Let it Burn!

Posted on by Thor

Since the start of the pandemic three years ago the United States had embraced a policy of allowing widespread infection to occur in low-risk groups, like young people. This has resulted in the highest death toll of any country in the world with well over one million deaths. The hope in all this mass infection was that the country might develop herd immunity. However herd immunity is impossible since the virus keeps mutating into variants that break through past waning immunity from past infection and vaccination.

The vast trouble with this mass infection strategy is that children are getting very sick and repeat infections are resulting in worst outcomes. Over 96% of children have been infected in our country so far and those kids then infect their parents and grand parents. Children are the primary way the virus is burning through society.

The United States is riding on a plateau of about 500 deaths a day due to COVID-19. That has become the new normal. At the start of the pandemic 500 deaths a day would have been unheard of, but after experiencing spikes or deaths in the thousands, 500 deaths a day seems low in comparison. Americans want to wish the virus away while taking no basic safety precautions. Wishful thinking and ignorance is not a public health solution.

Pandemic fatigue has become pandemic burn out and most people have given up all hope. The only way they can cope is to pretend that the pandemic is over. All evidence to the contrary will be ignored for the sake of imagining that life has returned to normal.

The 45th president knew the virus was airborne and highly infectious. Despite this he downplayed the potential dangers. The 46th president isn’t much better, in that he publicly proclaimed the pandemic is over while thousands or people needlessly die every week. Gaslighting the public and convincing them that mass infection is in their best interest seems to be the one thing that straddles party lines.

We have to learn to live with catching fire every few months!

Posted on by Thor

Immunity against coronavirus infection wanes quickly and reinfections are common. Protection against severe illness and death was the original goal of vaccines. Vaccines against respiratory viruses rarely protect against full infection. Any notion of herd immunity is out of reach. Too many people are not vaccinated. The coronavirus continues to find ways to evade immunity.

This virus is always going to be with us.  COVID detonates an immune response that can be deadly or debilitating.

The hope is that people will start to take all respiratory viruses more seriously, leading to lasting changes in mask wearing and ventilation.This does not seem to be the case.

This is the exit wildfire!

Posted on by Thor

Since Omicron surged, many countries have been scrapping COVID-19 restrictions in a shortsighted anticipation of entering an endemic phase. In a post-Omicron world, lockdowns will likely be phased out, and simple safety precautions against the airborne COVID virus, like masking and ventilation are being ignored. The virus is not endemic. No one knows what will happen next.

If the world becomes complacent, the virus will continue to spread in its own enthusiastic fashion. Humanity is simply not intelligent enough to keep safety measures in place until the pandemic is over. Across the country,  people have wishfully returned back to normal in a carefree and ignorant way. An estimated 3 billion people are unvaccinated by choice or lack access to vaccines.

The fire will continue to rage sing there is so much wood left to burn.

It was just a little spark, sparks don’t have any after effects!

Posted on by Thor

Many don’t think it is their responsibility to self isolate when they are sick. They seem to think that a “mild” infection can not spread.

Typical symptoms of a mild case of COVID include…

fever cough, fatigue, loss of smell or taste, body aches and pains, headache, sore throat, runny or stuffy nose, digestive symptoms, including nausea, vomiting, or diarrhea.

A case is considered mild if there is no shortness of breath or difficulty breathing. Research has found that about 81 percent of people with COVID-19 have a mild or moderate illness. Some people are asymptomatic, not even aware that they are sick and spreading the virus. Research found that people with a mild or moderate illness had at least one symptom for an average of 9.82 days.

So how long are people infectious? The amount of virus detected in the upper respiratory tract (nose and throat) peaked early on, generally in the first 3 to 5 days of illness. People with more severe illness seem to shed virus for a longer time. Individuals over the age of 60 appear to shed the virus longer than younger individuals. The virus is most contagious shortly after symptoms begin. However, some individuals may shed the virus for longer periods of time.

A study of 57 people with mild symptoms found, that the majority are not infectious before symptoms develop, but two-thirds of cases are still infectious five days after their symptoms begin. Lateral flow (at home) tests do not detect the start of infectiousness well, they more accurately identify when someone is no longer infectious and can safely leave isolation.

No one’s getting burnt anymore!

Posted on by Thor

The elite love to minimize COVID. They were among the first to flout COVID restrictions when they existed. That is in part because any precautions might cut into corporate profits. Investing in clean air for workers would be an investment. They also feel secure knowing they would have the best treatments should they become infected.

If you look at Hollywood elites or government elites you will not see a mask insight. The inequalities put on display when the rich and powerful flout the rules only add to public discontent. People are less likely to take even the simplest precautions like wearing a mask when elites act as if the pandemic is over.

By focusing on violations, the media helped undermine compliance by creating false norms, by implying, ‘if everyone else is going out, if everyone else if breaking the rules, why don’t we? Leaders should lead by example and the only person I noted doing that this week was Bernie Sanders who wore his mask in a crowded maskless presidential state of the union address.

A study found that the United States and United Kingdom were the only two countries of the 14 polled where a minority of people said the government had handled Covid-19 well. Not surprisingly those two countries have the highest death rates from COVID in the world. of the 6,782,716 deaths in the world, America is number 1 with  1,140,017 deaths. The UK comes in at number 9 with 205,540 deaths.

