48 thoughts on “C-19 Chat Post – November 21 2021”
Thanks TK!
A 4 year old boy mistakenly received a Covid-19 vaccine instead of a flu vaccine at a CVS in Fitchburg.
Total incompetence or “no harm, no foul”?
Currently, 5-11 year olds now have the highest cases of any demographic.
Makes very sad sense since we are exposing vast numbers in school
Interesting article I read last night regarding schools mandating the covid vaccine and the history of school vaccine mandates. I agree. Also, interesting fact about why polio vaccine was stopped for a while due to a very scary lab error
I continue to be dismayed at how officials are responding to this virus and the very lax attitudes.
And the anti-vaxers should all be jailed.
They are walking time bombs and murderers.
Ask me what I think.
I am so angry, I can’t even express it.
Are you referring to the riots in the Netherlands or the anti-vaxxers here in the U.S.? The latter can’t be arrested unless they actually commit a crime. Just being “unvaccinated” won’t do it.
Here and I know they can’t be arrested, but they should be.
It’s fine not to something because it is one’s right, as long
as doing so does not harm another. In this case, it clearly
does harm others. Here is where the line needs to be drawn.
These knuckleheads just don’t get it.
What IMO we need to do and don’t seem to be capable of doing is limit venues significantly for those without vaccines. Although, IMO also, the vaccinated who go about the day as if we are back to pre covid are also in part responsible for new cases. Schools are a huge invitation to be super spreaders.
Like JPD, were every segment to be placed on a pie chart, I believe our officials may be the biggest part of the problem.
Agree. The vaccinated go about their business like this is all over. Simply NOT so.
TK made an excellent point yesterday. The anti-vaxx folks and rioters put so much time and effort into protesting, sometimes violently; energy better spent on tackling the pandemic.
In response to Philip’s comment on rioting in the Netherlands. It got very bad on Friday night in Rotterdam. Police cars were set on fire, bricks and fireworks were tossed at police officers and riot police. Two people were shot by police in the legs when things got badly out of hand. All this said, it’s important to put some perspective on this. The numbers of people protesting violently were in the hundreds. Even peaceful protests against Covid-19 restrictions – which are relatively tame restrictions in the Netherlands where there is no lockdown – don’t draw large numbers. Perhaps several thousand to the largest demonstrations.
I missed TKs comment but sure agree. They are still causing problems at school meetings and too often at the homes of SC members
I hope gatherings don’t ever get out of hand like that over here.
Hosen mahmud md …I’m sure my spelling is incorrect
My daughter follows charleston, SC, news. You can’t read most of the story in the link below, but it isn’t really necessary to understand the thought process. Charleston county does have a school mask mandate.
In early September when covid cases were rampant in schools, the county went to temporary virtual learning. That is what grown ups do when children are at risk. Sorry…but apparently JPD isn’t the only one furious this morning.
Schools are back in person with the understanding that they’d go back to virtual if numbers increase. In this past week there were 35 school cases in all of Charleston county. Worchester, MA, schools alone had 90 cases last week. Worcester has half the population of Charleston county. Charleston is a deep red state…one we criticize often….
Could we have avoided countless covid cases in children ….you bet we could have. We could have funded home schooling for families who wanted remote. We have funded alternative schools for years. And we have Esser funds that may well have been approved for use.
You should be able to see the gist. But I summarized in my rant 🙂
Article below updates the Covid situation in the Netherlands. It contains two graphs, which you don’t need an understanding of Dutch to be able to read. The first is about the exponential growth in cases. Talk about a steep curve. Test positivity is approaching 25% in parts of the country. The second is about the nearly as dramatic increase in hospitalizations (slopes of the curves are quite similar, which tells you that cases matter – there isn’t much of a decoupling of cases and hospitalizations at all). In the past 24 hours a further 100 people were hospitalized, by the way. This is why the Dutch are now considering a strict lockdown for the entire country. Currently, they have relatively soft measures in place, such as mask mandates and capacity limits as well as distancing requirements, and restaurants must close by 8pm, and stores by 5pm, and no fans are allowed at any events, indoors OR outdoors.
