Mutating Corona Virus

[honeybee13]

TJ, the latest I read is that NHS 'sources' are saying that people should have been offered a vaccination by the end of the year but may not have received it by then.

[hightail]

Speaking during a visit on Monday to a vaccination clinic near Paddington, west London, the prime minister said: “Sadly, yes, Omicron is producing hospitalisations and, sadly, at least one patient has been confirmed to have died with Omicron........

 

........Shadow health secretary Wes Streeting said: “The awful news of the UK’s first Omicron death underlines the seriousness of the situation and my heart goes out to their family and friends.

 

We know nothing of the details and yet a death of someone 'with' omicron has instantly turned into an 'omicron death'.  Some articles are quoting the PM correctly and then going on to say the person died 'from' omicron.  This may, or may not, be the case but my goodness it shows how easy it is to whip up panic.

[brassnecked]

Meanwhile Drakeford wants you to take a lateral flow test every time you go out the door, even to dig the garden someone said.  Issue is NHS all out of LFTs

[hightail]

Right from the start of this booster campaign the strategy seems to have been to blame the public - who in the main have a healthy appetite to do the right thing but can't. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[hightail]

13 minutes ago, brassnecked said:

Meanwhile Drakeford wants you to take a lateral flow test every time you go out the door,

Pointless.  My daughter currently has Omicron.  I can confirm that she tested negative on flow tests for the first two days.  She had the results of a positive PCR by the time LFTs started showing positive.

 

This ties in with what we heard from South Africa that the flow tests weren't so good in the early stages.

Edited December 13, 2021 by hightail

[tobyjugg2]

LFTs always have been more reliable when there are symptoms hence high viral load high in the respiratory system. Being infected, and infectious with smaller amounts of viral load in the upper respiratory tract may be giving us a false sense of 'security' 

ie - not flagging infections and generating more mask refusnicks

 

Whatever happened to the diabetes type blood test for covid? Thats where we should be by now,

 

What concerns me at least as much is some indications that the Viral effects on the body could be moving more into the central nervous system and core organs - think long covid on steroids

 

Could easily be wrong, but seeing some concerning reports which are indicating possible trends

 

One thing I'm certain on - masks are crucial for keeping each other safer.

 

 

On a side note, Interesting that the group that seems to be howling objections to covid passports and vaccine requirement seem to be largely the same group who are pressing for very specific photographic proof of ID for voting ...

Edited December 13, 2021 by tobyjugg2

[honeybee13]

1 hour ago, hightail said:

Right from the start of this booster campaign the strategy seems to have been to blame the public - who in the main have a healthy appetite to do the right thing but can't. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Stephen Reicher of SAGE agrees with you, HT. I wonder how much longer he'll be on SAGE though, having spoken out.

 

The weakest link in fighting Covid is not the public, it’s the UK government | Stephen Reicher | The Guardian

WWW.THEGUARDIAN.COM

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People tend to follow the science when it comes to Covid restrictions, says Stephen Reicher, a member of the Sage subcommittee on behavioural...

 

[hightail]

14 minutes ago, tobyjugg2 said:

LFTs always have been more reliable when there are symptoms

Oh she had the symptoms alright, that's why she tested.  If anything they'd abated by the time LFT showed positive two days later.

[tobyjugg2]

1 hour ago, hightail said:

Pointless.  My daughter currently has Omicron.  I can confirm that she tested negative on flow tests for the first two days.  She had the results of a positive PCR by the time LFTs started showing positive.

 

This ties in with what we heard from South Africa that the flow tests weren't so good in the early stages.

 

What symptoms HT?

respiratory tract cold/flu type symptoms or other ?

 

AND an LFT is NOT 'pointless' any more than masks - and to be blunt, that statement of yours IS a rather unconsidered, unjustified and unwarranted.

They aren't perfect, never have been and never will be, and dont seem to be as effective with the omicron variant and its apparent lower viral loads for spread

- but used properly they are VERY valuable - masks even more so.

- but we should be on something better than the long existing lft's by now.

 

Oh - and despite many UK sources quoting Boris the liar as a source - phuuuuttt,  international news sources are quoting 'uK first confirmed Omicron death'

-That international sources are reporting it as confirmed adds some weight

 

Lets not forget that 150,000 of the most susceptible are no longer in the herd (sic), almost 70% (all ages) of the UK population has been vaccinated, and we are at the very start of this strains effect ...

