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  1. - Top - End - #961
    Firbolg in the Playground
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    Default Re: This year we kill it: Corona Virus Thread Mark II

    Quote Originally Posted by ziproot View Post
    Wouldn't the "meta-analysis" not be experimentation?
    Someone else's results are still results.

  2. - Top - End - #962
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    Default Re: This year we kill it: Corona Virus Thread Mark II

    Interesting article in The Atlantic

    Quote Originally Posted by Atlantic
    Unlike malaria and tuberculosis, HIV/AIDS was identified only 40 years ago, and still we’ve seen the same trend. After the infection emerged in the early 1980s, it went from a condition thought to affect only gay men in the global North to a global pandemic that, yes, mostly affects the global South today. In 2020, nearly 38 million people globally were living with HIV, and 680,000 people died from AIDS-related illnesses, with two-thirds of both cases and deaths in Africa. When effective antiretroviral drugs first became available in the early 1990s, they were expensive and mainly accessible to people in high-income countries. For these lifesaving tools to reach the global South took incredible activism and years of effort, and millions of people (mostly Africans) died as a result of this inaction. Even today, we do not have a vaccine against AIDS.

    Despite the continued toll of these “big three” infectious diseases, they are rarely spoken of as pandemics. “By epidemic we actually mean a pandemic that no longer kills people in rich countries,” wrote Peter Sands, the CEO of the Global Fund, an international group that combats these diseases. “By endemic we actually mean a disease the world could get rid of but hasn’t. HIV/AIDS, TB and malaria are pandemics that have been beaten in rich countries. Allowing them to persist elsewhere is a policy choice and a budgetary decision.”

    With the coronavirus, the global South is being left behind once again.
    That's very bad for the global south although, thankfully, it does mean things are clearing up in the north. So maybe that means we can start getting back to norm-

    Ah. Largest Nuclear plant in Europe on Fire . Nevermind. Maybe the radiation will mutate the bugs and we'll have a zombie invasion after all.

    Actually, the Fire is extinguished but that was still a close call.

    Doesn't anyone in the military get This lecture ? Anymore? Or is "DO NOT SHOOT AT THE NUCLEAR REACTOR" considered to be so obvious we don't need to say it? Except, obviously, we do?

    Respectfully,

    Brian P.
    "Every lie we tell incurs a debt to the truth. Sooner or later, that debt is paid."

    -Valery Legasov in Chernobyl

  3. - Top - End - #963
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    Default Re: This year we kill it: Corona Virus Thread Mark II

    Hey everyone. I have good news for my city in New York regarding the mask and the vaccination cards. It's optional that we don't need to wear masks outside and indoors. Also, we don't show our vaccination cards anymore.
    It's time to get my Magikarp on!

  4. - Top - End - #964
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    Default Re: This year we kill it: Corona Virus Thread Mark II

    I mean, COVID is still a threat. It's still a very good idea to be wearing masks as a precaution.
    There's probably an argument to be made about whether toning down restrictions is due to political matters or exhaustion, but that's not here nor there.
    An explanation of why MitD being any larger than Huge is implausible.

    See my extended signature here! May contain wit, candor, and somewhere from 52 to 8127 walruses.

    Purple is humorous descriptions made up on the fly
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    I walk, therefore I stand,
    I sleep, therefore I dream;
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  5. - Top - End - #965
    Firbolg in the Playground
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    Default Re: This year we kill it: Corona Virus Thread Mark II

    My line for stuff like eating at a restaurant indoors is about 1-2 cases per million people per day, so still going to be waiting for that for awhile.
    Last edited by NichG; 2022-03-12 at 05:46 PM.

