Yeah ... I figured it'd be like having herd immunity against the common cold, or common flu (and without flu shots) ... highly unlikely.
So much for the COVID doesn't hurt the young nonsense... COVID-19 heart changes raise death risk; virus may be lead killer of young adults during surges https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-science-idUSKBN27B2KA Covid 19 coronavirus: Study shows Covid leading death for young in some US states https://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/co...in-some-us-states/DTMXPIZTEXJZ67OVRKQSNVV74E/ Despite US president Donald Trump claiming his son Barron's coronavirus infection was "gone" after "15 minutes", a new study says the virus has likely become the leading cause of death among young people in some regions of the United States. For people aged between 25 and 44 living in one of 11 states with high infection rates - such as New York, Arkansas and Arizona - the chance of dying from Covid-19 is greater than any other risk, the researchers found. (More at above url)
Yet again, a really slanted view of the study. The actual study simply states (which isn't peer reviewed yet, but that's no big deal it seems legit) that COVID likely surpassed unintentional overdoses as the number one leading cause of death in the 25-44 cohort demographic. So what? If the chance of dying from an unintentional overdose (read: not a suicide) was so ridiculously low in this group (and it was) and COVID is now slightly higher but still so ridiculously low as to not even be a blip on the radar, why should people 25-44 give a shit? Answer: They shouldn't. Their likelihood of dying in a car accident is much greater, or from cancer, or diabetes based on their diet.
This is a reminder that the cohort facing the highest rate of death and hospitalization next to the elderly from COVID is health care workers taking care of COVID patients. Nurses endure the most within this healthcare cohort since they spend ore time in close contact with those sick with COVID-19. Among healthcare workers, the toll of COVID-19 falls hardest on nurses https://www.latimes.com/science/story/2020-10-27/among-healthcare-workers-covid-19-hardest-on-nurses The sudden appearance of a deadly new pathogen is always bad for the men and women who care for the afflicted, and a new report shows that the coronavirus that causes COVID-19 is no exception. In a three-month period early in the COVID-19 pandemic, when personal protective equipment was often scarce and scientists’ understanding of the virus was in its earliest stages, healthcare workers were hospitalized and died at rates that were atypically high for their ages and genders. Researchers scoured a sample of 6,760 adults hospitalized for COVID-19 between March 1 and May 31 and found that 5.9% of those patients were healthcare workers. Just over two-thirds of them were in jobs where they would likely have direct contact with patients — especially nursing. Despite being mostly female and typically younger than the general pool of hospitalized COVID-19 patients, the healthcare workers had rates of serious illness and death that were similar to those seen in older patients — especially men, who have proved to be more vulnerable to the disease. More than a quarter of the COVID-19 patients who identified as healthcare workers became sick enough to be admitted to the intensive care unit. Roughly 16% required the assistance of mechanical ventilation to breathe. And 4.2% died during their hospitalization. The median age of the hospitalized healthcare workers was 49, 13 years younger than the median age for the entire group of 6,760 COVID-19 patients. And although men who develop severe cases of COVID-19 generally outnumber women, 72% of the healthcare workers hospitalized for COVID-19 were female, reflecting women’s larger numbers in nursing and related healthcare fields. But other factors placed the hospitalized healthcare workers squarely in groups at high risk of developing severe disease. Nine out of 10 had an underlying health condition that increased their vulnerability, such as hypertension, asthma, heart disease or diabetes. Almost three-quarters were identified as obese, a powerful risk factor for a serious case of COVID-19. And more than half — 52% — were Black Americans. In part because Black people are heavily represented among “essential workers,” coronavirus infection rates have run three times higher in counties with predominantly Black populations than in counties that are predominantly white, and COVID-19 death rates are six times higher. The longstanding health inequities that contribute to higher rates of diabetes, asthma, hypertension and obesity among Black Americans are also driving their disproportionately high COVID-19 mortality rate, researchers say. The new report was prepared for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention by COVID-NET, a network of researchers tracking COVID-19’s impact from more than 250 acute-care hospitals in 14 states. Their findings were published Monday in