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Vaccines and Omicron mean Covid now less deadly than flu in England

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Re: Vaccines and Omicron mean Covid now less deadly than flu in England

#71

Post by bavell »

Reason077 wrote: post #28
somewhereoutth wrote: post #4

It may well be less deadly, but it is far more contagious. Reinfection also seems to be not uncommon. We do not fully understand the long term effects of even a mild case, or indeed how repeated reinfection might compound any such effects, given that we might expect to catch it once or twice a year as opposed to once or twice in our lives for flu.

> "once or twice in our lives for flu." I guess some people are more susceptible than others (or have more risk due to lifestyle factors), but only once or twice in a lifetime ? I'd guess I've had a really bad flu at least once every 4-5 years or so on average in my lifetime, and moderate cases probably every 1-2 years. I had Covid twice as well, within a year (both times in 2020, before vaccines were available).

I'm 30 and I've only had a bad flu once. I had to take a few days off work around 6-8 years ago.

Re: Vaccines and Omicron mean Covid now less deadly than flu in England

#72

Post by TacticalCoder »

JaimeThompson wrote: post #29
vinyl7 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Great way to destroy your immune system

I would love to see research that shows that to be a correct statement and why so many in Asian countries do not seem to have compromised immune systems would be interesting as well.

In Japan, before Covid, people did sometimes use masks but that wasn't the majority. Very far from it. If I'm not mistaken it is people who know they are sick that would wear a mask to protect others. That still doesn't work for people unknowingly carrying a virus.

And most people are unmasked: so they're still exposed to at least some pathogens. So I don't see why they'd have a compromised immune system.

Re: Vaccines and Omicron mean Covid now less deadly than flu in England

#73

Post by kodachrome64 »

somewhereoutth wrote: post #50
slackfan wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"once or twice in our lives" flu is a seasonal illness, unless you're a complete shut in, you get it much more frequently than that, considering the modern diets and vitamin deficiencies.

Except that is not true. We get the common cold quite often, but real flu very rarely. If you get the flu you know about it - it is much more severe than the common cold (which is why it kills people).

I've heard "if you get the flu you know it" spread around the internet for years, but given what we know now about the wide range of severity in cases of covid can that really be said with any confidence? Are we certain there aren't people who get the flu and are asymptomatic, or who just end up with mild to moderate cold symptoms?

Re: Vaccines and Omicron mean Covid now less deadly than flu in England

#74

Post by terminatornet »

notch656a wrote: post #55
terminatornet wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

good point, many asian countries (where public masking has been commonplace well before covid) have notoriously terrible students and learning issues.

You don't see any issues at all with those in their most neuroplastic language development years being unable to see a face while they are acquiring their native language? I'm not interested in some bigoted conversation suggesting those in asian countries are somehow inherently superior at learning. I never wear a mask when I'm with my toddler, even in public. I'd rather suffer whatever bad effects that bring me than…

Do blind people have trouble speaking because they can't see faces?

Re: Vaccines and Omicron mean Covid now less deadly than flu in England

#75

Post by RobertMiller »

somewhereoutth wrote: post #69
_dain_ wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I stopped caring about any of this over a year ago, and more people are joining me every day. Nobody is going in the opposite direction. Normal people will win through sheer attrition.

Win what? More sickness? You will care very much if debilitating long Covid happens to you. It is easy to be carefree when things are going well.

I think he's right. People are giving up on covid mitigations a lot faster than people are dying of covid. Every day I see fewer people wearing masks than before, and death rates are trending in the opposite direction.

Re: Vaccines and Omicron mean Covid now less deadly than flu in England

#76

Post by DaiPlusPlus »

boomskats wrote: post #7
DaiPlusPlus wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about the long-term impact on the lungs, etc? > Was reported on Channel 5 News today. That does not fill me with confidence.

> That does not fill me with confidence. You mean because Viacom?

Paramount now, but no: it's nothing to do with Viacom, but just that Channel 5's news programmes feel (to me, at least) dumbed-down in comparison to the BBC's or Sky's - let alone written journalism.

I'm not accusing them of media-bias or intentional misreporting, but I just don't expect C5 to be entirely accurate on nuances of the issues reported or things like second-order consequences of news events. Medical news is far outside their organizational expertise: they don't have their own journalists: their Ofcom-mandated news programmes are made by ITN which just repackage AP/Reuters/BBC/ITN - it's better to get information closer to the source, where the details are, rather than getting lost in the game of telephone played between researchers, their journals, the journals' publishers (...and publicists), to newsgatherers, to newsagencies' editors, to newsrooms, and your screen. There's a lot of people in the way: https://phdcomics.com/comics/archive.php?comicid=1174

So what I mean is that getting news on Covid from C5 is like getting world affairs updates from South Park.

Re: Vaccines and Omicron mean Covid now less deadly than flu in England

#77

Post by RobertMiller »

terminatornet wrote: post #74
notch656a wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't see any issues at all with those in their most neuroplastic language development years being unable to see a face while they are acquiring their native language? I'm not interested in some bigoted conversation suggesting those in asian countries are somehow inherently superior at learning. I never wear a mask when I'm with my toddler, even in public. I'd rather suffer whatever bad effects that bring me than…

Do blind people have trouble speaking because they can't see faces?

When they are blind before they learn to speak, yes. Specialized instruction can mitigate this.

Re: Vaccines and Omicron mean Covid now less deadly than flu in England

#78

Post by dang »

_dain_ wrote: post #43
westondeboer wrote: post #11

Still going to mask up when going indoors. I don't want the flu, I don't want a cold and I don't want to get covid.

Quoted post unavailable.

Please don't be a jerk to your fellow community members. It's against the site guidelines, and leads to much worse threads.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: Vaccines and Omicron mean Covid now less deadly than flu in England

#79

Post by JohnTHaller »

RobertMiller wrote: post #49
awb wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So were you going through life wearing a mask to mitigate the risk of a deadly flu in 2018 and before? I think probably not, but if your priority is risk mitigation, shouldn't you have been? No because those flu viruses were not novel, or as deadly. When there is a large degree of uncertainty (like a deadly novel virus), I personally tend towards caution and am fine being too cautious rather than not cautious enoug…

> No because those flu viruses were not novel, or as deadly. That information always lags reality. When/if the next deadly flu strain emerges, it will have emerged before it is discovered to have emerged. If you're not planning for this scenario, are you really planning for the worst case? You could be Patient Zero for Spanish Flu Part Two, with your preemptive masking being the difference between global disaster and…

We started masks when it became clear the Covid was far more contagious and deadly than the flu.

Re: Vaccines and Omicron mean Covid now less deadly than flu in England

#80

Post by [deleted] »

somewhereoutth wrote: post #69
_dain_ wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I stopped caring about any of this over a year ago, and more people are joining me every day. Nobody is going in the opposite direction. Normal people will win through sheer attrition.

Win what? More sickness? You will care very much if debilitating long Covid happens to you. It is easy to be carefree when things are going well.

[deleted]
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