30 thoughts on “C-19 Chat Post – May 29 2021”

  1. This is a repost / excerpt of a comment I made on the weather part of the blog this morning in response to JPD’s comment. I put this portion here because it’s more directly related to Covid-19, and I wanted to make sure the thoughts were here as well, in case you would have missed them on the other section…

    Woburn is having their Memorial Day ceremony on Monday. Typically this would start at 8AM with a parade of two bands, military representatives, and city officials into the common, followed by a full ceremony, then a parade from there up to one of the main cemeteries not too far from the city center, and a shorter ceremony there, then for those who want to stick with it until the end, bused to the east side of the city for another short parade down the road that leads to the other larger cemetery where a ceremony is held similar to the one at the other cemetery.

    However, this year, it’s starting at 9AM. and they are just confining it to the full ceremony in the city center (Woburn Common) without a parade. This makes sense to me given we’re right on the edge of coming out of the restrictions and there is a significant percentage of the crowd over 65 years old. Personally, I’m very happy they are doing the ceremony and equally happy they are still practicing safety for the protection of those still vulnerable, as face masks will be required to attend. The risk may be quite low now, but to analogize a bit, it’s kind of like the “low but not zero” tornado risk talk we use sometimes. This ceremony is to be held regardless of weather. We’ve done many Memorial Day and Veterans Day ceremonies and parades in rain, wind, cold, heat, etc. here in the city. We’re a tough bunch, but smart too. …

    1. Very interesting – thanks Vicki.

      I suppose another interpretation is that eating broccoli makes a person more susceptible to severe Covid!

        1. I’m probably a candidate for a breakthrough infection as I like broccoli and eat it frequently.

      1. Good point. I am not a huge fan of broccoli and will certainly not attempt to acquire a taste now 😉

  2. In Vietnam scientists have sequenced another troubling variant. This one combines features from the B117 (Kent, England variant) and the B1617 lineage (Indian variants). The virus appears to be doing everything it can to survive. Vietnam is experiencing a major surge in infections. It had been doing very well until a few weeks ago.

    1. I have to say that this virus is truly creepy in that it almost seems to have a thought process. An evil one at that.

    2. I find it interesting that the Spanish Flu in 1918 gave up so easily in comparison. Is that why there was no real need for a vaccine at the time?

  3. CDC Director Rochelle Walensky will be throwing out the first pitch at Fenway later today. I hope she has a much better fastball than Dr. Fauci last year.

    100% capacity and NO masks. Hopefully the Red Sox will be back to “2018” standards if you know what I mean.

  4. Philip, the Spanish Flu also included multiple waves, likely exacerbated by variants, over a 2 year span. The 2nd and 3rd waves were by far the worst. We can only speculate at this point that a mutated virus became more lethal. But then, as Vicki alluded to, the virus lost most of its lethality. It did stay with us but as a rather harmless annoyance. I’m hoping this happens soon with the coronavirus.

  5. 100% capacity at Fenway in this kind of weather is not good. It’s not indoors, but it’s the next best thing to being indoors. Viruses of all kinds LOVE this weather. Transmits much better in cool and damp conditions, with heavy air. Add to that the bandbox that is our lovely ballpark, with very cramped conditions, I’m not thrilled about the Governor’s decision.

    I was very surprised to hear Baker declare the pandemic “over” yesterday at the presser. He sort of qualified what he said, but he left the impression that it’s game over for Covid. I hope he’s right and that all we’ll see from here on out is more improvement. Yet, I can’t help but wonder why no other leader I can think of in the wealthy, industrialized world thinks this way. Are they all way too cautious? Worried unnecessarily about variants and the continued level of spread in the community? I’m talking about Johnson, Merkel, Macron, Trudeau, Rutte, and many others. They’re all very happy with the progress being made. But none of them has opened up 100%, or even close to it. They’ve all warned that the pandemic is not over, in part because it’s severely impacting so many countries at the moment. Several of the leaders I’m referring to preside over countries with vaccination rates at or above ours. So, I don’t know what to think. As I’ve said before, I guess I’m more risk-averse.

  6. TSA said There have been 1300 incidents of people violating the mask mandate 2500 reports of unruly passengers this year alone. 1900 are about mask compliance. And some of it has been violent.

    Some NBA teams are banning fans who are unruly. Even the crowds at the PGA tournament were disrespectful. The one place you rarely, if ever, see disrespect is at golf tournaments.

