity

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 02 Feb 22 - 08:47 AM

Dr. Fauci has tried to develop a general vaccine for the base protiens in the flu virus for decades without success.
I will never say it can't be done.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 02 Feb 22 - 08:57 AM

That's a better listen than the radio broadcast. The professor is an excellent and lucid communicator, I must say (like all us products of Imperial College, of course!). I think we can all feel just a tad more hopeful for the future.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 02 Feb 22 - 09:06 AM

Flu is not caused by a coronavirus. I'm not sure that Dr Fauci's difficulties inform the work on covid-19 vaccines.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 02 Feb 22 - 10:54 AM

One. Single. Nasal. Droplet. Is Enough To Infect!

Blicky to a Guardian article. Let me know if there is a paywall.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 02 Feb 22 - 11:19 AM

Yes the flu is the flu. Simply put, Vaccines can block the various tails of the flu virus but there have been none for the "head" of the virus ...yet. The vaccines for SARs covid 19 block the spike protiens but not the sphere of the body of the virus...yet.
A general vaccine may be a promising avenue to pursue but so is a manned mission to Titan. Its in a planning phase.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 02 Feb 22 - 11:49 AM

Mrrzy, over the years so many Mudcatters have posted links to The Guardian that I decided to contribute a modest amount quarterly so they let me read the news. (They let me choose the interval - very civilized - not dictating how much or how often, just "please contribute.")

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 02 Feb 22 - 02:08 PM

I've seen lots of drawings of viruses with grinning faces and teeth and little legs . But somehow I suspect that they were never intended to be taken as illustrations of what viruses actually look like, but rather as metaphorical in nature. And I took Donuel's post in the same sense.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 02 Feb 22 - 04:22 PM

What does the influenza virus look like?
Influenza virus has a rounded shape (although it can be elongated or irregularly shaped) and has a layer of spikes on the outside. There are two different kinds of spikes, each made of a different protein – one is the hemagglutinin (HA) protein and the other is the neuraminidase (NA) protein.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 03 Feb 22 - 05:39 AM

Steve is right that I was being contentious but pandemics have lots of guess work. 2 years ago we guessed this would last 4 years and diminish. Now it may never really go away but we can still pretend it is. Great things can happen with a simple speculatiive 'WHAT IF'.
So posts of great hope are appreciated and welcome.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 03 Feb 22 - 05:56 AM

You mean WHAT IF johnson hadn't of treated the threat with contempt at the start of the pandemic and decided that it was not as important as his divorce settlement?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 03 Feb 22 - 09:58 AM

Here are some pictures of flu viruses.

Quite pretty r eally. You could hang them on a Christmas Tree.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 03 Feb 22 - 01:35 PM

The nose knows

https://neurosciencenews.com/covid-smell-loss-20007/amp/

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mr Red
Date: 03 Feb 22 - 06:17 PM

The New Scientist has warnings from those wot reelly hunderstand pandemics.

And the message is that H1N1 (aka 'flu) has not circulated in anything like numbers this it normally does, because COVID is dominating, maybe out-competing (he said allegorically). So when (not if) it re-surfaces the general public's immunity will have faded and the virus will have mutated beyond the vaccine and that's when we call it a pandemic. OK maybe a small one, but you get the message, it won't be insignificant.

Bill Gates predicted a serious pandemic that would cost the US $2-$3 trillion, 5 years previous to COVID (and the current cost is????)

So should we be asking Bill for another prediction?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 03 Feb 22 - 09:09 PM

The precautions people have been taking such a wearing masks, social distancing and washing hands will have also reduced the likelihood of catching flu.

But I can't think how it can make sense to think of the two competing. Catching Covid doesn't doesn't stop you catching fu, or the other way about.Even at the same time. Though any boost to the immune system generated by one could possibly give you some protection from the other, and that would apply with vaccinations against either.

But flu hasn't been taking time off and regrouping. I don't think there is any reason to expect next witer¡s to be particularly But of course it always could be. Get your flu vaccine in October!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 04 Feb 22 - 07:39 AM

Every pandemic is different. There is a potential for a simple fungus to wipe out vast populations, especially in climate change. In life who is the hunted and who is the prey change places quickly. C'est la guerre.
Right now our cleverness has an advantage over stupidity. It may not always be the case. Sometimes we are just lucky, sometimes luck runs out.

For those who asked what if we weaponized the common cold, they have their answer. We need better questions don't you think.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 04 Feb 22 - 07:51 AM

ps.
I had measles and chicken pox at the same time.
Simultaneity is a bitch.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 Feb 22 - 07:51 AM

"There is a potential for a simple fungus to wipe out vast populations"

Populations of who or what? Potato blight? White-rot on my onions, leeks and garlic?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 04 Feb 22 - 07:54 AM

I always thought that H1N1 was a Geordie virus

Why aye hinny!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 04 Feb 22 - 10:10 AM

Dave,
I causes immobility of the lower legs:
"Keep yer feet still Geordie hinny!"

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 04 Feb 22 - 10:24 AM

There are four siblings in my family, born in six years, so close enough in age that we did lots of things together. Including catching childhood illnesses. My mother used to talk about the year we each caught mumps, in sequence, not simultaneously, so she had weeks of sick kids at home. Same with measles and chicken pox. But mumps was apparently worst of the bunch.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 04 Feb 22 - 06:15 PM

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/deadly-fungi-are-the-newest-emerging-microbe-threat-all-over-the-world/

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 Feb 22 - 06:59 PM

So what I've read today (dammit, I can't remember where, but maybe some Brit can...) is that almost all patients in intensive care with covid-19 are unvaccinated. I also saw an opinion that your chances of dying of covid-19 are next to nil if you've had both jabs plus the booster. To me, that's a victory, which should mean that we can do two things: persuade the reluctant to get the jab, and to drop all restrictions and get back to normal life.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 Feb 22 - 07:05 PM

Well, Scientific American was our go-to for the latest exciting stuff when I was a student over half a century ago. Sadly, it's become a bit of a desperado, relying on cod-drama and scaremongering in order to sell copy. Very sad. Your fungus article is rather typical of its modern-day thrust. Useless.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 04 Feb 22 - 08:08 PM

Steve, I don't know what you have against Scientific American. It's a well-respected science journal that covers science for the non-scientist. I suspect it is simply because of who posted it.

Stop with the slurs. Just skip past Donuel's posts if you don't want to read them, but we certainly don't need to read your complaints.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 05 Feb 22 - 11:49 AM

Potato blight is't exactly laughing matter. It caused millions of deaths in the Irish Famine, and there are probably parts of the world where a disease targeting a single basic food crop could have te same kind of results today.

And warnings that fungal infections in humans can be pretty nasty beasta aren't hard to find. Here is The Lancet

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 05 Feb 22 - 12:05 PM

Sounds like scaremongering to me too!!!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 Feb 22 - 01:02 PM

Absolute nonsense, Maggie. I've said it several times before, nothing to do with Donuel: Scientific American, Nature, New Scientist and their ilk are popular science magazines. They are not learned journals. I actually take learned journals from two disciplines in which I've had a lifelong interest. The gulf between their peer-reviewed content and what you (and I) read in popular science magazines is vast. There is nothing wrong with them unless you are suckered into thinking that they're the last word. They are not, they have to sell copies from magazine racks or annual subs to survive, and if you quote them in ignorance of the real leading-edge science you are in danger of being misled. The banner headline of the fungus piece in SA is a sensationalist piece of scaremongering that is not reflected either by the content of the article, which is largely anecdotal, or by real science. Have you even looked at it? There may be some truth in the content apropos of threats from fungi, but the world is not about to melt down in a mass of mycelium any time soon. To their credit, they do quote sources from peer-reviewed science in some cases (not this one), but I do wonder how many of their readers actually follow those up. Yes they are respectable and respected. They are still just potted science. By the way, if you click on the name of the journalist who penned the article you will see a list of other articles of hers which, undeniably, generally kick off on the sensationalist side of things. SA has to sell copies. Good luck to it.

One problem with potato blight, Kevin, is that the potato fields or allotment plots you see consist of a single variety. As potatoes are reproduced vegetatively, what you see are clones. Because there is no genetic variability, each and every plant is equally susceptible to blight, so the fungus sweeps through the whole crop and destroys the lot. Efforts to find blight-resistant varieties have met with limited success. Our predilection for growing vast areas of monoculture makes us our own worst enemy in some regards.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 Feb 22 - 01:12 PM

From your Lancet piece, Kevin:

"Mucormycosis is caused by ubiquitous environmental moulds with a global distribution, including the Rhizopus, Apophysomyces, Mucor, and Lichtheimia species. Although generally harmless to an immunocompetent host, the infection can be deadly in patients with an impaired immune system, such as in those with haematological malignancies or poorly controlled diabetes, or in individuals receiving steroids or other immunosuppressants."

The article goes on to state that there were 11700 cases being treated in India on a date last May. Well the population of India is over 1.3 billion people. So it's a very rare disease, despite the ubiquitous nature of the fungal spores in question, that generally only affects people with underlying conditions. We're constantly battling old and new infection agents and 'twas ever thus. We shouldn't be complacent, but neither should we be unduly alarmist.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 05 Feb 22 - 01:14 PM

"Our predilection for growing vast areas of monoculture makes us our own worst enemy in some regards. "

Precisely.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 05 Feb 22 - 01:24 PM

Okay, time for the lecture: Someone has to write good science for lay people. Scientific American isn't an aggregator, pulling in links from various scholarly journals and putting the abstracts and a few teaser statements on a page that attracts eyeballs and the ads make money. Scientific American has people who write original articles about subjects and they get their information from scholarly journals. They tend to link back to themselves as source material, but it took a few keystrokes searching Google Scholar to land one of the original articles about Candida auris that this article references.

It's a good starting point, like Wikipedia for references. Start there and work up if you need the rest of the scholarly detail.

Those who can, do. Those who can't teach. I've always thought that statement was short-sighted and dismissive, but if it will get you to stop with the "I used to teach science so I know better" stuff, sobeit. These Scientific American articles do like you did, teach. There's nothing wrong with teaching science so you need to stop dismissing your journalistic peers as if you're better than them. There is plenty of room for good science material in the world, and nothing wrong with reaching the masses.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 Feb 22 - 02:12 PM

I haven't got any journalistic peers as I'm not a journalist.

"I used to teach science so I know better"

I've never said anything like that in my life and I'll thank you for not ascribing it to me, thanks. It's a rather cheap shot, isn't it?

I'm not knocking any of the magazines I've mentioned. I am saying that they are not the be-all and end-all, and their science content lacks the rigour and the detail of learned journals. Often, it's the hard stuff, the technical stuff, the equations, that have to be omitted. Science is hard graft, and, while one major job of science is to communicate to everyone, it's very important to recognise (and communicate that recognition) that magazines hold less than half of the truth. That's all. They have a role. But the fungus article, with its anecdotal content and its implicit appeal to authority, whilst an entertaining read, falls well short. That's my opinion. If your opinion is different you can say so, if you like, without the accompanying abrasion.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 05 Feb 22 - 03:44 PM

Your main tool for shutting down opinions you disagree with is to say that you taught science. We've all seen it many times.

Hard science is over the heads of most readers and they're never going to approach it. Popular science journals offer the basics and more information and detail can be had by those who wish to find it. No cheap shot, just a frank appraisal of how you approach anything to do with science. From the Scientific American article:

Almost exactly four years earlier he and the CDC had sent an urgent bulletin to hospitals, telling them to be on the lookout. The fungus had not yet appeared in the U.S., but Chiller had been chatting with peers in other countries and had heard what happened when the microbe invaded their health-care systems. It resisted treatment by most of the few drugs that could be used against it. It thrived on cold hard surfaces and laughed at cleaning chemicals; some hospitals where it landed had to rip out equipment and walls to defeat it. It caused fast-spreading outbreaks and killed up to two thirds of the people who contracted it.

This writerly-style to general science writing gives a basic understanding of the problem. These are review articles that contain generalizations but also discuss specific studies. You the reader don't want to get this disease or condition, you want to know if it's out there, and you want to know more about how to prevent it. You're engaged.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 05 Feb 22 - 04:07 PM

But Steve your post
"There is a potential for a simple fungus8 to wipe out vast populations"

Populations of who or what? Potato blight? White-rot on my onions, leeks and garlic? appeared to be mocking the very idea that fungal infections can be an extremely serious matter, my link to The Lancet illustrates.

It's always waste of energy getting into feudlets.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 Feb 22 - 04:30 PM

Blimey.

In biology, "population" doesn't just mean humans. My request for elucidation was perfectly appropriate. I was absolutely not mocking and I didn't start a feudlet. I was asking for clarification of a statement that was too vague to be useful. Every remark I've made about fungal diseases has been an attempt to keep the thing in proportion and try to sidestep alarmism. The disease referred to in your Lancet piece is serious for those who catch it, but when one continues to read down the article one sees that it's actually very rare (I picked out the numbers) and does not affect people with normally-functioning immune responses. You can read that as well as I can. Hardly contentious.

"Your main tool for shutting down opinions you disagree with is to say that you taught science. We've all seen it many times."

I have never used my scientific background to "shut down opinions." I challenge you to present examples of when I've done that. You are trying to shut down perfectly civil yet provocative discussion via personal attacks, aren't you? It's beneath you and you need to step back from that.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 05 Feb 22 - 05:04 PM

I don't have to prove anything. We've all seen you do it. Now let's end this off topic bickering. Again.

Meanwhile, COVID-19.

The CDC is moving toward that fourth shot. A booster booster. CDC plans to let people with weakened immune systems get a booster earlier
That means allowing a fourth Pfizer or Moderna shot at three months instead of five

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is planning to update its guidance for some people with weakened immune systems to receive a booster dose of the coronavirus vaccine three months after completing the initial series of the Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna vaccine rather than at the current interval of five months.

Agency officials presented the anticipated changes Friday during a meeting of the CDC’s outside vaccine experts on the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices. The updated guidance is expected to be released Monday.

