Current community transmission levels: HIGH [Covid]

[rebeccmeister]

I am seeing signs all over the place that administrative people have gotten too tired to do their jobs and administrate about the pestilence, leaving other people to pick up the slack or risk getting very sick.

Our county's current community transmission rate is HIGH; this index lags behind what's actually happening. When the community transmission rate is HIGH, people should wear masks indoors, preferably tight-fitting ones.

I would advise against lingering indoors with strangers, too.

I have two questions, in the context of variants:

1. Is there still a (positive) correlation between a person's exposure level and the severity of illness?

2. For those who do recover without developing Long Covid: Is there any correlation between the severity of illness and subsequent immunity/antibody response? A friend who has been tracking the pandemic science much more closely than I have has concerns about waning immunity.

I will be teaching in a mask this fall. We are supposedly going to return to crowded classrooms. I will be holding my breath for the first two weeks of classes. Public schools here are reverting to 3-foot distances between students, and installation of plexiglass barriers. If you read any of the science on what plexiglass barriers do to aerosols and airflow, well.

Maybe we should all get good room air filters for Christmas this year?

Comments

[graydon]

Two data points; absolutely everyone's findings show more protective immune responses from vaccination than natural immune response. The CDC's big leak includes an assertion that vaccine protectiveness starts losing effectiveness six to nine months out.

COVID is, I hope, the Uncommon Cold; you can keep getting it, possibly annually, possibly every few years. ("I hope" because "works like dengue" has not been ruled out.)

One Lancet paper to the effect that absolutely everyone who gets COVID suffers cognitive impairment. This is correlated with severity of symptoms -- winding up on a ventilator is, on the averages, found to be worse than suffering a stroke -- but they find impairment in all cases.

Since no one is counting breakthrough cases that don't put you in the hospital, and the mild -- no hospital -- breakthrough rate isn't quite so low as one would best prefer by the anecdata, the degree to which vaccines are protective of function may have been overestimated.

[mallorys_camera]

Since no one is advising vaccinated people to be tested regularly nfor asymptomatic cases of COVID, I'd say they have an inadequate measure of the vaccines' protective function.

[graydon]

As I understand it, the current view is that given the reported case rates and the detectable antibodies, there are not many asymptomatic cases.

[shalpacafarm]

*post covid mental fuzziness grumbling sounds*

[mallorys_camera]

One Lancet paper to the effect that absolutely everyone who gets COVID suffers cognitive impairment.

How would they know? I suspect there are numerous cases of asymptomatic COVID that are never diagnosed. How could they have included those in their sample study?

I do think it sucks that you are expected to return to a crowded classroom. Are they not even imposing the 6-foot-distance rule?

[rebeccmeister]

I suspect that, by this stage in the pandemic, there really needs to be a better Covid research clearinghouse going, because I'm sure every Covid paper is fraught with methodological limitations.

No 6-foot-distance rule. The trouble is, we don't have classrooms large enough to accommodate it. Last year we managed by teaching hybrid classes of the worst variety (50% students in person, 50% on Zoom, 0% getting attention they deserve), teaching outside in tents (fun in winter and storms!), and teaching in the gym (acoustics, anyone?).

On the other claw, Facilities did overhaul the air filtration systems in buildings. But I should really buy a portable air filter and bring it with me to classrooms, too.

[mallorys_camera]

maybe a portable UVC light as well?

[rainswolf]

Ugh all the attention to pointless plexiglass and hand sanitizer....

[rebeccmeister]

Yeah, seriously!