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Coronavirus / COVID-19 : general fact-based reporting

Old Jan 27, 2020, 9:09 am
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Coronavirus / COVID-19 : general fact-based reporting

 
Old Oct 11, 2021, 3:21 pm
  #9676  
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Originally Posted by shorthauldad
Not wishing to seem dismissive, but I've never really understood what the phrase "life-changing" is supposed to mean, it always felt a bit too much like newspeak to me.
It's perfectly true that some COVID cases have a night or two in hospital, may get an oxygen line, may be put on drip, and are there more for observation. They are the lucky ones in my view.

Quite a lot of those who leave ICU leave with severe mental health trauma. PTSD in about 50% of COVID cases, for example, and just under half of that half will suffer PTSD for the rest of their lives, if it follows Ebola. Many a marriage breaks up a few years after ICU - sometimes the patient finds it difficult to maintain the bond, their priorities change; sometimes the spouse finds the patient is no longer the person they married. We are seeing a lot of permanent lung damage, ruling out things like going cycling with your kids. They would be the top 3, there are about 20 similar outcomes, with lower incidence levels. The people who are unvaccinated and who suffer most in hospital are disproportionately from lower socio-economic groups, very unlikely to have a degree, more likely to have left education at 16 years, less likely to own their own home or have a well paid job. So they often leave hospital in dire economic straits. This, unfortunately, is often the way with poor health outcomes, health inequalities just hammer those least able to ride it out, while the middle classes get their jabs and rarely get exposed to this.

Why on earth would any sensible adult even contemplate risks like that, even at a low risk level, when a free, safe, effective vaccine takes away 90% plus of these outcomes? Even if they don't care about themselves, in my experience there will be someone in their family who will feel tremendous guilt for not "making them" take their vaccine.

I'm only in ICU as part of a research project, those nurses and doctors who work in COVID ICU are real hawks on getting all their family vaccinated since they have seen the avoidable damage done to younger lives - I'm quite laid back by comparison! The only good thing is that after getting out ICU almost every single patient - and their families - get their vaccines after the requisite 4 weeks, I can't think of a recent exception to that, and I'm often the person administering it.

As for the point about children not getting educated or seeing relatives - yes I completely agree that there is also a mental health crisis buried in here, the like of which hasn't really surfaced yet but it scares me. But the restrictions are now largely over, children are only off school if they are ill, and the quickest way to get back to normal is for all those eligible to get their jabs. At that point we, collectively, will have taken all the reasonable steps. No other solution is realistically on the table.

Last edited by corporate-wage-slave; Oct 11, 2021 at 11:45 pm
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Old Oct 11, 2021, 3:55 pm
  #9677  
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Great summary as always by CWS. If everyone was vaccinated we will be almost back to normal months ago, now looking at another possibly unpredictable winter, at least in the US.
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Last edited by nk15; Oct 11, 2021 at 4:25 pm
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Old Oct 12, 2021, 12:19 am
  #9678  
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Originally Posted by shorthauldad
Not wishing to seem dismissive, but I've never really understood what the phrase "life-changing" is supposed to mean, it always felt a bit too much like newspeak to me. The UK [still] has a Prime Minister who seems to be doing just fine, if somewhat more cautious about the risks of Covid than he was before he ended up in ICU.
If you speak French, there is a patient who got COVID this Winter, ended up in ICU but not on ECMO, survived and is explaining what happened to him during and since. He has been interviewed for various newspaper and is very active on Twittter. He is still in hospitals dealing with the aftermath (he was able to walk only 3 months after being COVID free). He is very clear he is lucky and was not even in the most damaging ICU there is. It is very sobering and a good view of how life changing it can be, because it truly is. A lot of things are different after, as it is the same for people who got diagnosed chronic diseases for example.
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Old Oct 12, 2021, 1:29 am
  #9679  
 
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The latest figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) show that around one in 15 children in school years seven to 11 in England are estimated to have had Covid in the week to Oct 2 – the highest positivity rate for any age group.Government data show that more than 204,000 pupils were absent from school on Sep 30 for Covid-related reasons.
That's a pretty staggering figure. If the bubble system had been still in operation, would there have been any classes left in school?

Also came across these links, seems children aren't at higher risk from Delta, which is good news.

Delta does not appear to make children sicker;
https://www.reuters.com/business/hea...er-2021-10-08/

Illness characteristics of COVID-19 in children infected with the SARS-CoV-2 Delta variant
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1....06.21264467v1
data confirm that COVID-19 in UK school-aged children is usually of short duration and similar symptom burden, whether due to Delta or Alpha


...and an interesting paper on differing immune response between those who were solely vaccinated vs those vaccinated after infection.


