Lunchtime pandemic reading.
Standard disclaimer: this is a roundup of informative pieces I've read that interest me on the severity of the crisis and how to manage it. I am not a qualified medical expert in ANY sense; at best I am reasonably well-read laity. ALWAYS prioritize advice from qualified healthcare experts over some person on Facebook.
This is also available as an email newsletter at https://lunchtimepandemic.substack.com if you prefer the update in your inbox.
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Incentives, incentives, incentives. "A really innovative, smart strategy by @GovWhitmer to tie loosening of public health restrictions to vaccination rates in Michigan
Because metrics like infection #s fluctuate
But immunity through vaccinations is more durable
And lets hope this motivates folks to get the shot"
Source:
Commentary: This is a great way to tie vaccination to reopening in a sensible, durable way. The more people vaccinated, the more your region is ready to reopen. Let's hope others copy this strategy.
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Remapped senses? "One of several peculiar features of COVID-19 has been its effects on smell and taste. Some COVID sufferers experience a condition called anosmia, or the loss of smell. Some have periods of phantosmia, in which they sense smells that are not there, or parosmia, in which they experience distorted smells. It isn’t known how many people with COVID experience these symptoms. But a February 2021 review found that nearly half of COVID sufferers had smell and taste changes, and of those, about half reported having parosmia. The article authors note that, “There is now abundant evidence that loss of sense of smell is one of the most common symptoms of COVID-19 infection and in some cases the only symptom.”"
Source: https://www.connecticutmag.com/health-and-science/how-covid-is-still-affecting-my-senses-one-year-later/article_b7decb2c-a14c-11eb-b43d-fb2ae2df6240.html?utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter&utm_campaign=user-share
Commentary: While the author's life wasn't endangered by COVID-19, it's stunning to note how much their quality of life has suffered by the fact that smells and tastes don't work correctly for them any more. It will remain to be seen whether that is permanent or not.
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COVID deaths numbers may not be accurate. "April 23, 2021 -- Long-haul COVID-19 patients face many health threats -- including a higher chance of dying -- up to 6 months after they catch the virus, according to a massive study published in the journal Nature.
A second study, released by the CDC on Friday, also found lingering symptoms months later among COVID-19 patients who originally had mild symptoms.
For the Nature study, researchers examined more than 87,000 COVID-19 patients and nearly 5 million control patients in a federal database. They found COVID-19 patients had a 59% higher risk of death up to 6 months after infection, compared to non-infected people.
Those findings translate into about eight extra deaths per 1,000 patients over 6 months, because many deaths caused by long-term COVID complications are not recorded as COVID-19 deaths, the researchers said. Among patients who were hospitalized and died after more than 30 days, there were 29 excess deaths per 1,000 patients over 6 months.
“As far as total pandemic death toll, these numbers suggest that the deaths we’re counting due to the immediate viral infection are only the tip of the iceberg,” Ziyad Al-Aly, MD, the senior author of the study and a director of the Clinical Epidemiology Center at the Veterans Affairs St. Louis Health Care System, said in a news release from the University of Washington Medical School in St. Louis."
Source: https://www.webmd.com/lung/news/20210423/covid-study-deaths-months-after-infection
Commentary: We will be assessing the damage of the pandemic for years to come; many of these conditions will be persistent and have lasting impacts on population health. Expect health care costs in general to continue increasing as we learn more about the long-term effects of COVID-19. Wherever you reside, ask your governments to invest more in healthcare; the investment will be necessary.
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A reminder of the simple daily habits we should all be taking.
1. Always wear the best mask available to you when out of your home and you'll be around other people, even after you've been vaccinated. Respirators are back in stock at online retailers, too. Wear an N95/FFP2/KN95 that's NIOSH-approved or better mask if you can obtain it. If you can't get an N95 mask, wear a surgical mask with a cloth mask over it.
2. Get vaccinated as soon as you're able to, and fulfill the full vaccine regimen.
3. Wash/sanitize your hands every time you are in or out of your home for any reason.
4. Stay home as much as possible. Minimize your contact with others and maintain physical distance of at LEAST 6 feet / 2 meters, preferably more. Avoid indoor places as much as you can; indoor spaces spread the disease through aerosols and distance is less effective at mitigating your risks.
5. Get your personal finances in order now. Cut all unnecessary costs.
6. Replenish your supplies as you use them. Avoid reducing your stores to pre-pandemic levels in case an outbreak causes unexpected supply chain disruptions.
7. Ventilate your home as frequently as weather and circumstances permit, except when you share close airspaces with other residences (like a window less than a meter away from a neighboring window).
8. Masks must fit properly to work. Here's how to properly fit a mask:
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Common misinformation debunked!
There is no mercury or other heavy metals in the Pfizer mRNA vaccine. https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/12/09/1013538/what-are-the-ingredients-of-pfizers-covid-19-vaccine/
There is no genomic evidence at all that COVID-19 arrived before 2020 in the United States and therefore no hidden herd immunity:
Source:
There is no evidence SARS-CoV-2 was engineered, nor that it escaped a lab somewhere.
Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2020/01/29/experts-debunk-fringe-theory-linking-chinas-coronavirus-weapons-research/
Source: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-020-0820-9
Source: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/2020/05/anthony-fauci-no-scientific-evidence-the-coronavirus-was-made-in-a-chinese-lab-cvd/
There is no evidence a flu shot increases your COVID-19 risk.
Source: https://www.factcheck.org/2020/04/no-evidence-that-flu-shot-increases-risk-of-covid-19/
Source: https://academic.oup.com/cid/advance-article/doi/10.1093/cid/ciaa626/5842161
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A common request I'm asked is who I follow. Here's a public Twitter list of many of the sources I read.
https://twitter.com/i/lists/1260956929205112834
This list is biased by design. It is limited to authors who predominantly post in the English language. It is heavily biased towards individual researchers and away from institutions. It is biased towards those who publish or share research, data, papers, etc. I have made an attempt to follow researchers from different countries, and also to make the list reasonably gender-balanced, because multiple, diverse perspectives on research data are essential.
This is also available as an email newsletter at https://lunchtimepandemic.substack.com if you prefer the update in your inbox.