How was your Omicron experience?

[tede02]

My nuclear family took our turn with this thing over Thanksgiving weekend. We probably had the delta variant but who knows. It's been a brutal 6-7 weeks not because anyone was seriously ill, but after COVID, my kids came down with hand, foot and mouth virus (from daycare) around Xmas and in just the last two days now they have cold symptoms again. Talk about a slog.

 

With respect to our experience with COVID, fortunately it was very mild. My wife is a healthcare professional so she got a booster shot back in September. Tested positive the day after Thanksgiving as did my two kids (5 & 2). My wife was mildly sick for about two days (fatigue and aches). My 5 year old, who had the first round of Pfizer about 3 or 4 weeks prior to testing positive had no symptoms. My two year old had cold symptoms. I somehow escaped (I tested twice) despite being in a household with three people that tested positive. I got my booster shot about a week before this whole thing went down so maybe the timing was just lucky. Lots of mysteries to this virus. 

[cwericb]

P.E.I. is the smallest, but most densely populated province in Canada.

 

However, the province must be doing something right.

 

The U.S. death rate for Covid is 254.88 deaths per 100,000 population.

 

PEI's  population is 165,000 so if we apply the US death rate to that population (254.88x1.65) = 420 deaths.

 

To date PEI's total covid deaths are 0.

 

Safest place in North America?

 

[Gregmal]

This whole thing has basically been Pavlov’s Bell x Stanford Experiment. 95% willing yet unknowingly participate. Very enlightening. 

[SharperDingaan]

Lot of folks in health care are privately saying Omicron comes down as fast as it went up, and that it is largely done by end of Feb. Omicron is also a major blessing, as it has brought forward the endemic (herd immunity) stage of Covid by months, and way more reliably than could have been done by vaccination. Immediate mass infection/immunization of un-vaccinated protestors, vs slow drip.

 

Authorities responsible for ongoing operation of the health care system are in a bind. To mitigate collapse they can only publicly advise caution, and try to minimize hospital visits while 20-30% of staff are down with it. Hence, restrictions and curfews until staff are returning faster than than new ICU admissions grow. Cant yet tell Joe Public to get infected, as there just aren't the beds. However its purely a volume - and not a severity thing  driving the bus. Very temporary.

 

Once the 1st world starts waking up (All at the same time, and in Mar-Apr?), most would expect rapid change.

Runups in economic activity and supply chain, offset by sooner/higher bumps in interest rates and energy prices. The more the recovery becomes evident, the more rapidly public sentiment changes, and the higher/sooner the euphoria spend (VE day effects). Historic asset bubbles start looking like zits.

 

All around the 1st world the messaging has been subtly changing.

It's no longer we're fighting Covid, it's we're living with it. Endemic stage.

 

Once in a lifetime opportunity coming up 

 

SD

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[ERICOPOLY]

7 minutes ago, SharperDingaan said:

Lot of folks in health care are privately saying Omicron comes down as fast as it went up, and that it is largely done by end of Feb. Omicron is also a major blessing, as it has brought forward the endemic (herd immunity) stage of Covid by months, and way more reliably than could have been done by vaccination. Immediate mass infection/immunization of un-vaccinated protestors, vs slow drip.

 

Authorities responsible for ongoing operation of the health care system are in a bind. To mitigate collapse they can only publicly advise caution, and try to minimize hospital visits while 20-30% of staff are down with it. Hence, restrictions and curfews until staff are returning faster than than new ICU admissions grow. Cant yet tell Joe Public to get infected, as there just aren't the beds. However its purely a volume - and not a severity thing  driving the bus. Very temporary.

 

Once the 1st world starts waking up (All at the same time, and in Mar-Apr?), most would expect rapid change.

Runups in economic activity and supply chain, offset by sooner/higher bumps in interest rates and energy prices. The more the recovery becomes evident, the more rapidly public sentiment changes, and the higher/sooner the euphoria spend (VE day effects). Historic asset bubbles start looking like zits.

 

All around the 1st world the messaging has been subtly changing.

It's no longer we're fighting Covid, it's we're living with it. Endemic stage.

 

Once in a lifetime opportunity coming up 

 

SD

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Totally.  I can't fathom the whole "The TOP is coming" sentiment, other than to say yes, IT IS COMING and I'm so excited for it!!!

[Gregmal]

I think it depends on what you invest in. Top already came for the glam stocks of last decade. For the stuff I like, I feel like the kid who’s next in line at the merry go round. The line was long, but the wait will be worth it.

[ERICOPOLY]

I was reading about just how cheap T recently got from a historical standpoint.  Apparently only 1930 was cheaper going back all the way to the 1880s, although the UCLA basketball team under Wooden isn't the same as the one today.  

[Gregmal]

https://nypost.com/2022/01/09/alexandria-ocasio-cortez-tests-positive-for-covid-19/
 

“If I had a dollar for every lockdown politician who decided to escape to Florida over the last two years, I’d be a pretty doggone wealthy man, let me tell ya,” DeSantis, 43, said

 

 

Hopefully AOC recovers. Although her symptoms apparently mimicking that of a hangover, so who knows. 

