Coronavirus Outbreak

[Ken]

Since you seem to have missed the graph I posted. Here it is again. Where did the life-saving vaccinations start?

Lots of people are still dying. But unlike a year ago, it is mostly by choice, or more accurately, people who choose to take the risk. The numbers are strikingly similar to lung cancer. Most lung cancer deaths (about 90%) are people who brought it on themselves by being smokers. Lung cancer is a rare disease in nonsmokers. It still happens, but is hardly a pandemic. And mostly happens to those who have other risk factors such as job exposure to carcinogens. Covid is much the same. In fact choosing to get vaccinated reduces your risk of dying of Covid much more than choosing not to smoke reduces your risk of lung cancer. Nevertheless, neither Covid nor lung cancer are serious health risks for healthy people who protect themselves.

Here is YOUR graph broken down by vaccination status

[nett]

Since you seem to have missed the graph I posted. Here it is again. Where did the life-saving vaccinations start?

Lots of people are still dying. But unlike a year ago, it is mostly by choice, or more accurately, people who choose to take the risk. The numbers are strikingly similar to lung cancer. Most lung cancer deaths (about 90%) are people who brought it on themselves by being smokers. Lung cancer is a rare disease in nonsmokers. It still happens, but is hardly a pandemic. And mostly happens to those who have other risk factors such as job exposure to carcinogens. Covid is much the same. In fact choosing to get vaccinated reduces your risk of dying of Covid much more than choosing not to smoke reduces your risk of death cancer. Nevertheless, neither Covid nor lung cancer are serious health risks for healthy people who protect themselves.

Here is YOUR graph broken down by vaccination status

How many times to have to tell you, I don't care about vaccination status breakdowns. There is a population that either cannot or will not be vaccinated. This has always been the case.

Since you are so sure that vaccines are ultra-mega effective, please explain why cumulative deaths continue to grow at the same rate? If COVID getting so more deadly for the unvaccinated that it is making up for the lack of deaths in the vaccinated majority? If so, please show your proof.

[Ken]

Since you seem to have missed the graph I posted. Here it is again. Where did the life-saving vaccinations start?

Lots of people are still dying. But unlike a year ago, it is mostly by choice, or more accurately, people who choose to take the risk. The numbers are strikingly similar to lung cancer. Most lung cancer deaths (about 90%) are people who brought it on themselves by being smokers. Lung cancer is a rare disease in nonsmokers. It still happens, but is hardly a pandemic. And mostly happens to those who have other risk factors such as job exposure to carcinogens. Covid is much the same. In fact choosing to get vaccinated reduces your risk of dying of Covid much more than choosing not to smoke reduces your risk of death cancer. Nevertheless, neither Covid nor lung cancer are serious health risks for healthy people who protect themselves.

Here is YOUR graph broken down by vaccination status

How many times to have to tell you, I don't care about vaccination status breakdowns. There is a population that either cannot or will not be vaccinated. This has always been the case.

Since you are so sure that vaccines are ultra-mega effective, please explain why cumulative deaths continue to grow at the same rate? If COVID getting so more deadly for the unvaccinated that it is making up for the lack of deaths in the vaccinated majority? If so, please show your proof.

You are free to decide what you want to care about or not care about. But Covid is now more or less like lung cancer. A percentage of the US population (about 20%) continues to smoke even though they are fully aware of the increased risk of lunch cancer. The warnings are on every pack of cigarettes and anti-smoking campaigns have been going on for 50 years. You do what you can as a society to encourage people to make healthy choices but a percentage are never going to listen or care. It is what it is. Personally I think we should take Denmark's approach and roll back most Covid measures other than vaccinations. Perhaps throw up some cheap prefab Covid wards in vacant lots and parking lots for those who choose to gamble with their lives since we aren't a completely misanthropic society. Hire all the unvaxxed unemployed health care workers to staff them, and let the rest of us move on.

Death rates go up and down with each Covid wave, the original wild strain, the Alpha variant, the Delta variant, and now the Omicron variant. Which has peaked and is declining exponentially although deaths lag cases by about 3-4 weeks. Omicron is far more contagious so more people are catching it faster than with other waves, but those who are dying are still mainly the unvaccinated. You know all of this.

[nett]

Omicron is far more contagious so more people are catching it faster than with other waves, but those who are dying are still mainly the unvaccinated.

And there it is. You just implied that Omicron is significantly more deadly than the previous variants. This is what I find hilarious about the pro vaccine stance. Vaccines are so obviously ineffective on a macro-level, it only takes a few logical steps before you get an obviously absurd, falsifiable statement.

Thank for your support

[nett]

You are free to decide what you want to care about or not care about. But Covid is now more or less like lung cancer. A percentage of the US population (about 20%) continues to smoke even though they are fully aware of the increased risk of lunch cancer. The warnings are on every pack of cigarettes and anti-smoking campaigns have been going on for 50 years. You do what you can as a society to encourage people to make healthy choices but a percentage are never going to listen or care. It is what it is. Personally I think we should take Denmark's approach and roll back most Covid measures other than vaccinations. Perhaps throw up some cheap prefab Covid wards in vacant lots and parking lots for those who choose to gamble with their lives since we aren't a completely misanthropic society. Hire all the unvaxxed unemployed health care workers to staff them, and let the rest of us move on.