THE reason for any set of mitigation measures is to relieve pressure on health system capacity and to save lives. In fact, it’s so bad right now across Holland in many hospitals that non-Covid patients are not getting the care they need, and some are dying.
I do wish people would grasp this fact, on both sides of the Atlantic. I often hear this refrain: “Well, we’re all going to get Covid anyway, so why have restrictions, you’re just delaying the inevitable.” To that, I respond, perhaps you are just delaying the inevitable, but by doing so you save many lives by: 1. Reducing the pressure on hospitals; 2. In the meantime by vaccinating/boosting as many folks as possible so that those who do get infected have much less of a chance of severe disease. https://nos.nl/artikel/2406515-20-717-positieve-coronatests-ziekenhuisbezetting-neemt-verder-toe
Good grief, those graphs are scary as hell.
I suspect in the coming weeks and months, the USA will see
similar, if not worse numbers.
Why don’t people get this?????????????????????????
You argument for mitigation in spot on, but try telling that to red state America.
This comment was on the post about Austria protests.
“ At the end of the day they have to go home and comply. They don’t have governors obsessed with absolute power who ignore the science and issues of consequence and responsibility and who treat knowledge as the enemy. In fact, you’re in luck Austria. We have a Black Friday sale you will love. You get two governors and 100 senators for a good recipe of goulash.”
From what I could tell just from listening to the morning tv and radio newscasts, medical officials don’t seem very concerned about the rise in cases of kids at all. I’m now beginning to fear this Thanksgiving (2021) more than the 2020 one.
Btw, Fauci has been very silent as of late.
Disgusting
They use the “kids don’t get sick like adults do”. It’s the same speech over and over since the pandemic began.
I’m now becoming more disappointed in our medical officials than our politicians.
The comment is made by uninformed folks who want to justify steps we have taken that endanger children. Medical folks know better
I have also noticed Fauci’s silence.
That same statement I heard this morning on the radio was from a member of the “medical folk”. Fauci’s silence should be a clue. Now I can understand why Joshua is concerned about the message coming from the medical community.
We have been concerned about the medical community message for months. It’s lack of consistent and open dialog has understandably created a good deal of vaccine hesitancy.
Even down to pediatricians ….and my grandkids’ have exceptional reputations. Too many are so damned afraid of law suits, they cannot deviate from the written standard even though every individual is different
Yesterday, new Boston Mayor Michelle Wu got her 6 year old son vaccinated for the first time.
Joshua, if your kids were of that age now, would you have got them vaccinated yesterday as well?
Not Joshua. If my five home schooled grandkids were in school, they would have the vaccine. They have a bit of a grace period to see how it goes. My guess is my oldest grand (14) will have either one regular vaccine only or the vaccine for 5-11.
Interesting …. Perhaps this is what other countries are seeing and therefore limiting vaccines to one
Rates of post-vaccination myocarditis are expected to be lower in young kids than those observed in teens. Myocarditis, which can also occur after bacterial and viral infections, including COVID-19, is generally significantly less common among younger children. That’s partly because the condition is linked with puberty hormones, explains pediatrician Nicole Baldwin, who practices in Cincinnati.
At least NPR doesn’t expect a “donation” for a subscription to read their articles. It’s a wonder though considering they rely on donations like PBS does.
Thanks Vicki.
Another interesting comment in the article I cited above. How is it possible the trial was not in depth enough to know side effects in kids
“Should I be concerned about serious side effects, especially myocarditis?
In very rare cases, following vaccination with mRNA vaccines made by Pfizer and Moderna, people have developed inflammation of the heart muscle, which is known as myocarditis. In Pfizer’s clinical trial for 5- to 11-year-olds, there were no cases of myocarditis, although the company acknowledged that the trials were not big enough to pick up such rare events.”
