There has a been a “savior” strain that a lot of us have been hoping for which is: extremely transmissible, and relatively benign. So far it seems like omicron could be that, but I haven’t actually seen good data on mortality yet.
If anybody has good mortality data I would love to see it.
The problem is that there's so many factors to isolate (testing rates, vaccination rates, behavior changes, demographics of the infected population, etc.) that it is hard to get a precise number yet.
Of course, even if it's less severe, it's also more infectious which could make overall outcomes worse.
Days suggests 2,5 days instead of 8,5 days and that gives a lot of wiggle room.
Edit: it's not because of deaths...
( That's where the stat came from)
Yes I know influenza isn't a corona virus. My point partly being we've become complacent at just how dangerous SARS-CoV-2 is and its variants are probably worse, but at the very least they're more transmissible.
I think omicron is seen as less severe because so many people have had at least one shot of the vaccine. It's slamming anyone who is not vaccinated at all most ICUs are 75% un-vaccinated, the remaining two shot no booster, or two shots plus a booster, or two shots plus booster but elderly and sick. It's like MMR vaccine nobody is asking why doesn't everyone have measles, mumps, and rubella - because nearly everyone has been vaccinated for those.
MMR is similarly effective at infection vs. mumps as the mRNA vaccines are against infection with pre-Omicron SARS-CoV-2.
Transmission is a harder question: if you prevent infection in a bunch of people, but also create more asymptomatic people who are likely to go out and about: which effect wins out?
The "more transmissible" may be partially confounded by novelty. E.g. what's influenza's R0 in an immunologically naive population? Who knows.
Vaccination doesn't fully answer what the equilibrium transmissibility will be. either, because there's things like mucosal immunity.
> I think omicron is seen as less severe because so many people have had at least one shot of the vaccine.
So far the (weak) evidence we have points to both:
- A somewhat lower severity of infection from omicron than delta regardless of vaccination status.
- Moderate protection against severe disease from a 2 shot mRNA vaccine series, and pretty good protection against severe disease after a recent 3rd booster shot.
So, that is, it's not one or the other, it's both: Omicron is probably less severe overall and has its severity reduced further by vaccination.
Looks like death rates are climbing in jurisdictions who were on the leading edge of the Omicron wave. If I had to guess, it's significantly better if infected than Delta, but still much worse than we're used to dealing with with influenza.
> There has a been a “savior” strain that a lot of us have been hoping for which is: extremely transmissible, and relatively benign.
This is only able to have any benefit to the extent that it also is strongly and durably protective against infection from other variants.
I'm hopeful that things go much better this time around, both because vaccines are still somewhat protective and it looks somewhat less dangerous than Delta.
(To be clear I also wonder when it is time to return “to normal” but I disagree this is some kind of media propaganda. I think it’s too dismissive to assume there aren’t significant populations that have reasonable desires to continue to aim for mitigating policies like masking.)
https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/cases-updates/burd...
Once kids go from toddlers to starting walking and understanding the world around them though I think it's very important to teach them to be careful about - but actively use - things like knives, scissors, hot stoves etc. Then you don't have to constantly worry about them and they'll grow up to be capable and responsible individuals.
So yeah, I suppose my initial reaction was more towards the latter point of helicopter parenting, not the first one of protecting toddlers.
> Parents often can and will do whatever they can to protect their child...
I'd adjust that to "parents can and will do whatever they think will protect their child based on whatever the current wisdom (or scary headline) suggests".
Consider parents not letting their kids go trick or treating because they don't want to roll the dice on someone putting a razor blade in their candy. As a result, their kid will never eat a razor blade (though really they almost certainly never would have anyway), but what's the cost of missing out on that experience? Even if missing the experience is costly, maybe it ends up being a win because the kid now has a better relationship with sugary garbage food as an adult? Seeing the whole picture is difficult.
The furniture thing seems straightforward to me. I'd feel relatively confident that we won't learn anything surprising in the coming years about pros/cons of anchoring a book shelf to the wall. You can make that decision today with pretty good confidence that you understand the risk profile (and it seems like all upside, especially since its reversible anyway).
What are the odds that we don't learn something surprising in the next year about covid, the vaccines, the interaction between the two, any new variants, etc? It seems reasonable to me to make the same "even from low chances of danger" argument about skipping the vaccines for kids.
Everyone is going to do their best, and some people are going to be wrong. The confidence that I see people having that they're the ones who are going to be right is baffling to me (edit: in general, not talking about you specifically).