Recommendations for some immunocompromised people are already different from guidance for the general population because those with frail immune systems are at increased risk for severe covid-19 complications and more likely to be infected even after they are fully vaccinated. Once infected, they can also potentially harbor mutations that could lead to more virulent new variants, experts say.

CDC recommends people with weak immune systems receive three primary shots plus a booster for a total of four doses. But given the less-than-optimal immune response that these individuals typically have with their first three doses, a booster at three months may provide better protection, especially when there is such high transmission of the omicron variant, Elisha Hall, a CDC health education specialist, said Friday.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 05 Feb 22 - 06:14 PM

We've got an extra booster here now if you are in a vulnerable group, by illness or age, making a fourth in all. I had mine on Thursday. No side effects from any of them.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 05 Feb 22 - 06:19 PM

Was that a second booster (i.e. fourth vaccination), McG? If so, how did you come by it - were you invited for it by your Dr’s surgery or the NHS, or did you have to apply for it? I haven’t heard of such a thing up here in the Yellowbelly-Backwoods.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 Feb 22 - 07:59 PM

It's good to see restrictions being lifted in various EU countries (as well as ours). The vaccines have hit the thing on the head. You catch it now, you won't die of it or go to hospital because of it.

Negative again this morning and last Thursday too. Vaccines and testing, the way to go. And both those things, if done, leave us to make our own decisions and help us to be normal again. It'll take time, of course. I'd love to go on holiday to Italy again. Haven't dared for almost three years now. Mrs Steve and I, from running scared a few months ago, are now in "well, let's see..." mode...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 06 Feb 22 - 09:12 AM

I just had a text from our group praitice telling me I was on for a fourth jab ( second booster), and popped into the chemist. I don't know if it's a general thing - I've not seen anything about it - or a local try-out. Reassuring, anyway.

We've all been lucky about side effects in our family, for any kind of vaccinations.   That means we never expect to get them, and I suspect that feeds back and reduces the likelihood of having them..

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Feb 22 - 10:31 AM

Side effects of a serious nature are vanishingly rare. You're more likely to be run over by a London bus in Bude.

I honestly don't understand the reluctance to get the jab. I listened to the articulate, supercilious and utterly wrong-headed young woman on Question Time last Thursday. So wrong-headed that it's hard to know what to say in response to people like that. Every day I'm consuming pesticide residues on my fruit and veg. Every day I breathe in particulate matter from car exhausts. If I get a headache I might take a paracetamol. My telly might be giving off a bit of ionising radiation. The cleaning materials I use in the house might be slowly poisoning me. All that butter... All potentially deadly (we're variously told), but hey ho, life is there to be lived. A jab doesn't hurt (I haven't even felt any of my three). You are not going to be adversely affected. Jabs are safer than all those things I've mentioned, and they work and they help you to protect others, and you won't die or end up in hospital. What's not to like? If you think your body is such a temple, you'd better go off and live alone in the wilderness and consume nothing bar locusts and wild honey. No beer, wine, whisky (heaven forfend!) or shagging (you might catch something).

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Charmion
Date: 06 Feb 22 - 10:59 AM

I'm with you, Steve.

The very same people griping about the possibility of negative effects from vaccines are not at all shy about driving stupid big trucks all over the place in foul weather. Hypocrites, the lot of 'em.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 06 Feb 22 - 11:20 AM

A really good reason for never catching COVID-19 - Long COVID.

"Treatment options for long COVID are not robust, and they’re mainly geared towards treating the symptoms, organ by organ with anti-inflammatories for the lungs, beta blockers for a racing heart rate, etc. Although some innovative options are being explored, their use for long COVID remains unproven until they are studied more widely."

I was a healthy 38-year-old … but now I have long COVID

As a social epidemiologist who deals with big data and knew that COVID cases were on the rise, I was certain it was a false negative. The test itself even carried a warning that false negatives were possible and that clinical observations and patient history should be taken into consideration. But I was sent home, and by the end of March 2020, I thought I was on the road to recovery.

Then, in April, I had a seizure and was rushed to the hospital. At the ER, the doctor reviewed my medical case history and concluded that I had COVID. She said that I was lucky and tests showed my organs did not have lasting damage.

But after the seizure, I lay in my bedroom for weeks with the curtains drawn, because light and sound hurt. I started suffering from tremors, extreme migraine headaches, a feeling that I was walking on rocks, and a pins-and-needles sensation that radiated through my body. There were times that I needed a cane to help me walk, and I knew something was seriously wrong with me.

It was not until months later that I discovered I was a long-hauler — part of a growing group of people who have COVID-19 and have never fully recovered. Later, we would be given an official name of Post-Acute Sequelae of SARS-CoV-2 infection (PASC), which is estimated to affect between 30 percent and 60 percent of people who become infected with COVID-19.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 06 Feb 22 - 12:24 PM

The Lancet published a quack doctor that claimed vaccines caused autism
from the mercury antibiotic.

That started in small part a modern anti vax phenom in America.
I know of no harm done by scientific american. Redundant old folk crumudgeons disagree. So What. I will continue to devour every SA momthly issue since I was 11 no matter what strange strangers say.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 06 Feb 22 - 12:36 PM

I agree Steve. Hard to understand that kind of thinking. I hesitate to call it thinking even.

I remember many years ago when I was by chance at Woodstock Festival talking to one of the people working in the hospital tent - she was saying how weird it was to have kids in who had got problems after gulping all kinds of unidentified stuff but they'd freak out at the idea of medical drugs of any sort , even antibiotics or paracetamol.

That girl on Question Time was very irritating, so smug and self satisfied.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Feb 22 - 01:24 PM

"I know of no harm done by scientific american. Redundant old folk crumudgeons disagree."

Tell us what you really think. Name those crumudgeons [sic]. I'm sure they won't mind.

As a matter of fact, I know of no harm done either.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Charmion's brother Andrew
Date: 06 Feb 22 - 05:56 PM

Donuel, that is an "adjuvant" that you're thinking of.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Feb 22 - 06:43 PM

Something to google (sorry...)

"Vastly unequal US has world’s highest Covid death toll – it’s no coincidence..."

It's a lengthy piece in the Guardian and it makes for a very sobering read about how the US is handling the pandemic badly.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 06 Feb 22 - 09:11 PM

Agreed, always check the source for anything that seems very surprising. You don't have to understand the scientific language much toget a sense of whetherwhat's been asserted is consistent the original paper.

The same goes for a eprt that isnmt particularly surprising if it is about something that matters. There's nothing improbable about that a variant fungal infection could get badly out of hand, or indeed that a catastrophic asteroid had been spotted heading fot earth, but you'd want to check the source.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 06 Feb 22 - 10:41 PM

From a New York Times editorial today:

The Covid Policy That Really Mattered Wasn’t a Policy

You know what’s better than a vaccine mandate? A society that doesn’t need one.

We began this pandemic by asking the wrong questions, and thus we got the wrong answers. Rewind to October 2019. The Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security and the Nuclear Threat Initiative release the Global Health Security Index. It ranks 195 countries on their pandemic preparedness. Each country is judged on prevention policy, on detection capabilities, on response infrastructure, on health system capacity, on international cooperation and on underlying risk. The news is reassuring, at least if you live in the United States: We’re No. 1!

Then, only months later, we get an actual, once-in-a-century pandemic. The United States fails the test. We have more infections, more deaths, more pain and suffering and division and grief. Our performance doesn’t just fall short of rich countries like Germany and Denmark. It falls short of far poorer countries, too. The Global Health Security Index was measuring the wrong things. The researchers later noted that tucked inside the report was a finding about the United States that would prove more predictive of our response: “It had the lowest possible score on public confidence in the government.”

But that leaves the question: What were the right questions? What did we miss?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 07 Feb 22 - 07:24 AM

Handling the pandemic badly began with China misinforming and hiding the truth for 20 days until over 80,000 cases spread wildly.
Up until then they claimed no human transmission cases. They could have released the virus code by week one.
Most countries made the same early mistakes and made a health issue a political matter. Madness, but human.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 07 Feb 22 - 07:44 AM

You may recall the first mention of Covid on this forum in January 2020. It was called the The coming global pandemic that I wrote. Nigel was the first to respond mentioning I had overestimated fatalities by a factor of 3. He was eventually correct.
The thread was closed.

I am not predicting a fungal pandemic but I do warn the biggest mistake we can make is not sharing science information regarding pandemics, not being transparent, accusing each other of crying wolf and witholding any information for social reasons.

In the next pandemic there will be obvious repeats of social science failures. We don't lern 2 good imo.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 07 Feb 22 - 12:47 PM

We'll let Kevin have the last word on the selection and treatment of popular science journals, shall we, and move on?

Meanwhile, according to the Wall Street Journal Two Years Into Pandemic, Shoppers Are Still Hoarding
Bulk-buying habit is expected to stick as people eat more at home, supply remains uncertain and inflation rears up. Retailers and producers are shifting operations as a result.

People are still practicing hoarding behavior that started with the pandemic.

Alexis Abell recently walked out of a BJ’s Wholesale Club outside Buffalo, N.Y., with 24 boxes of Kraft Macaroni & Cheese, a box of 50 frozen mozzarella sticks, a 40-pound bag of basmati rice and a 12-can pack of garbanzo beans.

“I don’t want to be in a position again where I can’t get something,” says Ms. Abell, a 41-year-old mother of five, who was laid off from her retail job at a quilt shop in 2020 and decided not to return to work.

She estimates her family is now spending about 25% more a week on food and staples than before the pandemic, and she is buying more than twice as much of some staples and household supplies. . . .

After more than 20 years of steady but slow sales growth, sales at bulk retailers Costco Wholesale Corp., Walmart Inc.’s Sam’s Club and BJ’s Wholesale Club Holdings Inc. rose 26.6% in dollars and 18% in volume during the fourth quarter of 2021 compared with the same quarter of 2019, according to IRI, far greater than any other type of retail including dollar stores, grocery, drugstores and mass merchants.

I've quoted a bit since the WSJ has a fairly robust paywall.

I realized I had more stuff in the freezer here than usual, and have tried to change my routine. My shopping entails replacing things I've run out of and fresh produce as I draw down frozen and canned foods. There is an extra package of toilet paper in my hall cupboard; usually I buy multi-packs that go under the sink in each bathroom. That spare one does go back to early COVID.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Feb 22 - 06:16 PM

There's a bit of a groundswell in the UK ( and several other countries in Europe) that we are getting on top of this, that cases are falling and that we should relax, just a little. That we don't need restrictions forced on us (we can make up our own minds). I did a load of shopping in Truro today. I guesstimated that around a third to a half of people have ditched their masks, just a week after the mask mandate was lifted. We haven't got the best vaccination rate in the world, but we do have a pretty good rate. Who knows what's around the corner, but worrying about that is no way to live our lives. I have a hospital appointment tomorrow and I have to wear a mask to go in there. Last week at my first appointment, the chap in the medical assessment unit told me to take it off after I'd complained how hot his room was. We're making progress (except that he was, unfortunately, a Man U supporter). The way forward is to get vaccinated and to keep on testing. Our lateral flow test kits are still free and easy to get, in boxes of seven at a time. In our house we are using about six test kits per week, extra ones before visits to hospitals and the elderly. A very welcome development is that fewer and fewer people seem to be worrying any more. If you're jabbed and boosted, you won't end up in hospital because of this virus and you won't die of it. That'll do me!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 08 Feb 22 - 06:33 AM

Out of 100,000 people, 8 unvaccinated will die of covid.

Out of 100,000 Vaccinated people .01 will die of covid.
Yep its less than 1 person.
When millions of people are infected we see 2000 a day die of covid.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 08 Feb 22 - 10:30 AM

Alas, we're still seeing high death rates. 2,739 people died in the US (documented cases) on February 7, 2022. The equivalent of 5⁺ packed-full super-sized jetliner crashes in one day.

Our World in Data (Oxford University)

Coronavirus in the U.S.: Latest Map and Case Count (New York Times)

The UK hit quite a spike over the holidays (according to the Oxford site) but the US has the lead in daily deaths right now.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Feb 22 - 11:44 AM

Not comparable unless we're all measuring daily deaths the same way. And even if we could agree on the method, it could still be the wrong way. Anyway, your relatively high death rate is a function of the patchy coverage of your vaccination programme. If you're fully vaccinated, you don't die *of* covid-19.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 08 Feb 22 - 01:45 PM

Scaling up figures is never too trustworthy, but the official UK figures work out as about 1,600 at the size of the US, whilr the New York Times gives UK daily rate as around 1000.

Whatever, it's clear a lot of people are dying who shouldn't be dying.

True enough, fully vaccinated, the chances are good we won't die even if we catch Covid. But there is still a chance, and that gets worse for those of us in a more vulnerable group.   Or for any unvaccinated person who catches it from us.

Panic time is over, but it's too early to ease off completely. I'm still wearing a mask in company, and prefer the company of people who do the same.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 08 Feb 22 - 01:55 PM

What is covid breeding humans for?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Feb 22 - 03:37 PM

"True enough, fully vaccinated, the chances are good we won't die even if we catch Covid. But there is still a chance..."

If you catch Covid and you've already got something else, sure. There's a massive difference between dying with covid and dying of covid. That must impact the numbers. If you're fully jabbed, your chances of dying of just covid are next to nil. However, when you're dead you're dead I suppose, so for us wrinklies who are already suffering from this, that or the other we should worry just a little, but there's little reason for a fully-vaccinated person to worry ore about covid than there is for them to worry about complications from flu. We are on the brink of more or less normal lives now, and I for one want to embrace that. No more shutting kids out of schools or university. No more poverty-stricken families trapped in their flats with their stir-crazy kids for weeks on end. No more bans on meeting loved ones. No more abandoning Christmas. No more economy-wrecking lockdowns. No more assaults on people's mental health. The vaccines have changed everything.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 08 Feb 22 - 05:24 PM

US estimates we have more people who have had covid {80%}
than folks who are vaccinated (65%).

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Feb 22 - 05:30 PM

Two things. Vaccines don't stop you from catching it. And millions caught it before there were any vaccines.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 08 Feb 22 - 06:03 PM

I think the distinction between "Dying with Covid. And "dying of Covid" is not particularly relevant.

