How has the coronavirus affected your personal life?

[RD.]

The following was recently posted on Facebook by one of my co-workers whose wife is one of the head respiratory therapists at the local hospital. As of today she said that the care staff in ICU are now forced to send patients 2 hrs away to cities that have room in their ICU's (for now) and as they fill, everyone else incoming may end up being shipped to ICU departments clear across the country.


For those of you that think Covid “isn’t real” or it’s “just a bad cold” or the “government’s way to turn us all into sheep”, let me tell you from my firsthand experience how incredibly wrong that is. The ICU at my hospital is absolutely overwhelmed and getting VERY close to a crisis. I have worked there for 25 years and this is the absolute worst I’ve ever seen. It’s not just about physical spaces, or the equipment ie. ventilators (we’ve had 19 months to plan, so are “okayish” on equipment for now at least) Unfortunately, Its really about having trained professionals to care for the people in those spaces.
It is also about support for those trained professionals. No we don’t have enough people and please think about those that are working tirelessly trying their best, but feeling absolutely overwhelmed before you form your protest or post your offensive statements on social media. If you have not walked through or worked in an ICU in Alberta this week, don’t try to say the hospital is empty and it’s not that bad. Trust me, it is.
There’s a ton of debate about the vaccine and a great deal misinformation out there. Our ICU is full of unvaccinated patients with Covid pneumonia of all ages, (currently as young as 18) many with no pre-existing health conditions. Unfortunately the Delta variant happens to not discriminate nearly as much as the previous mutations did. If you think severe Covid requiring ICU can’t happen to you because you’re healthy, unfortunately you’re wrong!!
Do I support mandatory vaccination for all? No I don’t, even despite what we are going through in ERs, Covid wards, and ICUs, it is still your choice to decide what goes in your body. However, I do believe the vaccines currently available in Canada are very safe and effective and would strongly encourage anyone that hasn’t already gotten one to make an appointment ASAP. Unfortunately Covid has became a political issue to many. Honestly, I really don’t give a **** about politics right now.

What I do care about is watching good people die or become incredibly sick from something that’s now largely preventable.
What I really care about is hearing numerous of my colleagues talking about how they cry every shift before and after (or during) work, because they are completely overwhelmed and don’t know if they can face another day

What I’m incredibly scared about is what we are going to do in the coming weeks when we can just not accommodate one more person. Whose family member are we going to have to say sorry to because there just isn’t enough…..

 

[Supergeorge123]

So i just finished reading this and found it both sensible and deeply concerning. From what i gathered, his argument is that the wide scale deployment of non sterilizing vaccines is leading to the evolution of variants that avoid the vaccine and avoid the immunity acquired from a previous infection. Which seems to be what is already occurring to an extent.

He also brought up something which seems to be completely ignored (even though it is just one line) which is animal reservoirs. This disease has been found in cats, dogs, cattle, deer etc. Which seems to indicate that it is actively circulating in both domestic and wild animal populations and which could potentially serve as a constant source of exposure to the disease. Does anyone know of another disease which has so easily infected both humans and entirely different families of animals? I’d be interested in reading about it if there was one.

C-19 Pandemia: Quo vadis, homo sapiens?

As of the early days of the mass vaccination campaigns, at least a few experts have been warning against the catastrophic impact such a program could have on global and individual health. Mass vaccination in the middle of a pandemic is prone to promoting selection and adaptation of immune escape...

www.geertvandenbossche.org

 

[RD.]

So i just finished reading this and found it both sensible and deeply concerning. From what i gathered, his argument is that the wide scale deployment of non sterilizing vaccines is leading to the evolution of variants that avoid the vaccine and avoid the immunity acquired from a previous infection. Which seems to be what is already occurring to an extent.

He also brought up something which seems to be completely ignored (even though it is just one line) which is animal reservoirs. This disease has been found in cats, dogs, cattle, deer etc. Which seems to indicate that it is actively circulating in both domestic and wild animal populations and which could potentially serve as a constant source of exposure to the disease. Does anyone know of another disease which has so easily infected both humans and entirely different families of animals? I’d be interested in reading about it if there was one.

C-19 Pandemia: Quo vadis, homo sapiens?

As of the early days of the mass vaccination campaigns, at least a few experts have been warning against the catastrophic impact such a program could have on global and individual health. Mass vaccination in the middle of a pandemic is prone to promoting selection and adaptation of immune escape...

www.geertvandenbossche.org

Look hard enough, and you will find someone posting an opinion, that lines up to someone's personal beliefs, thoughts or opinion, but seldom is their any peer reviewed data to support that opinion.

Such as this direct quote from the article that you just posted:


"Facts and data:

Innate immunity critically contributes to protecting a population from Covid-19. This is why children and healthy people (i.e., not immune suppressed and without underlying disease) are enjoying a significant degree of protection from Covid-19 disease."


