5 ms·

Following that German minister's line of thinking that stated "by the end of this winter pretty much everyone in Germany will be vaccinated, recovered or dead"

Following that German minister's line of thinking that stated "by the end of this winter pretty much everyone in Germany will be vaccinated, recovered or dead" it's a really good news to expend quickly the second category. The sooner everyone will have antibodies, be it from natural immunity or paid one, the sooner society can stop revolving around saving a few months of life of a bunch of elderly at the expense of everything else.

tehjoker 5y ago
The more infections there are the more variants and more fit variants there are. Only a zero COVID policy with global technology sharing will realistically end this.
- tasogare 5y ago
  No. Also it's kinda over already, save for the media fearmongering. It's ridiculous to expect 0 death worldwide for any disease. We have to accept a few people will die of it from times to times, just like it is with the flu (which is targeting the same population anyway so nothing really changed).
  - tehjoker 5y ago
    Assuming you live in the US, that is the kind of thing a person living in the country with the most deaths in the world would say.
    - chrononaut 5y ago
      > Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith. > Eschew flamebait. Avoid unrelated controversies and generic tangents.
      - tehjoker 5y ago
        Tone policing someone protesting a call for millions of deaths is really something.
  - Klinky 5y ago
    There's still more than "a few" people dying "from time to time", so even by your metric, it is not over, or anywhere near over.
    - AtlasBarfed 5y ago
      Yes, about 300,000 americans (taking us over 1 million deaths) will probably die in the next four-five months given the current numbers. Definitely not a few. We were on the downslide of the third big bump of COVID deaths per worldometers, but let's face it, there's going to be a big fourth even without Omicron from the infections from far less restrained Xmas/Thanksgiving get togethers. I hope I'm wrong...
      - rswail 5y ago
        A large chunk of those deaths is due to the lack of urgency to get people vaccinated, as well as, somehow, your political allegiance deciding whether you get vaccinated, stop spreading disease by mask usage etc. The US is one of the worst examples of COVID response, both during Trump's era and the post-Trump/QAnon/Fox/OAN/etc spread of bullshit propaganda. It's not Xmas/Thanksgiving that's the issue, it's the lack of following logical safety and vaccination measures, somehow tied to "freedom" without considering the "general welfare".
  - wesleywt 5y ago
    I never understand these comments. We try are prevent deaths for all diseases. Infectious diseases are probably the easiest ones to prevent. Yet, we have these odd comments that we should allow people to die just as we allow people to die with the flu. We don't just allow people to die of the flu either, we try and vaccinate vulnerable groups. But ignorant comments such as this stand in the way of these effects. Just as it stands in the way of effectively dealing with Covid. The issue is this disease is killing younger people than those who typically die of the flu. There number of general hospitalizations is significantly higher, with more longer lasting after infection effects. Nearly all my friends who have had Covid can't taste or smell. That alone should scare you. I have not had it, because I am vaccinated and wear a mask while I do my normal social activities here in South Africa.
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    - henrikschroder 5y ago
      How's our track record at preventing influenza or the common cold, both of which are transmitted as airborne viruses? The problem is that most of the things that governments around the world have been doing to try to combat corona are completely useless, and carry a huge cost for society. We're killing people with lockdowns and school closures and by limiting medical procedures. Suicides among children and teenagers are up. Deaths of despair are up. Cancer screenings are down. The future healthcare debt is just piling up. If our strategy is killing more people than we're saving, we should stop and re-think the strategy! The hubris is enormous. Countries think they can eradicate sars-cov-2, and every single attempt has been an abysmal failure. Omicron has been detected in Australia. How? They have incredibly strict border controls, quarantine camps, vaccine requirements and testing requirements for travelers, and yet the virus slipped through. OP isn't saying we should throw our hands in the air and just ignore the virus, but we also shouldn't double down on useless measures that do more harm than good, and we shouldn't succumb to wishful thinking that the virus can be magically erased if only everyone did X.