    What the heck happened to us?

  7. Positivity rate down to 0.69–if it continues to fall over the next two weeks after the full reopening I think we can consider the virus crushed in MA.

      1. It truly is a good sign. And I pray you are correct.

        As we know I err on the side of caution. And I haven’t been far off in the past. I would far rather be wrong than right

        This from June 23, 2020

        In the Bay State, the current “Rt” for the coronavirus — a measure of a virus’s average reproduction rate at any given point in time — is estimated to be 0.68, according to Rt.live.

        1. This is indeed true, and the Rt was very low for plenty of state by late June. The Northeast, in particular, got cases down to very low levels in June and July. Seasonality and strong mitigation efforts were responsible.

          The big difference between last year and this year is vaccinations. Didn’t have them last year. Now we have them and states like Massachusetts have excellent vaccination coverage. Even if vaccines aren’t perfect they’ve made a large percentage of the population of Massachusetts largely immune to the virus. at least for the time being; until and if immunity wanes, until and if there’s a variant that successfully evades vaccines. Thus far, the evidence suggests immunity doesn’t wane very much over time (though we really don’t know yet; this is modeled data, not real-world), and the evidence suggests that vaccines do fairly well against even the scariest of variants.

          I still have some concern going forward now that all restrictions are lifted. There is no mitigation at all, and still a percentage of the population that is susceptible. Rt can change rather dramatically over time. All it takes is a cluster or two.

          I worry even more about the Deep South where vaccination rates are less than half of ours! This could portend a problem this summer – so very soon – across the region as folks head indoors to escape the heat to air-conditioned public spaces. While there’s more immunity there now than last year, there certainly isn’t herd immunity. Plus, now, everything is 100% open. By contrast, last year there were restrictions; bar closures, masks, and crowd limits. I predict at least a ripple and possibly a wave in that region.

          1. Well said. I truly have more hope this year. And Dave’s comment made me smile. I pray we can all attend my sons wedding in August. And that you can see your daughter. And Jean can see her family in South Africa and we can all just hug again

            The damned virus, as you said earlier today, works eerily hard to circumvent all we do. I pray also that we can stay a step ahead of it

      1. Joshua ….how did we come from singing from our windows and porches and stoops at the start of this virus to this? I assume you saw my earlier post about unruly folks.

        I feel as if we have a whole lot more to heal from than just Covid.

        1. So true. Unity is so important. Doesn’t mean we all think the same, vote the same, or are the same. I’m thinking more in terms of unity of purpose and identifying as citizens of a great society: The United States of America. Rochelle Walensky is a terrific doctor, a hard-working American who cares deeply about her job and the well-being of her fellow citizens. We can disagree on many things, including the inconsistency in communication. Yet, in her I see a fellow citizen.

          You’re so right to reference the singing many of us did last March and April. I think there was some unity of spirit then. But we became numb, perhaps, tired, too. We also had and have a political situation in which there just isn’t any mutual respect shown by political adversaries. Rather, it’s mostly demonization. Trumpism plays a major part in this.

          Yet, I don’t foist all the blame onto Trump. Trump appointed Drs. Jerome Adams, Scott Gottlieb, Alex Azar, Seema Verma, and Robert Redfield. Politically all of these people are quite conservative, and different from me in many ways. But, I respected them all. I tweeted and also emailed them all (received some correspondence back) to thank them for their service to this country. We can be politically on different sides of the fence, but we’re Americans first and foremost, and we care about this great nation of ours. Those Trump appointees I alluded to care deeply about our nation. [By the way, I’m not so sure about Pence and a few other appointees, but that’s beyond the scope of this post]

  8. With regard to public transportation, at some point very soon, I would like to see mask mandates be lifted, or at least eased somewhat. I find it interesting that a fully or half vaccinated person can now go inside a 100%+ packed bar for hours if they wish sans mask, but still can’t go on a city (MBTA) bus 1/4 – 1/3 capacity for a 10-20 minute ride.

    As to Vicki’s point above, it would certainly cut down on airline violence dramatically, if nothing else.

    Btw, I have noticed albeit a precious few T bus operators not wearing masks as of late. “Rules for thee, but not for me”. 😉

    1. Oh my point was not to cut masks on airlines. It is a contained area where germs spread.

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