"Dying with Covid" can mean someone who is dying anyway who catches Covid on their deathbed. But in most cases it means someone who had some existing condition which did not in itself threaten life, who catches Covid, and who dies.

That's a death that wouldn't have taken place without Covid just as much as that of someone who was in perfect health until they caught Covid.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 08 Feb 22 - 06:40 PM

The entropy of death begins around 21 for most people and for some much earlier. Death in all its forms can not be simply catagorized. Death only seems rational and always attributal.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Feb 22 - 06:50 PM

Hmm. One case considered at a time, I'd rather say. In the same sense as "everyone in the graveyard votes the same," it doesn't matter to the unfortunate person who has joined the choir invisible what got or didn't get him or her, that much can't be gainsaid. I was merely casting doubt as to how the covid death numbers are arrived at and how the methods of gleaning those numbers might vary from country to country. Before the vaccines, a death ascribed to coronavirus was hard to contest. Things are nowhere as clear these days. Note how the nightly death numbers are now given with the caveat "though some of these deaths may have been by other causes."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Feb 22 - 06:53 PM

"The entropy of death begins around 21 for most people and for some much earlier."

I see death as a discrete event at the very end of a person's life. Decline and death are not the same thing.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 08 Feb 22 - 09:41 PM

My uncle died with covid, but not of covid. He died of old age. He ought not have been counted in the covid nursing home deaths, but I think he was.

These distinctions do matter.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Feb 22 - 04:25 AM

Agreed. And, of course, statistics are highly vulnerable to abuse and misuse.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 09 Feb 22 - 06:02 AM

Old people die, but they don't die "of old age".

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Feb 22 - 07:44 AM

"Die of old age" is a catch-all phrase which (having seen my mum gently fade away in October 2020) I find perfectly acceptable. Sure, a couple of contributory, long-term conditions were mentioned on the death certificate, but I knew that she had had multiple issues for years that had sent her weakening body on a downward spiral which were not mentioned. She was 91, she was overweight and she'd smoked for 70 years. All sorts of things. There was nothing controversial and when I'm asked what she died of I'm quite happy to say that it was old age, rather than list a plethora of conditions that may have contributed.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 09 Feb 22 - 08:32 AM

It's what people say, and it's not offensive, but it's not strictly accurate. And it can be used inappropriately, where some old person who is in fair health and could be expected to live for years dies because something has happened that shouldn't or needn't have happened.

Being infected with Covid is an example. Or, as more is learned, catching Covid and not getting the right treatment.

There are better expressions that have dropped out of use. "Died at a ripe old aged" "Full of years". Of course there is still "Had a good innings". Though I don't think Americans say that - their innings in baseball are pretty short affairs. What is their equivalent saying?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 09 Feb 22 - 08:50 AM

"All remaining Covid restrictions in England - including the legal rule to self-isolate - could end later this month, Boris Johnson has said."

One reason only for this announcement. Boris would do anything to try to hold on to hid job.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Feb 22 - 09:00 AM

Well I agree with him.

As for dying of old age, I'd known my mum's multifarious conditions for donkeys' years, had taken her to countless hospital appointments and helped her to manage the seven or eight different medications she was taking. Two conditions were mentioned on the death certificate, but any of several others could easily have been. The busy doctor who signed it had hardly known my mum at all. Had he written "old age" on the certificate I'd have been OK with that (do they ever write that?). It's only words, and they're fairly gentle ones.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 09 Feb 22 - 10:44 AM

Very reasonable to accept "old age" in the case of your mother, Steve, and in many other cases. But less so in others. If there is reason to suspect an old person has not been given proper medical or physical care it would not be right to accept a cause of death to be "old age".
……..
Easing up restrictions as things get better is right, and in time ending them entirely. But, to abolish entirely the requirement to self isolate when infected, is not appropriate at a time when hundreds of people are still dying everyday. I doubt very much whether that this was done at the recommendation of the medical experts, and see the timing of this as very much Boris playing politics.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Feb 22 - 11:36 AM

The requirement might end but the emphasis should be on transitioning to personal responsibility instead. Let's face it: millions of people either don't know that they've got it or aren't willing to admit that they've got it. Like countless others, I deleted the COVID-19 app when I realised that I could be ordered under pain of sanction to self-isolate whilst others who didn't have the app could stay under the radar. Ludicrous. I doubt that the self-isolation rules, for these reasons, made an awful lot of difference. So lifting the restrictions will make no difference to me. If I test positive (and we are using a whole box of test kits up in our house every week), I'll self-isolate, my own decision, end of. I'd like to think that the government will relay that message in no uncertain terms to everyone.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 09 Feb 22 - 01:07 PM

I suppose there are three categories of people - those who do the right thing whatever the guidance or the law, those who do what they are told to do, only so long as they are told they must do it, and those who go there own way regardless of any effect on other people.

You fall in the first category, as any responsible person must, and the last lot I would say are beneath contempt.   But there are an awful lot who fall into that middle category, and they are the ones this policy will affect.

And that's why I think it is premature and irresponsible.

I would never regard anything Boris Johnson says as a reliable guide to anything.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 11 Feb 22 - 10:02 PM

I've gotten undeployed for the Covid hotline, as nobody calls anymore, or hardly anyone, and the people there can handle it.

A good sign.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 12 Feb 22 - 04:53 AM

A very good sign Mrrzy!
I was chatting to my sister-up-in-Scotland yesterday on the phone, and she told me she is almost back to normal after the (very!) long Covid of two years' duration. But she told me a few things I didn't know about the side effects. Her hair fell out and she had large bald patches, which have now regrown with a different sort of hair - very fine and fluffy! Also, her gums became inflamed and bled all the time. But her dentist (she had a check-up last week) said they had calmed down and were back to normal. Her upset stomach episodes have also now ceased.
Now, I had no idea that these problems can occur with this blasted virus. But as she's a (retired) doctor, she knows what she's talking about, and apparently many many people have suffered in the same way.
Gulp!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 12 Feb 22 - 06:30 AM

We are not all in this together. There are the people who stayed home and the people brought the food to them. That would include the truckers who are demonstrating this seperation of the essentials from the non essentials. Canada then in the US nd western Europe the trucker demonstrations will come

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 12 Feb 22 - 10:12 AM

I think most lorry drivers over here are quite happy about getting vaccines, the same way as most people generally.   Anti-vaxers, while they can be noisy, are generally seen as a bit weird. Which of course they are.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 13 Feb 22 - 10:50 AM

Its more complex than pro or anti anything. No one likes having to be subserviant to a beaurocratic manager or the ass hole with more money.
Even the Covid rescue money went to rich corporations like 10 million to a law firm but 10 grand to restaurant workers. Rescue rules have never been fair. Wall St got huge bail outs but those who lost houses lost homes in the gambling practice of criminal mortgage bundleing.

Getting to the heart of the problem in pandemic times has many pre existing lies, theft and death by gun legislation; Gore v. Bush, Iraq war, vaccines cause autism, a fast and loose FDA, Corporate corruption of government through money, enforced poverty by enhanced systemic racism etc.
The mendacity of the bull shit system casts the pandemic in dark amoral diseased shit. Morality is mocked for being mere virtue signaling. Thats my arguement that the problem is bigger than vax or no vax. Truckers have their reasons to demonstrate for many reasons they may not be able to articulate. Taking action is the one thing they can do.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 13 Feb 22 - 11:02 AM

Actually I think there are quite a lot of people who do like to be told what to do.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 13 Feb 22 - 11:13 AM

And there are lots of people who do what they're told to do in spite of not liking it. The heroes of the pandemic, after the care workers and NHS workers, have been the British people, who have overwhelmingly complied with the rules. Unlike their shabby rulers. That's why I think we can now move to putting responsibility for safe behaviour back in the hands of the people, no more rules, thanks.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 13 Feb 22 - 12:22 PM

”David Nabarro, a special envoy on Covid-19 for the World Health Organization, also highlighted the uncertainty of how future variants might behave: “There will be more variants after Omicron and if they are more transmissible they will dominate. In addition, they may cause different patterns of illness, in other words they may turn out to be more lethal or have more long-term consequences.”

Nabarro urged authorities to continue to plan for the possibility that there will be surges in numbers of people who are ill and need hospital care. “It would be prudent to encourage people to protect themselves and others consistently. An approach that does not do this would be a gamble with potentially severe consequences. I cannot see any upsides to such a gamble. The pandemic has a long way to go and – as is the case since it started – people and their leaders will influence its long-term impact through actions they take now.”

Extract from yesterday’s Guardian article on the possible consequences of the inevitable next Covid-19 variant.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 13 Feb 22 - 01:08 PM

Ontario and Ottawa are arresting protestors. Finally. A New York Times article today talked about how inarticulate the protestors are for their reasons to be there - the vaccination status was never really that big a deal - but behind the scenes the social media is full of racist and anti-science irrational speech. When the money from other haters (probably in the US) dried up I suspect a lot of the protestors lost interest since their reasons for being present were mostly pecuniary.

Recent bickering posts have been removed. All parties should walk away from the computer for a few minutes before hitting "Submit message" and consider if you really need to send it or if it will simply derail the conversation.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 13 Feb 22 - 08:03 PM

Well I did read that Guardian piece. It's true that there could be variants around the corner that could make life difficult. The thing is, since the dawn of mankind we've lived with the threat of diseases just around the corner. In the past, we've had neither the understanding of the pathogens involved, the medicines needed, nor the vaccines. But now we have those things. Keep on arguing if you like that we must keep restrictions in place until we make the virus extinct. Keep on arguing that we must keep restrictions in place because there are millions of vulnerable or immune-compromised people. Thing is, we will never make the virus extinct unless (like SARS) it decides to make itself extinct. The vulnerable people were here long before COVID-19 and, whilst we must take all reasonable steps to protect them, we need to get back to where we were, very likely with a greater understanding of their needs than before, in order to enjoy the freedoms that come with living in a democracy (in other words, no edicts, no mandates but with pressure on everyone to take responsibility for the wellbeing of all of us). If you believe in mandates and laws, then your responsibility is to say when that will stop. It's a responsibility that is almost always flunked.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 13 Feb 22 - 08:17 PM

It decides to make itself extinct?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 13 Feb 22 - 08:48 PM

Well put it this way: it became extinct without interventions from us. There was never a vaccine, for example.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 13 Feb 22 - 09:05 PM

Small pox did not make itself extinct nor will covid but we can take advantage of weaker variants if and when they happen. Globally speaking 2 more years is a possibility. Or these are the good ol days.
Oh and thanks for your omnipotant permission Steve.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 13 Feb 22 - 10:44 PM

Smallpox disappearing is entirely due to global efforts of administering the smallpox vaccine. When my children were small and getting immunizations, I asked their pediatrician if they would get the smallpox vaccine. He laughed at that and said "no" - he was enough younger than me that perhaps he didn't get the smallpox vaccine at school like I did, and my siblings, and every child in the state as far as I know (this was still being administered in the early 1960s.) It wasn't a choice, everyone got it. Science and medical common sense ruled.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Feb 22 - 04:39 AM

SARS became extinct because it wasn't very catching. As far as I know, work is still going on to make a vaccine for it. Comparison with the ridding of the planet of smallpox is spurious. As for covid-19, we have no idea at present what path it will take over years and decades to come. We need to be vigilant and keep on top of the drive to get even better vaccines (and make them available everywhere). If there's one lesson we can take from smallpox and polio, it's that one.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 14 Feb 22 - 07:38 PM

SARS is not extinct on *this* planet.

Long Covid may be vagus nerve damage.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Feb 22 - 08:07 PM

Well I have no idea what you mean by that. SARS lasted for less than three years in the early 21st century, infecting just a few thousand people only, and there have been no cases for seventeen years or more. It is effectively extinct in the human population (unless you have a different definition of extinct). Like smallpox, samples of the virus still exist in research laboratories. It doesn't mean that it's impossible for a variant to leap from wild animals. As yet, that hasn't happened and it's been quite a long time. I think that's probably enough to rest my case. Cheers.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Feb 22 - 08:35 PM

More on that (source: BBC):

One of the most recent viruses to vanish was Sars. The world first became aware of its existence on 10 February 2003, after the Beijing office of the World Health Organization (WHO) received an email describing “a strange contagious disease” which had killed 100 people in the space of a week...

...Sars was driven to extinction by a combination of sophisticated contact-tracing and the quirks of the virus itself.
Fast-forward two years, and the virus had infected at least 8,096 people, 774 of whom died. But it could have been so much worse.

Like its close relative Covid-19, Sars had many of the necessary qualities for world domination – it was an RNA virus, meaning it was able to evolve rapidly, and it was spread through droplets expelled when breathing, which are hard to avoid. At the time, many experts were concerned that the virus could cause devastation on the same level as the HIV crisis, or even the 1918 flu pandemic, which infected a third of the world’s population and killed 50 million.

Instead, Sars disappeared as abruptly as it arrived. By January 2004, there were just a handful of cases – and by the end of the month, the last suspected natural infection was announced (There was another outbreak a couple of months later, when it is thought to have escaped from a Beijing research lab – twice).

So what happened?

In a nutshell, we got lucky. According to Sarah Cobey, an epidemiologist at the University of Chicago, Sars was driven to extinction by a combination of sophisticated contact-tracing and the quirks of the virus itself....

...When patients with Sars got sick, they got very sick. The virus had a staggeringly high fatality rate –almost one in five patients died – but this meant that it was relatively easy to identify those who were infected, and quarantine them. There was no extra spread from people without symptoms, and as a bonus, Sars took a relatively long time to incubate before it became contagious, which gave contact-tracers extra time to find anyone who might be infected before they could pass it on.

