outbreak! (ebola, sars, coronavirus, etc)

“It kind of breaks your spirit because it’s an open book test and the answers are there.”

Books?!? What're we, nerds!?! (dies of COVID like a total nerd)

can you extrapolate a key lime pie

Is it wrong to think that a variant with mild symptoms becoming the dominant one is a good thing?

Well, that depends. If omicron confers some immunity to delta, then sure. But if that's the case, it's just as likely that delta (and vaccinations to same) confers some immunity to omicron, which would be great.

If that's not the case, then you're talking about a milder strain which becomes very common OVER AND ABOVE the level of delta we already have, which is causing some real damage! i.e. 1000 people getting delta and 1000000 people getting omicron is worse than 1000 people getting delta and omicron not existing, even if omicron has milder symptoms.

And we have no reason to think omicron has milder symptoms.

if the virus mutated into one that didn't kill its hosts wouldn't that be extremely in line with what viruses have always done

(If I understand correctly): Fortunately, COVID doesn't kill that many of its hosts; not enough for this kind of evolutionary pressure to work. Almost everyone survives and even the people who don't certainly get plenty of chances to transmit, which is all the virus cares about.

yeah you don't even know you have it for a few days usually and that's enough to spread so unfortunately i think the dying or the not dying is neither here nor there

I've heard lots of anecdotes about the third vaccination having "saved" people - stories about coach trips where all the double vaccinated people have contracted Covid and those with the booster haven't ... and that kind of thing. And I guess others are hearing the same thing and thinking "I'll get that"?

I thought I was going to be fine, and then I decided to go to NY for a weekend, and two weeks before I made an appointment.

While I was there, I was in some very crowded places. Really glad I got boosted.

at least NYC requires proof of jabs. I too was in crowded places exactly three weeks ago and have tested negative twice since then.

Hearing word of recent upticks in our elementary schools (kids under 12, so only recently eligible for vax) and high school (kids whose vaccine effectiveness could be waning 6+ months out).

Hm oh well, never mind, everything I thought I knew is disproved! Booster appt next week and I convinced my elderly neighbors to get it which I'm not sure they were planning to, and they only had the J&J before. So I'm happy about that.

gw io

I actually scheduled hers and mine last night while on the phone w her--we'd just been talking earlier about how all the pharmacies require you to use an online booking system and how she wasn't comfortable with the technology and how were people supposed to etc etc the same thing we all said back in March. After clicking through a lot of days, I finally found a place with 10+ slots open and called her immeds and got it done! Woot.

The online booking systems for CVS and Walgreens are garbage where I am. Ended up going to an urgent care and was surprised with a $25 charge. Oh well.

I think the vaccine itself is free, that's probably some sort of general co-pay for medical services. So far everything covid-related we've had to deal with here has been completely free, with the exception of home antigen tests. When I went in for a drive-through PCR test the other week they didn't ask for anything more than my name, address, phone number and email.

it'll be an interesting situation if i ever have to prove i have a booster. i have my original vaccination card, now torn in half and held together with tape, and then when I got the booster (at a CVS), i was like "should we add this onto my old vaccination card or is there a new one?" and he looked at the old card for a minute, then said "no, it doesn't look like there's a space for it. just hold onto the receipt and, of course, it'll in the CVS system". hahaha, right

I got a new card with my booster -- the aide just transcribed the first two vaccine info.

Depending on where you live your covid vaccination record is probably with the state too. Mine from https://myvaccinerecord.cdph.ca.gov/ has my booster within 48 hours. Admittedly I don’t get out much but I’ve never been anywhere the digital cars wasn’t accepted.

Anecdotal because we still have a handful at home and I haven't tried to source any myself for several months, but heard from several people this week that they are having a lot of trouble finding at home COVID tests.

Biden's personally delivering them iirc

Explains the Trans Am blasting Foreigner I keep seeing spinning around the neighborhood.

joe biden: america's sexy dad

What's hard for me is that I really can't make a rational case that I shouldn't dial back my interactions with other people, since there is a substantial chance -- I guess I'd say less than 50/50, but enough to pay attention to -- that my current vaccination status is not going to afford me much protection against omicron. Like, I am supposed to go see my over-75 parents in two weeks. Should I cancel it? They haven't asked me to or even raised the question. But until we know more about relation between omicron and existing mRNA vaccine, isn't there a real risk I pick it up and carry it to them?

And yet nobody around me is changing anything or talking about changing anything.

You can substitute "delta" for "omicron."

Are they vaccinated and boosted? Then, yeah, visit them. If you're eating indoors or hanging out in large parties indoors, I'd cool it in the days before visiting them -- the same precaution I took in August with delta and April with the other variants.

They're vaccinated and boosted, and so am I. And I don't think one can substitute "delta" for "omicron" because we have known for a while that current vaccines provide very good protection against delta. I don't want my parents to be exposed to delta but I like their chances if they are. Omicron I don't know.

The point is, we didn't know 100% in April and May as it spread. I mean, you do you. Has omicron spread enough that I'd worry about seeing my boosted parents? I wouldn't. You may think otherwiise.

Speaking for myself, I mask in my classrooms and any time I speak to a colleague at work -- we still observe those professional courtesies. I test myself voluntarily every Monday or Tuesday on campus. I hang out inside a coffee shop masked for three or four hours. I just left a meeting with students and their advisor at which every person -- let me stress, every person -- was unmasked in a classroom except me.

Those things, and avoiding crowded indoor settings where I'm unmasked, are my risk mitigation. They give me the confidence to visit friends and my parents indoors. It helps that Miami-Dade has averaged a 3% positivity rate for weeks (we'll see. I expect a spike).

