COVID19

[Banquo]

Also, I was the only person wearing a mask at the school drop-off this morning, which is a crowded area of people, that is admittedly outside, but one in which there is *literally* no downside to wearing a mask. Why would you not wear one when there is absolutely no advantage to not doing so?

Puja

Nearly everyone round here is wearing them- at the gym and at supermarkets and at school drop offs.

[Son of Mathonwy]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-57885175

New hated word - "pingdemic". Implies that the COVID app is somehow malfunctioning and causing problems by contacting too many people when, in fact, it's just *functioning* as designed and the reason it's contacting lots more people to say they've had contact with someone with COVID is because there's recently a lot more cases of COVID.

The current theory appears to go that because vaccines make COVID less deadly, more cases is *fine*, because they're just going to be mild. Quite apart from the furious shoving under the bus of any lung-damaged or immuno-compromised people for whom any COVID won't be fine, it's more than a little bit concerning that we're happy to give this virus a huge breeding ground for it to mutate within. It might be that the government gamble is correct and that COVID can be contained by the vaccines and the great god economy can be placated without risk. I suspect that by October at the latest, we'll have the Epsilon variant and be back in lockdown again.

I really hope I'm wrong.

Puja

I also hate that word because it makes light of something which is deadly serious. It's so fucking tabloid.

I reckon they'll need to bring back lockdown measures (although they will desperately try to avoid the word) when schools return in September. But by that point the virus will be well on its way to circumventing current vaccines. Then we'll fully be into groundhog year*.

* damn, now I'm making light of things

[Puja]

Also, I was the only person wearing a mask at the school drop-off this morning, which is a crowded area of people, that is admittedly outside, but one in which there is *literally* no downside to wearing a mask. Why would you not wear one when there is absolutely no advantage to not doing so?

Puja

Nearly everyone round here is wearing them- at the gym and at supermarkets and at school drop offs.

That's comforting.

Puja

[morepork]

Also, I was the only person wearing a mask at the school drop-off this morning, which is a crowded area of people, that is admittedly outside, but one in which there is *literally* no downside to wearing a mask. Why would you not wear one when there is absolutely no advantage to not doing so?

Puja

Nearly everyone round here is wearing them- at the gym and at supermarkets and at school drop offs.

What sort of pinko woke commie hell do you live in?

[Numbers]

The UK has never enacted a full lock down, and this is why you are dealing with these middling measures in seeming perpetuity. You can eliminate and vaccinate and deal with it, but you cant have these half-arsed economic points as a substitute if you chose not to do that. You want to stretch your health infrastructure like a rubber band indefinitely, then dont be surprised if it snaps. If it does snap, your economy will fall. There is an order of priority here, with all variables, including economic and social free-dums wholly and completely a function of the health variable.

Our government has got literally every decision wrong except for buying a shit tonne of vaccine. Literally every single decision. Any time I think of it it makes me extremely angry.

Yep and they're fucking over our NHS workers more and more by the day.

[Banquo]

Also, I was the only person wearing a mask at the school drop-off this morning, which is a crowded area of people, that is admittedly outside, but one in which there is *literally* no downside to wearing a mask. Why would you not wear one when there is absolutely no advantage to not doing so?

Puja

Nearly everyone round here is wearing them- at the gym and at supermarkets and at school drop offs.

What sort of pinko woke commie hell do you live in?

Cambridge, so yes, you are right

[Digby]

Obesity and a bad diet make folks more susceptible to Covid, and thusly we're offering free fast food as an incentive to get vaccinated.

Actually some of the work on diets is looking quite interesting, you can be eating meats, cheese and the like when it comes to Covid (though lots of meat and cheese can present issues elsewhere), the key thing is lots of fruit and veg, and ideally a range of circa 30 different types across a week. And thinking about it over the last few weeks we're probably only around 20 types a week, and we're likely better in the summer months with the soft fruits being around.

[Digby]

Oh FFS. Having Covid is now what I do. Since having it very recently I've been in two enclosed spaces other than my house, one is the house of some family who had Covid recently themselves and then all went fully through their quarantine period and a few days before we saw them (and they were all testing negative by then) and I've been to the doctors to get my 2nd vaccine, and that's it. Probably the doctors is the more likely culprit, and if so the FFP2 mask didn't offer as much protection as one might like

Not a positive PCR test at this point, but feeling pretty minging, and the LFT has returned a slow positive test, a bit of a weak testing positive bar, but back into lockdown it is. And the PCR tests will arrive shortly.

[Which Tyler]

Oh FFS. Having Covid is now what I do. Since having it very recently I've been in two enclosed spaces other than my house, one is the house of some family who had Covid recently themselves and then all went fully through their quarantine period and a few days before we saw them (and they were all testing negative by then) and I've been to the doctors to get my 2nd vaccine, and that's it. Probably the doctors is the more likely culprit, and if so the FFP2 mask didn't offer as much protection as one might like

Not a positive PCR test at this point, but feeling pretty minging, and the LFT has returned a slow positive test, a bit of a weak testing positive bar, but back into lockdown it is. And the PCR tests will arrive shortly.

Good luck, and get well soon - and fully

[morepork]

Hope you rock through it mate. Sounds like you are being very responsible with it.

[Digby]

Responsible my arse, clearly should never have gone for the 2nd jab, the anti-vaxxers had the measure of this from the off!

[morepork]

If you want I can send you some hydroxychloroquine.

[Digby]

I've been hearing good things about cat worming tablets, really good things from really good people, lots of people are talking about it now

[Which Tyler]

I've been hearing good things about cat worming tablets, really good things from really good people, lots of people are talking about it now

I thought it was the Big Pharma Communists putting their remote controls into people? That sounds far more libertarian Trumpist.

