61–70 of 185 posts
> COVID patients exhale high numbers of virus during the first eight days after symptoms start...then drop steeply." Eek. Eight days is longer than I expected.
Seems like the CDC reducing the suggested isolation time from 10 days to 5 was a mistake.
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"a guy"? I see people like this every day...and I'm one myself. Not outdoors, but when I enter a building. We don't yet know the long term sequelae of an epithelial infection, nor do we know why about 10% of those infected appear to get "long covid". Why should I risk it when the burden of reducing the chance is negligible? I also wear a seatbelt.
"I know a guy" , as we grew up down the road from each other and I was a groomsman at his wedding. We've known each other for 30 years. This isn't some random guy I see on the street. I see maybe one in a hundred strangers in public still wearing a mask, which is why I mentioned 99% of the public. That's my estimate for how many people gave up masks. I take it you are among the 1% of those who keep it up.
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"a guy"? I see people like this every day...and I'm one myself. Not outdoors, but when I enter a building. We don't yet know the long term sequelae of an epithelial infection, nor do we know why about 10% of those infected appear to get "long covid". Why should I risk it when the burden of reducing the chance is negligible? I also wear a seatbelt.
"I know a guy" , as we grew up down the road from each other and I was a groomsman at his wedding. We've known each other for 30 years. This isn't some random guy I see on the street. I see maybe one in a hundred strangers in public still wearing a mask, which is why I mentioned 99% of the public. That's my estimate for how many people gave up masks. I take it you are among the 1% of those who keep it up.
I still attend scientific conferences this year that require 100% masking indoors and proof of vaccination to attend in person.
At my work all the scientist (mainly microbiologists) are still masking indoors, not just in the lab.
I don't care a whit if other people mask or not, but I do. I don't understand what kind of "help" you have in mind, but would genuinely be interested in learning.
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I get your perspective, but everybody has their own risk assessment and comfort, and yours is no more necessarily right than his :). Some people still wear masks, some people still take booster shots, some people people still wash their hands, some people sneeze into elbows, some people stay inside, etc. Others may not do some or any of those things. "Accept new risk" and "this is the new normal" is as validly execut…
Also. I think it's rational for myself to wear a mask because getting COVID was one of the worst experiences of my life. It's like if I burned my hand on a stove and someone tried to convince me burning your hand on the stove is normal so no need to take precautions.
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One of the first proponents for hand washing and hygiene during medical practice wound up dying in a mental asylum. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7240806 What's considered normal socially is not always what's supported by the evidence at hand, and sometimes what that supports is well outside of the acceptable range of discussion or behavior at the time. Are you truly concerned that this person has made…
What you just demonstrated is called Survivor Bias or Survivorship Bias: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorship_bias what about all the people who challenged what was "considered normal socially" and actually were proven wrong? One never hears about those.
Most concerning on this, though, is "Levels of exhaled viral RNA did not differ across age, sex, time of day, vaccination status or viral variant." I think the data was clear enough that the vaccines are worth getting. However, this seems to shatter any thoughts folks may have that they are safer to others when they are vaccinated? I know that was at least a hope? (Question as I am not sure that was correct.)
I seem to remember a previous study that showed super spreaders exist out there. In that some individuals shed substantially more virus than others. In ways that we don't understand, yet.
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If there's literally no downside for him to wearing a mask, why do you even care?
If I was sick, or if there was a meaningful sickness in the air, I would wear a mask. But I wouldn't say there is zero downside to wearing a mask, atleast the way 98% of people wore one during covid. (The same one all day, if not a week, touching it, putting it in pockets, around your neck, on your greasy forehead, so on). I used to wear a mask because allergies when I mowed the lawn or even dirtbiking during certain…
This is absolutely false. There is very strong evidence that masks do not effect gas exchange. One example of many: https://www1.racgp.org.au/newsgp/clinical/face-masks-may-inc...
Masks do make your lung muscles work slightly harder, but there's nothing wrong with that.
I know a guy who still wears a half-face respirator every time he's in public even for just a second. I think at this rate he'll be wearing it for the rest of his life, unable to accept a new level of risk and move on with his life. I'd like to help him but I see no possible way, he's convinced that I and 99% of the rest of the public are suicidally insane like people who play literal russian roulette.
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What if he’s right?
The existence of the human race says he is wrong..
Medieval Peasant 2: "If it was making us all sick, how come only half of my children have died before the age of five?"
I wonder how this compares to other respiratory viruses, such as various flu strains? Shedding a lot of virus early, before the immune system has had a chance to develop and mount an attack, seems like what one would expect. But not sure if all viruses are like this?
One big difference in my understanding is the symptoms. For SARS-1 and MERS, people get symptoms earlier on, so they can be quarantine earlier and infect fewer people.
I would guess that parts of the symptoms are triggered when the immune system starts reacting, and hence maybe for those two, it would just happen earlier?
> Shedding a lot of virus early, before the immune system has had a chance to develop and mount an attack, seems like what one would expect.
But yeah, that's generally what I would expect too.