Coronavirus COVID-19

Australia is trickling towards its millionth vaccination, far behind schedule. Still in the initial phase of healthcare worker and elderly. I’m not even thinking about a vaccine at the moment, because it still feels months away. Given my being an early 30s woman with a blood clotting disorder and likelihood of AstZen, little perturbed as it could possibly pose no more or less risk to me than COVID itself, but it wouldn’t stop me taking the jab for communal sake at all. I’ve run clotting risks like this before with various things.

  On 4/8/2021 at 4:57 AM, Roo said:

Australia is trickling towards its millionth vaccination, far behind schedule. Still in the initial phase of healthcare worker and elderly. I’m not even thinking about a vaccine at the moment, because it still feels months away. Given my being an early 30s woman with a blood clotting disorder and likelihood of AstZen, little perturbed as it could possibly pose no more or less risk to me than COVID itself, but it wouldn’t stop me taking the jab for communal sake at all. I’ve run clotting risks like this before with various things.

might be oddly to your advantage they’re a little slow. the UK giving younger people a choice due to AZ link to clots in those with certain blood conditions / behaviours / characteristics might knock on to global adjustment in its use.

as for canada’s 4 months between doses - the UK uses 12 weeks as the gap. i suspect this allows for steadier administering pace, but certainly initially looked like a way to spin the figures to look more positive. oddly, deaths and hospitalisations have come down; but we’ve been in lockdown during these months of reaching 50%+ of population with first, and about 5m fully vaccinated.

im still expecting variants to scupper vaccines before too long; boosters and revisions in the works here, so it’s accepted as just the beginning by some - even if the public are convinced things are more resolved than it’s ultimately going to be possible to achieve easily.

i’m 47, had my first AZ dose two weeks ago. minor side effects, like a cold coming on for 48-72 hours. arm pains for a week.

Yeah, people definitely get infected after the vaccination, there's a retirement home here where seven fully vaccinated inhabitants just got infected and they're afraid it's going to spread.

Edit: looks like initial tests indicate at least some of them have gotten infected by the Brazilian strain.

  On 4/8/2021 at 4:57 AM, Roo said:

Australia is trickling towards its millionth vaccination, far behind schedule. Still in the initial phase of healthcare worker and elderly. I’m not even thinking about a vaccine at the moment, because it still feels months away. Given my being an early 30s woman with a blood clotting disorder and likelihood of AstZen, little perturbed as it could possibly pose no more or less risk to me than COVID itself, but it wouldn’t stop me taking the jab for communal sake at all. I’ve run clotting risks like this before with various things.

This makes for an interesting thought experiment. You may have something of a super power if you're factor deficient for instance. Your inability to form competent clots may help dodge that effect. 

If it's in the "hypercoagulable" side of things like Factor V Leiden, it makes covid even scarier than it already is. You don't have to answer with your personal health info. I work in a clinical lab and that was the scariest effect I was able to personally observe. People got admitted with perfectly normal "bleeding" metrics and I could watch them get rekt within hours. 

  On 4/8/2021 at 9:49 AM, Silent Member said:

Yeah, people definitely get infected after the vaccination, there's a retirement home here where seven fully vaccinated inhabitants just got infected and they're afraid it's going to spread.

Edit: looks like initial tests indicate at least some of them have gotten infected by the Brazilian strain.

If the Brazilian variant continues to spread in the US, I’m glad I got the Pfizer vaccine:

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-pfizer-brazil-idUSKBN2B02JC

  On 4/8/2021 at 9:49 AM, Silent Member said:

Yeah, people definitely get infected after the vaccination, there's a retirement home here where seven fully vaccinated inhabitants just got infected and they're afraid it's going to spread.

Yeah, in "my" retirement home quite a few people got infected after the first shot, too. but opposed to the pre-vac outbreak literally none of these cases got severe, whereas nearly 50% of non-vaccinated residents had died before.

I know, completely anecdotal and probably not saying much but yo... i try to remain cautiously optimistic.

