18 ms·

The article purposefully conflates numbers to tell a narrative. I am talking only about EU, and at that southern EU which is where I've been following the numbe

The article purposefully conflates numbers to tell a narrative. I am talking only about EU, and at that southern EU which is where I've been following the numbers closely. Delta variant has been acting for up to 1 month in some regions, and as described in the article yes cases are up very quickly. However, the article says: > COVID deaths [...] And if you think Europe or the US will be spared This is not reflected at all with the current numbers and the author is mixing deaths in one country with infections in another. There hasn't been even a single uptick of deaths in EU so far that I've seen, and we are past the potential 2+ week delay from cases to deaths so if it was of importance for EU, we'd see a massive climb in death graphs. That is just not happening, so regarding deaths this seems, so far, not to be a concern at all for highly vaccinated countries. Yes there are many other concerns for which we want to avoid more infections (saturation of hospitals, potential for more mutations, etc.) which are worth discussing, but this article is instead just conflating numbers. See a comparison taken 2 days ago of "infections" vs "deaths" in Spain, which includes this delta wave: https://imgur.com/a/A9VFS4G https://imgur.com/a/A9VFS4G

tremon 5y ago
and we are past the potential 2-week delay from cases to deaths Not everywhere. See here, for example: https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/netherlands/#graph-cases-daily https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/netherland... The Netherlands went from 550 cases/day at the end of June to 10,000 cases/day now. The Delta variant took less than two weeks to spread as much as the EU variant did in two months (Sep 1st - Nov 1st). Of course, it was helped a lot by the government deciding to open up bars, dancings and nights clubs on June 26th so it's not a fair comparison :/ Point is, we'll have to wait two weeks to see what effect this will have on the death rate. I expect the death rate to be a lot lower than in November, partly because of vaccinations but also because the age group that flocked to the bars and night clubs is a lot younger than the earlier wave victims. Still, I don't expect our death rate to remain in the single digits as it has been since the beginning of June.
- ginko 5y ago
  Still, the UK is quite a bit into the delta wave and the number of deaths have barely budged: https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/uk/ https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/uk/
  - f38zf5vdt 5y ago
    That is not surprising. UK targeted very high vaccination rates for those most likely to die from the disease. > As of 4th July, 2,118,096 (93.8%) of the clinically extremely vulnerable (CEV) population have been vaccinated with at least one dose. This includes all CEV individuals, even if they were vaccinated as part of a higher priority cohort. Of those, more than 9 in 10 (2,046,244, 96.6%) have received a 2nd dose (90.7% of all CEV individuals). https://www.england.nhs.uk/statistics/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2021/07/COVID-19-weekly-announced-vaccinations-08-July-2021.pdf https://www.england.nhs.uk/statistics/wp-content/uploads/sit... It is a bigger issue in countries like the US where vulnerable populations are refusing the vaccine.
  - dTal 5y ago
    Barely budged? It's gone up by a factor of 5x since the beginning of April!
    - 1123581321 5y ago
      Are you looking at cases instead of deaths?
      - dTal 5y ago
        No, I'm not. At the end of May, there were about 6 deaths daily. Now it's about 34, and rising exponentially. In two weeks it'll be 100 daily deaths.
        1123581321 5y ago
        I see. Let’s hope for the sake of the UK that there is some noise in that data. We expect greatly improved care with such small numbers compared to the prior waves.
mediaman 5y ago
I'm not sure how you assess that he is conflating numbers to tell a narrative. Pueyo discusses fatality rates in the article, specifically that the vaccines appear to still be highly effective at preventing deaths (though much less so for infections) and that countries with high vaccination rates are not seeing high death rates even when infections are growing. The only area where he says deaths are getting worse are for the unvaccinated: that fatality rates may be significantly higher for unvaccinated individuals due to a faster replication rate of the virus and therefore a much higher viral load.
- franciscop 5y ago
  I quoted it, the author warns that we should expect India-level deaths in Europe (that's the clear read from showing mass burning of bodies in India, talking about deaths in India, and saying "if you think Europe or the US will be spared"). But then shows infections growth (not deaths) to prove the point, so yeah it's conflating infections with deaths.
  - f38zf5vdt 5y ago
    The article specified that high death rates might be expected for developing countries with low vaccination rates, not countries with high vaccination rates. > So Delta, like Alpha before it, is both more transmissible and more fatal. Both of these effects have the same root: the virus is much better at binding to human cells, so it reproduces much faster. > Are people dying more then? Not in Britain. > But Delta is very hard in developing countries, especially in dense urban areas where the poor are forced to work but live in close quarters with many others. India, Argentina, Tunisia, South Africa, and Indonesia are very sad examples of this.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
  - zzzeek 5y ago
    that's not the impression i got at all. the words did not say, "will be spared from the identical outcome as India" and it is obvious that US / EU have better vaccination/ medical infrastructure compared to India. The phrase is a qualitative expression only for the purposes of a blog post, this is not a medical journal article.
vmception 5y ago
> mixing deaths in one country with infections in another so basically like the last 15 months there is a clear separation of critical thinkers on this planet such that we are almost two different species if it wasnt for the viable offspring
- spookthesunset 5y ago
