outbreak! (ebola, sars, coronavirus, etc)

And with my boss' kid and another coworker down with it, that's 15 new cases in my orbit I've learned about since just Saturday. Feels like the reported stats are further disconnected from reality than at any other point.

Interesting. We've entered a lull here. No new reported cases in my orbit for weeks, the quietest all year.

yeah, same here in Central Florida. my county is now considered low risk based on hospitalizations/cases for the first time in forever. positivity rate in single digits also for the first time in a while.

but it definitely varies by location.

Last week MDC dropped to moderate risk, whatever that means.

Looks like I see spikes in the Northeast and Upper Midwest without their looking like a wave.

State wide and county wide stats would lead you to believe we are in a lull, but our city stats are wild right now. For months we'd been ranging between 1-6ish new cases per day, never breaking 10 per day. Suddenly on the 9/20 we had 94 new cases and then 208 the following day, presumably some sort of reporting backlog involved somehow, but we've been over double digits in new cases per day since.

It's been betterish around here, but transmission is clearly continuing; we've never zeroed out at the hospital, even if it's been single digits for a while. Honestly based on the amount of people I saw at shows last week without masks -- I was in a distinct minority when it came to masking up at indoor shows -- I have to wonder, but no way to know for sure quite yet unless there's a clear spike. As it is it may just be a flowing miasma at this point.

Masking in my classes is down to single digits: three in a class of 50, for example.

Nine of 10 colleagues no longer mask.

I'm the lone masked holdout in my building. Could live without having to hear comments on it every week.

Almost nobody but me is masking, but also nobody comments about it.

Granted, it's usually from one of the same three obnoxious people, but I can't get through a week without some sarcastic comment about it.

They're not libs, are they?

One of them is 100% straight up conservative, one claims to be liberal and seems to be on some issues but really haaaates masks and the third is just a weirdo who comments on everything and I can't figure out their actual position on anything at all.

"Tonight on Crossfire"

Lol

haha it would be entertaining for about five minutes before the entire audience starts looking for the cyanide pills

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GxqgdU1QI5g

listen, can someone help joe gonzales understand something here

https://i.imgur.com/wV88xrH.png

Federal officials have spent the past year urging Americans to get booster shots to bolster their protection against the coronavirus, which wanes over time. In early September, they rushed out the first new shots — reformulated to target the still-dominant omicron variants — to give people time to get inoculated before a likely cold weather surge, when respiratory infections increase as people head indoors, and recommended that all Americans 12 and older receive a third and fourth dose of vaccine.

But the campaigns have lagged badly. Only about 105 million U.S. adults — roughly 40 percent — have received the third shot of vaccine initially offered a year ago, according to federal data, a far lower rate than countries like the United Kingdom, where more than 70 percent of adults have gotten a third dose. That figure is also well behind the 200 million U.S. adults who completed their primary series of shots.

Early data shows that just over 11 million Americans — or about 4 percent of those eligible — have received the new bivalent booster shots. A third of adults say they eventually plan to get those shots, according to KFF polling.

For public health leaders, the low booster rate is startling in a nation that financed the shots’ development, offers them free and touts them as the best way to protect against a virus that has already claimed more than 1 million lives in this country.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2022/10/07/covid-booster-winter-surge/

The case for not getting the (widely available, free) omicron booster for people who are already vaccinated is one I don't understand. Like, 40% of adults get their flu shot each year. What's the reasoning for "I'll get my annual flu booster but I won't get the omicron booster"?

What's the reasoning for "I'll get my annual flu booster but I won't get the omicron booster"?

I had a in-person doctor visit on Sept. 22. They asked if I wanted my flu shot. I said yes. I asked if they could give me a covid booster. They said 'we don't have any'. That was my reasoning.

I think they made a strategic mistake restricting (officially) who could get the last booster. Yeah, I know, you could always jump the line or lie or whatever, but I didn't, which meant almost a year between shots, which meant almost a year with I assume reduced protection. I got the bivalent the first day I could, but hadn't really altered my behavior the preceding several months. And I'm one of the very compliant ones. Everyone else, the great unwashed, even those open to vaccines? I wouldn't underestimate the impact of inertia.

My parents finally got their bivalent booster this week, despite resistance, because their doctors told them to. The reason for my mom's resistance? "Walensky said it hadn't been tested on humans."

my dad is biv boosted. yesssssssssss. whole family is DONE.

the whole 'not tested' thing, like....it isn't like they made a whole new vaccine, they took the existing one and tweaked a few things.

this isn't gonna be like the shitty I Am Legend remake

got mine on Thursday, flu and COVID, one in each arm. still feeling a bit achey and sweaty, and awake at 03:30. i just walked in to a chemist 10 minutes away, was no need for an appointment

I got my bivalent booster Monday, no problem at all, besides the sore arm. A minor sniffle Tuesday, that could have been anything else.