So there you go. We has the resourcefulness to recognise it quickly and the virus wasn't very good at spreading. We helped it on its way, but it ultimately squashed itself out of existence. "Extinct" does it for me.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Feb 22 - 08:39 PM

Incidentally, two different strains of smallpox also made themselves extinct in medieval times, without any help from us. I don't think that covid-19 is going to do that but I'm thinking that it will probably keep its head down. Eventually...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Feb 22 - 06:39 AM

We had a longish interview with Novak Djokovic on the radio this morning. He put his case for refusing the vaccine very lucidly (and he speaks English better than most English people I know). He will miss the French Open and Wimbledon rather then get jabbed. He is not anti-vaccine (he sez) but is strongly pro-personal freedom. He shows the same brand of wrong-headedness as the articulate young woman on Question Time I mentioned the other week, utterly failing to recognise that taking the vaccine is not just about you and your freedoms but is also about protecting the community. In spite of his apparent sincerity and clear articulation of his argument, my sympathy for him did not increase one iota.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 15 Feb 22 - 07:25 AM

He doth protest too much.
Relax, we all know you are always right, never wrong and the boss of every thread.
All manner of virus are found in any level four lab around the world as well as secret military labs.

Single word choice discussions are seldom pithy.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 15 Feb 22 - 09:01 AM

Back to news: how about that vagus nerve, eh?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Charmion
Date: 15 Feb 22 - 09:10 AM

Now that Ontario is emerging from the Omicron surge, capacity limits on communal and commercial spaces will be relaxed next week, and the system of vaccine certificates and compulsory contact tracing will be abandoned on 1 March. Hospital admissions for COVID are dropping rapidly, so elective surgeries will resume soon. The doctors say it will take months of flat-out work to handle the cancelled and postponed procedures, let alone dealing with new cases. I’m praying for continued success in not breaking anything.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 15 Feb 22 - 09:15 AM

Surely the needs of society outweigh the perceived freedoms of the individual.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Feb 22 - 09:25 AM

Sorry, Mrrzy, but a new interview with a high-profile vaccine-refuser IS news, if you don't mind d. Take it or leave it. As for the vagus, it's fine to keep saying the word but perhaps you'd care to tell us more.

The post at 07.25am is uncalled for and highly offensive and adds nothing to the conversation, fairly typical of the perpetrator. .

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 15 Feb 22 - 10:24 AM

two different strains of smallpox also made themselves extinct in medieval times

But we're not talking about those and they're meaningless in the face of the modern smallpox and the modern COVID. Dinosaurs have morphed into birds without our help. We're talking about science versus political stupidity.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Feb 22 - 12:42 PM

Historical cases of viruses which have either morphed or vanished are highly relevant to research on modern viruses. The fate of the SARS virus has helped to inform us of many of the epidemiological aspects of the current virus. Understanding the fate of viruses which have failed to become endemic is crucial in research on current viruses. It is not traditional to constrain threads on this board within extremely narrow limits. It's difficult at times to understand why you feel the need to do that. Looking at the broader picture is not only relevant, it is also what science always does. Before you throw the title of this thread back at me, please consider that the majority of the posts here have not delivered "new news." That's fine by me, and many of the people posting here haven't objected either. We are still talking about covid-19 after all, aren't we?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 15 Feb 22 - 01:20 PM

You do as you wish when it comes to speaking broadly or enforcing precise thread continuity.
"We tell it as it truly is, Donuel old chap. Now suck it up, look at yourself and talk to us about telescopes in space, right?"
Dinos & virus did go extinct but Stilly is right, some parts of life finds a way to change and go on. I don't know but I suspect total death and extinction is relatively rare. Broadly speaking 'nothing really dies completely'.

Now the Vagus nerve connects the mind and heart. Does long haul covid damage connectivity? Only the Mrzzy knows

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Feb 22 - 05:04 PM

Well it's clear that you don't.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 15 Feb 22 - 07:09 PM

I'm in the ongoing gene pool. Covid is in the ongoing corona rna pool.
Were in different pools but we're both strong swimmers.
Like DNA or rna, time also travels in a spiral like spring and not a straight arrow. Broadly speaking existence is spin and vector, just spin and vector. You name it and I'll show you its spin, twist and orbit.
However the entire universe is basicly a growing flat sponge.
doncha luv it?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 16 Feb 22 - 06:08 AM

Psilocybin?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 16 Feb 22 - 09:37 AM

Wait, why would only I know where the vagus nerve goes?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Feb 22 - 09:55 AM

I know too. May I...?

The vagus nerve is part of the autonomic nervous system. That system, as opposed to the central nervous system, is largely concerned with stuff that we don't have to think much about, such as heart rate and not forgetting to breathe. It connects many major organs with parasympathetic motor fibres. Because its branches reach many body parts and because many body parts are implicated in long covid, the nerve has been studied in samples of patients with long covid, and it's been found that observable vagus nerve abnormalities occur in some of those patients. At present, the evidence is observational only but it does look significant.

Fact-checking and corrections welcome. I'm a botanist really. Snarky remarks and accusations of thread-bossing are not welcome.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 16 Feb 22 - 10:45 AM

It sounds a bit to vagus for me

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 16 Feb 22 - 04:37 PM

Nigel if you asked Franz Tesla about his affinity to the number 3 you might not understand him but rest assured that his love of the universe was the reason he was passionate about the way he sees it. If you ask me about the spirals in the universe in the time dimension my answer would be long and passionate because I too love the universe even if it doesn't love me back. Some people are more or less at war with the universe. Does psilocybin 20 years ago have anything to do with my universe perceptions? Probably. It leaves the door open to perception

Ask a rhetorical question and you might get an answer.

Everything is a spiral from quarks in a proton to the Sun traveling around the Milky Way to the blueprints of life through time. When you were a fertlized egg you spiraled and spun down the fallopian tube with the help of swimming sperm that were the late arrivals.
Linear thinking is a common mistake we can make unless you are an accountant.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 16 Feb 22 - 07:49 PM

This could go in the Trump thread or the COVID-19 thread - toss up.

Trump's pick for Arizona secretary of state suggested Covid didn't exist and called vaccine a 'crime against humanity'

(CNN) Mark Finchem, the Arizona secretary of state candidate backed by former President Donald Trump, spread dangerous misinformation about the Covid-19 pandemic on social media, calling the vaccine a "crime against humanity," implying it was a "bio-weapon" and sharing an article last August that suggested Covid-19 did not exist in the Canadian province of Alberta.

A CNN KFile review of Finchem's social media postings on platforms popular with the extreme right wing found that he repeatedly promoted anti-vaccine rhetoric and other false claims about possible Covid-19 treatments, the efficacy of mask-wearing and the severity of the virus.
In August 2021, Finchem shared a story riddled with misinformation on the coronavirus and vaccine on the platform Gab -- a social media network popular with conservatives, the alt-right and some extremists -- writing, "It ain't a vaccine!!! Call it what it is, a crime against humanity."
Finchem also shared an image last August falsely claiming that a province in Canada had lifted its Covid protocols because "they can't produce an isolated sample of SARS-CoV-2 to prove covid exists to back their mandates."

I copy/pasted some from this story because the CNN links aren't very durable. This is the gist of the story.

Trump knows how to pick them. Or they know how to garble the news to get his attention and approval. Or both.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 16 Feb 22 - 08:43 PM

Finchem sounds like a deranged idiot who just needs a crowdfunding campaign to buy him a tinfoil lined hat.... I suppose the conspiracy theorists need their latest poster boy to drool over.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 16 Feb 22 - 08:46 PM

Even the Earth and Moon spiral round each other as they orbit the sun.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 17 Feb 22 - 06:24 AM

Donuel:
Does psilocybin 20 years ago have anything to do with my universe perceptions? Probably. It leaves the door open to perception

It also leaves the door open to false perceptions.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 17 Feb 22 - 07:03 AM

The more you know the more the possibility of the common pitfalls of false perceptions. THATS why a scientific method is needed to test fundamental laws. If I write about trends in perception in a BS social media thread you can see the strength/weakness of said perceptions.

My novel speculations/hypothesis about black holes and cosmic inflation are worthy of being tested.

PS There is a subatomic particle(s) with no spin. The Higgs boson is the only elementary particle with spin zero. If Z bosons or a graviton exist, they also would have 0 spin.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 17 Feb 22 - 07:13 AM

I will now back out of this covid focused thread and go to the SPACE thread.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 17 Feb 22 - 10:23 AM

Good move.

South Korea was the model of a good approach to COVID, but it is being hammered now. South Korea shifts its approach to the virus.

For the past two years, South Korea waged a successful battle against Covid-19 with a so-called three-T strategy: It ramped up lab “tests” to ferret out infections, it “traced” contacts using modern technology, and it “treated” patients by keeping them in isolation, where they were monitored by the government.

But as the fast-spreading Omicron variant threatens to overwhelm the public health system, that strategy now appears unsustainable — and it may even be pointless, South Korean officials say. Now, they are shifting the country’s pandemic focus to a new game plan: “select and focus.”

I?n the past week, South Korea has begun asking patients who test positive to simply look after themselves at home, while? the country redirects resources to those who are most vulnerable. This new approach has unsettled ?people who have grown used to the government’s heavy-handed virus intervention, and as the number of? people fending for themselves at home has surged, so have the complaints.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 19 Feb 22 - 10:46 AM

The Canadian truck protesters who are against required vaccinations are being rounded up since they didn't go away on their own. Canadian Covid-19 protesters and police face off in Ottawa amid freezing conditions

On Friday, the gridlock reached a crescendo when Ottawa police say protesters assaulted officers and tried to remove their weapons. One person was arrested after throwing a bicycle toward a police horse, police said, and by the end of the day more than 100 were arrested and 21 vehicles were towed. . . .

The Emergencies Act -- which is being invoked for the first time in the country since it passed in 1988 -- can provide for the use of the military, but may not necessarily lead to that, and the prime minister said the government is not bringing them in.

The points of contention have also become more delicate in recent days as some protesters placed young children between them and police. CNN has observed those children on the protest site in the last several days.

I think the "children as human shield" part of it is what is really going to get their asses put in jail.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 19 Feb 22 - 12:19 PM

General societal pandemic frustrations are worse than the precautions and lockdowns so ignoring risks may be safer. Opening schools with no more mask mandates for anyone may be the way to go now. CDC hopes to turn on a dime with the appearance of malicious varients.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 19 Feb 22 - 02:10 PM

Slight aside, but all perceptions are false. There is no rainbow in the sky, it is an artifact of your perceptual system.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 20 Feb 22 - 02:18 PM

How Long Covid Exhausts the Body

"Millions of people continue to suffer from exhaustion, cognitive problems and other long-lasting symptoms after a coronavirus infection. The exact causes of the illness, known as long Covid, are not known. But new research offers clues, describing the toll the illness takes on the body and why it can be so debilitating."

This is long and illustrated; if you hit the paywall you can edit your stored cookies to remove the NYTimes ones and read more free articles.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 20 Feb 22 - 07:17 PM

Coronavirus FAQ: Is it a good idea to get COVID before I'm over 60 and at higher risk?

The short answer - hell, no!

I'm in my 50s. If I'm going to get COVID, it seems like it would be better to get it before I'm older and in a higher-risk category. So — should I try to get COVID before I turn 60?

We spoke to three specialists and they all agree.

Definitely not, says Dr. Abraar Karan, an infectious disease physician at Stanford University.

"It's lunacy," says Dr. Sarah Fortune, professor of immunology and infectious diseases at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.

"There are very few times in medicine where we say go ahead and get the disease, because for the most part getting the disease is not good," says Dr. Fred Pelzman, associate professor of clinical medicine at Weill Cornell Medicine in New York City. "Once a vaccine became available for chicken pox, for example, no one was saying, go ahead and expose your child to chicken pox."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 20 Feb 22 - 07:53 PM

Stilly:
This is a music site. On Friday, the gridlock reached a crescendo when Ottawa police say protesters assaulted officers

Presumably the gridlock reached a high point. A 'crescendo' is a gradual increase (in volume). You do not usually 'reach a crescendo'. A crescendo leads you to something else.

end pedant mode.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Feb 22 - 08:43 PM

I've come across a ton of bullshit in my time, some of it from actual doctors, that it's a good idea to catch stuff while you're still young. Let's have chicken pox parties, etc. Let your kids crawl around on the kitchen floor and eat scraps of dropped two-day-old cream cake. That sort of thing. Toughen up your immune system. Stuff like that.

Well I don't think it's ever a great idea to catch any disease. Why would you ever want you/your kids to be sick?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 20 Feb 22 - 08:56 PM

Nigel, that was a quote. Not my words.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 21 Feb 22 - 01:31 AM

”Nigel, that was a quote. Not my words.”

Perhaps not my place to try to teach Granmaw to suck eggs, but isn’t it the standard way to indicate a quote by italicising the quoted piece and using quotation marks (what we used to call ‘inverted commas’)?

I frequently have difficulty identifying quotes in some people’s posts - simply using the above methodology would make these things far, far clearer and avoid confusion, n’est-ce pas?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 21 Feb 22 - 03:09 AM

BWM, I think the best method here for longer quotes which may run to several paragraphs is to use the blockquote (<blockquote> </blockquote>) tags to indent the quoted text. SRS usually does this.

Of course one may opt to combine this with italics and quotation marks.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 21 Feb 22 - 04:16 AM

That’s a fair point, Jon. But I think I would still italicise - in the post in question I didn’t realise Maggie was quoting whereas, if the blockquoted section had been italicised, I’d have been in no doubt. I just like to know for certain when someone is quoting.

