Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Flu has disappeared worldwide during the Covid pandemic

scientificamerican.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

731–740 of 821 posts

Re: Flu has disappeared worldwide during the Covid pandemic

#731

Post by Broken_Hippo »

rubicon33 wrote: post #318
aarondia wrote: post #300

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This year was a great experiment in person hygiene. It was the healthiest I have ever been for a full year, no colds, stomach bugs, anything. I'm not sure which practices I'll continue, but its definitely shown me that I have wayyyy more control over my health than I previously thought. Curious what others think are the most effective continued practices. Seems like social distancing isn't super reasonable, but maybe…

You can do a LOT. I haven't been sick once in 6+ years because I do the following: 1) Almost never eat out. Home cooked meals that I've prepped / washed. This was single handedly the biggest factor that completely removed "getting sick" from my life. 2) Hand wash before touching face, or food. 3) Avoid sick people. If I hear someone coughing or sneezing, I move away from them. Call me a germ freak, I don't care, I've…

Sure.. but this also means that you don't have to take public transportation, that you probably don't have small children, and you likely don't work in a school, pharmacy, daycare or hospital.

Bragging about sick days is hardly indicative. Many if not most places in the states don't give sick days, and folks are forced to go in when sick because they can't afford not to.

I should now mention that I worked 8+ years at a pharmacy, and a school before that. I rarely got sick and I didn't do most of your precautions. Just basic hygiene, and got my flu shot every year. And I directly led folks to cough and cold medicines.

Some of this time, I stopped to get coffee most days (there was a mcdonald's next door).

I just get sick even less now, but that's mostly because my lifestyle naturally isolates me (not in a bad way).

I'll also say that sick folks can - and do - get you sick before they show symptoms, and a lot of folks that cough or sneeze do not have any disease that you can catch: Smoking (pot or nicotine) causes coughing: Allergies and irritants cause both coughing and sneezing. You can only do so much.

You've just been lucky and have a lifestyle that allowed you to keep away from people to an extent, though the hand washing does help out and honestly, if anyone picks up one of your habits, it really should be somewhat frequent hand washing.

Re: Flu has disappeared worldwide during the Covid pandemic

#732

Post by nanis »

nanis wrote: post #564
Majromax wrote: post #237

This should not come as a surprise, and it was largely predictable from the outset. The flu has a base reproduction number (R0) less than 2 ( https://www.vdh.virginia.gov/coronavirus/2020/12/07/covid-19... ). Covid has an R0 in the vicinity of 2.5 ( https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/hcp/planning-scena... ). In the meantime, public health measures like masking and distancing will work against both viruses. If…

> In the meantime, public health measures like masking and distancing will work against both viruses. This argument does not make sense because of the timing of the disappearance of the flu. For example, NYS was having a really bad flu season before the Covid panic hit[1]. I am posting a link to my screenshot first because NYS flu tracker[1] is one of the stupidest web pages out there. Click on the "compare with prev…

I find the downvotes interesting. Do you think the web page is actually well done? Or do you disagree with the observation that the drop between weeks 6 and 7 in 2020 (in the midst of a bad flu season) looks different?

% ch in flu cases between weeks 6 and 7 in NYS

    2017:  -8%
    2018:  +9%
    2019:  +9%
    2020: -17%
    2021: -31% (really low absolute numbers)
What caused flu cases to start falling in mid-February _before_ so called "public health measures"?[1]

> The acceleration phase of a pandemic is complex and requires a multifaceted and rapidly adapting public health response. During a 3-week period in late February to early March, the number of U.S. COVID-19 cases increased more than 1,000-fold. Various community mitigation interventions were implemented with the aim of reducing further spread and controlling the impact on health care capacity.

So, between CDC weeks 7 to 10, the a bad flu season disappears while COVID-19 cases increase 1,000-fold. What are the "public health measures" that explain this divergence?

March 21, 2020[2]:

> "To be clear, the state has the legal authority to overrule any locality's decision to issue an order of mass quarantine or shut down. No locality will be closing down. The mass transit system is not shutting down. These rumors, caused by undue anxiety, are just that - rumors."

