NON_POLITICAL China Coronavirus THREAD

[thestrangebrew1]

Getting the kid tested tomorrow morning. We don't have any rapid tests (I know they're not accurate) around here being administered so it'll be a few days before we get results. But she sounds like she's getting worse. She doesn't feel bad but her congestion and the coughing is def worse.

 

[pmv]

This seems a bit scandalous, considering how many countries want more vaccines but can't get them.

Though I don't know that the headline makes any sense - why is it 'despite' near-record-production? You wouldn't expect higher production to automatically mean less waste, if anything it would be the opposite.

Thousands of AstraZeneca Covid vaccine doses going to waste despite near-record production

Authorities move to head off supply glut amid calls for increased donations to lower-income neighbouring countries

www.theguardian.com

Almost 1,000 Covid vaccination providers are destroying expired AstraZeneca supplies, with the wastage of 31,833 doses reported despite Australian production of the vaccine continuing at near-record rates.

 

[PingSpike]

Is their school mandating masks? My kids have been illness free so far this whole year (went back half time late last year, full time in April). Everyone has been wearing masks.

Yes, except for outdoors. But my youngest is 4. I doubt they are actually following rules that well and everyone eats together inside. It seems like most of the cases of covid come from home, but all of the colds have definitely come from school.

Its causing a lot of problems with appointments and visiting my parents since we have to wait for the tests.

 

[Zorba]

Man, talk about a dumb way to screw up your life.

Oklahoma City firefighter fired after refusing to get tested for COVID-19, department says

The Oklahoma City Fire Department announced that terminated a firefighter from employment after they said he refused to comply with the department's COVID-19 testing requirement after other personnel had contracted the virus.

www.koco.com

 

[Red Squirrel]

Over 50k education workers recently lost their job in Ontario. Getting crazy with all these mandates. This is just the beginning, we're going to see the unemployment rate probably exceed what it was when covid first hit. Most of these people are essential workers too. So much for them being heroes. That's so last year apparently.

 

[Zorba]

Over 50k education workers recently lost their job in Ontario. Getting crazy with all these mandates. This is just the beginning, we're going to see the unemployment rate probably exceed what it was when covid first hit. Most of these people are essential workers too. So much for them being heroes. That's so last year apparently.

Yeah, people generally don't call those fighting for the enemy a hero. I'm guessing most will change their minds when it's between getting a free shot and standing in a soup line.

If not they'll remove themselves from the labor pool, which doesn't affect unemployment, and it'll become an employee's market.

 

[pmv]

Looking at the global case and death counts, it looks as if numbers are heading upwards again. Was really hoping the downward trend would just continue this time, rather than continuing the pattern of wave after wave.

As far as I can see, the last three 'waves' were due to northern hemisphere winter, the alpha variant, and the delta variant, respectively. What would be driving yet another wave of infections this time? Just winter again?

 

[Brainonska511]

Over 50k education workers recently lost their job in Ontario. Getting crazy with all these mandates. This is just the beginning, we're going to see the unemployment rate probably exceed what it was when covid first hit. Most of these people are essential workers too. So much for them being heroes. That's so last year apparently.

Maybe they should quit being babies and get vaccinated. Their choice of inaction has consequences. Do you think that unvaccinated adults should continue to be allowed to be a vector of infection for children who are still awaiting vaccination approvals?

 

[K1052]

Over 50k education workers recently lost their job in Ontario. Getting crazy with all these mandates. This is just the beginning, we're going to see the unemployment rate probably exceed what it was when covid first hit. Most of these people are essential workers too. So much for them being heroes. That's so last year apparently.

I have some questions about the veracity of this statement since it appears nobody has been fired...

https://ottawacitizen.com/news/loca...d-19-vaccination-made-mandatory-minister-says

Also:

The education ministry provided this explanation:

There are “more than 312,000” school board staff in Ontario, from teachers to administrators and custodians.

As of Oct. 25, 85.2 per cent of education employees attested they were fully vaccinated, the ministry said. The remaining 14.8 per cent said they were not fully vaccinated, obtained a medical exemption, or did not submit the form.

