The pandemic is not over, you know


If you’d like to have nightmares, Christopher Stolarski has written up an account of his month of treatment for COVID-19. He was young and healthy, so he survived, but it sounds hellish.

Get vaccinated.

I’d also say, “wear a mask,” but I guess that ship has sailed. We require them at the university and in the hospital, but outside of those places, I never see anyone else wearing them anymore. Does anyone know how to read a graph?

Comments

  1. bmatchick says

    Both my parents are in their 70s and refused to get vaccinated. They both got covid a few week ago and ended up in the hospital on O2. My mom is home recovering, needing 24/7 care, but my dad is on a vent because the high-pressure O2 they used put a hole in his lung. He’s actually making progress and the doctor says the treatment plan is working, but he’s still critical and anything can happen. They refuse to offer a prognosis at this stage because covid is so unpredictable.

    I say this because even though I knew Covid-19 was horrible, now that it’s hit my family I can tell you it’s an absolute waking nightmare. To top off all the stress and grief, I’m so fucking angry because this was all completely unnecessary. And the anti-vaxers roll on.

  2. KG says

    I get my Covid “booster” jab (Moderna, while the first two were AstraZeneca) plus a flu jab yesterday. Feeling moderately grotty today, but I haven’t turned into Bill Gates.

  3. says

    We’re still masking up solid here in Portland. Considering our vaccination rate is like 86% in Multnomah County, we could back off but we aren’t because we give a shit.

  4. says

    We’re still masking up solid here in Portland. Considering our vaccination rate is like 86% in Multnomah County, we could back off but we aren’t because we give a shit.

  5. Nemo says

    Still masking here in PG County MD, still mandated. Our graph doesn’t even look like that, either. Lots of grumblers though.

  6. asclepias says

    You East and West Coasters sure lucked out with where you live, or rather, with the people who cohabit your states. Here in Wyoming, case rates are going up for some unknown reason (possibly the refusal of mask mandates), and the legislature just approved $4 million that the state doesn’t have (we’re tied to the coal industry, and I can’t think of many coal companies that haven’t gone bankrupt at some point, plus we’re stubbornly not collecting severance taxes from them) to join this useless lawsuit against the federal government about mask mandates. Me, I’m still masking. I live with someone who is immunocompromised, and I don’t trust any of these other people as far as I could kick them, if that.

  7. brightmoon says

    New Yorkers mask ! $50 fine if you refuse on public transportation and in government buildings. Most stores require it unless your vaccinated but most people still mask up anyway

  8. blf says

    Masking is now very hit-and-miss (erratic) in the S.France village where I live, albeit still extremely common in larger shops. Proper mask-wearing is another issue, however. And social distancing has all-but-disappeared (locally, at least).

    France, nation-wide, is over 87% fully-vaccinated (not entirely clear if that includes boosters), according to the track-and-trace app (which also functions as the Health Pass, to prove full-vaccination, soon(? now?) including boosters (once eligible), allowing access to cafés, restaurants, long-distance trains, etc). However, France is showing signs of a fifth wave, with the national R ≈ 1.2 and rising (from a recent low of about half that), and other indicators also going in the wrong direction. Eyeballing the numbers, there’s still the (approximate) 10:1 ratio of unvaccinated:vaccinated cases and ICU admissions.

  9. says

    I am not eligible for my third jab until January. I will get it, although I will probably have a bad reaction to it, if the second one is something to go by.
    Here in CZ we are now having another exponential wave of infections, just as bad as the one we had last fall/winter. Hospitals fill up at an alarming rate, deaths are now in hundreds per week. Two-thirds or more of people in intensive care are unvaccinated. 70% of overall cases are unvaccinated. We could already be back to normal if it were not for anti-vaxers, we had vaccination organized well and we had enough vaccine supply.
    Fucking stupid, selfish assholes.

  10. whywhywhy says

    #13 There is a decent chance that you will luck out and not have as severe a reaction to the booster. In the hospital where I work, many of my coworkers (including myself) reported that the reaction was reduced for the booster as compared to their reaction following the second shot. Might also be the variety (Pfizer or Moderna) or maybe what they had for breakfast….

  11. naturalcynic says

    Had my booster a week ago along with the booster for shingles. No general malaise like I felt with the first shingles, only local soreness. I had very little problem with the first two Pfizer’s back in Feb.

  12. JustaTech says

    Here in the Pacific North Wet (in the wet bit, not out east), folks are still doing very well with masks. I went to Costco this weekend and everyone but two tiny children were fully (and properly) masked, no big deal. Went to the shopping center and indoors everyone who wasn’t eating was masked, and only a few people walking outside didn’t have their masks on all the way (and it was early in the morning, so there were very few people out at all).

    Driving into work about half the people on the sidewalks were masked (the walkers and folks waiting for the bus, the runners tend to be unmasked).

