The Coronavirus Thread

[Tero]

The Claim
Far-right U.S. news outlet The Epoch Times reported on March 6 that 966 people had died after having the Pfizer or Moderna COVID vaccines.

Newsweek selected only deaths as an adverse event, and selected the COVID vaccine as the only vaccine in the dataset. We specified Pfizer and Moderna as the vaccine manufacturers.

However, it is false to say that COVID vaccines have caused 966 deaths, because the VAERS database is not designed to give this information.

The CDC said on its adverse events page, updated March 1: "To date, VAERS has not detected patterns in cause of death that would indicate a safety problem with COVID-19 vaccines."

Newsweek.com

[Joe]

And even if those deaths were caused by the vaccine, what percentage of vaccinations is that?

People are really bad at accurately assessing risk.

[NineBerry]

And even if those deaths were caused by the vaccine, what percentage of vaccinations is that?

People are really bad at accurately assessing risk.

Recently, I have a strange feeling in the area of the intestines. My doctor has suggested that I should do a colonoscopy. I looked it up and 1 in 10,000 people die during colonoscopy in Germany. That seemed like really much to me initially. Then I looked up the number of traffic deaths in Germany and found that having a colonoscopy is about as risky as participating in traffic for a year.

[Tero]

Colonoscopy has anesthesia here, so in US the deaths would be due to anesthesia.

[Brian Peacock]

Yep, what Tero said. Plus a good proportion of those 10,000 colonoscopy deaths will be ones where the procedure was performed on people in general poor health or in some sort of immediate health crisis (say, to check for bowel perforations following a traffic accident). Over the last 10 years, for one reason or another, I've had a colonoscopy, and cystoscopy, and an endoscopy. Yep, I've seen my own insides from every major orifice.

[NineBerry]

Yep, what Tero said. Plus a good proportion of those 10,000 colonoscopy deaths will be ones where the procedure was performed on people in general poor health or in some sort of immediate health crisis (say, to check for bowel perforations following a traffic accident). Over the last 10 years, for one reason or another, I've had a colonoscopy, and cystoscopy, and an endoscopy. Yep, I've seen my own insides from every major orifice.

Learn to read. I wrote 1 in 10,000.

[Brian Peacock]

I read it, I just didn't type it. Slip of the fingers.

[Seabass]

Nearly 9,000 people in Germany have to be vaccinated again after a nurse swapped vaccines for salt water

I had no side effects...

[laklak]

So we're not going to hit herd immunity, because not enough people are getting vaccinated, and the virus is mutating. So we're going to have to live with it. So lets fucking get on with it then. Stop this bullshit and dig the mass graves. It's going to happen sooner or later, so treat it like a bandaid and just pull that sucker off fast.

Once again Florida leads the way!

[NineBerry]

But who's going to buy all those pillows then?

[laklak]

My brother in law actually bought one of them. He used to absolutely HATE the pillow dude, but now loves him. Strange bedfellows.

[L'Emmerdeur]

I think Dirty Jobs was one of the coolest shows ever on television. I also like Mike Rowe's on air personality. My opinion hasn't changed, despite his willingness to join the chorus of trumpeting jerks. I think this piece is reaching on some of its points but it cites sources and bats down a number of dishonest canned bullshit accusations circulating around the vaccines and medical advice in the US during the pandemic. We've been treated to at least a couple of them on these pages.

'Mike Rowe's Dirty Lies'

ike Rowe—the famous real man, dirty-jobbing, tough guy—is trying to pioneer a new lane in political discourse: anti-anti-anti-vaxx.

In a Facebook post this week, Rowe decided to answer a question from one of his fans. The gentleman asked why, since Rowe had gotten a COVID vaccine, he had not used his platform to urge others to do so.

Rowe’s response is worth reading in full, because it is either an example of despicable dishonesty or breathtaking stupidity.

Rowe begins his explanation by saying, “I’m not a doctor, Steve, and even though I occasionally play one on TV, I’m not inclined to dispense medical advice to the people on this page.”

And you know what? That’s fair enough. If Rowe doesn’t feel comfortable telling others what to do when it comes to public health, that’s reasonable. Except that two paragraphs later he starts just asking questions about public health.

