Conoravirus ...

[TheOffice]

Bermuda is in a 7 day lockdown. They are jabbing people as fast as they can.

[Tim Ford]

Bermuda is in a 7 day lockdown. They are jabbing people as fast as they can.

Not sure if Rob has mentioned it elsewhere, but RESTIVE has pulled out of the Marion to Bermuda Race. Just sounded like not much fun and a potential nightmare in Hamilton.

In other news, one of our many children (seems like a thousand some days) got a POSITIVE on her test, the one she took Friday. Results came back yesterday (Sunday) on the PCR version. She is 28 and doing pretty well. Her O2 concentration has remained >98 for the past 2 days and her headache is gone. So fingers crossed....

[BeauV]

Bermuda is in a 7 day lockdown. They are jabbing people as fast as they can.

Not sure if Rob has mentioned it elsewhere, but RESTIVE has pulled out of the Marion to Bermuda Race. Just sounded like not much fun and a potential nightmare in Hamilton.

In other news, one of our many children (seems like a thousand some days) got a POSITIVE on her test, the one she took Friday. Results came back yesterday (Sunday) on the PCR version. She is 28 and doing pretty well. Her O2 concentration has remained >98 for the past 2 days and her headache is gone. So fingers crossed....

Tim, fingers crossed your daughter pulls through quickly. We've known many folks in her age group who haven't had much trouble shaking COVID. But, it's still a massive worry. Good luck! Beau

[Tim Ford]

Thanks Beau! I do appreciate it!

No shortness of breath, etc., and I think she is on the mend.

[TheOffice]

didn't know about Restive. We are not as protected as I thought we would be at this point. Bermuda is slowly reopening, but we are going anyhow.

I might have one opening for return crew leaving Hamilton on the 17th. I need to get an answer from one person.

Tim, hopefully she is over the hump. Age is in her favor.

[kimbottles]

Thanks Beau! I do appreciate it!

No shortness of breath, etc., and I think she is on the mend.

Fingers crossed in her favor!

[kdh]

Bermuda is in a 7 day lockdown. They are jabbing people as fast as they can.

Not sure if Rob has mentioned it elsewhere, but RESTIVE has pulled out of the Marion to Bermuda Race. Just sounded like not much fun and a potential nightmare in Hamilton.

In other news, one of our many children (seems like a thousand some days) got a POSITIVE on her test, the one she took Friday. Results came back yesterday (Sunday) on the PCR version. She is 28 and doing pretty well. Her O2 concentration has remained >98 for the past 2 days and her headache is gone. So fingers crossed....

I have a nephew a little younger who was positive. His sense of smell got funky for a couple of days. He kept smelling a bottle of bourbon to test its coming back. Otherwise he sailed through it.

[H B]

That seems to be the problem...the younger kids are now spreading it around since most of the old folks are vaccinated. I get my 2nd Pfizer shot tomorrow. All ready on Tigger's advice with the blanket and water and pre-emptive NSAID. My wife got her 2nd shot about 10 days ago, and other than feeling tired and she said her legs felt like lead that evening, she still went for her 2+ mile walk that day! I am already pretty miserable from the grass & tree pollen right now, and I am taking a Cetirizine every 18 hours instead of 24 to try and control the discomfort and nasal cavities full of junk..let's hope this 2nd shot doesn't knock me down too hard...I think we are sailboat racing Wed night. I will probably have noodle arms or something.

[Slick470]

Bermuda is in a 7 day lockdown. They are jabbing people as fast as they can.

Not sure if Rob has mentioned it elsewhere, but RESTIVE has pulled out of the Marion to Bermuda Race. Just sounded like not much fun and a potential nightmare in Hamilton.

In other news, one of our many children (seems like a thousand some days) got a POSITIVE on her test, the one she took Friday. Results came back yesterday (Sunday) on the PCR version. She is 28 and doing pretty well. Her O2 concentration has remained >98 for the past 2 days and her headache is gone. So fingers crossed....

Sorry to hear about Restive not doing the Marion race this year, I know it is usually looked forward to by all involved. Not to mention the time spent at the Pomander and club with other crew.

