[eddie1960]

nothing new about that

the yearly flu vaccine is developed based on what has happened in the past and " their " best guess as to what is to come

sometimes they get it right sometimes they don't

MRNA tech may well improve the hit rate on flu in the future as well. My personal experience with the flu vaccine (which I only started taking yearly about 7 years back) is in general it has been reasonably effective, I haven't had a nasty flu since i started and i used to get one pretty much every year. OTOH I did quit smoking 2 years before that so I imagine that had at least as big an impact.

[Parallax]

sometimes they get it right sometimes they don't

Understandably so. Medicine is not purely science; it's also an art.

[Rondec]

nothing new about that

the yearly flu vaccine is developed based on what has happened in the past and " their " best guess as to what is to come

sometimes they get it right sometimes they don't

It's a little different. Flu starts in China months ahead of when it comes to the United States. That means that the CDC can get viral samples from western China and try to figure out what strains are going to become dominant next flu season.

COVID seems to move a lot faster and so there is less time from a variant showing up before it is in multiple countries around the world.

---------- Post added 01-14-22 at 04:14 PM ----------

So discouraging.

My two year old daughter just tested positive for COVID. Our six year old probably has it as well, for the third time.

We saw my family over New Years, which obviously was a mistake. My sister and her husband came and several of them were coughing, but they said it was a cold -- they've all had COVID twice before and for certain didn't have COVID now. Well, a week later our youngest two developed symptoms. The rest of us are vaccinated and haven't had any symptoms.

They seem pretty mild at this point, but the two year old had high fever for three days and was pretty miserable.

To top it all off, my sister is pretty anti-vaccine and is convinced that it is the vaccinated folks who are passing COVID around.

[dstar]

May interesting from historical point view NEWS
Was The Russian Flu A ‘Coronavirus’? What The 1890s Pandemic Tells Us About How Covid Might End
Interesting in Telegraph
And pandemics .com

[aslyfox]

same old news from Kansas

not good imho

Kansas Jan 14, 2022 Covic 19 report

18,885 new cases
7 day trend rising
21 new deaths

total cases 621,692
total deaths 7,153

[ estimated population in Kansas' largest city - Wichita - 397,532 according to 2020 census ]

7 day trend:
82 counties rising
8 counties falling
15 counties flat

Shawnee County [ where I live ]
1,364 new cases
7 day trend rising
0 new deaths

total cases 37,597
total deaths 494

[aslyfox]

the news isn't getting better

The omicron-fueled surge in COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations had at least one Kansas hospital leader checking morgue capacity ahead of legislative debates over the health care staffing emergency.. . . Kansas Department of Health and Environment data released Friday show a seven-day average of nearly 7,900 new cases a day, as well as about 45 new hospitalizations and nine new deaths each day.

The highly contagious omicron variant appears to have become the dominant strain in Kansas in recent weeks. However, only a small fraction of positive tests undergo genomic sequencing to determine the virus strain. Omicron has been confirmed to be in 59 of the state's 105 counties.

Satterwhite said the numbers of unvaccinated and un-boosted people will impact the severity of the omicron surge.. . . Inside the COVID-19 intensive care unit at Stormont Vail Health, patients are seen in and out of consciousness in varying levels of condition. Health officials are predicting a "rough couple weeks" as COVID cases surge in Kansas.
Federal data on Kansas vaccination rates, as of Thursday, show the following:

70% of population has had a first dose.
58% of population is fully vaccinated.
37% of the fully vaccinated population has gotten a booster.
48% of the 12-17 population is fully vaccinated.
15% of the 5-11 population is fully vaccinated.
For the 65 and older population, 88% are fully vaccinated, and 60% of the fully vaccinated senior citizens have gotten a booster.

Experts expect to see a sharp decline eventually, but are unsure when that will come as cases across the region continue on a steep trajectory. Once that happens, it will still be about 14 days until the peak in ICU admissions and about 21 days before the peak in deaths, Satterwhite said.

"Even though we may see a rapid decline in cases, even in the next few weeks, there will be a lag in hospitalizations and ultimately in those very severe outcomes, including death, that we really want to prevent by preventing infection in the first place," she said. . . .

Flu prevalence at ERs is also the highest it has been since March 2020.

A Kansas Hospital Association report on Wednesday showed COVID-19 hospitalizations are worse now than at any previous point in the pandemic. The report covers all of Kansas, plus the Kansas City metro area.

Adult hospitalizations now are 28% higher and pediatric hospitalizations are quadruple than at the same point a year ago. Many hospital leaders have said the vast majority of patients are unvaccinated or did not get a booster shot.

Kansas hospital checks morgue capacity as COVID variant omicron surges

[alfa75ts]

the news isn't getting better

Victoria, Australia population ~ 6.6 million. 93% of those over 12 fully vaccinated (24% have had 3 doses).

Yesterday 20,180 cases (trending down?), 22 deaths.

A state-wide code brown has been called for the Victorian hospital system after record-high hospital COVID-19 admissions and wide-scale furloughing* of staff.

What is a code brown?

It’s a measure to relieve pressure on hospitals.
It’s typically reserved for sudden, short-term emergencies, such as a train crash or bushfire (for example, a code brown was called during the 2016 thunderstorm asthma event).
During a code brown hospitals can cancel their staff’s leave to ensure an adequate workforce is on hand.
They can also defer less urgent services.
This code brown starts at noon on Wednesday. It’s expected to last four to six weeks.
It will apply to all metropolitan public hospitals. In regional Victoria Geelong’s Barwon Health and the Grampians, Bendigo, Goulburn Valley, Albury Wodonga and Latrobe Regional health groups are also included.
Private hospitals have the option of calling their own code brown.

* furloughing refers to those on leave due to exposure or infection.