"Secondary immune response stronger after infection than after shot":
Anti-SARS-CoV-2 receptor binding domain antibody evolution after mRNA vaccination
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-021-04060-7
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Old Oct 12, 2021, 3:40 am
  #9680  
 
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Originally Posted by shorthauldad
Illness characteristics of COVID-19 in children infected with the SARS-CoV-2 Delta variant
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1....06.21264467v1
The vast majority of children have a mild illness, but still the study you shared shows an impact (either hospital visit or symptoms longer than 28 days) for ~2%.

Presentation to hospital was reported for 14 younger and 16 older children: 6 [2.2%] of 276 younger and 8 [1.9%] of 418 older children with Alpha infection and 8 [3.5%] of 227 younger and 8 [17%] of 479 older children with Delta infection (Table 1).

Illness longer than 28 days was reported for 5 younger and 22 older children overall (Table 1). Illness had resolved by 28 days in 274 [99.3%] of 276 younger, and in 408 [97.6%] of 418 older children with Alpha infection; and in 224 [98.7%] of 227 younger, and in 467 [97.5%] of 479 older children with Delta infection. For those children with longer illness duration, no new symptom developed after day 28.
Where the choice is between acquiring covid antibodies from the vaccine or the virus, I cannot see any rational decision that would not result in vaccination. I can understand that for some people these decisions are not rational though (which is 100% human).
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Old Oct 12, 2021, 4:20 am
  #9681  
 
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Originally Posted by shorthauldad
Not wishing to seem dismissive, but I've never really understood what the phrase "life-changing" is supposed to mean, it always felt a bit too much like newspeak to me. Hmm....
heres an example..

I have a family member who caught covid early on in March 2020. They were in a coma on a ventilator for 3 months. During this time they suffered severe hallucinatory dreams that felt so real when they woke up they didnt know what was real and what wasnt. They found this really hard to deal with (as well as having lost 3 months of their life).

since then they have been suffering from PTSD. They also lost pretty much their entire muscle mass and the ability to swallow. They had to be fed via a tube into their stomach for several months whilst they learnt how to swallow again. They still have to have twice weekly physical rehab to rebuild their strength. They get tired very easily and cant do some things they used to do pre-covid (they were very fit and physically active before). Theyre unlikely to get much better than they are now. They have been told that their immune system has been permanently affected and catching flu etc could now be fatal for them.

the psychological affects will stay with them probably forever.
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Old Oct 12, 2021, 4:53 am
  #9682  
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Originally Posted by 8420PR
The vast majority of children have a mild illness, but still the study you shared shows an impact (either hospital visit or symptoms longer than 28 days) for ~2%.
I've just come off a Teams meeting with the local education authorities, and yes there are a lot of children off with Delta right now, and pupil (and teacher) long term sickness levels are running much higher than normal - mostly Long Covid related. School sport is disrupted, schools can't raise full rugby or basketball teams, teachers are off looking after their own children, carol concerts cancelled and so on. However one school is working 100% normally, zero infections, full education programme, and no staff off work. As you can probably guess, it is a Special Needs school where 100% of pupils and staff were vaccinated before term started.
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Old Oct 12, 2021, 9:20 am
  #9683  
 
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I finally got a good answer (IMO) regarding antibody levels, boosters/etc. as it pertains to COVID and the vaccines.

It starts around 22 minutes. He's interviewing Dr. Offit from the FDA Vaccine Advisory Committee. I thought he explained it (again, at least for me) quite well. Unfortunately I don't think (just my opinion) the powers that be (at least here in the US) follow this, and will probably mandate boosters every 6 months, as they seem to rely only on antibody levels. Hopefully I'm wrong (as Dr. Offit points out, "we" have never done this for any other virus in terms of boosters for simply antibody levels when we have good memory B/T-cell measures).

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Old Oct 12, 2021, 10:26 am
  #9684  
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With, thankfully, travel opening up again over the coming weeks and months throughout the world, we are taking the decision today to permanently close this thread as we believe it's a good time to return the forum to its intended focus of Coronavirus & Travel.

Here at Flyertalk, the vast majority of us have more interest and expertise in visiting places rather than analysing and debating scientific (and not so scientific) studies. As we move to a point where we can do that again, this forum will be an extremely valuable resource for those seeking advice on the practicalities of travel and entry to other countries. That we can take this step should therefore be, in itself, a cause for celebration - and indeed we'd all like to be in a position where we didn't need this forum at all going forward, although that's still an aspiration for the future.

For those who wish to continue to discuss scientific studies there are doubtless many other places on the internet where that can happen, as we move to the next phase of helping and supporting each other here on Flyertalk.

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