7 ms·

Is there evidence for this? The typical theory is that during winter, you get more people indoors, in close proximity with poor ventilation- similarly planes i

Is there evidence for this? The typical theory is that during winter, you get more people indoors, in close proximity with poor ventilation- similarly planes is just about a large number of people sitting in close proximity for an extended period.

mschuster91 2y ago
> The typical theory is that during winter, you get more people indoors, in close proximity with poor ventilation Covid by far is no longer a "winter only" thing. The US has a record covid wave [1], so does Germany [2] and the UK [3]. Unfortunately politicians worldwide have pretty much given up preventing Covid transmission, mostly due to the serious backlash from shortsighted large employers and the far-right - some places like Nassau County (NY, US) even ban people from wearing masks [4] to protect themselves. Not to mention large parts of the population itself - try wearing a mask in public these days, people will either look at you like you're some sort of madman or they'll just outright assault you [5]. And all of that despite serious indicators that even minor measures like air filters in kindergartens and schools massively reduce sick times... it's truly maddening, air filters don't impact anyone, they're cheap to operate. But people don't want any kind of reminder of the lockdown era, they sometimes even violently respond to that. We regulate literally everything needed for survival... our water gets tested to make sure it's free of contaminants, food and medicine production of all kinds has to comply with very strict requirements, noise polluters such as cars, trucks and heavy machinery get regulated... but the air we breathe? Nothing except particulate emissions from cars and industry gets regulated. Children have to learn in schools no matter how hot, humid, CO2-overloaded or moldy it is. Workers enjoy barely any protection as well. And it takes a massive amount of mold for a residential building to be declared unfit for living, maintaining air-condition installations (especially filters) isn't a requirement, which means landlords can get away with a lot of shit... It's a disgrace how far we have all fallen. [1] https://edition.cnn.com/2024/08/16/health/covid-largest-summer-wave/index.html https://edition.cnn.com/2024/08/16/health/covid-largest-summ... [2] https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2024/07/17/bxrf-j17.html https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2024/07/17/bxrf-j17.html [3] https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/ck5g2jk0730o https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/ck5g2jk0730o [4] https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2024/08/27/nassau-mask-ban/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2024/08/27/nassau-mask... [5] https://www.newsweek.com/will-keenan-attacked-wearing-face-mask-covid-debbie-rochon-1826686 https://www.newsweek.com/will-keenan-attacked-wearing-face-m...
- BjoernKW 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - mschuster91 2y ago
    > Anyway, what do you suggest? Lockdowns and civil rights restrictions forever? I literally wrote what I suggested and what you're asking: mandate air purifiers (and ventilation/AC in general...) for public and educational buildings. Additionally to that and specially for the US: introduce unlimited paid sick time, just like every other Western country already has. And maaaaybe introduce by law a ban on knowingly sending sick kids to kindergarten/schools. It's utterly insane to watch every year how the weeks after major holidays are filled with "colleague X is out sick, caught a bug from their kids". If there is one thing every parent in my social circle is cursing about, it is all the tons of bugs their kids bring home from school because other parents can't be arsed to let their kid spend a few days at home watching TV - and it's not just covid. Lice, ordinary flu, hand-foot-mouth or whatever it's called in English, measles, ordinary fever, vomit/diarrhea... > For trying to avoid an illness at all costs that not only wasn't particularly dangerous to begin with for the general population In the US alone, 1.2 million people died of COVID. That's far from "wasn't particularly dangerous". > but also is very much manageable today, particularly considering that most people are vaccinated now (or at least have the opportunity to get vaccinated). Vaccines aren't perfect, even including them about 3-5% of the infected have a risk for debilitating long-covid (i.e. ME/CFS). It's not a gamble I want to take part in.
    - BjoernKW 2y ago
      I'm very much in favour of using (or even mandating) air purifiers and dissuading (or banning) people from going to work or sending their kids to school with a communicable disease (including any respiratory illness, not just COVID-19; people seem to think "It's not Covid. So, it doesn't matter."). Implementing such highly useful measures hasn't been tried, though, at least not at any meaningful scale. Everything politicians tried was about more restrictions and ever more severe lockdowns. > Vaccines aren't perfect, even including them about 3-5% of the infected have a risk for debilitating long-covid (i.e. ME/CFS). It's not a gamble I want to take part in. Again, I'm totally fine with that. I'm myself still getting vaccinated once a year with an updated vaccine and I occasionally still wear masks depending in the setting (cramped indoor spaces, particularly during cold season). If people personally want to avoid that risk that's perfectly ok. Demanding others behave in a certain way (e.g., by enforcing restrictions on their freedom of movement) is not, though.
jajko 2y ago
Its common knowledge in regions with stronger winters that indoor humidity needs to be well managed (aka avoid too dry air) since upper breathing tract is more prone to infections. I've experienced it myself numerous times, so did my family and literally everybody in that region I know. Nobody ever bothered to look for peer-reviewed study of something one experiences every winter during ones whole life (just like ie eating raw strong garlic works very well as prevention of infections, not so much once sick). Now that's not the sole reason for transmissions of course, but weakened outer defenses help infections a lot.

