Miscellaneous And Off Topic Subjects

[Obi-Jon]

Only 55-80% effective against Omicron after a Pfizer booster? For someone like me that is currently immunity-compromised, that's a huge risk. Except for doc visits, it looks like I'll be hunkered down at home for the next few months. No fun, but I don't see much alternative. Here in Trumplandia, less than 50% are vaccinated. I really don't give a damn if the unvaxed die a horrible death, I do care about them spreading the virus, potentially to me.

It's very disheartening that such a large segment of the population lacks the basic humanity to wear a simple mask to help their community. I do not advocate mandatory masking or vaccination, that (imho) should be something everyone with an IQ higher than a peach pit's should want to do.

[lineygoblue]

All of this because China decided to see if Covid could be used as a weapon.

Neighbor against neighbor, friend against friend, country against country.

I'd say they accomplished their mission.

[WingsFan]

What to feel old? Brad Pittt is 58 years old today.

[THE_WIZARD_]

Hey he's still younger than me...

[WingsFan]

Me too lol

[WingsFan]

Now stfu please

[THE_WIZARD_]

no

[iam416]

Senator Manchin officially says he's a no vote on the reconciliation disaster.

[lineygoblue]

Senator Manchin officially says he's a no vote on the reconciliation disaster.

Good. Now they need to focus on real world stuff. They won't of course, but they need to.

[Dr. Strangelove]

RIP Johnny Isakson, former Senator from Georgia. Very well liked on both sides. He was not in good health when he suddenly retired at the end of 2019 midterm.

[Hannibal]

Regrettably, I'm going to have to tamp down my "nothing burger" characterization of Omicron. Omicron's ability to evade the human immune response is impressive and substantial. This conclusion is based on credible studies out of the UK and SA.

The Economist presented the results of two studies whose preliminary results were released yesterday. Here are the highlights (caveat, the results and the impact of COVID on HC systems were based on modeling because not enough people have become infected and then required hospital level care yet. Data based on actual outcomes is going to take two more weeks):

• A single Omicron infected person will spread it to 3 other people {R(0)} in the circumstance where 70% of a population has either been fully vaccinated or previously infected. This is about the same rate of spread as the original SARS2 virus when there were no vaccines and mitigation measures had not yet been uniformly implemented.
• Modeling suggests that removing the protective aspects of vaccines and mitigation measures, Omicron is 5.4X more infectious than the original SARS2 that appeared in 2019/20. The implication is that more people, regardless of vaccine status or previous infection will become infected or reinfected. Even though Omicron appears to produce milder sx, that benefit is likely to be cancelled out by sheer numbers of new infections/reinfections.
• The rate of spread varies by country/level of the immune response of the population. One implication is that mRNA vaccines are better at providing protection against serious illness/death than other types. Another implication, and this should ameliorate a crises mentality among governments and PH agencies but probably won't, modeling and early actual outcome data suggests disease impact will be less than both the SARS2 original and Delta variants.
• The studies found that in Britain a two-dose course of the Pfizer or AstraZeneca vaccine was, at most, 20% effective against reinfection by Omicron. Having had COVID in the past was also of little help, conferring only 19% protection—far less than the 85% against Delta found in other studies.
• Boosters can make a difference. A third jab using Pfizer’s vaccine after an initial course of the AstraZeneca or Pfizer jab was between 55% and 80% effective in preventing reinfection by Omicron.

This sucks. Mainly because the data in the two studies stands up to scrutiny. I thought the Economist article reporting on these two studies did a good job of providing context and not suggesting the obvious is going to be required to contain the virus - vaccine and mask mandates, restricting social contacts as in closing shit down including sports events. I still hold it's not containable and the costs of mitigation measures to try to do that are too high given the likelihood that we're still going to have a shit-ton of new infections/reinfections without a solid case being made yet that the benefits outweigh them. We continue to have speculation and anecdotal evidence about HC systems already stressed and to be stressed to the failure point with Omicron.

The panicked circumstances we find ourselves in from the MSM's mostly irresponsible, long standing, negative Nancy COVID narrative presents policy makers with a tough environment to avoid re-imposing various restrictive mandates without properly assessing actual known costs v. unknown and speculative benefits.

tl,dr:

wear two masks at all times, and never leave your house.

[THE_WIZARD_]

Living in fear is key. As long as we do that...I feel safe.

[Mike]

The Labor Dept. is delaying enforcement of the vaccine mandate until Feb. 9 due to uncertainty surrounding various court rulings. It was supposed to begin Jan. 4.

[crashcourse]

so its settled

eternal quarantine for the wiz

[Mike]

American Hero, Joe Manchin hit back at his Democratic detractors this morning.

"They figured surely to God we can move one person. We surely can badger and beat one person up. Surely we can get enough protesters to make that person uncomfortable enough that they'll just say, 'OK I'll vote for anything,'" he said in a local radio interview.

"Well, guess what? I'm from West Virginia. I'm not from where they're from and they can just beat the living crap out of people and think they'll be submissive, period," Manchin added.

https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/...-on-biden-plan

That oughta play well in the Mountain State.

For her part, America's First Waitress chimed in that it's not democratic for an elected official to vote according to the opinions of the citizens he represents.

"It's a farce in terms of plain democracy," she said. "Because, you know, I represent just as many or more people than Joe Manchin does."

People in NYC are just better than the rest of us. We should do whatever they want because, you know... DEMOCRACY.

https://thehill.com/homenews/house/5...s-bill-a-farce

Can't make it up, folks.