Second, the immunocompromised have always had problems navigating society. It sucks, but the best we can (reasonably) do long term is to stay home when sick, and practice good hygiene in public places.
Third, I think the media and the "desires to continue mitigation" go hand in hand. The fact that you keep being worried about kids indicate that you tend to follow mainstream media, or particular people on Twitter, where you're fed the same narrative. It's a powerful tool.
Finally, if the media stopped reporting on Covid tomorrow, or even started calling it "seasonal flu" instead while reporting 10% of the amount they do now, the fears in people would subside and things would go back to normal. It's a negative feedback loop.
I think you’re projecting. I don’t really care about Covid; I’m not in a risk category. But I’m not so blind to my own bias that I can’t acknowledge that other people who feel more worried than I do might have reasonable arguments to be more worried! I’m merely arguing against vague dismissals as if there are no reasonably worried people who are taking their own personal evaluation of the danger they and their loved ones are in during a pandemic.
Additionally, please note you have no argument towards the fact that there are millions of immunocompromised individuals except to shrug and go “oh well”. This is not an adequate reason to dismiss that millions of individuals and their loved ones might advocate very reasonably for their benefit and safety so that they’re not shut in/excluded from society for multiple years due to everyone else refusing to practice basic mitigation like masking and vaccination during a pandemic.
I'm mainly trying to define/understand the fear, because I'm still not getting it and think it's irrational and overblown. Moreso now with Omicron.
> I’m not so blind to my own bias that I can’t acknowledge that other people who feel more worried than I do
I live under the same roof with an 83 year old. I've had two jabs, because I was under the false impression that vaccination would prevent transmission. I am sick and tired of having people call me selfish (I know you didn't!).
Immunocompromised people are, as I acknowledged before, a problem in this equation. But we as a society have always had to accept a certain level of risk, and inconvenience to minorities.
We could have every document/sign/book ever produced done in braille as well, but that would be considered an enormous waste of energy and resources. Are blind people worth any less than people with vision? Most would argue no (aside from economists). Blind (or otherwise impaired) people will inherently have inconveniences compared to their healthy counterparts. We should strive to remove their suffering, but we cannot go about our lives engineering everything tailored to every handicapped group.
We've simply gotten another coronavirus in circulation and it's nastier than the ones we had before. Naturally, as I see it, this should lead us to accept a higher level of risk in our daily lives (like when we started using cars instead of horses for transportation) instead of trying to irrationally cling to the previous one. Overall mortality raised by some 0.1-0.3% or whatever percentage and we need to accept it.
Of course everyone in a risk group should go get vaccinated ASAP. I assume many also overestimate their own health. But I still think it's wrong to shun and shame them and lock them out from society.
Instead we should be able to have reasonable discussions about things, like we're having here right now (I think), but instead I see ideas like vaccine mandates for everyone in the US, including all children and those with previous infections, which is just insane, and there is no open debate allowed about this. And this censorship only leads to stronger echo chambers, exacerbating the problem to begin with.
If we could be open and honest we might come to a conclusion together that there's no point in mandating vaccines for young men or children and we should instead focus on the elderly and the risk groups. Point out to people that there are risks of myocarditis but they're small in comparison to the risks of Covid, for most people. Now you can barely say anything negative about anything without getting "canceled" or "deplatformed". That's what I'm mainly worried about. And also why I the mainstream view is so skewed. Anyone who has any kind of skepticism/criticism is an "anti-vaxxer", which is countered by more censoring, shaming, whatnot. Creating a world of division where we have two people, the ones who are compassionate, and the ones who don't give a fuck about the rest of the world and only themselves. The truth is more nuanced than that.
Sorry about the rant. :D
The critical piece for a “savior” strain would be granting immunity to other less-benign strains. It’s still very early on, but so far it doesn’t look like Omicron has that feature as people are reportedly contracting both Omicron and Delta:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29698080#29699001
Without providing protection against other strains, it’s just another transmissible disease in addition to what we had before.
I don’t think it’s been long enough that anyone will have reliable enough data to form a solid conclusion.
The good news is that prior immunity seems to be very protective against severe outcomes, and that’s been clear for a bit
By the same token, does infection with omicron have any impact on your likelihood to catch Delta or other variants? The inverse appears to be vanishingly small.
The UK had a high infection rate of Delta, so it's still mixed data there.