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South Africa’s omicron coronavirus outbreak subsides as fast as it grew

washingtonpost.com

171–180 of 515 posts

Re: South Africa’s omicron coronavirus outbreak subsides as fast as it grew

#171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>What exactly are they waiting on? Public opinion.

Imagine running an organization based on public opinion, especially an opinion so wide as the whole internet. Groupthink is so dangerous.

Considering the details of the business they're in I don't think they have much choice other than to chart the course that enrages the fewest people even if that course is non-optimal.

Re: South Africa’s omicron coronavirus outbreak subsides as fast as it grew

#173

I’ve been tanking some downvotes for the past few days for saying this. Disease spread is only exponential for a brief initial period. It is not a good mental or even general model for how disease spreads. We have two years of observational covid data that shows this to be true. Spread slows down rapidly long before reaching 100%. People hear “5x as infectious” and reason that due to the nature of exponential models,…

A place where it hit exponential levels with really bad results is here in NY at the beginning. We had no precautions, testing, or vaccines in place yet, and hospitals were overwhelmed. It was honestly a scary time. That was where we started "flattening the curve". Now with vaccines available if there are surges and they are not literally building hospitals on fields like they were near me that is something we have to just live with. COVID will never hit 0 cases. People will still be hospitalized and occasionally die of COVID as was always the case with winter flu seasons.

Now we are at the point where fully vaccinated people and people with immunity from a previous infection have a low rate of death or serious illness. People who are very old or have a compromised immune system should lay low and take precautions now and during every flu season when it spikes. Those who choose not to get vaccinated and die, that is still on them.

Re: South Africa’s omicron coronavirus outbreak subsides as fast as it grew

#174
post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Triple vaxxed are safe, therefore antivaxxers have won? That does not seem to make any sense. What am I missing?

Yes, because there are still restrictions as a result of them, even though most people in the USA have been vaccinated. In other words policies that affect the super majority are being formed due to the actions of a small group.

Only 20% of Americans are triple vaxxed.

Re: South Africa’s omicron coronavirus outbreak subsides as fast as it grew

#176
post #64

The panic surrounding Omicron is absurd. Take a look at these two charts. Omicron cases spiked in SA. Deaths didn't budge. At all. https://i.imgur.com/TgRmz4F.png [1] Omicron is a good thing, if your baseline is Delta. But I'm still waiting for the US media stop hyperventilating about it. 1. https://graphics.reuters.com/world-coronavirus-tracker-and-m...

That chart is misleading; the rise/spike in deaths is always delayed from the rise/spike in cases. It does seem like Omicron is less deadly than Delta. The big concern is that because it's so significantly more contagious, that even though a smaller percentage of infected people will require ventilators, the absolute number will be high enough to overwhelm hospitals. Sources: Dr. John Campbell, Dr. Larry Brilliant (W…

Didn't the doctor who discovered and documented Omicron state that it results in mild disease? Therefore, it won't require ventilators and thus won't overwhelm hospitals?

Re: South Africa’s omicron coronavirus outbreak subsides as fast as it grew

#177
post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I saw some charts out of South Africa today showing that deaths are starting to rise with a three week delay. I'm optimistic that Omicron is less severe, but it's also possible that it's just taking a little longer than expected to start killing people.

They might be, but the fact that the case rate is now falling means that whatever increase is seen in deaths will be very short-lived. That is something to be thankful for, since Delta has been killing large numbers of people worldwide over a very long period of time.

But we don't know why the case rate is falling so fast. It could be that people tend to isolate when everyone around them is suddenly having symptoms.

Re: South Africa’s omicron coronavirus outbreak subsides as fast as it grew

#178

The panic surrounding Omicron is absurd. Take a look at these two charts. Omicron cases spiked in SA. Deaths didn't budge. At all. https://i.imgur.com/TgRmz4F.png [1] Omicron is a good thing, if your baseline is Delta. But I'm still waiting for the US media stop hyperventilating about it. 1. https://graphics.reuters.com/world-coronavirus-tracker-and-m...

I second the absurdness. It's almost as if there are entities that don't want it to end.

Re: South Africa’s omicron coronavirus outbreak subsides as fast as it grew

#179
post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That chart is misleading; the rise/spike in deaths is always delayed from the rise/spike in cases. It does seem like Omicron is less deadly than Delta. The big concern is that because it's so significantly more contagious, that even though a smaller percentage of infected people will require ventilators, the absolute number will be high enough to overwhelm hospitals. Sources: Dr. John Campbell, Dr. Larry Brilliant (W…

Didn't the doctor who discovered and documented Omicron state that it results in mild disease? Therefore, it won't require ventilators and thus won't overwhelm hospitals?

COVID in general results in mild cases for the vast majority. It's that sliver of the population that wont that's the problem.

Re: South Africa’s omicron coronavirus outbreak subsides as fast as it grew

#180
post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can't wait until public opinion seems to catch on to the fact that we will never eliminate covid. It blows my mind that we see 100% vaccinated universities going back to online-only learning. What exactly are they waiting on?

Normalcy. Right now everything is taken with an abundance of caution. Once stabilization occurs, normalcy will return (even if it's changed).

I'm not sure how you can suggest there's any caution here. At least not with regards to the students. They are a low risk category with 100% vaccination rate and their risk of losing out on many of the important aspects of college are being disregarded.

This is not what caution looks like.

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