Omicron Beats Delta

Posted on by Thor

Experts believe that the Omicron Variant of COVID-19 will be more transmissible that Delta. The World Health Organization (WHO) reported that 38 countries across the world have reported cases of the highly mutated omicron Covid-19 variant so far.

The virus spike proteins have  32 mutations which make it easier for the virus to spread and infect humans. For comparison, Delta had 9 mutations. The Omicron variant might also evade COVID-19 vaccines, but it could take some time to see if that’s true or not. The Omicron variant may also cause more re-infections.

More children are being admitted into hospitals with COVID infections in South Africa where the variant was first reported. Last month in South Africa, 74% of genomes sequenced were Omicron. Within two weeks, Omicron has replaced Delta in South Africa. 56 countries have imposed travel bans but the virus has already spread world wide. Thousands of people have flown into the United States from South Africa and other infected countries since the variant was first reported and when the flight restrictions finally began. Omicron can reinfect people who have had COVID-19. Since it can reinfect people the pool of potential hosts makes for exponential growth in infections. Omicron will become the main variant in the world.

At the moment, the only data scientists have to estimate omicron’s transmissibility comes largely from the cluster of cases at a university in Pretoria, South Africa. The rapid rise in cases there could be due, in part, to a superspreading event.With only 4% of the population vaccinated, thousands of people took to the streets to protest in a “Superspreader March.” It was a “March to Save Lives” but may have instead been the perfect way to spread the new variant.

Cases of Omicron in America have been reported in 5 states so far but it is likely fare more wide spread. The only reason we don’t know more, is that the United States has a very poor record of genomic analysis compared to other countries. The first case discovered in America had been fully vaccinated but had not gotten a booster yet.

Basic health measure that have been promoted since the start off the pandemic still work. Wear a good quality mask, social distance and wash your hands often.

The good news is the early cases have been mild so far. However cases usually get worse in the second and third week of infection, so we will see how deadly the virus  mutation is soon. If it turns out that it produces only mild cases that do not require hospitalization, then that could be very good news. Time will tell.

Infectious Children

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A study has found that younger children are more likely to spread COVID-19 in a family setting compared with older children. Specifically, children 3 or younger were more likely to spread the virus to household members compared with those aged 14 to 17.

The study, published in JAMA, analyzed public health data from Ontario, Canada, to identify COVID clusters in which a child was the primary case within households.

Earlier in the pandemic, some scientists suggested the risk of transmission declined with younger children. But this assumption was likely skewed by the fact that lockdowns and social distancing meant young children had very few social encounters.

The study involved 6,280 households with COVID-19 index patients 17 years and younger from Jun 1 to Dec 31, 2020, prior to the emergence of the Delta Variant, so more research is needed to understand transmission risk in the context of the variant. The study also took place prior to vaccines being available, meaning all household members were unvaccinated.

Babies and toddlers are probably more likely to spread disease to parents and caregivers because they are cared for directly, in close contact. “The 0-to-3-year-old child is held differently, is cuddled,” said Dr. Paul Offit, director of the Vaccine Education Center and professor of pediatrics in the Division of Infectious Diseases at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. The risk of death and severe illness is still much lower in younger children compared with older children and adults. The best line of defense against further spread of the virus is for the parents of the child to both be vaccinated.

This study reinforces the importance of existing mitigation strategies at childcare facilities and schools, including distancing, good ventilation, frequent cleaning and masking whenever possible. t also reinforces the importance of all eligible people over 12, especially those around young children, getting vaccinated.

Younger Pool of Vulnerable Hosts

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Children under the age of 12 are not yet eligible to be vaccinated. Hospital admissions are ticking up all across America thanks to the Delta variant which is 60% more transmissible than previous variants of COVID-19. It is spreading easily because people have dis-guarded masks, are crowding into indoor spaces, have resumed travel, and are resisting vaccinations.

Florida now accounts for 20% of the new cases of COVID many of those cases being the Delta Variant. Governor DeathSantis is not likely to reinstate any forms of health mandates to help stop the carnage. He has his eye on a presidential bid and needs the support of conspiracy theory believing MAGAts.

ICUs are filling with younger patients, in their 20s, 30s, and 40s,  many with no underlying health problems. Since the elderly are vaccinated the virus is burning its way through the unvaccinated population. Nearly all COVID related deaths are unvaccinated. Florida has less than 50% of its citizens vaccinated.

