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Realistically: 1) Mandatory vaccination, all age groups, boosters etc. AND 2) permanently reconfiguring our society to reduce social contacts such that with

Realistically: 1) Mandatory vaccination, all age groups, boosters etc. AND 2) permanently reconfiguring our society to reduce social contacts such that with the vaccines, COVID is suppressed. If the vaccines work well, then small (maybe no) changes will be needed. If they don't, then large changes. WFH, no indoor hospitality etc. We can cycle through lockdowns, we can wring our hands about vaccinating children, we can even pretend it isn't happening, but the formula is the same: vaccines+restrictions=suppression We don't know what the LHS needs to add up to, and we don't know how much vaccines can give us, but this equation must hold, as the alternative to suppression is complete failure of our healthcare system. To put another way, suppression is the only steady state. If you allow the virus to run unchecked, then eventually restrictions have to be reimposed. If you release restrictions, then the virus ramps up again. Either you tailor restrictions to suppress, or you bounce up and down around that point. Vaccines move that restriction point down.

pokepim 5y ago
Nah, what you saying is not realistical. This is more like wishful thinking and would only work in suppressive utopia (if that’s a thing). We as a society had only one shot at doing a lockdown that could work and it was at the beginning of march 2020. Some countries actually managed to have almost no cases but they had to do harsh lockdowns and everyone needed to comply. After that with 2nd and 3rd waves we have seen less and less countries do lockdowns and people already worn out stopped to comply. Now everything is half assed and on top of that vaccinated people are extremely unwilling to participate in lockdowns as it was promised that vaccines will help us avoid the disaster of lockdowns we have seen earlier (i got vaccinated based on that as many of my friends). So no. This is not realistical, nope.
- somewhereoutth 5y ago
  Well this is what is being seen in Germany right now - restriction fatigue -> case explosion -> overwhelmed hospitals -> restrictions. People may be unwilling, but at some point (i.e. when healthcare systems start failing) restrictions will be enforced, and people will comply.
  - 1123581321 5y ago
    Restrictions also become either increasingly lax or actively resisted. It's not an end of story. Part of the failure of the last two years was the unwillingness to think what will happen after the latest sure solution arrives and to govern with a goal of doing well across several phases of the pandemic instead of just one.
renewiltord 5y ago
Despite the wide variety of US state responses, no one is experiencing "complete failure of our healthcare" so I think we'll be all right.
- MauranKilom 5y ago
  German hospitals are currently transferring patients with severe cases from high incidence regions to lower ones (and the military has to help with nursing roles) because they simply can't stem the number of severe cases in some regions. The situation is as close to "complete failure of our healthcare" as it could be. If you take that as evidence of "we'll be alright", you're playing the white hat guy in https://xkcd.com/2278/ https://xkcd.com/2278/.
  - prohobo 5y ago
    Do you think, maybe, that has something to do with Germany losing 4000 ICU beds? https://www.dw.com/en/germanys-icu-medics-expect-covid-surge-before-christmas/a-59985778 https://www.dw.com/en/germanys-icu-medics-expect-covid-surge...
    - ascar 5y ago
      That actually has a lot to do with the pandemic itself, as intensive care personnel quit their jobs due to the extended stress. https://correctiv.org/faktencheck/2021/11/17/divi-praesident-zitat-zu-4-000-intensivbetten-ist-verkuerzt-und-falsch-interpretiert/ https://correctiv.org/faktencheck/2021/11/17/divi-praesident...
      - prohobo 5y ago
        Is that excuse something you'd use as a defense in court? Because that looks like mismanagement to me, and changes nothing. After two years, there should be more ICU beds, not thousands less.
        ascar 5y ago
prohobo 5y ago
Let me be clear: no place that has not put these measures in place has, or will, experience "complete failure" of their healthcare system. What you stated is a false dichotomy.
spookthesunset 5y ago
So uh, maybe we decide that life doesn’t need to be permanently centered around Covid and just move on? And realistically that is what society will do. Move on. There are infinitely more problems in the world than just Covid. Solving for exactly Covid to the exclusion of literally everything else is complete madness. Any rational person will tell you that. Life is to short to maintain a Covid centric lifestyle… life is meant to be lived. Oh yeah, and we’ve been wringing our hands about hospital capacity for 2 years now. Perhaps we should ask why there isn’t any effort at all into increasing it? Forcing society to do all these restrictions to “protect hospitals” while doing fuck all to increase capacity is also madness… perhaps hospitals are actually just fine? If they were actually “full” why has nothing been done to address the problem? This is an emergency, right?
- datameta 5y ago
  Spoken like an able-bodied individual of young(er) age and/or someone with zero co-morbidities. Fuck the rest, eh?
  - prohobo 5y ago
    He said what most poor people have been saying the entire time. They're willing to take the risk, because the risk is lower than all the other problems they have now. Now, the question is: should you care what poor people say?
    - datameta 5y ago
      People from lower socio-economic backgrounds are statistically more predisposed to develop co-morbidities.
      - prohobo 5y ago
        They also have bigger problems than this virus, get it?
        5y ago
fhany 5y ago
The winter outbreaks in the northern hemisphere seem to disprove these conjectures: https://www.standard.co.uk/news/world/christmas-cancelled-gibraltar-vaccinations-b966816.html https://www.standard.co.uk/news/world/christmas-cancelled-gi...
- somewhereoutth 5y ago
  They show that the current vaccines lose efficacy after about 6 months (unboosted). The grim calculation remains the same. Tragically, those most vulnerable were vaccinated first, so lost immunity just as vaccination programs were completed and we opened up.
TacticalCoder 5y ago
> 1) Mandatory vaccination, all age groups, boosters etc. 50% to 60% of all the people in ICU with covid related symptoms in the EU atm are fully vaccinated. It's been lies from day one: "masks do not protect" then "masks are mandatory because they protect" (I don't know which one is correct but at least one is a lie), "you're a conspiracy theorist if you think there's any link between a virus research lab in Wuhan and the fact that the outbreak started there" then now "a lab escape is a possibility", then Fauci commited a crime by lying in front of congress (he then retracted himself after having been called out by senator Rand paul) "I had no idea there was gain of function research done in the Wuhan lab", then "we will never discriminate between vaccinated and non vaccinated people", etc. ad nauseam. Then the mRNA vaccine (which I got) was sold us as major scientific discovery and as a panacea. Turns out that "vaccine" doesn't confer a long lasting immunity at all (otherwise there wouldn't be 50 to 60% of ICU beds in Europe filled with fully vaccinated people). I don't think suppression is possible with a non-sterilizing vaccine. I think it's even less possible that it's even less possible with something that is called a "vaccine" but that isn't really one (Merriam-Webster recently changed, by sheer chance, the very definition of what a vaccine is, but I need time to adapt to the new definition). The virus is here to stay and we won't get rid of it with snake oil (I'm not saying the mRNA Pfizer shots don't work at all, I'm saying their effectiveness is extermely limited seen that ICU beds are filled with vaccinated people).
- pjc50 5y ago
  That's a statistical effect: far more people are vaccinated than not, so they are more likely to show up in the ECU even if the vaccine reduces their infection rate.
- MauranKilom 5y ago
  > 50% to 60% of all the people in ICU with covid related symptoms in the EU atm are fully vaccinated. I'm trying to find a reliable/official source for this statistic (not your numbers in particular but numbers at all), but am coming up empty-handed. Can you tell me where you found this?
  - dnh44 5y ago
School-Cotton 5y ago
Another option is to not reconfigure our society, and accept the fact that life expectancy is now permanently slightly lower than it was in 2019. I hate this argument I keep seeing, that we have no choice but to do whatever is necessary to stop Covid. Of course we have a choice, and it is a legitimate political question, not a scientific one.

