I’m so sorry. What a miserable experience. I kept mine home earlier this week for colds, and tested them 3 days in a row before sending them back. Was pleasantly surprised to hear that the 2nd grader’s class had all of their cold “sufferers” do the same. Luck of the draw…
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A relative of mine recently who had cold symptoms and refused to get a Covid test said “it’s not Covid, just a virus.” Ummm … Covid is a virus. Then she proceeded to say she thinks she needs an antibiotic and then will be fine … double face palm.
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When it comes down to is I just don’t want to be a link in the chain. I am concerned about my unvaccinated 4-year-old, but I also know that outcomes for him would most likely be okay. Still, I prefer he be vaccinated.
But at the end of the day, I want to do everything I can to prevent anyone from getting sick and dying. I have no idea what anyone’s health needs are, but while there is significant community spread, and while I could be the one to spread it. I’m going to do what I can - mask in public, take tests if I feel sick at all, just generally try to do the right thing.
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Hope you recover soon!
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This is great to hear. Our school sent a mass email last week emphasizing that too many kids are being sent to school with symptoms. The school is sending those kids home and requiring a negative PCR to come back to school. The school asked that parents please stop sending kids to school with symptoms.
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Hope everything turns out ok. What an awful situation? For what it’s worth, Happy Anniversary.
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Good to know. I saw that and scheduled DS17 through Walgreens instead.
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Feel better soon!
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Don’t beat yourself up about this too much. COVID is much morel likely to be spread through the air vs. on utensils or popcorn boxes. Think of it more like second hand smoke. Handwashing helps with all germs but COVID transmission is much more likely to be from sharing air, not sharing snacks.
As others have said, thank you for choosing not to go to work and for getting tested. And thank you for getting vaccinated despite your reservations. And thank you for masking even though you are vaccinated.
I very much enjoyed your trip report. I’m sorry you’re sick and I hope you are better soon! .
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I am still trying to catch up on my usual sources for the week. The volume of rapidly emerging information is mind blowing. And it’s not just Omicron, which still isn’t prevalent enough in the US to be playing a significant factor to the current Delta caseload.
Andy Slavitt had Scott Gottlieb on his podcast on Wednesday. I’m actually not a huge fan of Gottlieb, especially in sound bites (including his own tweets) due to philosophical differences and his tendency towards dispensing excessive amounts of “hopium”, but from what I’ve observed he’s generally factually accurate and is extremely knowledgeable. (Gottlieb is currently on the board of directors for Pfizer and was FDA Commissioner under Trump pre-pandemic).
I found the part of their discussion on variant-specific boosters very interesting.
Another reason they haven’t put out variant-specific boosters to date is because in the trials for one of them (I think it was Beta) they found it provided excellent protection against that specific variant, but markedly less protection against every other variant when compared to the original vaccine. Basically, the original vaccine targets the common ancestor of all variants so has some applicability to all of them, whereas variants may be divergent enough for variant-specific boosters to be too targeted.
With Delta pretty much taking over the world in the last few months, they’ve been going under the assumption that any new problematic variants would evolve out of Delta, so a Delta specific booster going forward would be beneficial against the majority of circulating variants.
And then Omicron happened.
It is just so different from all the other variants of concern, they’re not sure how much compatibility there would be between an Omicron-specific booster and any other variant, and vice versa.
Also, testing of poly-variant boosters needs to be a more thorough process, because they really need to understand any potential for dilution or even neutralizing of the body’s response for each combination, whereas they feel pretty confident of their understanding of the process for developing any mono-variant booster. So we are unlikely to see any poly-variant booster before fall 2022, whereas they’re targeting March to have an Omicron-specific booster initially available.
Because of all the above, Gottlieb is thinking that most people will do well with just getting boosted now with the original vaccine (to achieve broadest coverage), and then the Omicron booster will have limited targeted distribution as an additional booster just to those demographics demonstrating a need for it (perhaps immunocompromised, elderly, etc…we should know by March). Then look for a poly-variant booster perhaps for everyone in fall 2022.
He said the current presumption is that the protection of a third dose against Omicron would be roughly equivalent to the protection of two doses against Delta (he didn’t specify if that was prior to any waning of not). He said these numbers are very highly speculative at this point, but maybe something like…
40% protective against infection
60% protective against symptomatic disease
85% protective against severe disease
Don’t base decisions off those, he stated he was just throwing them out to get a perspective on what we might see.
But the point is, boosters are needed for everyone, and get them with the original vaccine as soon as you are eligible, don’t wait for an Omicron-specific booster because you may not be eligible for it anyway.
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Good overview of the latest data. (Krammer is at Mount Sinai and is hugely respected in the epidemiology world.)
https://twitter.com/florian_krammer/status/1469546076101296131?s=21
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My first thought when looking at that chart - the red line looked like a timeline that had suddenly had too many variants split off (thank you very much, Loki). Too much MCU…
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The chances of this happening seem so ridiculously small. And yet. Here we are.
All in all though it’s a very interesting take on vaccines for variants.
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Thank you for sharing your story. I too loved your trip report.
We leave to WDW tomorrow among Orange County being labeled a hot spot again. DD9 had a fever this week (this is her 4th sickness since school year began in a new school district). They are masked indoors but not out. Luckily we have done pcr for each sickness and she’s been COVID negative. We’re lucky to have easy access to testing and flexible work so we can work from home when need be. She’s also now fully vaccinated.
