Coronavirus and Walt Disney World general discussion

[Andrew C]

What are you talking about? Hospitalizations are going up dramatically here. I have a feel next week will be one of the worst weeks we will have seen in this pandemic since tools became available to do the right thing.

In the evidence we have seen so far worldwide, the ratio of cases to hospitalizations is not as dramatic with omicron as with delta. Data is showing it isn’t as severe. Here is where the US sits right now…the question is going to be will the sheer number of cases cause hospitalizations to surpass previous waves.

 

[carolina_yankee]

We can’t get rid of COVID. We can, to a certain extent, control how wild the spread is by our behavior, and we can control how badly it affects us by getting vaccinated.

I know COVID is tearing through Britain and Europe but I wonder if their hospitalizations are as bad as here per capita? That’s the number to look at. God willing, COVID will eventually mutate to a mostly at-home crud, but until it does, not using the tools we have is playing in the interestate with razor blades.

 

[Jrb1979]

We can’t get rid of COVID. We can, to a certain extent, control how wild the spread is by our behavior, and we can control how badly it affects us by getting vaccinated.

I know COVID is tearing through Britain and Europe but I wonder if their hospitalizations are as bad as here per capita? That’s the number to look at. God willing, COVID will eventually mutate to a mostly at-home crud, but until it does, not using the tools we have is playing in the interestate with razor blades.

Agreed. The problem goes back to making this political from the beginning. IMO the biggest problem is the belief in "The Cure Can't Be Worse Then The Disease" rhetoric.

 

[AEfx]

83% of adults in NYC are fully vaccinated, another 8% are partially vaccinated, 55% of kids over 5 have at least one dose, they have mask mandates, they have vaccine passports, they have social distancing…… it’s time to accept it’s not something we can control, we can have an impact on it but the idea we can stop it seems crazy at this point.

Actually, you went one too far - yes, they are largely vaccinated, and yes, they have mask mandates - but - and this is the key - they did not continue social distancing in any meaningful way.

Obviously, given the what we have learned of Omicron, vaccines and masks are not nearly as effective in preventing you from getting it - so, vaccine passports, and everything related, are going to be far less effective.

But you know what IS still effective? Staying the hell away from other people. Social distancing DOES work - because if you aren't up against people breathing the same air, you can't be getting a virus from them. This was just too much for people, though - we've learned we are a society that apparently just loves to rub up against everyone else, and if we don't, we "aren't living life".

We shouldn't have needed mandates to do that, people should have enough common sense to limit contact on their own- but they don't, and that's why what is happening is happening.

I mean, look at this past week or two and the Spiderman movie - millions upon millions of people crammed into little metal cubes together for two and a half hours, breathing on top of each other as they munch and talk away. I follow a few movie forums, and this week I have seen quite a number of people post "I went to see it last week...and this week, I have COVID". All to see a movie.

Then you look at the elephant in this room in particular - we've got YouTube personalities who are at WDW or on cruises nearly every day who caught COVID, and it's like...come on, of course you did, there is no mystery here. Both WDW and cruises, etc. are known as Petri dishes in "normal" times, let alone during a pandemic. I'll be brutally honest - it frankly boggles my mind that anyone would go anywhere near WDW right now or, my goodness, a cruise ship of all things.

So, we do have it in our power - we have just have so many folks who have become accustomed to "living life" apparently hinging on "big group crowded leisure activities" that, unsurprisingly, are making up a huge portion of those getting sick.

 

[Andrew C]

we've learned we are a society that apparently just loves to rub up against everyone else, and if we don't, we "aren't living life".

Hah. You didn’t know this prior to the pandemic? We are a social species that has spent decades or even centuries trying to make the world smaller and more accessible. Or course to do the opposite is going to be a challenge.

