[ad_1]
A week ago, I noticed that Maine was seeing an increase in hospitalizations related to COVID. This happened despite the fact that 84% of all people over 12, 85.3% of all people over 18, and 98.4% of all people over 65 are less partially vaccinated.
Now the mainstream media has caught up with the analysis. Reports show New England is hit by a wave of COVID despite high vaccination rates.
Hospitals in the region are seeing full intensive care units and staff shortages are starting to affect care. Officials are begging the unvaccinated to get vaccinated. Healthcare workers face pent-up demand for other types of care that had been delayed by the pandemic.
“I think this is clearly frustrating for all of us,” said Michael Pieciak, the commissioner of the Vermont Department of Financial Regulation who monitors COVID-19 statistics for the state. “We want children to be safe in school, we want parents to not have to worry about their children’s education and health.
Even though parts of New England are seeing record numbers of cases, hospitalizations and deaths that rival pre-vaccine peaks, largely among the unvaccinated, the region has not seen the impact of the Delta variant wave over other parts of the country.
New England is hardly the stronghold of the Red-State-rubes who love Trump and are anti-vax.
According to statistics from the Associated Press, the five states with the highest percentage of a fully vaccinated population are all in New England, with Vermont leading, followed by Connecticut, Maine, Rhode Island and Massachusetts. New Hampshire is 10th.
According to AP data, full vaccination rates in the six New England states range from a high of 69.4% in Vermont to 61.5% in New Hampshire.
Before vaccine believers started claiming most cases are among the unvaccinated, a new analysis published in the European Journal of Epidemiology shows no discernible relationship between the proportions of fully vaccinated populations and new cases of Covid-19.
The study led by a population health researcher at Harvard University found no significant association between new cases of Covid-19 that appeared in a recent seven-day period and fractions of fully vaccinated populations in 68 countries.
In other words, having more people fully vaccinated does not necessarily mean fewer Covid infections.
The results actually indicate a marginal positive association: Countries with a higher percentage of fully vaccinated population had more Covid-19 cases per million.
Israel, 60% of its population of which was fully vaccinated, recorded the highest number of Covid-19 cases per million – 6,224 – in the seven days leading up to September 3.
India had fully vaccinated about 11% of its population as of September 3.
India has registered around 182 new cases of Covid-19 per million in the previous seven days.
The United States had fully immunized 51% of its population but had 3,039 new cases per million.
Iceland and Portugal had more than 75% of their populations fully vaccinated, but both had more Covid-19 cases per million than Vietnam or South Africa, which had less than 10% of their populations fully vaccinated.
The full article is interesting to read, especially since it comes to the same conclusion about the virus that I drew over 18 months ago: we have to learn to live with the virus.
The sole reliance on vaccination as the primary strategy to mitigate COVID-19 and its adverse consequences needs to be reconsidered, especially given the Delta variant (B.1.617.2) and the likelihood of future variants. Other pharmacological and non-pharmacological interventions may need to be implemented in parallel with increasing vaccination rates. Such a course correction, especially with regard to political discourse, is becoming paramount with the emerging scientific evidence on the effectiveness of vaccines in the real world.
… In short, while efforts should be made to encourage people to get vaccinated, it should be done with humility and respect. Stigmatizing people can do more harm than good. It is important to note that other non-pharmacological prevention efforts (for example, the importance of basic public health hygiene with regard to maintaining a safe distance or washing hands, promoting more frequent and cheaper forms of testing) must be repeated in order to find the balance between learning to live with COVID-19 in the same way we continue to live 100 years later with various seasonal alterations of the influenza virus of 1918.
I suspect the Biden administration will struggle with the “humility and respect” part of this very good recommendation.
MAKE A DONATION
Tax deductible donations
to the fullest extent permitted by law.
[ad_2]
Source link