Hope your daughter gets over the bug quick. I got my first shot yesterday. Other than a sore arm, mild headache, and some general tiredness, it's been ok. All of that minus the sore arm could also be blamed on the pollen count outside. I walked outside a few minutes ago and our massive oak tree in the front yard has started dropping the "tree sex" tendrils all over the yard and the air is gritty. Yay...

[H B]

I walked outside a few minutes ago and our massive oak tree in the front yard has started dropping the "tree sex" tendrils all over the yard and the air is gritty. Yay...

In the new world of the 'rona, no one looks at me twice for wearing a mask in the yard mowing the grass this time of year with all the pollen. I used to get all kinds of crazy stares before this spring.

[Ish]

I walked outside a few minutes ago and our massive oak tree in the front yard has started dropping the "tree sex" tendrils all over the yard and the air is gritty. Yay...

In the new world of the 'rona, no one looks at me twice for wearing a mask in the yard mowing the grass this time of year with all the pollen. I used to get all kinds of crazy stares before this spring.

Wretched pollen counts here, the car windshield is opaque every morning. I have been sneezing and drooling for the past week, but my first Pfizer shot a few days ago gave me a sore arm for a few hours and that's it.

[SemiSalt]

I've been wondering what the trend is in mortality due to Covid-19. I have data of new cases and of deaths for the State of Connecticut for about a year in 7-day-moving-average form. A bit of experimentation indicates that the the highest correlation between new cases and deaths is 25 days, which seems reasonable. So I plotted the ratio beginning 7/1/2020. Before that, the values are very high, probably due to a low rate of testing. In pseudo code, it's like this:

Death_Rate = Deaths(t+25) / New_Cases(t).

I haven't felt like fighting with Excel's chart function go get the x-axis labeled correctly. 1 = 7/1/2020, 7 = 1/1/2021, etc.

The surprising thing to me is how smooth the data is on a day-to-day basis. Using moving averages helps with that, obviously, but I expected more variation. What we don't see is a drop caused by all the old folks being vaccinated and the new patients skewing younger. (Now that I think of it, I should have plotted it on the death date, not the testing date. That would move the plot to the right about a block. The steepest part the decline would still be in 2020.)

[Tim Ford]

That's funny about the mask and the lawnmower, HB. I'm allergic to grass, so I have to mask up every damn time I fire up the mower!

But I still get the weird looks, probably even more so. As the Land Rovers and Suburbans roll by, I can hear them in there thinking: "Some one should tell that poor old fellow that he can't get COVID mowing the lawn."

BTW, thanks for your kind thoughts re: the kid...she is much much better and can even smell things now!

[JoeP]

That's funny about the mask and the lawnmower, HB. I'm allergic to grass, so I have to mask up every damn time I fire up the mower!

But I still get the weird looks, probably even more so. As the Land Rovers and Suburbans roll by, I can hear them in there thinking: "Some one should tell that poor old fellow that he can't get COVID mowing the lawn."

BTW, thanks for your kind thoughts re: the kid...she is much much better and can even smell things now!

Happy to hear your daughter is riding it out ok. I have to commisserate with you regarding allergies. I have had dust, pollen, and grass allergies since grade school. I wear a mask just about all the time these days. (it is amazing how fast an aisle will clear in a store when you sneeze, even with a mask on).

[BeauV]

One of the many reasons I took up sailing as a kid was that when I was offshore I didn't have a runny nose, low-grade fever, and watery eyes. It was as if someone had lifted a sack of manure off my once I got about 5 miles offshore. It took me a while to realize it was pollen.

To this day, I use a P-100 painting respirator, which isn't any good as a Covid blocker as it has an open exhaust vent, whenever I'm mowing laws or leaf blowing around the yard. BTW, Santa Cruz has a much lower pollen load than the San Fernando Valley north of LA. Although some of the difference may be zero smog in Santa Cruz and heaps of the stuff when I was in high-school in LA.

[H B]

One of the many reasons I took up sailing as a kid was that when I was offshore I didn't have a runny nose, low-grade fever, and watery eyes. It was as if someone had lifted a sack of manure off my once I got about 5 miles offshore. It took me a while to realize it was pollen.

