Covid 19

[Pigskin]

What did she get?

BMW

[Pigskin]

359 in hospital in Manitoba on Friday. 19 in ICU, but we had no report deaths.

[Pigskin]

Shanghai in a lockdown. There are 25M people in Shanghai.

[theaardvark]

OK, literally half my staff are either in protocol, or have just exited it.  None seem to have contracted it at work, most have outside contacts that are much more likely, and I'm (knock on wood) still negative.

But this is insane.

My twitter and facebook feeds are full of people posting positive tests. 

Fortunately, so far no serious illnesses, nothing close to hospital.  Thank goodness we are all vaxxed and boosted.  In the meantime, 5 day self isolation is killing my schedule.  Thank goodness we have some staff flexibility, but there are going to be some tough times this week. 

IS this wave of BA2 a good thing?  Will this create "herd immunity"?  I'm no so sure...

[Pigskin]

OK, literally half my staff are either in protocol, or have just exited it.  None seem to have contracted it at work, most have outside contacts that are much more likely, and I'm (knock on wood) still negative.

But this is insane.

My twitter and facebook feeds are full of people posting positive tests. 

Fortunately, so far no serious illnesses, nothing close to hospital.  Thank goodness we are all vaxxed and boosted.  In the meantime, 5 day self isolation is killing my schedule.  Thank goodness we have some staff flexibility, but there are going to be some tough times this week. 

IS this wave of BA2 a good thing?  Will this create "herd immunity"?  I'm no so sure...

Well everyone is walking around without a mask now. So I am not surprised. Jets games probably 90% of the people attending are not wearing masks.

A number of people have had to cancel there surgeries because they have tested positive for covid. This worked out good for me as I thought I wouldn't get my knee surgery for another 6 to 12 months. Turns out Tuesday morning I will be having my surgery.

[theaardvark]

Well everyone is walking around without a mask now. So I am not surprised. Jets games probably 90% of the people attending are not wearing masks.

A number of people have had to cancel there surgeries because they have tested positive for covid. This worked out good for me as I thought I wouldn't get my knee surgery for another 6 to 12 months. Turns out Tuesday morning I will be having my surgery.

Silver linings to everything, I guess... fingers crossed you don't catch it before Tuesday...

Thankfully it is no where near as serious as previous variants.  Whether than is the virus, or our vaxxed and boosted immune systems, who knows.  The rest of the world seems to be heading the wrong way, and China is reporting its worst numbers of the entire pandemic.  Much of the world remains largely unvaxxed, and no doubt variants are breeding, waiting to unleash themselves now that we have let our guard down.

One more month f mask mandate would have cost almost nothing in actual cost and even in political clout, and could have saved a lot of this spread.  I'm guessing they were betting on getting through this wave of less debilitating COVID and coming out the other side with a herd immunity "huzzah!" that they ride to the poles.  But I doubt they had that much strategy involved in this.

I do have to admit disappointment in Obby so far, as the newcomer to the party, he could have used his "at risk" health issues (he has very publicly spoken of his battles with Colitis) to lobby for a more cautious handling of the current pandemic issues, but I haven't heard a word out of his camp about it.  Pretty much the only thing I've seen was him bringing donuts to his first day at work (a "rookie" think from his football days).  Even that, he brought Tim's... when Oh Doughnuts is just down the street, a good, local, female/LGBTQ owned company.  Even Trudeau knew enough to bring locally baked product...

[Pigskin]

The Manitoba Government decided that it was time for people to be responsible and to protect yourself. Some have, and many haven't. The one's that haven't have had covid the one's that have continue to stay save. We continue to keep our circle small, stop going to Jets games once the masks were no longer mandatory, wear a mask everywhere. Hand sanitizer is also another item that is now missing from most public places. As much as I agree keeping the mask mandate in place for awhile long would have been a good idea, no one has made people take them off.

[theaardvark]

The Manitoba Government decided that it was time for people to be responsible and to protect yourself. Some have, and many haven't. The one's that haven't have had covid the one's that have continue to stay save. We continue to keep our circle small, stop going to Jets games once the masks were no longer mandatory, wear a mask everywhere. Hand sanitizer is also another item that is now missing from most public places. As much as I agree keeping the mask mandate in place for awhile long would have been a good idea, no one has made people take them off.

Yes, protecting yourself has become the focus.  And depending on how and where you have to work, that can be difficult.  Masks best reduce spread, n95's can protect, but when the air is loaded with virus, it is hard even for a n95 to protect you.  That's why a mask mandate protects, it reduces the amount of airborne virus dramatically.

Hand sanitizer is never going to hurt to use, but this is a virus shown to be spread through airborne droplets.  Watching people sanitize carts and hands at the grocery store while not wearing a mask is just insane.

A friend of mine says we just all going to get it, might as well get it over with.  And with hospitalizations, ICU and deaths not exploding, it is a sentiment that is getting more prevalent.  For me, "not exploding" is not a good thing.  With out levels of vaccinations and therapeutics, numbers shouldn't be stable, they should be approaching zero. 

And then we add in "long COVID".  We have no idea how many will be affected, or how debilitating it will be.  With Polio, the bad effects were visible.  Not the same with COVID. 

Sure, its now milder, shorter, less likely to cause long term effects, but does that mean we should respect it less?

And "herd immunity", that assumes one course of disease renders a person immune, like measles.  But how many people do you know that have had 2, 3 or even more infections of COVID? 

Now, international distribution of vaccine is starting to end, third world countries that wanted to make their own still have not been given the "recipe", so we have vast unvaxxed populations acting as breeding grounds for variants.  This is just asking for "Omega" to eventually surface, and truly live up to its name.

They say we shouldn't be spending our time doomscrolling... but have you seen the quality of doom out there to scroll?

[Pigskin]

Nice to hear a second booster shot is on it's way. Many people need this. Not sure if I will do mine until September. It will be nice layer of protection for the fall and winter when more people are inside.

[Pigskin]

I have to give a shout out to the Carman Surgical Facility. Very clean professional facility and staff. Little bit of a drive, but it's well worth it.

[theaardvark]

Nice to hear a second booster shot is on it's way. Many people need this. Not sure if I will do mine until September. It will be nice layer of protection for the fall and winter when more people are inside.

Heading to Vegas in June for a twice delayed appearance at the WSOP.  If they set the booster at 6 months, I will be eligible 2 weeks prior to travel, perfect timing.  And you bet i will be there the minute I can get it.

Still not sure if I have had it, have had multiple incidents of one symptom, tested a couple times negative, never had the multiple symptom illnesses I have seen in my co-workers that tested positive.  But who knows.  Do we have any way to see if we have had it?  Is that a blood test my doctor can request when running the rest of my lab work?

[Pigskin]

Manitoba now has 426 in hospital, 24 in ICU, 7 more deaths last week, which brings Manitoba total to 1764 Covid deaths.

[theaardvark]

359 in hospital in Manitoba on Friday. 19 in ICU, but we had no report deaths.

Manitoba now has 426 in hospital, 24 in ICU, 7 more deaths last week, which brings Manitoba total to 1764 Covid deaths.

Not trending in the right way... wastewater also showing upticks...  I'm fine with infection upticks, but not hospitalization and ICU increases...

[Pigskin]

Not trending in the right way... wastewater also showing upticks...  I'm fine with infection upticks, but not hospitalization and ICU increases...

Did you think the numbers were going to go down???

[theaardvark]

Did you think the numbers were going to go down???

I knew infections were going to blast off the charts, but was hoping the "bad outcome" numbers would decline... Omicron / ba.2 being less virulent... I guess that even though numbers are up a bit, its not panic worthy yet...