Omicron Variant

[masterpoonhunter]

With R values greater than 1 and in places where the bulk of the community are not vaccinated, a virus will continue to spread and unfortunately mutate. And here we go again with another variant. First noted Nov.24 in South Africa and already in the UK, just 3 days later. I understand Canada is or will be locking out flights arriving from Africa, other countries following suit and so on and so on and basically, here we go again (still?).

On the testing side, one of the 3 genes of the Omicron variant, within the PCR test are not detected. Early for statistics but all indicators are that a reinfection of those who have had covid, or a bypassing of immunity from vaccines is statistically significant.

Bummer. There goes my planned trip to Portugal and Spain next spring.

 

[Forum mod]

while the developed world has some decent vaccination rates, most of Africa and the developing world countries are very poorly vaccinated and a total variant creating monster. This is one of many more that will come up, they will develop a new vaccine for the new variant and COVID becomes the annual flu on steroids.

 

[westwoody]

As always, listen to real experts, not self proclaimed internet geniuses.

 

[Busterkeaton]

fun fact: omicron is an anagram for moronic

 

[AlphaPussyLicker69]

Does anybody else think that Omicron sounds like a name for a Transformer?

 

[Forum mod]

fun fact: omicron is an anagram for moronic

You would know a lot about being moronic, this is about the 10th handle of yours that has been banned. You need a new hobby.

 

[Newb808]

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/global-...r-raised-alarm-omicron-variant-says-symptoms/

Would be something if Omicron is the more contagious/less virulent strain we’ve been told would eventually come 🤞🏼

 

[MB Mod]

You would know a lot about being moronic, this is about the 10th handle of yours that has been banned. You need a new hobby.

Make it 11, started a new handle less than an hour ago lol

 

[westwoody]

fun fact: omicron is an anagram for moronic

Fun fact: you didn’t think that up yourself

 

[Robert Upndown]

A little more info. Not definitive, but interesting nonetheless

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/ar...ms-unusual-patients-NOT-lose-sense-smell.html


The discovery of Omicron, dubbed a 'variant of concern' last week by the World Health Organization (WHO), has sparked worries around the world that it could resist vaccinations and prolong the nearly two-year pandemic.
Omicron is potentially more contagious than previous variants, although experts do not yet know if it will cause more or less severe Covid-19 compared to other strains.
Dr Coetzee reassured the media that the new symptoms she had observed were 'mild', and that all of the patients she was treating had recovered well.
'We had one very interesting case, a kid, about six years old, with a temperature and a very high pulse rate, and I wondered if I should admit her,' Dr Coetzee said,
'When I followed up two days later, she was so much better.'
But the doctor also said she was worried the variant could pose a greater danger to the elderly.

Bob

 

[Soujourner]

Thank you for sharing the links about the Dr. Coetzee experience.

It is concerning to learn about the number of mutations this strain has. However, any virus mutates over time. Unfortunately, only more observations will reveal the full impact of omicron. (Crossing fingers for minimal effects over antibody generation)

Political reactions like closing borders will be swift though. I think that is just the world we live on now.


PS. First post. Hi!

- S

 

[wetnose]

News from South Africa:

https://www.voanews.com/a/south-afr...ariant-drives-new-covid-19-wave-/6340912.html

https://www.nicd.ac.za/latest-confirmed-cases-of-covid-19-in-south-africa-6-december-2021/


In the past week, cases have reached more than 16,000, up dramatically from 2,300 last Monday, according to South Africa's National Institute for Communicable Diseases.

The NICD says the increase in cases in such a short period of time is “unprecedented” in the trajectory of the pandemic, now in its fourth phase in the country.

Hospitals in South Africa’s Gauteng province, which contains two of the country’s biggest cities, are packed with people infected with the omicron variant. Doctors say most of the patients haven’t been vaccinated, and an alarming number of them are children under the age of five-years-old.

“There’s been a rather rapid rise in hospital admissions with patients who have COVID, whether they’re presenting with COVID pneumonia or severe COVID disease," Dr. Abdullah said.

“At this time, we think about 75% to 80% of hospitalizations are unvaccinated," he said. "It could be as large as 40% of the population that has not yet either been vaccinated or had a previous infection with coronavirus up until now,” he noted. “So, we have a large pool of people who can still present with overwhelming infection and severe disease,” he said.

====

Personally if I had young kids now, I'd be having an anxiety attack. Omicron cases look like a rocket ship on the second link!

The horrifying # is: 7x increase in hospitalizations in 1 week, mostly unvaxxed .... only 78% of eligible people in BC are fully vaccinated, leaving 1.1M still vulnerable. If the ball gets rolling on Omicron...

BUT!!! At least the numbers show that the vaccinated are not getting hospitalized, which was a key concern of scientists when they announced Omicron a few days ago. So there's your ray of sunshine.

 

[wetnose]

It looks like it is much more contagious but not as severe.
Vaxxed people can still become ill but are not as sick generally.

Again I encourage members to refer to actual peer reviewed journal articles if possible instead of mass media or politicians.

I'd agree with you if my link was opinion, speculation or hype. But it's raw #s, from the South African authorities. It could just as easily happen here with the unvaxxed population.

Omicron is a fast moving, extremely infectious variant - look at the infection numbers in the second link. Delta took some time to pick up speed but Omicron just rocketed out of the gate.

 

[Cock Throppled]

Omicron is spreading like wildfire in England, and they are projecting more deaths than from the first wave. It's starting to look like it's not only more transmissable, but possibly as dangerous as the original.

 

[Robert Upndown]

Omicron is spreading like wildfire in England, and they are projecting more deaths than from the first wave. It's starting to look like it's not only more transmissable, but possibly as dangerous as the original.

I disagree. there is SOOOOOO much misinformation out there I prefer fact checking sites for info, rather than the news or Twitter.

Is It True That No One Has Died of Omicron Variant?

Bob

 

[masterpoonhunter]

Statistical forecasting has been a way of life for many in the know since the pandemic first started. And of course one has to be careful with stats as we all know it is true that 48.3% of all people just pull stats out of their asses. We know this with 39.7% accuracy

But as long as one gets it that there are error bars associated with statistical analysis, this is the basis of the predictability of the pandemic variants trajectories.
This site https://www.statnews.com/2021/12/21/omicron-by-the-numbers-where-things-stand-now/ I find has been helpful as it gets down to some basics.
The heat maps for the US are meaningful to give an idea of where the virus is continuing to spread and in particular the hospitalizations map, which may be the real indicator of the virus success.

Omicron appears to have mutated to smaller and more energetic more dense protein spikes. With more active virus riding on the body's natural moisture, droplet formation appears to be a lot easier and therefore the cloud of aerosols that surround us from our natural body function, carries more viral particles. Numbers appearing in the various publications not yet peer reviewed but meaningful show (if the original in the wild SARS2 is considered as alpha, the most significant mutation as Delta and now Omicron) alpha = 1, Delta = 2 and Omicron = 4, Omicron is 4 times more infectious than alpha. However it replicates and thus sheds at more than 70 times that of alpha. All the factors of masking, distance, indoor vs outdoor etc all come into play but suffice to say this one really needs folks attention. If you have not and really why not? get your 2 shots and if in line to get a booster do it.

it's a major mutherfucker. As far as virus's go this mutation gets the gold star in super spreading which is what virus's strive to do. So please keep on doing what's right fellow pooners and poonettes.

Given all the doom, gloom and more restrictions, I say, fuck it. It's Christmas and I for one am going to pass right by the carrot sticks and head for the rum balls!

Cheers all.