Rowe says the following:

The fact is, millions of reasonable Americans have every right to feel confused and skeptical. Those people you refer to, Steve – the ones now telling us that we can “get back to normal just as soon as everyone is vaccinated” – those are the same people who said, “two weeks to flatten the curve!” Those are the same people who told us that masks were “useless” before they told us they were “critical.” Those are the same people who told us that a return to normalcy would occur just as soon as “the most vulnerable” among us were vaccinated. Then, just as soon as “half the population” was vaccinated. Then, just as soon as we achieved “herd immunity.” Those are the same people who told us they wouldn’t trust ANY vaccine developed under the last administration. Now, those very same people are belittling the skeptics!

[Author proceeds to address Rowe's blithering.]

I think we are already 'back to normal' because with the bug continuing to happily infect millions, new virulent variations along the lines of 'delta' will likely arise. (Acknowledging that may be pessimistic.) If the virus does keep coming up with new tricks, we'll be dealing with waves of infection even among the vaccinated population for years. Being stalked by this virus looks to be what passes for normal now. What I'd like to see is a highly infectious but practically non-lethal variation rising to become the dominant strain. It could happen.

[Seabass]

Delta Is Bad News for Kids


Two and a half weeks ago, as the next school year approached, a pediatric cardiologist from Louisiana headed into the Georgia mountains with her husband, their three young children, and their extended family. It was, in many ways, a fairly pandemic-sanctioned vacation: All nine adults in attendance were fully vaccinated. The group spent most of the trip outdoors, biking, swimming, and hiking.

Then, on the last night of the outing—July 27, the same day the CDC pivoted back to asking vaccinated people to mask up indoors—one parent started feeling sick. A test soon confirmed a mild breakthrough case of COVID-19. None of the other adults caught the coronavirus on the trip, the cardiologist told me, which she points to as “total proof that the vaccine worked.” (The Atlantic agreed not to name the cardiologist to protect her family’s privacy.) But within a week, six of the eight kids on the trip—all of them too young to be eligible for vaccines—had newly diagnosed coronavirus infections as well.

The infected group included two of the cardiologist’s three sons. Both boys, ages 5 and 11, had just a smattering of cold-like symptoms, the cardiologist said. Even so, the entire ordeal has been rough on their household, which is now split—quite literally—into isolation zones. “My middle son is negative,” she said. “So we have to keep our children on separate floors of our house.” The 7-year-old is missing the first few days of second grade to quarantine. The eldest son, an ardent soccer player about to start sixth grade, had a spate of chest pain and now needs cardiac clearance before he’s able to take the field again.

The family’s predicament is a microcosm of the dangerous and uncertain moment so many Americans face as the pandemic once again changes course. The COVID-19 vaccines have done an extraordinary job of stamping out disease and death. But as the hypertransmissible Delta variant hammers the United States, the greatest hardships are being taken on by the unvaccinated, a population that includes some 50 million children younger than age 12. Across the country, pediatric cases of COVID-19 are skyrocketing alongside cases among unimmunized adults; child hospitalizations have now reached an all-time pandemic high. In the last week of July, nearly 72,000 new coronavirus cases were reported in kids—almost a fifth of all total known infections in the U.S., and a rough doubling of the previous week’s stats. “It’s the biggest jump in the pandemic so far” among children, Lee Beers, the president of the American Academy of Pediatrics, told me. Last week, that same statistic climbed to nearly 94,000.

The most serious pediatric cases are among the pandemic’s worst to date. In the South, where communities have struggled to get shots into arms and enthusiasm for masks has been spotty, intensive-care units in children’s hospitals are filling to capacity. In several states, health workers say that kids—many of them previously completely healthy—are coming in sicker and deteriorating faster than ever before, with no obvious end in sight.

more: https://www.theatlantic.com/health/arch ... en/619712/

[Seabass]

Nearly 94,000 Kids Got COVID-19 Last Week. They Were 15% Of All New Cases
https://www.npr.org/sections/coronaviru ... infections


And several Republican governors are outlawing mask mandates...

[Sean Hayden]

Our district has said parents threatened them for suggesting they might ignore Abbott's no mandate rule. I'm surrounded by sickos.