News Worldwide impact of the novel coronavirus (covid-19)

[whiteraven]

Don't know about any of that. I made a phone call, booked an appointment and was told to bring ID and my medicare card to the appointment. All of a two minutes on the phone.

Mine was easy, too, although it took awhile before I was eligible (despite the fact that I met criteria for getting it early).

 

[lostforgottensoul]

My job is bringing everyone back in June. All 880 of us work at home folks and allowing people to go maskless if they prove with a picture of your vaccine stuff that you got the vaccine. Not sure that's smart with almost 2000 of us stuffed in a small call center like working a few feet from each other.

As much as the mask triggers me, just don't know if its smart. It would be smarter to bring people back slowly and allow maskless or bring everyone back at once and require a mask still and slowly go maskless in a few months. Just don't know if it's smart so though I handed them my proof of vaccine, don't think I will be maskless for a few months. But back to the office June 25th! Sigh!

 

[intothelight]

Just a word of caution for those who immunocompromised or have auto immune disorders, even though you are vaccinated, still take precautions. The vaccine is effective, but not as effective in these two groups and the breakthrough cases are mostly these two groups. The vaccine does really help prevent severe disease, but even if you've been vaccinated, talk to your doctor about an antibody test. I am going through cancer treatments and even though I am vaccinated, I don't do enclosed spaces and hang out with vaccinated friends and family. Outdoors is still the safest place and I don't mask up when I'm outside and not near anyone.

 

[blackemerald1]

Agreed @intothelight and also none of the vaccines are 100% effective in terms of efficacy for every single person vaccinated.

So there's a percentage of people that will still be vulnerable to the virus and it's variants despite having been vaccinated.

I guess the best way to look at vaccines is that they are part of a group of measures we must settle down and accept. Socially distancing, mask wearing, vaccines, getting tested, QR codes, washing hands and smothering our coughs being just a few. None of these are that inconvenient really.

 

[lostforgottensoul]

My therapist and I talked about being maskless at work. He said that he usually gets a cold a few times a year. That it could be banked on that he'd have a cold at least a few times a year before the pandemic. But since the pandemic, no cold, no sickness at all. Neither have I. He said after all of this, if he is cramped in a small space with people like on a airplane he will wear a mask. Cause why not?

I cannot stand the mask tho. It's triggering. So I can't see myself not wearing a mask at work at some point but that point isn't now. And I'm not even immune compromised (as far as I know). It's not 100% effect and I have perm damaged lungs. Just don't think it's smart go maskless around a bunch of other maskless people in a cramped space right now.

 

[lostforgottensoul]

My company is pulling everyone back into the office in min July. I got pulled in June 25th but everyone will be back mid July. Too soon? Dunno. Will see. They do an amazing job at sanitizing the stations, keeping social distancing, forcing a check in before you badge in and they fog the call center every week. That's the first I've heard of fogging for viruses.

 

[joeylittle]

That's the first I've heard of fogging for viruses.

Me too, I wonder what it's trying to do..

IMO, the most relevant metric for workplaces - second to vaccination - is HVAC. How long it takes the built in system that's there to cycle the cubic feet of air in the room, and whether the filters are rated to handle airborne (aerosolized) virus. It's less of a concern when everyone is masked, but very relevant if they're not. I'm curious, @lostforgottensoul - what's your company doing with masking requirements?

 

[Sideways]

Meanwhile, for those of us trapped in an eternal 2020, we're doing a "snap" lockdown again. Life on the continent that the vaccine hasn't reached yet *sigh*

Weirdly, people still want to stockpile toilet paper. Go figure.

 

[Friday]

Me too, I wonder what it's trying to do..

2 versions.

1 = Think Lysol Spray. But WHOLE buildings, like termite tenting a house or spider bombing, but with kills 99.99% of bacteria & viruses Lysol, rather than custodians using a zillion cans.

2 = Co2 fogging. That’s more commonly done for mold/fungal remediation after flooding, and requires the building or vehicle be air tight sealed. Kills -virtually- everything living but fleas... including most -but not all- aerobic microbes. I have noooo idea if Covid is aerobic, or anaerobic, though.

Spoiler: Geek Waffle

((Anaerobic microbes like gas gangrene or the one that rots teeth under your gum line, of course, looooove oxygen free environments. And aerobic bacteria who can encapsulate don’t give a damn, they just nip into their handy dandy stasis chamber and can wait out 3,000 years in an Egyptian tomb until air is introduced with living hosts to infect. <<< That’s how the CDC reps who came out to investigate when I was in the hospital thinks I caught the Spanish flu, a few years back, by the by. When I was cleaning the brick of my “new” +100yo loft, I wasn’t wearing the right medical grade mask, with air supply, just a construction dust mask. Inhaled an encapsulated bacteria who’d caught the flu, back in the early 1900s but didn’t have a host handy so sealed itself up to wait for a host, and voila! 100 years later? The bacteria was knocked out of the brick pores, into the air, inhaled, aaaaaaaand...Party Time!!! in Friday’s lungs! Upside, was it was the B version, so not super contagious. If it had been the A version, I’d have been Typhoid Mary. >>> We’re -potentially- gonna have a lot of problems with encapsulated bacteria, and all the colds they caught, as the polar caps melt (sending germs on sea voyages to the 4 corners), & deserts grow (because sand blows about, flinging microbes into the air that have been in stasis under jungles and lakes and hundreds of meters underground). Which is why it was such a big topic when I was in school / epidemiology was recruiting hard, because core sampling ice has turned up some seeeeriously nasty bugs that none of us are immune to, and desert diseases are less studied than tropical disease. Encapsulated bacteria can survive almost anything. The only real upside to either is that there aren’t a lot of nearby hosts, so -as long as core samples are handled carefully- the likelihood of infection in the Caribbean from ice melt in Russia? Or a Sahara bug blowing on the wind to a population center anywhere? Pretty slim. But the astronomical increase from just a few decades ago means generations worth of work for scientists who haven’t even been born, yet, has already hit the planet. Like trying to decode encryption without a computer, or astronomy before telescopes, we need better science to & better tools to turn it into a manageable task.))

