Covid omicron – Holland going into lockdown tomorrow

Bill Masen - December 18, 2021

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-59713503

Holland is going into a hard lockdown tomorrow

UK is seeing huge surges inOmicron infections and government is considering a Circuit Breaker lockdown,  10,000 new cases in UK in one day.  infection rates doubling every 24 hours near as dammit.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-59711474

London declares Major Incident over Omicron

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-59710649

The Mayor of London has declared a “major incident” due to the rapid spread of the Omicron coronavirus variant in the capital.Sadiq Khan said Omicron is now the “dominant variant” in London and was having an impact on staff absences in the emergency services across the city.He said London was the UK region with the largest number of Covid cases.Latest government data shows there are 1,534 Covid patients in London hospitals – up 28.6% on last week.Mr Khan said in the last 24 hours, London had seen the largest number of new cases since the coronavirus pandemic began – more than 26,000.

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Wonder if we will experience another early 2020 style of lockdown here in the US. How will it be received compared to the first one?

 

Thanks, interesting and alarming news! I’m not sure what to think. On the one hand, as far as I know, Omicron continues to be not very serious. But I understand that it’s frightening just from our past experience with the other serotypes. It’s moving so fast that if it becomes serious, we would t be able to stop it. I say that, it looks like we can’t stop it anyway. 

 

Omicron is most definitely NOT mild for the many unvaccinated people who will be getting infected over the next month. Many of them will need hospital-level care, leaving insufficient hospital capacity for other purposes.

Preparedness steps:

1) Get vaccinated AND boosted.

2) Wear N95 or better mask, properly sealed at the edges to your face, when indoors with people outside your household.

3) Prepare for the possibility that hospitals will be unavailable when you need them. That could include learning first aid or avoiding activities that could cause injury.

 

Add Germany to the list, they are now banning many international travellers from entering Germany, Mainly Brits.

 

Higher transmission equates to higher mortality even if average severity is low. 

“The original strain of SARS-CoV-2 has an R0 of 2·5, while the delta variant (B.1.617.2) has an R0 of just under 7. … omicron’s R0 could be as high as 10.” Lancet

Current vaccines won’t stop Omicron infection completely but:

“All vaccines still seem to provide a significant degree of protection against serious illness from Omicron, which is the most crucial goal. But only the Pfizer and Moderna shots, when reinforced by a booster, appear to have success at stopping infections,”  NYT

Get vaccinated, do the mask/distance thing and top off your tank, pantry, whatever.