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Why is India having a Covid-19 surge?

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Re: Why is India having a Covid-19 surge?

#31

Post by howinteresting »

fallingknife wrote: post #24
roenxi wrote: post #8

At some point people really have to stop trying to guess what is going on in real-time and adopt a more patient, evidence based approach. India is huge, the healthcare system is said to be collapsing and most of them don't speak English. We aren't going to get coherent reporting in the English press for a few months. On the other hand, if we're worried about variants then I hope there are some hard conversations happ…

> why are there still plane flights 12 months in to the pandemic? Someone fill me in on what I've missed; this seems to be not taking the situation seriously. Are these variants not going to be travelling between countries by plane and ship? Because the virus is more than an order of magnitude less dangerous than initial estimates, but we are stuck with the legacy decisions made back then in a political environment w…

You are commenting on a thread that is literally about an entire country's healthcare system collapsing because of this virus. People in their 30s and 40s who would otherwise have survived with appropriate medical care, are dying because they can't get hospital beds.

The raw facts are that lockdowns and other COVID restrictions saved millions of lives. I'm open to arguments about other balancing factors but they must come from an underlying view that some restrictions on personal liberty are completely legitimate in emergencies. Skeptics like the signatories of the "Great Barrington Declaration" should learn from India, take the L and have some more humility next time.

Re: Why is India having a Covid-19 surge?

#32

Post by maxerickson »

mlyle wrote: post #18
maxerickson wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is this just anecdotal or ? Basically no theory about high prevalence of previous infection has survived the test of time, so I think to say something like 'infecting previously recovered people much more vigorously' takes some solid evidence.

I was not concerned about all previous reinfection reports--- after all, anything will happen sporadically. But I believe recent immune-escape variants are a much higher risk here. Vaccines generate a much higher antibody titer and a much broader complement of antibody responses than natural infection, and still are noticeably less effective against emerging variants. Waning immunity also will contribute to this conc…

Which emerging variants are you talking about? The Twitter thread I link above talks about the variants that are spreading a lot and from what I see, experts are calm about the level of effectiveness of the vaccines against them.

Re: Why is India having a Covid-19 surge?

#33

Post by ericlewis »

k__ wrote: post #17
drumhead wrote: post #16

A combination of triumphalism and Stupidity. The govt there thought that they'd seen off the worst of pandemic and that they'd achieved herd immunity, so they didnt bother preparing for a second wave. Then politicans decided to hold massive election rallies, allow the largest religious festival in the world to go ahead and open up stadiums for sporting events.

How come their second wave comes so late?

> The govt there thought that they'd seen off the worst of pandemic and that they'd achieved herd immunity

because they thought they had solved the problem, and once they let up - it happened again

Re: Why is India having a Covid-19 surge?

#34

Post by wfhbata »

jessriedel wrote: post #22
roenxi wrote: post #8

At some point people really have to stop trying to guess what is going on in real-time and adopt a more patient, evidence based approach. India is huge, the healthcare system is said to be collapsing and most of them don't speak English. We aren't going to get coherent reporting in the English press for a few months. On the other hand, if we're worried about variants then I hope there are some hard conversations happ…

> To be honest, I'm confused by the amount of air travel that is still going on. If locking down large swathes of most countries is on the cards, why is there any air travel happening? I think essentially all the data we have indicates that there is a surprisingly low rate covid transmission on airplanes and airports. (You can be worried that the data is being provided by airline companies who are biased, but at this…

> Your concern should be with any method of travel, not air travel per se.

The U.S. was extremely slow to restrict travel from India. Are many people traveling to the U.S. from India via car, bus, train, or boat? Flights are the concern because that's how people travel between continents.

Re: Why is India having a Covid-19 surge?

#35

Post by zelphirkalt »

ghaff wrote: post #11
roenxi wrote: post #8

At some point people really have to stop trying to guess what is going on in real-time and adopt a more patient, evidence based approach. India is huge, the healthcare system is said to be collapsing and most of them don't speak English. We aren't going to get coherent reporting in the English press for a few months. On the other hand, if we're worried about variants then I hope there are some hard conversations happ…

I'm constantly reminded that I clearly live in something of a bubble. I think I know a few people who took a plane to ride out the pandemic somewhere they saw as safer and one person who took an international trip to do some business. But that's about it. And a lot of people I know, including myself, practically live in planes normally. Yet, while air travel is down significantly, it's not that far down. Certainly no…

My guess is: Many people just can't get a grip on themselves and their urges.