Lung cancer is an excellent example. Notice how the graph (for men, who make up most smokers) is on the downward trend. Why is COVID NOT doing the same thing, since the vaccines are so AWESOMEEEEE?

[Ken]

Yes, lung cancer death rates are going down for two reasons: (1) fewer people are smoking than in the past, and (2) cancer detection and therapies have consistently improved over the past 50 years so that all cancers including lung cancer are more survivable than in the past.

If you want to do an apples to apples comparison of lung cancer to Covid then you need to look at case fatality rates. Exposure rates for lung cancer are relatively constant over time as the number of people who smoke doesn't vary very much during the course of a year and not that much from year to year although it is slowly declining. By contrast, Covid comes and goes in seasonal waves with different variants. So you need to look at whether or not the deadliness of Covid is decreasing over time. If over the next month Covid death rates drop by 90% would you attribute that to the passing of the Omicron wave (by 90%) or would you conclude that Covid has become 90% less deadly?

This is what the Covid cumulative case fatality rate looks like over the past 2 years. It is slowly become less deadly with a dramatic drop recently with Omicron. If you look at the weekly averages the drop is even more dramatic.

[ken_sylvania]

Where exactly did the lower rate of death that ends the pandemic start?

The latest data show that vaccinated Americans are 14-times less likely to die than unvaccinated, and that vaccinated and boosted Americans are 97-times less likely to die of Covid than unvaccinated. And that most of those who are vaccinated and boosted and die have multiple comorbidities. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/hea ... 308759002/ If you are fully vaccinated and boosted and otherwise healthy then your chances of dying of Covid are about equal to or less than the common flu. At this point the pandemic (in terms of severe hospitalizations and deaths) is largely a pandemic of the unvaccinated and otherwise medically vulnerable. That is why some countries like Denmark are lifting most of their Covid measures.

Furthermore, if you cross compare various states it becomes clear that difference in death rates almost perfectly match differences in vaccination rates. The correlation is striking. Let's compare two states with roughly equivalent populations and demographics: Washington and Tennessee.

WA has a population of 7.7 million of which 16.2% (or 1.25 million) are over age 65
TN has a population of 6.9 million of which 17.1% (or 1.18 million) are over age 65.

So relatively similar population sizes and percentage of vulnerable (over age 65) populations.

First let's look at vaccination rates. Since the most vulnerable population and most likely to die of Covid is the over 65 population we can start there. WA has 92% of its over 65 population vaccinated and TN has 83% of it's over 65 population vaccinated. At first glance they don't look that strikingly different, that is a 9 percentage point difference. But, the relevant percentage is the unvaxed percentage, or the inverse of those numbers. WA has 8% of it's over 65 population unvaccinated and TN has 17% of it's over 65 population unvaccinated. If you calculate percent difference, that means that TN has a 113% higher rate of unvaccinated elderly than WA (17 is 113% higher than 8). Since the populations are roughly similar, that means TN has over twice as many unvaccinated elderly as WA.

Now lets look at the death rates. Since the pandemic began, WA has seen a Covid death rate of 145/100,000 and TN has seen a death rate of 333/100,000. If we do the same calculation, that means that TN has a 128% higher Covid death rate than WA (333 is 128% higher than 145). In other words, the difference in unvaccinated percentage (113%) closely correlates with the difference in death rates (128%).

We can do this with any comparable pairs of states that have roughly similar demographics and get the same result. The percentage differences in death rates are strikingly similar to percentage differences in the percentages of populations that are unvaccinated. Especially when we focus in on the most vulnerable portion of the population (over 65) that accounts for the bulk of Covid deaths.

Since you seem to have missed the graph I posted. Here it is again. Where did the life-saving vaccinations start?

I think maybe about halfway through the graph. Looks like the second half of the graph represents 2/3 as many deaths as the first half....

[nett]

[removed for brevity]

Since you seem to have missed the graph I posted. Here it is again. Where did the life-saving vaccinations start?

I think maybe about halfway through the graph. Looks like the second half of the graph represents 2/3 as many deaths as the first half....

I agree that there was a smoothing out around Feb 2021, however starting in Sep 2021, there was a sharp increase that is quite dramatic, despite high vaccination rates for vulnerable people. This is not what a graph of a highly effective vaccine rollout looks like.

Could be original antigenic sin, but it's hard to say, since the CDC refuses to publish any useful numbers, other than their obviously fake "unvaccinated/vaccinated" figures.

[Ken]

I agree that there was a smoothing out around Feb 2021, however starting in Sep 2021, there was a sharp increase that is quite dramatic, despite high vaccination rates for vulnerable people. This is not what a graph of a highly effective vaccine rollout looks like.

Could be original antigenic sin, but it's hard to say, since the CDC refuses to publish any useful numbers, other than their obviously fake "unvaccinated/vaccinated" figures.

The question, of course, is where those recent Covid deaths are coming from. If only we had data to answer that question. Oh wait, we actually do. And look! It is in fact, what a graph of a highly effective vaccine rollout does look like.

[GaryK]

Well, it looks like the mask mandates are being lifted one by one, even in Democratic run states. What is the lifting of these mandates based on?