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New Covid wave has begun and masks should be worn again, scientists warn
(www.independent.co.uk)
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this post was submitted on 17 Aug 2023
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Pretty sure every virus has killed people, from the cold, to flu, and of course covid. It feels like now the death rate for the latest variants of covid are pretty comparable to the flu, the virus has lost a lot of its killing power over time.
Except the flu does not regularly disable those who it infects
As someone who wound up with chronic fatigue syndrome after getting covid, thank you for this. This piece of shit virus is worse than most people want to admit.
Of course it does, the flu kills millions and leaves even more disabled.
the sheer number of Covid infections has made long Covid into a global crisis
amazing that you recognize the existence of not only long Covid, but other post-viral illnesses, and think it gives weight to your “Covid is no big deal” argument
Again, the flu disables millions every year.
Yeah, I misspoke in my initial comment. I was under the impression the percentage was lower, but I looked it up and it’s about the same (based on the first thing I read)
So to me there’s two conclusions: Covid, which infects people at a much higher rate and for which the vaccine is not really that effective, is a bigger problem since it will end up giving a larger number of people long Covid. The flu is not infecting people twice a year (or more), and it’s possible to go years without catching the flu, even without masks
Or, what I think is the correct conclusion, we should be taking flu more seriously. We saw how little flu there was during the years of the highest mask compliance. Very weird to say “oh we’ve always had post-viral illness, let’s just have even more.” How about we actually take public health seriously for once?
Mah freedums.. No but we should all be masking. I mask just for air quality reasons.
yes, and we should be masking for that as well. even so, covid is far more insidious because so many of the disabilities it leaves behind are invisible.
Death rates aren't a feeling. I want some hard numbers.
I feel like we just don't care if we live or die anymore.
Fun fact: the CDC readjusted what the 'normal' rate of deaths is to include the years of the pandemic so now it's harder than ever to find hard numbers because "excess deaths" was one of the last ways to get any information at all!
Plus a world wide fast aging population would increase the death background number even if nothing else happens.
Anything that doesn't make an observable, statistically significant difference, has no cause to further impose restriction on how people live their lives
Sharp edges don't happen from demographic trends. This is pure rationalization.
Further than what?? What restrictions??
And what are you implying? Covid has no observable affect on public health? Tell that to the millions of people still getting disabled every year.
I know I've read reports about the latest variants being much less deadly. I did see one study recently which for patients presenting to hospital covid was a few percentage points more likely to result in death compared to hospitalized flu patients. There were a lot more covid patients though.
Found it:
So there is some data backing up the feelings I've gotten from everything I've been hearing and seeing.
So that's almost twice as bad as the flu.
I mean, that's one way to look at it. I looked at it as only a couple percent higher death rate than the flu. Either way, a little less than 2x is way better than like 5x worse.
I'm not sure how severe an effect this would have on the numbers, but the death rate would non-negligibly go down after millions of the most vulnerable people died in the first wave. As well, the newer variants get more contagious and bypass immune responses more easily, and we're taking way fewer precautions as a society. so 6% is a lower percent but still an incredibly high number
There’s one crucial thing you overlooked in this: in 2020, most people hadn’t been infected, and hadn’t gotten the vaccine (because there was no vaccine until December,and even then it was in extremely short supply). Now, most people have some sort of immunity, be it from vaccine or from a prior infection. That definitely skews the hospitalization numbers downward. You can’t compare then and now, unfortunately, since there’s no real community that hasn’t been vaccinated and hasn’t caught it - and so you can’t compare their numbers.
That's fair, but I think you can still compare it to the flu, which is not that far off from covid percentage wise. At this point both the flu and covid should be at an equal level of people having vaccines and natural antibodies, right? Even if you go with covid being about twice as deadly as the flu, twice as deadly as almost nothing is still almost nothing.
I’m sure “almost nothing” is quite comforting for the families of the 1.1 million Americans who died.
I'm sorry, but people die of lots of different things all the time, it sucks but it's a part of life
Hundreds of thousands of Americans will die this year from COVID. Sure, almost nothing. Just a 9/11 every two weeks or so.
Thousands die every day from tons of other stuff also, just a part of life.
That's the same shit that businesses were pushing last time because they didn't want to close for a few months, ended up making everything worse.
Yup. More effective action faster would have had a higher same-day-you-make-the-decision cost but would have been tremendously less harmful economically to all the entities blocking it for fear of the economic impact to them. They were digging a mass grave and then leaping into it.
It's important to note that every state I'm aware of has long ended their testing and reporting, literally doing the Trump thing. So we actually have no idea what the numbers are.
The numbers I've seen are from hospitalized patients, which should still be tracked, and tracked in a similar way to the flu. It doesn't give us the full story for sure, but it gives us something to compare.
I’ve you’ve been vaxxed, or had a previous infection, or get some paxlovid… yes. If not, no, not really any better. It hasn’t gotten weaker.
Do you have any studies or research to suggest covid hasn't gotten weaker?
Unfortunately, the myth that virii become weaker over time is a long standing misconception, and the anti-vax people pushed it because it fit their narrative.
These articles discuss it with immunologists & doctors & geneticists, though, so it seems that it’s a known truth and so, like gravity, isn’t extensively studied. Instead, they’re focusing on actual prevention via better vaccines and personal behavior/responsibility.
Hope this helps!
Https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2022/01/14/1072504127/fact-check-the-theory-that-sars-cov-2-is-becoming-milder
https://abc7ny.com/covid-update-pandemic-do-viruses-get-weaker-as-they-evolve-omicron-variant/11463220/
https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-not-mutating-to-be-weaker-over-time-genetics-2020-7
https://en.as.com/en/2022/02/07/latest_news/1644263846_400285.html (note that this site is a Spanish-language sports site, but it was nice to find this there)
Thanks for the links!
To summarize the NPR one, and correct me if I am wrong, but they are confirming that the current variants are weaker, but that we shouldn't take that to mean the next variants will follow the same trend?
Kind of. It’s not that it’s weaker, it’s that it’s route into cells is less damaging, and so it’s less “severe” , though the article contradicts itself on that particular word.
FTA: “ this alternative entryway likely causes less damage inside the lungs”
"Omicron may be a small step back in severity. But it's probably more severe on its own than the original version of the virus,"
Before omicron came along, SARS-CoV-2 was actually evolving to be more severe, says Bhattacharyya, of Harvard Medical School. "We're looking at a virus that's gotten progressively more severe over time," he says.
Viruses tend to mutate to be more contagious and less lethal, it's just how natural selection/evolution works. The strains most likely to survive will be the ones that don't kill their hosts before they can do so.
That’s false. Show me your research.