Among friends I know, that I am the most strictly adhering to lockdown rules, even going beyond what the rules are. I don't visit people, I avoid being visited (even whatever number of people is allowed visiting each other. Just because one can, does not mean it is a great idea.) I try to tell close ones to avoid visits. Many days I don't leave the house or premises, which of course I can only do, because of being able to work from home. Many people at least need to go to work, that much I understand. This goes on for a year or so by now, in which I have once met one friend outside for hiking.

Yet I know people, who I thought were smarter or had more self-control, who travelled. To me this is bafflingly selfish. Is their vacation travelling really more important than people around them, family members included? What if they catch a new variant, perhaps even one which goes undetected? (I don't know if that is biologically possible with the tests we have.) What if they have no symptoms but spread it to others? Are they ready to carry the responsibility for someone suffocating? Why do they need to go on vacation every year, no matter what is happening? What is the reasoning behind their actions?

I guess these thought and questions are not on the menu for many. Too uncomfortable to think about that. I guess I am quite extreme in my isolation. Probably easier for me to do than for others, because of pre-existing social isolation and being used to little social contact. However, what I also think is, that if more people avoided unnecessary contacts, travelling and such, we would be in less trouble than we are now.

The whole thing changed my view of some people I know. Not much to the better, I am afraid. Perhaps I am a person with especially low requirements of my world, as long as I have a computer with Internet access, food and running water. I guess it is hardest for the people, who have a huge contrast to the before pandemic time.

Re: Why is India having a Covid-19 surge?

#36

Post by lambdaba »

ryandrake wrote: post #30
k__ wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How come their second wave comes so late?

What if it's early and we just don't know yet? Everyone acts as though "COVID is almost behind us" which is part of why we keep seeing these new waves. We are in such a rush to get back to normal at all costs, and keep doing it too early.

If people would spend more time outside in summer, destressing, getting vitamin D, improving their immunity etc. then we can expect the current cycle to end as respiratory infectious diseases tend to.

The coercive measures by govs are pushing in the opposite direction.

Re: Why is India having a Covid-19 surge?

#37

Post by lebuffon »

The history of theses things in India seems to be the track that Covid followed everywhere.

Is it just human psychology that is the problem?

1st wave: everybody clamps down. R goes to 2nd wave: people think it's over R goes >1, then clamp down again.

3rd wave: more of no. 2 but with a broader base of carriers across the nation.

3rd wave in India therefore will be really nasty based on other nations 3rd wave, unless their rapid vaccination plan gets a big percentage of the populace vaccinated over the next few months.

Re: Why is India having a Covid-19 surge?

#38

Post by hasmanean »

roenxi wrote: post #8

At some point people really have to stop trying to guess what is going on in real-time and adopt a more patient, evidence based approach. India is huge, the healthcare system is said to be collapsing and most of them don't speak English. We aren't going to get coherent reporting in the English press for a few months. On the other hand, if we're worried about variants then I hope there are some hard conversations happ…

“Most of them don’t speak English?”

That is so not true. English is compulsory in Indian schools and has been since partition. There are 125 million English speakers in India, second only to America. You will never find a shortage of people who speak English there, even in remote villages.

Re: Why is India having a Covid-19 surge?

#39

Post by sigstoat »

fallingknife wrote: post #24
roenxi wrote: post #8

At some point people really have to stop trying to guess what is going on in real-time and adopt a more patient, evidence based approach. India is huge, the healthcare system is said to be collapsing and most of them don't speak English. We aren't going to get coherent reporting in the English press for a few months. On the other hand, if we're worried about variants then I hope there are some hard conversations happ…

> why are there still plane flights 12 months in to the pandemic? Someone fill me in on what I've missed; this seems to be not taking the situation seriously. Are these variants not going to be travelling between countries by plane and ship? Because the virus is more than an order of magnitude less dangerous than initial estimates, but we are stuck with the legacy decisions made back then in a political environment w…

> The reality of the situation is that the virus has a mortality rate of around 0.3% of which half are over 80.

...when everyone can receive medical treatment in a roughly modern-ish hospital.

the concern from the start of the "flatten the curve" discussions has been to ensure that the number of simultaneous severe infections does not exceed the number of hospital beds, so that we stay at merely 0.3%.

(and also to keep the rate of transmission low enough that we're not providing ideal conditions for the virus to evolve.)

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