Bivalent just becoming available to all adults in my area. Will get sometime. Has the thing been updated yet to the hottest new strains?

and like most other under-65, relatively healthy people here that will be my 4th total. got 3rd (first boost) back in January

It works against the first couple omicron strains.

Seeing the new Pfizer bivalent is more up to date. No idea when I might be able to get that. Get poked with something or other soon.

Get it today.

Splikevax bivalent Original / Omicron
elasomeran / imelasomeran

call it by it's name!

soonest is oct 14, and in Bay Bulls! cmon Alf

they'll open some city clinics soon probably

and 20 weeks later i can get the extra tasty crispy

Ah. I wasn't sure on your chronology based on your posts.

it's all confusing. there might have been a one week window i was eligible for a non bivalent 4th hit

FL's surgeon general actively faking studies to try and indicate mRNA vaccines cause heart problems.

I fucking hate this state

#vaccineswork this is yet another example of write your conclusion and then fashion an article. @DrSusanOliver1 https://t.co/RxTjt8zSs7 . @FLDeptofHealth tried to analyze deaths after COVID vaccination starting from their rollout till June 2022. 🧵(1/9)

— Frank Han MD 🇺🇦Pediatric/ACHD/GUCH Cardiologist (@han_francis) October 8, 2022

Our Department of Health now recommending against people 18-39 not getting mRNA vaccines. Unfucking believable

Well this latest booster (Pfizer omnicron updated one) absolutely put me on my arse.

Went to bed, woke up after 3 in the afternoon and back in bed by 10.

Man I’m sorry Aldo.

Am I an outlier because I never had a bad reaction to the vaccine?

Man I’m sorry Aldo.

Am I an outlier because I never had a bad reaction to the vaccine?

Am I an outlier because I never had a bad reaction to the vaccine?

maybe. i never have, either, beyond my arm being sore for the day because my limbs are sharp rails. from seeing the range of reactions to vaccines on here and irl, it seems like either no reaction is an outlier or every reaction is -- it's across the board, no apparent rhyme or reason

I've been a bit fuzzy round the edges today but that's as likely from oversleeping than the vaxx.

My first three were the same as B,M and I was fine with them all, I don't know whether the omnicron tweaksdid something to me.

i've never met anyone who had a more than three day reaction to the vaccines/booster
i've met a few people who got taken out by a month + by covid

My neighbor told me today that both previous boosters coincided with some serious hearing loss that took weeks to resolve. He knows correlation is not causation, but his doctor nonetheless recommended against the latest vaccine for the time being.

I had a fairly mild reaction to the bivalent booster, but two weeks after that I got a not exactly mild case of Covid. Now I'm wondering if it makes any sense to get a second jab of that booster.

My wife and I got our Pfizer bivalent boosters last week and it took us down for a couple days. Still miles better than actual covid though.

Saw a story the other day saying that research indicates those with (normal) reactions to the vaccine might actually gain better immunity. Then again, I could have sworn I've seen that story multiple times over the past almost three years.

Been reading/hearing/seeing some things that at least so far studies are not showing the latest vaccine much if any more effective than its predecessors, which as far as messaging goes may partly explain the lax embrace of the current vax. They kind of have to overpromise to get/keep people motivated (iirc the bivalent was supposed to be 99.9% effective against omicron), but when they underdeliver it breeds skepticism or complacency. Maybe they should slow down a little, take their time with boosters, and release them when they have better research. If people aren't in a rush to get the boosters, then they should maybe stop rushing them out.

Anecdotally, we barely have heard of anyone around here testing positive these days (knock wood), maybe two or three we've heard about in the past few months, up to date with boosters or no. People are getting more and more used to the perpetual prospect of covid and how to handle it. Even the last public place I know to require a mask (the food pantry where I volunteer) has just gone mask optional.

All the research in the world ain't getting these people jabbed.

Re infections: yeah, it's the quietest it's been all year, maybe a three-month stretch when no one I know has gotten infected.

I never heard or thought the bivalent booster was supposed to be 99.9% effective against omicron (that seems really unrealistic!) nor have I seen anything to suggest that it's less effective than expected (which, speaking roughly, I would say means "about as effective in diminishing chance of transmission as original vax was against original strain.")

As for me, I continue to not try very hard to not get COVID (getting the bivalent booster and wearing an N95 when I'm indoors with people is about as much as I do, and I take it off to eat and drink) and to not, as far as I know, get COVID.