  > so basically like the last 15 months Yup. It started with conflating CFR and IFR (picking CFR of course because it is the bigger number). Comparing raw numbers between two regions that report their data completely different, etc. Worse is when you show public data and get called "dangerous" because it doesn't fit the narrative that this all is the worst thing ever.
  - paulddraper 5y ago
    > picking CFR of course because it is the bigger number And it changed over time. You remember hearing news media 3% at the beginning of the pandemic? When did you hear them update it to <1%? Nope by that point they had moved to raw case counts, which by then then the higher statistic. Selective reporting all day long.
    - spookthesunset 5y ago
      Plenty of people (like my folks) still think that covid has a 4% “kill rate”. “Well that is what the experts say” is what their source is. It’s disgusting how this whole thing is nothing but raw appeals to authority the entire way down. Thinking for yourself, expressing doubt or skepticism or having hope and optimism gets met with scorn, shame and ridicule.
      - pasabagi 5y ago
        Well, there has been a lot of 'skepticism' that amounts to cherry picking whatever facts allow people to believe what they please. I think the fact remains that COVID was and is extraordinarily dangerous, and that's evidenced by the enormous casualty figures, even in countries that were supposed to be well prepared. I think there's a simple difference in scale between this other events, that makes it hard to assimilate - COVID was, statistically, the most deadly single natural disaster to happen to my country (the UK) in a century. That's hard to relate to, hard to make policy about, hard to put in perspective. Bear in mind the last pandemic (Spanish Flu) was before antibiotics, before oxygen, before all of the techniques that made COVID something you can treat to some degree of success in a hospital.
ElectronCharge 5y ago
This article is also unabashedly pro-vaccine, and completely ignores the age related issues. Here are a few thoughts: - If you already had CV-19, you don’t need the vaccine. Get an antibody test first. - Ivermectin, HCQ and other drugs are both prophylactic and effective when infected, and very likely mitigate “long covid” if taken early. - Take other effective steps like weight loss, exercise, sun exposure (Vitamin D), distancing, and hygiene. - The vaccine has effectively higher risk for younger people. The “over 60” crowd is the main audience. Don’t let “big pharma” sell you on an endless cycle of multiple annual vaccines. Treatment is much preferable, since you’re only exposed to whatever adverse effects if you get sick! Let’s not forget that a significant number of those infected are asymptomatic.
- specialist 5y ago
  Prior to this pandemic, were you getting the yearly flu vaccine?
- OzyM 5y ago
  Ignoring the higher risk of major long-term damage incurred by letting yourself get sick when you could've been vaccinated, I don't understand how this thought process accounts for anyone else. What if my main reason for getting vaccinated is to lower my chance of infecting an immunocompromised person I care about? Even if I could somehow be 100% certain that if I were to be infected it'd be fully asymptomatic, the vaccine still helps me avoid spreading COVID-19 further. Do you imagine young people who get flu shots do so only because they're worried about dying from influenza at 20?
  - bamboozled 5y ago
    But you can still infect other people? It's a non-sterilizing vaccine?
    - ashtonbaker 5y ago
      The vaccines do reduce the chances of transmission quite significantly, so it makes sense to get vaccinated if your goal is to protect others. It doesn't need to be 100 percent sterilizing to be helpful in this regard.
motohagiography 5y ago
I hate having to be skeptical of this stuff, because the consequences of skeptics being accurate are even more horrifying than the pandemic. This is so challenging because when you look at each number he uses, and then compare it to its base rate, you can see why hesitancy levels are 30-50% in regions of developed countries. If you are among that cohort of people in your region who are not vaccinated, should you get it? Yes, and especially if you have co-morbidities or work with people who do. We need to seriously consider what the consequences of a controversial vaccination plan that requires 90% compliance for it to succeed are going to be if/when it fails. (I would even posit that number is closer to 70%) If you talk to hesitant people, and there are a lot of them, the reason is a mistrust of the people leading the effort and managing the pandemic. Why mistrust? Many reasons, but the most challenging one is because of numbers that don't pass a smell test coupled with apopleptic ad-hominim aggression directed against anyone who questions them. This all but guarantees a 20%+ rejection rate from people who just dig in because they do not make health or other decisions based on fear and shame. There will be a defiant group of about 5-10% who you just can't reach at all, so if your plan needs them, you will need a new plan. Calling people hesitant is patronizing and was probably the stupidest PR move of all time and the committee responsible for it will have to live with those consequences. But instead of arming people with a litany of whataboutisms, I would say this to an unvaxed person: given your objections, how does getting the shot prevent you from resisting or even fighting a battle you percieve you need to fight against these authorities you do not trust? Polite euphemisms aside, let's call it what it is, because that's the crux of it. If it does, you need to just act now and literally overthrow your governments in the next few weeks, but if you aren't going to act today and do that, then get a shot, and use the time to figure out how to depose these people that you do not trust in good time. If, as many hesitant people believe, there might be long term harm to them, your long term still involves a conflict to replace these people, but risk from hypothetical side effects still nets out of that equation. My rationale to the so-called hesitant would be this: get the shot, and then use the time to organize and support your revolts against untrustworthy leaders and institutions, because once you are vaccinated, you can draw from the ranks of others who were also forced into it. Use this to unite people to your causes against untrustworthy authorities, because your skepticism comes directly from people using this to divide you. Take that from them, and then commit to organizing and scaling the change that has to come. Having the shot gives you skin in the game with the people you are going to need on your side. This issue isn't the main battle, but I will absolutely support efforts to ensure trustworthy people get into positions of authority after this.
