The Road goes ever on and on ... Day 288 (788)

If you thought the lockdowns of city sections or even entire cities in China were bad, North Korea has locked down the country. That's right, the entire country. They just reported their first covid outbreak, declaring it a "maximum emergency." I find it difficult to believe that they made it over two years without any cases, though they do keep their borders tightly controlled. First outbreak or not, it's not going to be pretty over there. It's not clear how many people there have been vaccinated, but it's clear that not many have. I'd bet those who have been vaccinated are in the political elite while the general population sits unimmunized. 

As for Chinese lockdowns, the ones in Shanghai closed a General Electric Healthcare factory that makes medical imaging contrast material aka dye. Doctors here in the US are having to prioritize patients, doing scans on the most serious ones while postponing scans for those who can safely wait. The Shanghai plant is now up to 25 percent capacity. The goal is to have the normal flow back by the end of June. GE is also using a plant in Ireland to meet the need.

POTUS has ordered federal flags to fly at half-staff until next Monday to mark the one million deaths from covid. We're oh so very close if we aren't already there. The CDC puts the death toll at over 995,000, while The New York Times has it at over 997,000. While we're on numbers, there were around 159,000 confirmed new cases yesterday along with 800 new hospitalizations; both of those are the highest in several weeks. Deaths were at almost double the seven-day average, 585 deaths compared to the average of 308. If we're gaining ground on covid, we're doing it slowly.

Moderna has asked the FDA for authorization to give its vaccine to children ages six through 11 years. It's not clear how much authorization will help get children vaccinated. Right now, only 28.5 percent of children in the six-through-11 age group have gotten two doses of the Pfizer vaccine. I'm not sure offering a second vaccine will get any more parents to vaccinate their children at least in the short term. 

The EU says that member countries no longer need to require masks on planes and in airports. Airlines can continue to require masks if they want to. It was recommended that masks still be required by airlines for flights to and from countries that still require masks. 

Finally, there are data suggesting that long covid might be linked to viral fragments left in a person's gut. One researcher calls these fragments "ghosts." Researchers have already found viral fragments in hearts, eyes, and brains. These fragments have been detected up to 230 days after the original infection. I admit that in the back of my mind is that all this could be a Twilight Zone episode in which everyone who gets infected retains some viral fragment that activates after some time period with appropriately eerie results. Here's hoping ... not.

The Road goes ever on and on ... Day 191 (691)

I forgot to include a little WTF item yesterday, so I'll lead with that today. I got two convection oven cookbooks for Christmas. Looking for recipes to try, I came across Zucchini-Flavored Chocolate Cookies. Now, I've made, had, and liked zucchini bread, but why zucchini mixed with chocolate, with a name implying that the chocolate taste is secondary to the zucchini taste? I'm sorry. That's one recipe I will not be trying.

Olympics covid update. Through yesterday, 308 people had tested positive inside the closed-loop or on arrival at the airport. Athletes or team officials constituted 111 of the positives. Not counted anywhere, though, are the athletes who tested positive before leaving their home country and decided not to come if their event was scheduled such that they would not be recovered in time to complete. 

"The path to freedom is the vaccine mandate." So says the Austrian Chancellor as the vaccine mandate is signed into law. Letters will be mailed to all citizens giving them one month to comply. There are a couple of exemptions including pregnant women, people with a medical reason such as an allergy, and people recently recovered from covid. Beginning in mid-March, police will conduct random checks of vaccination status. Currently, 76 percent of those coming under the mandate are already fully vaccinated. Germany is considering a vaccine mandate. Italy has one for people over 50, while Greece's covers people over 60.

I have been trying not to cite numbers that I know have a fudge factor, but I can't not include that the US death toll is now over 900,000. Given that the last 100,000 deaths have been since December 13, when will we hit 1,000,000? I'd like to think that a million deaths would slap some folks who aren't yet vaccinated and motivate them to get vaccinated. Four of the five states with the highest shares of population-adjusted deaths over the past month have less than 60 percent fully vaccinated. At the top of the list is Tennessee, with 73 covid deaths per 100,000 people and 52.8 percent fully vaccinated. At the bottom sits Hawaii, with 10 covid deaths per 100,000 people and 76 percent fully vaccinated. The fact that Hawaii is an island probably helps.

The Guardian asked some leading scientists what they'd gotten wrong during the course of the pandemic so far. One said he had not expected the vaccines to be successful. Another regretted having supported school closures. A third said that at the outset he felt scientists should not be involved with policy-making. As might be expected, there was one who doubted that masks would be valuable. Skipping over several, I think my favorite was the scientist who said he'd been wrong in predicting the course of the pandemic because of the unpredictability of human behavior. Really? He must have slept through some psychology classes.

There are two worrisome trends, transportation-wise, that have developed during the pandemic. One is how fewer customers there are on public transit, putting some systems in dire financial straits. Commuter rail ridership has seen a 79 percent decline. Trips on all modes of public transit are around half of what they were before the pandemic. Car-related deaths meanwhile are up 27 percent. Some of those deaths may have been people who otherwise would be taking public transit. Go figure.