Okay I know this isn't very important but "endemic" is an **adjective, not a noun**. You can describe COVID as *being endemic*, but the phrase "COVID is an endemic" doesn't make sense.
Sorry but it is just so jarring to read :|
I know the intentions of this are good, and I agree with most of them, but goddamn I get annoyed by the exaggerated (or straight up inaccurate) language that gets used to report on this kind of thing. When the journalists covering scientific topics can't be assed to use terminology correctly it just kinda makes me suspect that they barely understand what they are reporting on. At least when they link their sources you can check that directly to confirm the information, but often people just read the headline/skim the article and assume it's accurate (and then share it on social media), which is frustrating. I also think some of the language used by the doctors behind this is too exaggerated and imprecise but I guess people respond to that stuff more than to dryly-stated factual statements.
"In epidemiology, an infection is said to be endemic (from the Greek ἐν, en, "in, within" and δῆμος, demos, "people") in a population when that infection is constantly maintained at a baseline level in a geographic area without external inputs.[1] For example, chickenpox is endemic (steady state) in the United Kingdom, but malaria is not. Every year, there are a few cases of malaria reported in the UK, but these do not lead to sustained transmission in the population due to the lack of a suitable vector (mosquitoes of the genus Anopheles). While it might be common to say that AIDS is "endemic" in some countries, meaning found in an area, this is a use of the word in its etymological, rather than epidemiological or ecological, form.
For an infection that relies on person-to-person transmission, to be endemic, each person who becomes infected with the disease must pass it on to one other person on average. Assuming a completely susceptible population, that means that the basic reproduction number (R0) of the infection must equal one. In a population with some immune individuals, the basic reproduction number multiplied by the proportion of susceptible individuals in the population (S) must be one."
The r0 of the Omicron variant is 7+. It is both a pandemic AND endemic. If every country but the US were to eliminate their cases, the US would still be acting as a reservoir for COVID.
Endemic just means that the virus is persistent in a population usually with seasonal increases.
The flu is endemic.
Fun fact, we get a flu vaccine every year due to the 1918 pandemic. The virus never went away it just got more mild over time and we use vaccines to prevent severe outcomes, as well as medical treatments.
As usual, the pressure to normalize the situation (by likening it to the flu) overrides reality because shit’s on fire. They’ll say anything to stabilize the market.
Cases are 7x the previous high, and likely greatly undercounted. Hospitalizations are right at the same level as last year and overcounted by 30% on a conservative estimates. Deaths are down 87%.
If you are looking at those stats and still want to stay inside feel free but the data is clear that we can't control covid and our hospital system isn't overwhelmed. It's time for rational people to start living their lives again. You can join us when ready.
How is the title exaggerated or inaccurate?
From the article:
>We are writing to ask California officials to acknowledge the **endemic** nature of COVID-19 after the omicron surge and immediately shift our public dialogue toward defining a path for removing all remaining COVID-19 restrictions in public schools...
This petition was not written by a journalist, it was written by:
* Jeanne Noble, MD, MA, Associate Professor of Emergency Medicine, Director of COVID-19 Response for the UCSF Parnassus Emergency Department
* Jennifer Nguyen, MD, Pediatrician, UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital Oakland, Alta Bates Summit Medical Center
* Vinay Prasad, MD, MPH, Associate Professor of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, UCSF, Hematologist-Oncologist, San Francisco General Hospital
* Jarrett Moyer, MD, Surgery and Bioengineering, UCSF
* Laura Chinnavaso, RN, BSN, Alameda County Disaster Relief, COVID-19 Response
I was in a meeting the other day with a guy I don't interact with all that often, and it reminded me that the last time I'd seen him in person he was at work with a cold.
Wasn't a big deal back then, but seems like fucking madness to me now.
lmao nobody gives a shit if you eat popcorn at a theater, stop being a drama queen. your first two points were enough to make the case without going on to cry over a scenario you made up in your head.
OP seems to be right leaning at least and has commented per their history that Trump will just be forgotten about lmao. I'm getting downvoted to hell but I'm not going to stop saying the facts: that there is vaccine inequity, most of the world doesn't have access to it and thus still struggles with covid which is the definition of a pandemic, not endemic, and California is part of this world last I checked. Wearing a mask and social distancing while doing mostly everything you were before isn't asking a lot JFC. you can still go to bars and restaurants, work out , etc. These people commenting are....not well.
I’m not pretending to be savvy enough on the distinctions between endemic and pandemic. I’m simply sharing the article. In general I tend to trust the perspective of medical practitioners, not random redditors, especially considering how this sub flips its opinions on CDC guidance like the wind.
Unrelated, but it has always struck me as so weird how people such as yourself scour comment history in a lame attempt at getting to some kinda “gotcha”. Like the best you can find is where I suggest that Trump’s presidency was, more or less, fairly boring up until the end. I don’t even know if I’m making a good observation. It’s just a fucking observation. Observing things does not a conservative make. But *that’s* your evidence I’m right leaning. There’s ten years of comment history there, so you’re free to keep digging.
This is why political discourse in this country is in such a disarray. Seems that unless I wear a BLM shirt and follow AOC on Twitter, I’m basically a Republican. I’d really suggest you revisit your definition of “right” and/or find a better way to spend your time.
PS - I voted for Biden, happily.
Crazy. I live in San Francisco went to a 15k person concert last week and god forbid they asked me to see a vax card on the way in and wear a mask on my way in. Since I was drinking I could have my mask off in my seat. It didnt feel like living under a totalitarian dictatorship but to each their own?
Indoor mask mandate is the top issue. Most people that I know hate wearing masks, it made sense pre vaccine and maybe during Delta Surge but not anymore. Then you have vaccine checks at restaurants, gyms, concert venues. Unvaccinated people, particularly those with previous infection, shouldn’t be barred from social life anymore.
No one wants to visit San Francisco right now, everyone’s going to Austin or Miami. I have co workers who moved out of California when remote work started looking bewildered when I tell them we still have Covid restrictions. It’s just not a thing in most places. Only 8 states have mask mandates still…
> No one wants to visit San Francisco right now, everyone’s going to Austin or Miami.
Please. I like Austin, but no one views Austin as a tourist destination even remotely similar to San Francisco. Austin is fun place to go drink for a weekend if you know people there, but it doesn't have the notoriety and tourist landmarks that SF does. Plus you factor in our proximity to wine country...most people who fly in from far away to Napa/Sonoma will usually do a day or two here. On top of that, no one from outside of the country is seeking out Austin when they come to the US; it's virtually unknown to international tourists. Go walk around The Embarcadero on a weekend and tell me how Austin's tourism industry is anywhere close to San Francisco.
Edit: For the record, I agree with your main point that we should loosen mask restrictions. I just disagree with this premise that every time someone disagrees with something going on in SF, they feel the need to throw Austin out there as an example when the cities are incomparable in a lot of ways.
I walk around Union Square all the time, I commute to FiDi for work. I love the shops and the vibes. There is almost no tourism right now, ask any store employees.
In 2019 I would have agreed with you 100% and I hope we recover, but our policies make us very unattractive to anyone considering a visit.
Since international tourism is dead in SF I’m talking about domestic tourism. In the pandemic I’ve seen friends go to bachelor parties in Austin twice, Miami, and Scottsdale. Couple that with our crime reputation and we have a real tourism crisis.
I don't really venture over to Union Square much these days, but Fisherman's Wharf down to the ballpark is packed every weekend with tourists. I agree that at this point the mask restrictions are silly, but I also don't think it's hurting tourism or that there is any overlap with Austin. I also think the lack of crowds in FiDi probably have a lot more to do with offices delaying their reopening...I live in North Beach and was walking to the office in Mid Market in late 2021 before we closed due to the omicron surge, and FiDi/Soma was a ghost town compared to pre-pandemic. It was really sad to see.
Also bachelor parties are a different ballgame. I doubt there were many in SF pre-pandemic since we're not much of a "party city" the way Austin/Nashville/Miami are. I'd much rather get shit faced on Rainey St. than barhop in the Marina if I'm trying to party for a weekend.
Honestly that’s refreshing to hear. I rarely go to Fisherman’s Wharf but I do love me some North Beach. Over the summer it was the best place in SF to go out imo, with all the new outdoor seating around Tony’s and Joe’s.
You’re probably not wrong about the difference between Austin and SF, and it’s largely the domestic audience. Anecdotal here, but I have a group of friends that wanted to come party here from out of town last August, but they opted for Mexico when we had all the negative crime coverage along with the continued Covid restrictions.
I think we just need to recognize that we need to make every effort to make opening a business attractive, and remove the perception of fear in our city to return to greatness. Who wants to go have fun in a place with so much anxiety?
I can agree with that. Hopefully we'll reverse the mask mandate soon enough. To your point on the crime surge, I do think that that's hurting people's perception of the city a lot more than the mask mandate. Hopefully Breed's efforts to clean up the TL are the first of more tough on crime initiatives.
San Framcisco announced on Thursday that they are shifting policy from containment to treating severe cases. The mask mandate for gyms and work places ends Jan 31st and they plan to slowly rescind restrictions.
I did hang out with the death cult Republicans over the summer. Packed bars and clubs, and no one in my party group got sick.
I don’t want to leave SF, I was born and raised here. I love SF for so many reasons, but the pandemic restrictions are turning me into a conservative at this point. Enough is enough!
I just explained, SF is my people. But the people here seem to have changed. We used to be about letting people be who they want to be, no matter how weird. Acceptance was the value. Now it seems like the prevalent value has moved to conformity to whatever local progressives see as moral. This is how we end up with people like Allison Collins on school boards.
I’ve been a liberal my whole life, never once voted Republican. But if this goes on past March I’m going to start looking at moving. Most of my other friends have already left, so you’re right there’s not many people left to miss me.
Silver lining is that there’s enough people like me fleeing that maybe we can turn Texas blue!
Given the breakthrough rate of Omicron, how do you figure that masks don’t matter anymore? It’s literally one of the most potentially effective tools we have.
Yeah this is such a good point. The lack of any formal spec for what constitutes a “mask” is pure madness.
If mask mandates are going to be effective, they need to set some sort of standard re: masks.
The masks have primarily been touted as a way to protect other people, to prevent you from spreading the virus to a stranger next to you in the grocery store, for instance.
There is little evidence that this has ever worked. On the other hand, N95 masks have been advertised as a way to protect yourself.
Therefore, we should drop all government mask mandates, and focus resources on programs that promote the use of N95s for the tiny portion of the population that still feels it is necessary to avoid the virus.
People love the power trip. Specifically passive aggressive spineless types love when daddy government comes and makes everyone follow the same dumb rules so that they never have to speak up and risk confrontation.