  6. - Top - End - #966
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    Default Re: This year we kill it: Corona Virus Thread Mark II

    Quote Originally Posted by Squire Doodad View Post
    I mean, COVID is still a threat. It's still a very good idea to be wearing masks as a precaution.
    There's probably an argument to be made about whether toning down restrictions is due to political matters or exhaustion, but that's not here nor there.
    Here in Sweden if I wear a mask I get the occasional death stare. If I cough loudly nobody cares. Morale is down, sadly it seem to have taken morals with it.
    Black text is for sarcasm, also sincerity. You'll just have to read between the lines and infer from context like an animal

  7. - Top - End - #967
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    ElfRangerGuy

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    Default Re: This year we kill it: Corona Virus Thread Mark II

    Quote Originally Posted by Mastikator View Post
    Here in Sweden if I wear a mask I get the occasional death stare. If I cough loudly nobody cares. Morale is down, sadly it seem to have taken morals with it.
    That's what I like when I was on holiday in South-East Asia (Thailand, Indonesia, although I've heard other countries in the region are the same). Since the SARS epidemic of 2003 (I think) they put on a mask in public then they are coughing. We used to laugh with them when they showed up wearing masks in the airport. Now, not so much anymore.

    We will have to do the same. Even if you have a cold, you wear a mask so as not to infect others.
    Clacks-Overhead: GNU Terry Pratchett

    "Magic can turn a frog into a prince. Science can turn a frog into a Ph.D. and you still have the frog you started with." Terry Pratchett
    "I will not yield to evil, unless she's cute."

  8. - Top - End - #968
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    Default Re: This year we kill it: Corona Virus Thread Mark II

    Quote Originally Posted by farothel View Post
    We will have to do the same. Even if you have a cold, you wear a mask so as not to infect others.
    Yes. It's good manners. I hope it catches on for other things besides COVID; if you have a contagious disease, mask up if you can't stay home. Perhaps we need to 'encourage' companies not to force employees to come in to work at, say, a burger joint when they're coughing all over the food.


    So the rest of the world seems to be recovering from Covid, but China is not

    Quote Originally Posted by National Review
    From overwhelmed hospitals to overflowing morgues, the scenes from Hong Kong’s COVID-19 crisis were strikingly similar to those that unfolded around the world in the early months of the pandemic.

    Except that for the wealthy city of 7.5 million people, the sight of bodies piling up in hallways and around patients in hospitals emerged only this month, a year after vaccines against the virus became widely and freely available in the territory. . . .

    In a matter of weeks, the contagious Omicron variant of the virus has infected more than 1 million people and caused more than 5,000 deaths, mostly among unvaccinated, elderly people.

    Why is this happening? There appear to be at least two answers:

    1) Draconian 'zero covid' policies. That might have worked with Covid Alpha, but Covid Omicron is just not having it. We need a certain degree of natural transmission among the vaxxed population in order to further strengthen immunity. Having 'hybrid immunity' -- vaxxed plus boosted plus natural immunity -- is a " Superpower " .

    You can slow the spread, but you can't stop it. Not of Omicron.

    2) They're using Sinovac, not Pfizer or Moderna or even Johnson & Johnson. For some reason it's not as effective, and even less effective against Omicron.

    And of course the more spread there is the more likely another variant will appear.

    Respectfully,

    Brian P.
    "Every lie we tell incurs a debt to the truth. Sooner or later, that debt is paid."

    -Valery Legasov in Chernobyl

  9. - Top - End - #969
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    Default Re: This year we kill it: Corona Virus Thread Mark II

    (I would not use the National Review as a source, just in general.)

    A potential problem is that natural immunity appears to be lasting far less time with Omicron than it was with Alpha and Delta. We're not completely certain on this, but if true it would put a huge damper on "Omicron burns itself out" hopes.

    Quote Originally Posted by pendell View Post
    Yes. It's good manners. I hope it catches on for other things besides COVID; if you have a contagious disease, mask up if you can't stay home. Perhaps we need to 'encourage' companies not to force employees to come in to work at, say, a burger joint when they're coughing all over the food.
    Yeah, I think if masking when sick became a norm in a post-pandemic area, you'd likely have somewhat lower case rates for the flu and the like.

    Quote Originally Posted by pendell View Post
    And of course the more spread there is the more likely another variant will appear.
    Very true.
    Last edited by Squire Doodad; 2022-03-25 at 12:52 PM.
    An explanation of why MitD being any larger than Huge is implausible.

    See my extended signature here! May contain wit, candor, and somewhere from 52 to 8127 walruses.