So 14.8 per cent of the total 312,000 employees represents just more than 46,000 people, which is close to 50,000.

However, it’s not clear that 46,000 to 50,000 school board employees would have to be terminated because they refused to be vaccinated. An undetermined number of employees in the 14.8 per cent group have one dose of vaccine, have vaccine exemptions or haven’t filled out the form because they no longer work at the school board or are on leave.

 

[manly]

Looking at the global case and death counts, it looks as if numbers are heading upwards again. Was really hoping the downward trend would just continue this time, rather than continuing the pattern of wave after wave.

As far as I can see, the last three 'waves' were due to northern hemisphere winter, the alpha variant, and the delta variant, respectively. What would be driving yet another wave of infections this time? Just winter again?

I glanced at this and currently the hottest zones are the UK and Russia. You probably know better than I can, but the mess in the UK has all to do with throwing caution to the wind since the July grand reopening. As for Russia, we all know they have a very low vaccination rate. As cold weather sets in, they're likely to have problems for a long while.

Maybe they should quit being babies and get vaccinated. Their choice of inaction has consequences. Do you think that unvaccinated adults should continue to be allowed to be a vector of infection for children who are still awaiting vaccination approvals?

Based on his posts over time, the answer seems to be yes.

 

[Red Squirrel]

I have some questions about the veracity of this statement since it appears nobody has been fired...

https://ottawacitizen.com/news/loca...d-19-vaccination-made-mandatory-minister-says

Also:

Oh my bad, I thought it had already happened. But either way this is going to be a pretty big hit once it does go through and lot of other companies doing it too. I find these mandates do more harm than good especially if they start hitting industries like supply chain etc.

 

[pmv]

I glanced at this and currently the hottest zones are the UK and Russia. You probably know better than I can, but the mess in the UK has all to do with throwing caution to the wind since the July grand reopening. As for Russia, we all know they have a very low vaccination rate. As cold weather sets in, they're likely to have problems for a long while.

Yup, I'm sure that's what's happening here in UK - entirely predictably, I would say - indeed I explicitly predicted it. The rest seems to be not just Russia, but also Ukraine, Belarus, Bulgaria, and Romania, and increasingly the whole of Eastern Europe. I suppose it's the winter plus low vaccination rates in all those countries.

 

[jpiniero]

I glanced at this and currently the hottest zones are the UK and Russia. You probably know better than I can, but the mess in the UK has all to do with throwing caution to the wind since the July grand reopening. As for Russia, we all know they have a very low vaccination rate. As cold weather sets in, they're likely to have problems for a long while.

The vax rate in the UK looks pretty high. If they are having problems now I bet it's the crappy J&J or AZ.

 

[manly]

Yup, I'm sure that's what's happening here in UK - entirely predictably, I would say - indeed I explicitly predicted it. The rest seems to be not just Russia, but also Ukraine, Belarus, Bulgaria, and Romania, and increasingly the whole of Eastern Europe. I suppose it's the winter plus low vaccination rates in all those countries.

Eastern Europe is also a hot zone, but numerically UK and Russia are larger problems. Russia has extreme vaccine resistance and I don't entirely blame them; I wouldn't take PutinVac if you paid me. As I suggested, you might be seeing the beginning of a cold weather effect in the former Soviet bloc, but I'd expect it to continue for a while. Weather varies significantly by location, but technically we're only in the middle of autumn.

If your NHS doesn't collapse, the UK should emerge with some robust natural immunity by Christmas-time. At least all the survivors can have a jolly good holidays.

 

[Torn Mind]

Maybe they should quit being babies and get vaccinated. Their choice of inaction has consequences. Do you think that unvaccinated adults should continue to be allowed to be a vector of infection for children who are still awaiting vaccination approvals?

Ontario's general collective is quite far along with percentage of double vaccinated. Thus, I am not inclined to believe the holdouts are mere "babies", a rather denigrating and simplistic term.

 

[Spacehead]

Our local hospital is getting overwhelmed with covid patients... around 80% of those are unvaxed. They've brought in a mobile trailer to help with the minor ER traffic.