 

[hopemax]

Dr. Salemi posted a graph of Florida's cases & hospitalizations for Delta and Omicron for adults and for pediatric cases. You can see the huge decoupling of cases. Hospitalizations at this point are nowhere near as strongly decoupled.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FH0R4StVcAA0XjF?format=jpg&name=large

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FH0R5DXVUAQhZ42?format=jpg&name=large

And the whole tweet thread

 

[AEfx]

Dr. Salemi posted a graph of Florida's cases & hospitalizations for Delta and Omicron for all people and for pediatric cases. You can see the huge decoupling of cases. Hospitalizations at this point are nowhere near as strongly decoupled.

This is what has annoyed me to no end with the "for most people, it's just like getting a cold, so no biggie" narrative. If I am understanding correctly what he is saying, it's confirming the same common sense thing that some of us have said since the beginning of Omicron - sure, it may be "X" times less likely to put you in the hospital if you get it, but if "X" times more people get it because it is so much more transmissible, then...duh, hospitalizations are still going to pile up.

 

[Disney Analyst]

This is what has annoyed me to no end with the "for most people, it's just like getting a cold, so no biggie" narrative. If I am understanding correctly what he is saying, it's confirming the same common sense thing that some of us have said since the beginning of Omicron - sure, it may be "X" times less likely to put you in the hospital if you get it, but if "X" times more people get it because it is so much more transmissible, then...duh, hospitalizations are still going to pile up.

Exactly. With such a fast spreading variant, that’s really good at infecting everyone, health care systems can still become overwhelmed and can still crumble.

Our provinces testing capacity is already maxed, and they are now triaging that.

 

[DisneyCane]

Actually, you went one too far - yes, they are largely vaccinated, and yes, they have mask mandates - but - and this is the key - they did not continue social distancing in any meaningful way.

Obviously, given the what we have learned of Omicron, vaccines and masks are not nearly as effective in preventing you from getting it - so, vaccine passports, and everything related, are going to be far less effective.

But you know what IS still effective? Staying the hell away from other people. Social distancing DOES work - because if you aren't up against people breathing the same air, you can't be getting a virus from them. This was just too much for people, though - we've learned we are a society that apparently just loves to rub up against everyone else, and if we don't, we "aren't living life".

We shouldn't have needed mandates to do that, people should have enough common sense to limit contact on their own- but they don't, and that's why what is happening is happening.

I mean, look at this past week or two and the Spiderman movie - millions upon millions of people crammed into little metal cubes together for two and a half hours, breathing on top of each other as they munch and talk away. I follow a few movie forums, and this week I have seen quite a number of people post "I went to see it last week...and this week, I have COVID". All to see a movie.

Then you look at the elephant in this room in particular - we've got YouTube personalities who are at WDW or on cruises nearly every day who caught COVID, and it's like...come on, of course you did, there is no mystery here. Both WDW and cruises, etc. are known as Petri dishes in "normal" times, let alone during a pandemic. I'll be brutally honest - it frankly boggles my mind that anyone would go anywhere near WDW right now or, my goodness, a cruise ship of all things.

So, we do have it in our power - we have just have so many folks who have become accustomed to "living life" apparently hinging on "big group crowded leisure activities" that, unsurprisingly, are making up a huge portion of those getting sick.

If social distancing is the key how do so many white tailed deer get infected? Do they spend a lot of time packed into bars?

 

[DisneyFan32]

In the evidence we have seen so far worldwide, the ratio of cases to hospitalizations is not as dramatic with omicron as with delta. Data is showing it isn’t as severe. Here is where the US sits right now…the question is going to be will the sheer number of cases cause hospitalizations to surpass previous waves.

View attachment 610548View attachment 610549

I'm worried about future variants next year as years to come....

 

[JoeCamel]

This is what has annoyed me to no end with the "for most people, it's just like getting a cold, so no biggie" narrative. If I am understanding correctly what he is saying, it's confirming the same common sense thing that some of us have said since the beginning of Omicron - sure, it may be "X" times less likely to put you in the hospital if you get it, but if "X" times more people get it because it is so much more transmissible, then...duh, hospitalizations are still going to pile up.

