Good to see these people in Canada stand up for freedom

The other extreme, how China is handling the Olympics:

https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/coronavirus/beijing-seals-off-more-residential-areas-reports-12-covid-19-cases-1.5760409

Beijing officials said Sunday they had sealed off several residential communities north of the city centre after two cases of COVID-19 were found.
The Chinese capital is on high-alert as it prepares to host the Winter Olympic Games opening Friday.

Another 34 cases were confirmed among athletes and others who have come for the Games, the organizing committee said. In all 211 people have tested positive among more than 8,000 who had arrived by the end of Saturday. They include a Swedish cross-country skier and a snowboarder from Slovenia.

While the number of cases is low compared to other countries in the region, China has doubled down on its "zero-tolerance" policy, which tries to break the chain of transmission as soon as it is found.

The Chinese capital reported a total of 12 cases of COVID-19 between 4 p.m. Saturday and 4 p.m. Sunday, said Pang Xinghuo, the vice head of the Beijing Center for Disease Prevention and Control. All those cases came from people who were already under some kind of pandemic control measures.

Athletes are kept separate from the public and from each other when tested positive:

The participants in the Games stay in hotels that have been surrounded by temporary walls. They can come and go only in special vehicles that take them directly to the venues or other Olympics facilities. The public is not allowed to enter the hotel properties or the venues, though a limited number of spectators will be let in for the events.

Anyone who tests positive inside the Olympics bubble is isolated in a hospital or quarantine hotel to try to prevent the virus from spreading to other participants.


Draconian measures, however the fallout from the Summer Olympics in Japan was about 900K infections and 3,000 extra deaths in Japan.

Easily preventable diseases...

Why prevent them when, people kind, goes out of their way to make them ourselves?

Just like all those easily preventable collisions, words, thoughts...

I wonder what Jesus would have to say about that today?

Atm our freedom is severely restricted by the high case load of Omicron as well as no info where it is. My wife's lung have been getting worse, but she's too afraid to go see a doctor, even if she could get an appointment. All we know is that there are currently 45 Covid-19 patients in out local hospital (25% of the total they've had since the pandemic started)

Our youngest is now afraid to go to school, he fears he'll kill his mother when he goes back :( We're keeping them both home another week. All we know from the school is that there are 12% people absent (not in school and not participating in asynchronous learning) We haven't heard yet whether our youngest's teacher has recovered from Covid-19 and whether he is back yet.

He gets his second shot on Tuesday so he would be home with that anyway and probably Wednesday as well. All they do on Fridays is watch movies at school, no point risking Covid for that. Basically no point going back to school yet. And then of course the oldest doesn't want to go either.

It's great we're now expected to self gauge whether it's safe or not to go back in Ontario. Too bad there is no more information about cases in schools, only a long list of outbreaks in care homes.

It's depressing, no idea what to do anymore.

People are starting to realize the lie they've been told, that they can have everything, is just that.

Not an easy pill to swallow when you're being told to give up some of the good stuff. Those blue pills sure hit the spot.

People think it's safe to drive, and get injured or die everyday in collisions. Even if the Gov says it's safe to breathe, it don't mean much.

Plenty of people keep living in Detroit, Chicago, etc, even though they don't have to. Nobody of working age is forced to live there.

Maybe we should all agree that not every place be designed and run the same, and leave each to their own devices.

50 provinces, each calling their own shots mostly, would've solved a lot of problems during this mess, and more.

Individuals themselves have to go beyond that and plan ahead the best they can, to better deal with or avoid future negativity.

Every once in a while however, the situation just is what it is, and you simply have to ride out the storm.

I got my booster today. I chose Maderna, mix it up, plus Pfizer is having commercials here now which always work the opposite way with me :)
My youngest got his second shot as well, Pfizer (same as first shot), all went well.

What stood out is how quiet it was at the vaccination center. We saw about 2 or 3 other people in total while getting the shot and waiting 15 minutes for side effects. It was at 1 pm, hopefully it's still more busy in the morning or people just aren't showing up anymore.

Ontario sits at 79.0% fully vaccinated, the other 20% is in the hospital :p
6.4 million third doses administered (43%) so just over half of fully vaccinated got a booster.



https://toronto.ctvnews.ca/omicron-wave-has-plateaued-in-ontario-but-covid-19-hospitalizations-expected-to-see-prolonged-peak-1.5762564

Hospital occupancy related to COVID-19 is expected to remain in a "prolonged peak" despite the fact that the Omicron wave in Ontario has plateaued or is in decline, the province's science table said in new modelling released Tuesday.

"Taking into account the time lag until diagnosis and reporting, the peak of Ontario's wastewater signal around Jan. 4, 2022 would correspond to a peak in cases around Jan. 11, 2022," the report said.

