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nwhikerDh had to explain to his sister the other day that "endemic" didn't mean mild, just a cold, no biggie.
Endemic means we're stuck with it, and depending on what variant is circulating, that might mean a lot of dead people.
Endemic used to mean that it was stuck in a given region... Endemic, say, plague in London wouldn't affect me in Seattle. Now, there is one region, all of our 360 degrees of longitude and 180 degrees of latitude.
Even so-called-mild Omicron is killing folks, in two ways: 1. Because it's Covid and it's a roll of a the dice with good odds if you are vaccinated and ok if you are not as to whether you get a really bad case and 2. Because of the pressure on hospitals, there is some evidence that events that should be survivable are not being survived, or that long term outcomes are compromised because of care being delayed.
So eh. Endemic Omicron is not my idea of a picnic.
That said, I thought this article was pretty good: The COVID-19 Endemic Will Not Be the End of All Problems – Here’s Why the Virus Will Continue to Be a Threat!.
The bullshit idea that many people seem to have, that anti-vaxxers and RWers have been pushing for over a year now, is that "viruses evolve to become mild", and that, alas, is very much not true.
I'm seeing evidence that we've given up. Eugenics, in the comment of the bitch at CDC is rearing its ugly head. I'm not talking about the part of her interview a few weeks back where Fox et al. pretended not to notice that she was talking about vaccinated people, not everyone. I'm talking about the part of her interview where she said, "The overwhelming number of deaths, over 75%, occurred in people who had at least four comorbidities, so really these are people who were unwell to begin with, and yes, really encouraging news in the context of omicron," in a display of who the fuck gives a shit about those unwell people. She did apologize for the comment later, but the dismissal of people with comorbidities as "unwell" is rather disturbing. Anyhow.
Endemic means we're stuck with it, and depending on what variant is circulating, that might mean a lot of dead people.
Endemic used to mean that it was stuck in a given region... Endemic, say, plague in London wouldn't affect me in Seattle. Now, there is one region, all of our 360 degrees of longitude and 180 degrees of latitude.
Even so-called-mild Omicron is killing folks, in two ways: 1. Because it's Covid and it's a roll of a the dice with good odds if you are vaccinated and ok if you are not as to whether you get a really bad case and 2. Because of the pressure on hospitals, there is some evidence that events that should be survivable are not being survived, or that long term outcomes are compromised because of care being delayed.
So eh. Endemic Omicron is not my idea of a picnic.
That said, I thought this article was pretty good: The COVID-19 Endemic Will Not Be the End of All Problems – Here’s Why the Virus Will Continue to Be a Threat!.
The bullshit idea that many people seem to have, that anti-vaxxers and RWers have been pushing for over a year now, is that "viruses evolve to become mild", and that, alas, is very much not true.
I'm seeing evidence that we've given up. Eugenics, in the comment of the bitch at CDC is rearing its ugly head. I'm not talking about the part of her interview a few weeks back where Fox et al. pretended not to notice that she was talking about vaccinated people, not everyone. I'm talking about the part of her interview where she said, "The overwhelming number of deaths, over 75%, occurred in people who had at least four comorbidities, so really these are people who were unwell to begin with, and yes, really encouraging news in the context of omicron," in a display of who the fuck gives a shit about those unwell people. She did apologize for the comment later, but the dismissal of people with comorbidities as "unwell" is rather disturbing. Anyhow.
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