shoto_io 5y ago
I still love to share the UK report about the Delta variant from mid of June. Bottom-line: If you’re 2x vaccinated, hospitalization is highly unlikely for Alpha and Delta variants. See this report, page 44 bottom: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1001359/Variants_of_Concern_VOC_Technical_Briefing_16.pdf https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/...
- timr 5y ago
  The latest data is even more dramatic: across the UK, the IFR for Delta is ~1/10th that of Alpha, and the "infectiousness" is about the same. https://twitter.com/EricTopol/status/1413537810296950786 https://twitter.com/EricTopol/status/1413537810296950786 https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1001358/Variants_of_Concern_VOC_Technical_Briefing_18.pdf https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/... It is quite clear that for a vaccinated population, it isn't a threat. These are facts that simply aren't being reported by the news media. It's unfortunately quite common for talking heads to prefix "the highly infectious Delta variant" to any discussion, and never offer any context or nuance.
  - addicted 5y ago
    Except everywhere I see the media is reporting that 99% of infections are amongst the unvaccinated. So they are all clearly reporting this. And the reality is that there are tens of millions of people who are not vaccinated who are extremely susceptible to the Delta variant. It’s not clear to me what point you’re trying to make by insisting that it is significantly less dangerous to the vaccinated that isn’t being made by every news outlet and government agency that I have been following.
    - timr 5y ago
      > Except everywhere I see the media is reporting that 99% of infections are amongst the unvaccinated. Maybe they do this five paragraphs down. I almost never see this mentioned within the same paragraph as the "highly infectious" claim, which is always at the very top of the story. > It’s not clear to me what point you’re trying to make by insisting that it is significantly less dangerous to the vaccinated that isn’t being made by every news outlet and government agency that I have been following. Two things: 1) I am not "insisting"...I'm providing data. Nobody should believe me blindly. I am nobody. 2) If you already know these facts, great! Most people don't. ok, three things: 3) I'm not sure why you're so prickly about the fact that I'm sharing factual information.
specialist 5y ago
You still don't explain why: Conflating infections with deaths is meaningless where the mortality rate has gone down. Please forward the discussion by showing how you would present the data.
phkahler 5y ago
Also in the beginning "Depending on which figureyou use, it would put Delta’s R0 between 4 and 9" and toward the end he assume R0 of 8 when talking about herd immunity. In the What About You section he doesnt even mention those that have had covid, only vaccinated and unvaccinated.
zpeti 5y ago
Another issue which this article ignores, and so does the fear mongering clickbait media, is how many asymptotic people we are testing now vs 6 months ago or a year ago. It’s way more. The UK especially is testing like crazy. But that means a lot more cases appear in the statistics than before, even if the R rate is only marginally higher. We simply don’t know what the actual r rate of all the different variants are because we had different test velocities as well. And this is crucial in whether we should be hysterical about Delta or not. Also, wtf happened to cases in India? It’s not exactly all that catastrophic any more. In fact by the time the media had their 2 week India is dying narrative, cases declined. https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/india/ https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/india/
- gonzo 5y ago
  > even if the R rate is only marginally higher. R is an exponent. Small changes in an exponent lead to huge differences in the result.
  - zpeti 5y ago
    How does that change my point? The article says the original variant had an R rate of 2.7, and delta had one between 4 and 9. That’s a big claim with no data. And thanks I understand how exponential works.
- dharma1 5y ago
  The test velocity has been fairly stable now for long enough to establish the delta variant R rate is significantly higher than with the previous variants. We are definitely doing more testing in the UK than a year ago and it’s likely reflected in the case stats, but at the same time the rate of case growth during the last few weeks looks like a straight line up and that’s not a good thing. We will likely see fewer hospitalisations than before due to a fairly successful vaccination effort, particularly with the edlerly, but as cases go up so does the number of people who may not die but end up with long covid. Also, the more people infected, the better breeding ground for the virus to develop new variants, and a higher chance of vaccine escape due to evolutionary pressure.
- 5y ago
sometimesokay 5y ago
I wonder if it’s also misleading to only say that young adults have a rise in cases (due to less vaccination) and be fearful of that. The overall hospitalization and death is still lower (I think I read another article that talked about either in California or NY) because they’re better at handling covid. We need to present the hospitalization / death by age range for vaccinated and unvaccinated which if anyone has any data on that I would love to see it.
- codeflow2202 5y ago
  here you go https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1001358/Variants_of_Concern_VOC_Technical_Briefing_18.pdf https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/...
RickJWagner 5y ago
I thought it was odd, to see a chart like 'New Cases / 1000 people', instead of simply gross numbers. Gross numbers would have highlighted different states, placing 'blame' in a different way. It does seem a narrative is being spun.