    Purple is humorous descriptions made up on the fly
    Green is serious talk about hypothetical
    Blue is irony and sarcasm


    "I think, therefore I am,
    I walk, therefore I stand,
    I sleep, therefore I dream;
    I joke, therefore I meme."
    -Squire Doodad

  10. - Top - End - #970
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    ElfRangerGuy

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    Default Re: This year we kill it: Corona Virus Thread Mark II

    Quote Originally Posted by pendell View Post
    And of course the more spread there is the more likely another variant will appear.
    Actually we're seeing this already. Here in Belgium we have a variant with certain proteins of omicron B2 and others of omicron B1, from a person which got infected with both variants at the same time.
    Clacks-Overhead: GNU Terry Pratchett

    "Magic can turn a frog into a prince. Science can turn a frog into a Ph.D. and you still have the frog you started with." Terry Pratchett
    "I will not yield to evil, unless she's cute."

  11. - Top - End - #971
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    Default Re: This year we kill it: Corona Virus Thread Mark II

    Quote Originally Posted by Squire Doodad View Post
    I would not use the National Review as a source, just in general.)
    I link to them because as you will see in the article, they are not reporting rumors or their own firsthand reporting but are quoting mainstream sources to which they had their own commentary which, in this case, seemed worth passing on. In this case, the referenced sources are The Guardian , Vice , The Lancet , ABC, Straits Times and ... well, I give up. There are at least a few more. It's an opinion piece, not an academic article, so the sources are inline links rather than conveniently footnoted at the bottom. Yes, it is opinion piece but they put in the work to make it more than a talk show rant. If you believe they are wrong on matters of fact, please post counter-arguments and I will consider them; I have in fact posted fact-checks to other people's assertions in this thread, so I can hardly complain about being fact-checked myself. If you do not dispute their facts but do dispute their logic and conclusions, feel free to advance your argument and I will, likewise , consider it.

    Although, come to think of it, I don't yet see us actually disagreeing on anything substantive, at least at this point.

    Respectfully,

    Brian P.
    Last edited by pendell; 2022-03-25 at 02:41 PM.
    "Every lie we tell incurs a debt to the truth. Sooner or later, that debt is paid."

    -Valery Legasov in Chernobyl

  12. - Top - End - #972
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    Default Re: This year we kill it: Corona Virus Thread Mark II

    Quote Originally Posted by pendell View Post
    I link to them because as you will see in the article, they are not reporting rumors or their own firsthand reporting but are quoting mainstream sources to which they had their own commentary which, in this case, seemed worth passing on.
    Fair enough, that seems reasonable.

    Quote Originally Posted by pendell View Post
    Although, come to think of it, I don't yet see us actually disagreeing on anything substantive, at least at this point.
    Yeah, it was more a general statement than calling out anything in the article itself. Seemed appropriate given the circumstances.
    An explanation of why MitD being any larger than Huge is implausible.

    See my extended signature here! May contain wit, candor, and somewhere from 52 to 8127 walruses.

    Purple is humorous descriptions made up on the fly
    Green is serious talk about hypothetical
    Blue is irony and sarcasm


    "I think, therefore I am,
    I walk, therefore I stand,
    I sleep, therefore I dream;
    I joke, therefore I meme."
    -Squire Doodad

  13. - Top - End - #973
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    Default Re: This year we kill it: Corona Virus Thread Mark II

    Quote Originally Posted by Squire Doodad View Post
    (I would not use the National Review as a source, just in general.)

    A potential problem is that natural immunity appears to be lasting far less time with Omicron than it was with Alpha and Delta. We're not completely certain on this, but if true it would put a huge damper on "Omicron burns itself out" hopes.
    Do people actually believe that omicron will burn itself out? Even the original variant had a too short natural immunity time for that to be possible.

    Then again people believed (and still probably do) that 5G towers are spreading the virus, so the false hope that covid is going anywhere seems less outrageous by comparison.
    Black text is for sarcasm, also sincerity. You'll just have to read between the lines and infer from context like an animal

  14. - Top - End - #974
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    Default Re: This year we kill it: Corona Virus Thread Mark II

    Quote Originally Posted by Mastikator View Post
    Do people actually believe that omicron will burn itself out? Even the original variant had a too short natural immunity time for that to be possible.