 

 

Edited December 13, 2021 by tobyjugg2

[hightail]

21 minutes ago, tobyjugg2 said:

What symptoms HT?

respiratory tract cold/flu type symptoms or other ?

Muscle aches and overwhelming tiredness initially.  Call that day one.  Cold symptoms followed around 24 hours later, muscle aches had abated (day two) and she returned positive LFT on day three by that count.  First one was a very faint positive.  Most would have missed it but she had already gone down the route of pcr by then anyway.

 

Cold symptoms rather than flu like..  No chills, fever etc.  Fatigued for a few days.

Edited December 13, 2021 by hightail

[hightail]

42 minutes ago, tobyjugg2 said:

AND an LFT is NOT 'pointless' any more than masks - and to be blunt, that statement of yours IS a rather unconsidered, unjustified and unwarranted.

Sadly TJ I fear not.  A difference with Omicron compared with Delta is that the infected are very contagious very quickly and there's little hope of detecting it in an individual in time to stop transmission with current technology. 

 

At no point did I suggest that masks were pointless.

Edited December 13, 2021 by hightail

[tobyjugg2]

1 hour ago, hightail said:

Sadly TJ I fear not.  A difference with Omicron compared with Delta is that the infected are very contagious very quickly and there's little hope of detecting it in an individual in time to stop transmission with current technology. 

 

 

Agreed to a certain extent, as (like everything) LFT's need to be used within and understanding their limitations.

BUT - as it still catches people while they are infectious, and even if not as quickly as it caught prior versions it still helps identify whether its a cold/chill or Covid 

- hardly pointless, and highly usful in those who think its only a cold/chill - and carry on mixing - perhaps even maskless

.... and while Johnson/Paterson and the like enable and protect companies like immensia ...

 

Glad your perspective (or statements at least) on masks seems to have changed. It might save you or your loved ones lives.

- as we know masks protect others, so especially relevant if you or your loved ones are the others who are saved. We all need to understand that

and that Its MOST likely theres a long way to go yet.

Even addressing it as smallpox is very unlikely to fully resolve the issue, although that approach would help and unquestionably would be least damaging to the worlds economy - which beggars the question of: what agenda is preventing that?

 

 

1 hour ago, hightail said:

Muscle aches and overwhelming tiredness initially.  Call that day one.  Cold symptoms followed around 24 hours later, muscle aches had abated (day two) and she returned positive LFT on day three by that count.  First one was a very faint positive.  Most would have missed it but she had already gone down the route of pcr by then anyway.

 

Cold symptoms rather than flu like..  No chills, fever etc.  Fatigued for a few days.

 

As expected then for Omicron - initially not high loads higher in the respiratory tract (cold type sneeze/cough/congestion) symptoms which LFT's  catch

- as they did when the symptoms got more into the upper respiratory tract. Always the limitation of lfts

 

Any ideas on the circumstances it was caught?

 

 

 

Edited December 13, 2021 by tobyjugg2

[hightail]

10 minutes ago, tobyjugg2 said:

Any ideas on the circumstances it was caught?

Absolutely - in the office from someone who was (as they all were) flow testing daily.  London based.  A few of days later and she'd have been back WFH.

 

Really cannot make the point of speed/rate of infection hard enough. 

 

 

Edited December 13, 2021 by hightail

[tobyjugg2]

3 hours ago, brassnecked said:

Meanwhile Drakeford wants you to take a lateral flow test every time you go out the door, even to dig the garden someone said.  Issue is NHS all out of LFTs

Still shipping them in from China aren't we - with vast middlemen markups ..

Maybe one of the VIPals wants more middleman markup

 

 

19 minutes ago, hightail said:

Absolutely - in the office from someone who was (as they all were) flow testing daily.

 

Are you confident your daughter was doing the swab test correctly?

- genuine question without any critique implied - just trying to add to my body of first hand or near first hand experiences

I know I've caught myself quite a few times not really paying attention while I'm doing mine - and i really do believe wholeheartedly  its important even knowing the limitations - so god knows how others with greater doubts feel

 

Is your daughter confident others were ... 'taking it seriously'

- we are all far into the 'fed up with this' period even without Johnson et ass abuses .. ( oops typo should have been als .. err then again)

- aka symptoms in the office 'its just a winter chill and i did a ferkin swab test (reluctantly)

 

Although I absolutely and fully agree that transmission with the Omicron variant appears to be a whole new degree of shitstorm.