March 7, 2020[3]:

> During a briefing on the novel coronavirus, Governor Andrew M. Cuomo today declared a state of emergency to help New York more quickly and effectively contain the spread of the virus.

February 29, 2020[4]:

> "We'll start testing immediately here in New York, so we can handle more tests, more volume, turn them around faster, and we are ready to go and literally we can start testing immediately We have mobilized for emergencies before, and we're going to do it again."

February 27, 2020[5]:

> Governor Andrew M. Cuomo today announced the total number of flu cases in New York State has eclipsed the record number of seasonal cases since the New York State Department of Health began tracking flu cases during the 1998-99 season.

[1]: https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/69/wr/mm6918e2.htm

[2]: https://www.governor.ny.gov/news/statement-secretary-governo...

[3]: https://www.governor.ny.gov/news/novel-coronavirus-briefing-...

[4]: https://www.governor.ny.gov/news/video-audio-rush-transcript...

[5]: https://www.governor.ny.gov/news/governor-cuomo-announces-re...

Re: Flu has disappeared worldwide during the Covid pandemic

#733

Post by bkuhns »

tehlike wrote: post #475
rubicon33 wrote: post #318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can do a LOT. I haven't been sick once in 6+ years because I do the following: 1) Almost never eat out. Home cooked meals that I've prepped / washed. This was single handedly the biggest factor that completely removed "getting sick" from my life. 2) Hand wash before touching face, or food. 3) Avoid sick people. If I hear someone coughing or sneezing, I move away from them. Call me a germ freak, I don't care, I've…

I don't think your anecdata proves anything but your own experience. 1. I eat out a lot, including junk food every now and then. 2. Of course I hand wash, but i would not say "before touching face" per-se, but as often as you'd normally expect (restroom breaks, before preparing food and/or eating, after coming from outside). 3. I don't really run away from sick people. I simply am indifferent. I still never get sick,…

The biggest factor for me was having kids. After I moved out of my parents' (my mom was an administrator of a preschool, so I think she brought home lots of fun germs), I didn't even get a cold for 3-4 years. I wouldn't say I did anything other than basic hygiene (hand washing after bathroom breaks, etc) to prevent getting sick during that time.

Then I started having kids. I've spent most of the cooler seasons with at least mild cold symptoms ever since. It's been like clockwork that every year for the last 8 years, everyone in the house gets a "stomach bug" around February; including 2020.

No surprise to me, this past year no one in the house (of five) has had anything besides allergy symptoms. This February was the first in 8 years that I didn't find myself spending an evening on the toilet with constant diarrhea. I don't want to go back to normal.

Re: Flu has disappeared worldwide during the Covid pandemic

#735

Post by collyw »

teachingassist wrote: post #567
collyw wrote: post #439

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's potentially the opposite. Say you have a population of 1000. If one person infects ten others. Then its going to be 3 generations before 1000 are infected and full immunity is reached. We go for a suppression strategy instead.If 1 person infects 1 other person (as we seem to be trying to achieve with corna) it is going to take 1000 generations before full immunity is achieved. There is going to be far more chanc…

If everybody has had the disease, what's the purpose of having full immunity? However, I think this is right in one sense: an implicit or explicit strategy of keeping R0 as close as possible to 1 would be the strategy with the highest risk of significant mutations, as we have seen. UK government ministers literally stated this to be their strategy.

It was just an example to make the theory easier to understand.

Re: Flu has disappeared worldwide during the Covid pandemic

#736

Post by collyw »

mrtksn wrote: post #157
collyw wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At the height of the "second wave" here, it was estimated that around 0.8% of the population was infected at the time. That means that if you were randomly tested there was a greater chance that you would have a false positive than an actual infection.