According to the wastewater data, between 1.5 million and four million Ontario residents were infected with COVID-19 in the past 60 days.

It will still be a while until the hospitals can go back to normal operation

The modelling says that hospitalizations are expected to "remain at a prolonged peak, except under the most favourable assumptions." Pressure on intensive care is also expected to be "prolonged."

Assuming that at least eight million people in Ontario will have received their third dose of COVID-19 vaccine by the end of the month, and that there is a high level of immunity in the community, the province could continue to see over 2,000 patients in hospital in March.

In the worst case scenario, with low levels of immunity, that number could skyrocket to just under 6,000 patients.

There's still a small chance BA.1.1 "wins", it seems.

Unlike BA.2 which is a lineage separated from BA.1 by at least a couple of months, BA.1.1 is just BA.1 with an additional R346K mutation also found in the Mu variant.

According to atomistic models, that additional mutation makes Omicron almost entirely resistant to neutralizing antibodies elicited by the Wuhan-type virus, perhaps no more than one or two mutations away from such.

I'd guess BA.1.1 might not be transmissible like BA.2 but it scores more wins with breakthrough infections and reinfections.

BA.1.1 triumphing would also be good for the Omicron vaccines, which are using BA.1 and would otherwise have to contend with BA.2's dramatically different N-terminal domain.

Weekly update. The rise in cases has peaked, however many countries have not yet peaked and numbers are lower due to testing less. Deaths are rising faster now the residual decline in Delta wave deaths is getting overtaken by new Omicron deaths.

In total 21.1 million new cases were reported (down from 23.4 million) to a total of 391,316,273
Also another 75,811 more deaths were reported (up from 64,527) to a total of 5,743,438

Europe remains high while deaths slowly keep climbing, the USA seems to have come off relatively easy although not all states have peaked yet.

The continents

Europe reported 11.0 million new cases (slightly up from 10.8 million) and 22,943 more deaths (up from 20,781)
Asia reported 4.63 million new cases (slightly down from 4.80 million) and 14,242 more deaths (up from 10,499)
North America reported 2.73 million new cases (down from 4.51 million) and 24,003 more deaths (up from 22,260)
South America reported 2.24 million new cases (down from 2.70 million) and 11,380 more deaths (up from 8,973)
Africa reported 216K new cases (down from 256K) and 2,671 more deaths (slightly up from 2,430)
Oceania reported 209K new cases (down from 402K) and 572 deaths (620 last week)

Corners of the world

USA reported 2.23 million new cases (down from 3.88 million) and 18,869 more deaths (slightly up from 18,018)
India reported 1.22 million new cases (down from 1.95 million) and 7,924 more deaths (up from 4,307)
Brazil reported 1.18 million new cases (slightly down from 1.28 million) and 5,121 more deaths (up from 3,301)
Japan reported 586K new cases (up from 404K) and 397 deaths (173 last week)
Iran reported 210K new cases (up from 68.6K) and 325 deaths (184 last week)
Australia reported 194K new cases (down from 394K) and 537 deaths (547 last week)
South Korea reported 141K new cases (up from 74.3K) and 158 deaths (177 last week)
Canada reported 96K new cases (down from 125K) and 1,025 more deaths (slightly down from 1,144)
South Africa reported 20.6K new cases (slightly down from 21.9K) and 982 deaths (835 last week)

(Australia had a big correction this week, -22,767 cases last Sunday affecting both Australia's and Oceania's totals)

Despite reported cases in South Africa peaking 7 weeks ago, deaths are still slowly rising.

Europe in detail

Russia, Germany, Netherlands and Ukraine are still rising (and more Eastern European countries), more to the West has peaked and is declining.

Cases are still record high, weekly deaths are approaching last winter's wave numbers which were at 77K in the week ending Jan 1st 2021. That wave peaked at 100K deaths in the week ending Januari 29th, which has been the deadliest week so far. With measures already relaxing in many countries while others are yet to peak, plus deaths lagging 3+ weeks behind, Omicron can still become the deadliest wave despite being a lot milder :/

Global vaccination rate is now 51.12% (-1.23%)
A correction in Asia drove the vaccination rate down

South America 68.15% (+1.17%)
Europe 63.57% (+0.53%)
North America 60.56% (+0.43%)
Asia 59.75% (-0.76%)
Oceania 59.7% (+0.32%)
Africa 10.92% (+0.40%)

The guy who has been repairing my family's bikes for years in the bikeshop died a few months ago from Covid. Terrible stuff.

I got my booster shot. Only small pain at the injection and I slept longer afterwards, but otherwise no side effects.