Exactly. With such a fast spreading variant, that’s really good at infecting everyone, health care systems can still become overwhelmed and can still crumble.

Our provinces testing capacity is already maxed, and they are now triaging that.

Plus each new or reinfection is one more chance for a very contagious virus to become more deadly though mutation.
Our CDC has down reported the prevalence of Omicron cases to about 25% so that means the rest are Delta or one of the others. Sobering with Delta's death numbers and the explosion of new cases

 

[AEfx]

If social distancing is the key how do so many white tailed deer get infected? Do they spend a lot of time packed into bars?

Because the deer aren't social distancing from themselves...

 

[Andrew C]

Our CDC has down reported the prevalence of Omicron cases to about 25% so that means the rest are Delta or one of the others. Sobering with Delta's death numbers and the explosion of new cases

This concerned me a lot. Delta is freakin severe and still around. However it seems omicron is continuing to take over.

 

[DisneyCane]

Because the deer aren't social distancing from themselves...

When I see deer they are always outdoors and they don't tend to crowd each other. They are typically at 6+ foot distance from each other.

 

[hopemax]

If social distancing is the key how do so many white tailed deer get infected? Do they spend a lot of time packed into bars?

Are bars the only place COVID spreads? I would interpret this as white tailed deer are in closer proximity to both deer and humans more frequently than people realize. Or are you saying that you have changed your opinion that COVID is spread by extended personal encounters and not briefly sharing of the same space?

 

[mmascari]

If social distancing is the key how do so many white tailed deer get infected? Do they spend a lot of time packed into bars?

When I see deer they are always outdoors and they don't tend to crowd each other. They are typically at 6+ foot distance from each other.

There’s a local herd that would appreciate if I set up a bar on the deck. Packed in enough that when counting them, there’s always one more that was missed. You would think all the neighbors are serving drinks the way the act.

 

[Vegas Disney Fan]

This is what has annoyed me to no end with the "for most people, it's just like getting a cold, so no biggie" narrative. If I am understanding correctly what he is saying, it's confirming the same common sense thing that some of us have said since the beginning of Omicron - sure, it may be "X" times less likely to put you in the hospital if you get it, but if "X" times more people get it because it is so much more transmissible, then...duh, hospitalizations are still going to pile up.

All depends on the ratios, early reports are Omicron cases are 70% less likely to require hospitalization than Delta, if those rates hold Florida would have to average around 70,000 cases a day to match Deltas hospitalization rates.

Florida is currently at 45,000 but still going up quickly so we’ll have to wait to see where it tops out.

The other factor is early reports are Omicron has a 30% shorter hospital stay compared to Delta, I’m not sure how to calculate that in but it seems likely Florida would need to see somewhere in the neighborhood of 90,000 cases a day to see hospitalization rates matching Delta.

Having said that Delta rates are nothing to aspire to, Delta level hospitalization rates were horrific so hopefully it doesn’t even come close to those numbers, I’m just doing some rough math trying to figure out how many cases would be needed to reach the same levels as Delta based on early predictions.

 

[GuyFawkes]

Yawn. You people seem to think rich countries can vaccinate people over and over with the rest of the world not vaccinated. You think that is going to stop anything?

 

[Joesixtoe]

Multiple SARS-CoV-2 variants escape neutralization by vaccine-induced humoral immunity

Vaccination elicits immune responses capable of potently neutralizing SARS-CoV-2. However, ongoing surveillance has revealed the emergence of variants harboring mutations in spike, the main target of neutralizing antibodies. To understand the impact of ...

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

Study is asking for vaccines that have a more broader antibody response as they are finding some varients having enough changes to the spike protein that causes evasion of the antibody response.

 

[BrianLo]

NYC is breaking records. Ontario is breaking records.

We'll see which way things go, but rolling 7-day has Ontario at 624 per million and NY 1916 per million.

On a different stat note, there's a reason the odds of having died from COVID-19 in the last 2 years are 3x less in Canada than the USA.