Then again, maybe I’m a bit thick? ;-) :-)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 21 Feb 22 - 04:21 AM

All I can say there BWM, is I usually try (I'm not sure how consistent I am) to use all 3 indicators.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 21 Feb 22 - 05:06 AM

Makes sense, Jon. I shall try to be more aware from now on! ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 21 Feb 22 - 11:03 AM

In publishing quotes MLA and APA both give a word count - 40 words can be included in quote marks, longer than that should be a blockquote. I don't count the words often, I use just the blockquote because it is generally understood to be quoted material (and you don't use quote marks WITH blockquotes). Other style books give similar rules, but these are the two I work with most. The italics in the blockquote below are for emphasis of a quote within a quote (and I preferred italics to bold that was originally used.)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Feb 22 - 12:56 PM

No more free lateral flow tests after April 1. It's being predicted that a box of seven may cost £20. That means that the vast majority of people will stop self-testing. To me, the two main tenets of exercising personal responsibility, which is what the government now expects from us, are getting the vaccines and frequent testing (and keeping away from people if you test positive). I also note that boosters for most will not be provided until the autumn. For me, that will mean a whole year between boosters. I can't help thinking that Johnson is making wrong calls again. I think he's counting on a big seasonal drop in infection numbers. He'd better be right. I know that most countries charge big money for tests and that the UK is an exception. So mixed feelings this end.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 21 Feb 22 - 05:46 PM

Apologies, Maggie - I’d just got up, feeling very grumpy before my first cup of tea. I’ve recovered my equilibrium now.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 23 Feb 22 - 09:43 AM

Transport for London drops rules on compulsory face masks

"Passengers will no longer need to wear masks on the tube and other transport in the capital from Thursday, Transport for London has announced.

TfL said it would continue to strongly recommend masks are worn but would no longer make them mandatory.

TfL has previously continued to make mask-wearing a “condition of carriage” on London Underground and other services, even when the government said they were no longer a legal requirement.

However, compliance rates dropped without the threat of enforcement by police or fixed penalty notices. The legal requirement in England to wear masks on transport and other public settings, reimposed during the Omicron surge, was dropped in late January."

And

"TfL said independent testing by Imperial College London carried out monthly since September 2020 had no found traces of coronavirus on touch points in stations and on buses, and revealed that the whole transport network was well ventilated."

++

I was up in London at the start of February. The majority of passengers that I saw on the Tube were wearing masks.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 25 Feb 22 - 05:53 AM

All legal restrictions have been lifted here. One or two small shops still insist on face masks. Most people comply, me included, but the few who don't are not challenged (in my experience anyway).

It's over four weeks since the mask edict was dropped and case numbers have continued to fall. The Omicron surge went on unabated despite the mask mandate being restored two weeks before Christmas. I'm not drawing conclusions, nor resorting to bad science, just reporting what's happened. Confounding factors are many and significant and should never be set aside.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 25 Feb 22 - 11:01 AM

COVID has taken a back burner to the invasion of Ukraine this week, but it's still killing a lot more people. That's what normalization does for you.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 25 Feb 22 - 11:27 AM

Overwhelmingly, it's killing unvaccinated people.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 27 Feb 22 - 07:54 AM

Two Dozen Hundreds!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 27 Feb 22 - 10:27 AM

I think the CDC is throwing up its hands - they're now watching the pressure on regional hospitals and if the hospitals are full or overwhelmed, the advice is to wear masks. Otherwise, not. This is like they're saying "you fools won't get vaccinated and won't wear masks, and you're going to do what you want to do no matter what we say, so until the hospitals are full of dying people, do what you're gonna do."

This doesn't mean COVID is gone, it means the Omicron variant is dissipating. I plan to continue to wear a mask in public places because I don't want to get sick. I don't know that my area is allowed to go without masks yet, we were hit pretty hard recently, so there is research involved. But when in doubt, the prudent move is to keep the masks handy.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Feb 22 - 05:33 PM

I never go anywhere without a fresh mask in my pocket.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 01 Mar 22 - 12:29 PM

The 1/3 dose of vaccine for 5 to 11 year olds is not working well in its effectiveness or distribution.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 01 Mar 22 - 01:16 PM

I too am still wearing a mask when I go out (I only go to the supermarket). Yesterday in Morrisons, I found that my glasses were misting over alarmingly, and then realised I'd put my mask on upside down, so the metal band was under my chin! What a twit, but I'd been trying to concentrate on my driving alone and pushing the trolley etc, so was rather preoccupied.
I'm lucky in that mask-wearing doesn't bother me at all, but I sympathise with those who find it suffocating.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 01 Mar 22 - 04:35 PM

Omicron B is more infectious than the original Omicron and is doubling each week, now up to 8% of the cases in the US. The setting aside of masks is probably temporary, until the next wave.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 01 Mar 22 - 05:20 PM

I love my mask. It has the beard I can't grow.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 01 Mar 22 - 05:36 PM

Haha Mrrzy! I've seen many really funny masks worn in the supermarket. Some with strange faces on, and some pretty, flowery ones. My neighbour has one with the Norwich City football logo on it.
Mine are just those blue paper surgical ones. I've got several boxes of them, because I throw each one away after a single use.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 02 Mar 22 - 02:06 AM

We have a few masks with the lower half of our dog’s face printed on them. We look hilarious as half-human, half Border Terrier! If ya gunna wear a mask, ya might as well make it fun! :-)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 02 Mar 22 - 02:26 PM

First sign of returning to normal: my local Costco has samples again!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 04 Mar 22 - 06:23 PM

In the US one could wander COSTCO and have the equivalent of a nice lunch just from free samples. The combinations could be wierd though.
Lobster and chocolate?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 Mar 22 - 06:46 PM

We had our first Bude Memory Café for two years today. Great turnout, lovely atmosphere, and scarcely a mask in sight. I tell you, those oldies can teach us a lesson or two about how to live! Give it a couple of months, I predict, and those useless, profit-making masks will be no more than a bad memory, just like all the other inhuman restrictions we've been forced to endure...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 04 Mar 22 - 08:53 PM

Oh the inhumanity!
Relax, its late in the evening and time to wind down, not up.

I suspect that some symptomless people may still get latent long haul Covid symptoms that involve heart inflamation problems that could resemble angina like feeings of chest pressure.

Its a suspicion and not a fact. Meanwhile the expected number of heart patients that have delayed treatment during the pandemic has grown large.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 Mar 22 - 09:12 PM

You guys seem to be obsessing about long covid. It simply is not worth the resort to continue using restrictions. You really can't see how vital it is to get back to normal life, can you? I met elderly people today at our Memory Café who live alone and who have hardly been out of their houses for two years. I know of families who have been cooped up in high-rise flats with their stir-crazy children for months on end. We now have a mild variant that is killing only idiots who refuse the vaccine, and (in the UK at least), infection numbers, masks or not, are plummeting. I no longer want to hear about bloody long covid. If you get it, too bad. But the far greater priority for us all is to get back to normal so that we can try to live our lives in a way that makes people happy and secure in the knowledge that, whatever is thrown at us, we can be resilient and we can avoid ghastly mental ill-health issues. Live normally, in other words. Not enough people are dying any more to allow us to sidestep that.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 14 Mar 22 - 08:32 AM

Steve: You guys seem to be obsessing about long covid. It simply is not worth the resort to continue using restrictions. You really can't see how vital it is to get back to normal life, can you?

I'm with you on this. I'm 'back to normal' as much as I can be. But 'long Covid' is, and will continue to be, a problem.
I have been aware for several months (had Covid early 2021) that my breathing was not what it should be, but had not realised the extent.
Last Tuesday I got up in our local club (Cardiff second Tuesday) to sing "Dafydd y Garreg Wen". Within two lines I realised I didn't have the breath support to do it justice. This is not a problem I've experienced before, and I rarely practice in advance, just get up and sing. It was worrying. For my second song I went for something a bit punchier and with shorter lines!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Mar 22 - 11:37 AM

Maybe I sounded a bit too much out of sympathy with people unlucky enough to be suffering with long covid. I regret that. However, whilst covid-19 cases are still high, it is a mild disease for almost everyone who's been jabbed and it's causing far fewer deaths, far less serious illness and far less hospitalisation. We had our first Memory Café in Bude for two years the week before last, everyone was incredibly happy to be back (it's nearly all elderly people, even the volunteers), and there was hardly a mask in sight. On Saturday, at the cake-and-coffee morning for Ukraine, hundreds of people piled in and out of our tiny Methodist Hall, again mostly maskless, and it was an absolute delight to go to a community event that felt so bloody NORMAL for the first time in over two years. We all need to keep the jabs up-to-date and treat coronavirus as just another of life's hazards in my opinion, and tell anyone who wants to stay away from people or keep their masks on that it's entirely a matter for them. I'm not going to crowded events like this unless I've tested myself that morning first. We Brits can continue to get free boxes of seven test kits until the end of March. It's a good idea to get some, I reckon.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 14 Mar 22 - 07:28 PM

The Delta omnicron new varient doesn't seem to be causing much trouble.
Just because your neck hurts turning left doesn't mean you should rejoice looking only one way to the right before you cross the street.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 12 Apr 22 - 05:43 AM

Happy Halfway point for the pandemic everyone.
Lockdowns in Asia, record infection rates in UK and eastern US cities all owe a debt of gratitude to the vaccines.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Apr 22 - 06:04 AM

The vaccines are responsible for saving hundreds of thousands of lives and have been instrumental in getting life back to something like normal in my country. Lockdowns have created misery for millions, wrecking countries' economies and destroying the mental and physical health of countless people.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 13 Apr 22 - 03:14 AM

Surprise, surprise the fall in the number of reported infections has matched the fall in the number of tests being carried out. I suppose johnson will claim that charging for LFTs has reduced the number of actual infections. More of a concern that the current death rate is more than 1,500/week (projects to 70,000/year) and rising.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 13 Apr 22 - 04:37 PM

Now on track for 101K deaths per year.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 14 Apr 22 - 03:58 AM

Many elderly folk in our village are being called up for the 'Spring booster'. (This will be the second booster.) Our schools were riddled with Omicron just before the Easter half-term holiday began.
I read somewhere that this bad cold that's going around (not Covid) is due to the fact we've been hiding behind masks and keeping apart, so our natural 'herd immunity' against colds and other nasty germs has been depleted.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 14 Apr 22 - 08:57 AM

Surprise, surprise the fall in the number of reported infections has matched the fall in the number of tests being carried out.

Um. The number of reported infections being the number of positive tests, isn't this like being surprised the rainfall in inches went down when the number of raindrops did?

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Rain Dog
Date: 18 Apr 22 - 05:06 AM

Not exactly new news but might be of interest to some who contribute to this thread.

On BBC Radio 4

Preventable - Written and read by Devi Sridhar

"How a Pandemic Changed the World & How to Stop the Next One

The World Health Organisation hears about 3000 potential pathogen outbreaks each month. It follows up on 300 of them - and investigates 30. It only took the right one to turn everything upside down. Devi remembers the early days of the pandemic as news trickled out from Wuhan, and focuses on Senegal's surprising response to COVID-19.

Professor Devi Sridhar, Chair of Global Public Health at Edinburgh University, has risen to prominence as one of Britain’s most trusted commentators on COVID-19. Fresh from advising the Scottish and UK Governments, the WHO and UNICEF, the academic uses the timeline of the pandemic to shine a light on how science, politics, ethics and economics affect our health."

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 18 Apr 22 - 07:53 AM

Covid cases are like Jesus, they have risen.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 18 Apr 22 - 02:09 PM

Mrrzy, In the case of the UK government, it is probable drawing a conclusion that it hasn't rained on the grounds that rainfall has not been measured.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 18 Apr 22 - 03:10 PM

The numbers of infections plummeted in the summers of 2020 and 2021. We can hope for similar this year. I think that withdrawing free tests last month was an egregiously-bad mistake. Our hallowed government has made plenty of those.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 19 Apr 22 - 03:19 AM

The delightful family-over-the-road (nice couple with two school-age children) were very worried when the daddy got Covid a couple of weeks ago. He was triple-jabbed, so luckily he wasn't too terribly ill. His place of work (double-glazing company) insisted that he took an LFT test in front of them when he returned to do his job (It was negative - phew!). He's still very tired, but is 'keeping a-troshing' as best he can.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 19 Apr 22 - 03:53 AM

Got my second booster booked for next Saturday. The benefits of being 75 (it was my birthday last week, while on holiday on Lindisfarne)! ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 19 Apr 22 - 03:25 PM

Got my second booster tomorrow, at a pharmacy near to my workplace.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 20 Apr 22 - 04:12 PM

Moderna booster for me today, just a very slight soreness at point of entry!! Mrs Bonzo has hers tomorrow.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 21 Apr 22 - 02:09 AM

Good for you Bonzo! Do you know, I have never ever had a sore arm or even felt the needle go in when having an injection. My friend laughed and she wondered if the nurse had injected the armchair I sat in by mistake!
Still haven't been 'summoned', but I don't expect it will be long. I'm up for any booster on offer - seems sensible to me. Also, still wearing a mask when out shopping.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Jul 22 - 06:25 PM

Well, after well over two years of avoiding the bloody thing, Mrs Steve and I both have the virus. The Bude Memory Café last Friday was heaving, in a fairly small room, and we had the WI choir with around 25-30 members. We both tested positive on Monday (we still have a decent supply of test kits, as we were wise virgins when the kits were free). Another of our valued volunteers also has the symptoms, so it looks like the Memory Café was the source. Mrs Steve has had the overall sore body, headachey thing with a cough and runny nose, and feels like a pile of manure (very worrying that she declined a glass of red on a Wednesday!) I've been clammy for three days and I have the mother and father of a cough, and yesterday I was like a zombie, but, oddly, I feel well and have spent all afternoon today in the sun cutting my huge hedges with my pole trimmer (and getting eaten alive by horseflies). So we've got it but we're both OK and looking forward to the barbecue heatwave to come! Well done you vaccine developers!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 06 Jul 22 - 07:49 PM

Get well soon Steve (and the boss)
I just ordered some more free tests on Tuesday, we are on our last box.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Jul 22 - 08:42 PM

Cheers, Nigel.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: keberoxu
Date: 06 Jul 22 - 09:00 PM

Oh, Steve, I am truly truly sorry and unhappy for you and your family.
PLEASE get better. Soon.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 07 Jul 22 - 02:33 AM

Get well soon Steve and Mrs Steve.
My poor sister has got 'it' again. She has had Long Covid for a couple of years, but was slowly getting her strength back. Now she's very poorly, and has tested positive. Luckily she's a retired doctor, and has a pulse oximeter etc, so can monitor herself. Her two daughters live in Edinburgh (she's near Perth) and will keep an eye on her.
My village is riddled with the new mutation. I'm a bit wary now of going to the village bingo, or the village coffee morning. All you hear is yet another name is laid low. I still wear my mask when shopping.
I'm also worried about my estranged husband. He cleans in two schools now, and pupils are 'dropping like flies' all over Norfolk. But he does wear a mask and a visor at work, and must test twice a week. He has bad hayfever, so I hope he can tell the difference between those symptoms and Covid.
I'm up for any vaccination, and am awaiting The Call. They seem to have started with the very aged people. (I'm not as old as them!)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Jul 22 - 06:49 AM

Cheers for the kind thoughts, good people! I'm fine today except for this horrible cough (worst I can remember having) but Mrs Steve is still under the weather.