tremon 5y ago

and we are past the potential 2-week delay from cases to deaths Not everywhere. See here, for example: https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/netherlands/#graph-cases-daily https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/netherland... The Netherlands went from 550 cases/day at the end of June to 10,000 cases/day now. The Delta variant took less than two weeks to spread as much as the EU variant did in two months (Sep 1st - Nov 1st). Of course, it was helped a lot by the government deciding to open up bars, dancings and nights clubs on June 26th so it's not a fair comparison :/ Point is, we'll have to wait two weeks to see what effect this will have on the death rate. I expect the death rate to be a lot lower than in November, partly because of vaccinations but also because the age group that flocked to the bars and night clubs is a lot younger than the earlier wave victims. Still, I don't expect our death rate to remain in the single digits as it has been since the beginning of June.

ginko 5y ago
Still, the UK is quite a bit into the delta wave and the number of deaths have barely budged: https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/uk/ https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/uk/
- f38zf5vdt 5y ago
  That is not surprising. UK targeted very high vaccination rates for those most likely to die from the disease. > As of 4th July, 2,118,096 (93.8%) of the clinically extremely vulnerable (CEV) population have been vaccinated with at least one dose. This includes all CEV individuals, even if they were vaccinated as part of a higher priority cohort. Of those, more than 9 in 10 (2,046,244, 96.6%) have received a 2nd dose (90.7% of all CEV individuals). https://www.england.nhs.uk/statistics/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2021/07/COVID-19-weekly-announced-vaccinations-08-July-2021.pdf https://www.england.nhs.uk/statistics/wp-content/uploads/sit... It is a bigger issue in countries like the US where vulnerable populations are refusing the vaccine.
- dTal 5y ago
  Barely budged? It's gone up by a factor of 5x since the beginning of April!
  - 1123581321 5y ago
    Are you looking at cases instead of deaths?
    - dTal 5y ago
      No, I'm not. At the end of May, there were about 6 deaths daily. Now it's about 34, and rising exponentially. In two weeks it'll be 100 daily deaths.
      - 1123581321 5y ago
        I see. Let’s hope for the sake of the UK that there is some noise in that data. We expect greatly improved care with such small numbers compared to the prior waves.

