Omicron is causing major disruptions in the economy and among the personal lives of Americans but it’s mostly for nothing. You’re 80% less likely to be hospitalized with omicron compared to the delta strain. Masks are generally ineffective against COVID and even less effective against omicron.
Yet what is the death toll from omicron? So far only one person is alleged to have died from omicron. Not true.
Public officials and media reported that a man in Texas became the first American to die from the Omicron variant. I checked with the Harris County Public Health Department. Turns out that’s not true.
Here’s audio of my phone call. pic.twitter.com/fIDZNPzYuj
— Dan Cohen (@dancohen3000) December 22, 2021
The media continues to do its best to frighten people baselessly. Newsweek puts out this title:
Michigan Loses Hundreds to COVID in 1 Week as Officials Expect Omicron to Sweep State
They conflate delta and omicron into one boogey virus, intimating that omicron is part of the death toll. Worse, they make some unscientific assertions:
Much remains unknown about the Omicron variant, including whether it causes more or less severe illness than previous strains.
The analysis, published Thursday by the U.K. Health Security Agency, follows studies in Scotland and South Africa that also pointed to a substantially lower risk of hospitalization with Omicron than with earlier established variants, including Delta. The studies published Wednesday suggested Omicron was on average causing milder disease than earlier variants—though that advantage could be outweighed by its more rapid spread.
You’ll need an extra booster shot for that mild virus.
Early studies suggest that the vaccinated will need a booster shot for the best chance at preventing Omicron infection, but that even without the extra dose, vaccination still should offer strong protection against severe illness and death, health officials said.
But omicron isn’t causing widespread severe illness and death. If it were, it’d be front page everywhere, and it’s not. You might choose to get a booster and that’s fine but know this: vaccine effectiveness drops precipitously after 10 weeks:
Booster protection against symptomatic illness caused by the Omicron variant drops by up to 25% within 10 weeks, new real-world data has found – though it is not yet clear if everyone will need further doses in 2022.
There are suggestions that omicron might infect the vaccinated preferentially over the unvaccinated.
Fauci continues with his blather
Whether or not Omicron causes a milder illness than Delta, the variant might cause more harm due to its fast-spread. Dr. Anthony Fauci, President Joe Biden’s chief medical advisor said in a briefing Wednesday, that even with a possible diminution in severity, “if you have a much larger number of individual cases, the fact that you have so many more cases might actually obviate the effect of it being less severe.”
Say what? Omicron might well crowd out the other strains. I swear sometimes it seems to me that Fauci does not want the pandemic to end. Remember- vaccination is a personal benefit, not a public benefit.
And speaking of the unvaccinated, they are quickly headed toward becoming the Japanese-Americans who were interned during WWII.
CNN medical analyst Dr. Leana Wen said Wednesday on CNN’s “Newsroom” that President Joe Biden should “go further” in placing restrictions on Americans who have not gotten COVID vaccines. Wen said, “I think what we will see with Omicron is a very large number of infections due to Covid-19.”
MSNBC’s “I’m not a virologist but I play one on MSNBC” Sanjay Gupta:
He added, “This is where it’s controversial, but we need to talk about this, the bioethics of it broadly because this is not the last respiratory pandemic we’re going to face, Joy. What do we do with somebody who is unvaccinated who is taking advanced ICU therapies from somebody who is vaccinated in the hospital? How do we rank order that priority? We do it for organs, kidneys, livers, lungs. We say, ‘Did you smoke, did you drink recently?’ If you did, you’re lower on the list, even if you need it. We need to start thinking of that model. Have bioethics around it.”
Think about that- he wants to throw the unvaccinated to the trash heap of death despite both being infected by the same virus and both needing hospital care.
That brings me to the question I have in my mind:
Who is the bigger threat- the unvaccinated person testing negative or the fully vaccinated/boosted person testing positive?
Merry Christmas!
DrJohn has been a health care professional for more than 30 years. In addition to clinical practice he has done extensive research and has published widely with over 70 original articles and abstracts in the peer-reviewed literature. DrJohn is well known in his field and has lectured on every continent except for Antarctica. He has been married to the same wonderful lady for over 30 years and has three kids- two sons, both of whom are attorneys and one daughter on her way into the field of education.
DrJohn was brought up with the concept that one can do well if one is prepared to work hard but nothing in life is guaranteed.
Except for liberals being foolish.