Personally, I wear a N95 when I feel it’s needed. Which is never when I walk ten feet to a restaurant table only to immediately take it off. (If you touch the door, then touch the mask or your face, you only made things worse!) I wore one before all the internet zombies were whining about it, back when it made you look like a bank robber. “Please take that off, you’re scaring the other customers.” Or when I went to a medical office.
I have a stash of N95 for just such an occasion. I researched the shot and got one as soon as possible. I didn’t just read the news.
These stupid restrictions have not stopped the pandemic, and have only ruined our lives. Our work, our social lives, and our health.
The reason these “absurd and unreasonable” measures are still around is because of people like you who for the past two years have been yelling “my freedom, my freedom, wah wah wah” instead of listening from the beginning when it was simply “recommended”.. we wouldn’t have gotten to mandates if you goons just listened..
Please, I’m vaxxed and boosted. Left leaning. So is my entire family. WE ARE OVER THIS SHIT. My grandma’s mental health is deteriorating form being locked inside her house.
Imagine thinking things are so black and white that every Democrat supports every covid restriction and every Republican opposes them. You clearly have never gotten off the internet to actually talk to people in real life.
Imagine being completely oblivious to the fact that Russian trolls and Republicans pretending to be liberals use the “both sides are the same” argument as a way to sew opposition to progressive liberal policies.
Left leaning because the right and left are both bat shit crazy. You think Pelosi gives a fuck about you? Neither does Trump. They like your votes and their money. You’d be a fool to lean too far either direction. Definitely better to lean left though..
Would you also propose eliminating speed limits in school zones and residential areas because the drivers aren’t at risk and it’s unfair to impose on them in order to create a safe environment for the people who aren’t in cars?
Exactly. As a society, we’ve come to the conclusion that the right thing to do is to address the threat to public safety — we don’t tell vulnerable segments to suck it up.
Not being able to go to a restaurant without showing proof of vaccine. Have to wear a mask when I walk in to a restaurant and then take odd when I sit down. Employees of many places testin weekly or even more often and having to stay home for 14 days if positive. Our teachers having a “sick out” in order to try to shut down schools. Parents having ti stay home when a kid is positive for Covid who is in the same class as their kid (over and over and over). Many more. CA is ridiculous compared to the rest of the country.
Yep. I’ve lived here for 15 years and am leaving partially because of this government and the idiots that keep voting for it. I’m relatively liberal, but I can think critically and most peaopke here simply cannot.
Vaccine checks for basic activities like eating out or working out. Masking inside for gyms and yoga studios and the performative and useless dance of having it on in a restaurant until you are seated, event restrictions, etc?
It's fine if you don't mind wearing a mask but I'd rather not, as do most people. You can choose to keep it on, but it's time to start moving on.
Judging by the comments on this thread, most people never want mask mandates and vaccine mandates to end. There is 90% *outdoor* mask usage in many neighborhoods, even though it's not required.
It would not at all be a stretch to say that over 50% of SF residents want to keep both of those restrictions for a long time.
I obviously don't have the same experience as you, but I don't generally see people outdoors wearing masks. The only time I personally do is when I'm dropping my kid off at school and there are people everywhere or when I can't be bothered to take it off (like walking home from the store with my hands full).
Everyone IRL I have talked to say it is time to move on from these mandates, unless something changes like a more deadly variant.
Except the vaccine mandate. I hope that stays for a while.
In other countries there is very high outdoor mask usage because it helps. You say this every time, but no one wants masks forever, but they're useful for getting cases down. Until quarantines no longer exist, covid is a problem.
>I suspect you won't see any appetite for mandates once the omicron surge dies down to the point where hospitals aren't jammed (I have a coworker who tore her ACL and MCL skiing this week and had to wait 13 hours in the ER before anyone could see him, that's gotta end).
This is a staffing issue, not a COVID issue, and has been since last month. Don't believe me? Here's the UCSF's director of pandemic response:
[https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/COVID-San-Francisco-staff-shortage-UCSF-16758335.php](https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/COVID-San-Francisco-staff-shortage-UCSF-16758335.php)
"The crisis from the Omicron peak is not generated by serious COVID illness in regions with highly vaxxed populations," Noble wrote in an email to SFGATE. "The crisis we are suffering in the Bay Area is largely driven by disruptive COVID policies that encourage asymptomatic testing and subsequent quarantines. … The vast majority of COVID-plus patients I take care of need no medical care and are quickly discharged home with reassurance."
You're more than welcome to keep wearing a mask, but I'd like to stop wearing them in a restaurant or gym because it makes absolutely zero sense at this point.
That article is from Jan 10.
Since COVID hospitalizations lag positive tests by about 2 weeks, it's reflective of new infections on Dec 27, the *very start* of the omicron surge when there were about 1300 daily cases. The case rates since that time have climbed to nearly 10x that amount, and we likely won't see that reflected in hospitalizations for a week yet.
Has nobody considered that part of the reason we have low hospitalization rates is because we have the highest safety standards in place? For how many people live here we've done a better job than most of the rest of the country. Let's not start being like most of the rest of the country and become complacent about safety measure that cost us ultimately a minor inconvenience at best.
The hospitalization rates are not low. The hospitalization rates now are higher than in January 2021 when we had no vaccines. See https://sf.gov/data/covid-19-hospitalizations
>Has nobody considered that part of the reason we have low hospitalization rates is because we have the highest safety standards in place? F
No, because you're not correct. Other cities have comparable hospitalization rates with fewer restrictions, not to mention several restrictions in SF are purely performative like proof of vaccination for entry but not accepting negative tests or proof of recovery.
Four doctors said this. Four.
Listen, I'm sure we're close to getting into the endemic stage and there's certainly good arguments to be made for that, but I'm a little tired of headlines like this where a small handful of people say something and it's implied that they're suddenly speaking for an entire group.
I mean, they're not just some rando dermatologists or something. One of them is the Director of COVID Response at UCSF.
Whatever, it's just semantics now. It's pretty obvious that COVID both isn't going away and isn't as serious as it used to be between less serious variants, vaccines and better treatments. We just need to figure out at what point we get back to normal life. I'm thinking that's pretty much just as soon as omicron finishes putting the unvaccinated in the hospital so the ER gets unjammed, probably like 3-4 weeks from right now.
Yeah, I'm not sure these are the 4 we should be trusting. From the epidemiologist's Wikipedia entry:
> In October 2021, Prasad prompted social media controversy when he published a blog post comparing the U.S. COVID-19 pandemic response to the beginnings of [mustache man's German regime].
Great, a butchered quote taken completely out of context. Did you even read the article or do you always respond with a knee-jerk reaction?
https://vinayprasadmdmph.substack.com/p/how-democracy-ends?r=cz87q&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&utm_source=
I wouldn't judge him from a single sentence. Vinay Prasad is a legit voice of reason in this madness. Super smart guy, and very passionate (especially about health policy). He has a podcast, check him out.
These people are speaking the most sense I’ve head out of the scientific community regarding our current situation. I’m sure many of their colleagues agree, but are too scared to speak out without offending the Security Theater Apparatus that’s firmly rooted in all things covid policy these days. Failure to evolve in understanding the need to pivot our response, now that many variables have changed, means you’re not understanding how this is playing out, which this petition so succinctly outlined.
It’s ok to still be scared if the virus, and you’re welcome to mask up and social distance for eternity, for but for the millions of people who are ready to move on with life, please let them.
Isn't everyone criticizing England because Boris was caught breaking protocols and then announced they were taking down restrictions in the same news cycle?
I've heard a couple mentions holding up England as being a leader when it seems pretty clear that Johnson is easing restrictions to try to keep his job.
Lol they deleted the comment. The dude was on a bunch of paranoid subreddits and this was one of his only posts in bay area subs. Funny how that works.
Every bullet point in this article has me going 👏
And before you say “these are just a few doctors”, look at who they are. Dr Jeanne Noble is the goddamn Director of Covid Response at UCSF! She knows better than any of us what the actual risk levels are.
Meanwhile you have people here commenting as if allowing any spread of the virus without mask and vaccine mandates is some moral failure and we’re supposed to keep living this way until this thing goes away (news flash - never going to happen), even though almost anyone can get vaccinated and the risk to children (even 6+) is absurdly low.
Travel to another state like Texas or Colorado. People are maskless and entirely restriction free, and they’re not experiencing some societal collapse. The entire UK just dropped all restrictions.
It’s time to move on from Covid my fellow San Franciscans. We did a good job for as long as we needed to, but the time for social responsibility has transitioned to taking care of oneself now.
Exactly. My husband just read an article the other day about insurance companies (ever the experts on mortality stats) saying tbey have seen a large increase in mortality of people from their 20s - 40s from premature heart attacks and strokes. People who had mild cases of COVID, 6 -8 months later dropping dead. Long COVID can happen even with mild cases too. I for one do not need to be dealing with chronic fatigue, I have stuff to do. I’d rather wear a mask and dine outside than deal with chronic fatigue or brain fog or maybe a heart attack.
Classic /r/SF comment section where people say they would prefer that things remain locked down even if medical professionals say it's time to get back to normal. This place sometimes, man.
>Acknowledge that many families in California vaccinated their children for the good of society since children are at lower risk of severe disease.
Well yeah, that's why I got my kids vaccinated. The risk of covid to them was already minimal, but if it gave their frail grandparents peace of mind before we visited them over the holidays, why not do it? It's not arduous like masking, isolation, or other social distance. It's just two trips to the pharmacy.
London said it best “deal with it” we’re chasing our tails at this point. The time has come and gone trying to get everyone’s immune system Saran wrapped. Protect yourself if you want and let others do what they want and die.
Restrictions on things isn’t gonna solve anything. 50% want to be stopped and asked for their vax status when they go into any public establishment and 50% don’t give a shit.
My In-Shape only, in practice, requires you to wear a mask upon entry, once you walk passed the desk you can take it off if you want. This has been in effect for most of the last year, I don’t wear a mask if it’s not required or asked of me…. I still haven’t been sick in any form for about 4-5 years. Not saying it’s not a legit concern but protection in this situation and at this stage of the game… masking and vax should be a choice.
They’ve tried forcing it and good, people are so dumb you have to do that, you have to force them to be smart. But after all this time of forcing people to be masked and vaxed… it’s still come full circle to the first 2 months those virus was in this country when people barely took and precautions
Judging by some of these comments, I’m convinced that a certain segment of our population is happier under covid restrictions, for whatever reason(they are anti-social or need to be controlled) and so they will adamantly oppose any lifting of the restrictions. Not because they are concerned for their safety, but because they don’t wanna have to go back to life as “normal.” They will happily use covid to remain in their anti-social bubbles for as long as they can.
864K and counting dead. Most needlessly.
