A Little Levity
Ending the Pandemic. We desperately want covid to be behind us. Some of us are declaring that this is the case, facts be damned. Not an unusual attitude in the modern world. Here’s a college that has found that to end the covid-19 pandemic, all you have to do is stop reporting cases, eliminate all special risk-reduction practices, and put an end to the emergency paid leave policy.
Springfield News-Leader.com 5/18/2022
Predicting the Future. Oregon seems to have some super computers that can predict the future with precision: “The state is expected to peak at 321 covid-19 hospitalizations on June 10.” Share with the rest of us?
KEZI.com 5/18/2022
Trumpeting the Obvious. A big research computer study says being outside is safer than being inside, and that holding a gathering with everyone doing a PCR test ahead of time is better than requiring vaccinations. Seems I’ve heard that somewhere before.
KXAN.com 5/10/2022
And Now For Something Completely Different
The 100,000 new cases a day being reported and tracked are likely low by a factor of four or five, per multiple estimates. Dr. Eric Topol says: "The real number of cases is likely at least 500,000 per day, far greater than any of the US prior waves except Omicron.”
“We have a highly unfavorable picture of: (1) accelerated evolution of the virus; (2) increased immune escape of new variants; (2) progressively higher transmissibility and infectiousness; (4) substantially less protection from transmission by vaccines and boosters; (5) some reduction on vaccine/booster protection against hospitalization and death; (6) high vulnerability from infection-acquired immunity only; and (7) likelihood of more noxious new variants in the months ahead.”
And he reports that vaccinated individuals account for 42 percent of the deaths during the Omicron wave, which is an all-time high percentage.
Ground Truths 5/15/2022
Highlights From Past Blogs
April 29 - The Big Meter
April 7 - How to Test
February 25 - One. Million. Deaths.
February 16 - Ventilation Revolution
February 2 - Covid-19 Testing
January 11 - Air Purifiers
January 4 - Masks That Actually Work
December 15 - The Double Risk of Indoor Dining