Good question from Philip on getting my children vaccinated, supposing this was 23 years ago and they in that age category. I probably would have, but I definitely would not have rushed to do it. in fact, my priority would have been to get myself and my wife – and other adult relatives, including my mother and father – boosted before the children. By the way, this has been the Israeli stance. At some point this week they will begin the vaccination campaign for 5-11 year olds. In the meantime, in the past few months they’ve boosted like there’s no tomorrow, and the results are clear: Cases have plummeted (precipitous drop, in fact), and deaths are nearing zero.
A very good sign for Israel. Hope that can happen over here eventually.
It’s important to note that when you have a highly vaccinated region the percentage of vaccinated who are in hospital will appear large. Yet, it’s still much better to be vaccinated, as the chances of you being hospitalized if vaccinated are much smaller than if you’re unvaccinated. This tweet contains a Venn diagram that explains this principle. https://twitter.com/Dichtbij_Ilja/status/1462527891154034692/photo/1
Nevertheless, what we’re seeing in the Netherlands in terms of cases and hospitalizations is surely a sign of waning vaccine immunity. And rather quickly waning immunity, given that the population was vaccinated on average about 2 months after the typical person was vaccinated in the U.S.
From November 1st through the 14th the percentage of vaccinated folks in hospital rose from 44% in October to 57%. This percentage was just 27% in September. Overall, the growth in numbers of hospitalizations has been on a torrid clip. It has more than doubled since November 1st. There are now 2,316 Covid-19 patients in hospital.
You may recall my concern when I saw these numbers last month. It’s only gotten much worse. It would be one thing if the vaccination campaign had ramped up in September, October and November to raise the overall vaccination rate to its present 84% (among >18 population). But there were very few vaccinations during this period. In fact, the Netherlands’ vaccination rate was already well over 80% by September 1st. There is no other way causal explanation than rapidly waning vaccine immunity.
Does the Netherlands do enough genomic sequencing to be sure that the increase is not caused by a variant with new-and-improved vaccine avoidance abilities?
Yes. It does a lot of sequencing, at least 10 times more than we do, though not as much as the UK or Denmark.
I think the AY. sub-lineages – the dot after the AY indicates that there are many such sub-lineages – are partly responsible. Certainly, they’ve increased transmissibility. But, because I’m not an epidemiologist and only observing the numbers I really can’t tell you with any certainty or scientific support whether they’ve contributed to waning vaccine immunity. Maybe this is what’s happening: You get your vaccinations and before the AY. sub-lineages emerged you have at least 5 months of really good immunity, and now that’s down to 3 months. This is VERY speculative on my part. But, it’s plausible.
The authorities there and here are in a pickle. They know that the data suggest that this is no longer a pandemic of the unvaccinated. But, they also know that vaccinations and boosters are very helpful at reducing severity of diseases, and offer a possible way out of this mess (see Israel – though today’s numbers there were a bit discouraging – 22 deaths and 282 cases).
My last post for the day – I apologize for so many posts – is about our TV anchors/news persons not doing a good enough job at interviewing. I don’t want to bash Dana Bash, but she really should have prepared tougher questions, and pushed back against lies and deception on the part of the interviewee. I’ve never understood this in America; our interviewers’ reluctance to truly engage and b hard-nosed in their questioning. Interviews are too often smile fests. https://twitter.com/FPWellman/status/1462438565481172993
Joshua – I only can speak for myself, but there is not need for you to apologize. I learn so much from your posts!
I agree with SClarke. And on this topic, Sears is one of the individuals who JPD mentioned this am….was it just today. She is a double talking fool. But she should not get away with it
On the topic of media and playing the devils advocate…..do we know what corporate dictates? I do know what corporate dictates to Mets…..but have no idea when it comes to talking heads
I second Vicki’s comment Joshua. We are so lucky to have access to your thoughts & expertise – please post early & often – we are all better educated and informed bc of it/yoi! Thank you!!!
ditto
C-19 for 11-22 is ready.
Comments are closed.
Your no-hype southeastern New England weather blog!
Thanks TK!
A 4 year old boy mistakenly received a Covid-19 vaccine instead of a flu vaccine at a CVS in Fitchburg.
Total incompetence or “no harm, no foul”?
Currently, 5-11 year olds now have the highest cases of any demographic.
