I put up the poll after I tested positive yesterday, wondering how many here have had it.
The implied question was “As far as you know, have you had COVID?” but I’m brain-fogging and didn’t spell it out.
So far, with 56 respondents, 47% say no, 46% say yes and 7% say “I think so, even though I never tested positive”
And, surprisingly to me, a large majority of Yes respondents had it in 2022: 25%, more than all other years combined, including those who’ve had it more than once.
My wife tested positive yesterday as well. This is her 2nd confirmed case. We both most likely had it before tests were available also.
I’m surprised; I know very few people who haven’t had it at least once.
From March 2020 to December 2022, we took every reasonable step to avoid COVID. In December 2022, we ate inside at a restaurant.
I don’t remember when I caught it. I THINK it was 2022, but dates keep sliding together. I do know that I wasn’t terribly sick with it. I’d had all the doses of vaccine that I was allowed at the time and an infusion as well. If I’ve had it since then, I wasn’t sick enough to even notice.
My mother caught it once for sure, confirmed positive, and I had a presumed positive case because I experienced a temporary loss of my sense of taste.
I’m prepared to believe I’ve had an asymptomatic case, since they say it’s fairly common among the vaccinated. However, our household has been exceptionally careful, since Mr. Legend and our daughter are both at high risk for dangerous complications, so maybe those precautions have been working. I’ve only had a respiratory illness twice since 2020, and both times, I had a negative PCR test (given the false negative rates of the home tests, I’ve always assumed that the only result you pay attention to is a positive one).
Our family has taken two round-trip plane trips in the past year, and we’re about to do another. We’ll wear our N95 masks and keep our fingers crossed again.
Mid 2021 is when the vaccines became commonplace and late 2021 was when most of the hiding at home came to an end. Early 2022 was when the Omicron variants, which are more contagious and less hazardous really became the dominant strains out there. So it sure makes sense to me that 2022 would be the bulk of the infections.
The last time I though about COVID as something to alter my behavior over was probably in late 2021. In earlier 2021 I wasn’t concerned for myself, but my first wife was in real raggedly shape by then and could not have survived COVID, so I was still as careful as somebody whose job entails air travel 14 days a month can be. Once she died in late 2021, COVID was/is something completely in my rear view mirror.
As I type I’m sitting in a large airline club lounge at a hub airport. This room is one of about 6 in this club. I count about 90 people. Most of the chairs are occupied. I see exactly zero masks. COVID is over.
To the best of my knowledge, I have not. If I did, it was asymptomatic and after the first round of vaccines (I assume an antibody test would show positive now, right?).
I was surprised the first time I donated blood and it came back negative for Covid. I’m not even sure how I managed that. I work retail, so I was surrounded by (coughing) people all day. Plus, very early on in the lock down, someone that sits very close to me, in a very tiny office, 40+ hours a week, had it and was coughing non stop for weeks at one point. He’s had positive antibody tests, so I know he had it (plus I think he’s had it a second time as well).
A few other people at my work have had it as well. But to the best of my knowledge, I’ve someone managed to avoid it.
Have had it twice to the best of my knowledge - in December 2021 which was sort of a “bad cold” that passed relatively quickly, and again in July 2022 after travelling abroad, which involved a couple of days of high fever and a cough that lingered for months after.
In neither case did I see a doctor or become ill enough to worry or need to go to the hospital - I’ve had worse cases of flu. But it was annoying, in the way that being sick is always annoying.
I’ve never tested positive. Every time I’ve had some minor COVID-like symptoms, I’ve taken a test. So, either I’ve never had it or it was asymptomatic.
Me too, they’re so rare amongst my acquaintance we should gift these miracle people to science. To be fair, we had free covid tests for everyone up until April last year, and the tests are still really cheap (c£2), so if you’ve had it, most of us know, even the asymptomatic ones (who tested if they had been near someone with it).
I got it at my friend’s superspreader wedding in April 2022.
I would have said “COVID is over” a few days ago, before I tested positive, but now that I’m uncomfortable with coughing, wheezing, body aches and Paxlovid mouth, it’s come roaring back for me.
