I think we need to walk back a little and manage the expectations as to what “the pandemic is over” means and always meant. It doesn’t mean “Covid will go away”. It won’t. It will never go away. The pandemic is over because it entered into the endemic stage. All the things we did during the pandemic phase of Covid was to save as many people as possible until
A) a vaccine was found (check) and
B) an endemic variant emerged. (Check) an endemic variant is a mutation that’s harmless enough so people don’t become too sick and spread the bastard around. That’s what Omicron is.Yes, people die of Covid. People die of many pathogens, bow we have one more. But we cannot make it go away. We could mask up, keep distance forever, but that would cost us dearly, if not economically, at least mentally. There will always be Covid deaths from now on and nothing can change that as far as we know. Yet, that was clear from almost day 1 of the pandemic.
Besides: look at who dies of Covid. It’s those with weakened immune systems mostly. I want everyone to live as long and as happily as possible, but we need to acknowledge that some are sicker than others and all of us will die. Those who die of Covid are compromised on a way that would have them die from the flu or any number of other pathogens around (for the most part).
Like it or not, that’s what the world is like and always has been like. Until we find a way to eradicate viruses, people will die from Covid. End of story.
That’s funny, wearing a mask never cost me anything mentally, but I’m not surrounded by Dunning Krueger rednecks who make fun of masks so I got that going for me.
I really don’t understand why there’s so much hostility towards masks. I’ve always worn masks when I was sick and it was never a big deal for me. Wearing a mask all the time during 2020-2023 wasn’t a bother either.
I don’t get it either. I was working in a hospital lab in TX for H1N1 (swine flu) in 2009. The hospital lined up all staff members to get the brand new H1N1 vaccine and you either got it or signed a declination. Declining meant you got a sticker on your badge requiring you to wear a mask for the entire flu season while at work. No fits, no protests, and everyone cooperated. My mind is blown by how toxic the rhetoric became.
You’ve added an extra ‘e’ to Kruger
Endemic illnesses get spread around and kill people all the time. Endemic actually just means “statistically naturally occurring within a given population”. It shouldn’t have been allowed to get to endemic levels, but half of America thought the pandemic wasn’t real and didn’t wear masks or isolate.
First of all, there is more than the US. So let’s not get into US centrism. I’m from Germany and we had issues with those ppl as well. The US alone would not have been able to stop this at all. Secondly, the endemic stage was guaranteed to happen in the very moment Covid left Wuhan province. That was the last time it was stoppable. Given it’s incubation time, there was no way we could have caught all infected in time as soon as it left the very distinct borders it first occurred in.
Fucking Boris Johnson thought the UK could get through the pandemic through herd immunity and cost the lives of thousands.
They might die of the flu anyway is a horrific justification. If someone isn’t getting vaccinated and masking up they’re really just saying they don’t care if other people die as long as they don’t have to be inconvenienced.
Yet another comment that sounds rational at face value, but is actually insane when considering the high rates of long covid and how much about it is unknown.
The most dangerous thing when COVID emerged was it’s novelty. Since no one’s immune system had seen anything like it before, it had free reign to do widespread damage to it’s victims often without any immune response and spread like wildfire.
Most of the planet is has either caught COVID, been immunized, or both at this point. Even though the variant changes it’s not a completely novel disease. As such the damage it can do is limited.
At this point enacting controls other than immunization will be counterproductive. Remember that any control you place on a pathogen is a selection pressure for it to evolve to overcome it. So masks, distancing etc. that we half-assed at the heat of the pandemic will make the pathogen evolve to overcome them.
The best and most effective control is immunization. We need to hold the other controls in reserve for if/when that fails.
The idea that we should just let immunocompromised people die is horrific and disgusting holy shit.
Justifying it based on “that’s what the world is and always will be like” is just as shitty, because it is essentially saying “I don’t think we should strive to change this because of the fact it happened in the past, and it is still happening now when we haven’t done much to change it.”
Source on it being endemic? Because I don’t think WHO or CDC declared it endemic. It’s expected to become endemic – that’s pretty much common sense – but the only thing that’s happened is the rescinding of public health emergencies, which is not the same as the pandemic being over or it becoming endemic.
The WHO ended it’s public health emergency of international concern in 2023.