Makes very sad sense since we are exposing vast numbers in school
Interesting article I read last night regarding schools mandating the covid vaccine and the history of school vaccine mandates. I agree. Also, interesting fact about why polio vaccine was stopped for a while due to a very scary lab error
https://www.npr.org/2021/11/19/1056568867/should-schools-mandate-covid-vaccine-for-children
Thanks for sharing this Vicki. Very informative.
I continue to be dismayed at how officials are responding to this virus and the very lax attitudes.
And the anti-vaxers should all be jailed.
They are walking time bombs and murderers.
Ask me what I think.
I am so angry, I can’t even express it.
Are you referring to the riots in the Netherlands or the anti-vaxxers here in the U.S.? The latter can’t be arrested unless they actually commit a crime. Just being “unvaccinated” won’t do it.
Here and I know they can’t be arrested, but they should be.
It’s fine not to something because it is one’s right, as long
as doing so does not harm another. In this case, it clearly
does harm others. Here is where the line needs to be drawn.
These knuckleheads just don’t get it.
What IMO we need to do and don’t seem to be capable of doing is limit venues significantly for those without vaccines. Although, IMO also, the vaccinated who go about the day as if we are back to pre covid are also in part responsible for new cases. Schools are a huge invitation to be super spreaders.
Like JPD, were every segment to be placed on a pie chart, I believe our officials may be the biggest part of the problem.
Agree. The vaccinated go about their business like this is all over. Simply NOT so.
TK made an excellent point yesterday. The anti-vaxx folks and rioters put so much time and effort into protesting, sometimes violently; energy better spent on tackling the pandemic.
In response to Philip’s comment on rioting in the Netherlands. It got very bad on Friday night in Rotterdam. Police cars were set on fire, bricks and fireworks were tossed at police officers and riot police. Two people were shot by police in the legs when things got badly out of hand. All this said, it’s important to put some perspective on this. The numbers of people protesting violently were in the hundreds. Even peaceful protests against Covid-19 restrictions – which are relatively tame restrictions in the Netherlands where there is no lockdown – don’t draw large numbers. Perhaps several thousand to the largest demonstrations.
I missed TKs comment but sure agree. They are still causing problems at school meetings and too often at the homes of SC members
I hope gatherings don’t ever get out of hand like that over here.
Crap: https://twitter.com/CMichaelGibson/status/1462430919416033282/photo/1
No surprised by this at all
Literally and figuratively and I agree. Crap
Charlie is the 2nd reply on there!!
Hosen mahmud md …I’m sure my spelling is incorrect
My daughter follows charleston, SC, news. You can’t read most of the story in the link below, but it isn’t really necessary to understand the thought process. Charleston county does have a school mask mandate.
In early September when covid cases were rampant in schools, the county went to temporary virtual learning. That is what grown ups do when children are at risk. Sorry…but apparently JPD isn’t the only one furious this morning.
Schools are back in person with the understanding that they’d go back to virtual if numbers increase. In this past week there were 35 school cases in all of Charleston county. Worchester, MA, schools alone had 90 cases last week. Worcester has half the population of Charleston county. Charleston is a deep red state…one we criticize often….
Could we have avoided countless covid cases in children ….you bet we could have. We could have funded home schooling for families who wanted remote. We have funded alternative schools for years. And we have Esser funds that may well have been approved for use.
https://www.postandcourier.com/health/covid19/7-charleston-county-schools-transition-to-virtual-learning-as-covid-19-cases-rise/article_bcc0737e-0b38-11ec-9f2f-fff06f039b4d.html
Subscription block! 🙁
You should be able to see the gist. But I summarized in my rant 🙂
Article below updates the Covid situation in the Netherlands. It contains two graphs, which you don’t need an understanding of Dutch to be able to read. The first is about the exponential growth in cases. Talk about a steep curve. Test positivity is approaching 25% in parts of the country. The second is about the nearly as dramatic increase in hospitalizations (slopes of the curves are quite similar, which tells you that cases matter – there isn’t much of a decoupling of cases and hospitalizations at all). In the past 24 hours a further 100 people were hospitalized, by the way. This is why the Dutch are now considering a strict lockdown for the entire country. Currently, they have relatively soft measures in place, such as mask mandates and capacity limits as well as distancing requirements, and restaurants must close by 8pm, and stores by 5pm, and no fans are allowed at any events, indoors OR outdoors.
