Corona-zona

I've been doing this blog for just about a year now. The first regular post was January 6, 2021. I'll reflect on that in a few days. Meanwhile, what kind of a media outlet would this be if I didn't do a year-in-review post? Looking back over the year's posts, it's amazing how much has been going on, and how much there potentially is to review. I can't spend all day on a detailed summary.  So I will try to focus on a bird's eye view. Vaccines & Anti-Vaxxers Vaccines have to be the biggest topic on this blog over the past year. Vaccines were very hard to get this time last year. A lot of people wanted them and the distribution was just getting started.  People had to navigate really crappy systems, like one in Arizona , to make reservations. There were " vaccine tourists " who would travel from other states and even countries in an effort to get jabbed.   Then, around March last year, those who wanted the shots had largely gotten them, and incre...

  I heard last nigh t that 96% of Intensive Care beds in Texas are occupied by COVID-19 patients, with only 300 available statewide. Some huge percentage (like 95%) of those are occupied by people who refused to get a vaccine proven safe and effective 367 million times in the U.S. Is that fair? What if a vaccinated person has some non-COVID health emergency, or a vaccinated person has a serious breakthrough infection? Should they have to compete for ICU beds with people who didn't bother to protect themselves, often for political reasons? No, it's not fair. That's why I'm happy to see that Dallas hospitals are  considering adding vaccination status to the things it considers in triage decisions.  This would only go into effect if the hospitals become overwhelmed and have zero ICU beds available. Vaccination status would only be one factor, but it would be a factor.  An important principle of triage is that you allocate care resources to patients that are most likely...

I haven't done an update post for some time, so here are a few items of interest. An Epidemic of Resignations I've recently blogged about how people are not all that excited about going back to work.  Also that people who would have normally resigned in 2020 went into a holding pattern and could be expected to resign en masse .   Well it seems to be happening . People quit their jobs at a rate of 2.7% in April.  That's an all time record. Delta "Promoted" to Variant of Concern Earlier this month I blogged about the Delta variant .  It's more contagious and produces more serious disease, and is causing particular problems in the UK. Earlier this week the CDC reclassified it as a "variant of concern." That same story says that as of Sunday, it accounted for about 10.3% of cases in the US.  Yesterday I checked the GISAID database for Arizona. Here delta accounts for just 6.86% of the sequences, so less than the national average. But public health of...

Not quite a month ago, I had a post about people who were queasy about going back to the office. The reasons ranged from growing accustomed to working from home, to distrust of all institutions, to fear of COVIDiot coworkers. Another frequent topic in this blog is shortages. There have been continuing problems with supply chains , particularly those supplying microchips needed to build everything from cars to appliances. There have been more bizarre and temporary shortages of things like ketchup packets and garden gnomes . Now the big issue is worker shortages . The Wall Street Journal calls it the worst ever  (possible paywall) such shortage. Conservative governors are blaming the enhanced unemployment benefits passed as part of pandemic relief.  Half of states are cancelling the extra $300 per month, which leaders they think are keeping people form returning to work. But a study by the Fed says concludes that the payments are not a major driver of the worker shortage. T...

  Here are some updates on previous Corona-zona posts. Toilet Aerosols…Ewww Previous posts have discussed how the virus spreads, mostly focusing on how masks stop transmission of aerosols emitted from one’s mouth. Now there’s a new potential source.   It has been known for some time that SARS-CoV-2 can infect one’s gut and be expelled with feces. Those feces (hopefully) go into a toilet, and guess what happens when you flush the toilet.   You get aerosols, lots of them .   According to a scientist quoted in the article: Both the toilet and urinal generated large quantities of droplets smaller than three micrometers in size, posing a significant transmission risk if they contain infectious microorganisms. Due to their small size, these droplets can remain suspended for a long time. As the article points out, there are no documented cases of COVID-19 being spread this way. But it is a possibility. Gnome Shortages Back in January, I did the first post abo...

  Today, I offer for your reading enjoyment updates on some topics discussed previously in this blog. Surges I've recently written about worries over new surges .  A piece in today's NYT declares the pandemic out-of-control in Michigan.  Sadly, the governor there has been cowed into tepid pleas for responsible behavior in lieu of concrete action. Hard to blame her after armed covidiots plotted to kidnap and execute her. I hope those assholes are on ventilators right now.   The surge there is blamed on the UK variant, which is apparently taking over the country .  The good news is that the vaccines seem pretty effective against it. The vaccine makers are also working on boosters , expected by the end of the year.    That's good news.  The bad news is that there's a... Vaccine Wall As predicted here a month ago, vaccination rates are hitting a wall. We're starting to run out of people who want the shots. It's starting to show, especially in...

  I remember when toilet paper stock in my local store began to shrink about this time last year. I saw people in the checkout line with their carts full of toilet paper. I  thought they were being stupid and resolved not to participate in the stupidity. Then it totally disappeared (along with almost all the other paper products) and was gone for quite some time. I came dangerously close to running out before some packages started to trickle back in. The disappearance was not the result of supply chain problems or any actual shortage. It was the result of panic buying . As soon as people calmed down stock  was rebuilt. Well now we might be on the verge of another toilet paper shortage.  This time it is supply-chain related, though not the way you might think. It turns out that most of the wood pulp used to make toilet paper comes from Brazil . They can make plenty of pulp, but for it to be turned into toilet paper it has to be shipped here. The problem is there is a ...

  The pandemic has been disrupting supply chains since early summer. We all remember having trouble getting things like paper products, baking supplies, staples like rice and canned soup.   Some of that was due to hoarding and some was due to disrupted transportation systems. But some of the shortages are a lot more complex than that. They result from shifts in demand. The shortage mentioned in the picture above is a good example. Actually, there is no shortage of aluminum but a shortage of aluminum cans . People are not going going to restaurants to drink soda, or bars to drink beer. Instead they are buying canned beverages to consume at home. Manufacturers were caught flat-footed, resulting in a shortage of cans.  This has hit local breweries particularly hard. They've lost business at their brewpubs, so to stay afloat they've turned to canning their products. But they are competing with the brewing and soft drink giants, who are themselves struggling to meet incr...