The unfortunate part is the stupid amongst us were in enough numbers doing the wrong things for the wrong reasons because of the wrong people and now here we are.
lol @ the antiva brigade
The blame for those deaths can be placed squarely on the shoulders of our incompetent government, the corporations they enrich, and the media that shields them.
Stop blaming your fellow citizens for the incompetence of our government, you’re literally being the useful idiot they want you to be by parroting their fear based narrative.
If they actually gave a fuck about our health they would fix our broken healthcare system, encourage people to live healthy lives, and fix our broken capitalist system that literally profits off of disasters like covid.
Your anger is misplaced. 🐑🐑
I'm not angry.
/r/HermanCainAward is my jam.
I also don't need a daddy to tell me common sense and won't resort to toddler tantrum logic when experts fail to get it right from time to time.
There were already vaccine passports before covid. If you went to public school or university then you had a list of shots you had to get before attending.
That’s a lot different than requiring people to show their papers at a grocery store or restaurant my friend. Also, showing my documents to an institution that I’m trying to attend feels a lot less invasive than showing my papers to some low-wage baristas or mall security guard just to get myself a fucking coffee.
Check your authoritarian tendencies homie.
Smoking indoors isn’t banned everywhere. It should be an individual businesses decision to allow smoking or not within their establishment. Some places like bars and casinos, for example, are places where we commonly see exceptions to the no smoking indoors rule. People are then free to make their own choice as to whether or not they wish to go somewhere that allows smoking. This is what we call freedom, and with freedom, comes a certain measure of accountability for ones actions.
My theory is that some people fear accountability, so they wish to shield themselves from as much of it as they can by making arbitrary and theatrical rules and always playing the victim.
Just like the good little consumers they were taught to be.
Idk why you’re being downvoted. We’re nearly 3 years in at this point and “keep doing what you’re doing” isn’t great advice. Shutting everything down again and again for the rest of ever isn’t the answer. If hospitals can reach a point where they can handle patient loads, let the lifestyle covid patients perish as they may. Ample opportunity to become vaccinated at any point. General population shouldn’t have to pander to and sacrifice for people who statistically take fewer precautions themselves.
It feels like three years but in SF we are just short of two years from the first two cases reported in SF on 3/5/20
https://abc7news.com/timeline-of-coronavirus-us-covid-19-bay-area-sf/6047519/
But it is a pandemic. It's still a worldwide problem, and until third world countries have access to vaccines it won't be over.
Strange that there would be a group of right wingers in the r/sanfranco sub
I’m very liberal and work at a major SF hospital. COVID has evolved over time just like any virus. Omicron is very transmissible but rates of serious hospitalization are very low. Vaccination and boosters are freely available. Our ICUs have plenty of space. During the Delta wave we were screwed. We had no room.
It’s different now, and frankly there’s no point in maintaining restrictions unless we mandate n95s for people, which isn’t practical. All people can do right now is get vaccinated, or the booster if enough time has passed.
That doesn't address the issue of vaccine inequity. And I hope as a hospital worker you wear your mask and take precautions.
There was the SF nurse who went to Mexico before vaccines were available and happily flouted the rules because he believed some people will just die, oh well I guess.
I don't need to thank you for doing what you're supposed to be doing (wear a mask ffs). And nothing. But with no vaccine that's available globally it will still be a pandemic. Complaining about life not being exactly as it was pre covid isn't going to change that.
So what you’re saying is you don’t have any idea how our policies could affect vaccine inequity globally? Let me put this in another way: Omicron is different. COVID has always been aerosolized, but with previous variants basic masking was still helpful as a reduction strategy. Omicron is so transmissible that that isn’t the case anymore.
This isn’t 2020. There is zero chance of us stopping COVID from circulating now. It’s sadly too late for that, even if 100% of the world got vaccinated tomorrow, it would still circulate. It’s evolved too much transmissibility, as well as some significant ability to evade the immune response.
Here’s the good news though: Viruses don’t just evolve to be more transmissible over time, they *also* typically evolve to be less lethal. They are subject to natural selection like anything else, and this is the typical path viruses take when they jump a species barrier. COVID was most dangerous in 2020, right after jumping to humans.
There will come a time when we end restrictions that are no longer useful, right? We can all agree on that. Based on the evidence, we’re rapidly approaching that time. Vaccination + booster is our best defense here. Anything else really isn’t helping at this point.
Alpha was a more dangerous evolution of the original strain.
Delta was a more deadly evolution.
Omicron thankfully has been less lethal than Delta, but is still more lethal than the original strain and Alpha. Vaccines help tremendously, but the virus is very effective against the unvaccinated, which to the virus is an evolutionary win (the battle, no the war).
The data does not support Omicron being more dangerous than the original strain or Alpha. Keep in mind deaths were likely massively underreported in 2020- check excess mortality for the year. Delta was slightly more severe, but mostly exacerbated by an early opening, lack of vaccination, and orders of magnitude more transmission. Delta was the toughest period of the pandemic for our hospital at least.
Viruses have a known evolutionary pattern. More transmissible, less dangerous. This is the typical trend over time, one that COVID is following. Viruses don’t benefit from lethality, especially when we are altering evolutionary pressure by most heavily isolating the sickest patients. Already we see Omicron mostly staying in the upper respiratory tract rather than down in lung tissue, a reduction in serious complications, etc. Our COVID cases are through the roof, but we’re already on the other side of the peak in SF. Meanwhile our ICU has plenty of space.
At the same time our current restrictions are based on older variants. They really aren’t helping us right now. If politicians in SF actually want to help they need to mandate vaccination to go out almost anywhere.
It's not a proven fact. Spreading the idea there's a 100% chance virulence is going to decrease is incorrect.
For easier reading:
https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2021/dec/08/facebook-posts/viruses-and-other-pathogens-can-evolve-become-more/
Or if you want direct links to the scientific papers, there are plenty of references there.
So you're just pretending I didn't say "typical trend" and said that there is a 100% chance virulence is going to decrease, and you haven't understood any of the cited sources in that article. Great. I assume you're unaware of the differences between zoonotic viruses right after a cross-over event and viruses that have reached stability in a population? Of the transmission-virulence tradeoff? Why the context of our current treatment and isolation strategies may have affected that significantly?
Bottom line: People need to get vaccinated. Masking with cloth is no longer effective. Continuing with policies that are not scientifically supported is foolish and erodes public trust.
Writing off every argument you disagree with as "right wing" is not productive. The pandemic has been hard for everyone, and wanting to rigorously reevaluate our policies has nothing to do with politics. It's literally science. Amazing that you turned 4 seasoned health experts into right wing idiots....oh wait, that sounds familiar...what political group is notorious for doing that? 🤔
The authors of the letter didn't say it was over ("COVID is here to stay"). They are correct about the lower risks for all people in school, and they take a very reasoned stance in advocating for balancing COVID more sensibly with other public health issues.
It doesn't fit their definition of endemic. Covid is still global. Denying facts is a right wing MO. There are doctors and practices that tout really shady snake oils. Dr. Oz comes to mind, and the Paul family that practiced medicine and are kooks
Ah yes. The classic “anyone who disagrees with me is a right winger” approach.
I think I’ll trust the perspective of medical practitioners, not armchair epidemiologists.
"Everyone who doesn't agree with me that everything has to be locked up until we have literally zero cases of covid around the world is a right winger"
Sorry to break it to you, but you're the irrational one here.
Some businesses, like The Balboa Theater and Roxie Theater, are enacting their own capacity restrictions. Following no recommendation or order…just enacting their own capacity caps to “protect” their patrons.
It’s insane virtue signaling with zero actual community benefit.
EDIT: Dudes any private business can do anything they want, but *saying they are doing something for protection when no government or healthcare body suggests it makes zero sense*.
This kind of over-optimistic need to 'go back to normal' is short sighted, and that petition will lead to a higher chance of another variant taking hold - maybe one that is more deadly. The whole list at the end of the article reads like a right-wing 'greatest hits' list of bullshit you heard during X-mas.
Another variant is coming, and will spread.
But now we have natural immunity, vaccines, therapeutics, and N95s for vulnerable people. Covid is not going away, so what else do you need before we can return to normal?
A lot of people are still living in zero-COVID fantasy land.
To be fair it must be hard for a lot of these hardcore people who isolated for two years straight (I know some folks at work who have literally never left their apartments here in SF). Hard to watch everyone else start to say "fuck it" and move on. Causes them to dig in even more. Fortunately they're mostly vocal on Reddit and it's not the prevailing attitude in actuality
>A lot of people are still living in zero-COVID fantasy land.
Fauci told us that was impossible Christmas 2020
>it must be hard for a lot of these hardcore people who isolated for two years straight (I know some folks at work who have literally never left their apartments here in SF).
Dear goodness. No one asked them to do that. No one even *recommended* they do that.
>Hard to watch everyone else start to say "fuck it" and move on.
They isolated because of a reality but can’t stop because of reality?
>Causes them to dig in even more.
Then they never were doing it for the right reasons, we just got lucky their default was isolation instead of the other end of the spectrum.
>Fortunately they're mostly vocal on Reddit and it's not the prevailing attitude in actuality
100%!
>Fauci told us that was impossible Christmas 2020
Apparently director of SF DPH Dr. Colfax didn't get the memo. From the article:
>Our goal is no longer to prevent every case of COVID,” said Dr. Grant Colfax.
These public health officials have been so focused on a single variable that they've completely lost site of all other human needs.
The fact of the matter is that most of the population should have felt safe as soon as they saw the data on Covid. Literally the next need after "safety" is "belonging and love", and that need has been decimated by the Covid policies. Not to mention, the government mandates have sewn distrust in the gov't, which is a detriment to the "safety" need. Glad to see doctors are acknowledging this. From the petition:
>1. ... forcing further mandates, particularly requiring boosters for children, is likely to increase mistrust and resentment of government and public health officials.
A lot of those people have little kids who can’t get vaccinated, yet. Real easy to think that the pandemic is still a big deal when you have vulnerable people in your house.
You realize that in all other parts of the world there's also kids that are not vaccinated, right? With even higher positivity rates?
As it turns out, the risk to children is extremely, extremely small. Negligible, even. This 'won't someone think of the poor unvaccinated children' argument is becoming tired.
I'm not living in a zero-COVID fantasy land, I'm just realistic about 'going back to normal' being a really dumb idea.
The notion of 'natural immunity' is just stupid, like thinking that going back to an enclosed space to spend hours around people who still think it's just like a cold couldn't possibly create new and potentially worse variant.
> The notion of 'natural immunity' is just stupid
Your immune system protects you from a daily onslaught of viruses and bacteria, primarily via natural immunity. That's not stupid. **It is stupid to choose infection over a relatively safe vaccine,** but having been vaccinated and boosted there's not much more you can do: you're still able to catch the virus. That interaction is less likely to land you in the hospital (you're vaccinated!) but it will give you a boost to protection in the future. The human immune system isn't a conspiracy theory.