mschuster91 2y ago

> The typical theory is that during winter, you get more people indoors, in close proximity with poor ventilation Covid by far is no longer a "winter only" thing. The US has a record covid wave [1], so does Germany [2] and the UK [3]. Unfortunately politicians worldwide have pretty much given up preventing Covid transmission, mostly due to the serious backlash from shortsighted large employers and the far-right - some places like Nassau County (NY, US) even ban people from wearing masks [4] to protect themselves. Not to mention large parts of the population itself - try wearing a mask in public these days, people will either look at you like you're some sort of madman or they'll just outright assault you [5]. And all of that despite serious indicators that even minor measures like air filters in kindergartens and schools massively reduce sick times... it's truly maddening, air filters don't impact anyone, they're cheap to operate. But people don't want any kind of reminder of the lockdown era, they sometimes even violently respond to that. We regulate literally everything needed for survival... our water gets tested to make sure it's free of contaminants, food and medicine production of all kinds has to comply with very strict requirements, noise polluters such as cars, trucks and heavy machinery get regulated... but the air we breathe? Nothing except particulate emissions from cars and industry gets regulated. Children have to learn in schools no matter how hot, humid, CO2-overloaded or moldy it is. Workers enjoy barely any protection as well. And it takes a massive amount of mold for a residential building to be declared unfit for living, maintaining air-condition installations (especially filters) isn't a requirement, which means landlords can get away with a lot of shit... It's a disgrace how far we have all fallen. [1] https://edition.cnn.com/2024/08/16/health/covid-largest-summer-wave/index.html https://edition.cnn.com/2024/08/16/health/covid-largest-summ... [2] https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2024/07/17/bxrf-j17.html https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2024/07/17/bxrf-j17.html [3] https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/ck5g2jk0730o https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/ck5g2jk0730o [4] https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2024/08/27/nassau-mask-ban/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2024/08/27/nassau-mask... [5] https://www.newsweek.com/will-keenan-attacked-wearing-face-mask-covid-debbie-rochon-1826686 https://www.newsweek.com/will-keenan-attacked-wearing-face-m...

BjoernKW 2y ago
[flagged]
- mschuster91 2y ago
  > Anyway, what do you suggest? Lockdowns and civil rights restrictions forever? I literally wrote what I suggested and what you're asking: mandate air purifiers (and ventilation/AC in general...) for public and educational buildings. Additionally to that and specially for the US: introduce unlimited paid sick time, just like every other Western country already has. And maaaaybe introduce by law a ban on knowingly sending sick kids to kindergarten/schools. It's utterly insane to watch every year how the weeks after major holidays are filled with "colleague X is out sick, caught a bug from their kids". If there is one thing every parent in my social circle is cursing about, it is all the tons of bugs their kids bring home from school because other parents can't be arsed to let their kid spend a few days at home watching TV - and it's not just covid. Lice, ordinary flu, hand-foot-mouth or whatever it's called in English, measles, ordinary fever, vomit/diarrhea... > For trying to avoid an illness at all costs that not only wasn't particularly dangerous to begin with for the general population In the US alone, 1.2 million people died of COVID. That's far from "wasn't particularly dangerous". > but also is very much manageable today, particularly considering that most people are vaccinated now (or at least have the opportunity to get vaccinated). Vaccines aren't perfect, even including them about 3-5% of the infected have a risk for debilitating long-covid (i.e. ME/CFS). It's not a gamble I want to take part in.
  - BjoernKW 2y ago
    I'm very much in favour of using (or even mandating) air purifiers and dissuading (or banning) people from going to work or sending their kids to school with a communicable disease (including any respiratory illness, not just COVID-19; people seem to think "It's not Covid. So, it doesn't matter."). Implementing such highly useful measures hasn't been tried, though, at least not at any meaningful scale. Everything politicians tried was about more restrictions and ever more severe lockdowns. > Vaccines aren't perfect, even including them about 3-5% of the infected have a risk for debilitating long-covid (i.e. ME/CFS). It's not a gamble I want to take part in. Again, I'm totally fine with that. I'm myself still getting vaccinated once a year with an updated vaccine and I occasionally still wear masks depending in the setting (cramped indoor spaces, particularly during cold season). If people personally want to avoid that risk that's perfectly ok. Demanding others behave in a certain way (e.g., by enforcing restrictions on their freedom of movement) is not, though.

jajko 2y ago

Its common knowledge in regions with stronger winters that indoor humidity needs to be well managed (aka avoid too dry air) since upper breathing tract is more prone to infections. I've experienced it myself numerous times, so did my family and literally everybody in that region I know. Nobody ever bothered to look for peer-reviewed study of something one experiences every winter during ones whole life (just like ie eating raw strong garlic works very well as prevention of infections, not so much once sick). Now that's not the sole reason for transmissions of course, but weakened outer defenses help infections a lot.