 

 

Edited December 13, 2021 by tobyjugg2

[tobyjugg2]

2 hours ago, honeybee13 said:

 

Stephen Reicher of SAGE agrees with you, HT. I wonder how much longer he'll be on SAGE though, having spoken out.

 

The weakest link in fighting Covid is not the public, it’s the UK government | Stephen Reicher | The Guardian

WWW.THEGUARDIAN.COM

---

People tend to follow the science when it comes to Covid restrictions, says Stephen Reicher, a member of the Sage subcommittee on behavioural...

 

 

 

Theres been some utterly disgraceful statements from some of our so called scientific leads as commented on in this thread

whitterie specifically and the SAGE group generally for example has not a microgram of credibility in my eyes.

I dont give a sh** that they are now 'demonstrating' that they 'want' to be honest as worth squat - they caved to Johnson, supported misdirection and are all tainted.

How can people 'follow the science' in such circumstances. To people like Johnson and Trump, science is whatever fits their agenda, and those who support that in any circumstances can 'by definition' have no credibility.

(except any who resigned in protest)

Edited December 13, 2021 by tobyjugg2

[hightail]

All valid questions TJ. 

 

Daily witnessed flow tests were mandatory at work so I have to assume they were done as 'correctly' as is possible to say.  Nobody else could get away without doing them too. Nobody has tested positive with LFTs.

How 'seriously' were others taking it, well her colleague was barely twenty four hours ahead of her with symptoms and pcr test and informed everyone promptly. 

 

I can't imagine a more careful work environment, properly thought out, much work put in to redesign during initial lockdown.

 

I think it's pertinent to say that not one employee has caught covid since return to work until last week.

16 minutes ago, tobyjugg2 said:

Although I absolutely and fully agree that transmission with the Omicron variant appears to be a whole new degree of shitstorm.

That's the very thing which makes it successful and I consider your description to be entirely appropriate

 

 

Edited December 13, 2021 by hightail

[unclebulgaria67]

Dominic Cummings accuses PM of ‘lies’ on boosters and says he must go ‘before he kills 1000s’

INEWS.CO.UK

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The Prime Minister's former chief aide accused him of "lying again" and claimed the next few days would prove a "hyperomnishambles" for Mr...

 

[tobyjugg2]

I cant get that early infection trace report out of my mind which confidently tied a transmission stream back to a few seconds close contact at a doorway (a brief door delivery/interaction type event) - no masks.

 

Current statements are that its 2-3x as transmissible - I think from what I am seeing reported thats a vast UNDER-ESTIMATE, although we have only just gone back into supermarket and transport mask wearing again.

I was relieved to see the vast majority wearing masks at both ASDA and Tesco over the last few days.

 

The reports and epidemiological projections/forecast/models I read (confirmed as far as I was able - which aint that far) indicates that  the Omicron variant was expected to be more damaging than delta (from the various mutations expected effects) (which we dont seem to be seeing yet),  as well as the significant increase in transmission which we are seeing in spades

 

 

 

@unclebulgaria67

and Cummings, who is the self acclaimed 'genius' creator of many of the lies whos impact we are all suffering and who sat in the Rose garden and lied to the nation that he was testing his eyesight, says Johnson 'the corrupt liar' is lying some more ..

No sh** sherlock !!!

 

Cummmings statements may actually be at least partially true

- but the detail will be just more Cummings self serving misdirection and lies about Johnsons' self-serving misdirection and lies - now wont it?

THAT we can be reasonably sure on.

 

 

 

 

Edited December 13, 2021 by tobyjugg2

[tobyjugg2]

Back to lfts

I've just done a search to get a pack from a chemist :

 

 

We can't find any results within 30 miles of your location.

 

Luckily my daughter is booked for booster this week - else she'd probably struggle to get one before Christmas without queuing for hours at one of the walk in centers in a long queue of strangers - in cold damp conditions highly conducive to catching something

 

Edited December 13, 2021 by tobyjugg2

[tobyjugg2]

Dont wish to be a scaremonger, but this should be watched carefully by authorities

 

 

A New Bird Flu Jumps to Humans. So Far, It's Not a Problem - The New York Times

WWW.NYTIMES.COM

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Covid fuels the current virus pandemic, but the world is full of flu viruses waiting in the wings. And they keep changing unpredictably.