  On 4/8/2021 at 2:15 PM, jaderpansen said:

Yeah, in "my" retirement home quite a few people got infected after the first shot, too. but opposed to the pre-vac outbreak literally none of these cases got severe, whereas nearly 50% of non-vaccinated residents had died before.

I know, completely anecdotal and probably not saying much but yo... i try to remain cautiously optimistic.

While that is good to hear, the Chili report I alluded to above talks about mobile morgue units that are needed because the regular hospital morgues are overflowing. So severe cases after vaccination are still possible, it seems.

  On 4/8/2021 at 2:20 PM, rhmilo said:

While that is good to hear, the Chili report I alluded to above talks about mobile morgue units that are needed because the regular hospital morgues are overflowing. So severe cases after vaccination are still possible, it seems.

Well, fuck.

  On 4/8/2021 at 11:11 AM, xxx said:

This makes for an interesting thought experiment. You may have something of a super power if you're factor deficient for instance. Your inability to form competent clots may help dodge that effect. 

If it's in the "hypercoagulable" side of things like Factor V Leiden, it makes covid even scarier than it already is. You don't have to answer with your personal health info. I work in a clinical lab and that was the scariest effect I was able to personally observe. People got admitted with perfectly normal "bleeding" metrics and I could watch them get rekt within hours. 

Yep, Factor V Leiden. Luckily, Australia effectively stopped AstZen for under-50s overnight! (a future rollout phase) My father and his mother are the hereditary line, both high risk to Covid, going to exercise Pfizer choice.

WATMM's favourite philosopher opines on life in the pandemic.

Required listening while reading:

lol is that actually written by Zizek?  (Just skimmed the first bit.)  That's a rare case of a 50/50 could be satire, could be legit article at a glance.  I'm guessing it is indeed him, because he is wacky.

  On 4/9/2021 at 9:25 PM, Zephyr_Nova said:

lol is that actually written by Zizek?  (Just skimmed the first bit.)  That's a rare case of a 50/50 could be satire, could be legit article at a glance.  I'm guessing it is indeed him, because he is wacky.

the cool thing about zizek's writing is that it all reads like someone else writing a zizek-style shitpost

  On 4/9/2021 at 9:25 PM, Zephyr_Nova said:

lol is that actually written by Zizek?  (Just skimmed the first bit.)  That's a rare case of a 50/50 could be satire, could be legit article at a glance.  I'm guessing it is indeed him, because he is wacky.

I guess so, it looks like he writes a fair bit for that paper (a left-wing paper in South Korea that has a good reputation and sizable readership, and is publicly owned).

Two really interesting articles on thinking about COVID-19 and implications for society and the response.

https://www.e-ir.info/2020/05/29/anxiety-and-covid-19-the-role-of-ontological-security-and-myth/

https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/08/01/the-sociologist-who-could-save-us-from-coronavirus/

Got my 2nd jab today 

apparently there's going to be a big protest here today against the most recent lockdown measures (gyms shut back down, curfew moved from 9:30 to 8PM, mandatory to wear a mask in parks), with the stated intention being to intentionally flaunt the curfew. i'm kinda curious to see how rowdy it gets - it's definitely far more than just crazy QAnon types who are against the government at this point (last I looked on the Montreal Reddit page there were, like, people openly threatening violence against the premier). I passed by a couple parks yesterday & they were more packed than I've ever seen them; like music festival packed. Felt like there had to be something more to it than just people out enjoying the weirdly early summer weather

  On 4/11/2021 at 3:19 PM, Cryptowen said:

apparently there's going to be a big protest here today against the most recent lockdown measures (gyms shut back down, curfew moved from 9:30 to 8PM, mandatory to wear a mask in parks), with the stated intention being to intentionally flaunt the curfew. i'm kinda curious to see how rowdy it gets - it's definitely far more than just crazy QAnon types who are against the government at this point (last I looked on the Montreal Reddit page there were, like, people openly threatening violence against the premier). I passed by a couple parks yesterday & they were more packed than I've ever seen them; like music festival packed. Felt like there had to be something more to it than just people out enjoying the weirdly early summer weather

Yeah there’s all kinds of stupid going around. 
Some of it is definitely the human response to being locked down for so long,  but fuck these irresponsible cunts with no thought for others. 