 

I’ve got a strong natural defense against bursting into flames!

Posted on by Thor

Does keeping children safe, endanger them? Some scientific “experts” fear that lockdowns could have left children with life-long immunity problems. The fact is that repeat COVID infections are creating life long immunity problems in children. Children are indeed becoming infected with RSV, flu and COVID more often than ever before. This “expert” seems to feel that COVID infections are an education for a child’s immune system.

Data in the UK from the Office for National Statistics suggests about 71,000 children in the UK are suffering from long Covid, which includes symptoms such as debilitating fatigue, brain fog, sleep problems and muscle pain.

On a personal note, I developed scarlet fever as an infant and was not expected to live. Scarlet fever, has had  more than ten times the average number of cases this winter season. COVID-19 reduces the numbers and functional ability of certain types of immune cells in the blood, say researchers. This could affect responses to secondary infections.  96 % of children have already been infected with COVID. Repeat COVID infections are resulting in children being more prone to other infections as well.

You need to burn to develop non-flamability!

Posted on by admin

Some seem to think that getting infected is the solution to fighting an infectious disease. No one is exactly sure how long the protection after natural infection will last and how durable that protection will be against a variety of different variants. An infection will protect you from reinfection against only the variant that caused your illness. The virus is mutating very quickly. The next mutation can cause re-infection. Some people think that after you’ve gotten a natural infection, you will be permanently protected against COVID-19 as if this were measles. That is simply not true.

An infection will cause COVID-19 antibodies can stay in the body for months. New evidence suggests that ‘hybrid’ immunity, the result of both vaccination and a bout of COVID-19, can provide partial protection against reinfection for about eight months. However, if a new variant finds ways to escape the existing immune response, then even a recent infection might not guarantee protection. The Omicron variants circuiting now are mutating at an incredibly fast rate. Many of these new variants are finding ways to break through existing immunity.

The virus is evolving so fast, that it is impossible to predict exactly how many months someone might be protected from re-infection if they survive their bout with COVID. One in five people who are infected develop long COVID which can greatly reduce quality of life.

We all have to get burned!

Posted on by admin

Public responses to widespread disease have remained mostly unchanged since the Black Death, in the 14th century. Over 3000 COVID related deaths a week in America has become the new normal. Blindly accepting so much death is as American as Sunday football. Michigan Stadium in Ann Arbor, Michigan has a seating capacity of 107,601. What better place for a maskless orgy of denial and disease? If I had any desire to see a Michigan football game I would be perfectly happy to watch on TV.

When people observe others taking risks despite the pandemic they assume those risks are acceptable. Unfortunately from the start of the pandemic, leaders have not been honest and transparent. Contradictory messages are the norm.

Human beings are inherently social, not solitary, creatures. Making that a reality can be accomplished while masking and having some physical distance. Physical distancing is different than social distancing. The human need for connection with other people is probably what fuels a lot of disease transmission. Most people however have abandoned all protective measures. They actively seek to infect others  as they ignore reality and go about life like it was 1999.

Social distancing does not have to equal social isolation. Those are two very different concepts and virtual interaction can make a big difference.

 

This is a wildfire of the unburnt!

Posted on by Thor

Ignoring COVID does not make it go away. The World Health Organization (WHO) pointed out that, although everyone is tired of hearing about COVID-19 and its restrictions, “we need to face an undeniable fact…the virus is still very much present among us”. Engaging in risky behavior sends the message that COVID isn’t really their problem, that they don’t see a reason to modify their behavior to mitigate risk. To see this behavior just watch the State of the Union Address in which the only member of Congress to wear a mask was Bernie Sanders. The president giving his speech kept coughing.

People feel helpless and out of control. Their only coping mechanism is to pretest the pandemic does not exist. Complacency, denial and ignorance take over for rational thought. People do not want to live in fear, so they ignore the source of the feat rather than facing the fear. The risk has not magically disappeared, they have chosen to ignore the risk. Ignorance is bliss. Ignorance is also death.

 

We have all the tools we need to deal with a wildfire!

Posted on by Thor

Tools to fight COVID-19 have been abandoned or are being phased out. Treatments available earlier in the pandemic are becoming useless with the rapidly evolving new variants of the virus. Monoclonal anti-body treatments are no longer effective. “The big problem is that monoclonal antibodies bind to a very small piece of the virus. As the virus changes, we are now in a position in which we lost them all because they don’t bind to the virus anymore,” Johns Hopkins School of Medicine professor Arturo Casadevall, MD, PhD, told NBC News.

In May of 2022 the White House said it would have to wind down it’s COVID relief program since Congress cut  $22.5 billion in COVID relief funding. There will be no more free vaccinations, tests and treatment to the immunocompromised. If more COVID-19 variants emerge, different boosters may be developed to fight them. Without additional funding, the government will not be able to purchase enough boosters for Americans. U.S. doctors will stop accepting claims from uninsured people.

U.S. will no longer be able to invest in more oral antiviral pills or any new promising antiviral treatment. They will also dial back on research into a “next-generation” COVID-19 vaccine that would protect against a wide range of variants. The country “blindsided” to emerging variants. Researchers won’t be able to properly assess any new variants of COVID-19 that could possibly emerge.

You may have a wildfire and you may have water. The water is useless unless you have a way to get the water to the fire.