What is frustrating is that all this disease and death is entirely unnecessary. Misinformation first promoted by the former president is killing Americans. Many patients don’t realize their mistake until it’s too late. Doctors and nurses exhausted after more than a year of battling the virus are now becoming overwhelmed again by the needless death. They end of resenting the patients who are extending the pandemic needlessly. There is no cure once you are sick enough to need admission into the hospital.

675,000 Americans died in the in the U.S. 1918 Spanish flu pandemic. As of July 19, 2021 there have been Spanish Flu.  It would be nice to think that we as a nation had learned something in the 100 plus years since that tragedy. However history is repeating itself and stubborn and misinformed people are willingly going to slaughter. They believe until their dying breath that COVID is not real.

Pre-Pandemic: Fridge Repair

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This is the first sketch I did in a sketchbook that was returned to me after if fell off my bike on a cross country bicycle trip 35 years ago. Someone found the sketchbook packed away in a box and realized I had signed the first page.

The pages are rather thin and don’t hold watercolor very well, but I am attempting to full the remaining pages. This is a sketch of Jimmy John’s sandwich Shop in Downtown Orlando. The fridge was on the fritz and a repairman was trying too get it back up and running. I sketched as I enjoyed my sandwich.

The sketchbook ha once again been put on hold since I am no longer going on location to sketch each day. Now Most of my sketches are illustration having to do with the COVID-19 virus and America’s mishandling of this health crisis. Those illustrations are being done digitally. That work could also be lost to time if I don’t keep on top of backing up files or making prints of all the work I am doing. I remember a film historian mentioning that the early silent films of Thomas Edison are the only samples of very early film because film degrades and burns up in time. Thomas Edison thought ahead and made paper prints of every frame of film and those paper prints make it possible to recreate the films of the time, remaining the only samples of early film.

I am thinking that making prints of digital files may be the only way to have digital art stand the test of time.

Rose Garden Super Spreader

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Now that the animation project is finished, I can not resist starting to do Covid-19 themed illustrations again. Every day brings a new heightened insanity. I am not trying to do a COVID illustration ever day just yet since I want to finish posting the storyboards and animation from the project I have been working on for the past month.

The COVID-19 Rose Garden super spreader event had to be painted. The super spreader event was staged to celebrate Trumps push to have Amy Coney Barrett take the supreme cort slot that opened when Ruth Bader Ginsburg died of natural causes. I researched who was sitting where and who fist bumped and hugged who. The White House is not doing any contact tracing so I felt as an artist I had to document who might have infected who. The number of people infected in the White House keeps rising. The latest number I have from earlier today is 34 people.

Among the infected are of course Donald and Melania Trump . Trump announced his infection early Friday morning October 2, 2020 via Twitter. Senators Mike Lee and Thom Tillis both tested positive on Friday Evening October 2, 2020. Lee is seen in the foreground of this illustration hugging a couple. Watching video footage of the Rose Garden event was like watching a train wreck of stupidity since few wore masks as they hugged an bumped fists. Former New Jersey Governor Chris Christi has been hospitalized due to the virus as has Trump who has since returned to the White House claiming he was immune.

The latest count as of October 8, 2020 shows 34 White House staff infected according to a memo distributed to FEMA Homeland Security senior management. Hope Hicks and Stephen Miller who are senior aids to the president tested positive. Government officials have gone to great lengths to block information about the outbreak’s spread and basic information about the president’s health. No one knows when the president last tested negative for the virus. It is possible he went to a fundraiser in New Jersey and to the debate with Joe Biden knowing he was infected. As late as Wednesday October 7, 202 White House aides were seen in meeting  without masks. The White House seemed to rely on testing to keep the virus from the president but clearly that plan had holes when science and basic health safety measures are ignored.

Yesterday This Was Home: Boarding

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I woke up this morning realizing how nice it is to wake up to just focus on animation. For the past 4 months I have been doing dark COVID-19 themed illustrations and my research always left me fuming about the incompetence and indifference of America’s response to this global health  crisis. Now I can put that aside and focus on this tale of a bus trip.

Of course 1957 was also a dark time. Emmett Till had just been lynched and the civil rights movement had just begun. Despite this turmoil, a 12 year old boy took a trip up to Detroit on his own and took a stand.