As I said, we have a supply of test kits that we amassed when they were still free. I think that the withdrawal of free test kits was a huge mistake (last I heard, four tests at Boots cost £17). Our symptoms have been very different from each other's since we both tested positive on Monday, so, had we not had test kits (and let's face it, the vast majority of people are not going to want to pay that kind of money in these tough times), how would we have known who had or didn't have what? There must be droves of people out and about who feel a bit unwell, or not even that, untested, spreading the virus. I'm sure that's how we caught it at the Memory Café. I don't know how the science works for this, but let's say I'm not exactly surprised that infection numbers are currently as high as ever. I think that withdrawing the free kits was a false economy for the country. I know that the strains are not the same, and that other factors were involved and that the public mindset was far more cautious, but the two summers before this one had tiny numbers of cases compared to this summer...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: MaJoC the Filk
Date: 07 Jul 22 - 07:49 AM

Best of health to yourself and Mrs Steve. Touch wood [puts forefinger to forehead], we neither of us have had the Bug, but I suppose I should add "yet": it's slowly making its way through our congregation.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 07 Jul 22 - 10:30 AM

Here in the US the states are not reporting cases as diligently to the CDC and COVID has dropped off of the front page, so to speak, so the newest outbreak (that is growing rapidly) of the newest variant BA.5 is coming as a surprise to people.

The most transmissible variant yet of the coronavirus is threatening a fresh wave of infections in the United States, even among those who have recovered from the virus fairly recently.

The subvariant of Omicron known as BA.5 is now dominant, according to federal estimates released Tuesday, and together with BA.4, another subvariant, it is fueling an outbreak of cases and hospitalizations.

Though the popularity of home testing means reported cases are a significant undercount of the true infection rate, the share of tests that come back positive is shooting upward and is now higher than during most other waves of the pandemic. According to the C.D.C., the risk from Covid-19 is increasing in much of the country. (emphasis mine)

Just when I was thinking it would be safe this time to go to outpatient physical therapy for the knee, I'm rethinking that option.

Get well soon, Steve and Mrs. Steve. You'd be a lot worse off if you hadn't had the vaccines that were already available. It looks like there will be a new one here in the fall to cover these recent variants.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Jul 22 - 12:01 PM

Thank you!

I have occasional bursts of an uncontrollable hacking cough and pretty sore sinuses, but I feel well and am doing loads of gardening. Mrs Steve isn't doing as well and is watching a ton of tennis, the poor thing. We're hoping and praying that we'll be clear by a week tomorrow, the next Memory Café meeting. We're supposed to avoid contact with the most vulnerable for ten days after testing positive. We're just about within spec for that as long as we recover promptly and test negative a couple of times each. We'll still be in that smallish room, but at least we have a solo singer and not a huge choir, unlike last Friday. As I sat in that room I was wondering whether we were being wise...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: leeneia
Date: 07 Jul 22 - 01:08 PM

Six friends of mine, all of them fully vaccinated, have come down with Covid in recent weeks. None had to be hospitalized, but all were miserably ill. So the DH and I are still wearing masks and avoiding crowds.

I look forward to the next vaccination, which I heard will be out this fall.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 09 Jul 22 - 03:17 AM

Just got an email from my sister. She's feeling a little better, but has lost her sense of smell and taste completely, and has a very runny nose. She's wisely relaxing on her sun-lounger with a pile of novels and a cooling drink. (Sun-lounger? Cooling drink? In Scotland?) She's still testing positive so must isolate, and she's rather lonely and bored. But she's a fabulous cook and has plans for a tagine later today. I'm very relieved. So many people have caught this latest version of Bloomin' Covid. Our village is now riddled with it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Jul 22 - 06:04 AM

God yes, the runny nose. Kleenex must be cleaning up. I'm almost completely better today but that runny nose...Mrs Steve is much better too, though hanging on to that nagging cough for longer than I did, but she'll be watching the ladies' final cuddling a box of tissues...

I was still testing positive yesterday. I won't test myself again until tomorrow. We're not doing any kind of mixing at all until that little T line disappears for two days in a row.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 09 Jul 22 - 06:31 AM

here in the Land of Oz health authorities are suggesting more mask wearing & boosters as "More than 3,700 Australians are in hospital with COVID-19, the most since February" but the Happy People are socialising & crowding & having a wonderful time - cos, in the words of the bloke who yelled at a mask wearer recently "Take that mask off, it's gone!"

New mask mandates all but ruled out around Australia as Covid cases surge Medical experts have criticised federal and state governments for “inconsistent” messaging around the looming winter virus wave, with new face mask rules all but ruled out nationwide ...

“We have a population believing, and governments delivering, that Covid is in the rear-view mirror, that we’re over the worst of it, that it’s time to do away with any of the measures and move on with life,” said infectious disease expert Prof Brendan Crabb, the CEO of the Burnet Institute.
“It’s always been wrong to do that, ever since Omicron arrived” ...

State and federal governments have escalated warnings that Covid case numbers are set to explode in coming weeks, as Australia battles fresh outbreaks of the BA.4 and BA.5 variants. The federal health minister, Mark Butler, this week warned cases were “going to continue to rise for some time yet”, with Covid hospital admissions currently at their highest level since February.
Australia recorded nearly 42,000 cases and 35 deaths in the last 24 hours. On Friday, the Australian Health Protection Principal Committee (AHPPC) revised down its official advice on reinfection periods from 12 weeks to 28 days, warning the new variants “are associated with increased immune escape and we are likely to see rates of reinfection rise”.
But despite the dire warnings, politicians have poured cold water on talk of reinstating mandates on masks, vaccinations or public health measures, even as they encourage people to voluntarily wear masks ...

sandra - always masked in public transport (compulsory but many ignore the notices) & often masked in indoors, sigh (recommended, I know I'm careless but I am trying to do better)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Jul 22 - 08:01 AM

Well we could end up wearing masks for the rest of our lives, couldn't we, now that we seem to be accepting that the thing will always be with us.

Let's all get boosted and occasionally test ourselves, then live the normal lives we do when colds and flu are going around. We can wear masks if we want to. Vaccinated and boosted people are not dying and few end up in hospital. No more masks for me unless the law forces them on me.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 09 Jul 22 - 08:55 AM

Compared to past pandemics we are beyond the halfway point. These things sweep around the world with variants about 4 times but they are all a bit different.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Jul 22 - 09:47 AM

Risking weasel words, it's predicted by those who understand epidemics far better than I do that this virus is here to stay. It may wax and wane, it may diminish in seriousness, it will almost certainly keep mutating, but it won't go away. One fine day a vaccine might be made that stops us from catching it for life. I think that's a long time off. We will live with the virus around, as with colds and flu, for the rest of our lives. Wear a mask if you want to.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 09 Jul 22 - 10:21 AM

I get a flu shot every year because flu never goes away, it always comes back and usually in some variant. COVID will be the same, I expect.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 09 Jul 22 - 10:36 AM

I had my second booster + flu & pneumonia shots recently. I'm sure covid & flu shots will be annual.

sandra

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 09 Jul 22 - 01:58 PM

Before Fauci got 'distracted' by Covid he was working on a flu vaccine that disrupts the nucleus of a flu virus and not just its receptors that look more stubby than the corona virus.
He was hoping to create that lifetime vaccine that Steve speculates.

The flu virus may have billions of years of an evolutionary head start over Fauci but I wish him luck.

Life and near life is found in the newest 1965 Cerxes volcanic island trapped deep within the magma that the volcano deposited.
Little single celled life feeds on the rock/heat at three times the boiling point of water. This gives some push to the pan spermia theory in my way of thinking. The evolution of life could have begun billions of years before Earth even formed. Time plus evolution can make a flu virus one tough little tenacious bug.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 11 Jul 22 - 08:02 AM

Day 8 for both of us and we've both just tested positive, though we both feel well and have almost lost all the symptoms. We're stuck at home for at least a couple more days then. Bummer.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 11 Jul 22 - 12:38 PM

Its not likely but a person can catch the highly contagious variant every month. Vaccine prevents dire symptoms but the new normal of an annual estimated flu vaccine and multiple covid varient boosters are probably the new normal.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 11 Jul 22 - 04:17 PM

Alas, that is what I've read, that the new variants can clobber someone who already had an earlier version of COVID. Don't feel safe just because you caught it once and survived, it can come back again. Damn.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 11 Jul 22 - 07:03 PM

Mrs Steve and I are peed off because all the advice for people without test kits (which is most people) is that you can go out and about if you feel better, no temperature, etc., after five days. So we still have some test kits, we've been testing ourselves, we feel well but are still testing positive...so we are stuck at home. Not legally, but because we think we should.

A lady who does deliveries for one of the courier companies came round today. We know her well, she's a lovely lady who loves being part of the community and we usually have a really good old banter. Today we had to tell her to keep her distance. She told us that she's scared of catching it because she can't afford to take time off work, that she has her kids to feed, she can hardly afford to pay her bills and that there's no way she could afford to buy test kits. The other week she felt unwell, but just shut it out and carried on working. And who's to blame her? There must be millions like her. Ending the free supply of test kits was a big mistake.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 12 Jul 22 - 10:20 AM

As the BA.5 variant spreads, the risk of coronavirus reinfection grows

America has decided the pandemic is over. The coronavirus has other ideas.

The latest omicron offshoot, BA.5, has quickly become dominant in the United States, and thanks to its elusiveness when encountering the human immune system, is driving a wave of cases across the country.

The size of that wave is unclear because most people are testing at home or not testing at all. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in the past week has reported a little more than 100,000 new cases a day on average. But infectious-disease experts know that wildly underestimates the true number, which may be as many as a million, said Eric Topol, a professor at Scripps Research who closely tracks pandemic trends.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 13 Jul 22 - 08:43 AM

Infection rates are up 8% for now. Deaths are for the most part optional for the vaccine resistant or the poor countries. Still no one is beyond redemption. What a long strange trip its been.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 13 Jul 22 - 09:17 AM

So two days later we are still testing positive (my line's gone faint). Mrs Steve is fine but a bit lacking in energy and all I have is a residual slight cough. There's no way we can go to Friday's Memory Café (where almost everyone will be over 75) and there's even more no way I can spend two hours in the confined space of my car on Friday with the 89-year-old lady who I fetch and carry. Had we not had test kits we'd be cracking on as normal. Ho hum.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 13 Jul 22 - 09:26 AM

Make that line fade away.
Get well soon Steve.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 13 Jul 22 - 09:29 AM

At least I have a test kit now.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 14 Jul 22 - 03:02 AM

Many more cases in our village. I decided to go to our village hall last night for the bingo, wearing a mask of course. I took a while to decide to go, and when I arrived, there sat quite a few cases of Covid who swore they felt better (but had they tested negative or not?)
I didn't win a bloomin' thing however, despite being only one number away from the £90 jackpot. Serves me right! I shan't go again - a mask doesn't always protect one completely (or so says my knowledgeable retired-doctor sister!)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 14 Jul 22 - 07:38 AM

Steve, good for you for staying home. Hope you all feel better soon. I haven't caught covid yet... Just what I wouldn't need right now. Senoufou, et ta sœur, la pauvre!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 14 Jul 22 - 09:27 AM

The BA.5 variant is spreading fast here and apparently can get past immunizations and antibodies built up from previous cases. Dr. Fauci says if you are still eligible for another booster, get it now.

Now or later? When to get a Covid booster shot
Updated vaccines targeting BA.4 and BA.5 are expected in the fall, but doctors still overwhelmingly encourage those who are eligible to get booster shots now.

I've had both boosters so will be near the front of the line when the next vaccine iteration appears. Whatever it takes to try to stay healthy.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Jul 22 - 09:34 AM

Well Mrs Steve was poorly for a few days but I got away with just an annoying cough. If anyone is going to catch it and show symptoms, then let me wish mine upon you! The most irritating thing is that I STILL can't test negative.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 14 Jul 22 - 11:44 AM

Ma soeur va un peu mieux, merci Mrrzy. Elle fait un peu de jardinage, cequi me dit qu'elle a retrouvé sa santé.
Et vous? Ça va un peu maintenant? Meilleurs voeux!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Jul 22 - 07:05 PM

Well that was this morning, the faint T line. After a day working in the garden, with hard labour, blazing sun, a strong Cornish breeze and an overdose of fresh air, I tested negative (at long last) at six o'clock this evening. I so didn't beIieve it that I immediately repeated the test with a different brand kit. Same result! I'll do another test in the morning before I undo my shackles. I sense impending release...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Jul 22 - 06:58 PM

We are both negative. That makes me two days, so I'm unshackled! Mrs Steve is waiting until tomorrow, but we are now ditching the testing. We've gone way over and above current guidelines. Fortuitously, I'd done a big food shop just before we suspected that all was not well, and, as the garden is currently providing lots of salad and spuds and herbs, we haven't needed to call on anyone to shop for us, though we've had lots of offers.

The only hangover is that we both have slightly reduced energy levels, but that's improving. Not bad for two septuagenarians, aka two people approaching middle age!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 15 Jul 22 - 09:59 PM

here in the Land of Oz it's mid winter & we have medical authorities saying wear masks indoors & politicians saying no way, it's business as usual!!

‘Not just another wave’: Australia’s Covid hospitalisations reach record levels in several states Hospitals across the country are “bursting at the seams” as the number of people being admitted with Covid-19 reaches record levels in several states ...

