The Road goes ever on and on ... Day 466 (966)

Today is the day before we get an indication of the future of democracy. Being in a small, rural precinct, I don't anticipate any protests or problems tomorrow. As always, we will do our utmost to see that the election is run fairly, and that any eligible voter arriving between 6:00 am and 7:00 pm is able to vote. We will also offer same-day registration and allow all those who register that way to vote provisional ballots. I move up to precinct chief after this election, so I will be doing my best to note the little things I might otherwise not pay attention to.

Of course, should the political party known by the color red and the animal elephant win majorities in both houses of Congress, I expect action will be taken to end the remaining coronavirus mitigation measures and financial assistance. The military mask mandate will become a relic of the past. It may well be that after such actions are taken, I will have an easier time finding COVID news about which to post. The pandemic is not over yet.

Apple has announced that iPhone 14 shipments will be "temporarily impacted" by COVID restrictions in China. The factory in Zhengzhou is "currently operating at significantly reduced capacity."  There was no indication of just how long the delay would be. Anyone having an iPhone 14 on their winter holiday wish list may want to think of a Plan B. Given the goal of zero COVID, it may be a while to get the factory back to normal capacity.

A 26 percent reduction in long COVID was seen for COVID patients treated with Paxlovid. Paxlovid has also been linked to reductions in deaths (by 48 percent) and hospitalizations (by 30 percent) once the acute phase of the illness has passed. There was no difference by number of vaccinations/boosters a person had had, prior infection with COVID, or unvaccinated status. The average age of patients in this study was 65, but the benefit for patients under the age of 60 was the same as that for patients over 70. This finding adds a third way to prevent long COVID. First, not getting COVID is 100 percent effective in avoiding long COVID. Second, prior vaccination and boosters are 30 to 50 percent effective. Third, we now have Paxlovid.

Hospitalizations are not down everywhere. Many emergency rooms are so crowded that a person might wait hours just to be triaged. Lines are going outside at some hospitals. It could be eight to 10 hours before a patient actually sees a doctor. Since winter's slippery surfaces are on the way, let's be careful out there. Sitting in the emergency room waiting to be seen while holding a towel over a bleeding broken nose is no way to spend an evening. Trust me on that one.

Finally, the BQ.1.1 variant is fading in France raising hopes that it will stay low here and allow us to avoid a winter holiday COVID wave. The bivalent booster induces some cross-immunity against BQ1.1, adding to an optimistic view. I'm not counting any eggs now, though, remembering how Omicron was announced just after Thanksgiving last year and the winter wave that followed.

Don't expect to hear from me tomorrow. My mind will be elsewhere, as will my body. Here's hoping we still have a secure democracy to wake up to on Wednesday.

The Road goes ever on and on ... Day 465 (965)

Yesterday was exhausting, and today will also be a rousing one celebrating Son #1's 35th birthday. He's halfway to 70! I feel old.

The coronavirus news I skimmed through is for the most part too technical for my weary brain to parse. There was one reference, though, that I take as good news. The BQ.1.1 continues to grow in the US as BA.5 wanes. It's also increasing in France several weeks ahead of where we now are. The good news is that hospitalizations in France are actually decreasing a bit. Here's hoping we follow that trend. 

Tuesday is Election Day, meaning the alarm goes off at 4:00 am, and if we're lucky we'll be home a bit after 8:00 pm. If there is any post that day, it will be preset the day before.

The Road goes ever on and on ... Day 464 (964)

I was nice, and agreed to work both shifts of early voting Saturday. I'm setting this up to post tomorrow morning. Given how hectic this afternoon was, I will be in no shape to post anything coherent after I get home tomorrow evening. Hope you guys have a good Saturday.

The Road goes ever on and on ... Day 463 (963)

Not much news out there, but then I didn't look for too long given working voting this afternoon and needing to do a few things beforehand. Yet another new variant that might be of concern at some point, BA.2.3 has been detected in the Philippines and Australia. 2022 may be the year with just one named variant--Omicron--but like the spider in Charlotte's Web, it will leave behind many offspring.

A panel of experts from over 100 countries has developed 41 consensus statements and 57 recommendations for dealing with and ending the pandemic. The statements fall into six categories: communication, health systems, vaccination, prevention, treatment and care, and pandemic inequities. A large factor in developing these was that public health efforts vary greatly from country to country. One of the panel's leaders summarized the panel's efforts, "... a whole-of-society and a whole-of-government approach, along with a vaccines-plus approach, which means prevention measures that include and go beyond vaccination. We can do this. We should, and we must."

I am still puzzling over "whole-of-society" and "whole-of-government" wondering if there wasn't a better way to say what I think they mean. I also fear that "prevention measures that include and go beyond vaccination" will not fare well in the US, especially if the non-vaccination measures include things such as mask mandates and restricting crowd size. Are we our own worst enemies? Could be. 