Now for some real facts, see previous post that I made prior to yours. Specifically this part;

Our ICU is full of unvaccinated patients with Covid pneumonia of all ages, (currently as young as 18) many with no pre-existing health conditions. Unfortunately the Delta variant happens to not discriminate nearly as much as the previous mutations did. If you think severe Covid requiring ICU can’t happen to you because you’re healthy, unfortunately you’re wrong!!


Lots of so called facts being bantered about, some that certainly do not appear to line up with real world data or experience.

 

[pacu mom]

Two more anti-vaxxers die.

An Alabama couple who trashed vaccines on their YouTube channel died from COVID-19 within 3 weeks of each other

In one of the couple's last YouTube videos, Dusty Graham said the COVID vaccine was "technically not" a vaccine. He died of the disease on Thursday.

www.yahoo.com

Another Go Fund Me page to help with funeral expenses for two more anti-vaxxers. Any one who wants to help with their funeral expenses, here is the site:

Donate to Funeral Expences for Dusty and Tristan., organized by Michael Graham

This is the ONLY Gofundme account for the Graham family. The others are fake. … Michael Graham needs your support for Funeral Expences for Dusty and Tristan.

www.gofundme.com

 

[pacu mom]

FDA rejects Pfizer's application for a booster injection:

Coronavirus update: FDA booster meeting and Covid-19 vaccine news

The Food and Drug Administration's advisory committee is meeting today to discuss booster doses of coronavirus vaccine. Follow here for the latest news.

www.cnn.com

 

[Supergeorge123]

I think that someone with a Phd in virology, with the career that he has had and who successfully modeled the rise of the delta variant, is someone who is worth listening to.

Also, patients in hospital are obviously going to skew heavily in the direction of those are having a hard time and would not be representative of the experience of the population as a whole. I would as well like to point out that what you described as a real fact is in fact an anecdote.

As was my experience with the virus i should add. The fact that me and the individuals that i know that had it did not get seriously ill are anecdotes. But they are anecdotes that do line up with the data for this particular age bracket. The quote that you shared does not line up with the data which clearly shows that young healthy people are at very minimal risk from this virus. That does not mean that that particular person’s experience is untrue, but it does mean that it would be an exception likely based on a large number of factors.

Actually you could take this further. I, myself, nearly died of the flu as a kid, but that does not mean that most kids are going to have near death experiences with the flu. Nor does it mean that every kid should get the flu shot every year, wear masks everywhere they go, be banned from socializing or wash their hands every thirty minutes. Yet that is the public response to covid in most of the USA. All for a disease that is not just less dangerous, but significantly less dangerous to them than the disease that nearly took my life when i was their age.

Life in the end is temporary. We can take action to reduce risk, but we can never eliminate all risk. We live our lives based off of cost benefit analysis. We analyze the risk and consider the benefits of nearly every action we take, even the simplest. Every once in a while you see a story of someone who was walking down the street and were killed when a tree fell on them. On the other side you see people free climb sheer cliff faces in the middle of a thunderstorm and walk away unscathed. Yet few people avoid walks for fear of a tree falling on them and few others willingly free climb cliff faces in a thunderstorm. These decisions dictate our lives and how and when they will end, but none of them dictate if they will end.

This has been one of the main problems since this began, the complete disregard for cost benefit analysis. Should, in my view, the elderly get the vaccine? Yes, even though we know that some percentage of them may have serious side effects or die from it, the risk to them from catching the disease is far greater than the short term risks of the vaccine and if there are long terms risks, they are unlikely to live to long enough to experience them. Should, in my view, children get the vaccine? No. We have growing and emerging evidence that the vaccine is not just more dangerous to them in the short term, but potentially significantly more dangerous, up to 610% more dangerous. On top of that, we have no idea what the effects could be years or decades down the road. Should people in their 20s take the vaccine? If you look at the short term, it appears that any benefits vs risks would be minimal and given the unknown long term risks, the answer i believe, should be no. How about people who had the virus? This answer should clearly be no and the evidence is simply overwhelming, particularly among those who had symptomatic cases as i did.

Obviously there are exceptions to every case, a certain elderly person could have a condition making them at higher risk from the vaccine and a young person could be at more risk from the virus. Also, these are my own views based on the publicly available evidence that i have read and the people that i have spoken to and (as i hope would already be obvious) are not recommendations to anyone.

But of course, that is the problem. The “officials”, at least in most of the west, have taken a “vax them all, let god sort them out” strategy. They would never say “take into account your own medical or health circumstances”. They say “do it or else”. Cost benefit analysis is gone and has been gone for a year and a half. They take into no account the fact that there are populations that will never get the vaccine, either due it being banned (Afghanistan, for example) or for some other reason. They take into no account the animal populations that could be (are?) serving as reservoirs of the disease. They don’t care if more (potentially far more) young people get sick or die from the vaccine then from the disease. They don’t care if there are unknown health consequences from it that develop years or decades down the road. They don’t care if mass vaccination ends up driving the evolution of variants that could eventually avoid the vaccine entirely (a risk that needs to be investigated and considered, especially given the current outbreak). They don’t care. Do it or else.