    Then again people believed (and still probably do) that 5G towers are spreading the virus, so the false hope that covid is going anywhere seems less outrageous by comparison.
    I mean, the way that cases were climbing but deaths were lagging made it so a few people were contemplating the possibility that Omicron could spread so fast that it'd trap itself if people also got serious about masking and all that.
    Unfortunately neither of those happened, so Omicron is here to stay for the time being.

    I don't think anyone currently thinks that's still going to happen, but a few people got hopeful and theorized about it shortly after the Omicron wave started.
    Last edited by Squire Doodad; 2022-03-26 at 04:30 PM.
    An explanation of why MitD being any larger than Huge is implausible.

    See my extended signature here! May contain wit, candor, and somewhere from 52 to 8127 walruses.

    Purple is humorous descriptions made up on the fly
    Green is serious talk about hypothetical
    Blue is irony and sarcasm


    "I think, therefore I am,
    I walk, therefore I stand,
    I sleep, therefore I dream;
    I joke, therefore I meme."
    -Squire Doodad

  15. - Top - End - #975
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    DwarfClericGuy

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    Default Re: This year we kill it: Corona Virus Thread Mark II

    Quote Originally Posted by Squire Doodad View Post
    I mean, the way that cases were climbing but deaths were lagging made it so a few people were contemplating the possibility that Omicron could spread so fast that it'd trap itself if people also got serious about masking and all that.
    Unfortunately neither of those happened, so Omicron is here to stay for the time being.

    I don't think anyone currently thinks that's still going to happen, but a few people got hopeful and theorized about it shortly after the Omicron wave started.
    I don't know why anyone would have thought that in the first place. The entirety of some folks' beliefs in many areas make slowing the virus via masking impossible.
    May you get EXACTLY what you wish for.

  16. - Top - End - #976
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    Default Re: This year we kill it: Corona Virus Thread Mark II

    My apologies if someone's already thought of this upthread: Any chance of the OOTS store getting cloth masks inspired by Tarquin in the last few panels of comic 852, that could be worn under the real thing?

    (/kidding since I know it wouldn't happen, but I'm fond enough of the idea that I really would spend money)
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  17. - Top - End - #977
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    Default Re: This year we kill it: Corona Virus Thread Mark II

    So I guess this is as close to a victory announcement as we're going to get.

    Quote Originally Posted by Washington Post
    “We are certainly right now in this country out of the pandemic phase,” Anthony S. Fauci, President Biden’s chief medical adviser, said Tuesday on PBS’s “NewsHour,” when asked by anchor Judy Woodruff if the country was near the end of the pandemic.

    Fauci expanded on, and clarified, his views in an interview Wednesday morning with The Washington Post, saying the global pandemic is ongoing but the United States is transitioning to a period in which the virus is no longer causing the level of hospitalization and death seen during the omicron wave of infection this past winter.

    “Right now we’re at a low enough level that I believe that we’re transitioning into endemicity. ... We’re not in the full-blown explosive pandemic phase. That does not mean that the pandemic is over,” Fauci said. “A pandemic means widespread infection throughout the world. ... In our country we’re transitioning into more of a controlled endemicity.”

    Restrictions are easing as many Americans appear to be putting the pandemic behind them. Masking requirements have been lifted across most of the country, and officials stopped enforcing a federal mask mandate in transportation settings after a judge struck down the requirement.
    There's still a pandemic out there ... China has still locked down several cities. But at this point the west seems to be just shrugging and moving on. While the disease is still around, a combination of vaccination and natural immunity is rendering it and its variants a lot less lethal than it was two years ago. It's not a novel coronavirus any more, not after a majority of people have had it.

    So I guess this is as much of a "win" as we're going to get, as it drops from the news. I suspect there will be booster shots and new shots against later variants, same as the flu. But we are now back to "normal", at least as "normal" as things will be.

    Respectfully,

    Brian P.
    "Every lie we tell incurs a debt to the truth. Sooner or later, that debt is paid."

    -Valery Legasov in Chernobyl

  18. - Top - End - #978
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    Default Re: This year we kill it: Corona Virus Thread Mark II

    That is not a proclamation of victory; it is a concession of defeat. The only winners are the nurglites who fought every measure to control the disease and actively sought to spread it so they could rejoice in causing death. Covid deaths will continue, it will just be accepted as normal, thanks to the anti-vaxxers and their open treason against humanity.