the CDC’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. At a time when healthcare workers are stretched to the limit, COVID-19 threatens to hobble a crucial workforce. The researchers said their findings underscored that adequate supplies of personal protective equipment, scarce throughout the pandemic, were crucial to keeping healthcare workers healthy and on the job. Doctors have been highly visible in calls to shore up stocks of protective safety gear. But in the new study, they were far less likely than nurses to have been hospitalized for COVID-19. Fewer than 3% of healthcare workers counted in the study were physicians. By contrast, nurses and certified nursing assistants amounted to close to four-in-10 of healthcare workers who landed in the hospital. (Phlebotomists, home healthcare aides, hospital housekeeping and maintenance staff, and other workers rounded out the list, though no other single group accounted for more than 6.6% of hospitalizations in the study.) For nurses up and down the hierarchy, such findings are particularly important. “This is not rocket science,” said healthcare expert Barbara Resnick of the University of Maryland’s School of Nursing, who was not involved in the new study. “Nurses are providing direct care to patients, and you have to be up close and personal for a lot of what they do. They spend the most time with patients, especially the nursing assistants. Bathing, dressing and giving medications — you can’t do that from six feet away.” While doctors have relatively brief encounters with patients, nurses are more likely to spend more time in close contact with those sick with COVID-19, Resnick said. Across the country, nurses have sat by the bedsides of sick patients in lieu of families, or held phones connecting patients with their loved ones who have been barred from visits during the pandemic. That means they’re probably exposed to a higher dose of the coronavirus — a factor in causing more severe illness, Resnick added. Roughly 17 million U.S. residents are employed in the nation’s healthcare sector. The new study is based on a sample of hospitalized patients in 98 counties in 13 states. It’s not clear whether the sample reflects the country as a whole. Nor is it clear whether healthcare workers will continue to be hospitalized and die at rates seen in the pandemic’s early months. But if the trends seen in the study continue, more than a million healthcare workers could be hospitalized with COVID-19, and more than 42,000 of them could die by the time the pandemic is over.
When weighing the impact of Covid-19, a concept to consider is “Disability years”. About 15% of people have serious complications from Covid that includes permanent organ damage. If you are in your 30’s, thats 30 plus years of potentially reduced work capacity, not even considering loss of quality of life for the victim as well as their family, including spouse and children. Potential disability years are higher for a younger person than they are for a older person. There are potential out of pocket healthcare costs to consider even by those with a comprehensive healthcare plan because of uncovered complications or indirect costs from a Covid infection, such as accidents, vulnerability to other medical conditions, depression, alcoholism, and crime. Covid is more serious than the flu and decisive personal and goverment action to combat Covid is warranted, although at this point, I feel another mandated lockdown will be net counterproductive. Viruses are a serious human vulnerability in our connected and population dense modern world. As such, a necessary core competency of a modern human is knowing how to use PPE and complying with best practices during an outbreak. It is inevitable a more severe virus will come along through natural or man-made means, potentially causing a negative economic feedback loop in our increasingly specialized society, especially if distribution channels are compromised by either attenuation or fear. Controlling the spread of infectous diseases requires the sustained efforts of everyone on the planet. When I say “Everyone”, I am considering that some people may not participate either deliberately or accidentally through ineffective precautions being taken. However, strict enforcement of appropriate mandates should minimize the effect of such individuals, hopefully resulting in an R0 of less than 1.
I don't disagree with anything you're saying here. What we need to do is what we've always done. If you have some sort of disability that makes you more susceptible to this (or any) virus then you need to take precautions to protect yourself or those you love (if they have the disability). Don't ask me to close my business, or to shutter my life's work, or to not send my kids to school or to not spend my holidays with my family or to not get on a plane or to not do anything I want if I have spent my life keeping myself healthy in order to protect you having not spent your life protecting yourself. Not when the risk to me is inconsequential.