“Endemic” means that we can predict infection rates. This can happen one year after it has become stable at the earliest, so the fact that it’s not called “endemic” yet isn’t because we have have left emergency territory, it’s because we need at least one year’s worth of “stable” data to call it endemic.So authorities declaring something to be endemic isnt exactly the same as a pandemic being over. They declared the latter, will declare the former with enough data.
So how many new viruses does it take before we panic? What if every five years a new world changing virus like Covid comes out? What if we all get sick so often our bodies can no longer supply enough Tcells? Compare this to tech. Would you surf the Internet without a firewall?
Not comparable, not how viruses work.
We actually saw COVID coming (researchers and scientists did at least, there are been papers and documentary about it even), but there’s a very low chance we’d get yet another pandemic so soon
We actually saw COVID coming
It was already predicted? How can something like that be done?
How can someone predict a rapidly mutating virus will appear in new forms?
Is that a serious question? The common cold? SARS? MERS?
That’s like asking how I can predict a new Star Wars show or movie will come out in the future.
Might not. But probably will.
Lets start again, the OP said that they (Scientists) saw a pandemic coming, and then says how the chance of another pandemic is very low, so I was asking how it can be said whether a new pandemic is coming or not, is there some sort of timeframe they follow?
(I am not presenting this as an argument, it’s a genuine question, I feel like I need to make this clear)
Despite the link, it’s just statistical averages regarding frequency. And my understanding is, partially due to climate change and partially due to a more globalized world, pandemics will increase in frequency.
Even if we got one again… Is a life dictated by fear of the next mean thing worth living?
How dare you! If you don’t panic right this instant people will die and it will be your fault.
Oh… Ah … Sorry, I didn’t know that. So…
AAÄAAAAAAH JUDGEMENT DAY IS UPON US!
Is that better?
Thank you
Don’t worry, I understood that you weren’t being serious.
Yeah each and every Covid death is a tragedy but how many people committed suicide during lockdown? How much did our society and culture suffer from shutting everything down except the bare essentials? How many people went broke because they couldn’t work from home?
I think the lockdown was worth it back in 2020-2021. But at some point you just need to accept that people are going to die no matter what, and there’s nothing we can do to eradicate Covid forever.
The WHO never announced that the pandemic is over. People just got bored of it so they decided it was.
Not trying to be argumentative or contrarian but WHO not declaring that a pandemic is over is not really what signals the end of a pandemic (any pandemic, not just COVID). Most literature suggests that pandemics tend to end organically, once the culture(s) impacted return more or less to normal. The pandemic has been over by conventional definitions for a couple years now. That doesn’t mean that COVID is less of a threat or shouldn’t be taken seriously by any means. It just means that society is no longer adjusting daily life because of the threat.
The pandemic is over because it’s now endemic.
Yes, and I’m sorry, but I really was very bored of it.
As long as you’re willing to get vaccinated on occasion then being bored isn’t anything to feel sorry about.
It’s never going to be over. It’s endemic now. Instead of Flu Season we will always have COVID and Flu Season.
I was about to make this same comment, but I looked up some statistics and it seems that COVID still has a 10x hospitalization rate and 3-4x death rate among seniors as compared to seasonal flu. While it’s fair to say that COVID is probably seasonal now, like the flu, I think it’s important to acknowledge that it’s much more dangerous. I was never one to get flu shots in the past, but COVID shots seem like a good idea. I’ll probably stay home from work longer if I do catch COVID, and I’ll probably wear a mask if I have to go out in public before I’m fully recovered. I think we just need to recalibrate our common sense for this new reality.
https://www.ahcancal.org/News-and-Communications/Blog/Pages/Flu-or-COVID-19---Which-is-Worse.aspx
Between new diseases and all the smoke from entire states and provinces burning each spring and summer and the unbearable heat and cold, we’re all gonna be walking around looking like sand people in a few years.
Iirc in the 2019/20 bushfires here in Oz, over 1B hectares were scorched, flora and fauna decimated nationwide. I smoked for years, I can tell you now more damage was done to my airways by those fires than all the durries I punched.
If we’re going to burn the world to the ground, can we at least start with all the mansions, bunkers and superyachts?