Epidemiologist Adrian Esterman said the differing hospitalisation rates across the nation make for a “quite strange” picture – but one with a unifying theme.
“My understanding, from speaking to people around the country, is that every major hospital is at full capacity and bursting at the seams,” the University of South Australia professor said.
And there is worse to come, with most states and territories likely several weeks away from their peak hospitalisation rates of this wave, he said.
“That will be when the pressure is really on, and we’ll just have to see how they manage.”
The current wave, driven by the BA.4 and BA.5 Omicron subvariants, has coincided with a “horrendous” hospitalisation rate from influenza ...

“If we use boosters and antivirals and get people wearing masks and staying at home, we have the ability to control it, to some degree,” the academic and director of infectious diseases at Mater Health Services said ...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Jul 22 - 08:41 PM

We felt emancipated after our negative tests, and Mrs Steve went into town to buy some birthday cards and some peppers for our peperonata, her first sortie past our garden gate for two weeks. We had managed very well, as I'd somewhat fortuitously done a big shop the day before my first positive test, almost two weeks ago...

Still slightly lacking in energy and still a bit nasal. I've heard similar things from many people. Six months ago I was saying that I'd never come across anyone who had had the disease. Today, I'm struggling to find anyone who hasn't had it...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 16 Jul 22 - 10:31 PM

since Christmas a number of my friends have caught covid, I can't remember any getting it beforehand, but I'm sure some must have.

The strangest case was after a christmas lunch - friend & husband & 97 y/o mother didn't catch it, but their daughter & son & their partners each with 2 children (15 mths to 10) caught it, & other friends I've seen weekly before & after lockdowns, are missing our socially distanced Craft group (once we sat around several big tables) cos they or kids/grandkids in widespread suburbs have it.

People here are ignoring the daily statistics (we've had more deaths this year than we had in deep lockdown) & pleas by medical authorities at wear masks & make sure their boosters are up to date ... but the politicians & business leaders aren't listening, apart from saying get boosters.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 16 Jul 22 - 11:49 PM

I agree with Steve, it is now very common for people who managed to avoid it for two-plus years to suddenly find they have COVID. This latest variant seems to be particularly easy to catch. Family members with a couple of roommates are all hunkered down in different rooms of their house trying to not have everyone catch it. I've handed over some of my stash of tests to them and gone ahead to replenish my supply since both Medicare and my insurance company will pay for 8 tests a month (each).

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 17 Jul 22 - 02:19 PM

I wonder if several bouts of nothing but a runny nose could have been the mild symptoms people report. I have not been sick enough to require testing. Rhino virus is still alive and well.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 17 Jul 22 - 07:18 PM

If you are in the northern summer and you have a cough and a runny nose, you probably have covid. Those symptoms, plus the positive tests, informed my behaviour for almost two weeks, until I tested negative at last. What you do about those symptoms is now up to you. In my case, I had to consider my plans for mixing with elderly people. My solution was to stay home until I tested negative.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 18 Jul 22 - 07:29 PM

I can't find the exact article I read this morning but I thought it was from the Washington Post, about how problematic the undercount is now of COVID. Many people test at home and deal with it, and the numbers and version of the virus aren't reported.

Tracking U.S. covid-19 cases,
deaths and other metrics by state is the overall number of cases since the beginning.

Fauci said he will retire before Biden's administration is over. He is 81 now, and he said if he stayed till it's gone he'd be 105.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 19 Jul 22 - 10:07 AM

Problem here is if people want to take personal responsibility for public health, we have to pay to do so. I only have a handful of tests left.

Subject: RE: FITNESS & Declutter 2022 - Pandemic redux
From: Donuel
Date: 22 Aug 22 - 11:45 AM

Woo Hoo only 209,000 US deaths from Covid this year so far!
-grim grin-

Subject: RE: FITNESS & Declutter 2022 - Pandemic redux
From: Donuel
Date: 22 Aug 22 - 05:22 PM

Thanks for the memories
Retro virus clues
Covid's not the flu
The Presidents that you worked for
are practically no more
Thank you so much

Strictly entre nous
Fauci, how are you?
And how are all
Those little dreams
That mostly did come true?
Awfully glad we met you
Cheerio and toodle-oo
Thank you
Thank you so much

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 23 Aug 22 - 02:46 AM

I got a call from my doctors' surgery yesterday offering me two injections! The lady didn't say what they were, but I assume she meant a Covid vaccination and a flu jab. I declined for now. I'm not an 'anti-vaxxer' but I'll wait until the autumn after seeing how this new jab affects people. I don't want to be ill with post-vaccination reactions, as I now live alone.
I still wear a mask when shopping at the supermarket.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 23 Aug 22 - 08:22 AM

SEPTEMBER is the month for the recent variant vaccine distribution.
The flu shot is always a guess as to its coming variant. We get it wrong more often than getting it spot on.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 23 Aug 22 - 09:02 PM

The senior (double-strength) flu vaccines are in now (I just called my favorite pharmacist) and if I go in next week on Monday (I choose a day when she's in because she has a great counter-side manner) to get that then maybe by mid-September if COVID vaccines are in I'll be set.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: keberoxu
Date: 22 Sep 22 - 06:35 PM

I don't know how well this link will work to Bloomberg. It's a report
on the statement from the World Health Organization.

"We have never been in a better position to end the pandemic"

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 Sep 22 - 06:59 PM

Infection rates in the UK have dropped dramatically. Seasonal, of course. My booster is booked for next month.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 28 Sep 22 - 12:33 PM

I got the new Pfizer Omicron COVID booster almost three weeks ago. I still wear a mask when I go into public spaces, but with ever booster I hope I'm more resistant should I come into contact.

I heard a news story this week that said there may be about 10% of the population (US? World?) that has immune systems that use exposure to past corona viruses (colds) to combat exposure to the new corona virus, so they fight it off early and don't develop symptoms. Everyone else has to get exposed, let their immune systems start making the antibodies, then fight it off (hopefully) after symptoms have developed. I look forward to more information about this.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 28 Sep 22 - 12:51 PM

Most colds are not caused by coronaviruses (only about one cold in seven) so you wouldn't know whether that was a useful strategy anyway as you wouldn't know which virus you had.

I had my flu jab a couple of days ago and I'm getting boosted on Monday. As I had covid in July I'm hoping that lot will see me through relatively unscathed (giving it my best shot if you'll excuse the pun).

I have the mother and father of a cold at the moment (not covid - tested negative twice this week), so, who knows, I might be one of the one-in-seven. Masks are rarely seen round here and no-one insists that you wear one. I hear that infection numbers are on the up again. The government here, presiding over a health service that they've rendered unfit for purpose, is getting worried about a possible double whammy of flu and covid this winter.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 28 Sep 22 - 12:59 PM

https://www.webmd.com/cold-and-flu/cold-guide/common_cold_causes

It's likely that someday you'll have a close encounter with one of these types:

Rhinovirus

Coronavirus

RSV and parainfluenza

There are also a lot of viruses that doctors haven't identified. About 20%-30% of colds in adults are caused by these "unknown" bugs.

Enough that it makes a noticeable number of cases and doesn't render the statement I made incorrect, especially with the mystery 20-30% unknown.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 28 Sep 22 - 02:46 PM

Well webMD states that coronaviruses cause about 20% of colds, a bit higher than my wiki figure, but who knows. I didn't say you were incorrect, just that even if you knew that coronavirus-colds did help to protect against covid it wouldn't really be a useful strategy to try to employ. All down to pot luck really. Every little helps.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 28 Sep 22 - 03:22 PM

I don't know anything about it and am not basing my luck on anything - I observed that there is new research. We will have to wait and see what comes of it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 28 Sep 22 - 04:33 PM

Anything that helps to enhance immunity is good.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 09 Oct 22 - 02:56 AM

Has anyone had the Pfizer Autumn booster, I had one yesterday and have slight shortness of breath today.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Oct 22 - 05:40 AM

I had my booster last Monday. On the little card it sez "Pfizer-Comirnaty." My arm was sore for a few days (I've never had that before). Oddly, I also had a sore arm (the other one) after my flu jab the week before. But life must go on. What with all my lurgies over the last few weeks, I've had umpteen blood tests as well as a cannula stuck in my hand for days. My new nickname is pincushion.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 09 Oct 22 - 06:06 AM

Yes I've had the sore arm every time, but never any other side effects. Mrs Bonzo had to pass on the Pfizer because one she had previously almost certainly caused a blood clot in her left eye.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 09 Oct 22 - 10:38 AM

My most recent booster was Pfizer, same company as all of the rest of my vaccinations and boosters. This most recent one had the least amount of side effect, amounting to a day of an achy arm and not much more. Maybe a little headache.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 13 Oct 22 - 02:06 PM

There is a reported surge of Covid in Europe and is suspected to show up in the US by winter.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 13 Oct 22 - 08:07 PM

There is a good reason to wait 4 months or more after having Covid or a Covid vaccine, to get a booster.
nuff said.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Oct 22 - 07:08 PM

Not nuff said at all. I can't find a single responsible website that says you have to wait more than four weeks after testing positive for covid before you can have the regular booster. Please do not peddle irresponsible misinformation.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Jeri
Date: 15 Oct 22 - 07:26 PM

CDC recommends waiting 3 months.

I had some moderately nasty side effects for about a half a day, the day after my booster, until my last one (second booster). I was prepared to spend it in bed, but I didn't really have ANY side effects other than a slightly sore arm. I'm working on soon getting the omicron booster.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 15 Oct 22 - 09:10 PM

The Omicron booster for me was much like you describe your last booster; the arm was a little sore but otherwise, a non-event.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Oct 22 - 03:44 AM

From Jeri's link:

"If you recently had COVID-19, you may consider delaying your next vaccine dose (whether a primary dose or booster) by 3 months from when your symptoms started or, if you had no symptoms, when you first received a positive test.

Reinfection is less likely in the weeks to months after infection. However, certain factors, such as personal risk of severe disease, or risk of disease in a loved one or close contact, local COVID-19 Community Level, and the most common COVID-19 variant currently causing illness, could be reasons to get a vaccine sooner rather than later."

The caveats in that extract, which I won't bother to highlight as we can all read, in no way amount to a recommendation that "there is a good reason to wait 4 months or more after having Covid or a Covid vaccine, to get a booster." I haven't found any source on any UK website that suggests such a delay, and I did go to the trouble to try to find one.

In medical matters, it's often the case that we should not make recommendations in these threads as to how people should act. Drawing attention to reputable sources to support a point of view is valid, but "nuff said" doesn't cut it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 22 Oct 22 - 10:26 AM

In the last week, COVID cases are up 29% in the US. Daily reported deaths were up 23%. Hospitalizations always lag behind those two numbers - this week they were up only 1%, but that will probably increase in the next month.

Tracking U.S. covid-19 cases, deaths and other metrics by state
More than 1,064,000 people have died from coronavirus in the U.S., and more than 97,084,000 cases have been reported.

No numbers can fully convey the state of the covid-19 pandemic in the United States, but several metrics taken together provide a clearer view of what is happening now and what may be coming soon.

The data in these charts is gathered by The Washington Post from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and state government sites (cases and deaths) and the Department of Health and Human Services (hospitalizations). Not all tracking sites use the same sources or report dates, so case and death numbers can differ.

Half of the states show increasing numbers while the rest are neutral or dropping numbers. Those with the worst infection spikes right now are, alas, Hawaii, Alaska, Texas, Florida, and Arizona. All GOP states. There is a correlation to be made as those states' governors tend to dismiss COVID precautions.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 22 Oct 22 - 01:17 PM

Also in the Washington Post:

Whites now more likely to die from covid than Blacks: Why the pandemic shifted

Skill Wilson had amassed more than three decades of knowledge as a paramedic, first in Memphis and then in Fayette County. Two places that felt like night and day.

With only five ambulances in the county and the nearest hospital as much as 45 minutes away, Skill relished the clinical know-how necessary to work in a rural setting. Doing things like sedating patients to insert tubes into their airways.

But when it came to covid-19, despite more than 1 million deaths nationwide, Skill and his family felt their small town on the central-eastern side of Fayette County, with its fields of grazing cattle and rows of cotton and fewer than 200 covid deaths since the start of the pandemic, was a cocoon against the raging health emergency.

“It was a lot easier to stay away from others,” his widow, Hollie Wilson, said of the largely White and predominantly conservative county of about 42,000 residents. “Less people. Less chance of exposure.”

Covid seemed like other people’s problems — until it wasn’t.

The imbalance in death rates among the nation’s racial and ethnic groups has been a defining part of the pandemic since the start. To see the pattern, The Washington Post analyzed every death during more than two years of the pandemic. Early in the crisis, the differing covid threat was evident in places such as Memphis and Fayette County. Deaths were concentrated in dense urban areas, where Black people died at several times the rate of White people.

“I don’t want to say that we weren’t worried about it, but we weren’t,” said Hollie, who described her 59-year-old husband as someone who “never took a pill.” After a while, “you kind of slack off on some things,” she said.

Over time, the gap in deaths widened and narrowed but never disappeared — until mid-October 2021, when the nation’s pattern of covid mortality changed, with the rate of death among White Americans sometimes eclipsing other groups.

Those GOP White people who ignored the vaccinations and didn't bother to socially distance or wear masks - COVID came back to bite them in the ass.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 22 Oct 22 - 04:03 PM

This is only winter number 3. We should not get cocky until after year 4 if previous pandemic parameters apply.

In CA there is a new respiratory epidemic developing among infants.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 25 Oct 22 - 09:40 AM

In the past
Oh the breathin' was easy
Now folks are coughin'
And the fever is high
Oh, your daddy's rich
And your ma' is good lookin'
So hush
Little baby
Don't you cry
One of these mornings
You're gonna wake up wheezing
Yes, you'll spread your wings
And you'll take to the sky
But with some vaccines
There's nothin' can harm you
Yes with Doctors and Nurses
Standing by

In the past
Oh the breathin' was easy
Now folks are coughin'
And the fever is high
Oh, your daddy's rich
And your ma' is good lookin'
So hush
Little baby
Don't you cry
One of these mornings
You're gonna wake up wheezing
Yes, you'll spread your wings
And you'll take to the sky
But with some vaccines
There's nothin' can harm you
Yes with Doctors and Nurses
Standing by

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 19 Apr 23 - 10:42 PM

There is news. COVID is still killing about 250 people a day in the US (though you have to hunt to find that fact). And the FDA approved and the CDC concurred - more COVID vaccines are recommended.