'There's no way to sugarcoat it': COVID-19 cases are surging; one American dies every 107 seconds https://www.usatoday.com/story/news...ees-surge-americans-tire-pandemic/6052710002/ The U.S. set a record this week for new coronavirus cases over a seven-day period with more than 500,000 infections. An American is testing positive every 1.2 seconds. Daily deaths are also climbing – one of us is dying every 107 seconds, according to Johns Hopkins data. And daily hospitalizations have been rising steadily for more than a month, from 28,608 on Sept. 20 to more than 44,000 on Tuesday. "There's no way to sugarcoat it: We are facing an urgent crisis, and there is an imminent risk to you, your family members, your friends, your neighbors and the people you care about," said Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers, whose state is seeing one of the nation's worst outbreaks. As winter approaches, America is facing a crucial fork in the road, said Melissa Nolan, an infectious disease expert and professor at the University of South Carolina. "We might see a larger surge due to the pandemic fatigue Americans are experiencing," Nolan told USA TODAY. "Americans are tired of adhering to public health guidelines and getting tested." She repeated the familiar plea of public health experts: Masks. Social distancing. Hand washing. Risk mitigation strategies until a vaccine is developed. While the White House’s science policy office ranked “ending the Covid-19 pandemic” among President Donald Trump's top achievements, the world isn't buying in. Stock markets around the globe fell sharply Wednesday amid investor fears that global lockdowns are once again on the horizon. "We're well behind this virus," Dr. Mike Ryan, executive director of the World Health Organization's emergencies program, said this week. "We will have to get ahead of this virus, and that may require sacrifice for many, many people in terms of their personal lives." Some suggest a national lockdown might allow a “reset” for states more severely affected to reduce their spiraling numbers, but that is unlikely to happen given the political climate, most experts agree. "A national mandate from the federal government for universal masking is more likely to achieve the greatest impact to reduce deaths in the next several months," said Robert Glatter, an emergency physician at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City. That's not very likely either, however. Meanwhile, states like Wisconsin suffer. State officials there are urging residents to stay home and avoid social gatherings – despite a series of legal challenges that have frustrated efforts by Evers to order restrictions. "It's a nightmare scenario, frankly, that this could get quite a bit worse in the next several weeks or months before it gets better," said Ryan Westergaard, chief medical officer for the Wisconsin Department of Health Services. Experts say at least one vaccine candidate could win FDA approval by year's end. But that could just be the beginning of questions related to vaccinating a nation of more than 300 million people. And a world of more than 7 billion people. Nolan warns that until it becomes clear what type of vaccine clears FDA guidelines for mass distribution, it won't be clear what problems the nation faces in getting it to the public. For example, some vaccines require refrigeration – and, because this is how the world works in 2020, it turns out we are nearing a national shortage of clinical laboratory refrigerators. We still don't know how well any vaccines actually will work. And even if they do work, Americans must be convinced it is safe and effective before they line up to get the shot. Once the vaccine is available, "uptake issues" must be overcome, said Ogbonnaya Omenka, an associate professor and public health specialist at Butler University. Will the vaccine be mandatory or optional? And if mandatory, how will it be enforced "in view of the clash between individual liberty and public health?" Also, there are questions of prioritization: figuring out who should get the vaccine first because there won't be enough to go around for some time. Young, healthy people would seem to be last in line, but what effect will that have on in-classroom learning for students? There is also evidence that vaccine hesitancy may be higher in minority communities, the communities that have been hit the hardest by the pandemic, said Dr. Anuj Mehta, a pulmonary and critical care physician at National Jewish Health in Denver. "Convincing people that a vaccine is a safe and effective will be a critical part of widespread dissemination," Mehta said. Trump, who recovered from COVID-19 earlier this month, continues to downplay the latest wave of infections. "We're rounding the turn," the president said at recent campaign stop. "We're doing great. Our numbers are incredible." Trump points to daily death totals, which, while rising, have not reached numbers seen in April, when thousands of Americans died each day. Glatter said deaths have not reached those numbers during this surge because of increased testing, more judicious use of intubation and noninvasive forms of ventilation, and use of steroids and the medication remdesivir when indicated. The world is also struggling. South African President Cyril Ramaphosa said Wednesday that he has gone into quarantine. India is second only to the U.S. in reported infections, nearing the 8 million mark. In Europe, several nations are weighing tougher restrictions. European Union officials on Wednesday urged the bloc’s 27 nations to introduce common rules to test for the disease and track its spread to help prevent further damage to their virus-battered economies. “We are seeing a large number of cases, we are seeing widespread disease" in Europe, Ryan said. "We are seeing very, very high positivity rates and an increasing lack of capacity to do any effective form of contact tracing." He said stay-at-home orders may be needed in some countries to take the "heat out of this phase of the pandemic." When will it all end? There are so many variables, it's not easy to say. Glatter said it will take three years. Nolan went out on a limb: "Next spring," she said.