Just want to say this is a quality comment. Thanks. Good points made.
There are so many people I come across now think of this as a cold, perhaps a bad one in the worse case. They have had it at least once to 3 times so there’s nothing more that can be done in their minds.
My gf has had it 2 years in a row and I’ve dodged it there too.
I’m being told I’m a unicorn now as I’m the only one in my circles that hasn’t had it yet.
Then I see the numbers above like this and recall almost 3000 died in 9/11 and how many were so moved by those senseless deaths which lead to a million more senseless civilian deaths while domestically these Rona numbers happening weekly, and there’s nothing that can be done in a way worse than the lack of action for gun violence against children.
At least there are thoughts and prayers to be applied for gun violence. We won’t even think of this minimum for those that have died from Rona…
Food for thought: you may very well have had Covid, multiple times. Plenty of people have no, or extremely minor, symptoms. My son has had Covid twice and both times his ONLY symptom was a bit of a stomach upset. We only found out he had Covid by sheer coincidence.
If only there were some sort of rapid covid test you could take to check instead of just headcanoning whether or not you have covid.
If you don’t have any symptoms, why would you use a RAT? I’m not sure what they cost where you are, but they aren’t all that cheap in Australia.
Feels weird to dunk on someone else’s healthcare system as an American, but I have a shit ton of rapid tests that the US government gave me for free.
Haha yeah but the reason we have to pay for them now is that we have 90%+ vaccination rate so Covid really isn’t a big deal here any more. The vaccines are free. The RATs were also free until a year ago.
As someone working in a public place, I used the ten they gave me already (they only did it once iirc). Where do I stock up on these other shit ton of free tests? I had to pay out of pocket the last four, and that gets fucking expensive.
A lot of the rapid tests had problems with false negatives, no?
https://www.mcgill.ca/oss/article/covid-19/navigating-false-negatives-covid-rapid-tests
I’ve wondered that. Thankfully I’ve not tested positive at work the first year and neither time the gf was sick. We get plenty of free rest kits still up here so we usually test at the sign of anything. I think that’s how I’ve been able to avoid getting it with the gf as she has been religious about testing right away at the first sign of a tickle.
But still if neither of us are sick or showing symptoms we don’t test so it could have come and gone without knowing.
I’m one of those who have extremely mild symptom. Just one. A minor sore throat. No mucus build up, no coughing, no fever, etc etc. In my line of work it’s not terribly uncommon to finish a random day with heavy circular saw use and have worse symptoms than covid (for me). I consider myself very lucky but it sure was strange when my job site all got it and I was seemingly unaffected.
Bear in mind those are death counts. The variants have become less deadly but that doesn’t mean they’re harmless
I mean, no disease will never not be lethal, but that is considerable better than it was.
Depends on what you consider better. I’d rather be dead than permanently disabled from long covid.
Well that’s certainly a take.
I don’t think it’s unreasonable to not want to be alive if you have no quality of life.
Long covid doesn’t usually make you a vegetable or something. So it sounded quite extreme
Being a vegetable isn’t the only negative QoL out there. If I have to take several breaks just walking to the mailbox, that doesn’t sound like any sort of quality of life to me.
I am in no way denying this claim, I just dont find stating that this time of year is the highest since this time of year last year *to be a compelling claim. While perfectly true, it doesnt convey anything mwaningful to me, as it seems that common diseases such as cold and flu are always on seasonal variations, so you would expect the peak seasons to be regular each year. I think communication on an issue like this needs to be both speciic and careful to consider that cultural expectations of diseases could lessen the impact if what is being said here.
edit:spelling and grammar
This seems to be the same Twitter account that said the Palestine marches in DC and London had a million people combined when every article seemed to describe the attendance as “thousands”.
I’m sceptical of all their claims now.
