eXXon posted:

I have a booster appointment later this week. Woke up with a sore throat and am getting extremely faint lines on rapid tests. Whoo...

BusError posted:

I'm just about through my bottle of Enovid and I'd like to replace it with some iota carrageenan spray instead of dropping another jillion dollars on something that by all accounts works less well. US goons who have purchased some, where'd you get it? I've pretty skeptical of getting anything that really needs to be the genuine article from Amazon, but that's all I've found via googling...

Teabag Dome Scandal posted:

if you’re in the US you’re just gonna have to get over your skepticism. you aren’t buying an sd card. the other option is to buy from canada and pay 25 bucks for shipping.

road potato posted:

Ah, thanks for clarifying. I assume that you mean 'people who are asking questions but not fully folowing the thread orthodoxy of 100% safety precautions. FWIW, I feel like the thread has been a super helpful place for mostly-lurkers like myself who don't take the full-tilt set of precautions like many others.
(..)

road potato posted:

(..)
The wedding and reception are outside, and we won't be doing any indoor dining while traveling. Thanks to the thread's mask guidance (way better than other sources) I haven't gone to any public indoor space without my 3m Aura. I'm the only teacher at my school who still wears a mask throughout the day, and I got the school to put in additional HEPA filters in my classroom. Sometimes we have friends over in our home, and we have HEPA filters running in every room. We tried to do as much socializing as we could this summer when it was easy for people to go with the outdoor option, and we're gonna be avoiding any big indoor gatherings this winter. Only doing takeout from restaurants, or dining at places with big areas for outdoor dining.

I traveled for a wedding this summer, and I am now I'm going to another. I think the risk-reward tradeoff for this scenario is probably worth it, particularly taking precautions while we travel.

I have a feeling there are a ton of folks who are about at this level of precaution. Doing things to reduce risks, but with a higher risk tolerance than some of the folks in the thread. I dunno much that makes us 'open biden' folks. I wish there was a greater level of public precaution too, and I was thankful to be teaching outside of the US in 2020-2022.

eXXon posted:

I have a booster appointment later this week. Woke up with a sore throat and am getting extremely faint lines on rapid tests. Whoo...

Pingui posted:

It is a general reference to the gleeful opening up of society during the pandemic. Gunshow Poophole (whom I think you are confusing me with) merely meant that in earlier days going to a wedding at all would have gotten some angry replies, while now everyone more or less just accepts that "you gotta do what you gotta do "

Sounds like you are taking the precautions you feel are sustainable long term. You gotta do what you gotta do

Also massive kudos for getting the school to put in extra HEPA filters, that is some good poo poo

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/sep/16/nhs-uk-prepared-covid-winter-pirola-variant posted:

‘Lessons have been forgotten’: is the UK ready for a new Covid variant?
With worrying mutations, limited vaccine rollout, vastly reduced testing and a creaking health service, experts are predicting a tough few months ahead
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While the EG.5.1 (Eris) and XBB variants account for most Covid infections globally (and most of the more than 1m symptomatic Covid cases currently in Britain), Pirola, which descended from Omicron, is heavily mutated. This follows a pattern seen with Sars-CoV-2 since the beginning of the pandemic, explains Andrew Pekosz, professor of molecular microbiology and immunology at Johns Hopkins University. “They accumulate a few mutations that allow them to evade some of the antibodies induced by prior infection or vaccination, they spread for a few months, then they are supplanted by a variant that has picked up a few different mutations that also function to evade pre-existing immunity, and the cycle continues.”
(..)
The consensus is that it is too early to tell how useful the vaccine may prove, though some MPs are pushing for 50- to 64-year-olds to be immunised, either as part of the rollout or privately. With Covid becoming “more of a value-for-money exercise” for the government, according to Duncan Robertson, senior lecturer in management sciences at Loughborough Business School, they may be playing a risky game by reducing eligibility for “financial savings”.

Planning is all the more challenging given that the UK’s surveillance and testing regimen is now the thinnest since the pandemic began. This is “frustrating” says Robertson, as “the UK’s ability to detect new variants has been compromised by the effective ending of the Office for National Statistics Coronavirus Infection Survey. Not only did that give a very good indication of the level of Covid in the population, it also allowed the proportions of variants … to be estimated, which could have meant that the emergence of BA.2.86 could have been better tracked.”