[ERICOPOLY]

21 minutes ago, Gregmal said:

https://nypost.com/2022/01/09/alexandria-ocasio-cortez-tests-positive-for-covid-19/
 

“If I had a dollar for every lockdown politician who decided to escape to Florida over the last two years, I’d be a pretty doggone wealthy man, let me tell ya,” DeSantis, 43, said

 

 

Hopefully AOC recovers. Although her symptoms apparently mimicking that of a hangover, so who knows. 

 

DeSantis is cute, but AOC is vaccinated today and lockdowns predated that.

[RedLion]

On 1/7/2022 at 9:40 AM, Gregmal said:

Yup. And it will be OK. So let’s just get there already. The people whom are uneasy will get used to it once they see there’s nothing to worry about. 

It's about damn time. It's been almost impossible to run a small business these last two years, and for what, everyone is going to catch the damn thing eventually. 

 

It's funny that in my personal circle the doctors and medical professionals seem to be the least worried about covid, while the teachers say to "believe in science" and sanitize their grocery bags. 

Edited January 10, 2022 by RedLion

[Gregmal]

Yea but don’t worry, all you small businesses. While you’re riddled with burdens, Walmart is open and happy to poach your business. 
 

Meanwhile the clowns in Canada still can’t even figure out how to host a hockey game. At least we re not THAT bad.

[ERICOPOLY]

Because OSHA ETA ran out last month, employees can no longer stay home sick AND PAID if they had previously exhausted sick time.  Unless their employer voluntarily gives them additional paid sick time.

 

The sunsetting of that policy is a covid spread accelerator.   From what I am seeing, people do not voluntarily stay home sick UNPAID.

 

[Gregmal]

Yup. They get on with their lives the same as they always used to. Imagine that? 

[Gregmal]

https://nypost.com/2022/01/12/kodak-black-goes-viral-for-twerking-at-panthers-canucks-game/

 

Hilarious. In Florida you can practically have sex at a hockey game. In NY you cant go near people, but you can still watch. And in Canada you cant even go to a game LOL. Some folks keep focusing on "deaths"...to which one must rebut, who cares if you have no life?

[gary17]

1 hour ago, Gregmal said:

https://nypost.com/2022/01/12/kodak-black-goes-viral-for-twerking-at-panthers-canucks-game/

 

Hilarious. In Florida you can practically have sex at a hockey game. In NY you cant go near people, but you can still watch. And in Canada you cant even go to a game LOL. Some folks keep focusing on "deaths"...to which one must rebut, who cares if you have no life?

 

i think it's important to remember in Canada, we have public health care and many people's surgeries, cancer treatments, etc are delayed because the resources being drawn to deal with covid.   issue is not covid / death  , issue is how do we keep other aspects of society going... it's a very tough one.  people on diff political spectrum will have diff views and i respect that.

[no_free_lunch]

COVID does put a strain on the countries resources, no doubt about that. However there is also an underlying issue that the health regions were already running at capacity before this all started. There were many stories of long waits pre virus. I feel COVID gets scapegoated for an inflexible, unionized and bureaucratic system. You can do whatever you want with non vaccinated, it's not going to fix the underlying issues.

Edited January 13, 2022 by no_free_lunch

[LongHaul]

Nasal Irrigaiton (Neti Pot)

 

I thought this study and at least 1 other on nasal irrigation were fascinating.  

 

This makes a lot of sense to me because:

1.  Nasal irrigation is agitating inside the sinus and flushes out microbes from your body.

2. There seems to be clear data from this study and others.  Another study found ~ 2 days fewer symptoms and less transmission.

3. Anecdotally, I had a sinus infection off an on for a couple of months and it was largely gone withn 1 week after I started the Neti pot. 

 

Feel free to comment Cigarbutt as I believe you are a doctor and do great research. 

 

~88% reduction of hospitalization  with Nasal irrigation (Salt - Bakingsoda/Iodine) see Figure 2 https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.08.16.21262044v3.full-text

 

• Download figure

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Figure 2:

Percent Severe Outcomes in Nasal Irrigation Group Compared to CDC Dataset

Percent of patients ≥55 in the prospective nasal irrigation group who were hospitalized compared to the number of patients age ≥50 in the CDC National Dataset reported hospitalized, or with death reported if hospitalization information was not reported or missing.

[Spekulatius]

I use Neti pots to alleviate my allergies mostly. Very little downside. It also helps if you have the cold with a running nose.

Edited January 13, 2022 by Spekulatius

[Cigarbutt]

On 1/12/2022 at 11:08 PM, LongHaul said:

Nasal Irrigaiton (Neti Pot)

Hi @LongHaul,

i could defer to Spekulatius' "expert"ise, this site should really focus on investments and believe that potential for online rational discussions is entering maximum bear market but still extremely bullish about the future of constructive engagement.