mediaman 5y ago

I'm not sure how you assess that he is conflating numbers to tell a narrative. Pueyo discusses fatality rates in the article, specifically that the vaccines appear to still be highly effective at preventing deaths (though much less so for infections) and that countries with high vaccination rates are not seeing high death rates even when infections are growing. The only area where he says deaths are getting worse are for the unvaccinated: that fatality rates may be significantly higher for unvaccinated individuals due to a faster replication rate of the virus and therefore a much higher viral load.

franciscop 5y ago
I quoted it, the author warns that we should expect India-level deaths in Europe (that's the clear read from showing mass burning of bodies in India, talking about deaths in India, and saying "if you think Europe or the US will be spared"). But then shows infections growth (not deaths) to prove the point, so yeah it's conflating infections with deaths.
- f38zf5vdt 5y ago
  The article specified that high death rates might be expected for developing countries with low vaccination rates, not countries with high vaccination rates. > So Delta, like Alpha before it, is both more transmissible and more fatal. Both of these effects have the same root: the virus is much better at binding to human cells, so it reproduces much faster. > Are people dying more then? Not in Britain. > But Delta is very hard in developing countries, especially in dense urban areas where the poor are forced to work but live in close quarters with many others. India, Argentina, Tunisia, South Africa, and Indonesia are very sad examples of this.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- zzzeek 5y ago
  that's not the impression i got at all. the words did not say, "will be spared from the identical outcome as India" and it is obvious that US / EU have better vaccination/ medical infrastructure compared to India. The phrase is a qualitative expression only for the purposes of a blog post, this is not a medical journal article.

vmception 5y ago

> mixing deaths in one country with infections in another so basically like the last 15 months there is a clear separation of critical thinkers on this planet such that we are almost two different species if it wasnt for the viable offspring

spookthesunset 5y ago
> so basically like the last 15 months Yup. It started with conflating CFR and IFR (picking CFR of course because it is the bigger number). Comparing raw numbers between two regions that report their data completely different, etc. Worse is when you show public data and get called "dangerous" because it doesn't fit the narrative that this all is the worst thing ever.
- paulddraper 5y ago
  > picking CFR of course because it is the bigger number And it changed over time. You remember hearing news media 3% at the beginning of the pandemic? When did you hear them update it to <1%? Nope by that point they had moved to raw case counts, which by then then the higher statistic. Selective reporting all day long.
  - spookthesunset 5y ago
    Plenty of people (like my folks) still think that covid has a 4% “kill rate”. “Well that is what the experts say” is what their source is. It’s disgusting how this whole thing is nothing but raw appeals to authority the entire way down. Thinking for yourself, expressing doubt or skepticism or having hope and optimism gets met with scorn, shame and ridicule.
    - pasabagi 5y ago
      Well, there has been a lot of 'skepticism' that amounts to cherry picking whatever facts allow people to believe what they please. I think the fact remains that COVID was and is extraordinarily dangerous, and that's evidenced by the enormous casualty figures, even in countries that were supposed to be well prepared. I think there's a simple difference in scale between this other events, that makes it hard to assimilate - COVID was, statistically, the most deadly single natural disaster to happen to my country (the UK) in a century. That's hard to relate to, hard to make policy about, hard to put in perspective. Bear in mind the last pandemic (Spanish Flu) was before antibiotics, before oxygen, before all of the techniques that made COVID something you can treat to some degree of success in a hospital.