The UK Health Security Agency has promised that Covid testing will be increased, “although details at the moment are scant”, says Griffin. He says that “lessons learned during the early part of the pandemic, and before, do seem to have been forgotten.”

Susan Michie, professor of health psychology at UCL and another Independent Sage member, agrees that as we find ourselves in a position where “we really can’t see what’s happening” because of the lack of testing, missteps of the past appear not to have been absorbed. “One of the things we’ve really learned from the mismanagement of previous pandemics, certainly in this country, is waiting too late to do something about it. Given the exponential growth of pandemics, it does mean that once you’ve waited until it’s an obvious problem, you’ve really got a problem.”

The NHS in August hit a record 7.6 million people on waiting lists, and has in recent months been beset by strike action leading to the cancellation of 839,327 hospital appointments. It “is really on its knees”, says Michie. “We just can’t afford to have any huge big influx into the NHS.”

This is more likely given what Griffin calls the current “vaccine-only strategy”, which appears not to address measures such as masks or social distancing, and “fails to recognise and account for airborne Sars-CoV-2 transmission, including in healthcare settings”. He adds: “Vaccine strategy appears to completely disregard long-term consequences of Covid, which is both undermining of those affected as well as a false economy.”

With most excluded from the vaccine programme, should we be returning to masking, and social distancing? Michie is firm that “we need to take a population-wide approach to reducing the level of infection”, with everyone playing their part, rather than the current attitude that vulnerable people should stay at home. “This is discriminatory, but also, it’s not effective,” she says; either pushing elderly people into greater loneliness and social segregation, which studies have shown can accelerate decline, or overlooking the estimated 1.8 million multigenerational households in Britain. Such households are more likely to be made up of poorer people or those from ethnic minorities, who suffered a “disproportionate impact” during the lockdown years, according to the King’s Fund. Telling already vulnerable communities to stay at home is only “increasing inequalities”, says Michie.

Watching how Pirola continues to spread is now critical. “We are at the start of a wave; how serious it’s going to be, we don’t know,” Michie says. She adds that it is also unclear whether Covid is becoming seasonal. “But we do know that there are other seasonal viruses like flu and RSV (respiratory syncytial virus), which do always ramp up over the winter months. We’re in a potentially dangerous situation.”

Others remain more hopeful.“We don’t really see it [Pirola] spreading fast so perhaps it isn’t as concerning a variant as it looks on paper,” says Pekosz.

Management is everything this time around, Robertson thinks, with the future of any potential outbreak now a matter for ministers. “To govern is to make choices. Let’s hope the government makes wise ones.”

Bruce Hussein Daddy posted:

Chamale posted:

Early days like 2020. Now we know how well N95s work, so pretty much everything is safe if you're properly resp'd up. As long as you aren't making a truce with covid to take the mask off inside for just ten minutes.

https://www.who.int/publications/m/item/weekly-epidemiological-update-on-covid-19---1-september-2023 posted:

Weekly epidemiological update on COVID-19 - 1 September 2023
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Please note that this is the last edition of the COVID-19 Weekly Epidemiological Update. Moving forward, as WHO transitions its COVID-19 surveillance from an emergency response to long-term COVID-19 disease prevention, control and management, we will be providing updates every four-weeks, with the next edition set to be published on 28 September 2023.
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jisforjosh posted:

Circling back to this, what is the ratio of sterile distilled water to iota carrengeenan to go for?

Completely anecdotally but I've been using Betadine twice a day and saline nasal irrigation at night while being around several COVID positive people at work (OPEN BIDEN) and haven't succumbed yet.

edit: duh I could just look at the bottle, 1.2mg per ml

Madame Psychosis posted:

So Nipah stuff goes here or is this Covid-only pestilence?

Madame Psychosis posted:

So Nipah stuff goes here or is this Covid-only pestilence?

eXXon posted:

I have a booster appointment later this week. Woke up with a sore throat and am getting extremely faint lines on rapid tests. Whoo...

BusError posted:

I'm just about through my bottle of Enovid and I'd like to replace it with some iota carrageenan spray instead of dropping another jillion dollars on something that by all accounts works less well. US goons who have purchased some, where'd you get it? I've pretty skeptical of getting anything that really needs to be the genuine article from Amazon, but that's all I've found via googling...

road potato posted:

Ah, thanks for clarifying. I assume that you mean 'people who are asking questions but not fully folowing the thread orthodoxy of 100% safety precautions. FWIW, I feel like the thread has been a super helpful place for mostly-lurkers like myself who don't take the full-tilt set of precautions like many others.

