COVID-19 (artist formerly known as Wuhan strain novel Corona virus)

Day 2 since getting a booster. I woke up not dead. I felt a little sore yesterday but this was probably milder than the first 2. Everyone is different, of course.

 

I didn't even feel my booster.

 

Dunno if I said anything about it in here but the booster just made me want to sleep for about 2 days. It didn’t hit me until about 48 hours after

But I felt fine aside from being tired

 

Another indication that the population effects of vaccines are real and if enough people got them, this would be over:

 

For reference, the US would be somewhere between Croatia (HR) and Poland (PL).

 

The new variant is already detected in Belgium and other places. Very likely already here anyway, just in small numbers so far.

 

Yeah, the only way travel restrictions are ever going to work is if we cut off all international travel, indefinitely. I’m very pro-covid mitigation measures, but that’s unreasonable

 

It doesn't work even then, because people will just get around the restrictions/rules.

 

but it cuts down the risk significantly if the # of those coming/going goes down bigly

 

On the scale of the United States, if it exists and has been detected then it is already here.

 

not really.

For it to become the new dominant strain, it has to be more contagious than the delta.

if it’s that contagious, there’s no stopping it from spreading unless you’re a small island and can stop all travel in and out.

 

As more countries ban travel from Africa and Japan shuts down all international travel, I am going to expand on why this is not logical. There is nothing special about South Africa's COVID. What is particular to South Africa is that it has world class researchers of contagious diseases. They detected this variant and others because they are looking the hardest for them. This same variant has already been detected other places and may not have even originated in South Africa at all. The same pressures that selected for the mutations in one place would select for it in others. It's already in the UK and other countries in Europe. The odds are quite good that even if it didn't independently arise in North America, which is possible, it is already here.

And in the end, for us normies, it changes nothing. Wear a mask in public indoor spaces. Get vaccinated. If you are sick, get tested and isolate until you know. I am just spitballing on this part, but it is highly unlikely that omicron is more deadly than delta. Maybe more contagious, maybe able to pass through vaccinated people better, but probably not more deadly. And I say that because these variants should trend to less deadly over time since greatly sickening your host lowers your opportunities to spread and also gets you noticed.

 

It's stupid.

What is about to happen in South Africa economically over this is truly evil.

 

Dependence on globalism is a net harm, whenever shit gets real.

 

They're dependent on tourism and we're shutting down the flights.

It's an endemic virus that isn't ever going to zero. It's time to move on. Get the vaccine, boosters, wear mask. and avoid public places, if you're concerned. But it's time to move on as the public in general.

 

It's been time for a while.

 

We moved on like a year ago, in the US. I heard someone complaining about Federal shutdowns hurting businesses... What US Federal shutdowns? There have been no Federal shutdowns. We never had any national shutdowns. And I think the consensus is that we may not have a mechanism to do such a thing even if someone wanted to.

 

This is what I mean, there is clear evidence of community transmission far from South Africa. Apologies for using kind of a shitty source, the NYT does sometimes write things they know to be false:

 

To be the new strain, it has to out compete the delta strain, and be more contagious. I'd say it has a weaker or the same pathology, so that shouldn't change things much.
The issue will be with the spike protein changes and how that might let it escape the vaccine more easily.

Once you find it, it's already out in the public and no stopping it.

The travel bans are like shutting the barn door after you see the horse run over the hill.