U.S. Authorizes a New Round of Covid Boosters
Older Americans and those with weakened immune systems, groups still particularly vulnerable to the virus, may receive additional shots of the reformulated vaccine, federal officials said.

The endorsement followed a daylong discussion by the C.D.C.’s expert advisers. The Food and Drug Administration authorized the booster plan on Tuesday, and the C.D.C.’s recommendation was the final administrative step. Eligible Americans will be able to receive booster doses immediately.

Federal health officials are also phasing out the original vaccine formulas created by Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna, revoking their authorizations in the United States. And instead of needing an initial series of two shots, unvaccinated people will now require just a single dose of the reformulated, or “bivalent,” Covid shot to be considered vaccinated.

Until now, federal officials had required two doses of the older vaccine before recipients could begin to receive the bivalent boosters, a process some experts felt was confusing.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 20 Apr 23 - 03:12 AM

I’ve got my 2023 booster booked in a couple of weeks’ time (UK). They clearly know it’s still around, but there’s no ‘official’ talk about it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 20 Apr 23 - 07:13 AM

I have a national number of a current 1,300 Covid deaths per day.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 20 Apr 23 - 07:38 AM

I had my booster yesterday, along with my flu shot (flu season is here!)

One of the friends who took me to the National Folk Festival over Easter woke feeling miserable the next morning. She looked ill, RAT showed covid (her husband was ok, so was I) & she was planning to get a more accurate PCA test later in the morning as she had her booster shot earlier in the week & wondered if that influenced the reading. Result showed covid. I was told another couple in my circle both got covid,

Very few people wore masks, very few people in the supermarket or on public transport are masked, but people are still dying.
This page provides updates on national COVID-19 weekly current trends. COVID-19 cases and 7 day rolling average, 01 Jan 2022 to 11 Apr 2023

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Apr 23 - 01:09 PM

My personal philosophy, your mileage might vary, is to live a normal life from now on. I'll have all my vaccines when called (so far this past winter I've had flu, covid, shingles and pneumonia jabs), I had covid the once last September and it was very mild, I long since stopped treating people in public places as if they're virus-infested pariahs, I don't avoid pubs and restaurants and I've forgotten what a mask looks like. The pandemic was bad, the UK death toll was horrendous, but even worse was the clumsy, wasteful, inhuman and damaging way the thing was handled by our government (and I don't think we were alone in that). Our economy is in ruins and only God knows whether any lives were saved apart from the ones saved by the vaccines, and we'll be living for decades to come with the harm done to relationships, schooling and mental health caused by those cruel lockdowns.

Feel free to shoot, but any pandemic neurosis I might have been harbouring has long gone, and, as I say, that's just my personal philosophy. By the way, I abided by every single imposed rule, every one, all the time.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Apr 23 - 01:11 PM

Last July it was. Just in case someone notices that I've said it before!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Helen
Date: 20 Apr 23 - 04:25 PM

Now and then I still look at this statistics site:

Worldometer: Coronavirus Pandemic

When I compare countries by looking at the two columns to the right, i.e. total cases per million population, and deaths per million, I tend to also think about the factors within those countries which either exacerbated or hindered the progress of COVID. Political governance had a lot to do with it, in my opinion, and also the wealth or poverty of a country and its associated infrastructure, e.g. hospitals, access to vaccinations, information sharing capabilities etc. Political arrogance seemed to be a key factor, too - not mentioning any Trumpy or Johnsony or Putiny or North Korean names, of course - and despite the fact that we had an arrogant bloke in charge at the time, he did seem to be serious about managing COVID.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 24 Jul 23 - 11:05 AM

Aw man. Tasmania reopened before everyone was fully vaxed, and my (only original) bro-in-law caught it pretty right quickly. He has been suffering terribly with lung trouble ever since, and may actually be dying. Not releasing CO2 nor absorbing O2. In ICU, finally. Over 6" tall, never fat, has lost 40kg and looks like a Holocaust victim. The kid in the States has been called home. My sister is frazzled.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 24 Jul 23 - 07:19 PM

That sounds like such a slow torturous death; I hope the child is able to get home quickly enough to have time with him. That's a long trip and it will be worry all the way. Did the rest of the family have COVID and recover completely? Condolences to your sister.

COVID deaths are no longer a separate blip in the death rate of the US but that doesn't mean it has gone away. And for those not vaccinated, it can still be deadly. Reports still come out (this the WHO for this week).

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 24 Jul 23 - 07:46 PM

Well there are still a lot of cases here but the odd thing is that hardly anyone ever talks about it any more. I think that's a good thing. I might see about one mask per day in shops. Covid is still a risk to some people, not exactly millions though, and I think we just have to get on with our lives.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 24 Jul 23 - 09:39 PM

Thanks for the sympathy, Steve. You get right along with yours.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 24 Jul 23 - 10:28 PM

They are sending him home to die. I don't think it will take long.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 24 Jul 23 - 11:17 PM

Will they have palliative care set up? I have read that it can make things more comfortable for the patient and give quality time for the family members there.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 25 Jul 23 - 04:28 AM

There are thousands of examples of comments on Mudcat which don't necessarily address the previous post directly, Mrrzy, and my post was fully in keeping with the spirit of the thread title. I'm perfectly aware that my opinion on living with covid is not shared by everyone, though it's hardly an outlier. Be assured that I have every sympathy for the sad situation in which you find your family.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 27 Jul 23 - 11:07 AM

Painkillers only, no O2. Instructions to neither feed nor water are being ignored. Occasional nursing pops by...
As a digression, I like the un-American acceptance of impending death on the part of the medical folks.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 29 Jul 23 - 06:46 AM

He died.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Charmion
Date: 29 Jul 23 - 10:13 AM

Sorry for your family’s loss, Mrrzy.

And I agree that it’s a bit of a surprise, but nevertheless a relief, when the medical pros accept that a patient is dying and step back to let it happen.

The truth can feel like a slap in the face when it comes, but it never leaves that feeling of betrayal that comes from even the most well-meant lies.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 29 Jul 23 - 10:39 AM

That sounds like a directive from the patient himself; a facility wouldn't set those rules for a patient. Painkillers only, no food and water - that is how my mother died, by refusing care because the hospital was doing such a terrible job of managing her pain. She was moved to a skilled nursing facility and once a morphine pump was installed she refused anything else. This because the hospital refused to administer pain treatments on a schedule, you had to ask as needed, but it took them upwards of an hour to administer. Fall asleep from the drug, wake up comfortable for an hour or so, then the pain comes back and request again. Another painful wait.

I'm so sorry it came to that. I hope his family all made it home in time to say goodbye.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 30 Jul 23 - 10:04 PM

Yes, kid made it home, thanks.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 30 Jul 23 - 11:12 PM

That has to have been a horrible long trip for the kid from the states, but good it was in time. COVID. The gift that keeps on giving.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 02 Aug 23 - 09:24 AM

Ah, family dynamics. I bothered to look up time changes for the memorial service (10am 10/10 in Taz). They will have Sprung Forward already. We will not have Fallen back yet. But they are all arguing I'm off by an hour. But the *current* time diff is not what will apply, then...

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 02 Aug 23 - 08:39 PM

Double argh. Not long Covid at all. Many, many lies. But he *is* dead.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 03 Aug 23 - 12:35 PM

I have a mentally ill brother who started a rumor about how our father died. When it got back to us we had to make it clear he wasn't to speculate or offer that opinion any more. Good luck with whatever you're dealing with.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Senoufou
Date: 05 Aug 23 - 03:27 AM

There's a new variant of Covid now spreading across the UK called 'Eris' Oh bloomin' heck!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Mrrzy
Date: 05 Aug 23 - 08:31 AM

All hail discordia

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 05 Aug 23 - 08:39 AM

Approval for the new Covid variant vaccine booster
starts at the end of Aug. For now Covid is like the flu. Its not going away. Covid is now down to the 5th leading cause of death in the US.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 05 Aug 23 - 10:36 AM

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/stay-up-to-date.html Updated July 17, 2023.

https://www.fda.gov/news-events/press-announcements/coronavirus-covid-19-update-fda-authorizes-changes-simplify-use-bivalent-mrna-covid-19-vaccines

“At this stage of the pandemic, data support simplifying the use of the authorized mRNA bivalent COVID-19 vaccines and the agency believes that this approach will help encourage future vaccination,” said Peter Marks, M.D., Ph.D., director of the FDA’s Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research. “Evidence is now available that most of the U.S. population 5 years of age and older has antibodies to SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, either from vaccination or infection that can serve as a foundation for the protection provided by the bivalent vaccines. COVID-19 continues to be a very real risk for many people, and we encourage individuals to consider staying current with vaccination, including with a bivalent COVID-19 vaccine. The available data continue to demonstrate that vaccines prevent the most serious outcomes of COVID-19, which are severe illness, hospitalization, and death.”

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 05 Aug 23 - 01:39 PM

Much of the reporting in the US is less frequent and there are fewer places maintaining sites to do with tracking COVID. This about the UK from The Guardian:

UK almost ‘flying blind’ on Covid this autumn, experts say
As cases rise, scientists say country is mostly in the dark about how infections could play out in coming months

While the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) continues to track some metrics of Covid, including hospitalisation numbers, many of the community surveillance studies tracking infection levels have finished.

Now experts have said the situation is leaving the country in the dark about how Covid may play out in the months ahead.

Christina Pagel, a professor of operational research at University College London, said a new wave of Covid appeared to be under way – possibly driven by waning immunity, new variants of Omicron, and factors including poor weather keeping people inside.

With the autumn coming on and people returning to school and work, Covid pressures may increase, Pagel added.

“We might see the wave continue to grow, and grow faster, in September,” she said.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: robomatic
Date: 05 Aug 23 - 03:32 PM

My closest friends are an older couple with a young dog which I participate in regular walking with. The couple are health conscious and have had all their shots. They each caught covid within the last month, one with a mild case, the other not mild, but not 'bad' bad. I had had a bivalent booster most recently, and did not test positive at all. I think I'm the only one I know who has not yet caught it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: keberoxu
Date: 13 Aug 23 - 05:15 PM

"Eris" is being reported on in local news here in the US as well, Senoufou.

It's music season at Massachusetts' Tanglewood Festival, and
COVID-19 made its impact on the season
when cellist Yo-Yo Ma tested positive for COVID-19
and had to cancel his appearance with the Boston Symphony Orchestra.

The orchestra found someone, an opera singer,
to substitute on short notice, and the show went on without Yo-Yo Ma.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 13 Aug 23 - 10:50 PM

Good to know the newest variant's name. I heard one was around but didn't know the moniker.

Substitution for A-list performers is a big deal; the most interesting one I remember was when Pavarotti became ill and Aretha Franklin sang Nessun Dorma at the Grammys. I'd love to have been the fly on the wall as they figured out who else could perform it (who knew the words in Italian.)

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 18 Aug 23 - 05:20 PM

My pharmacy of record has texted telling me that my flu shot can be scheduled for September, and I'm sure they'll do the same when the next COVID booster is available. I'll be there with bells on!

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: MaJoC the Filk
Date: 18 Aug 23 - 08:24 PM

I didn't know you were in a Morris team, SRS ....

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 18 Aug 23 - 09:18 PM

Thanks, I wanted to hear her version.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 24 Aug 23 - 08:26 PM

I've had it for two weeks now. Its been horrible.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 24 Aug 23 - 08:38 PM

Supermarkets have largely abandoned their sanitising stations at the entrances. That seems a bit crazy to me. I'll never wear a mask again unless forced to by law, but I won't grab an unsanitised supermarket trolley. I carry my own sanitiser at all times. Sorry to hear that, Al. It's all but a year since my one and only dose and I got away lightly. I'll be pouncing on my next booster as soon as I hear that I can have it.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Aug 23 - 09:15 PM

Big Al get better and/or get attention.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 04 Jan 24 - 03:54 PM

From Politico:

Hydroxychloroquine could have caused 17,000 deaths during COVID, study finds
Former US President Donald Trump said: ‘What do you have to lose? Take it.’

Nearly 17,000 people may have died after taking hydroxycholoroquine during the first wave of COVID, according to a study by French researchers.

The anti-malaria drug was prescribed to some patients hospitalized with COVID-19 during the first wave of the pandemic, "despite the absence of evidence documenting its clinical benefits," the researchers point out in their paper, published in the February issue of Biomedicine & Pharmacotherapy.

Now, researchers have estimated that some 16,990 people in six countries — France, Belgium, Italy, Spain, Turkey and the U.S. — may have died as a result.

That figure stems from a study published in the Nature scientific journal in 2021 which reported an 11 percent increase in the mortality rate, linked to its prescription against COVID-19, because of the potential adverse effects like heart rhythm disorders, and its use instead of other effective treatments.

Researchers from universities in Lyon, France, and Québec, Canada, used that figure to analyze hospitalization data for COVID in each of the six countries, exposure to hydroxychloroquine and the increase in the relative risk of death linked to the drug.

In fact, they say the figure may be far higher given the study only concerns six countries from March to July 2020, when the drug was prescribed much more widely.

Hydroxychloroquine gained prominence partly due to French virologist Didier Raoult who had headed the Méditerranée Infection Foundation hospital, but was later removed amid growing controversy.

It was also considered something of a “miracle cure” by the then-U.S. President Donald Trump, who said: “What do you have to lose? Take it.”

There are links to the study and other reports in the article.

Subject: RE: BS: New news on the pandemic COVID-19
From: Donuel
Date: 05 Jan 24 - 12:59 PM

RSV has nearly burned out but flu is coming on strong.
The Covid J mutation resists immunity more but is less fatal.
It has doubled this month and is about a quarter of US corona infections.