The wedding and reception are outside, and we won't be doing any indoor dining while traveling. Thanks to the thread's mask guidance (way better than other sources) I haven't gone to any public indoor space without my 3m Aura. I'm the only teacher at my school who still wears a mask throughout the day, and I got the school to put in additional HEPA filters in my classroom. Sometimes we have friends over in our home, and we have HEPA filters running in every room. We tried to do as much socializing as we could this summer when it was easy for people to go with the outdoor option, and we're gonna be avoiding any big indoor gatherings this winter. Only doing takeout from restaurants, or dining at places with big areas for outdoor dining.

I traveled for a wedding this summer, and I am now I'm going to another. I think the risk-reward tradeoff for this scenario is probably worth it, particularly taking precautions while we travel.

I have a feeling there are a ton of folks who are about at this level of precaution. Doing things to reduce risks, but with a higher risk tolerance than some of the folks in the thread. I dunno much that makes us 'open biden' folks. I wish there was a greater level of public precaution too, and I was thankful to be teaching outside of the US in 2020-2022.

Zugzwang posted:

*Kramers in from 2021* Don't worry, reinfections are rare.

Steve Yun posted:

hey time traveler from 2021 I have good news, the Covid national emergency gets declared over in 2023

Chad Sexington posted:

Ordering another box of 9105s for the pending COVID winter. Wife requested something in black but Zoro had gently caress-all. Any recs?

Chad Sexington posted:

Ordering another box of 9105s for the pending COVID winter. Wife requested something in black but Zoro had gently caress-all. Any recs?

Chad Sexington posted:

Ordering another box of 9105s for the pending COVID winter. Wife requested something in black but Zoro had gently caress-all. Any recs?

Soap Scum posted:

i think a fair handful of people in thread are approximately same precaution levels as you. and imo that's fine. my personal bar for covid behavior is you should do enough such that if everyone made the same effort you did, the reproduction rate would fall below 1.00 and we'd eradicate it, and i'm pretty confident you clear that bar. i don't think it's realistic to get your covid risk to zero (like, what if you have to see an emergency dentist? etc. it's just not feasible) so you have to find somewhere else to draw the line. "i'm doing my part" seems like a fair ask given that "zero risk" is off the table, i think

Cretin90 posted:

When the gently caress can I schedule my booster? All my local pharmacies say “awaiting CDC guidance” on their websites. Isn’t the CDC guidance “take the new booster you idiot”?

BusError posted:

I'm just about through my bottle of Enovid and I'd like to replace it with some iota carrageenan spray instead of dropping another jillion dollars on something that by all accounts works less well. US goons who have purchased some, where'd you get it? I've pretty skeptical of getting anything that really needs to be the genuine article from Amazon, but that's all I've found via googling...

Pingui posted:

They are missing the most important part: insurance coding.

kreeningsons posted:

Did Enovid end up being legit?

I got a bottle of that stuff when it came out but at the time was told by this thread that it was snake oil.

Cretin90 posted:

I will pay $150 to get my left cheek injected with sweet sweet COVID fighting juice. I don’t care. I’m the voice of the market, Wegmans, take my money!

mahler_biryani posted:

(..)
I've been feeling depressed and guilty particularly for getting my son sick with COVID . On the one hand, being sick only once in 3.5 years is not so bad, but I know that in this particular case, I could have stopped it as this was largely an unnecessary trip. poo poo sucks. I love traveling, but this experience might have finally knocked the travel bug out of me. I suppose it's for the best.

thats not candy posted:

wellbefore's 3d pro line (foam and headstrap) actually has decent numbers now https://wellbefore.com/products/3d-kf94-style-kn95-pro-mask-with-adjustable-ear-loops?variant=39580952232065

they're not deep enough for me though and my lips hit them when i talk. also the headstraps are white

https://twitter.com/FitTestMyPlanet/status/1700348645571235865/photo/1

still nothing beats an aura

kreeningsons posted:

Also has anyone in the thread gotten a new booster yet? The local CVS only has appointments for Tuesday available now, so I got one, but I'm not sure if they actually have the vaccine in hand