To this day, I use a P-100 painting respirator, which isn't any good as a Covid blocker as it has an open exhaust vent, whenever I'm mowing laws or leaf blowing around the yard. BTW, Santa Cruz has a much lower pollen load than the San Fernando Valley north of LA. Although some of the difference may be zero smog in Santa Cruz and heaps of the stuff when I was in high-school in LA.

They aren't quite P-100, but I just picked up a couple P-95 respirators with the vent for mowing the grass at Harbor Freight yesterday.. Locally, no respirator (not even refill cartridges) of any kind exist anywhere.

[BeauV]

One of the many reasons I took up sailing as a kid was that when I was offshore I didn't have a runny nose, low-grade fever, and watery eyes. It was as if someone had lifted a sack of manure off my once I got about 5 miles offshore. It took me a while to realize it was pollen.

To this day, I use a P-100 painting respirator, which isn't any good as a Covid blocker as it has an open exhaust vent, whenever I'm mowing laws or leaf blowing around the yard. BTW, Santa Cruz has a much lower pollen load than the San Fernando Valley north of LA. Although some of the difference may be zero smog in Santa Cruz and heaps of the stuff when I was in high-school in LA.

They aren't quite P-100, but I just picked up a couple P-95 respirators with the vent for mowing the grass at Harbor Freight yesterday.. Locally, no respirator (not even refill cartridges) of any kind exist anywhere.

P-95s will work great for that. In the past, when mowing fields of grass with a tractor, I've worn the full-face respirator as the pollen in my eye was enough to set off the snot flow.

I've been buying my filters and respirators from Amazon. I prefer to buy locally from our nearby Ace Hardware (it is owned by a sailor at the harbor and because of that carries some boat parts that one wouldn't find in a normal Ace). But, he has been totally sold out of respirators and cartridges since last March, and just emailed a bunch of us that he was starting to get parts.

[H B]

Beau...exactly. My P-100 respirator is a 3M product with the purple-ish cartridges. I am thinking about hauling the boat in a couple weeks, so maybe I'd better bite the bullet and get some from Amazon..my local Ace doesn't have anything yet.

[SemiSalt]

This is the most interesting graphic I've seen in a while, the combination of immunity by infection and immunity by vaccination:

Go to web site to see state by state data.
https://covid19dashboardgt.shinyapps.io ... nitylevel/

2021-05-04_10-12-53.png

[BeauV]

I don't get the "infected" number. The site says it is from "COVID-19 case data collated by The New York Times, based on reports from state and local health agencies." But, for California, the NY Times site says there have been 3.75m cases in CA. The population of CA is 39m.

But this site reports that they estimate that 38% of the CA population has been infected. Clearly, they are assuming that the official case count is only stating about 10% of the actual number who have been infected. That assumption doesn't appear to be stated explicitly anyplace and a 10:1 ratio between total infected and officially counted is more than twice the most aggressive number I've read anywhere. While they recognize that there is an ascertainment bias - they fail to state what it is. I can only back into it as I've done above.

Their graph doesn't look nearly as optimistic if one uses the 5:1 number the CDC has referenced.

There is a great article HERE on why Nate Silver's 538 guys think that using case counts that are testing-based is a terrible idea. They point out that one can easily be off by "20 fold". These guys handwave right past that problem and don't document it.

While this graph is interesting to look at - the case count axis doesn't past the sniff test for me.

[SemiSalt]

I agree the numbers are suspect. They have 30% infection for CT, and I dont believe it. OTOH, that number has to be an estimate/SWAG because of silent cases, and mild cases that are never formally diagnosed.

[Olaf Hart]

The other variables are the extent of effective immunity after infection vs after vaccination, and relative immunity to variants.

Not comparing apples with apples here.

The current Indian mess puts paid to hopes of post infection herd immunity, some studies showed around 50% background antibody levels after the first phase, not helping much now.

And that official infection rates based on testing just indicative of rates of spread, not totals infected.

[SemiSalt]

It's a cold and rainy day here in SW Connecticut, and I've used up most of my great tolerance for doing nothing important or interesting, so let me tell you my tale of woe...

I had been feeling pretty secure. Wife and self Pfizer vaccinated. Coming to the end of my CLL treatment. Getting organized for a summer sailing season.