pokepim 5y ago

Nah, what you saying is not realistical. This is more like wishful thinking and would only work in suppressive utopia (if that’s a thing). We as a society had only one shot at doing a lockdown that could work and it was at the beginning of march 2020. Some countries actually managed to have almost no cases but they had to do harsh lockdowns and everyone needed to comply. After that with 2nd and 3rd waves we have seen less and less countries do lockdowns and people already worn out stopped to comply. Now everything is half assed and on top of that vaccinated people are extremely unwilling to participate in lockdowns as it was promised that vaccines will help us avoid the disaster of lockdowns we have seen earlier (i got vaccinated based on that as many of my friends). So no. This is not realistical, nope.

somewhereoutth 5y ago
Well this is what is being seen in Germany right now - restriction fatigue -> case explosion -> overwhelmed hospitals -> restrictions. People may be unwilling, but at some point (i.e. when healthcare systems start failing) restrictions will be enforced, and people will comply.
- 1123581321 5y ago
  Restrictions also become either increasingly lax or actively resisted. It's not an end of story. Part of the failure of the last two years was the unwillingness to think what will happen after the latest sure solution arrives and to govern with a goal of doing well across several phases of the pandemic instead of just one.

renewiltord 5y ago

Despite the wide variety of US state responses, no one is experiencing "complete failure of our healthcare" so I think we'll be all right.

