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Vaccines should end the pandemic, despite the variants, say experts

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181–190 of 370 posts

Re: Vaccines should end the pandemic, despite the variants, say experts

#181

I hope they are correct. I also hope we will continue to be more careful about germ control from here on out in myriad ways. I hope we do not blithely go back to "business as usual" in a way that fosters future pandemics as if we learned absolutely nothing here.

Can you explain what you mean by germ control? Covid is primarily transmitted by sustained exposure to aerosols. Much of the disinfecting we are now doing now is essentially performative.

Re: Vaccines should end the pandemic, despite the variants, say experts

#182
post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can imagine the fatigue of what I’m currently going through of constantly locking down for 4 months at a time! Compared to that, having to lock down every couple of months for a week or two doesn’t seem anywhere near as bad. Oh, and we wouldn’t have 130,000 dead in the UK and 500,000+ dead in the USA!

To bad that simply isn't realistic when accounting for hundreds of millions of people. Not to mention the whole "freedom" thing. Quit virtue signaling using conjecture and bogus stats (i.e. my way would have saved everyone!).

[deleted]

Re: Vaccines should end the pandemic, despite the variants, say experts

#183

I hope they are correct. I also hope we will continue to be more careful about germ control from here on out in myriad ways. I hope we do not blithely go back to "business as usual" in a way that fosters future pandemics as if we learned absolutely nothing here.

Can you explain what you mean by germ control? Covid is primarily transmitted by sustained exposure to aerosols. Much of the disinfecting we are now doing now is essentially performative.

Much of the disinfecting we are now doing now is essentially performative.

Yes, a lot of the things we are doing are performative. Most people don't really know how to use masks effectively and a lot of how people interact with their masks makes things worse, not better.

I work really hard to just avoid being exposed to germs because of my situation. I try to not touch a lot of stuff in public and this is not the norm.

I hate it when people "helpfully" want to get me a cart. I can get it myself. Keep your hands off my cart.

I saw someone blow their nose under their mask just a few feet from me. I wish we would focus much more on messages like "Don't blow your nose in crowded public spaces" than on "Wear your mask." There have been so many incidents like that and I have been toying with the idea of starting an "incident report" file to talk about specific incidents and why this stuff makes me crazy.

I don't like people talking at me unnecessarily.

I don't like people laughing near me. That's almost as bad as people coughing at me.

I will shower as promptly as I can if someone does cough in my general direction or similar.

There's a whole lot of stuff I do to simply avoid germs without having to rely a lot on chemical disinfectants because I'm also chemically sensitive. And I am a lot healthier than I am supposed to be so I know this stuff works.

If anyone has ideas on how I can effectively start writing about this, I'm all ears. I don't know how to get, say, beta readers or some kind of early feedback. I know it's a touchy topic and feedback and some kind of traction would be enormously helpful in trying to write more about this. I can't seem to get that part, so it ends up being very incomplete, one-off comments on the internet, like this one.

Re: Vaccines should end the pandemic, despite the variants, say experts

#184

A globally coordinated approach, similar to NZ's approach could have ended the oandemic already a year ago. Thanks to COVID-19 fatigue amongst the population, such an effort very close to impossible.

New Zealand is an island nation, which gives it a pretty significant advantage when it comes to controlling pandemics.

So is Britain.

Re: Vaccines should end the pandemic, despite the variants, say experts

#185

I hope they are correct. I also hope we will continue to be more careful about germ control from here on out in myriad ways. I hope we do not blithely go back to "business as usual" in a way that fosters future pandemics as if we learned absolutely nothing here.

I worry also about an overreaction. At some level people who can survive a virus with little to no symptoms are better off contracting it than not, if only to form the antibodies to be ready for future mutants they might come in contact with. The behavior changes we make because of COVID could be dooming a lot of people to one day encounter much worse mutant viruses they could have been ready for.

I haven't had so much as a cold in the last... checks calendar... year. Humans are much more capable of containing basic every-day pathogens than we seem to have thought.

Re: Vaccines should end the pandemic, despite the variants, say experts

#186
Unfortunately, at least in the US, the massively increased buy-in to conspiracy theories got together with the anti-vaxxer movement and had a three-way with folks who still believe COVID is a liberal attack on Trump, and their newborn baby is significant resistance to getting vaccinated by a large portion of the population.

Re: Vaccines should end the pandemic, despite the variants, say experts

#187

Perhaps unpopular opinion, but the US vaccination system is about the worst when it comes to preventing spread. Instead, it seems to be attempting to prevent death. I've always argued that preventing spread would as a byproduct prevent death, but I'm obviously not studied in the field. Put shortly, I would have vaccinated college kids and working age folks first. They are not likely to die from it, but are far more l…

Minimizing death at the expense of a slightly longer pandemic doesn't seem like an unreasonable choice in a situation that lacks any perfect solutions.

Re: Vaccines should end the pandemic, despite the variants, say experts

#188

A globally coordinated approach, similar to NZ's approach could have ended the oandemic already a year ago. Thanks to COVID-19 fatigue amongst the population, such an effort very close to impossible.

New Zealand is an island nation, which gives it a pretty significant advantage when it comes to controlling pandemics.

Hence a global approach similar to New Zealand’s. The globe has similar advantages to New Zealand when it comes to controlling pandemics.

Re: Vaccines should end the pandemic, despite the variants, say experts

#189
post #165

A globally coordinated approach, similar to NZ's approach could have ended the oandemic already a year ago. Thanks to COVID-19 fatigue amongst the population, such an effort very close to impossible.

I’m skeptical. Even countries like Singapore have constantly had 1 or 2 locally transmitted cases per month they can’t trace. Now multiply that across 170 countries some too poor to do what Singapore did. If every country had locked down like NZ, we would have just had a series of lockdowns and flare ups and more lockdowns. It certainly would have kept the case numbers much lower but can you imagine the fatigue after…

Wouldn’t you need fewer and less extreme lockdowns every couple of months if you aren’t opening everything up every couple of months?

Re: Vaccines should end the pandemic, despite the variants, say experts

#190
post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m skeptical. Even countries like Singapore have constantly had 1 or 2 locally transmitted cases per month they can’t trace. Now multiply that across 170 countries some too poor to do what Singapore did. If every country had locked down like NZ, we would have just had a series of lockdowns and flare ups and more lockdowns. It certainly would have kept the case numbers much lower but can you imagine the fatigue after…

I can imagine the fatigue of what I’m currently going through of constantly locking down for 4 months at a time! Compared to that, having to lock down every couple of months for a week or two doesn’t seem anywhere near as bad. Oh, and we wouldn’t have 130,000 dead in the UK and 500,000+ dead in the USA!

We wouldn't? That seemes like a bold statement.

To put your numbers in perspective, in a population of 330mio with life expectancy 70-75y (USA numbers), every year around 4mio people die for some reason or another. Not saying covid is not a problem, but these numbers don't really support the claim.

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