[ChrisPlatt]

Numbers are starting to improve in the Tri-State region.
I'm hopeful Omicron has peaked here and is now declining.

Chris

[MarkJerling]

It's a little different. Flu starts in China months ahead of when it comes to the United States. That means that the CDC can get viral samples from western China and try to figure out what strains are going to become dominant next flu season.

COVID seems to move a lot faster and so there is less time from a variant showing up before it is in multiple countries around the world.

---------- Post added 01-14-22 at 04:14 PM ----------

So discouraging.

My two year old daughter just tested positive for COVID. Our six year old probably has it as well, for the third time.

We saw my family over New Years, which obviously was a mistake. My sister and her husband came and several of them were coughing, but they said it was a cold -- they've all had COVID twice before and for certain didn't have COVID now. Well, a week later our youngest two developed symptoms. The rest of us are vaccinated and haven't had any symptoms.

They seem pretty mild at this point, but the two year old had high fever for three days and was pretty miserable.

To top it all off, my sister is pretty anti-vaccine and is convinced that it is the vaccinated folks who are passing COVID around.

Oh bloody hell. I just spotted your post. For the third time? On that basis, are we going to have to deal with Covid as an ongoing issue, I wonder?

[RobA_Oz]

the news isn't getting better


Kansas hospital checks morgue capacity as COVID variant omicron surges

One of the local brains trust wrote on a wall “Fear is the virus”. A lot of people in Kansas are being scared to death, apparently.

Anyway, we had our booster shots yesterday: Pfizer, after two doses of AZ. We seem to still be in the land of the living, and our wireless reception hasn’t improved.

[Rondec]

It is just awful here in Lynchburg. Currently there are 155 patients with COVID in Lynchburg General. The hospital's max is 350 beds, but I doubt they are ever staffed for 350 beds in the best of times. Currently with staff furloughs due to COVID it is much lower. Wait times simply to be seen in the ER there are upwards of 20 hours. Patients routinely wait in the ER for a couple of days before they can get a bed in the hospital if they require admission.

About one third of the patients requiring admission for COVID are vaccinated, but of the ICU requiring patients, 90 percent are unvaccinated.

I can only hope that we are near the peak and that things fall fairly quickly, as they did in South Africa.

[slartibartfast01]

It is just awful here in Lynchburg. Currently there are 155 patients with COVID in Lynchburg General. The hospital's max is 350 beds, but I doubt they are ever staffed for 350 beds in the best of times. Currently with staff furloughs due to COVID it is much lower. Wait times simply to be seen in the ER there are upwards of 20 hours. Patients routinely wait in the ER for a couple of days before they can get a bed in the hospital if they require admission.

About one third of the patients requiring admission for COVID are vaccinated, but of the ICU requiring patients, 90 percent are unvaccinated.

I can only hope that we are near the peak and that things fall fairly quickly, as they did in South Africa.

One of our neighbours in the UK had to call for an ambulance recently and was told it would take 17 hours to get to her. The ambulance finally arrived and the Paramedics examined her only to tell her she should go to the hospital, but she wasn't bad enough to go in the ambulance and could her niece who was there temporarily looking after her take her to the hospital by car. If she had known that would be the outcome she could have been driven to the hospital 17 hours earlier. What would they have done if her niece hadn't been there? Probably tell her to take a taxi.

[Unregistered User 8]

About one third of the patients requiring admission for COVID are vaccinated, but of the ICU requiring patients, 90 percent are unvaccinated.

Could statistics like this be anymore convincing or damning, and yet still ignored or argued against by so many.

[Jonathan Mac]

I found this from Pfizer
"Pfizer, which developed a vaccine with BioNTech, said in a statement that if a “vaccine-escape” variant emerges, the two companies would be able to develop and produce a “tailor-made vaccine” in about 100 days."
They might be able to develop the vaccine in six weeks but some testing is still required although less than for the original vaccine.

Development and testing but production is also a big thing as it would take some time to manufacture in quantities sufficient for everyone. If and when this happens we'll be back in the position of the rich countries buying up all available supplies and leaving nothing for the poorer one, who are left to suffer and generate new variants.

It's a little different. Flu starts in China months ahead of when it comes to the United States. That means that the CDC can get viral samples from western China and try to figure out what strains are going to become dominant next flu season.

COVID seems to move a lot faster and so there is less time from a variant showing up before it is in multiple countries around the world.

---------- Post added 01-14-22 at 04:14 PM ----------

So discouraging.

My two year old daughter just tested positive for COVID. Our six year old probably has it as well, for the third time.

We saw my family over New Years, which obviously was a mistake. My sister and her husband came and several of them were coughing, but they said it was a cold -- they've all had COVID twice before and for certain didn't have COVID now. Well, a week later our youngest two developed symptoms. The rest of us are vaccinated and haven't had any symptoms.

They seem pretty mild at this point, but the two year old had high fever for three days and was pretty miserable.

To top it all off, my sister is pretty anti-vaccine and is convinced that it is the vaccinated folks who are passing COVID around.

I recently discovered my younger sister is anti-vaccine, at least with regard to covid. Neither she nor her two sons are vaccinated even though they both want to get it. I can0t say it's a surprise though, she's one of those people who, when given a choice on anything, will choose wrong 90% of the time.

I've had covid twice now, the "original" (with whatever mutations it had by the time it started in Western Europe) and omicron. There's no reason to believe that having it once means you're protected for ever more, though my guess is that, all else being equal, having it once and recovering with no complications means that's likely to happen on subsequent infections.

[slartibartfast01]

Nick Kyrgios was interviewed after his win in the Australian Open. He said Covid left him bedbound for two days. I believe Nadal was quite badly affected as well. Allan Saint-Maximin of Newcastle United was out for months after being infected. Some tennis players test positive and don't seem to be affected at all.