Bad News Thread

Grace T. said:
The monkey wrench in this is that South Africa despite having what’s been reported as the worst of the variants isn’t exhibiting the same behavior (yet). I agree that the most likely explanation of what happening is the variants. But it also doesn’t explain why all Scandinavia is behaving the same. There’s another factor here we aren’t fully understanding (maybe spring/fall season affects but who knows).
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How so? SA had a large mid winter outbreak in July/August, and a second outbreak when the SA variant hit them in January.

Seems completely consistent with a high transmissibility SA variant.

It is the same behavior, it just hit them early, and did not come on top of a winter Christmas surge.
 
dad4 said:
How so? SA had a large mid winter outbreak in July/August, and a second outbreak when the SA variant hit them in January.

Seems completely consistent with a high transmissibility SA variant.

It is the same behavior, it just hit them early, and did not come on top of a winter Christmas surge.
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Agree but it requires some scary assumptions: that the South Africa variant was an early variant which crowded out other variants in sa leading to the dec surge, that the infection rates are much higher than testing indicates (plausible given it’s a 3rd world country) and that so many people have been infected by the new variant (including those who had the prior variants because prior immunity is imperfect) that they are now close to herd immunity. It would be a trifecta of awfulness and (is the seasonal variance isn’t holding up due to this new variant) awful news for our summer. The only decent news then would be it’s not much deadlier seeing sa hasn’t had a wave of death on par with say Italy at the beginning of the pandemic, despite being close to herd immunity. I’m skeptical of this scenario but I agree it’s possible
 
dad4 said:
Fair enough.

The question is whether this is a temporary flat on the way down, or the flat spot before it turns up.

We will know in a few weeks, I guess.

Osterholm says it's the flat before another, larger mountain, but I don't quite follow his numbers on that. ( Not that I have any real qualifications. Just sport for me. )
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I think we'd likely be looking at another significant wave if it wasn't for the vaccine. It wouldn't surprise me to see a relatively small mountain. However, 3 weeks from now we are looking at 20% vaccinated another 30% who haven't been vaccinated who already had it and we'll be vaccinating about 1% / day. I just don't see where the big mountain gets all its bodies.
 
Grace T. said:
Agree but it requires some scary assumptions: that the South Africa variant was an early variant which crowded out other variants in sa leading to the dec surge, that the infection rates are much higher than testing indicates (plausible given it’s a 3rd world country) and that so many people have been infected by the new variant (including those who had the prior variants because prior immunity is imperfect) that they are now close to herd immunity. It would be a trifecta of awfulness and (is the seasonal variance isn’t holding up due to this new variant) awful news for our summer. The only decent news then would be it’s not much deadlier seeing sa hasn’t had a wave of death on par with say Italy at the beginning of the pandemic, despite being close to herd immunity. I’m skeptical of this scenario but I agree it’s possible
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The one thing we have going for us is that humans and viruses have been around for a long time and ... we're still around. I am assuming it's because, even with variants, severity decreases if you had an earlier version of the virus.
 
Grace T. said:
Agree but it requires some scary assumptions: that the South Africa variant was an early variant which crowded out other variants in sa leading to the dec surge, that the infection rates are much higher than testing indicates (plausible given it’s a 3rd world country) and that so many people have been infected by the new variant (including those who had the prior variants because prior immunity is imperfect) that they are now close to herd immunity. It would be a trifecta of awfulness and (is the seasonal variance isn’t holding up due to this new variant) awful news for our summer. The only decent news then would be it’s not much deadlier seeing sa hasn’t had a wave of death on par with say Italy at the beginning of the pandemic, despite being close to herd immunity. I’m skeptical of this scenario but I agree it’s possible
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Look at the median age in SA: 27.6 years. Barely over half of the median age in Italy.

You would not expect a huge wave of deaths in such a demographically young country.

Partial herd immunity aided by behavior changes seems a reasonable explanation. Remember that, if you adopt good anti-viral practices, herd immunity comes at a lower level. We may just be talking about a country of mostly young people, wearing masks, and spending time outside. Add in a bit of being afraid to gather for the last few months, and those 4 factors may explain the shape of the SA curve.

Good point on the prevalence of the SA variant within SA. If the SA variant is somehow still minor within SA, my theory is bunk.
 
dad4 said:
Look at the median age in SA: 27.6 years. Barely over half of the median age in Italy.

You would not expect a huge wave of deaths in such a demographically young country.

Partial herd immunity aided by behavior changes seems a reasonable explanation. Remember that, if you adopt good anti-viral practices, herd immunity comes at a lower level. We may just be talking about a country of mostly young people, wearing masks, and spending time outside. Add in a bit of being afraid to gather for the last few months, and those 4 factors may explain the shape of the SA curve.