That would be unfortunate to all those prevalence studies where the difference between 1.1 and % 0.3 means the world for them. They may never know if it was %0.5 or %0.8 of the people infected. On the other hand, it's a pretty good accuracy when you have a hospital full of sick people. Sure, you may end up recommending 14 days of staying at home every now and then when it's not necessary. See, the PCR test is just on…

That's why I said they were completely unsuitable for mass testing. I said nothing about them being used where covid is suspected.

Re: Flu has disappeared worldwide during the Covid pandemic

#737

Post by cheeri0 »

jakobnissen wrote: post #708
cheeri0 wrote: post #561

I'm just going to go ahead here and state the obvious. The flu did not magically disappear and people with the flu are without any question being counted as counted as covid-19 cases.

No. I work in my country's national influenza lab, and we still do tests specifically for influenza. We can distinguish between subtypes of influenza with those, the idea of the test being so broad it can pick up other phyla is outrageous.

I never questioned the ability of a lab to detect the flu. I chose the null hypothesis that the flu did not disappear. You are the one claiming the flu disappeared lol.

Re: Flu has disappeared worldwide during the Covid pandemic

#738

Post by globular-toast »

aarondia wrote: post #300
gorbachev wrote: post #262

I was just commenting to a co-worker my entire family hasn't been sick since the pandemic started. That is very unusual for a family with young children. No flu, no stomach viruses, absolutely nothing for more than a year now. Thankfully no covid-19 either.

This year was a great experiment in person hygiene. It was the healthiest I have ever been for a full year, no colds, stomach bugs, anything. I'm not sure which practices I'll continue, but its definitely shown me that I have wayyyy more control over my health than I previously thought. Curious what others think are the most effective continued practices. Seems like social distancing isn't super reasonable, but maybe…

I doubt it has much to do with personal hygiene. I always washed my hands. That hasn't changed. What's changed is personal distancing, in particular not sharing an office, train, hotel etc with sick people.

I really hope the long term effect of this will be huge social stigma against being in public with a contagious illness.

Re: Flu has disappeared worldwide during the Covid pandemic

#739

Post by JulianMorrison »

valarauko wrote: post #505
JulianMorrison wrote: post #269

Maybe we were too callous just allowing the ordinary flu to run rampant, and we should consider in future doing things like masking up when a flu season is expected, so as to stop the disease from killing thousands of old people. And also possibly consider going for full eradication rather than harm reduction. Can flu jabs be made more effective, and multi-strain, using mRNA vaccine technology? That's a genuinely new…

> Can flu jabs be made more effective, and multi-strain, using mRNA vaccine technology? That's a genuinely new tool in the toolbox. In theory, yes; in practice, I don't see this happening for some time (outside of a possible combined SARS-CoV-2 booster + flu combo). The mRNA vaccines are expensive to produce, and it's hard to justify a cost multiplier that's a magnitude higher & harder to produce. Flu vaccines are al…

If I understand it right, mRNA isn't so much exactly hard, as bespoke. It's a new technology and not many places are fitted out to make it. It can eventually be expected to become much cheaper.

And mRNA can keep up with flu. It can also target things in a more deliberate way, if I understand it. So a protein could be selected that is common to many variants and hard for the virus to do without.

Re: Flu has disappeared worldwide during the Covid pandemic

#740

Post by globular-toast »

rubicon33 wrote: post #318
aarondia wrote: post #300

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This year was a great experiment in person hygiene. It was the healthiest I have ever been for a full year, no colds, stomach bugs, anything. I'm not sure which practices I'll continue, but its definitely shown me that I have wayyyy more control over my health than I previously thought. Curious what others think are the most effective continued practices. Seems like social distancing isn't super reasonable, but maybe…

You can do a LOT. I haven't been sick once in 6+ years because I do the following: 1) Almost never eat out. Home cooked meals that I've prepped / washed. This was single handedly the biggest factor that completely removed "getting sick" from my life. 2) Hand wash before touching face, or food. 3) Avoid sick people. If I hear someone coughing or sneezing, I move away from them. Call me a germ freak, I don't care, I've…

You can't avoid sick people if it's your boss at work. My old boss used to make fun of people if they stayed off with "the sniffles".
Post reply on HN