Public Health/Coronavirus

CDC may now mandate masks for influenza season

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CDC says we will wear masks the remainder of our lives as the mask guidance succumbs to mission creep – now we have to wear masks because influenza:

“It’s important to note that as we look at the current situation we are also heading into respiratory virus season,” Walensky added. “During that season we know respiratory viruses tend to thrive, so we’re taking that all into consideration.”

“Respiratory virus season” typically begins in the fall – in October or November – and ends in spring – in February or March – meaning the CDC may not ease back on mask guidance until the spring season.

Source: CDC mask guidelines under review as COVID numbers fall, cold season begins | Fox News

They believe that masks stopped influenza last year. But then why did masks not stop Covid-19? I have asked this question repeatedly and they will not touch it.

And why did influenza rates collapse in the nations that had no mask mandates? Again, the CDC geniuses cannot provide a coherent explanation for that.

So now they want us to continue wearing useless cloth facial coverings (not even actual masks that might work) FOREVER. The CDC can go to hell.

Yesterday our state’s public health agency admitted to having not reported 550 deaths over the summer. This is at least the third or fourth major error in their public data. All they do is collect and massage data and they can not even do that correctly. Epidemiology does not seem to always attract the brightest bulbs in the bunch.

Public Health/Coronavirus

Good grief: The unvaxxed are the ones ignoring “guidance”

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Only in the world of public health …

Mask wearing among unvaccinated people is about half the rate of vaccinated people. Unvaccinated people are also more likely to attend large events outdoors.

Source: New OHA modeling shows continued drop in COVID-19 cases, hospitalizations through early November – KTVZ

The vaccine protects us from the unvaccinated. So why do we wear useless cloth facial coverings? What is the specific metric of risk reduction from the vaxxed wearing useless cloth facial coverings?

Public Health/Coronavirus

CDC director: U.S. may update definition of full vaccination for COVID-19

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Israel already said your vaccine passport expires at 9 months unless you have a booster:

“We have not yet changed the definition of ‘fully vaccinated.’ We will continue to look at this. We may need to update our definition of ‘fully vaccinated’ in the future,” CDC director Rochelle Walensky told reporters

Source: CDC director: U.S. may update definition of full vaccination for COVID-19

You know the CDC will mandate another booster (and another ….) and that you continue to wear a useless cloth facial covering at all times, even when triply vaccinated.

The CDC messaging is backwards and implies vaccines do not work – vaccines do work but masks hardly work at all. :eave it to the CDC to screw this up. Again.

Public Health/Coronavirus

Guess hybrid immunity is a thing – and possibly very important

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Reminder: It is preferable to get vaccinated – since if you then get sick with Covid-19, you are far more likely to have a mild case, to avoid hospitalization, and survive. If you are after hybrid immunity, get vaccinated first, then get Covid, if you have to.

Crime/Corruption, Public Health/Coronavirus, Stupidity

Astrology disease modeling

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Note the range of the disease models goes from zero to infinity.

Forecasts for new cases for the state of Vermont, October 20, 2021:

Source: Vermont reports 318 new Covid-19 cases, 2 new deaths – VTDigger

Astrology is more accurate than these disease models; they are really that awful yet have become the basis for errant public policy. Per the linked story, Vermont is now using disease models to look ahead one week recognizing how useless the disease models have shown themselves to be.

Uniquely, the reporter on this story appears to have the necessary background to understand data (unlike most reporters). This is good news and glad to see this.

Reminder: In my state, from late October 2020 to late February 2021, OHA’s 3-week disease models had the wrong sign 11 out of 13 projections. Flipping a coin would have been more accurate.

Oregon disease model

Diseases models have proven themselves to be worthless – and likely causing harm, not benefit. My state shut down non-emergency health care access in the spring of 2020 due to a shitty model from the UW IHME that was badly incorrect. I had to wait 13 weeks to get a diagnosis of a broken foot and torn tendon, by which time there was not much that could be done. Disease modelers can go to hell.

Business, Social media, Software/Tech

Google to remove YouTube apps from Roku

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After a months-long fight between Roku and YouTube’s parent company Google, Google announced Thursday that it would no longer allow Roku customers to download the YouTube or YouTube TV apps to their devices starting Dec. 9. (Roku customers who already have YouTube or YouTube TV installed will still be able to use those apps normally.)

Source: Google to remove YouTube apps from Roku

Google/Youtube appear to be lying about what happened; there is a paper trail.

I am so old, I remember when Google’s motto was “Don’t be evil”. The good old days…

Public Health/Coronavirus, Software Quality, Software/Tech

Oregon Health Authority failed to report 550 Covid-19 deaths due to “technical error”

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Source: State Health Officials to Add Approximately 550 COVID-19 Deaths from May to August 2021 to State Totals, Omitted Due to Technical Error

What This Means

Besides the obvious misreporting of the data, this led to Oregon being ranked as one of the best states for its Covid mitigation measures.

This chart is from Statista

On occasions the state’s public health “experts” and the Governor have publicly said the mortality rate was low because of their expert guidance and management of the pandemic.

Where will Oregon rank after this correction? Best guess is “about average” although OHA says they think it will only change a few places on the list.

Given time, almost every where ends up at roughly the same destination, in spite of, not because of, the mitigations they inflict.

Will be interesting to see where Oregon ranks in about a month.

Reminder: Until last February, OHA misrepresented deaths trends by counting a death as the day OHA publicly disclosed it – yet the deaths were often weeks to months prior. The effect of this was to always be “catching up” such that during parts of the epicurve, OHA was making it look like, say, January was the peak month for deaths (at that time) when in fact, it was the week of Dec 6th when the peak was hit. I manually transcribed the (up to then) 1,600 death reports back to actual date of death and correctly identified the error in OHA’s misreporting of the death data. While OHA never responded to my notes to them -two weeks later they unveiled a new chart that shows deaths by date of death. rather than the day they publicly reported the death.

Uncategorized

262 days in lock down

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Australia detained 5 million people for 262 days:

SYDNEY, Oct 21 (Reuters) – Millions in Melbourne are readying to come out of the world’s longest COVID-19 lockdown later on Thursday even as cases hover near record levels, with pubs, restaurants and cafes rushing to restock supplies before opening their doors.

Source: Melbourne readies to exist world’s longest COVID-19 lockdown

Wonder if they ever calculated a benefits to harm ratio?

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