Yeah these numbers (and post, by proxy) are meaningless without context, context I don’t have. I really don’t give a shit that there’s 1,000 crusty old geezers dying every day. If they don’t take care of their health and wellness I don’t need to give a shit about their easily preventable death.
https://www.usbirthcertificates.com/articles/people-born-daily In the United States,
- 445 people are born every hour
- 10,687 people are born every day
- 8 people are born every second
https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/71/wr/mm7117e1.htm
COVID-19, listed as the underlying cause in 415,399 deaths during 2021, ranked as the third leading underlying cause of death after heart disease (693,021 deaths) and cancer (604,553 deaths) (Figure 2). COVID-19 was the underlying cause for 13.3% of all deaths in 2021, increasing from 10.4% (350,831 deaths) in 2020. Unintentional injuries, the fourth leading cause of death in 2020 and 2021, increased from 200,955 in 2020 to 219,487 in 2021. start highlightOther leading causes of death maintained the same ranking from 2020 to 2021, except for chronic liver disease and cirrhosis and influenza and pneumonia. Chronic liver disease and cirrhosis, which was not among the 10 leading causes of death in 2020, was the ninth leading cause in 2021 with 56,408 deaths (51,642 deaths in 2020).end highlight Influenza and pneumonia, which was the ninth leading cause of death in 2020 (53,544 deaths), dropped out of the 10 leading causes in 2021 (41,835 deaths).
You don’t need context. People are dying of a preventable illness. Period.
Mostly preventable. Even vaccinated people get it. But of course the vast majority of those cases are less severe as a result, making it totally worth it still.
You think I was in a coma for covid?
Why should I care? People die all the fucking time.
Yeah but people are over it. No more shutdowns. Covid isn’t going away ever.
Unfortunately there are way too many people who not only refuse to accept that but who will also actively resist any attempts to control this or any future pandemic
Unfortunately there are way too many people.
I wonder, how many of these people were homeless and could easily been prevented just with some human decency, housing them and given them basic medical care.
I only got it when I was put in jail for shit I didn’t do. They made me catch COVID when I otherwise wouldn’t have because I already self isolate to the extreme.
I am saddened for those that die despite doing everything that they can to prevent it. The vaccine doesn’t always work. Some people can’t get it for legitimate health reasons (as opposed to the illegitimate excuses some people use). Etc.
Call me cold hearted, but with the exception of the minority of people meeting the above criteria, I can’t help but imagine that most of the people dying of COVID at this point are willfully ignorant Trumpets taking one for their team. Good riddance to them. That’s one less ballot we need to worry about in November.
The vaccine does work. Vaccines aren’t a silver bullet “you’ll never catch this disease now” solution. They simply mitigate the harmful effects of the virus and reduce your chances of contracting it.
A lot of vaccines prevent you from becoming sick. With that in mind they work in a way but aren’t very good. Better than nothing for sure.
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Yup, the only good thing Trump has ever done was killing off a ton of his cult members.
I’d like to see the data broken out by comorbidities, vaccination status, etc. so we can understand the risks - is it mostly elderly? Immunocompromised? Unvaccinated? Diabetics? It would be useful to have a real assessment of my personal risk of dying at this point, and whether or not I should be alarmed. For instance, if it’s mostly unvaccinated people, that’s sad, but I’m basically a pincushion at this point so no worries.
Agreed, that would be useful knowledge. I’m sure there’s a publicly available data set that has that information somewhere. But it’s probably a case of knowing who to ask for the raw data and being willing to crunch your own numbers.
Get vaccinated, test, mask and social distance.
I was really active about all that befor. But I’ve since stopped testing. I just don’t feel like it matters if I have the flu or covid, it’s not like I’m goint anywhere sick anyway.
for the US*
Don’t get complacent. COVID has been hitting Europe pretty hard too
Edit: I put bad links, sorry!
I am regularly boosted and test when I am sick as does my family. It ain’t over but I’m living my life. We have the means for most people to walk around without any concern, but some people refuse to take 30 minutes out of their day to get a (generally free) sho every 12mo or so because it’s inconvenient or their politics.
The pandemic is over for me and my family. All the “vaccine skeptics“ out there can get on board or deal with it at this point. It’s been almost 4 years folks, get with the program. Any of you reading this who are able but have not gotten boosted or (god forbid) aren’t vaccinated yet, get off your ass and do it. It’s not that difficult.
Now check to see if the folks in the Hospital and dying were vaccinated.
The vast majority of people hospitalized and intubated and deceased from COVID were not vaccinated.
As expected. Not a thing in the world you can do to stop idiots from getting themselves killed.
Cold/Flu season is in full effect so I’m betting getting Covid with the Flu is rough.