Well sorry, i won’t be apart of that game. I am of no risk to anyone and the evidence is very clear on that. Nor will i be afraid of or shun people who have not had the disease or had the vaccine. I will live my life as i always have. I will not walk around in bubble wrap or show my papers everywhere i go. Whatever i have to do to deal with that, i will do. I will not surrender the life and freedoms i have always known to disease, just as i was not willing to surrender it to terrorists when that was the issue of the day. You give a little and the powers that be will keep taking and taking and taking it all until there is nothing left.

 

[Supergeorge123]

FDA rejects Pfizer's application for a booster injection:

Coronavirus update: FDA booster meeting and Covid-19 vaccine news

The Food and Drug Administration's advisory committee is meeting today to discuss booster doses of coronavirus vaccine. Follow here for the latest news.

www.cnn.com

So apparently this vote was from an advisory panel and non binding. It appears as though the FDA is going to approve the boosters soon. The CDC is planning to meet to distribute boosters next week.

 

[skjl47]

So i just finished reading this and found it both sensible and deeply concerning. From what i gathered, his argument is that the wide scale deployment of non sterilizing vaccines is leading to the evolution of variants that avoid the vaccine and avoid the immunity acquired from a previous infection. Which seems to be what is already occurring to an extent.

He also brought up something which seems to be completely ignored (even though it is just one line) which is animal reservoirs. This disease has been found in cats, dogs, cattle, deer etc. Which seems to indicate that it is actively circulating in both domestic and wild animal populations and which could potentially serve as a constant source of exposure to the disease. Does anyone know of another disease which has so easily infected both humans and entirely different families of animals? I’d be interested in reading about it if there was one.

C-19 Pandemia: Quo vadis, homo sapiens?

As of the early days of the mass vaccination campaigns, at least a few experts have been warning against the catastrophic impact such a program could have on global and individual health. Mass vaccination in the middle of a pandemic is prone to promoting selection and adaptation of immune escape...

www.geertvandenbossche.org

Hello; Saw this or a similar link a while back on another site. As has happened here the link was dismissed on that site also. The author provides a list of references at the end which can be checked. Thing is the potentials for mutations generated by the vaccine push may never be peer reviewed.

The part about the virus moving thru animal hosts is plausible. A few species are known to have tested positive for the covid virus. Under natural conditions for a virus to jump species has been known. Rabies is one. This world pandemic is not what would be considered natural conditions. Best I can recall is house cats were the first to show positive for covid. Then big cats in zoos. More recently gorillas.
Will the virus mutate as it passes thru these species? Yes, my take is it will much the same as in people.
Will some troubling mutant strain jump back to people at some point? I can not predict, but do not know of any clear reason why not at first thought.

 

[RD.]

I think that someone with a Phd in virology, with the career that he has had and who successfully modeled the rise of the delta variant, is someone who is worth listening to.

Agreed, but that doesn't mean that one should consider everything that they say, as being factual. Everyone & their dog seems to have an opinion on the correct manner to treat, or proceed in this pandemic.

Also, patients in hospital are obviously going to skew heavily in the direction of those are having a hard time and would not be representative of the experience of the population as a whole. I would as well like to point out that what you described as a real fact is in fact an anecdote.

That was a comment made by a respiratory therapist with 25 yrs experience in the field, 20+ of those yrs in our local hospital. Her only agenda is to treat the sick, and hopefully save lives.

The quote that you shared does not line up with the data which clearly shows that young healthy people are at very minimal risk from this virus. That does not mean that that particular person’s experience is untrue, but it does mean that it would be an exception likely based on a large number of factors.

Her comment absolutely lines up with the data, no one said that this was common, but it most certainly is no longer a rare issue when a younger person (under 40) with no comorbidities, gets very sick from the Delta variant, and in some cases does not survive. Let's take that quote again, and you tell me what part doesn't line up with your reality.

Our ICU is full of unvaccinated patients with Covid pneumonia of all ages, (currently as young as 18) many with no pre-existing health conditions. Unfortunately the Delta variant happens to not discriminate nearly as much as the previous mutations did. If you think severe Covid requiring ICU can’t happen to you because you’re healthy, unfortunately you’re wrong!!

I don't know what you consider minimal, but I guess as long as it's not someone in that age bracket that you love or care about, it's just a minimal statistic?
I hope that for your sake it remains that way.

The immune system is a very complicated thing, and realistically no one has the slightest notion how they would fair against this virus, whether they have been exposed previously, or not. Or, even if one is fully vaccinated, or not. I see both sides of the equation and would never in a million years gamble it all in either direction. But no matter what you or I may believe, at the end of the day many hospitals are currently under siege with covid patients, and that data clearly points to folks that are unvaccinated.

Stay safe amigo.

 

[pacu mom]

FDA votes for Pfizer boosters for those 65 and older and for those at high risk of contracting a severe case of COVID-19. I guess I'm out of luck for getting the booster shot until the FDA approves Moderna.