The first bad omen was a story in the NY Times saying that some meds interfere with the vaccines so that no antibodies are created. Had I been given one of those? Yes (Gayzva).
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/15/heal ... =url-share

A day later, an email from my daughter-in-law, whose father also has CLL, contains the information that CLL patients in general tend not to create antibodies, and have a very high risk of serious disease if infected with Covid-19. Like 40% mortality. (I've seen better reports if the CLL is in remission.)

So, searching the internet, I found several articles quoting one particular study (https://tinyurl.com/yjzje2e5) reporting that of 22 patients in my general situation, none generated antibodies in response to a vaccine. A few patients, whose treatment with the troublesome medications were farther in the past generated a weak response. Even that news was tempered by the observation that the degree of response did not correlate with the time since being treated. So the upshot is that, as matters stand, the time that I start feeling secure again is ... never.

So, I'm unsettled about summer sailing. The optimist would make the case that the exposure would be to 1 or two vaccinated crew so, especially if the incidence of the disease in the local area falls very low again this summer, is an acceptable risk. The pessimist says go out and buy one of the those tiny homes and have have your wife lock you inside.

I'd be interested in anyone's opinion of weighing these sorts of risks. Also in medical opinions for which I make the following summary: it's all about the B cells.

[Olaf Hart]

Your pessimism is probably well advised, your question is one for a good virologist like Daniel Griffin or Anthony Fauci...

I try to keep up with COVID, this guy is really good from the clinical perspective.

https://youtu.be/msFvK_b4dcE

[SemiSalt]

Your pessimism is probably well advised, your question is one for a good virologist like Daniel Griffin or Anthony Fauci...

I try to keep up with COVID, this guy is really good from the clinical perspective.

https://youtu.be/msFvK_b4dcE

Thanks for the link. The info about possible covid treatments from Pfizer and Merck was new to me. It's good to have something to be optimistic about.

[Slick470]

Just got shot #2 this morning. Pretty happy about it.

[H B]

Just got shot #2 this morning. Pretty happy about it.

Welcome to the club...you can now officially call yourself a "Vaxhole". I am almost 3 weeks past my 2nd shot, so I should be as protected as I am gonna get. Time for a mask burning party! I felt a little run down the day after my 2nd shot, but nothing terrible. It was nice that it was an easy work day, and I didn't have to use too many brain cells.

[Slick470]

Just got shot #2 this morning. Pretty happy about it.

Welcome to the club...you can now officially call yourself a "Vaxhole". I am almost 3 weeks past my 2nd shot, so I should be as protected as I am gonna get. Time for a mask burning party! I felt a little run down the day after my 2nd shot, but nothing terrible. It was nice that it was an easy work day, and I didn't have to use too many brain cells.

I'm already tired due to lack of sleep so I'm not sure if I'll notice the difference much. A nap sounds nice though. First shot I was a bit tired and and my arm hurt.

[Tigger]

Currently 42% of the population in BC has received their first dose. My understanding is that 'herd immunity' starts to kick in at around 75%? Anyway, at the current rate of vaccinations it's less than a month away. Admittedly, that's just shot one, not both, but it's a hell of a step in the right direction.

[BeauV]

Currently 42% of the population in BC has received their first dose. My understanding is that 'herd immunity' starts to kick in at around 75%? Anyway, at the current rate of vaccinations it's less than a month away. Admittedly, that's just shot one, not both, but it's a hell of a step in the right direction.

Great to hear about the progress. Sadly, I think whatever hopes folks had for herd immunity are fading with newer more contagious variants of the virus. Don't get me wrong, the vaccine still works great with around 95% efficacy. But herd immunity is proving much harder to reach for two reasons: the number is probably more like 85% fully vaccinated and there are a lot of crazy folks who are saying they won't get vaccinated at all. (Mostly a US problem I think, as a country, this issue has become politicized)

Many organizations, events, families etc... are starting to require vaccination to attend, get into a building, get into someone's home. The police have already started arresting vaccine card forgers. Sigh.... We're almost certainly going to require 100% vaccination for sailing aboard MAYAN starting in about June. By then everyone should have been able to get it done. One of our Yacht Clubs is already requiring vaccination to enter.

The vaccinated folks are simply going to leave the unvaccinated behind, something that will be quite divisive eventually.