Texas to open 100%

[mom2rtk]

No I got the point, I responded back on solely the poster's chosen words. You seek out testing, isolate while waiting for testing, you don't just stay home the entire year because you have allergies. I haven't advocated for going around sneezing or coughing so there's just no reason to try and lecture about that

And to be frank I know we're in the middle of the pandemic and while I don't expect you to know necessarily my viewpoint throughout the threads you're barking up the wrong tree on that one especially about asymptomatic carriers and more.

Oh geez. I'd never leave home.

 

[ShirikiUtundu]

I don’t consider 2% statistically significant. The reason I referenced the most current data released by CDC is bc the timing coincided with multiple States decisions to lift their mask mandates. My thoughts were this may have influenced their decision.

Days 1-20 -> 0.5 point decrease vs.
Days 20-100 -> 1.8 point decrease.

View attachment 561009

As if statistical significance has literally anything to do with your opinion. Don't cite things you don't understand.

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

Oh geez. I'd never leave home.

I'm meaning if you think you legit don't have allergies or you suspect it's much more than that. I'm not meaning test yourself everyday and isolate all the time because of waiting on testing because yeah for allergy people that's too common of an occurance.

It's march and until the end of may it's main allergy season for me. It'll ramp up in the fall again. I can't stay home 24/7 for 6 months just because of my allergies and it being that time of year. And because I know someone will take that comment to mean something else (not you though) I'm not advocating for someone to go out in public if they suspect it's more than just allergies.

 

[ShirikiUtundu]

I think you missed the point that this is in the middle of a pandemic. Why you are coughing and sneezing is of little importance when we're dealing with a virus where many carriers are asymptomatic, and where most people who are vaccinated can become asymptomatic carriers.

We already know that 25 percent of people infected with influenza are asymptomatic carriers, and this is the way the influenza virus is spread. People aren't catching it from people who are too sick to work; most people catch influenza from an asymptomatic carrier who is a close contact. SARS-CoV-2 is the same. Thank goodness for genome sequencing -- we might finally know how much we don't know.

It's important to distinguish asymptomatic from presymptomatic. The role of asymptomatic transmission is still largely unknown.
Presymptomatic is the period in which you are asymptomatic but contagious, up to the point where you start to show symptoms. Unfortunately with Covid, this presymptomatic period can be a week long (in some cases it has been shown to be longer); this is unlike pretty much any illness common in humans, which accounts for the far spread.

 

[White Cat]

This was very well explained. I think the comparisons between counties with mask mandates and those without is most helpful. It would really be nice to see comparisons between counties where people actually wear masks and where they don't. It seems like in the US a lot of people choose not to follow the mask mandates even where the government is telling them it's the quickest way to get out of this mess.

I’m wondering when the last time was you were in the US? I’ve just spent several months traveling through 8 states and didn’t find this to be true. In fact, I noticed more compliance than in Canada. It’s just you live in a very isolated area with out much outside exposure where people are more afraid of being shamed for not following the rules than they are of the virus. Try having Ontario plates in Nova Scotia.

 

[Disney_escape]

Remember. This is the state that just had a massive power outage and people living with no water or electric for a good period of time. Is this the state we really want to use as an example of what to do with the pandemic?

Texas' biggest mistake was having ERCOT board living in Illinois, Maine and Toronto. You would have thought they would have understood winter issues and had a plan during a massive storm, instead of just turn it all off. Their failure and lack of having a plan is negligent at best, most likely criminal. However that has nothing to do with how Texas handles its Covid plan.

 

[redrosesix]

It's important to distinguish asymptomatic from presymptomatic. The role of asymptomatic transmission is still largely unknown.
Presymptomatic is the period in which you are asymptomatic but contagious, up to the point where you start to show symptoms. Unfortunately for Covid, this presymptomatic period can be a week long (in some cases it has been shown to be longer); this is unlike pretty much any illness common in humans, which accounts for the far spread.

Very true. And the original covid plans were based on people not being infectious before having any symptoms.

 

[redrosesix]

I’m wondering when the last time was you were in the US? I’ve just spent several months traveling through 8 states and didn’t find this to be true. In fact, I noticed more compliance than in Canada. It’s just you live in a very isolated area with out much outside exposure where people are more afraid of being shamed for not following the rules than they are of the virus. Try having Ontario plates in Nova Scotia.

Oh geez...if you drive through Nova Scotia with Ontario plates, at least 10 people will report you to the mounties.