At least I wasn’t contagious when I flew to Canada to visit my 86 year old mother, 2 weeks ago. A number of people on the flight and in Toronto - Pearson were masking.
I think I might have had it in February 2020–bad cough which lasted 2 weeks, congestion, headache, slight fever, but there’s no way to know.
This time I had a cough, sore throat, headache and fever, and thought it might be just a summer cold or flu. Just in case, I took a home rapid test (negative) and so was a bit taken aback when I went to urgent care and tested positive there. I’ve been knocked out for 3 days but feeling a bit better with Paxlovid.
I figured that it was just a matter of time before I caught it, in spite of being vaxxed and triple-boosted. Two friends at work died of it in 2020, a family friend in 2021 and an uncle in 2022. My 3 siblings have had it, as have several of my nephews, nieces and in-laws (all vaxxed and boosted). And my son has had it 3 times, in February, September and December 2021. His first time was bad, the 2nd was mild and the 3rd was asymptomatic; he found out when he was required to take a random test. My husband and daughter haven’t had it - yet.
It could be selection bias; people who have never had COVID may be more likely to want to answer the poll.
I held out for well over two years before getting it, and I had four shots in me by that point. I’m very grateful that I got it during the Omicron phase. During the first six months, in addition to the “we don’t know when you’ll be able to leave your house” terror, the stories I heard about COVID autopsies, and how they’d reveal lungs filled with near-crystalline structures, were nightmare-inducing. By the time I got hit, I think it was typical to land more in the throat. I lost my voice and had a ragged raw throat for about five days, and was tired and sluggish for a bit beyond that (plus my taste buds were a bit wonky for a month or so).
I’m still masking, though a bit inconsistently. If there’s anyone close to me on public transit I mask up, though if there’s a lot of space on the bus, I’m less stringent. I also cover my face in malls and grocery stores. Had my fifth shot in January and I’ve got an appointment in July for my next one. Plus I test at least once a week, whenver I feel at all cruddy. So hopefully I’m on top of things.
…well, then, let me limit myself to saying that, if I’ve had it, I haven’t noticed.
I just spent five days at a good-sized gaming convention (probably 15K+ people). I saw a few masks, but it was very few. COVID isn’t over, but the vast majority of people are acting that way now.
FWIW, I am in the “I’ve had COVID” camp, but it was only six or seven weeks ago when I finally got it for the first time.
I had it at least 2x in 2022, both related to travel. First time was the day after a vacation in Alaska, tested positive. Second time was during a trip in Patagonia where one of the guys in our room tested positive - I did not test but felt off for a couple days. I suspect everyone who slept in the same room as him in the days prior got it, too. I am fully vaxxed and boosted, so my symptoms were mild in both cases. It’s also possible I (and others in the poll) have had it other times but barely noticed, or just wrote it off as something else without testing specifically for COVID-19.
I bet the surge in cases in 2022 are correlated to the relaxing of pandemic protocols.
COVID is over as a global pandemic - it’ll always be around in some form, like influenza. To answer the question - I’ve never had it, AFAIK.
Let me clarify my “COVID is over” comment:
I meant that both almost all individuals’ and the public health authorities’ reactions to COVID are over and now it is simply a perpetual endemic part of the human condition as is flu, common cold, heart disease, cancer, diabetes, and bad driving. COVID certainly exists and infects; it just isn’t special nor does it warrant special precautions.
Or at least that’s how the public at large and most governments are now treating it.
Continuing my cited post, as I was leaving the airline club I surveyed the whole facility. About 500-600 people all told. I saw 2 masks. Interestingly, both were on black people. The airline club’s patrons are all either first class passengers, or people who fly enough to warrant spending $500/year on a membership. Not a cross section of the USA, but a cross-section of the semi-affluent part of the USA.
Once out in the main terminal area I kept watching. Very, very few masks. Far less than 1%. Air travelers in general are hardly the elite of high society anymore, but the truly poor of course are real rare in that crowd. So middle America is done w COVID even in unfamiliar public locations packed with strangers from everywhere in the USA.
That’s what I meant by “COVID is over”.