  - adrianN 5y ago
    ICU nurses would strongly disagree with it being "kinda over already", at least where I live.
- creato 5y ago
  Plenty of pandemics have come and gone, this one will pass too, and global technology sharing or not will probably have a negligible impact on that timeline. How many times have we seen a region or country held up as a model for success for whatever reason (lockdowns, vaccines, etc.) only to be a hotspot months later? Just get vaccinated, avoid crowded poorly ventilated places, stop trying to herd 7 billion cats, and move on with your life.
  - BbzzbB 5y ago
    >Plenty of pandemics have come and gone Honest question, how does this one go away on the timescale of a few years to a decade (or, worst case in what truly interests us, a generation)? Couldn't seem to find an answer on pubmed or scholar when I looked, I'm jabbed and have been mindful this whole time but my logic tells me that is not happening. We'd have to get it's R0 low enough that it disappears before mutating a variant that escapes immunity (if that is even necessary given the likelihood of impermanent immunity, at least partial). Is that possible barring a new type of vaccine that entirely prevents infection and reinfection for which we'd have to get full planetary coverage of in time?
    - nradov 5y ago
      SARS-CoV-2 will never disappear. While the vaccines are pretty good at preventing deaths they don't reliably prevent infection or transmission. Even if we had more effective vaccines, the virus stll spreads and mutates in other animal species. There is no real risk that a new variant will completely evade immunity from previous infections. Nothing is 100%. Over the long run it will probably play out similar to the previous coronavirus pandemic. Fortunately this time we have vaccines and other treatments which can prevent most deaths. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7252012/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7252012/
  - didibus 5y ago
    > Plenty of pandemics have come and gone, this one will pass too A lot of them lasted for centuries. People would get it and play the lottery, maybe 3 in 10 would die, the rest develop immunity for example. Most pandemics either end because too many people die, and you're only left with the immune survivors, like the plague. Or they end because of improvement to public health and sanitary practices. Vaccines ended smallpox, condoms and awareness reduced AIDS impact, better water sanitization ended cholera, even the plague ended with help by quarantine and lockdowns. I'm not sure how this one will end, but they almost never "just end" magically. Either some level of herd immunity is achieved, for example by having everyone have it very quickly, and being left with only immune survivors, or the spread is contained through public measures, or immunity is achieved through vaccination, or a drug to cure it is found.
- nradov 5y ago
  A zero COVID policy is impossible. While the vaccines a pretty good at preventing deaths they don't reliably prevent infection or transmission. The virus is also spread by animals.
zuminator 5y ago
Maybe you missed the news that naturally acquired antibodies aren't necessarily effective against further variants.[0] I wouldn't be so glib about hoping that millions get infected. If it turns out that Omicron is decidedly less deadly than the prior mutations, that of itself will shape policy decisions toward fewer restrictions. But if it's as deadly or more deadly, our best option is for a slow spread so we have time to revise our treatments as needed without unnecessary loss of life. [0] https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/02/world/africa/virus-omicron-variant-reinfection.html https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/02/world/africa/virus-omicro...
- unmole 5y ago
  Prior Infection Is Little Defense Against Virus Variant, Scientists Say claims the NYT based on a study that found thet 2.7% of subjects might have been reinfected.
- peteradio 5y ago
  From where does NYT derive that conclusion?
- sliken 5y ago
  I follow medcram on youtube, he's a doctor and dives into COVID related topics. He gives his opinion, and provides sources on the papers he references. Generally the research presented made a case that getting COVID provided better protection than the vaccines, until Delta. Similarly Omicron seems to have a higher breakthrough rate for vaccinated folks than the previous variants.
benjaminwootton 5y ago
Predictable downvotes, but you are right that the sooner we lose the unwinnable war the better.
- wesleywt 5y ago
  Predictable uninformed comment.