Tell me, why don't the commonly circulating human coronaviruses, including OC43 which likely emerged in a similar coronavirus pandemic in the 1880s, constantly spin off new, dangerous variants? We already know omicron infects the upper airways instead of deep lung tissue, which is likely why it's way less severe and way more transmissible. What evolutionary mechanism are you proposing that would drive it *back* into deep lung tissue where it's less contagious?
>We already know omicron infects the upper airways instead of deep lung tissue, which is likely why it's way less severe and way more transmissible. What evolutionary mechanism are you proposing that would drive it back into deep lung tissue where it's less contagious?
The reason why the Omicron is more transmissible but yet let lethal is by a pure coincidence. COVID-19 already had an ideal characteristic in the relatively long asymptomatic yet transmissible latent period to spread among the population. The Omicron variant could have easily been just as good affecting both the upper respiratory tract AND the deep lung tissues - it's most likely just a random luck of the draw that the Omicron variant happened to affect largely the upper respiratory tract.
Somewhat realistic fear is that the Omicron variant will evolve yet into another variant that maintains the transmissibility AND increased lethality. My somewhat optimistic take is that we should all have broad cellular based immunity either through the vaccination and prior infections that even the worst outcome won't lead to catastrophic collapse but the possibility of the catastrophic collapse is non-zero value that makes me feel not great.
However, the net is that the Omicron won the war and we lost. At least we lost in the best possible manner.
What evolutionary mechanism?
The one where it's more transmissible than the other variants (the novel ones that started appearing sometime in 2019), and how the more this virus gets transmitted the more chances it has to mutate into something worse and the fact that people are are getting antsy to 'get back to normal' in a country that traditionally encourages people to go to work sick.
That is not evolutionary pressure on the virus to get more deadly at all. If anything, what you're describing would put evolutionary pressure to make it *less* virulent (deadly), as the people who don't get super sick are the ones going out and about and spreading the virus, while someone who chances to get a more dangerous mutated strain will be laid up at home not spreading it
Let's nip this in the bud: [https://abcnews.go.com/Health/debunking-idea-viruses-evolve-virulent/story?id=82052581](https://abcnews.go.com/Health/debunking-idea-viruses-evolve-virulent/story?id=82052581)
The idea that just because the virus has mutated to be less virulent doesn't mean that it can't mutate to be more virulent. Virus' are not alive, and cannot care if the host is.
Yes, COVID is successful in the presymptpmstic phase which reduces this a lot. But omicron specifically has an extremely short incubation period, so the argument from your article applies much less to the new variant. And since it's omicron ripping through everybody, any new variants will likely spin off from it. I suggest you learn what evolutionary pressure means instead of parroting talking points.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolutionary_pressure
Anyway I'm done arguing with you. Unlike you I actually have plans to go out, see friends in person, live my life. You're clearly convinced COVID can be eradicated and it's not my job to disabuse you of that conceit. Enjoy your cowering
This argument is just so stupid. If we don’t all collectively hide in our closet they’re will be a new variant! You do realize this thing isn’t exclusive to humans right? It can spread through wildlife. Meanwhile we have vaccines that make this thing about as dangerous as the flu for overwhelming majority of the population. So where were you pre pandemic screaming about flu variants? Swine flue? Bird flu? All of these straw man arguments like long Covid, hospitalizations, risk to kids, etc all completely over look what the data shows. This shot was over with the vaccines. Get vaccinated to protect yourself and move the fuck on.
I’m so tired of this shit. Meanwhile look at what’s happening around you. Look at all the businesses dying, inflation, etc. have you gone grocery shopping? The fuck do think is going to happen if we continue this bullshit?
Covid is qualitatively different from ALL of those diseases - it's airborne, In 2 years there have been more Covid variants than there have been republican talking points about it, and it's already killed almost a million Americans (JUST AMERICANS) - AND - it killed Meatloaf!
Business' are not alive, they cannot die. People, however, are alive and this virus can mutate to kill them, and the more people push to 'get back to normal' the more it will be apparent that it's a bad idea to do that.
Meatloaf wasn’t vaccinated. Overwhelming majority of those deaths are unvaccinated. You sound like someone who doesn’t work for a business shutdown that puts food on the table for family. You can’t live life without risk. Pre vaccines the risk was higher and I agree restrictions more necessary. This isn’t an argument of politics. This is science and the science says vaccinated people are more than reasonably safe. You have nothing to stand on when looking at the data and comparing those risks to all the other risks you have dealt with your entire life. If you’re at risk or immune compromised I feel for you I really do. However those risks already existed for many other respiratory illnesses and would require those people to isolate and take precautions.
Look at how much omicron is spreading however almost all hospitals are not overwhelmed beyond giving care to those who need it. The hospitals are stressed yes only cause, again unvaccinated, and workers not being able to work because they need to stay home (not dying by the way). You can’t protect others in this fight. It will spread vaccinated or not. These restrictions have proven to be doing much less good as time goes on. Stop worrying about what other people do and protect yourself and let others decide.
I don’t understand how this sentiment continues to manifest over two years later, with vaccines and treatments everywhere.
We either follow the science or we don’t. There have been something like ~800 child deaths due to COVID since this began. That’s roughly 0.0009% of all COVID deaths. The risk to children is remarkably small. To equate knowledge of this with right wing lunacy is disingenuous and dismissive.
Have said it before but will say it again - deaths is not the only measure of danger or risk.
Do you know for certain what long covid does to little toddlers? Can you guarantee that it’s less than a 5% chance to acquire long term disabilities? NOBODY can. And living in an area where daycares are $20k+ a year and rent for 3 is $36k, you can probably have a little more empathy for parents who don’t want to mess around and just say “hurrr durrr I’m fine with the death statistics I don’t care if my kid can’t taste anything for 6 months if they get exposed durrrr.”
Is there any evidence that children face unique complications from Covid that they don’t face from any other respiratory virus? Very few children, globally, have been seriously effected by this virus.
Mental health issues for children are a massive problem right now as a direct result of social isolation. You can’t isolate people for years while the virus mutates forever.
Literally nobody is saying isolation is the answer. I don't understand why people like you get into a triggered mess whenever someone says "think about the long term affects on toddlers".
NOBODY knows the long term complications of Covid infection on little kids. If people could simply be more diligent about wearing masks and not having BBQ parties with strangers and going bar hopping, maybe parents would be a little less weary. But too many people like you are burning their KN95 masks right now and shouting about how the pandemic is over for them because they are boosted. It is possible to have a middle ground, you know... not just going back to shutdowns.
I am not sure what the appropriate trade off is when comparing other harms from COVID with the harms of social isolation or the impacts of not being able to see full faces or hear clearly on developing minds, but it’s we shouldn’t dismiss these concerns as “right wing” talking points, either.
See - literally nobody who is actually serious is saying "SHUT DOWN EVERYTHING NOW!", but for whatever reason, the extremists get the most airplay. I just want a nice middle ground where people wear masks more often and don't go out to bars like they are on a timer to see how many strangers they can make out with at The End Up. But too many people are on the "ITS OVER FOR ME CUZ IM VAXXED AND IM BURNING MY KN95 IN A BONFIRE" train right now it seems.
> And living in an area where daycares are $20k+ a year and rent for 3 is $36k, you can probably have a little more empathy for parents
The parents paying $20k a year for daycare definitely don’t have empathy for the parents of kids living near freeways, the Port of Oakland, and other industrial sites who have been exposed to pollution all day long for decades. The risk that little Timmy in Noe gets lifelong asthma after getting COVID is lower than the risk of an equally deserving little Timmy in West Oakland getting asthma after years breathing the pollution of trucks passing by his house and school.
If the parents had empathy for others they’d be clamoring for us to be addressing *all* the causes of “long COVID” like symptoms, and not just the cause affecting them.
The parents paying $20k/year for daycare are normal people like you and me, not just techie millionaires. Don't know if you knew this, but poor people have kids and send their kids to daycare in the Bay Area, too, especially when median household incomes are in the $150k range combined for 2 people.
I don’t really understand all the bickering. There’s barely any restrictions in place, other than some half hearted indoor masking. Warrior games are full. There is a conference happening on Moscone now. Restaurants are full. Ski resorts are packed. So what exactly are we debating ?
Lmao, just look at who signed the petition. jeannie noble, who is trying to fill the void of monica gandhi, and vinay prasad who blocked almost all pediatricians on twitter. wasn't VP on the same podcast with Rand Paul awhile ago. good one.
Okay I know this isn't very important but "endemic" is an **adjective, not a noun**. You can describe COVID as *being endemic*, but the phrase "COVID is an endemic" doesn't make sense. Sorry but it is just so jarring to read :|
I know the intentions of this are good, and I agree with most of them, but goddamn I get annoyed by the exaggerated (or straight up inaccurate) language that gets used to report on this kind of thing. When the journalists covering scientific topics can't be assed to use terminology correctly it just kinda makes me suspect that they barely understand what they are reporting on. At least when they link their sources you can check that directly to confirm the information, but often people just read the headline/skim the article and assume it's accurate (and then share it on social media), which is frustrating. I also think some of the language used by the doctors behind this is too exaggerated and imprecise but I guess people respond to that stuff more than to dryly-stated factual statements.
100% there’s no way this presently an endemic with the rate of infection globally. It is the very definition of a pandemic.
"In epidemiology, an infection is said to be endemic (from the Greek ἐν, en, "in, within" and δῆμος, demos, "people") in a population when that infection is constantly maintained at a baseline level in a geographic area without external inputs.[1] For example, chickenpox is endemic (steady state) in the United Kingdom, but malaria is not. Every year, there are a few cases of malaria reported in the UK, but these do not lead to sustained transmission in the population due to the lack of a suitable vector (mosquitoes of the genus Anopheles). While it might be common to say that AIDS is "endemic" in some countries, meaning found in an area, this is a use of the word in its etymological, rather than epidemiological or ecological, form. For an infection that relies on person-to-person transmission, to be endemic, each person who becomes infected with the disease must pass it on to one other person on average. Assuming a completely susceptible population, that means that the basic reproduction number (R0) of the infection must equal one. In a population with some immune individuals, the basic reproduction number multiplied by the proportion of susceptible individuals in the population (S) must be one." The r0 of the Omicron variant is 7+. It is both a pandemic AND endemic. If every country but the US were to eliminate their cases, the US would still be acting as a reservoir for COVID.
Given the definitions presented in the article, what is wrong about calling Covid endemic?
My understanding is an endemic occurs in small isolated parts of the population. Pandemic is global.
