Yeah it is bad. And as much as people may want to blame the unvaccinated, I am fairly sure there are a large group of unvaccinated who are not because no one has talked to them, they are not easily reached, they fear side effects keeping them out of work for a day or two, etc. Just people who are disadvantaged or lack good information in one way or another. Obviously there are the hard anti-vaxxer group as well, but I suspect that group may be smaller than the other group.
So saying there is nothing to be done is definitely a weak response.
It was really frustrating in May and June to see no sustained outreach to these communities, as I said here. Outreach has tremendously high ROI.
The lack of early mandates was also super weak and shortsighted. Mandates = liberty! At least we are seeing them now.
There are basically three groups of people refusing to get the vaccine
1) People of color who are wary of anything government and health related thanks to things like the Tuskegee experiments and other crimes.
2) The granola crowd who are more into alternative medicine than mainstream medicine. This is a wide range of people with some who prefer to try alternatives first but are open to mainstream medicine to people who think mainstream medicine is hokum and alternatives are the only way to go. It's the latter group who are resisting the vaccine. Though I know someone in that latter group most of the time who got vaccinated as soon as she was eligible.
3) Then the last group are those who only consume right wing news sources and believe all the lies.
The first group is getting there thanks to the efforts of other people of color going to their communities and educating them. The second group is beginning to cave too, but the third group are the ones saying that COVID is a hoax as they die from it.
Here's the last update on my wife's breakthrough case (Pfizer in March+April). She's basically back to normal. Taste and smell have returned. I looked back at my posts on this and here's an overview:
07/10 - we assume this was the exposure date
07/13 - very minor symptoms (occasional sneezing)
07/16 - major symptoms start, she was in bed through the next day (no fever, just serious fatigue, aches and pains, and headache)
07/18 - felt much better, test came back positive ... but taste and smell sensation totally disappear over the day
07/28 - taste and smell *finally* start improving
08/04 - back to normal
The taste+smell thing was really bizarre. Totally gone for almost two weeks then one morning when she woke up her tongue had an "electrical" feel to it. I guess that was the nerves waking up. It rapidly improved after that.
I'm glad to hear she's OK. I was concerned she was going to develop long-COVID.
I heard this on NPR today
Missouri Hospitals Are Struggling To Cope With Summer Spike Of COVID-19
It looks like Delta really is more lethal than previous variants
"ERIK FREDERICK: As we got through the initial surge in June, what came in July that followed was a pretty significant number of deaths - in fact, 78 in the month of July, which put us at about 2 1/2 a day. And we've started off August even higher at about 3 1/2 a day. It's unfortunate. I think since July 1, about 17% of our patients that have been admitted for COVID have died. And that's just - it's remarkable, and not in a good way."
"FREDERICK: So what we're seeing is largely unvaccinated patients. Probably about 92% of our admitted patients with COVID are unvaccinated. We're seeing a decrease in the average age, especially in the ICUs and stepdown units. We're seeing folks in their 20s and 30s and 40s, whereas, last year, it was typically much older and with co-morbidities or other health issues. And then the ones that are admitted who are vaccinated are not typically found in the ICU or on ventilators unless they're much older and have other health conditions. So, you know, large percentage of the patients are unvaccinated."
17% death rate for the hospitalized is high, especially now that the treatment regime has improved over the last 18 months. If this variant had hit before the vaccine it would be a far grimmer picture.
www.cnn.com
