Flatten it straight up into the stratosphere :doomjak: |

Edit: after doing some cursory checking, this is equivalent to the surge that india experienced a while back, except its actually 3x worse since we have 3x fewer people

so that's cool. It's twice as bad in the UK as it is in the US, too

  • rubpoll [she/her]
    ·
    3 years ago

    NPR: "Are China's lockdown measures going too far? We talked to an American businessman who lost two weeks of his month-long vacation due to quarantine in Beijing."

    • Goadstool [he/him, comrade/them]
      ·
      3 years ago

      "I don't care how many of your relatives have to die, I refuse to be denied my right to go to a job I hate every second of working!"

      • sappho [she/her]
        ·
        3 years ago

        Reminds me of a comment I read on /r/medicine just today about a woman who had been the only one to get vaccinated in her family. She lost both her parents, her husband, and her two adult sons. I can't even begin to imagine how that would feel.

      • spectre [he/him]
        ·
        3 years ago

        I mean you're left totally on your own in the US, so when help is definitely not coming I kinda see where some people are coming from.

        • Goadstool [he/him, comrade/them]
          ·
          3 years ago

          totally, but if I was in China where they'll literally bring me food and stuff to compensate for being quarantined, you wouldn't catch me cryin'

          ...god I wish I was in China

    • bottomfeeder [none/use name]
      ·
      3 years ago

      Welcome to Whose Line Is It Anyway, the show where the numbers are made up and the people don't matter.

      • TheLepidopterists [he/him]
        ·
        edit-2
        3 years ago

        Had a covid scare at some point during this recent nightmare and prescheduled tests at medical sites were nearly a week away, and given how dangerous it is to sit in an urgent care waiting room right now, we decided to get at home tests. I think we literally went to about 10 pharmacies before we found a single one.

    • TraschcanOfIdeology [they/them, comrade/them]
      ·
      3 years ago

      That already happened in Italy. A friend of mine had had a close contact with a bunch of positive people and they couldn't find even a rapid test, much less a PCR one.

  • bottomfeeder [none/use name]
    ·
    3 years ago

    We're so far beyond COVID-zero that Queensland's Chief Health Officer Dr John Gerrard said it baldly this week: infection with COVID-19 was required for the pandemic to evolve to be endemic — a constant presence in our lives.

    "Not only is the spread of this virus inevitable, it is necessary," he said on Thursday. "In order for us to go from the pandemic phase to an endemic phase, the virus has to be widespread."

    "If you don't fulfil this definition of a close contact then there is no need for you to be in that line," Mr Morrison said.
    "You should go home. Go to the beach, go and do what you want to do. Read a book in the park."

    :this-is-fine:

    • PlantsRstillCool [des/pair]
      ·
      3 years ago

      I keep seeing people casually talk about COVID becoming endemic as if that means COVID being over. Lmao no that just means we failed and have given up trying to do anything about it.

      Now that i think about it, i guess for healthy young people that is basically COVID being over. Sad they can't see beyond themselves

      • bottomfeeder [none/use name]
        ·
        3 years ago

        casually

        it's been the national agenda since forever. We're kicking the can down the road and we're running out of road

      • sooper_dooper_roofer [none/use name]
        ·
        3 years ago

        Now that i think about it, i guess for healthy young people that is basically COVID being over

        Not really because long haulers exist and reinfections cause cumulative damage lul

      • Ecoleo [he/him]
        ·
        3 years ago

        Covid isn't over for me as long as it can still kill my loved ones who are older, and give myself and others long term effects.

        But given less and less people care, there's less and less I can do to limit mine and their exposure. So it may be over soon whether we want it or not. Failed states; the whole West.

      • sooper_dooper_roofer [none/use name]
        ·
        3 years ago

        If it was a normal virus, then becoming endemic might be good

        But since it's a Ft. Detrick bioweapon, there's no reason to think that "it'll become less virulent so it doesn't kill its host" lul

        • ClimateChangeAnxiety [he/him, they/them]
          ·
          3 years ago

          I know you’re just doing a bit, but I’ve genuinely seen people say this and I’m always like, you do know the flu kills thousands every year right? And the fact that flu is endemic in animal populations is why we can’t fucking get rid of it.

          • bottomfeeder [none/use name]
            ·
            3 years ago

            Hundreds of thou. Anywhere from 2~700k depending on who you ask I think.

            Feeling pretty scared tbh

    • TheModerateTankie [any]
      ·
      3 years ago

      It's over guys, there's no way it's going to evolve to be more deadly, like it's already done several times. Letting the virus spread without taking measures to stop it hasn't worked to prevent devastating covid waves anywhere it's been tried, but this time is different.

  • UncleJoe [comrade/them]
    ·
    3 years ago

    To be fair, they didn't specify if they were gonna flatten it horizontally or vertically

  • PrideBoy [he/him]
    ·
    3 years ago

    What the fuck? Like what is happening? Our society is falling apart.

    • AOCapitulator [they/them]
      hexagon
      ·
      3 years ago

      Nah its just that omicron is really infectious and this was terrible timing for it to exist

    • SolidaritySplodarity [they/them]
      ·
      3 years ago

      This is the outcome of neoliberalism. It's been like this for decades but there weren't any pandemics to test the fragile system en masse. Though the poor can tell you similar stories about the hospitals they've had to visit before COVID.

  • emizeko [they/them]
    ·
    3 years ago

    is there anything Boris Johnson could do that would cause the people of England to tear him limb from limb?

  • s0ykaf [he/him]
    ·
    3 years ago

    given the new year it's gonna be horrifying 2 weeks from now

    brazil was doing OK, but i'm afraid the holidays might have brought the shitstorm in

  • Mother [any]
    ·
    3 years ago

    It’s worse now than it’s ever been, and restrictions are completely lifted. I hope deaths decouple here or Biden is gonna make trump look positively benevolent

    • SolidaritySplodarity [they/them]
      ·
      3 years ago

      They're not going to decouple because the hospital system will be overwhelmed.

      But the numbers may shift away from confirmed COVID deaths and instead pop up in excess mortality statistics.