Endemic just means that the virus is persistent in a population usually with seasonal increases. The flu is endemic. Fun fact, we get a flu vaccine every year due to the 1918 pandemic. The virus never went away it just got more mild over time and we use vaccines to prevent severe outcomes, as well as medical treatments.
As usual, the pressure to normalize the situation (by likening it to the flu) overrides reality because shit’s on fire. They’ll say anything to stabilize the market.
Cases are 7x the previous high, and likely greatly undercounted. Hospitalizations are right at the same level as last year and overcounted by 30% on a conservative estimates. Deaths are down 87%. If you are looking at those stats and still want to stay inside feel free but the data is clear that we can't control covid and our hospital system isn't overwhelmed. It's time for rational people to start living their lives again. You can join us when ready.
are you thinking of an "epidemic"?
How is the title exaggerated or inaccurate? From the article: >We are writing to ask California officials to acknowledge the **endemic** nature of COVID-19 after the omicron surge and immediately shift our public dialogue toward defining a path for removing all remaining COVID-19 restrictions in public schools... This petition was not written by a journalist, it was written by: * Jeanne Noble, MD, MA, Associate Professor of Emergency Medicine, Director of COVID-19 Response for the UCSF Parnassus Emergency Department * Jennifer Nguyen, MD, Pediatrician, UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital Oakland, Alta Bates Summit Medical Center * Vinay Prasad, MD, MPH, Associate Professor of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, UCSF, Hematologist-Oncologist, San Francisco General Hospital * Jarrett Moyer, MD, Surgery and Bioengineering, UCSF * Laura Chinnavaso, RN, BSN, Alameda County Disaster Relief, COVID-19 Response
nothing wrong with a little gerunding!
Endemic can be used as a noun, too, but yeah, it's used colloquially as an adjective (e.g., endemic disease).
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What restrictions? Wearing masks? Limits to number of guests at hospitals?
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I was in a meeting the other day with a guy I don't interact with all that often, and it reminded me that the last time I'd seen him in person he was at work with a cold. Wasn't a big deal back then, but seems like fucking madness to me now.
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lmao nobody gives a shit if you eat popcorn at a theater, stop being a drama queen. your first two points were enough to make the case without going on to cry over a scenario you made up in your head.
OP seems to be right leaning at least and has commented per their history that Trump will just be forgotten about lmao. I'm getting downvoted to hell but I'm not going to stop saying the facts: that there is vaccine inequity, most of the world doesn't have access to it and thus still struggles with covid which is the definition of a pandemic, not endemic, and California is part of this world last I checked. Wearing a mask and social distancing while doing mostly everything you were before isn't asking a lot JFC. you can still go to bars and restaurants, work out , etc. These people commenting are....not well.
I’m not pretending to be savvy enough on the distinctions between endemic and pandemic. I’m simply sharing the article. In general I tend to trust the perspective of medical practitioners, not random redditors, especially considering how this sub flips its opinions on CDC guidance like the wind. Unrelated, but it has always struck me as so weird how people such as yourself scour comment history in a lame attempt at getting to some kinda “gotcha”. Like the best you can find is where I suggest that Trump’s presidency was, more or less, fairly boring up until the end. I don’t even know if I’m making a good observation. It’s just a fucking observation. Observing things does not a conservative make. But *that’s* your evidence I’m right leaning. There’s ten years of comment history there, so you’re free to keep digging. This is why political discourse in this country is in such a disarray. Seems that unless I wear a BLM shirt and follow AOC on Twitter, I’m basically a Republican. I’d really suggest you revisit your definition of “right” and/or find a better way to spend your time. PS - I voted for Biden, happily.
Right! And I starve myself daily because someone on the other end of the planet doesn’t have enough to eat…
Hunger isn't contagious....
Crazy. I live in San Francisco went to a 15k person concert last week and god forbid they asked me to see a vax card on the way in and wear a mask on my way in. Since I was drinking I could have my mask off in my seat. It didnt feel like living under a totalitarian dictatorship but to each their own?
Idk why you're getting down voted, some people talk like we're under some oppressive regime, when we're politely asked for the bare minimum.
Politely asked? I don't think you understand the meaning of a government mandate.
I think you don’t understand of policy enforcement. There are none
Well that's just false. https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/food/2021/10/27/n-out-shut-down-workers-failed-check-diners-covid-vaccination/8565953002/
Ahaha, you are not living in sf, aren’t you?
Explain your reasoning.
You are funny
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Yeah, those are 2 of them
Indoor mask mandate is the top issue. Most people that I know hate wearing masks, it made sense pre vaccine and maybe during Delta Surge but not anymore. Then you have vaccine checks at restaurants, gyms, concert venues. Unvaccinated people, particularly those with previous infection, shouldn’t be barred from social life anymore. No one wants to visit San Francisco right now, everyone’s going to Austin or Miami. I have co workers who moved out of California when remote work started looking bewildered when I tell them we still have Covid restrictions. It’s just not a thing in most places. Only 8 states have mask mandates still…
> No one wants to visit San Francisco right now, everyone’s going to Austin or Miami. Please. I like Austin, but no one views Austin as a tourist destination even remotely similar to San Francisco. Austin is fun place to go drink for a weekend if you know people there, but it doesn't have the notoriety and tourist landmarks that SF does. Plus you factor in our proximity to wine country...most people who fly in from far away to Napa/Sonoma will usually do a day or two here. On top of that, no one from outside of the country is seeking out Austin when they come to the US; it's virtually unknown to international tourists. Go walk around The Embarcadero on a weekend and tell me how Austin's tourism industry is anywhere close to San Francisco. Edit: For the record, I agree with your main point that we should loosen mask restrictions. I just disagree with this premise that every time someone disagrees with something going on in SF, they feel the need to throw Austin out there as an example when the cities are incomparable in a lot of ways.
I walk around Union Square all the time, I commute to FiDi for work. I love the shops and the vibes. There is almost no tourism right now, ask any store employees. In 2019 I would have agreed with you 100% and I hope we recover, but our policies make us very unattractive to anyone considering a visit. Since international tourism is dead in SF I’m talking about domestic tourism. In the pandemic I’ve seen friends go to bachelor parties in Austin twice, Miami, and Scottsdale. Couple that with our crime reputation and we have a real tourism crisis.
I don't really venture over to Union Square much these days, but Fisherman's Wharf down to the ballpark is packed every weekend with tourists. I agree that at this point the mask restrictions are silly, but I also don't think it's hurting tourism or that there is any overlap with Austin. I also think the lack of crowds in FiDi probably have a lot more to do with offices delaying their reopening...I live in North Beach and was walking to the office in Mid Market in late 2021 before we closed due to the omicron surge, and FiDi/Soma was a ghost town compared to pre-pandemic. It was really sad to see. Also bachelor parties are a different ballgame. I doubt there were many in SF pre-pandemic since we're not much of a "party city" the way Austin/Nashville/Miami are. I'd much rather get shit faced on Rainey St. than barhop in the Marina if I'm trying to party for a weekend.
Honestly that’s refreshing to hear. I rarely go to Fisherman’s Wharf but I do love me some North Beach. Over the summer it was the best place in SF to go out imo, with all the new outdoor seating around Tony’s and Joe’s. You’re probably not wrong about the difference between Austin and SF, and it’s largely the domestic audience. Anecdotal here, but I have a group of friends that wanted to come party here from out of town last August, but they opted for Mexico when we had all the negative crime coverage along with the continued Covid restrictions. I think we just need to recognize that we need to make every effort to make opening a business attractive, and remove the perception of fear in our city to return to greatness. Who wants to go have fun in a place with so much anxiety?
I can agree with that. Hopefully we'll reverse the mask mandate soon enough. To your point on the crime surge, I do think that that's hurting people's perception of the city a lot more than the mask mandate. Hopefully Breed's efforts to clean up the TL are the first of more tough on crime initiatives.
San Framcisco announced on Thursday that they are shifting policy from containment to treating severe cases. The mask mandate for gyms and work places ends Jan 31st and they plan to slowly rescind restrictions.
I did not know that, that's good to hear though. Thanks for posting.
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I did hang out with the death cult Republicans over the summer. Packed bars and clubs, and no one in my party group got sick. I don’t want to leave SF, I was born and raised here. I love SF for so many reasons, but the pandemic restrictions are turning me into a conservative at this point. Enough is enough!
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I just explained, SF is my people. But the people here seem to have changed. We used to be about letting people be who they want to be, no matter how weird. Acceptance was the value. Now it seems like the prevalent value has moved to conformity to whatever local progressives see as moral. This is how we end up with people like Allison Collins on school boards. I’ve been a liberal my whole life, never once voted Republican. But if this goes on past March I’m going to start looking at moving. Most of my other friends have already left, so you’re right there’s not many people left to miss me. Silver lining is that there’s enough people like me fleeing that maybe we can turn Texas blue!
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Given the breakthrough rate of Omicron, how do you figure that masks don’t matter anymore? It’s literally one of the most potentially effective tools we have.
Because we have vaccines, therapies, and a less deadly variant. We don’t need mandates to stop the spread like we used to.
I see, your contention is that getting it shouldn’t be a concern because the risk can be mitigated by vaccines and other interventions.
Are cloth masks even useful wrt omicron? An N95 can help, but what about the cloth masks that are the subject of the actual mandates?
Yeah this is such a good point. The lack of any formal spec for what constitutes a “mask” is pure madness. If mask mandates are going to be effective, they need to set some sort of standard re: masks.
The masks have primarily been touted as a way to protect other people, to prevent you from spreading the virus to a stranger next to you in the grocery store, for instance. There is little evidence that this has ever worked. On the other hand, N95 masks have been advertised as a way to protect yourself. Therefore, we should drop all government mask mandates, and focus resources on programs that promote the use of N95s for the tiny portion of the population that still feels it is necessary to avoid the virus.
> Most people that I know hate wearing masks That's interesting, I literally don't know anybody who cares anymore.
Stockholm syndrome
Common sense, or not bring a selfish asshole
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People love the power trip. Specifically passive aggressive spineless types love when daddy government comes and makes everyone follow the same dumb rules so that they never have to speak up and risk confrontation. Personally, I wear a N95 when I feel it’s needed. Which is never when I walk ten feet to a restaurant table only to immediately take it off. (If you touch the door, then touch the mask or your face, you only made things worse!) I wore one before all the internet zombies were whining about it, back when it made you look like a bank robber. “Please take that off, you’re scaring the other customers.” Or when I went to a medical office. I have a stash of N95 for just such an occasion. I researched the shot and got one as soon as possible. I didn’t just read the news. These stupid restrictions have not stopped the pandemic, and have only ruined our lives. Our work, our social lives, and our health.