    At this point, I think I'm wearing a mask as much to offend the willing slaves of disease as I am to protect people. But I have no doubt they'll start pushing to make masks illegal.
    Last edited by Lord Arkon; 2022-04-28 at 09:09 PM.

  19. - Top - End - #979
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    Default Re: This year we kill it: Corona Virus Thread Mark II

    I feel inclined to agree, though some of that is very sharply worded; while things are "better" now, the pandemic is far from over. Restrictions falling is purely out of exhaustion, not actual risk.
    And...yes, the reason why it is still going is increasingly because so many people decided to mislead and cast doubt on the simplest means of protecting oneself. I would not be surprised if someone told me that, if vaccinations and masking were at like 90%, the pandemic would be over already.

    ...I could probably write at length on the topic, but I don't want to lean on the rules.
    Last edited by Squire Doodad; 2022-04-28 at 09:27 PM.
    An explanation of why MitD being any larger than Huge is implausible.

    See my extended signature here! May contain wit, candor, and somewhere from 52 to 8127 walruses.

    Purple is humorous descriptions made up on the fly
    Green is serious talk about hypothetical
    Blue is irony and sarcasm


    "I think, therefore I am,
    I walk, therefore I stand,
    I sleep, therefore I dream;
    I joke, therefore I meme."
    -Squire Doodad

  20. - Top - End - #980
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    Default Re: This year we kill it: Corona Virus Thread Mark II

    Quote Originally Posted by Lord Arkon View Post
    That is not a proclamation of victory; it is a concession of defeat. The only winners are the nurglites who fought every measure to control the disease and actively sought to spread it so they could rejoice in causing death. Covid deaths will continue, it will just be accepted as normal, thanks to the anti-vaxxers and their open treason against humanity.
    I think you're giving them a great deal too much credit. Very few people actively seek to spread any disease. Specific precautions may be refused, but that is different than intentional spreading.

    Realistically, it just appears that as a species, we have remarkably limited ability to stop a disease once it's gone pandemic. Early detection may still be effective, and arguably has been for a number of diseases. The former is far, far harder to do.

    So, worst case, we've at least learned a fair bit. That may be small comfort in comparison to the lives lost, but hopefully it will be of use for future disease fighting efforts. Perhaps more effort will happen in the future to avoid risk of early spread and on early detection, reducing our risk of another such pandemic. Less effort can be expended on things that don't work at all.

    At this point, I think I'm wearing a mask as much to offend the willing slaves of disease as I am to protect people. But I have no doubt they'll start pushing to make masks illegal.
    I certainly hope not. Some might, there were some laws in some areas against masks beforehand, but realistically, choice goes both ways. You should have just as much freedom to wear a mask as they do to not.

    Hopefully that stays true, rather than it becoming some kind of endless grudge match where both sides just want to make the other suffer.

  21. - Top - End - #981
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    Default Re: This year we kill it: Corona Virus Thread Mark II

    Quote Originally Posted by Tyndmyr View Post
    Perhaps more effort will happen in the future to avoid risk of early spread and on early detection, reducing our risk of another such pandemic. Less effort can be expended on things that don't work at all.
    Which comes back down to one of the major issues: being able to actually halt the early spread. Experience has shown that: well, that's not going to work very well.
    May you get EXACTLY what you wish for.

  22. - Top - End - #982
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    Default Re: This year we kill it: Corona Virus Thread Mark II

    Quote Originally Posted by sihnfahl View Post
    Which comes back down to one of the major issues: being able to actually halt the early spread. Experience has shown that: well, that's not going to work very well.
    Depends on how early. When the biolab in London accidentally exposed people to smallpox, they were able to quickly lock it down and stop the spread. However, we're talking a quarantine of 260 people and vaccination of 500. Not a trivial incident, but certainly much, much smaller than Covid became.

    And that worked, completely. No Smallpox roaming around out there.

    I don't know where the line is, and I suspect exact numbers vary depending on specifics of disease, but it clearly is possible to stop it below some threshold if we know fast enough. For Covid that didn't work out, but most diseases do not become pandemics. It's probably our best thing to focus on going forward. Measures like closing borders don't really matter if the disease has already substantially crossed.

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