  On 4/11/2021 at 4:54 PM, chenGOD said:

Yeah there’s all kinds of stupid going around. 

yeah imo a big problem is that the longer this goes on the more people will be emotionally reacting rather than rationally considering what's going on, and when that happens a reactionary position begins to seem more appealing (as the name suggests). initially it's just the people who would have been against the government in any case (ie conspiracy theorists). over time nerves become frayed, the human error (and perhaps in some cases genuine incompetence) of governing officials stands out more & more. the idea of aggressive pushback becomes more normalized as more people dare to voice the possibility.

it all just feels extremely childish to me. this is being dressed up as some kind of power to the people thing, standing up for liberty or whatever. but really it's just the exact same mindless emotional reactivity which had people (probably the same people) panicking & buying a year's worth of toilet paper a year ago. it's less about actually doing something politically & more about the individual trying to demonstrate to their peers that they're the kind of person who stands up to Totalitarianism, or that standing up for your right to eat at Golden Corral is on par with your great grandpa storming the beach at Normandy

  On 4/11/2021 at 5:35 PM, Cryptowen said:

right to eat at Golden Corral

If I can’t get my St. Hubert, a motherfucker is gonna pay. 

  On 4/11/2021 at 5:49 PM, chenGOD said:

If I can’t get my St. Hubert, a motherfucker is gonna pay. 

Shops and gyms open in England and Wales tomorrow. Be interesting to see how the stats react since Covid seems to be largely under control now.  Plenty of people still getting jabs though so hopefully we have actually got a way out and can have a half decent summer ahead. 

Unless of course the work done so far gets spoilt by the idiots partying and recklessly protesting en-masse. 

(Note, I'm ok with a protest.... But not when you act like a twat and don't protect yourself and others)

  On 4/11/2021 at 5:35 PM, Cryptowen said:

yeah imo a big problem is that the longer this goes on the more people will be emotionally reacting rather than rationally considering what's going on, and when that happens a reactionary position begins to seem more appealing (as the name suggests). initially it's just the people who would have been against the government in any case (ie conspiracy theorists). over time nerves become frayed, the human error (and perhaps in some cases genuine incompetence) of governing officials stands out more & more. the idea of aggressive pushback becomes more normalized as more people dare to voice the possibility.

it all just feels extremely childish to me. this is being dressed up as some kind of power to the people thing, standing up for liberty or whatever. but really it's just the exact same mindless emotional reactivity which had people (probably the same people) panicking & buying a year's worth of toilet paper a year ago. it's less about actually doing something politically & more about the individual trying to demonstrate to their peers that they're the kind of person who stands up to Totalitarianism, or that standing up for your right to eat at Golden Corral is on par with your great grandpa storming the beach at Normandy

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I was a bit surprised this didn't already happen last summer in a larger scale than it did.

But soon that the most vulnerable parts of society should be vaccinated against the virus it's going to be even harder to try to justify the lockdowns and social isolation morally. There is a real mental health damage from all the isolation and lack of social contacts, especially in the children and young people who get accustomed to living without physical contact.

  On 4/11/2021 at 7:45 PM, zkom said:

But soon that the most vulnerable parts of society should be vaccinated against the virus it's going to be even harder to try to justify the lockdowns and social isolation morally. There is a real mental health damage from all the isolation and lack of social contacts, especially in the children and young people who get accustomed to living without physical contact.

Yeah it's complicated. imo there actually are a lot of good arguments for being against the lockdown (or at least against aspects of it), but I've mostly been hearing the really dumb ones as justification for today's protest.

I feel like I'd be more empathetic to the "I'm at my wit's end because of all this" crowd if this issue wasn't affecting literally everyone on the planet (pretty much). it's like saying you're at your wit's end because you're going to die eventually. So is everybody (pretty much), get used to it or come up with a better angle

Interesting read on what the booster shots landscape will look like next year:

https://apple.news/AU4J2O6jYTOOrs7CXeHAwaw