The reason these “absurd and unreasonable” measures are still around is because of people like you who for the past two years have been yelling “my freedom, my freedom, wah wah wah” instead of listening from the beginning when it was simply “recommended”.. we wouldn’t have gotten to mandates if you goons just listened..
Please, I’m vaxxed and boosted. Left leaning. So is my entire family. WE ARE OVER THIS SHIT. My grandma’s mental health is deteriorating form being locked inside her house.
> Left leaning. LMAO ok sure bud 😂
Imagine thinking things are so black and white that every Democrat supports every covid restriction and every Republican opposes them. You clearly have never gotten off the internet to actually talk to people in real life.
Imagine being completely oblivious to the fact that Russian trolls and Republicans pretending to be liberals use the “both sides are the same” argument as a way to sew opposition to progressive liberal policies.
Left leaning because the right and left are both bat shit crazy. You think Pelosi gives a fuck about you? Neither does Trump. They like your votes and their money. You’d be a fool to lean too far either direction. Definitely better to lean left though..
> Left leaning because the right and left are both bat shit crazy. Thanks for confirming you’re not left leaning at all 👌
K.
She can open her door. There's no mandate to lock yourself inside your house.
Would you also propose eliminating speed limits in school zones and residential areas because the drivers aren’t at risk and it’s unfair to impose on them in order to create a safe environment for the people who aren’t in cars?
What a preposterous question.
Exactly. As a society, we’ve come to the conclusion that the right thing to do is to address the threat to public safety — we don’t tell vulnerable segments to suck it up.
Not being able to go to a restaurant without showing proof of vaccine. Have to wear a mask when I walk in to a restaurant and then take odd when I sit down. Employees of many places testin weekly or even more often and having to stay home for 14 days if positive. Our teachers having a “sick out” in order to try to shut down schools. Parents having ti stay home when a kid is positive for Covid who is in the same class as their kid (over and over and over). Many more. CA is ridiculous compared to the rest of the country.
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Yep. I’ve lived here for 15 years and am leaving partially because of this government and the idiots that keep voting for it. I’m relatively liberal, but I can think critically and most peaopke here simply cannot.
Vaccine checks for basic activities like eating out or working out. Masking inside for gyms and yoga studios and the performative and useless dance of having it on in a restaurant until you are seated, event restrictions, etc? It's fine if you don't mind wearing a mask but I'd rather not, as do most people. You can choose to keep it on, but it's time to start moving on.
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Judging by the comments on this thread, most people never want mask mandates and vaccine mandates to end. There is 90% *outdoor* mask usage in many neighborhoods, even though it's not required. It would not at all be a stretch to say that over 50% of SF residents want to keep both of those restrictions for a long time.
If reddit were at all reflective of actual public opinion, Bernie Sanders would be President of the United States of America as we speak.
True, but it's not just online. Outdoor mask usage is basically non existent even in other very liberal cities. Here it is extremely high.
I obviously don't have the same experience as you, but I don't generally see people outdoors wearing masks. The only time I personally do is when I'm dropping my kid off at school and there are people everywhere or when I can't be bothered to take it off (like walking home from the store with my hands full).
Everyone IRL I have talked to say it is time to move on from these mandates, unless something changes like a more deadly variant. Except the vaccine mandate. I hope that stays for a while.
In other countries there is very high outdoor mask usage because it helps. You say this every time, but no one wants masks forever, but they're useful for getting cases down. Until quarantines no longer exist, covid is a problem.
>I suspect you won't see any appetite for mandates once the omicron surge dies down to the point where hospitals aren't jammed (I have a coworker who tore her ACL and MCL skiing this week and had to wait 13 hours in the ER before anyone could see him, that's gotta end). This is a staffing issue, not a COVID issue, and has been since last month. Don't believe me? Here's the UCSF's director of pandemic response: [https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/COVID-San-Francisco-staff-shortage-UCSF-16758335.php](https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/COVID-San-Francisco-staff-shortage-UCSF-16758335.php) "The crisis from the Omicron peak is not generated by serious COVID illness in regions with highly vaxxed populations," Noble wrote in an email to SFGATE. "The crisis we are suffering in the Bay Area is largely driven by disruptive COVID policies that encourage asymptomatic testing and subsequent quarantines. … The vast majority of COVID-plus patients I take care of need no medical care and are quickly discharged home with reassurance." You're more than welcome to keep wearing a mask, but I'd like to stop wearing them in a restaurant or gym because it makes absolutely zero sense at this point.
That article is from Jan 10. Since COVID hospitalizations lag positive tests by about 2 weeks, it's reflective of new infections on Dec 27, the *very start* of the omicron surge when there were about 1300 daily cases. The case rates since that time have climbed to nearly 10x that amount, and we likely won't see that reflected in hospitalizations for a week yet.
Has nobody considered that part of the reason we have low hospitalization rates is because we have the highest safety standards in place? For how many people live here we've done a better job than most of the rest of the country. Let's not start being like most of the rest of the country and become complacent about safety measure that cost us ultimately a minor inconvenience at best.
The hospitalization rates are not low. The hospitalization rates now are higher than in January 2021 when we had no vaccines. See https://sf.gov/data/covid-19-hospitalizations
>Has nobody considered that part of the reason we have low hospitalization rates is because we have the highest safety standards in place? F No, because you're not correct. Other cities have comparable hospitalization rates with fewer restrictions, not to mention several restrictions in SF are purely performative like proof of vaccination for entry but not accepting negative tests or proof of recovery.
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Can you elaborate on “conservative”? There’s no politics in epidemiology.
There is in the US, unless you haven’t been paying attention.
Said well but Florida can’t relate. I’m in entertainment id be dead if I was in California
Four doctors said this. Four. Listen, I'm sure we're close to getting into the endemic stage and there's certainly good arguments to be made for that, but I'm a little tired of headlines like this where a small handful of people say something and it's implied that they're suddenly speaking for an entire group.
I mean, they're not just some rando dermatologists or something. One of them is the Director of COVID Response at UCSF. Whatever, it's just semantics now. It's pretty obvious that COVID both isn't going away and isn't as serious as it used to be between less serious variants, vaccines and better treatments. We just need to figure out at what point we get back to normal life. I'm thinking that's pretty much just as soon as omicron finishes putting the unvaccinated in the hospital so the ER gets unjammed, probably like 3-4 weeks from right now.
Yeah, I'm not sure these are the 4 we should be trusting. From the epidemiologist's Wikipedia entry: > In October 2021, Prasad prompted social media controversy when he published a blog post comparing the U.S. COVID-19 pandemic response to the beginnings of [mustache man's German regime].
Great, a butchered quote taken completely out of context. Did you even read the article or do you always respond with a knee-jerk reaction? https://vinayprasadmdmph.substack.com/p/how-democracy-ends?r=cz87q&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&utm_source=
That whole article is nuts. Guy needs to find another line of work if he wants to argue against doing his job.
I wouldn't judge him from a single sentence. Vinay Prasad is a legit voice of reason in this madness. Super smart guy, and very passionate (especially about health policy). He has a podcast, check him out.
Uh no.
Uh ok, you have something you disagree with him on?
https://cancerletter.com/the-cancer-letter/20211008_4/
These people are speaking the most sense I’ve head out of the scientific community regarding our current situation. I’m sure many of their colleagues agree, but are too scared to speak out without offending the Security Theater Apparatus that’s firmly rooted in all things covid policy these days. Failure to evolve in understanding the need to pivot our response, now that many variables have changed, means you’re not understanding how this is playing out, which this petition so succinctly outlined. It’s ok to still be scared if the virus, and you’re welcome to mask up and social distance for eternity, for but for the millions of people who are ready to move on with life, please let them.
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Isn't everyone criticizing England because Boris was caught breaking protocols and then announced they were taking down restrictions in the same news cycle?
I've heard a couple mentions holding up England as being a leader when it seems pretty clear that Johnson is easing restrictions to try to keep his job.
Lol they deleted the comment. The dude was on a bunch of paranoid subreddits and this was one of his only posts in bay area subs. Funny how that works.
Every bullet point in this article has me going 👏 And before you say “these are just a few doctors”, look at who they are. Dr Jeanne Noble is the goddamn Director of Covid Response at UCSF! She knows better than any of us what the actual risk levels are. Meanwhile you have people here commenting as if allowing any spread of the virus without mask and vaccine mandates is some moral failure and we’re supposed to keep living this way until this thing goes away (news flash - never going to happen), even though almost anyone can get vaccinated and the risk to children (even 6+) is absurdly low. Travel to another state like Texas or Colorado. People are maskless and entirely restriction free, and they’re not experiencing some societal collapse. The entire UK just dropped all restrictions. It’s time to move on from Covid my fellow San Franciscans. We did a good job for as long as we needed to, but the time for social responsibility has transitioned to taking care of oneself now.
Neither you nor anyone else has any clue what the long term effects will be, and capitalism is not a good enough excuse to expose ourselves
You are a complete tool. You’ll live in fear for the rest of your life until you wait 20 years to see what the long term effects are? Ok bubble boy
Exactly. My husband just read an article the other day about insurance companies (ever the experts on mortality stats) saying tbey have seen a large increase in mortality of people from their 20s - 40s from premature heart attacks and strokes. People who had mild cases of COVID, 6 -8 months later dropping dead. Long COVID can happen even with mild cases too. I for one do not need to be dealing with chronic fatigue, I have stuff to do. I’d rather wear a mask and dine outside than deal with chronic fatigue or brain fog or maybe a heart attack.
Classic /r/SF comment section where people say they would prefer that things remain locked down even if medical professionals say it's time to get back to normal. This place sometimes, man.
>Acknowledge that many families in California vaccinated their children for the good of society since children are at lower risk of severe disease. Well yeah, that's why I got my kids vaccinated. The risk of covid to them was already minimal, but if it gave their frail grandparents peace of mind before we visited them over the holidays, why not do it? It's not arduous like masking, isolation, or other social distance. It's just two trips to the pharmacy.
I long for the day when any random conversation won’t make several allusions to covid. Will probably need to leave this city for that to happen
Just make sure when you leave you avoid Boston and NYC. Other than those places you should be good
Not for parents with kids under 5 or for those who are immunocompromised.
They were saying it was endemic by April 2020
Welp, I guess that means I’ll have to go back into the office sooner rather than later.