MauranKilom 5y ago
German hospitals are currently transferring patients with severe cases from high incidence regions to lower ones (and the military has to help with nursing roles) because they simply can't stem the number of severe cases in some regions. The situation is as close to "complete failure of our healthcare" as it could be. If you take that as evidence of "we'll be alright", you're playing the white hat guy in https://xkcd.com/2278/ https://xkcd.com/2278/.
- prohobo 5y ago
  Do you think, maybe, that has something to do with Germany losing 4000 ICU beds? https://www.dw.com/en/germanys-icu-medics-expect-covid-surge-before-christmas/a-59985778 https://www.dw.com/en/germanys-icu-medics-expect-covid-surge...
  - ascar 5y ago
    That actually has a lot to do with the pandemic itself, as intensive care personnel quit their jobs due to the extended stress. https://correctiv.org/faktencheck/2021/11/17/divi-praesident-zitat-zu-4-000-intensivbetten-ist-verkuerzt-und-falsch-interpretiert/ https://correctiv.org/faktencheck/2021/11/17/divi-praesident...
    - prohobo 5y ago
      Is that excuse something you'd use as a defense in court? Because that looks like mismanagement to me, and changes nothing. After two years, there should be more ICU beds, not thousands less.
      - ascar 5y ago

prohobo 5y ago

Let me be clear: no place that has not put these measures in place has, or will, experience "complete failure" of their healthcare system. What you stated is a false dichotomy.

spookthesunset 5y ago

So uh, maybe we decide that life doesn’t need to be permanently centered around Covid and just move on? And realistically that is what society will do. Move on. There are infinitely more problems in the world than just Covid. Solving for exactly Covid to the exclusion of literally everything else is complete madness. Any rational person will tell you that. Life is to short to maintain a Covid centric lifestyle… life is meant to be lived. Oh yeah, and we’ve been wringing our hands about hospital capacity for 2 years now. Perhaps we should ask why there isn’t any effort at all into increasing it? Forcing society to do all these restrictions to “protect hospitals” while doing fuck all to increase capacity is also madness… perhaps hospitals are actually just fine? If they were actually “full” why has nothing been done to address the problem? This is an emergency, right?

datameta 5y ago
Spoken like an able-bodied individual of young(er) age and/or someone with zero co-morbidities. Fuck the rest, eh?
- prohobo 5y ago
  He said what most poor people have been saying the entire time. They're willing to take the risk, because the risk is lower than all the other problems they have now. Now, the question is: should you care what poor people say?
  - datameta 5y ago
    People from lower socio-economic backgrounds are statistically more predisposed to develop co-morbidities.
    - prohobo 5y ago
      They also have bigger problems than this virus, get it?
      - 5y ago

fhany 5y ago

The winter outbreaks in the northern hemisphere seem to disprove these conjectures: https://www.standard.co.uk/news/world/christmas-cancelled-gibraltar-vaccinations-b966816.html https://www.standard.co.uk/news/world/christmas-cancelled-gi...

somewhereoutth 5y ago
They show that the current vaccines lose efficacy after about 6 months (unboosted). The grim calculation remains the same. Tragically, those most vulnerable were vaccinated first, so lost immunity just as vaccination programs were completed and we opened up.

TacticalCoder 5y ago

> 1) Mandatory vaccination, all age groups, boosters etc. 50% to 60% of all the people in ICU with covid related symptoms in the EU atm are fully vaccinated. It's been lies from day one: "masks do not protect" then "masks are mandatory because they protect" (I don't know which one is correct but at least one is a lie), "you're a conspiracy theorist if you think there's any link between a virus research lab in Wuhan and the fact that the outbreak started there" then now "a lab escape is a possibility", then Fauci commited a crime by lying in front of congress (he then retracted himself after having been called out by senator Rand paul) "I had no idea there was gain of function research done in the Wuhan lab", then "we will never discriminate between vaccinated and non vaccinated people", etc. ad nauseam. Then the mRNA vaccine (which I got) was sold us as major scientific discovery and as a panacea. Turns out that "vaccine" doesn't confer a long lasting immunity at all (otherwise there wouldn't be 50 to 60% of ICU beds in Europe filled with fully vaccinated people). I don't think suppression is possible with a non-sterilizing vaccine. I think it's even less possible that it's even less possible with something that is called a "vaccine" but that isn't really one (Merriam-Webster recently changed, by sheer chance, the very definition of what a vaccine is, but I need time to adapt to the new definition). The virus is here to stay and we won't get rid of it with snake oil (I'm not saying the mRNA Pfizer shots don't work at all, I'm saying their effectiveness is extermely limited seen that ICU beds are filled with vaccinated people).

pjc50 5y ago
That's a statistical effect: far more people are vaccinated than not, so they are more likely to show up in the ECU even if the vaccine reduces their infection rate.
MauranKilom 5y ago
> 50% to 60% of all the people in ICU with covid related symptoms in the EU atm are fully vaccinated. I'm trying to find a reliable/official source for this statistic (not your numbers in particular but numbers at all), but am coming up empty-handed. Can you tell me where you found this?
- dnh44 5y ago

School-Cotton 5y ago

Another option is to not reconfigure our society, and accept the fact that life expectancy is now permanently slightly lower than it was in 2019. I hate this argument I keep seeing, that we have no choice but to do whatever is necessary to stop Covid. Of course we have a choice, and it is a legitimate political question, not a scientific one.