It’s been a bit over 24 hours since Jab #3, and there is virtually no arm pain. Last night and through the early morning, there was literally no pain to the point where I feared they gave me a dud. Now I have very minor arm pain, minor body aches and minor chills/fever. So far, it’s just a less severe version of my response to Jab #2. I’ll report back. Also, the time between Jab 2 and Jab 3 was just a bit more than 10 months. Not sure how that length affects the severity of side effects.
The 2nd 24 hours post-jab have been a bit worse than the first 24, but so far still quite a bit milder than after #2. The right arm pain is definitely noticeable now, but I think not as bad. Again, my arm pain was never too bad. Still have minor body/muscle aches and chills, although the slight fever (about 99 degrees) is now 98.2. My normal is 97.9. These were the worst symptoms back in February, as my leg muscles felt like I do after a heavy squat workout, and my upper body after heavy bench and deadlifts. Not the case this time.
By the way, for the next booster (which now seems inevitable), I’m going to be sure to not go to the gym the day before. I think that the timing of the side effects emerging is lined up with the exact day(s) that I’d be sore from a workout, so the vaccine may be having a compounding effect.
That is really interesting, thanks for posting everything!
A professor on immunology in the UK just now saying the number of new cases was like having a month’s rainfall in a day.
There is an estimate that the number of cases of people with the omicron variant in the UK is doubling every two days!
The question is what percentage will need hospitalisation. But even if it’s really mild, it means huge disruption as those who catch it take days off work. And a small percentage being hospitalised still will create a huge overall number in intensive care if too many people contract this thing. In fact if it’s half as deadly as Delta but with the reproduction rate they think, it will hospitalise more people than Delta two days after starting with the same number of people.
78,000 people were confirmed as testing positive today in the UK. The previous record during the entire pandemic was 68,000 back in January but it’s suspected the real figure is 200,000 new cases.
This thing is going to run rampant over the next week or two and just in time for Christmas…
I decided instead of a booster I would get Covid instead. No needles.
I was due to get the booster on Saturday but started getting sick and was positive on a test I took Thursday night.
This is not a scientific analysis but I can’t help but think what has started to come out about the Omicron Variant is true. It’s much more contagious but generally more minor. We currently have out of work more people with Covid this week than we have had during the entire pandemic. And we would have to routinely go into the houses of the dead and dying when New Jersey was the hot zone. None of those that are sick are reporting severe respiratory problems just flu like symptoms.
In Illinois, 40% of the people hospitalized were on ventilators as of this past Tuesday. That sounds pretty bad.
All the analysis I’ve seen acknowledges that we’re certain it’s much more contagious, but we’re not yet certain that it causes less serious disease. There are too many confounding variables. Many people who are catching Omicron - like you - are vaccinated but not boosted. Even though you still caught it, your vaccination may be making symptoms much less serious than they would have been. Since most older people are now vaccinated and many are boosted, the average age of the person who contracts Omicron is younger than earlier strains.
So we really don’t yet have enough carefully controlled data to know whether it causes less serious disease than other strains ceteris paribus. The data may just indicate that as a population we’re on average less susceptible to serious disease from any strain. If that’s the case, it would still be good news at a population level - but for an unvaccinated person it would not justify complacency.
Out of the 7 people at work that are now sick I might be the only one vaccinated. I don’t know for sure but I wouldn’t be surprised
Official UK daily cases:
2 days ago: 54,661
yesterday: 78,610
today: 88,376
They’re starting to postpone some NBA games because teams can’t field a team. The Bulls had TEN players on the COVID list this past week.
Hmm…
I think it’s safe to say that the jury is still out on the severity of omicron.
Modelling suggests… same severity. “We’re assuming the same severity, and we don’t have enough data to disprove that, so our assumption stands.” That seems to be… not so great science.
Omicron seems far different from Delta. I think “assuming X because it’s derived from OG Covid” may not be accurate. Better to treat it separately and look at emerging field data from South Africa.
Yes possibly although they do add the qualifier that the numbers are small. I think the point is to say that there are a lot of assumptions that Omicron is less severe and that is a potentially dangerous conclusion to jump to right now. Let’s hope it is though.
Perhaps you can make a case for a different null hypothesis, but it’s not obvious to me what that would be. The point here is that if you take your null hypothesis to be equal severity, we do not yet have sufficient data to disprove that null hypothesis. That’s a traditional scientific approach.
The alternative would be a Bayesian approach, where you assume a prior wide distribution of possible levels of severity, then incorporation more information from research data to progressively narrow this probability distribution.
Under either approach, I have not yet seen any research that provides sufficient data to control for confounding variables in a conclusive way.
I’m not sure anyone assumed that off the bat, though. It’s based on field reports, what is going on in South Africa.
It is more the politics at this point. If using the same template for Omicron is seen as a wolf cry, and it harms subsequent messaging efforts. The general public’s appetite for lockdowns etc. is limited, and I don’t want to waste ammo on tactics that are unneeded and ineffective.
Here’s some concrete information, plus potentially an explanation for why Omicron is more infectious but less lethal:
The short version: Omicron appears to replicate 70 times faster in the bronchus, but the replication rate in lung tissue is much lower than Delta (one tenth!). Snce lung trouble is what kills most people who die ftom Covid, this could be very good news.
Normal disclaimer: It’s only one study, and it’s preliminary. But if these findings are true, then everyone’s probably going to get it unless you are completely isolated. The good news is that it shouldn’t be nearly as lethal, even for unvaxxed people.
In other good Omicron news, a study of sewage in Orlando has found that Omicron made up almost 100% of the virus found. And yet, Omicron cases in hospital are very low.
Taken together, along with other information from other regions all seems to point to much more infectious, but less dangerous. Still, the rapid rate of infection could still swamp the hospital system.
The surge won’t last long at that rate.
Hospitalizations and deaths lag infections. So I think it remains to be seen.
Yes, but if the impact on the lungs is so different, what’s true for OG Covid and Delta may not apply to Omicron.