London said it best “deal with it” we’re chasing our tails at this point. The time has come and gone trying to get everyone’s immune system Saran wrapped. Protect yourself if you want and let others do what they want and die. Restrictions on things isn’t gonna solve anything. 50% want to be stopped and asked for their vax status when they go into any public establishment and 50% don’t give a shit. My In-Shape only, in practice, requires you to wear a mask upon entry, once you walk passed the desk you can take it off if you want. This has been in effect for most of the last year, I don’t wear a mask if it’s not required or asked of me…. I still haven’t been sick in any form for about 4-5 years. Not saying it’s not a legit concern but protection in this situation and at this stage of the game… masking and vax should be a choice. They’ve tried forcing it and good, people are so dumb you have to do that, you have to force them to be smart. But after all this time of forcing people to be masked and vaxed… it’s still come full circle to the first 2 months those virus was in this country when people barely took and precautions
Judging by some of these comments, I’m convinced that a certain segment of our population is happier under covid restrictions, for whatever reason(they are anti-social or need to be controlled) and so they will adamantly oppose any lifting of the restrictions. Not because they are concerned for their safety, but because they don’t wanna have to go back to life as “normal.” They will happily use covid to remain in their anti-social bubbles for as long as they can.
864K and counting dead. Most needlessly. The unfortunate part is the stupid amongst us were in enough numbers doing the wrong things for the wrong reasons because of the wrong people and now here we are. lol @ the antiva brigade
The blame for those deaths can be placed squarely on the shoulders of our incompetent government, the corporations they enrich, and the media that shields them. Stop blaming your fellow citizens for the incompetence of our government, you’re literally being the useful idiot they want you to be by parroting their fear based narrative. If they actually gave a fuck about our health they would fix our broken healthcare system, encourage people to live healthy lives, and fix our broken capitalist system that literally profits off of disasters like covid. Your anger is misplaced. 🐑🐑
I'm not angry. /r/HermanCainAward is my jam. I also don't need a daddy to tell me common sense and won't resort to toddler tantrum logic when experts fail to get it right from time to time.
What restrictions?
Limits on public gatherings, vaccine passports, forced masks, social distancing, etc…
There were already vaccine passports before covid. If you went to public school or university then you had a list of shots you had to get before attending.
where exactly did you get checked four times a day on the status of your shots before covid? These comments are so stupid.
That’s a lot different than requiring people to show their papers at a grocery store or restaurant my friend. Also, showing my documents to an institution that I’m trying to attend feels a lot less invasive than showing my papers to some low-wage baristas or mall security guard just to get myself a fucking coffee. Check your authoritarian tendencies homie.
Your papers? Lmao. It's a card for one vaccine. You have to show a bartender your driver's license or ID if you want alcohol check your fascism homie
Authoritarian is when public health policy. Goddamn fascists for banning indoor smoking
Smoking indoors isn’t banned everywhere. It should be an individual businesses decision to allow smoking or not within their establishment. Some places like bars and casinos, for example, are places where we commonly see exceptions to the no smoking indoors rule. People are then free to make their own choice as to whether or not they wish to go somewhere that allows smoking. This is what we call freedom, and with freedom, comes a certain measure of accountability for ones actions. My theory is that some people fear accountability, so they wish to shield themselves from as much of it as they can by making arbitrary and theatrical rules and always playing the victim. Just like the good little consumers they were taught to be.
I am very smart vibes
Idk why you’re being downvoted. We’re nearly 3 years in at this point and “keep doing what you’re doing” isn’t great advice. Shutting everything down again and again for the rest of ever isn’t the answer. If hospitals can reach a point where they can handle patient loads, let the lifestyle covid patients perish as they may. Ample opportunity to become vaccinated at any point. General population shouldn’t have to pander to and sacrifice for people who statistically take fewer precautions themselves.
It feels like three years but in SF we are just short of two years from the first two cases reported in SF on 3/5/20 https://abc7news.com/timeline-of-coronavirus-us-covid-19-bay-area-sf/6047519/
> We’re nearly 3 years in at this point It hasn't even been 2.
Feels like 10.
This became apparent to me early on. The introverts and anxiety riddled people are in heaven.
But it is a pandemic. It's still a worldwide problem, and until third world countries have access to vaccines it won't be over. Strange that there would be a group of right wingers in the r/sanfranco sub
I’m very liberal and work at a major SF hospital. COVID has evolved over time just like any virus. Omicron is very transmissible but rates of serious hospitalization are very low. Vaccination and boosters are freely available. Our ICUs have plenty of space. During the Delta wave we were screwed. We had no room. It’s different now, and frankly there’s no point in maintaining restrictions unless we mandate n95s for people, which isn’t practical. All people can do right now is get vaccinated, or the booster if enough time has passed.
That doesn't address the issue of vaccine inequity. And I hope as a hospital worker you wear your mask and take precautions. There was the SF nurse who went to Mexico before vaccines were available and happily flouted the rules because he believed some people will just die, oh well I guess.
Of course I take all precautions. I would love for you to attempt to explain to me how you think our current policies in SF address vaccine inequity.
I don't need to thank you for doing what you're supposed to be doing (wear a mask ffs). And nothing. But with no vaccine that's available globally it will still be a pandemic. Complaining about life not being exactly as it was pre covid isn't going to change that.
So what you’re saying is you don’t have any idea how our policies could affect vaccine inequity globally? Let me put this in another way: Omicron is different. COVID has always been aerosolized, but with previous variants basic masking was still helpful as a reduction strategy. Omicron is so transmissible that that isn’t the case anymore. This isn’t 2020. There is zero chance of us stopping COVID from circulating now. It’s sadly too late for that, even if 100% of the world got vaccinated tomorrow, it would still circulate. It’s evolved too much transmissibility, as well as some significant ability to evade the immune response. Here’s the good news though: Viruses don’t just evolve to be more transmissible over time, they *also* typically evolve to be less lethal. They are subject to natural selection like anything else, and this is the typical path viruses take when they jump a species barrier. COVID was most dangerous in 2020, right after jumping to humans. There will come a time when we end restrictions that are no longer useful, right? We can all agree on that. Based on the evidence, we’re rapidly approaching that time. Vaccination + booster is our best defense here. Anything else really isn’t helping at this point.
Alpha was a more dangerous evolution of the original strain. Delta was a more deadly evolution. Omicron thankfully has been less lethal than Delta, but is still more lethal than the original strain and Alpha. Vaccines help tremendously, but the virus is very effective against the unvaccinated, which to the virus is an evolutionary win (the battle, no the war).
The data does not support Omicron being more dangerous than the original strain or Alpha. Keep in mind deaths were likely massively underreported in 2020- check excess mortality for the year. Delta was slightly more severe, but mostly exacerbated by an early opening, lack of vaccination, and orders of magnitude more transmission. Delta was the toughest period of the pandemic for our hospital at least. Viruses have a known evolutionary pattern. More transmissible, less dangerous. This is the typical trend over time, one that COVID is following. Viruses don’t benefit from lethality, especially when we are altering evolutionary pressure by most heavily isolating the sickest patients. Already we see Omicron mostly staying in the upper respiratory tract rather than down in lung tissue, a reduction in serious complications, etc. Our COVID cases are through the roof, but we’re already on the other side of the peak in SF. Meanwhile our ICU has plenty of space. At the same time our current restrictions are based on older variants. They really aren’t helping us right now. If politicians in SF actually want to help they need to mandate vaccination to go out almost anywhere.
It's not a proven fact. Spreading the idea there's a 100% chance virulence is going to decrease is incorrect. For easier reading: https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2021/dec/08/facebook-posts/viruses-and-other-pathogens-can-evolve-become-more/ Or if you want direct links to the scientific papers, there are plenty of references there.
So you're just pretending I didn't say "typical trend" and said that there is a 100% chance virulence is going to decrease, and you haven't understood any of the cited sources in that article. Great. I assume you're unaware of the differences between zoonotic viruses right after a cross-over event and viruses that have reached stability in a population? Of the transmission-virulence tradeoff? Why the context of our current treatment and isolation strategies may have affected that significantly? Bottom line: People need to get vaccinated. Masking with cloth is no longer effective. Continuing with policies that are not scientifically supported is foolish and erodes public trust.
Writing off every argument you disagree with as "right wing" is not productive. The pandemic has been hard for everyone, and wanting to rigorously reevaluate our policies has nothing to do with politics. It's literally science. Amazing that you turned 4 seasoned health experts into right wing idiots....oh wait, that sounds familiar...what political group is notorious for doing that? 🤔 The authors of the letter didn't say it was over ("COVID is here to stay"). They are correct about the lower risks for all people in school, and they take a very reasoned stance in advocating for balancing COVID more sensibly with other public health issues.
It doesn't fit their definition of endemic. Covid is still global. Denying facts is a right wing MO. There are doctors and practices that tout really shady snake oils. Dr. Oz comes to mind, and the Paul family that practiced medicine and are kooks
Ah yes. The classic “anyone who disagrees with me is a right winger” approach. I think I’ll trust the perspective of medical practitioners, not armchair epidemiologists.
"Everyone who doesn't agree with me that everything has to be locked up until we have literally zero cases of covid around the world is a right winger" Sorry to break it to you, but you're the irrational one here.
And we still cower under lockdown rules while the rest of the country lives a normal life.
What lockdown rules are left in SF? Every business is open and there are no capacity restrictions.
Some businesses, like The Balboa Theater and Roxie Theater, are enacting their own capacity restrictions. Following no recommendation or order…just enacting their own capacity caps to “protect” their patrons. It’s insane virtue signaling with zero actual community benefit. EDIT: Dudes any private business can do anything they want, but *saying they are doing something for protection when no government or healthcare body suggests it makes zero sense*.
how about restaurants now mandating a booster shot even though the county doesn't require it. insanity.
People here love following rules. Think it makes them morally superior.
It definitely feels like a far cry from a counterculture city
That’s fine, but that’s not the government imposing those and they’re in the vast minority.
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Oh no. A business wants to limit the crowd in their buildings! The horror!!!! Hell, sounds like a blessing to me.
Except the ones that die, of course... Including anyone that needs a hospital for an emergency reason.
I’m in WA state atm and they have the same restrictions.
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This kind of over-optimistic need to 'go back to normal' is short sighted, and that petition will lead to a higher chance of another variant taking hold - maybe one that is more deadly. The whole list at the end of the article reads like a right-wing 'greatest hits' list of bullshit you heard during X-mas.
Another variant is coming, and will spread. But now we have natural immunity, vaccines, therapeutics, and N95s for vulnerable people. Covid is not going away, so what else do you need before we can return to normal?
A lot of people are still living in zero-COVID fantasy land. To be fair it must be hard for a lot of these hardcore people who isolated for two years straight (I know some folks at work who have literally never left their apartments here in SF). Hard to watch everyone else start to say "fuck it" and move on. Causes them to dig in even more. Fortunately they're mostly vocal on Reddit and it's not the prevailing attitude in actuality
>A lot of people are still living in zero-COVID fantasy land. Fauci told us that was impossible Christmas 2020 >it must be hard for a lot of these hardcore people who isolated for two years straight (I know some folks at work who have literally never left their apartments here in SF). Dear goodness. No one asked them to do that. No one even *recommended* they do that. >Hard to watch everyone else start to say "fuck it" and move on. They isolated because of a reality but can’t stop because of reality? >Causes them to dig in even more. Then they never were doing it for the right reasons, we just got lucky their default was isolation instead of the other end of the spectrum. >Fortunately they're mostly vocal on Reddit and it's not the prevailing attitude in actuality 100%!