THE reason for any set of mitigation measures is to relieve pressure on health system capacity and to save lives. In fact, it’s so bad right now across Holland in many hospitals that non-Covid patients are not getting the care they need, and some are dying.
I do wish people would grasp this fact, on both sides of the Atlantic. I often hear this refrain: “Well, we’re all going to get Covid anyway, so why have restrictions, you’re just delaying the inevitable.” To that, I respond, perhaps you are just delaying the inevitable, but by doing so you save many lives by: 1. Reducing the pressure on hospitals; 2. In the meantime by vaccinating/boosting as many folks as possible so that those who do get infected have much less of a chance of severe disease. https://nos.nl/artikel/2406515-20-717-positieve-coronatests-ziekenhuisbezetting-neemt-verder-toe
Good grief, those graphs are scary as hell.
I suspect in the coming weeks and months, the USA will see
similar, if not worse numbers.
Why don’t people get this?????????????????????????
You argument for mitigation in spot on, but try telling that to red state America.
This comment was on the post about Austria protests.
“ At the end of the day they have to go home and comply. They don’t have governors obsessed with absolute power who ignore the science and issues of consequence and responsibility and who treat knowledge as the enemy. In fact, you’re in luck Austria. We have a Black Friday sale you will love. You get two governors and 100 senators for a good recipe of goulash.”
From what I could tell just from listening to the morning tv and radio newscasts, medical officials don’t seem very concerned about the rise in cases of kids at all. I’m now beginning to fear this Thanksgiving (2021) more than the 2020 one.
Btw, Fauci has been very silent as of late.
Disgusting
They use the “kids don’t get sick like adults do”. It’s the same speech over and over since the pandemic began.
I’m now becoming more disappointed in our medical officials than our politicians.
The comment is made by uninformed folks who want to justify steps we have taken that endanger children. Medical folks know better
I have also noticed Fauci’s silence.
That same statement I heard this morning on the radio was from a member of the “medical folk”. Fauci’s silence should be a clue. Now I can understand why Joshua is concerned about the message coming from the medical community.
We have been concerned about the medical community message for months. It’s lack of consistent and open dialog has understandably created a good deal of vaccine hesitancy.
Even down to pediatricians ….and my grandkids’ have exceptional reputations. Too many are so damned afraid of law suits, they cannot deviate from the written standard even though every individual is different
Yesterday, new Boston Mayor Michelle Wu got her 6 year old son vaccinated for the first time.
Joshua, if your kids were of that age now, would you have got them vaccinated yesterday as well?
Not Joshua. If my five home schooled grandkids were in school, they would have the vaccine. They have a bit of a grace period to see how it goes. My guess is my oldest grand (14) will have either one regular vaccine only or the vaccine for 5-11.
Interesting …. Perhaps this is what other countries are seeing and therefore limiting vaccines to one
Rates of post-vaccination myocarditis are expected to be lower in young kids than those observed in teens. Myocarditis, which can also occur after bacterial and viral infections, including COVID-19, is generally significantly less common among younger children. That’s partly because the condition is linked with puberty hormones, explains pediatrician Nicole Baldwin, who practices in Cincinnati.
https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2021/11/03/1051299050/covid-vaccine-kids-5-11
At least NPR doesn’t expect a “donation” for a subscription to read their articles. It’s a wonder though considering they rely on donations like PBS does.
Thanks Vicki.
Another interesting comment in the article I cited above. How is it possible the trial was not in depth enough to know side effects in kids
“Should I be concerned about serious side effects, especially myocarditis?
In very rare cases, following vaccination with mRNA vaccines made by Pfizer and Moderna, people have developed inflammation of the heart muscle, which is known as myocarditis. In Pfizer’s clinical trial for 5- to 11-year-olds, there were no cases of myocarditis, although the company acknowledged that the trials were not big enough to pick up such rare events.”