We plan on using K95 masks and face shields on the plane (mostly cause she’s still always touching her face). All eating will be outdoors. We will wear masks indoors and out. BUT we have an Oga’s reservation and your story really makes me rethink that idea. I’ve also been looking for a Topolinos reservation. Maybe not now.
It’s so easy now that she’s vaccinated and I’m boosted to want to relax. That COVID fatigue is strong. But if we do get sick, the repercussions to our work, our family, missing school etc becomes too much.
Thank you again and I hope you feel better asap!
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They probably are. But you give something enough opportunities to happen and it becomes inevitable. The odds of someone winning the lottery are tiny, but it happens every week.
We should have vaccinated the world. I don’t know why we didn’t. What are the barriers to this? Cost can’t be a barrier: as I think I’ve said in this thread before, we literally have all the money in the world.
If the world weren’t so bizarrely compliant in funnelling vast amounts of money to a tiny number of people, we might actually be able to tackle the existential threats we face.
If you are not disgusted by the concept of a billionaire then you’ll just have to accept that your way of life is under increasing threat and that this is just a natural consequence of the political choices you are for some reason making. Is it that you think you might be a billionaire one day and so want to protect your future wealth? Or that you think the philanthropy of billionaires in solving the world’s problems is already pushing itself to the limit and there is nothing more than can be done?
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It feels like a few black swan events occurred with the virus over the past 2 years to create this nightmare.
But imagine what this would have been like 20 years ago without the benefit of mRNA vaccines?!? The death toll would likely be a multiple of the current numbers.
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It seems there is a consensus that this many mutations don’t “just happen” all at once. It would indeed be a ridiculously small possibility.
There also seems to be a consensus there are 3 possibilities. The discussion is around which of the 3 is most likely.
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These mutations have been slowly evolving over time in one or more pockets of people where no surveillance is being done. (This is considered least likely. Some areas have poor surveillance, but this would have to have been staying under the radar a very long time.)
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One of the places where it spread to a wild animal population, it evolved in that population, then jumped backed to humans. (For instance, Covid has been widespread in the US deer population, so any number of mammals could be a possibility.)
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That someone that’s immunocompromised was unable to clear the virus for a prolonged period of time (weeks or months).
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMsb2104756
So, yeah, our lack of diligence in resolving the global HIV situation has possibly collided with our lackluster global response to the Covid pandemic. We’ll see what the repercussions of that are.
High rates of community spread will eventually find immunocompromised individuals, resulting in ongoing variants. We’re playing with fire, big time.
Also, vaccine hesitancy isn’t just a challenge in the US. Unfortunately, when they’ve looked into the sources of the hesitancy, turns out the US has done a much more effective job of exporting Covid misinformation than it has vaccines. 
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Don’t even get me started. (Oops. Too late.) That’s not just about the rich wanting to keep a larger and larger share of the pie.
It’s because HIV is a gay disease and those people deserve to die. (Yes, I know it isn’t. Any more than the Spanish flu was Spanish. But labels stick and simple messages hang around.)
Thanks, Reagan.
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I can’t like that post but you nailed it.
Or, at the very least, “not a problem for people like me so not my problem” running rampant. Which seems to be kind of a theme here.
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Wow.
I just reconnected with a friend I haven’t spoken to in about a decade. We got onto the subject of COVID and vaccines.
Wow.
I’ve never spoken to an anti-vaxxer before. Those people are nuts. I mean properly delusional crazies.
Wow.
He describes COVID vaccines as “experimental”. He’s read that 80% of pregnant women who get the vaccine then miscarry. He believes the “mainstream” media (yup, that old chestnut) are part of a global conspiracy to cover “facts” like this up.
Wow.
Any of you familiar with the Fermi paradox? It’s super-interesting. It basically asks “where is everyone?” Given the size of the universe — the number of stars, the number of planets — why have we never detected signs of intelligent life elsewhere?
There are some fascinating theories as to why. One is called the “Great Filter”. All sufficiently advanced technological societies eventually end up becoming extinct before they get to the point of being detectable by other civilisations. Something kills them off.
I think we might be approaching the Great Filter. I think we’re going to kill ourselves off because we are so unimaginably stupid, despite having iPhones.
If you look at the typical belief-set of an average American (sorry, but you people are the worst) your jaw just falls off completely with astonishment.
As a species we deserve to die off. We’re fricken morons. If viruses don’t get us, climate change will. Maybe nukes.
If you’re an anti-vaxxer you are just breathtakingly and wilfully stupid. You have allowed yourself to be manipulated by the same people who have persuaded you it’s best that they have all the money and you scrape by. Dumbasses.
My anti-vaxxer friend? He smokes weed. You know, that super-healthy, not at all dangerous addiction that people have. But he’s smart. No vaccines for him. They’re poison.
Did you know that nearly three and a half BILLION people have had two COVID shots. Sorry, experimental vaccines. Just think of all those miscarriages. Wow.
In other news, half a million people die in motor accidents per year. I assume the anti-vaxxer crazies avoid those death-traps. Alone with drugs, tobacco, alcohol, sugar, …
No? Hmm. How odd.
People are idiots.
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