ElectronCharge 5y ago

This article is also unabashedly pro-vaccine, and completely ignores the age related issues. Here are a few thoughts: - If you already had CV-19, you don’t need the vaccine. Get an antibody test first. - Ivermectin, HCQ and other drugs are both prophylactic and effective when infected, and very likely mitigate “long covid” if taken early. - Take other effective steps like weight loss, exercise, sun exposure (Vitamin D), distancing, and hygiene. - The vaccine has effectively higher risk for younger people. The “over 60” crowd is the main audience. Don’t let “big pharma” sell you on an endless cycle of multiple annual vaccines. Treatment is much preferable, since you’re only exposed to whatever adverse effects if you get sick! Let’s not forget that a significant number of those infected are asymptomatic.

specialist 5y ago
Prior to this pandemic, were you getting the yearly flu vaccine?
OzyM 5y ago
Ignoring the higher risk of major long-term damage incurred by letting yourself get sick when you could've been vaccinated, I don't understand how this thought process accounts for anyone else. What if my main reason for getting vaccinated is to lower my chance of infecting an immunocompromised person I care about? Even if I could somehow be 100% certain that if I were to be infected it'd be fully asymptomatic, the vaccine still helps me avoid spreading COVID-19 further. Do you imagine young people who get flu shots do so only because they're worried about dying from influenza at 20?
- bamboozled 5y ago
  But you can still infect other people? It's a non-sterilizing vaccine?
  - ashtonbaker 5y ago
    The vaccines do reduce the chances of transmission quite significantly, so it makes sense to get vaccinated if your goal is to protect others. It doesn't need to be 100 percent sterilizing to be helpful in this regard.

motohagiography 5y ago

I hate having to be skeptical of this stuff, because the consequences of skeptics being accurate are even more horrifying than the pandemic. This is so challenging because when you look at each number he uses, and then compare it to its base rate, you can see why hesitancy levels are 30-50% in regions of developed countries. If you are among that cohort of people in your region who are not vaccinated, should you get it? Yes, and especially if you have co-morbidities or work with people who do. We need to seriously consider what the consequences of a controversial vaccination plan that requires 90% compliance for it to succeed are going to be if/when it fails. (I would even posit that number is closer to 70%) If you talk to hesitant people, and there are a lot of them, the reason is a mistrust of the people leading the effort and managing the pandemic. Why mistrust? Many reasons, but the most challenging one is because of numbers that don't pass a smell test coupled with apopleptic ad-hominim aggression directed against anyone who questions them. This all but guarantees a 20%+ rejection rate from people who just dig in because they do not make health or other decisions based on fear and shame. There will be a defiant group of about 5-10% who you just can't reach at all, so if your plan needs them, you will need a new plan. Calling people hesitant is patronizing and was probably the stupidest PR move of all time and the committee responsible for it will have to live with those consequences. But instead of arming people with a litany of whataboutisms, I would say this to an unvaxed person: given your objections, how does getting the shot prevent you from resisting or even fighting a battle you percieve you need to fight against these authorities you do not trust? Polite euphemisms aside, let's call it what it is, because that's the crux of it. If it does, you need to just act now and literally overthrow your governments in the next few weeks, but if you aren't going to act today and do that, then get a shot, and use the time to figure out how to depose these people that you do not trust in good time. If, as many hesitant people believe, there might be long term harm to them, your long term still involves a conflict to replace these people, but risk from hypothetical side effects still nets out of that equation. My rationale to the so-called hesitant would be this: get the shot, and then use the time to organize and support your revolts against untrustworthy leaders and institutions, because once you are vaccinated, you can draw from the ranks of others who were also forced into it. Use this to unite people to your causes against untrustworthy authorities, because your skepticism comes directly from people using this to divide you. Take that from them, and then commit to organizing and scaling the change that has to come. Having the shot gives you skin in the game with the people you are going to need on your side. This issue isn't the main battle, but I will absolutely support efforts to ensure trustworthy people get into positions of authority after this.

shoto_io 5y ago

I still love to share the UK report about the Delta variant from mid of June. Bottom-line: If you’re 2x vaccinated, hospitalization is highly unlikely for Alpha and Delta variants. See this report, page 44 bottom: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1001359/Variants_of_Concern_VOC_Technical_Briefing_16.pdf https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/...