Again, you asked for advice. I gave it to you.

It is appreciated

The omicron variant is likely to have picked up genetic material from another virus that causes the common cold in humans, according to a new preliminary study, prompting one of its authors to suggest omicron could have greater transmissibility but lower virulence than other variants of the coronavirus.

Researchers from Nference, a Cambridge, Mass.-based firm that analyzes biomedical information, sequenced omicron and found a snippet of genetic code that is also present in a virus that can bring about a cold. They say this particular mutation could have occurred in a host simultaneously infected by SARS-CoV-2, also known as the novel coronavirus, and the HCoV-229E coronavirus, which can cause the common cold. The shared genetic code with HCoV-229E has not been detected in other novel coronavirus variants, the scientists said.

The study is in preprint and has not been peer-reviewed.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2021/12/04/omicron-coronavirus-transmissible-cold-variant/

Encouraging

While we still need more data, see here stating that most patients contributing to the hospitalized numbers were hospitalized for another reason and found to be SARS-CoV-2 upon admission screen. H/T: @emilybethwong pic.twitter.com/786uPqHCOb

— Chise 🧬🧫🦠💉🔜 MFF (@sailorrooscout) December 4, 2021

🦠 There’s a lot we don’t yet understand about Omicron, including its impact on immunity and what it means for vaccines. New data will be emerging over the next few wks, which could be misinterpreted w/o context. What we might expect & how to interpret the emerging data? 🧵(1/n)

— Muge Cevik (@mugecevik) December 3, 2021

Yesterday, I walked into a Walgreen's 2 blocks away to schedule a booster, walked out an hour later injected with the requested Moderna booster (rather than a 3rd Pfizer shot). If only other preventative health care was this frictionless.

Why did you switch?

6 of 7 dentists back Pfizer

i got boosted today. pfizer on top of 2x AZ. i think the kids call this “candy flipping”. i don’t “feel it” yet though.

i hear that makes you hairier

strawberry fields forever

xp James: There are early studies that find mixing with a "heterologous" boosters has a greater on antibody titers, eg Table 2 in [this US study](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/labs/pmc/articles/PMC8528081/). Benefits for mixing prime and boost vaccinations seem pretty minor if both are mRNA vaccines, but there's a great improvement when the J&J prime vaccination is followed by one of the mRNA vaccines as booster. J&J perhaps erred in not trialing a two dose regimen.

For those outside the US initially given the AstraZeneca vaccine, early studies indicate that boosting with the mRNA vaccines increases antibodies more than a AstraZeneca boost ([French study](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-021-04120-y), [Bavarian study](https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3949414), [Saarland study](https://assets.researchsquare.com/files/rs-1034243/v1/086afaa4-ca6d-43b3-a15d-17d60b8e7a0c.pdf?c=1636141249)), but the magnitude isn't as great as seen mixing J&J prime and mRNA boost in the US study.

As for why Moderna? Maybe I just wanted to try all the flavors.

Oops on the formatting.

early studies indicate that boosting with the mRNA vaccines increases antibodies more than a AstraZeneca boost

I should hope so after getting delta a few weeks ago after 2 AZs. I fucking knew when they told me I was getting AZ back in spring that it was going to be the shit one. of course it's anecdotal but everyone I know who's had breakthrough infections had AZ. nobody I know who got Pfizer has had covid at all.

cool, cool

Jen Psaki somewhat mockingly asks reporter at the White House Daily Press Briefing if the US should be sending out rapid #COVID19 tests to every household.

In the UK you can order 1 pack (containing 7 tests) everyday. https://t.co/ErnSsiLxxl pic.twitter.com/L7ruKWdy5n

— Matt Karolian (@mkarolian) December 6, 2021

I HATE HER SO MUCH

"We share the same objective, except we've all decided that fealty to an unrestrained free market of rent-seeking ghouls is more important than ending the pandemic."

"Early data from the Steve Biko and Tshwane District Hospital Complex in South Africa’s capital Pretoria, which is at the centre of the outbreak, showed that on December 2 only nine of the 42 patients on the Covid-19 ward, all of whom were unvaccinated, were being treated for the virus and were in need of oxygen.

The remainder of the patients had tested positive but were asymptomatic and being treated for other conditions."

"The pattern of milder disease in Pretoria is corroborated by data for the whole of Gauteng province. Eight per cent of Covid-positive hospital patients are being treated in intensive care units, down from 23 per cent throughout the Delta wave. And just 2 per cent are on ventilators, down from 11 per cent.

Although the total number of Covid-positive patients in Gauteng’s hospitals is approaching the level it reached at the same stage of the Delta wave, researchers said a large proportion received treatment for other conditions. And the number of Covid patients in intensive care is one quarter of what it was three weeks into the Delta outbreak."

www.ft.com/content/d315be08-cda0-462b-85ec-811290ad488e

Good news is better than bad news

But look, it's good to read whatever tea leaves there are in the cup, but inside of a month we are going to have very good worldwide data about how many thousands of people infected with omicron are doing

So if Omicron does turn out to be milder, does that mean it would be in countries' best interest to reverse their travel bans? Is it better for it to spread more widely and out-compete the more deadly strains?

travel bans are a pretense

A pretense I guess unless you have travel plans.

most experts are pointing out it still wouldn't be good for the entire world to have the same cold at the same time. people could still be hospitalized! even if it was a much milder form of COVID, heavy transmission could lead to a run on hospitals.