The rise and fall of rationality in language | PNAS

Anyways, nasal irrigation is not up my alley and ENT colleagues seem to have mixed 'feelings'. The study is interesting but the design has the potential to introduce huge selection bias (and unreliable outcomes). The people who are included and agree for the 'treatment' may have an unusual set of attributes. Opinion: before large scale use, the work needs to be replicated using a more standard protocol. Apart from some costs and time value, there is very little downside although it's been reported that nasty deep-seated infections can occur when tap water is used (incidence similar to Guillain-Barré paralysis after covid vaccines; extremely rare but real).

Anecdotal #1: recently (true story), i had some exchanges (on another board, covid subsection) with a participant who supported (with some evidence and using a similar conceptual approach although on a more distant mucosal surface) colonic irrigation as a preventative and therapeutic measure for covid. The opinion i provided came along the same line as the above except that i would not support both lavage techniques simultaneously using a close circuit.

Anecdotal #2: thank you for this idea since during the review leading to this post i asked my youngest daughter for help (she's turning 15 in a few days) and we really connected when she showed me youtube videos and TikTok segments showing real people doing the real thing. Humans are fascinating.

-----

Alternative hypotheses are critical but there has to be a way to effectively separate the wheat from the chaff? Numbers are starting to roll out and, in 2020, US health expenditures increased by 9.7% (up by 1.9% ex-covid) and reached 19.7% of GDP. Rinse and repeat?

 

 

[ERICOPOLY]

On 1/14/2022 at 8:08 PM, Cigarbutt said:

Apart from some costs and time value, there is very little downside although it's been reported that nasty deep-seated infections can occur when tap water is used

 

I've read that removing the protective mucous through irrigation is said to increase frequency of sinus infections. 

 

Here is a tap water example:

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/health/2018/12/07/neti-pot-tap-water-caused-womans-deadly-brain-infection-report/2236681002/

 

Edited January 16, 2022 by ERICOPOLY

[Spekulatius]

Omicron will be done in February mostly but what is the over and under that a new variant is going to pop up causing similar or more problems? It is clear that the Virus mutates to keep spreading even amongst the vaccinated due to evolutionary pressure. Luckily Omicron was caused my lower hospitalization and death rate than Delta for example, but I don't think there is an evolutionary pressure to make the disease more harmless.

 

So I guess the next variant which is certainly going to pop up within a few month, due to the world being a giant petri dish with a huge number to of ongoing infections to create new mutations. Or could it just be that the virus runs out of space for mutations at some point because it will render itself ineffective?

 

I am curious how other think the end game will be. It's clear the virus will be around somehow forever, but I thought we would be endemic at this point and we clearly aren't.

[Cigarbutt]

On 1/16/2022 at 11:40 AM, ERICOPOLY said:

I've read that removing the protective mucous through irrigation is said to increase frequency of sinus infections. 

Too much of a good thing may not be a good thing. Evolution deserves a lot of respect because, through very high numbers of trials and especially errors over long periods, nature tends to identify the optimized processes for our bodies and behaviors. In the last two hundred years or so, humans have found ways to effectively compete with evolution but one has to accept that human efforts will be fruitless in the vast majority of these contests and that's one of the reasons venture capital makes sense. But most mutations spectacularly fail. How to make room for alternative theories?

For example, when humans tried to reproduce delicate movements related to upper extremity dexterity, it was (eventually) discovered that the human template remained, more or less, the gold standard scheme. A similar story is happening with neural networks.

7 hours ago, Spekulatius said:

I am curious how other think the end game will be...

Humility required here. The law of diminishing virulence doesn't always apply and black swans are possible.

The above was suggested a while back (virulence vs contagiousness) and i added an area for omicron. The delta's relatively high virulence did not exactly 'fit' the supposedly down-sloping curve. Omicron was also a surprise (huge jump in transmission potential). Still, on a weighted basis of scenarios (what happens in general, with previous coronaviruses etc), it's likely that covid and related variants to come (genetic drift and shift) will become immaterial although endemic and regional outbreaks are likely to occur in a somewhat seasonal pattern. One major unknown is that the virus sometimes 'jumps' and there's still some uncertainty about the original 'jump' and six-sigma deviations are always possible but this is mostly the unknowable-unknown territory so..

One thing which is not much talked about is that a very large and populated area (China) has chosen a very rigid containment strategy (so far) and herd immunity is only partial (natural very-very-partial and vaccine-partial). It seems like this strategy is not sustainable with omicron and related which transmits so easily and it's hard to envisage a scenario (given their tendency to use a binary and centralized approach) where the tight approach does not show major cracks in the foreseeable future. Viruses are not known for their patience or intelligence but they have evolution on their side.

[LongHaul]

That is super funny photo Cigarbutt

 

I agree- I would like to see some bigger studies.  

 

Here is an article on a prior study.  Bottom line: ~1.9 day reduction in length of illness.

https://www.edinburghnews.scotsman.com/health/edinburgh-scientists-make-breakthrough-finding-cure-common-cold-143824