 

 

 

Not least because

Plenty of Evidence for Recombination in SARS-CoV-2

WWW.THE-SCIENTIST.COM

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Different variants of the virus behind the COVID-19 pandemic are swapping chunks of genetic material, but it’s not yet clear what implications that...

 

Mutated COVID-19 may foretell a great risk for mankind in the future - ScienceDirect

WWW.SCIENCEDIRECT.COM

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Coronavirus disease 2019 SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19) is a zoonotic virus causing a variety of severe respiratory diseases. SARS-CoV-2 is closest to...

 

How will Covid-19 evolve in the future?

WWW.BBC.COM

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Every time the coronavirus passes from person to person it picks up tiny changes to its genetic code, but scientists are starting to notice patterns...

 

 

Beyond Omicron: what’s next for COVID’s viral evolution

WWW.NATURE.COM

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The rapid spread of new variants offers clues to how SARS-CoV-2 is adapting and how the pandemic will play out over the next several...

 

Edited December 14, 2021 by tobyjugg2

[tobyjugg2]

Lets balance the bad news with some good (for the triple/ or double mRNA vaccinated and mask wearers anyway)

 

Omicron is reported as not causing the increased severe illness expected, and SA is promoting mild disease .. although its my understanding that SA generally DON'T check which variant is, and always remember a lot of the most susceptible have sadly died, and we are at about 70% significant vaccination (2 doses or more).

 

Once youve got 2+ an mRNA or 2/3 mRNA vaccines doses in you, it seems so far that you are roughly 70% less likely to get infected (broadly in line with 2*AZ shots against the earlier strains), and roughly the same 70% less likely to get symptomatic illness.

 

90% of the hospitalised are reported as unvaccinated.

 

Mask wearing on transport/in supermarkets + hand cleaning should still give similar absolutely great protection against spread they always have.

 

IMO Johnson can kiss my ass if he thinks I will NOT be seeing my family and friends over Christmas.

WE, unlike him and his tosspot mates/accomplices ; always have and always will take great care to protect each other and also others not in our immediate circle - so he should follow our lead, not the reverse.

 

 

I'm going to add a bit of food for thought.

I'm not medically qualified, or a virologist, or a qualified epidemiologist - or a vet ...

BUT - if I do end up going out and seeing others outside my immediate family circles, in a social gathering where mask wearing might well be seen to 'defeat the object'

- I WILL be using one of the nasal sprays - even if its a cold/flu one as extra defense. I would never be able to forgive myself if i brought harm to my family and friends.

 

 

 

 

Edited December 14, 2021 by tobyjugg2

[tobyjugg2]

Hes something for those who (like me) saw massive discrepences in claims vs both common sense and other sanity checks in figures

 

For example

South Africas tune changed quite significantly once the world started (mostly stupidly IMO) putting SA on a red list rather than working proactively with them

 

figures for covid vs excess deaths (oft touted to catch the uncaught covid caused deaths and include things like missed operations and missed detections due to pandemic issues)

 

SA  : 89,940 covid deaths reported - but over 230,000 excess deaths in the same period ..

USA: 755,610 covid - 992,710 excess

 

Britain? - strange as usual under Menteuse Johnson

145,180 - 144,980 (yep, more Covid deaths than excess deaths - something very wrong with those 'official' figures if they aren't transcription errors on the economist - sure I saw over 160,000 excess deaths reported some time ago -  warrants sanity check i haven't got time for at moment)

 

 

Tracking covid-19 excess deaths across countries | The Economist

WWW.ECONOMIST.COM

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In many parts of the world, official death tolls undercount the total number of fatalities

 

Edited December 14, 2021 by tobyjugg2

[tobyjugg2]

I hear that the UK will remove all prior red list countries from the 'red list'

- No longer needed as the UK is shortly expected to be on everyone elses red list

 

[unclebulgaria67]

Bit concerning that Governments are now not using lockdowns as a way to try to control Covid case numbers.

 

Numbers of deaths in many countries is now increasing. 

At what point do Governments start to put in place stronger measures ?

[tobyjugg2]

 

As we have seen reported - London is leading the way (sic) in Omicron infections

- and now in hospitalisations

 

 

 

Edited December 15, 2021 by tobyjugg2