I created this board with the idea of having the viewer a bit lower than waste level, making the adults look tall in relation to the small boy. The protagonist approaches the line, which is being held up as a woman fumbles for her ticket. I’ll   probably have to get rid of that purse under her elbow when i animate to allow some freedom to move her arms.

This short film will be on display at the Orange County Regional History Center (65 E. Central Blvd. Orlando, Florida 32801) from October 3, 2020 to February 14, 2021. The exhibit titled Yesterday This Was Home is about the 1920 Ocoee Massacre in Orange County, Florida, which remains the largest incident of voting-day violence in United States history. This landmark exhibition will mark the 100-year remembrance of the Ocoee Massacre. The exhibition will explore not only this horrific time in our community’s history but also historical and recent incidents of racism, hatred, and terror, some right here at home.

 

Yesterday This as Home: Animating Again

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For those of you who have been following my COVID-19 series, I have had to stop that series since I am now fully engaged in animating for an exhibit at the Orange County Regional History Center. I am animating oral histories, using those stories as the audio for the animation. This process is an all consuming obsession so I have decided to just post small clips each day of the project in progress rather than posing old sketches each day. I haven’t been fully involved in animation since Disney Feature Animation closed over 20 years ago. At Disney I was one of several hundred artists who helped create films that were drawn by hand with 24 drawings for every second of film. I am tipping my toe in again, and having fun solving new challenges every day. Should any animation student find this series of posts they should find it helpful to see what problems and solutions had to be found to keep this project moving with an army of one.

Fade in on this simple title card. The black border is the film safe 1920×1080 aspect ratio. All of my storyboards are done in this black and white style. I am hoping that the boards are finished enough so that I can use the art as the background for the animation itself. I am working digitally keeping the background level separate for drawings of characters and background elements. I jump around each day sometimes animating sometimes boarding and every day compositing it all in Adobe Premiere Pro.

Today I am working on a animation that I consider the cornerstone of the piece I am putting together. It involves lip syncing dialogue and if it goes well, more scenes will be done this way. I find myself acting out actions during the day thinking about the animation to come. An added benefit is that working on animation in the studio keeps me very engaged during the COVID-19 lock down. Anyway, I need to keep these post short since there is tons of boarding and animating left to do.

Pre-Pandemic: Istanbul Apartment

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United States foreign service employees at the US Embassy get to stay in a really nice apartment complex in the heart of Istanbul Turkey. I did a drawing of the complex from a model in the lobby. The arching windows had an amazing view of the surrounding neighborhoods for miles. Right next door was a huge mall and several mom and pop restaurants which were packed at lunch time.

On June 11, 2020 Turkey announced opening the majority of its international air, land, and sea borders. The land border with Iran remains closed. The border with Syria remains closed. To date, tourist travelers do not need any specific health documentation to enter/exit Turkey unless they are arriving for medical treatment.

On August 5, 2020 Reuters reported that doctors in Turkey’s COVID-19 hots pots say hospitals are filling up with more cases than are reflected in the official nationwide count, which re surged above 1,000 this week.

The government, which lifted a partial lock down in June 2020 to restart the economy, sounded its own warning when the health minister described the 1,083 new COVID-19 cases as a “severe” rise after a four-day holiday weekend.

In response, authorities rolled out new inspections and enforcement measures, including fines for not wearing masks or maintaining social distancing. New cases had hovered just below 1,000 for more than three weeks, according to official figures.

All individuals in Turkey must wear cloth face coverings where people are collectively located, including supermarkets, marketplaces, hair salons, shopping malls, and workplaces as well as in all forms of transportation (including private vehicles) with at least two persons inside.

The Trump Virus

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2606 New Yorkers died on September 11, 2001 when the twin towers were attacked. 3352 Americans died during the Republican National Convention between August 24 – 27, 2020. About 1,500 largely mask-less people gathered on the South Lawn of the White House so President Donald Trump could accept his party’s nomination. Uncomfortable looking white folding chairs were placed inches apart from one another, with no room for social distancing, in violation of president’s own public health recommendations. Only people the White House expected to be in “close proximity” to the president and vice president were tested for COVID-19. Guidance sent to those invited to the event specified that masks would not be required on the South Lawn. Hundreds of protesters gathered outside the White House Trump accepted the Republican nomination on the South Lawn.