Good point on the prevalence of the SA variant within SA. If the SA variant is somehow still minor within SA, my theory is bunk.
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Well the data out of Europe south of Scandinavia this weekend isnt great. Czech Republic is looking awful. Poland Romania Germany Ne all rising slightly (too early to see if it’s a new wave or just a bump up but given how these things go once direction changes it’s usually the former). France and Italy plateaued. Only real bright spots in the eu are spain and Belgium which have been the hardest hit countries so far. Given the eu vaccine rollout has been such a s show so far, if this is the start of the next wave it’s really awful for them.
 
Not sure if this should go in good news or bad news thread...

Cultural appropriating teacher union president being entirely hypocritical.

www.kqed.org

After Leading School Closures, Berkeley Teachers Union President Spotted Dropping Daughter Off at In-Person Preschool | KQED

Parents shoot video of Matt Meyer, president of the Berkeley Federation of Teachers, dropping his 2-year-old off for in-person instruction even as he fights against in-person instruction for Berkeley public school teachers until they are all vaccinated, which the parents' groups view as hypocrisy.
www.kqed.org www.kqed.org
 
texanincali said:
Not sure if this should go in good news or bad news thread...

Cultural appropriating teacher union president being entirely hypocritical.

www.kqed.org

After Leading School Closures, Berkeley Teachers Union President Spotted Dropping Daughter Off at In-Person Preschool | KQED

Parents shoot video of Matt Meyer, president of the Berkeley Federation of Teachers, dropping his 2-year-old off for in-person instruction even as he fights against in-person instruction for Berkeley public school teachers until they are all vaccinated, which the parents' groups view as hypocrisy.
www.kqed.org www.kqed.org
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I posted that article in the good news thread, because it was good news that he’s hypocrites are being exposed one by one.
 
One of the other points that was discussed at this forum I attended was the economic implications of COVID (the talking heads were split on pent up demand v. long underlying structural damage) and the implications of printing so much money over COVID relief. I've become substantially darker over the months in my long term outlook. This doesn't exactly move my needle to the more sunny side of things.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1366467823367843841
 
Hüsker Dü said:
So I guess the question is do you agree with what says he is for or his actions?
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Not sure I understand your question, because he is taking action that contradicts his other actions

His actions of taking his pre-school DD to a school outside of his district for in person learning, contradicts his other actions of not allowing in-person schooling in the district he resides over (even for pre-schoolers) because his position is that it is “not safe”.

So my thoughts are, either there is a political/union agenda that he must fall in line with to keep his job that goes against how he truly feels (this he sends his own kids to school) OR....well, I honestly can’t think of another reason why someone would do this but I’m open to listen.
 
Kicker4Life said:
Not sure I understand your question, because he is taking action that contradicts his other actions

His actions of taking his pre-school DD to a school outside of his district for in person learning, contradicts his other actions of not allowing in-person schooling in the district he resides over (even for pre-schoolers) because his position is that it is “not safe”.

So my thoughts are, either there is a political/union agenda that he must fall in line with to keep his job that goes against how he truly feels (this he sends his own kids to school) OR....well, I honestly can’t think of another reason why someone would do this but I’m open to listen.
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As all rational public officials are trying to serve and protect there will always be some hypocrites. We have hypocrites calling others hypocrites, we have grown adults who believe in vampires, worldwide cabals and believe trump is secretly still president. It’s a mixed up world right now.
 
Hüsker Dü said:
As all rational public officials are trying to serve and protect there will always be some hypocrites. We have hypocrites calling others hypocrites, we have grown adults who believe in vampires, worldwide cabals and believe trump is secretly still president. It’s a mixed up world right now.
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Sorry but I don’t see how people believing in vampires or people believing that Trump is still president have anything to do with someone who is an elected official keeping people from going to school while they drop their children off at school in another district.
 
Kicker4Life said:
Sorry but I don’t see how people believing in vampires or people believing that Trump is still president have anything to do with someone who is an elected official keeping people from going to school while they drop their children off at school in another district.
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So you missed the first part?
 
Bad news is coming to get many. Karma has no friends folks. Time to lawyer up and this is just the beginning of playing the game, "Dominos."

New York Governor Cuomo hires defense lawyer in nursing home probe

Look's like his bro can only cover him for so long and when bad news comes, he can;t cover for his bro anymore.

“Obviously, I’m aware of what’s going on with my brother,” ((I bet you are aware of your bro)) the CNN host said on Monday. “Obviously, I cannot cover it because he is my brother. Now, of course CNN has to cover it. They have covered it extensively and they will continue to do so.”
 
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