tehjoker 5y ago

The more infections there are the more variants and more fit variants there are. Only a zero COVID policy with global technology sharing will realistically end this.

tasogare 5y ago
No. Also it's kinda over already, save for the media fearmongering. It's ridiculous to expect 0 death worldwide for any disease. We have to accept a few people will die of it from times to times, just like it is with the flu (which is targeting the same population anyway so nothing really changed).
- tehjoker 5y ago
  Assuming you live in the US, that is the kind of thing a person living in the country with the most deaths in the world would say.
  - chrononaut 5y ago
    > Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith. > Eschew flamebait. Avoid unrelated controversies and generic tangents.
    - tehjoker 5y ago
      Tone policing someone protesting a call for millions of deaths is really something.
- Klinky 5y ago
  There's still more than "a few" people dying "from time to time", so even by your metric, it is not over, or anywhere near over.
  - AtlasBarfed 5y ago
    Yes, about 300,000 americans (taking us over 1 million deaths) will probably die in the next four-five months given the current numbers. Definitely not a few. We were on the downslide of the third big bump of COVID deaths per worldometers, but let's face it, there's going to be a big fourth even without Omicron from the infections from far less restrained Xmas/Thanksgiving get togethers. I hope I'm wrong...
    - rswail 5y ago
      A large chunk of those deaths is due to the lack of urgency to get people vaccinated, as well as, somehow, your political allegiance deciding whether you get vaccinated, stop spreading disease by mask usage etc. The US is one of the worst examples of COVID response, both during Trump's era and the post-Trump/QAnon/Fox/OAN/etc spread of bullshit propaganda. It's not Xmas/Thanksgiving that's the issue, it's the lack of following logical safety and vaccination measures, somehow tied to "freedom" without considering the "general welfare".
- wesleywt 5y ago
  I never understand these comments. We try are prevent deaths for all diseases. Infectious diseases are probably the easiest ones to prevent. Yet, we have these odd comments that we should allow people to die just as we allow people to die with the flu. We don't just allow people to die of the flu either, we try and vaccinate vulnerable groups. But ignorant comments such as this stand in the way of these effects. Just as it stands in the way of effectively dealing with Covid. The issue is this disease is killing younger people than those who typically die of the flu. There number of general hospitalizations is significantly higher, with more longer lasting after infection effects. Nearly all my friends who have had Covid can't taste or smell. That alone should scare you. I have not had it, because I am vaccinated and wear a mask while I do my normal social activities here in South Africa.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - henrikschroder 5y ago
    How's our track record at preventing influenza or the common cold, both of which are transmitted as airborne viruses? The problem is that most of the things that governments around the world have been doing to try to combat corona are completely useless, and carry a huge cost for society. We're killing people with lockdowns and school closures and by limiting medical procedures. Suicides among children and teenagers are up. Deaths of despair are up. Cancer screenings are down. The future healthcare debt is just piling up. If our strategy is killing more people than we're saving, we should stop and re-think the strategy! The hubris is enormous. Countries think they can eradicate sars-cov-2, and every single attempt has been an abysmal failure. Omicron has been detected in Australia. How? They have incredibly strict border controls, quarantine camps, vaccine requirements and testing requirements for travelers, and yet the virus slipped through. OP isn't saying we should throw our hands in the air and just ignore the virus, but we also shouldn't double down on useless measures that do more harm than good, and we shouldn't succumb to wishful thinking that the virus can be magically erased if only everyone did X.
- adrianN 5y ago
  ICU nurses would strongly disagree with it being "kinda over already", at least where I live.
creato 5y ago
Plenty of pandemics have come and gone, this one will pass too, and global technology sharing or not will probably have a negligible impact on that timeline. How many times have we seen a region or country held up as a model for success for whatever reason (lockdowns, vaccines, etc.) only to be a hotspot months later? Just get vaccinated, avoid crowded poorly ventilated places, stop trying to herd 7 billion cats, and move on with your life.
- BbzzbB 5y ago
  >Plenty of pandemics have come and gone Honest question, how does this one go away on the timescale of a few years to a decade (or, worst case in what truly interests us, a generation)? Couldn't seem to find an answer on pubmed or scholar when I looked, I'm jabbed and have been mindful this whole time but my logic tells me that is not happening. We'd have to get it's R0 low enough that it disappears before mutating a variant that escapes immunity (if that is even necessary given the likelihood of impermanent immunity, at least partial). Is that possible barring a new type of vaccine that entirely prevents infection and reinfection for which we'd have to get full planetary coverage of in time?
  - nradov 5y ago
    SARS-CoV-2 will never disappear. While the vaccines are pretty good at preventing deaths they don't reliably prevent infection or transmission. Even if we had more effective vaccines, the virus stll spreads and mutates in other animal species. There is no real risk that a new variant will completely evade immunity from previous infections. Nothing is 100%. Over the long run it will probably play out similar to the previous coronavirus pandemic. Fortunately this time we have vaccines and other treatments which can prevent most deaths. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7252012/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7252012/
- didibus 5y ago
  > Plenty of pandemics have come and gone, this one will pass too A lot of them lasted for centuries. People would get it and play the lottery, maybe 3 in 10 would die, the rest develop immunity for example. Most pandemics either end because too many people die, and you're only left with the immune survivors, like the plague. Or they end because of improvement to public health and sanitary practices. Vaccines ended smallpox, condoms and awareness reduced AIDS impact, better water sanitization ended cholera, even the plague ended with help by quarantine and lockdowns. I'm not sure how this one will end, but they almost never "just end" magically. Either some level of herd immunity is achieved, for example by having everyone have it very quickly, and being left with only immune survivors, or the spread is contained through public measures, or immunity is achieved through vaccination, or a drug to cure it is found.
nradov 5y ago
A zero COVID policy is impossible. While the vaccines a pretty good at preventing deaths they don't reliably prevent infection or transmission. The virus is also spread by animals.

zuminator 5y ago

Maybe you missed the news that naturally acquired antibodies aren't necessarily effective against further variants.[0] I wouldn't be so glib about hoping that millions get infected. If it turns out that Omicron is decidedly less deadly than the prior mutations, that of itself will shape policy decisions toward fewer restrictions. But if it's as deadly or more deadly, our best option is for a slow spread so we have time to revise our treatments as needed without unnecessary loss of life. [0] https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/02/world/africa/virus-omicron-variant-reinfection.html https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/02/world/africa/virus-omicro...

unmole 5y ago
Prior Infection Is Little Defense Against Virus Variant, Scientists Say claims the NYT based on a study that found thet 2.7% of subjects might have been reinfected.
peteradio 5y ago
From where does NYT derive that conclusion?
sliken 5y ago
I follow medcram on youtube, he's a doctor and dives into COVID related topics. He gives his opinion, and provides sources on the papers he references. Generally the research presented made a case that getting COVID provided better protection than the vaccines, until Delta. Similarly Omicron seems to have a higher breakthrough rate for vaccinated folks than the previous variants.

benjaminwootton 5y ago

Predictable downvotes, but you are right that the sooner we lose the unwinnable war the better.

wesleywt 5y ago
Predictable uninformed comment.