Vice President Mike Pence gave a speech speech Wednesday August 26, 2020, delivered in front of about 100 mask-less people, including wounded veterans, at Fort McHenry in Baltimore. Already 4 people who attended the vice presidents speech have been confirmed to have COVID-19. Pence was seen shaking hands, and exchanging fist bumps. No one appeared concerned about social distancing. An assassin would not need a gun, a simple hand shake could suffice.  Dozens of secret service officers have contracted COVID-19 in the struggle to keep the president and vice president safe.

The president pretends there is no virus in his struggle to get re-elected. People had to sit together for hours listening to Trump’s insanely boring speech which sounded like a Wikipedia summation of American history. It was hard to keep track of all the lies.

Hosting the campaign event from the White House South Lawn and the Rose Garden also violated federal ethics law called the Hatch Act which prohibits federal employees from engaging in most political activity inside federal buildings or while on duty. More important, to Trump, the TV ratings tanked. He was more concerned about the ratings numbers rather than the number of Americans that have died.

No Escape

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There are about 95,000 inmates in Florida prisons. Last month, the number of inmates who had died from COVID-19 was 29, this month that number of deaths has surged to 70. In Florida, an estimated 11,000 inmates are now infected by the virus.

The virus continues to spread rapidly in the prison system, July and August have been the deadliest months since the start of the pandemic. Florida prisons are simply not set up to deal with treating the illness, much less stop the spread. In the prisons there is plenty of misinformation about how to protect against the highly contagious disease.

Two corrections officers also died this month from complications of COVID-19, according to corrections officials and the Florida Police Benevolent Association, a union that represents officers. The virus has even infected top-ranking officials in the department. Corrections Secretary Mark Inch and Deputy Secretary Ricky Dixon were diagnosed with the disease in early August.

Prisons hit hardest by the virus are Columbia Correctional Institution, which has had 1,317 inmate cases; Lowell Correctional Institution, which has had 909; Santa Rosa Correctional Institution, which has had 793; Graceville Correctional Facility, which has had 656; and Taylor Correctional Institution, which has had 561, according to the Florida Department of Corrections.

Also, 1,946 corrections workers had tested positive as of Friday August 7, 2020. At least 48 Brevard County Jail inmates tested positive for COVID-19 after results came back from the first round of widespread testing of the inmate population conducted the first week of August 2020.

At Columbia Correctional Institution, corrections workers are thoroughly cleaning the facility and enforcing a mask requirement for inmates and staff. Despite the preventive measures, inmates and workers are getting sick because not much else can be done now that COVID-19  is inside the prison and it is nearly impossible to maintain social distancing.

The Tampa Bay Times reported that Debra Bennett, a former inmate and current prisoner advocate, has organized donations of masks, gloves, bleach, face shields, soap, toilet paper and other necessities to Homestead Correctional Institution, where 302 inmates are infected. When she dropped off supplies, she noticed that some guards were not wearing masks or any other PPE. On the day of her latest delivery, two female prisoners at Homestead had died from COVID-19. Bennett knew both women well.

On the federal level, Attorney General William Barr released a memo that ordered the Federal Bureau of Prisons to identify “at-risk inmates who are non-violent and pose minimal likelihood of recidivism and who might be safer serving their sentences in home confinement.” His plan, however, was criticized because these inmates will be identified by an algorithm that the Marshall Project reports is biased toward white people. The Marshall Project reported that 100,000 prisoners have been released across the country during the duration of the pandemic.

As more inmates and workers test positive, prisoners and criminal-justice reform advocates are pleading with Florida Governor Ron DeSantis to do more to address the problem. Denise Rock, executive director of the nonprofit inmate-advocacy group Florida Cares, wants DeSantis to grant the early release of certain inmates, particularly low-level nonviolent offenders and prisoners who have six months left in their sentences, to help address the spread of the virus in the system. But House Criminal Justice Chairman James Grant, R-Tampa, said in an interview that he does not think it is an “acceptable approach” to let people out of prison because of the pandemic.

During the 2020 Florida legislative session, lawmakers proposed bills to help streamline the process of releasing sick or elderly inmates, the populations most at risk of dying from the disease. Both bills went nowhere. The Orlando Sentinel reported that many of the Florida inmates who died of COVID-19 were eligible for parole.

Back in April when the prison system had just 73 cases, Governor DeSantis told reporters, “I don’t see how in a time of pandemic where people are on edge already (that) releasing felons into society would make a whole lot of sense. I think it makes everything we are doing with social distancing more difficult.”