    So some places are still doing our best to do the right thing. I’m sorry other places and folks aren’t.

  13. billseymour says

    I live in a suburb of St. Louis in Missouri’s 2nd Congressional District which is gerrymandered Republican.  (My U.S. Rep. is Ann Wagner…not my fault, I promise.)  But my state Senator and Representative are both among the small minority of Democrats, so I guess I live in a not-so-wackaloon area carved out of the 2nd District.

    When I go to the grocery store, all the employees are wearing masks, although you’ll sometimes see a mask not covering a nose.  Some customers don’t wear masks, but most do.

    I have no idea what the vaccination rate is around here.  I got my third Pfizer jab a couple of days ago.

  14. canadiansteve says

    PZ: “Does anyone know how to read a graph?”

    I teach math to high school students. Based on the fact that most students don’t learn any additional math after leaving high school (hopefully for most with the exception of learning more about personal finances) then the answer is definitely very few adults know how to read a graph.

  15. simonhadley says

    Here in Colorado we were doing really well with a high(er) percentage of people getting vaccinated compared to the national average. Now we’re something like the fifth worst state for infections and it’s almost entirely the unvaccinated people in the rural areas of Jesus Land who are sick. These idiots outright blame the vaccinated people for spreading the virus and it frankly baffles me how people this stupid manage to continue functioning on a daily basis.

  16. hemidactylus says

    I’m probably an outlier here and don’t try this at home, but since numbers seem headed in a better direction in Florida (for now) and I have almost two weeks after my third Moderna, I’ve relaxed on masking in public. I’m possibly at peak immunity right now. If I get exposed that’s where I would want to be if (or when) it happens. Not where I was at pre-booster. I made a deal with myself based on getting the third shot.

    I actually ate at a restaurant early last week without a mask. First time eating out since early 2020. I will keep my eye on the numbers here and continually sit rep. If it spikes again I will reevaluate. And when I get nearer 6 months since this last shot I will rethink. My mind can quickly pivot on a dime, but that’s where I am at right now. I could be acting way too recklessly and I don’t recommend anyone to make the same choices.

    Feels weird especially wondering if people think I’m anti-mask when I walk by them.

  17. hemidactylus says

    @22-
    A topic near and dear to Bruce [Iron Maiden] Dickinson’s heart:
    “People are talking about long-term COVID causing diabetes, causing stuff with your brain, even — dare I say it — erectile dysfunction. There you go. They didn’t tell you about that when they said go and get vaccinated. There’s a really good reason to go [and get the vaccine] ’cause [COVID] makes your willy shrivel. Because the blood vessels with COVID can become really inflamed, so they get blocked up and your extremities don’t get enough blood, and, obviously, there’s one extremity which is dear to our heart as men, and if that doesn’t get enough blood, then, boy, you’re in for a world of pain — or not.”

    https://www.blabbermouth.net/news/iron-maidens-bruce-dickinson-says-covid-19-is-not-just-a-flu-it-makes-your-willy-shrivel/

  18. rorschach says

    If you can find a place that will do it, get your booster shots at 4 months rather than 6. I have a list in front of me with literally thousands of vaccination breakthrough infections in people who had the second shot in July/August.

  19. numerobis says

    Masks are still near-universal in Montreal. This morning I heard my first “medical exemption” claim when the guy at the garage told the customer behind me to please don a mask.

    Same store on Sunday, I saw a customer walk in and abashedly ask for a mask while covering her face with her sweater. A passer-by gave me one the other day when I was in the same situation.

  20. jrkrideau says

    Eastern Ontario here, everybody wears a mask inside except when eating and drinking. Outside, a lot of pedestrians are not masked unless there’s a fairly heavy amount of traffic on the sidewalks. Complete compliance on public transit from what I’ve seen.

    One requires proof of vaccination for restaurants and bars various other places I think theatres and maybe concert venues. There are few wackos still protesting the vaccine mandate and masks, etc. At least a couple of towns and cities have started laying off unvaccinated workers in key areas and I think the Federal Gov’t started unpaid leaves Monday.

    Our premier is an idiot but he already seems to be actually listening to our experts.

    Still after Halloween and Thanksgiving we are getting a rise in cases. We’re almost up to 150 when we almost never had been over 45 before all year long, and often down to single digits. We even have nine people in the hospital. 5 in the ICU and one on a ventilator. I think this is the worst we’ve seen since the beginning of the pandemic.

    At least our vaccination rate is looking good, 89.9 percent of population over 12 have received both shots.

  21. Steve Morrison says

    Well, the large majority of people here in Edina, MN (a suburb immediately south of Minneapolis) are wearing masks indoors. Today I did notice a few people without masks in Target and Trader Joe’s, though.

  22. coragyps says

    Here in the West Texas department of Jesusland, we’re perhaps 50% immunized and 10% masked. And 83% Trump voters. Not an ideal environment.