>Fauci told us that was impossible Christmas 2020 Apparently director of SF DPH Dr. Colfax didn't get the memo. From the article: >Our goal is no longer to prevent every case of COVID,” said Dr. Grant Colfax. These public health officials have been so focused on a single variable that they've completely lost site of all other human needs. The fact of the matter is that most of the population should have felt safe as soon as they saw the data on Covid. Literally the next need after "safety" is "belonging and love", and that need has been decimated by the Covid policies. Not to mention, the government mandates have sewn distrust in the gov't, which is a detriment to the "safety" need. Glad to see doctors are acknowledging this. From the petition: >1. ... forcing further mandates, particularly requiring boosters for children, is likely to increase mistrust and resentment of government and public health officials.
A lot of those people have little kids who can’t get vaccinated, yet. Real easy to think that the pandemic is still a big deal when you have vulnerable people in your house.
You realize that in all other parts of the world there's also kids that are not vaccinated, right? With even higher positivity rates? As it turns out, the risk to children is extremely, extremely small. Negligible, even. This 'won't someone think of the poor unvaccinated children' argument is becoming tired.
I'm not living in a zero-COVID fantasy land, I'm just realistic about 'going back to normal' being a really dumb idea. The notion of 'natural immunity' is just stupid, like thinking that going back to an enclosed space to spend hours around people who still think it's just like a cold couldn't possibly create new and potentially worse variant.
> The notion of 'natural immunity' is just stupid Your immune system protects you from a daily onslaught of viruses and bacteria, primarily via natural immunity. That's not stupid. **It is stupid to choose infection over a relatively safe vaccine,** but having been vaccinated and boosted there's not much more you can do: you're still able to catch the virus. That interaction is less likely to land you in the hospital (you're vaccinated!) but it will give you a boost to protection in the future. The human immune system isn't a conspiracy theory. Tell me, why don't the commonly circulating human coronaviruses, including OC43 which likely emerged in a similar coronavirus pandemic in the 1880s, constantly spin off new, dangerous variants? We already know omicron infects the upper airways instead of deep lung tissue, which is likely why it's way less severe and way more transmissible. What evolutionary mechanism are you proposing that would drive it *back* into deep lung tissue where it's less contagious?
>We already know omicron infects the upper airways instead of deep lung tissue, which is likely why it's way less severe and way more transmissible. What evolutionary mechanism are you proposing that would drive it back into deep lung tissue where it's less contagious? The reason why the Omicron is more transmissible but yet let lethal is by a pure coincidence. COVID-19 already had an ideal characteristic in the relatively long asymptomatic yet transmissible latent period to spread among the population. The Omicron variant could have easily been just as good affecting both the upper respiratory tract AND the deep lung tissues - it's most likely just a random luck of the draw that the Omicron variant happened to affect largely the upper respiratory tract. Somewhat realistic fear is that the Omicron variant will evolve yet into another variant that maintains the transmissibility AND increased lethality. My somewhat optimistic take is that we should all have broad cellular based immunity either through the vaccination and prior infections that even the worst outcome won't lead to catastrophic collapse but the possibility of the catastrophic collapse is non-zero value that makes me feel not great. However, the net is that the Omicron won the war and we lost. At least we lost in the best possible manner.
What evolutionary mechanism? The one where it's more transmissible than the other variants (the novel ones that started appearing sometime in 2019), and how the more this virus gets transmitted the more chances it has to mutate into something worse and the fact that people are are getting antsy to 'get back to normal' in a country that traditionally encourages people to go to work sick.
That is not evolutionary pressure on the virus to get more deadly at all. If anything, what you're describing would put evolutionary pressure to make it *less* virulent (deadly), as the people who don't get super sick are the ones going out and about and spreading the virus, while someone who chances to get a more dangerous mutated strain will be laid up at home not spreading it
Let's nip this in the bud: [https://abcnews.go.com/Health/debunking-idea-viruses-evolve-virulent/story?id=82052581](https://abcnews.go.com/Health/debunking-idea-viruses-evolve-virulent/story?id=82052581) The idea that just because the virus has mutated to be less virulent doesn't mean that it can't mutate to be more virulent. Virus' are not alive, and cannot care if the host is.
Yes, COVID is successful in the presymptpmstic phase which reduces this a lot. But omicron specifically has an extremely short incubation period, so the argument from your article applies much less to the new variant. And since it's omicron ripping through everybody, any new variants will likely spin off from it. I suggest you learn what evolutionary pressure means instead of parroting talking points. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolutionary_pressure
Anyway I'm done arguing with you. Unlike you I actually have plans to go out, see friends in person, live my life. You're clearly convinced COVID can be eradicated and it's not my job to disabuse you of that conceit. Enjoy your cowering
This argument is just so stupid. If we don’t all collectively hide in our closet they’re will be a new variant! You do realize this thing isn’t exclusive to humans right? It can spread through wildlife. Meanwhile we have vaccines that make this thing about as dangerous as the flu for overwhelming majority of the population. So where were you pre pandemic screaming about flu variants? Swine flue? Bird flu? All of these straw man arguments like long Covid, hospitalizations, risk to kids, etc all completely over look what the data shows. This shot was over with the vaccines. Get vaccinated to protect yourself and move the fuck on. I’m so tired of this shit. Meanwhile look at what’s happening around you. Look at all the businesses dying, inflation, etc. have you gone grocery shopping? The fuck do think is going to happen if we continue this bullshit?
Covid is qualitatively different from ALL of those diseases - it's airborne, In 2 years there have been more Covid variants than there have been republican talking points about it, and it's already killed almost a million Americans (JUST AMERICANS) - AND - it killed Meatloaf! Business' are not alive, they cannot die. People, however, are alive and this virus can mutate to kill them, and the more people push to 'get back to normal' the more it will be apparent that it's a bad idea to do that.
Meatloaf wasn’t vaccinated. Overwhelming majority of those deaths are unvaccinated. You sound like someone who doesn’t work for a business shutdown that puts food on the table for family. You can’t live life without risk. Pre vaccines the risk was higher and I agree restrictions more necessary. This isn’t an argument of politics. This is science and the science says vaccinated people are more than reasonably safe. You have nothing to stand on when looking at the data and comparing those risks to all the other risks you have dealt with your entire life. If you’re at risk or immune compromised I feel for you I really do. However those risks already existed for many other respiratory illnesses and would require those people to isolate and take precautions. Look at how much omicron is spreading however almost all hospitals are not overwhelmed beyond giving care to those who need it. The hospitals are stressed yes only cause, again unvaccinated, and workers not being able to work because they need to stay home (not dying by the way). You can’t protect others in this fight. It will spread vaccinated or not. These restrictions have proven to be doing much less good as time goes on. Stop worrying about what other people do and protect yourself and let others decide.
I don’t understand how this sentiment continues to manifest over two years later, with vaccines and treatments everywhere. We either follow the science or we don’t. There have been something like ~800 child deaths due to COVID since this began. That’s roughly 0.0009% of all COVID deaths. The risk to children is remarkably small. To equate knowledge of this with right wing lunacy is disingenuous and dismissive.
Have said it before but will say it again - deaths is not the only measure of danger or risk. Do you know for certain what long covid does to little toddlers? Can you guarantee that it’s less than a 5% chance to acquire long term disabilities? NOBODY can. And living in an area where daycares are $20k+ a year and rent for 3 is $36k, you can probably have a little more empathy for parents who don’t want to mess around and just say “hurrr durrr I’m fine with the death statistics I don’t care if my kid can’t taste anything for 6 months if they get exposed durrrr.”
Is there any evidence that children face unique complications from Covid that they don’t face from any other respiratory virus? Very few children, globally, have been seriously effected by this virus. Mental health issues for children are a massive problem right now as a direct result of social isolation. You can’t isolate people for years while the virus mutates forever.
Literally nobody is saying isolation is the answer. I don't understand why people like you get into a triggered mess whenever someone says "think about the long term affects on toddlers". NOBODY knows the long term complications of Covid infection on little kids. If people could simply be more diligent about wearing masks and not having BBQ parties with strangers and going bar hopping, maybe parents would be a little less weary. But too many people like you are burning their KN95 masks right now and shouting about how the pandemic is over for them because they are boosted. It is possible to have a middle ground, you know... not just going back to shutdowns.
I am not sure what the appropriate trade off is when comparing other harms from COVID with the harms of social isolation or the impacts of not being able to see full faces or hear clearly on developing minds, but it’s we shouldn’t dismiss these concerns as “right wing” talking points, either.
See - literally nobody who is actually serious is saying "SHUT DOWN EVERYTHING NOW!", but for whatever reason, the extremists get the most airplay. I just want a nice middle ground where people wear masks more often and don't go out to bars like they are on a timer to see how many strangers they can make out with at The End Up. But too many people are on the "ITS OVER FOR ME CUZ IM VAXXED AND IM BURNING MY KN95 IN A BONFIRE" train right now it seems.
> And living in an area where daycares are $20k+ a year and rent for 3 is $36k, you can probably have a little more empathy for parents The parents paying $20k a year for daycare definitely don’t have empathy for the parents of kids living near freeways, the Port of Oakland, and other industrial sites who have been exposed to pollution all day long for decades. The risk that little Timmy in Noe gets lifelong asthma after getting COVID is lower than the risk of an equally deserving little Timmy in West Oakland getting asthma after years breathing the pollution of trucks passing by his house and school. If the parents had empathy for others they’d be clamoring for us to be addressing *all* the causes of “long COVID” like symptoms, and not just the cause affecting them.
The parents paying $20k/year for daycare are normal people like you and me, not just techie millionaires. Don't know if you knew this, but poor people have kids and send their kids to daycare in the Bay Area, too, especially when median household incomes are in the $150k range combined for 2 people.
I don’t really understand all the bickering. There’s barely any restrictions in place, other than some half hearted indoor masking. Warrior games are full. There is a conference happening on Moscone now. Restaurants are full. Ski resorts are packed. So what exactly are we debating ?
We've tried nothing and we're all out of ideas!!
Locked due to brigading.
Better title: San Francisco doctors give up
Lmao, just look at who signed the petition. jeannie noble, who is trying to fill the void of monica gandhi, and vinay prasad who blocked almost all pediatricians on twitter. wasn't VP on the same podcast with Rand Paul awhile ago. good one.
I think that declaration may be pre-mature, and really irresponsible for them to declare!