19 thoughts on “C-19 Chat Post – January 13 2022”

  1. In MA and throughout Northeast I’m convinced the Omicron surge has peaked. BUT, given the peak’s very high level of transmissions, for several more weeks even as we decline there will be a very large caseload, significant number of hospitalizations, and still many more deaths to come.

    Nationwide we have NOT yet peaked. Probably will do so next week, but an extremely high levels. Same words of caution apply. Remember last year. We peaked in cases in early January and peaked in deaths in mid February.

    India is in an O-line. I predict India will go over 1 million cases a day within a couple of weeks (with lower levels of testing). I do hope we don’t get another variant from there, or here for that matter.

    Still almost no messaging on boosters. Sounds trivial, but message boards on highways have an impact. We’re not even doing that, at least I haven’t seen it. Our booster rate is sagging badly. Crucially, it’s limping along among at-risk folks and the elderly. Our European friends have blasted past us and then some. Similar story was told in the spring with respect to vaccination. Americans can start a job and do so with fanfare, but we can’t seem to finish it. Follow-through is important, but isn’t an attribute of the Biden Administration (or the states’ administrations) or the Trump Administration.

    https://twitter.com/EricTopol/status/1481627045549412352

  2. @joshua at what point do you think we should be looking at this as endemic vs Pandemic. The cases are up but the vaccinated aren’t really dying and aren’t really even in the hospital bc of Covid.

    1. Good question, Hadi. I’m also interested to know if thar new variant in Europe actually took hold and also whether we need more vaccinated before the virus can stop spreading / mutating.

  3. Also protestors are at WUs home because of mandates. I know these are public officials, but I find it remarkably disrespectful to go to a home. Go to the statehouse. Go to the common.

    1. I guess these idiots do not understand the virus and what
      the mandates do.

      Can’t fix stupid!

      And there are too many STUPIDS out there!

  4. Hadi, that’s a great question. First, it’s important to qualify the statement “the vaccinated aren’t really dying.” They’re certainly not dying (whether 2x or 3x vaxed) at even close to the rate of the unvaccinated. But, our definition of vaccinated should include boosters, at least for adults, in my view. With boosters, your statement is more or less correct. Without boosters, however, it is not.

    I think several European countries are close to endemicity. Portugal, for example. Perhaps Spain. The others should follow suit, including Germany, France, Austria, and perhaps even the UK. When I say “close” I mean by March. We are behind, because of our relatively poor vaccination and booster rates, and other factors, too, such as comparatively worse underlying health conditions. We still have a bad stretch to go through in the coming 4 to 6 weeks in terms of deaths. However, I remain somewhat optimistic that by mid March our deaths will really plummet, and that by May our deaths will be at or under 100 a day, which would definitively mean endemic. The caveat is of course the emergence of another variant.

    1. Thank you, Joshua. It all makes sense. What happened to the other variant mentioned here a week or so ago

  5. School positive Numbers are in for this week….most schools had four in-person days due to snow

    41,963 students. 7,351 staff

    Two weeks ending 1/6 and 1/12 (8 schools days)

    99,514 total positives, 79,950 students …REPEATING, IN 8 schools day

    The table is below. In 77 school days (give or take a day or two depending on different school calendars) there has been 159,807 covid positives in Massachusetts schools. Many were preventable has we taken known precautions. In school year 2020-2021 there were 20,321 total cases.

    https://ibb.co/gDXGz2J

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