 

[lostforgottensoul]

I'm curious, @lostforgottensoul - what's your company doing with masking requirements?

If you upload a picture to their vaccine system that shows you've been vaccinated then you can go 100% maskless. I did upload a picture of my vaccine card to their system but am still wearing a mask when away from my desk or unless I'm outside as I don't think that's smart at this point to go maskless. Especially when we get to mid July and have a full center. Right now every other desk doesn't have a PC. That's about to change so then social distancing won't be a thing there.

2 versions.

1 = Think Lysol Spray. But WHOLE buildings, like termite tenting a house or spider bombing, but with kills 99.99% of bacteria & viruses Lysol, rather than custodians using a zillion cans.

2 = Co2 fogging. That’s more commonly done for mold/fungal remediation after flooding, and requires the building or vehicle be air tight sealed. Kills -virtually- everything living but fleas... including most -but not all- aerobic microbes. I have noooo idea if Covid is aerobic, or anaerobic, though.

Spoiler: Geek Waffle

((Anaerobic microbes like gas gangrene or the one that rots teeth under your gum line, of course, looooove oxygen free environments. And aerobic bacteria who can encapsulate don’t give a damn, they just nip into their handy dandy stasis chamber and can wait out 3,000 years in an Egyptian tomb until air is introduced with living hosts to infect. <<< That’s how the CDC reps who came out to investigate when I was in the hospital thinks I caught the Spanish flu, a few years back, by the by. When I was cleaning the brick of my “new” +100yo loft, I wasn’t wearing the right medical grade mask, with air supply, just a construction dust mask. Inhaled an encapsulated bacteria who’d caught the flu, back in the early 1900s but didn’t have a host handy so sealed itself up to wait for a host, and voila! 100 years later? The bacteria was knocked out of the brick pores, into the air, inhaled, aaaaaaaand...Party Time!!! in Friday’s lungs!

Upside, was it was the B version, so not super contagious. If it had been the A version, I’d have been Typhoid Mary.

>>> We’re -potentially- gonna have a lot of problems with encapsulated bacteria, and all the colds they caught, as the polar caps melt (sending germs on sea voyages to the 4 corners), & deserts grow (because sand blows about, flinging microbes into the air that have been in stasis under jungles and lakes and hundreds of meters underground). Which is why it was such a big topic when I was in school / epidemiology was recruiting hard, because core sampling ice has turned up some seeeeriously nasty bugs that none of us are immune to, and desert diseases are less studied than tropical disease. Encapsulated bacteria can survive almost anything. The only real upside to either is that there aren’t a lot of nearby hosts, so -as long as core samples are handled carefully- the likelihood of infection in the Caribbean from ice melt in Russia? Or a Sahara bug blowing on the wind to a population center anywhere? Pretty slim. But the astronomical increase from just a few decades ago means generations worth of work for scientists who haven’t even been born, yet, has already hit the planet. Like trying to decode encryption without a computer, or astronomy before telescopes, we need better science to & better tools to turn it into a manageable task.))

Huh. Maybe version 1? Maybe a commercial grade type of lysol? Not sure. The cleaning crew is still sanitizing each station and bathrooms and the while 9 but it sounded like they were trying to sanitize the air? I dunno.

 

[Mee]

I will be staying masked in confined areas. My T told me today a prominent U.K. journalist (Andrew Marr) ahead has covid despite having two vaccines and I have heard a few people on talk radio with it after two vaccines. That they can call the radio station shows the chances are much milder with the vaccines! But I have such weak lungs and poor health ‘just a flu’ would be dangerous for me - I think it’s worth being cautious and taking non onerous precautions. I find a mask not onerous.

I am considering venturing out to a market for the first time tomorrow. One of the reasons is if we don’t go our community lose the market . :( I’m cautious but feel with two vaccines, a mask and good hygiene it’s a reasonable risk .

 

[Chris-duck]

My mates son tested positive n was told not to isolate cos he got covid from his aunt, who he stayed with for ten days since aunt was diagnosed. He tested positive today on day 10 n is going home to his mum, my mate. N none of them have to isolate.

I see another lockdown on the horizon. Since my mate works in a care home n hasn't to isolate even tho she will get exposed today for first time when her kid gets home.

Public health has such smartz.