 

[Kaido]

Great post:

 

[Kaido]

Our local hospital is getting overwhelmed with covid patients... around 80% of those are unvaxed. They've brought in a mobile trailer to help with the minor ER traffic.

My nurse friend at the local city hospital said that while the number of vaccinated patients isn't zero, the vast majority of the people she has to intubate & who die on her are unvaccinated. She's also pretty upset that while the pandemic is still ongoing, it's just not nearly as heavily pushed into the news as before, so people think things are kinda-sorta back to normal, whereas she's dealing with people literally dying on her all the time. Side note, I'm extremely grateful there are people who can handle people dying on them all the time...like, if a computer dies in my job, I can fix or replace it; I don't know how I could separate my emotions from not feeling about bad about maybe not trying harder or trying a different way or whatever, as my internal emotional structure isn't the type to say "well, I did the best I could, and now I'm moving on to the next job". I still think about this photo of a nurse silently protesting last year, being in the thick of treating dying people, and having to go through a literal face-to-face denial of the reality of the situation:

https://www.azfamily.com/news/continuing_coverage/coronavirus_coverage/phoenix-nurses-silently-counterprotested-at-mondays-patriots-rally/article_6cbb851c-83f3-11ea-a5be-0f8b06667870.html

 

[K1052]

Oh my bad, I thought it had already happened. But either way this is going to be a pretty big hit once it does go through and lot of other companies doing it too. I find these mandates do more harm than good especially if they start hitting industries like supply chain etc.

This is just conjecture and experience has shown that the mandates generally are achieving high vaccination rates with minimal job loss due to refusers.

 

[Brainonska511]

Ontario's general collective is quite far along with percentage of double vaccinated. Thus, I am not inclined to believe the holdouts are mere "babies", a rather denigrating and simplistic term.

If they had a legitimate reason to not vaccinate, they wouldn't lose their jobs. Actions have consequences, and they are being held accountable for their choices.

 

[K1052]

If they had a legitimate reason to not vaccinate, they wouldn't lose their jobs. Actions have consequences, and they are being held accountable for their choices.

Admittedly this is quite likely a novel experience for some police officers.

 

[jpiniero]

This is just conjecture and experience has shown that the mandates generally are achieving high vaccination rates with minimal job loss due to refusers.

So far the mandates have mostly been targeting Unions (and who knows how many 'refusers' had gotten the vaccine but are just doing Union things) and cities who obviously aren't going to publicize if there was a decent % of people who had refused to get it.

I'm skeptical of this so called labor shortage, but if an employer is concerned at all about staffing they aren't going to do a mandate.

If they had a legitimate reason to not vaccinate, they wouldn't lose their jobs. Actions have consequences, and they are being held accountable for their choices.

I am also wondering how many are getting religious exemptions.

 

[Zorba]

So far the mandates have mostly been targeting Unions (and who knows how many 'refusers' had gotten the vaccine but are just doing Union things) and cities who obviously aren't going to publicize if there was a decent % of people who had refused to get it.

I'm skeptical of this so called labor shortage, but if an employer is concerned at all about staffing they aren't going to do a mandate.



I am also wondering how many are getting religious exemptions.

The mandates are out of the hands of many corporation at this point. From data released by healthcare systems and United shows the vast majority end up getting vaccinated at the end.

 

[K1052]

FDA Authorizes Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 Vaccine for Emergency Use in Children 5 through 11 Years of Age


On to the CDC next.

 

[manly]

Yup, I'm sure that's what's happening here in UK - entirely predictably, I would say - indeed I explicitly predicted it. The rest seems to be not just Russia, but also Ukraine, Belarus, Bulgaria, and Romania, and increasingly the whole of Eastern Europe. I suppose it's the winter plus low vaccination rates in all those countries.

Russia's vax rate is low, but Ukraine is just half that! In the past, Russia ran anti-vax disinformation campaigns in Ukraine so that partially explains society's beliefs. AP has a good report:

Vaccine reluctance in Eastern Europe brings high COVID cost

Ukraine is suffering through a surge in coronavirus infections and deaths, along with other parts of Eastern Europe

abcnews.go.com