India’s second wave • Hacker News Board

Re: India’s second wave

#91

Post by mrow84 » Wed, Apr 21, 2021, 12:57 PM UTC

boyadjian wrote: post #75

mrow84 wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How would the lockdowns have made it worse? Could they have produced the exponential growth in cases and deaths that are currently observed in the official data?

I quote qart: "Lockdowns hurt poor people very badly; they need to earn to survive."

The title of the piece is "‘It is much worse this time’: India’s devastating second wave". Given that the discussion is of the exponential increases in both cases and deaths, it seems clear that the "it" in the title refers to "the pandemic", not "life in general".

My response followed this interpretation, despite the wording of your questions - clearly I should have been more explicit: "How would the lockdowns have made the pandemic worse?"

Re: India’s second wave

#92

Post by kanche » Wed, Apr 21, 2021, 2:02 PM UTC

hunter-2 wrote: post #44

The fact that the official numbers are through the roof tell you how bad the unofficial (and real) numbers are. In the past week, there have been reports from several cities where the number of Covid deaths are measured in single digits - yet crematoriums are so full that people have started cremating their dead ones on sidewalks.

In some places by 20x! https://i.imgur.com/VJHL2VT.jpg

Re: India’s second wave

#93

Post by nonamechicken » Wed, Apr 21, 2021, 2:04 PM UTC

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #15

dataflow wrote: post #11

The situation is also horrible in Brazil (14M cases, 378k deaths, ICUs near full): https://www.nbcnews.com/news/latino/brazil-alarming-high-num... One can only wonder if it's simply a matter of time before variants break through vaccines in the US too.

I've heard there's an Indian variant that affects vaccinated people in the UK; it's not as clear cut though, this article seems a bit uncertain about it atm: https://news.sky.com/story/is-the-indian-covid-variant-more-...

Indian Council of Medical Research announced today that Covaxin is effective against several variants including B.1.617 (double mutant variant identified in certain regions of India and several other countries), B.1.1.7 (UK variant), B.1.1.28 (Brazil variant) and B.1.351 (Southern African variant).

https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/icmr-says-covaxin-...

https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/covaxin-shows-78-o...

According to this Twitter person: https://twitter.com/sailorrooscout/status/138482553989517312...

>Covaxin is the inactivated virus-based COVID-19 vaccine being developed with Bharat Biotech and Covishield is the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine being manufactured locally by the Serum Institute of India under that name.

>So inactivated vaccines tend to have lower immunogenicity on average (when we look back on past vaccines). I would like to think if Covaxin neutralizes it, the others would likely do so as well. We will definitely need data but this is very promising

Re: India’s second wave

#94

Post by collyw » Wed, Apr 21, 2021, 2:36 PM UTC

mrow84 wrote: post #73

boyadjian wrote: post #27

But why is it much worse ? Because of the pandemic, or because of the lockdowns ?

How would the lockdowns have made it worse? Could they have produced the exponential growth in cases and deaths that are currently observed in the official data?

One theory is about relative movement of old and young. Normal situation, young heathy people move around a lot more than the elderly, contract the virus get immune.

With lockdown everyone is restricted and old and young go to the supermarket and back. As such the elderly are exposed at a higher rate before any level of herd immunity is reached.

Re: India’s second wave

#95

Post by collyw » Wed, Apr 21, 2021, 2:40 PM UTC

mrow84 wrote: post #74

rataata_jr wrote: post #5

Not leading to deaths, but just increasing case numbers, that is good news.

Deaths are clearly exponentially increasing: https://ourworldindata.org/explorers/coronavirus-data-explor...

It's following a gompertz curve like every other country.

Re: India’s second wave

#96

Post by collyw » Wed, Apr 21, 2021, 2:43 PM UTC

esperent wrote: post #36

throwaway4good wrote: post #6

It is sadly predictable that the pandemic would end up becoming a permanent source of havoc in less developed part of the world, even as it comes under control in the west. This will for certain be with us for many years to come and will further distort the difference between rich and poor. Not at least helped by the nationalism in the west in form of export controls and patents.

I live in a less developed part of the world - Vietnam - and the government and people have been incredibly successful in controlling the virus here. Aside from two short lockdowns of a couple of weeks, my life has barely been affected (except for the lack of tourists and the fact I can't travel outside the country). Local tourism and business seems to be booming. Meanwhile I hear all the stories from back home in Eu…

Governments can't control a virus. East Asia seems to have existing immunity or a genetic factor that means they aren't getting hit anywhere near as badly as other parts of the world.

Re: India’s second wave

#97

Post by collyw » Wed, Apr 21, 2021, 2:44 PM UTC

brnt wrote: post #90

Wildgoose wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Absolutely not true. The UK Government paid for the AZ vaccine to be developed and then stipulated as part of the contract that it must be made available at cost to developing countries. The EU on the other hand keeps seizing vaccines produced for other countries.

> The EU on the other hand keeps seizing vaccines produced for other countries. Citation needed. I've not heard about this at all.

https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/eu-official-a...

Re: India’s second wave

#98

Post by Balgair » Wed, Apr 21, 2021, 2:53 PM UTC

dataflow wrote: post #11

The situation is also horrible in Brazil (14M cases, 378k deaths, ICUs near full): https://www.nbcnews.com/news/latino/brazil-alarming-high-num... One can only wonder if it's simply a matter of time before variants break through vaccines in the US too.

Seeing how the 'original' SARS-COV2-19 virus spread, if you are concerned about a variant, then likely it's already in your population.

The speed of the virus is much faster than the speed of the public health infrastructure. Maybe upping the tempo of our human controlled reaction is something we can focus on in this pandemic.

Re: India’s second wave

#99

Post by mavhc » Wed, Apr 21, 2021, 2:56 PM UTC

fabatka wrote: post #76

qart wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The virus does not care what you consider misguided. Make all the excuses you want, but crowds lead to spreading of airborne diseases.

Sure, but disease containment is not (or should not be) the sole metric to optimize for. Edit: grammar fix

Problem is people don't understand exponential growth, whenever the R number if >1 you're totally screwed, even if just 1 person is infected

Re: India’s second wave

#100

Post by dataflow » Wed, Apr 21, 2021, 2:59 PM UTC

Balgair wrote: post #98

dataflow wrote: post #11

The situation is also horrible in Brazil (14M cases, 378k deaths, ICUs near full): https://www.nbcnews.com/news/latino/brazil-alarming-high-num... One can only wonder if it's simply a matter of time before variants break through vaccines in the US too.

Seeing how the 'original' SARS-COV2-19 virus spread, if you are concerned about a variant, then likely it's already in your population. The speed of the virus is much faster than the speed of the public health infrastructure. Maybe upping the tempo of our human controlled reaction is something we can focus on in this pandemic.

The question isn't whether the variant is in the population (of course we can assume it is), the question is whether it differs enough from the prior variant to break through past immunization at the population level.