timr 5y ago
The latest data is even more dramatic: across the UK, the IFR for Delta is ~1/10th that of Alpha, and the "infectiousness" is about the same. https://twitter.com/EricTopol/status/1413537810296950786 https://twitter.com/EricTopol/status/1413537810296950786 https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1001358/Variants_of_Concern_VOC_Technical_Briefing_18.pdf https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/... It is quite clear that for a vaccinated population, it isn't a threat. These are facts that simply aren't being reported by the news media. It's unfortunately quite common for talking heads to prefix "the highly infectious Delta variant" to any discussion, and never offer any context or nuance.
- addicted 5y ago
  Except everywhere I see the media is reporting that 99% of infections are amongst the unvaccinated. So they are all clearly reporting this. And the reality is that there are tens of millions of people who are not vaccinated who are extremely susceptible to the Delta variant. It’s not clear to me what point you’re trying to make by insisting that it is significantly less dangerous to the vaccinated that isn’t being made by every news outlet and government agency that I have been following.
  - timr 5y ago
    > Except everywhere I see the media is reporting that 99% of infections are amongst the unvaccinated. Maybe they do this five paragraphs down. I almost never see this mentioned within the same paragraph as the "highly infectious" claim, which is always at the very top of the story. > It’s not clear to me what point you’re trying to make by insisting that it is significantly less dangerous to the vaccinated that isn’t being made by every news outlet and government agency that I have been following. Two things: 1) I am not "insisting"...I'm providing data. Nobody should believe me blindly. I am nobody. 2) If you already know these facts, great! Most people don't. ok, three things: 3) I'm not sure why you're so prickly about the fact that I'm sharing factual information.

specialist 5y ago

You still don't explain why: Conflating infections with deaths is meaningless where the mortality rate has gone down. Please forward the discussion by showing how you would present the data.

phkahler 5y ago

Also in the beginning "Depending on which figureyou use, it would put Delta’s R0 between 4 and 9" and toward the end he assume R0 of 8 when talking about herd immunity. In the What About You section he doesnt even mention those that have had covid, only vaccinated and unvaccinated.

zpeti 5y ago

Another issue which this article ignores, and so does the fear mongering clickbait media, is how many asymptotic people we are testing now vs 6 months ago or a year ago. It’s way more. The UK especially is testing like crazy. But that means a lot more cases appear in the statistics than before, even if the R rate is only marginally higher. We simply don’t know what the actual r rate of all the different variants are because we had different test velocities as well. And this is crucial in whether we should be hysterical about Delta or not. Also, wtf happened to cases in India? It’s not exactly all that catastrophic any more. In fact by the time the media had their 2 week India is dying narrative, cases declined. https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/india/ https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/india/

gonzo 5y ago
> even if the R rate is only marginally higher. R is an exponent. Small changes in an exponent lead to huge differences in the result.
- zpeti 5y ago
  How does that change my point? The article says the original variant had an R rate of 2.7, and delta had one between 4 and 9. That’s a big claim with no data. And thanks I understand how exponential works.
dharma1 5y ago
The test velocity has been fairly stable now for long enough to establish the delta variant R rate is significantly higher than with the previous variants. We are definitely doing more testing in the UK than a year ago and it’s likely reflected in the case stats, but at the same time the rate of case growth during the last few weeks looks like a straight line up and that’s not a good thing. We will likely see fewer hospitalisations than before due to a fairly successful vaccination effort, particularly with the edlerly, but as cases go up so does the number of people who may not die but end up with long covid. Also, the more people infected, the better breeding ground for the virus to develop new variants, and a higher chance of vaccine escape due to evolutionary pressure.
5y ago

sometimesokay 5y ago

I wonder if it’s also misleading to only say that young adults have a rise in cases (due to less vaccination) and be fearful of that. The overall hospitalization and death is still lower (I think I read another article that talked about either in California or NY) because they’re better at handling covid. We need to present the hospitalization / death by age range for vaccinated and unvaccinated which if anyone has any data on that I would love to see it.

codeflow2202 5y ago
here you go https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1001358/Variants_of_Concern_VOC_Technical_Briefing_18.pdf https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/...

RickJWagner 5y ago

I thought it was odd, to see a chart like 'New Cases / 1000 people', instead of simply gross numbers. Gross numbers would have highlighted different states, placing 'blame' in a different way. It does seem a narrative is being spun.