[morepork]

No matter how much data comes in, there are still people out there that make a healthy living peddling vaccine bullshit for it to fuck up the best chance we had of dealing with this properly first time around. I really wish I was back home some days.

[Digby]

home isn't all it might be. I just had a cheese and chutney sandwich for lunch, and an apple and some strawberries. interestingly I could taste the chutney which was nice, and sort of the strawberries but they only tasted faintly of vomit which was not, everything else tastes bland or at most slightly salty, spicy or bitter, not much sweetness coming through

so it's down tools again with my temp up to 38.7 and I'm settling down for a hard afternoon on the playstation/dozing

the PCR test has arrived and I registered it just fine, took it just fine, and then the missus utterly botched the putting it in the biohazard bag having decided I was too ill to cope, the bags can be a little odd in truth (and variably odd), but certainly it's created a frosty atmosphere as my requests she 'stop' were not heeded, likely she'll now ignore me unless I report a significant worsening, and perhaps even then (I have a suspicion if I'd similarly ruined her assembly of box/bag I'd still be hearing about it)

[Galfon]

the PCR test has arrived and I registered it just fine, took it just fine, and then the missus utterly botched the putting it in the biohazard bag having decided I was too ill to cope, the bags can be a little odd in truth (and variably odd), but certainly it's created a frosty atmosphere as my requests she 'stop' were not heeded, likely she'll now ignore me unless I report a significant worsening, and perhaps even then (I have a suspicion if I'd similarly ruined her assembly of box/bag I'd still be hearing about it)

tried reading this a few times - is mild delirium co-symptomatic with Covid, or just with fever generally ?..

[Son of Mathonwy]

home isn't all it might be. I just had a cheese and chutney sandwich for lunch, and an apple and some strawberries. interestingly I could taste the chutney which was nice, and sort of the strawberries but they only tasted faintly of vomit which was not, everything else tastes bland or at most slightly salty, spicy or bitter, not much sweetness coming through

so it's down tools again with my temp up to 38.7 and I'm settling down for a hard afternoon on the playstation/dozing

the PCR test has arrived and I registered it just fine, took it just fine, and then the missus utterly botched the putting it in the biohazard bag having decided I was too ill to cope, the bags can be a little odd in truth (and variably odd), but certainly it's created a frosty atmosphere as my requests she 'stop' were not heeded, likely she'll now ignore me unless I report a significant worsening, and perhaps even then (I have a suspicion if I'd similarly ruined her assembly of box/bag I'd still be hearing about it)

Get well soon man.

I heard getting sunlight into your veins can help, or bleach or something, anyway the guy seemed to know what he was talking about.

[morepork]

Here, in USandA, there are millions of doses of vaccine in numerous states that are set to expire very soon. States ordered them through the federal government, with numbers ordered based on the population needing vaccinating to ~70%. However, the career anti-Vax brigade, and this includes a scary number of elected officials at the state and federal level, has successfully blocked that target, resulting in "excess" vaccine. There is an effort to distribute these extra doses to countries that are in need of them, but because the federal government technically owns them and they do so care of an agreement with the manufacturer that the latter has protection from liability when the product is used in the USA. The language surrounding use and liability outside the US seems opaque and unclear. Lawyers should be locked in a room to have it out and not come out until this is resolved to allow distribution of the soon to be expired product. Wankers around the world have been traveling between countries unnecessarily throughout this pandemic, spreading the mutating love, so FFS, get the world vaccinated law monkeys.

[Son of Mathonwy]

UK daiily deaths >100 for 5 consecutive days, first time since March. New cases rising steadily.

It will be interesting to see what social distancing rules will operate when schools reopen.

The rise of a novel variant seems like the biggest risk to me. I expect our government will continue to use crossed fingers as their front line policy against that.

[Puja]

UK daiily deaths >100 for 5 consecutive days, first time since March. New cases rising steadily.

It will be interesting to see what social distancing rules will operate when schools reopen.

The rise of a novel variant seems like the biggest risk to me. I expect our government will continue to use crossed fingers as their front line policy against that.

We've just had the e-mail from my daughters' primary school about September - there's going to be no social distancing, bubbles, staggered drop-off times - no mitigation measures whatsoever.

Puja

[Son of Mathonwy]

UK daiily deaths >100 for 5 consecutive days, first time since March. New cases rising steadily.

It will be interesting to see what social distancing rules will operate when schools reopen.

The rise of a novel variant seems like the biggest risk to me. I expect our government will continue to use crossed fingers as their front line policy against that.

We've just had the e-mail from my daughters' primary school about September - there's going to be no social distancing, bubbles, staggered drop-off times - no mitigation measures whatsoever.

Puja

Holy shit. But no surprise. Shit times incoming for the anti-vaxxers. And the vulnerable, and plain unlucky.

My son's school has generally been more cautious than legally required, but we shall see.

[Which Tyler]

Well, last weekend, we had the family around for a BBQ - all except 1 niece (17) who was at a surfing festival with 50,000 other young people, with no social distancing and barely any hygiene, in an area already peaking in cases of Delta; albeit outdoors (boardfest in Newquay).



Out of my niece's group of 21, 21 are now symptomatic. Every other group they've been in contact with has 100% infection rate in the unvaccinated.

She doesn't know anyone who's been taken to hospital, and she's the worst from her group, she's says she's never felt so ill. She also says that it was well worth it.

[Digby]

Good news for them is it seems the premium way to go about things is get Covid (and don't suffer too badly) and then get fully vaxxed.

[Son of Mathonwy]

Good news for them is it seems the premium way to go about things is get Covid (and don't suffer too badly) and then get fully vaxxed.

Premium, if you assume there are no ill effects from catching Covid.