Good question from Philip on getting my children vaccinated, supposing this was 23 years ago and they in that age category. I probably would have, but I definitely would not have rushed to do it. in fact, my priority would have been to get myself and my wife – and other adult relatives, including my mother and father – boosted before the children. By the way, this has been the Israeli stance. At some point this week they will begin the vaccination campaign for 5-11 year olds. In the meantime, in the past few months they’ve boosted like there’s no tomorrow, and the results are clear: Cases have plummeted (precipitous drop, in fact), and deaths are nearing zero.
A very good sign for Israel. Hope that can happen over here eventually.
It’s important to note that when you have a highly vaccinated region the percentage of vaccinated who are in hospital will appear large. Yet, it’s still much better to be vaccinated, as the chances of you being hospitalized if vaccinated are much smaller than if you’re unvaccinated. This tweet contains a Venn diagram that explains this principle. https://twitter.com/Dichtbij_Ilja/status/1462527891154034692/photo/1
Nevertheless, what we’re seeing in the Netherlands in terms of cases and hospitalizations is surely a sign of waning vaccine immunity. And rather quickly waning immunity, given that the population was vaccinated on average about 2 months after the typical person was vaccinated in the U.S.
From November 1st through the 14th the percentage of vaccinated folks in hospital rose from 44% in October to 57%. This percentage was just 27% in September. Overall, the growth in numbers of hospitalizations has been on a torrid clip. It has more than doubled since November 1st. There are now 2,316 Covid-19 patients in hospital.
You may recall my concern when I saw these numbers last month. It’s only gotten much worse. It would be one thing if the vaccination campaign had ramped up in September, October and November to raise the overall vaccination rate to its present 84% (among >18 population). But there were very few vaccinations during this period. In fact, the Netherlands’ vaccination rate was already well over 80% by September 1st. There is no other way causal explanation than rapidly waning vaccine immunity.
Does the Netherlands do enough genomic sequencing to be sure that the increase is not caused by a variant with new-and-improved vaccine avoidance abilities?
Yes. It does a lot of sequencing, at least 10 times more than we do, though not as much as the UK or Denmark.
I think the AY. sub-lineages – the dot after the AY indicates that there are many such sub-lineages – are partly responsible. Certainly, they’ve increased transmissibility. But, because I’m not an epidemiologist and only observing the numbers I really can’t tell you with any certainty or scientific support whether they’ve contributed to waning vaccine immunity. Maybe this is what’s happening: You get your vaccinations and before the AY. sub-lineages emerged you have at least 5 months of really good immunity, and now that’s down to 3 months. This is VERY speculative on my part. But, it’s plausible.
The authorities there and here are in a pickle. They know that the data suggest that this is no longer a pandemic of the unvaccinated. But, they also know that vaccinations and boosters are very helpful at reducing severity of diseases, and offer a possible way out of this mess (see Israel – though today’s numbers there were a bit discouraging – 22 deaths and 282 cases).
My last post for the day – I apologize for so many posts – is about our TV anchors/news persons not doing a good enough job at interviewing. I don’t want to bash Dana Bash, but she really should have prepared tougher questions, and pushed back against lies and deception on the part of the interviewee. I’ve never understood this in America; our interviewers’ reluctance to truly engage and b hard-nosed in their questioning. Interviews are too often smile fests. https://twitter.com/FPWellman/status/1462438565481172993
Joshua – I only can speak for myself, but there is not need for you to apologize. I learn so much from your posts!
I agree with SClarke. And on this topic, Sears is one of the individuals who JPD mentioned this am….was it just today. She is a double talking fool. But she should not get away with it
On the topic of media and playing the devils advocate…..do we know what corporate dictates? I do know what corporate dictates to Mets…..but have no idea when it comes to talking heads
I second Vicki’s comment Joshua. We are so lucky to have access to your thoughts & expertise – please post early & often – we are all better educated and informed bc of it/yoi! Thank you!!!
ditto
C-19 for 11-22 is ready.