The last time I was in the US was pre-covid and that goes for Ontario and Quebec too...which are on fire and have been since this started. In Nova Scotia it was cool to wear a mask before the government even mandated it, but we also do a lot of other things that have made a difference eg. if there are 2 people passing each other on a sidewalk, one walks on the street. Our borders have been closed since March, and anyone coming in had to have a quarantine plan. That kept us at zero for 4 months but people not respecting the quarantine rules accounts for all of the cases since then. We don't wear masks while taking a run or walking a dog but we have all been wearing masks in grocery stores since March.

We had 6 new cases yesterday, which sounds like very little with a population of 1 million but that may be enough to have restrictions imposed again. We have 29 cases in total but this is only because we had a hard lock down over Christmas with the kids off school for a month instead of a week.

 

[J'aime Paris]

I am cringing writing this, but I think it's important so.....there are other serious issues we need to take into consideration in addition to covid. The alarming rate of adolescent suicide, rates of depression, drug/alcohol abuse, overdose, general need for mental health treatment that has gone unavailable during shutdowns (sometimes online sessions don't help). These things have skyrocketed and they had to many thousands of deaths over the last year. You can't just focus on 1 disease.

My comment is overly simplistic but I'm just trying to point out some other very important issue during this difficult time. The final outcomes and statistics from this last year will be seen in years to come, especially with children and lack of schooling.

A true tragedy that is largely being ignored!
You should really make this it's own thread. It will quickly get buried in this argument.....

 

[FairestOfThemAll37]

I am cringing writing this, but I think it's important so.....there are other serious issues we need to take into consideration in addition to covid. The alarming rate of adolescent suicide, rates of depression, drug/alcohol abuse, overdose, general need for mental health treatment that has gone unavailable during shutdowns (sometimes online sessions don't help). These things have skyrocketed and they had to many thousands of deaths over the last year. You can't just focus on 1 disease.

My comment is overly simplistic but I'm just trying to point out some other very important issue during this difficult time. The final outcomes and statistics from this last year will be seen in years to come, especially with children and lack of schooling.

You’re not wrong. This interview with a Dr from UCSF really sums up how I’ve been feeling throughout this pandemic and my frustrations with the responses to my point of view. It’s a really great read IMO

https://www.sfgate.com/news/editors...vaccines-effective-San-Francisco-15961073.php

 

[lifesavacation]

You’re not wrong. This interview with a Dr from UCSF really sums up how I’ve been feeling throughout this pandemic and my frustrations with the responses to my point of view. It’s a really great read IMO

https://www.sfgate.com/news/editors...vaccines-effective-San-Francisco-15961073.php

I really like Dr. Gandhi. She's one of the epidemiologists I follow on Twitter because she's not an alarmist.

 

[White Cat]

Oh geez...if you drive through Nova Scotia with Ontario plates, at least 10 people will report you to the mounties.

The last time I was in the US was pre-covid and that goes for Ontario and Quebec too...which are on fire and have been since this started. In Nova Scotia it was cool to wear a mask before the government even mandated it, but we also do a lot of other things that have made a difference eg. if there are 2 people passing each other on a sidewalk, one walks on the street. Our borders have been closed since March, and anyone coming in had to have a quarantine plan. That kept us at zero for 4 months but people not respecting the quarantine rules accounts for all of the cases since then. We don't wear masks while taking a run or walking a dog but we have all been wearing masks in grocery stores since March.

We had 6 new cases yesterday, which sounds like very little with a population of 1 million but that may be enough to have restrictions imposed again. We have 29 cases in total but this is only because we had a hard lock down over Christmas with the kids off school for a month instead of a week.

I thought. The government has you scared to death. The apocalypse is coming to Canada.

 

[White Cat]

https://www.wsj.com/amp/articles/canadas-covid-vaccine-failure-11613772230

 

[redrosesix]

I thought. The government has you scared to death. The apocalypse is coming to Canada.

I can't even talk about the Canadian government. Residents of Nova Scotia demanded the province step up, and they did. We had an excellent summer because we had zero cases by then, as did the other provinces in the Atlantic bubble. Where we failed was on enforcing quarantine on people coming in from outside, and we couldn't sustain it.

 

[DLgal]

If you are walking around with symptoms of the illness currently causing a pandemic, you can expect to get dirty looks (at a minimum) or be asked to leave. Probably worst case is that you get assaulted. That’s your prerogative I guess, for going out when sick people are supposed to stay home.

Stop. First of all, sneezing isn't even a Covid symptom. People with Covid *might* sneeze, because EVERYONE SNEEZES OCCASIONALLY. But sneezing does not mean a person might have Covid. In fact, if you are sneezing and have an itchy nose, throat or eyes, that is a pretty solid 99.999% chance of being allergies.