The Road goes ever on and on ... Day 462 (962)

Today has been a hard day for finding coronavirus news. Even Google was unable to steer me in the direction of new news as opposed to news that is day-old, beyond its expiration date, or not behind a payment wall. Is no news good news? Who knows with the not-so-novel-any-longer coronavirus. 

Some universities including Harvard, Tufts, Wellesley, Yale, and Fordham are making bivalent COVID vaccines mandatory for students, faculty, and staff. The goal is preventing or lessening transmission during the spring semester. The local university has said nothing which does not surprise me given that its home page has absolutely no mention of COVID.

A report by Vanity Fair and ProPublica is the subject of some attention given that it says evidence supports a biosecurity incident at the Wuhan lab in mid-November 2019. The event appeared to be urgent and non-routine. Was this incident the accidental release of some viral strain that resulted in what was at the time called the novel coronavirus? Maybe ... and maybe not. Questions have been raised about the accuracy of the translation from Mandarin to English of the documentation surrounding the incident. A team of independent translators is now reviewing that translation.

Finally, Pfizer is testing a combined COVID-influenza vaccine. That would certainly beat getting a shot in each arm. As for Pfizer's making an mRNA flu vaccine, I decided what the heck and got into a Stage 3 trial of that vaccine. I did get a flu shot; I just don't know if it was the one the pharmacies and clinics are giving or Pfizer's mRNA vaccine. I probably would have signed up to do it even without the financial incentive. We must support science for the public good.

The Road goes ever on and on ... Day 461 (961)

Just a few quick bits today since I'll be spending the afternoon working early voting. It could get dicey if the crowds we saw last week continue. A "full" slate of officials would be eight or nine, nine giving one extra person to handle things that pop up and require unusual attention, things such as same-day registration. This afternoon, there will be six of us. If we need to, we can probably get a staff member from the registrar's office to help out, but they have their own work to do. I am not optimistic about the election as a whole. Who knows what kind of election we will have in 2024 if 2022 swings red. Or might that election be our last?

I was pleased to read this morning that Shanghai Disney has kept rides operating for the people who are locked in there until they test negative for COVID. I wonder if they're charging them for food.

BA.5 is no longer the dominant COVID variant in the US. Omicron subvariants such as BQ.1 and BQ.1.1 are. There is some new evidence that the bivalent vaccine tailored for BA.5 does offer some protection against the new subvariants. That only helps if you get vaccinated, though.

Finally, there is news of the tridemic or tripledemic or threesome or whatever you want to call the threesome of COVID, RSV, and influenza. Orange County, California has declared a health emergency as all three diseases spread rapidly. RSV used to be highest in December through February; it's already higher than that. Emergency rooms are seeing more children on a daily basis than ever before. The best protection? Do what we did two years ago. Wear a mask indoors or around other people, stay home when sick, wash your hands often and refrain from touching your face. 

The Road goes ever on and on ... Day 460 (960)

When I began writing this daily musing 960 days ago, there seemed to be no real consensus on what to do with "covid" the word. Some articles had it as I've used it up to now, in all lower case. Others gave it an initial capital, while still others used all capitals. The third means, all caps, has become the standard meaning that anything else is marked as a typo or misspelling. Having gotten tired of seeing the squiggly red line under my "covids," I'm switching to the all-caps version. I probably should have done so a long time ago, but I've been lazy. It's just easier to type it in all lower case, with no shift or caps key involved. 

I mentioned that Shanghai Disney had been locked down due to COVID with visitors shut inside. A visitor can now leave after testing negative for COVID. I wonder if they're keeping the attractions open so that the people have something to do while they wait. 

Hospitalizations from influenza are at an all-time high paralleling the rise of RSV (respiratory syncytial virus). RSV is said to be up because of COVID mitigation measures that prevented many infants from being exposed and gathering some immunity. As one pediatrician put it, "The virus is now playing catch-up in these kids." Most adults can, if they come down with RSV, fight it off in a week or two, since they have some immunity from prior infections. These people may assume that RSV is a mild cold or even a mild case of COVID. Primary symptoms in adults and children are cough, runny nose, and fever. For infants, RSV may present as lethargy, irritability, decreased appetite, and a change in breathing. Besides less immunity, young children have much narrower airways. Unlike COVID, RSV can spread through touch. Viral discharge is in the form of respiratory droplets; where these droplets land becomes temporarily infectious. 

According to a new article in Nature Communications, COVID can reduce the number of bacterial species in a person's gut, with the resulting drop in diversity meaning there is more space for dangerous microbes to thrive. The wide use of antibiotics has killed off the disease-causing bacteria that are most susceptible to drugs. Antibody-resistant strains of bacteria can escape into the circulatory system and put a person at greater risk for life-threatening secondary infections. This migration to the bloodstream occurred in 20 percent of the patients studied. COVID, the gift that keeps on giving in so many ways.