I live with a child with chronic, severe allergies. He has been getting allergy shots for 2 years now. He is on OTC allegry meds as well. He STILL gets symptomatic when pollen counts are high. He hasn't been a shut in for the last year and no one has given him a dirty look, asked him to leave a place or assaulted him (like, what even is that thought process anyway?) He goes to school, where the covid policy mentions that "allergy symptoms that are consistent with normal baseline are not subject to the daily symptom checker guidelines." Meaning, he can go to school and sneeze all day in his mask and no one is going to care.

 

[DLgal]

But again, we are dealing with growth rates, not percentage increase. We know that the R0 of SARS-CoV-2 is probably 6 ie. each infected person infects 6 more people, each of those infects 6 more people and so on and so on. So the percentage of people infected won't just grow, it will grow faster and faster over time. Imagine a snowball that is rolling down a hill. It gets bigger and bigger as it collects more snow. But as it goes downhill it picks up speed at a faster and faster rate, so it collects more snow at a faster and faster rate. Your goal in the US isn't even stopping that snowball from rolling downhill --- you have so many people infected that you're still trying to slow that snowball down.

I find it very frustrating to watch what is happening in the US. I remember 9/11 and how devastating it was for you all to lose 3k people in one day, but now you're losing more than that every single day and a lot of you seem not to care at all. You're all hung up on whether mask mandates work ie. whether the government telling you that you have to wear a mask works. Didn't it ever occur to you that it's worth it to try to save lives, whether or not the government tells you do do it? So sure -- do what you like and let those planes keep smashing into those buildings every day. I just find it all heartbreaking. I don't get why people don't care.

From what I saw you never really gave public health measures a good chance. No state locked down hard or enforced public health measures and even in the states that introduced measures, a lot of people didn't comply. You didn't close state or national borders or impose quarantines on people entering the country in the way that countries like Taiwan did.

No one thinks the R0 of SARS-COV2 is 6.

Best estimates pin it somewhere between 1.5 and 3. They are using 2.5 for modeling purposes at this point. 6 was a number cited last April, and has proven to be WAY off base.

 

[redrosesix]

No one thinks the R0 of SARS-COV2 is 6.

Best estimates pin it somewhere between 1.5 and 3. They are using 2.5 for modeling purposes at this point. 6 was a number cited last April, and has proven to be WAY off base.

the R0 is based on how quickly it spreads and it's going to be affected by public health countermeasures. If you did nothing the R0 would be 6. The R0 in Taiwan is less than 1, so they've effectively stopped it from multiplying.

it's very possible that where you live the R0 is 2.5, but last April they probably had it right.

 

[DisneyJamieCA]

Stop. First of all, sneezing isn't even a Covid symptom. People with Covid *might* sneeze, because EVERYONE SNEEZES OCCASIONALLY. But sneezing does not mean a person might have Covid. In fact, if you are sneezing and have an itchy nose, throat or eyes, that is a pretty solid 99.999% chance of being allergies.

I live with a child with chronic, severe allergies. He has been getting allergy shots for 2 years now. He is on OTC allegry meds as well. He STILL gets symptomatic when pollen counts are high. He hasn't been a shut in for the last year and no one has given him a dirty look, asked him to leave a place or assaulted him (like, what even is that thought process anyway?) He goes to school, where the covid policy mentions that "allergy symptoms that are consistent with normal baseline are not subject to the daily symptom checker guidelines." Meaning, he can go to school and sneeze all day in his mask and no one is going to care.

Agreed. We took DD out to brunch for her 17th bday today (outdoors). DH has photic sneezes and when he did it today, DD and I both cringed, expecting to get dirty looks. Not a single person looked our way. And he hasn’t sneezed since. I have seasonal allergies and can definitely tell the difference between those symptoms and being sick. I still try to stay home when possible just to not freak anybody else out, but I’m certainly not going to stay home every single time they act up.

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

Agreed. We took DD out to brunch for her 17th bday today (outdoors). DH has photic sneezes and when he did it today, DD and I both cringed, expecting to get dirty looks. Not a single person looked our way. And he hasn’t sneezed since. I have seasonal allergies and can definitely tell the difference between those symptoms and being sick. I still try to stay home when possible just to not freak anybody else out, but I’m certainly not going to stay home every single time they act up.

I think early on people did get looks and snide remarks but that was in the spring when it was all starting to go down. I haven't heard of that in so very long.

 

[Planogirl]

This is accurate to my point.

it doesn’t matter why you are coughing or sneezing. Right now that is an inappropriate thing to be doing in public even with a mask on. I apologize if that’s inconvenient for some, but that’s the way it is.

I get hay fever occasionally but I won’t stay home. Too bad if others don’t like it.

I also have a type of reflux that causes coughing and I try to hide that. Believe me, there is nothing like it so there’s no confusion.