Kathy
Terra Nova Tramp
519 new cases here in Newfoundland today and moving to alert level 4 at midnight , 2925 active cases
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Silent_Water
Tribune
The good news from Germany is again: Because of the usually milder Omikron-Variant, a fast increase of cases does not necessarily mean an increase in cases of death, but our minister of health thinks that we should forget any slight hope of herd immunity, which would never work with such a "sophisticated corona virus". Only vaccinations would be a way back to a normal life.
"Delta" was most probably the worst Covid-19-variant which ever hit Germany and I have heard of several cases, in which the parents both died this autumn/ fall 2021 after their holidays and their 2 or 3 children never were as sick as their parents but became orphans within a few weeks. Such children are the most innocent victims of this virus.
The severity of the cases depends on the variant but the problem is sometimes that you have to check the tests by a so-called "sequencing" in order to detemine the variant and this is possibly one reason, why Germany looks relatively good in this moment compared to neighbouring states. Our German laboratories did almost no sequencing during the Christmas holidays and some experts are expecting an Omikron-explosion in the next 2 weeks.
Other experts say, the explosion should already have taken place and "our luck" in Germany could have been our "legislative slowness", because our federal states were warned by the central government to be very careful with lifting precautions and they never dared to lift some restrictions like in other neigbouring countries. In other countries, the measures were like driving a roller coaster with a temporarily stop in a crowded bar; in Germany in comparison we were driving a slow train in a flat desert without ever being able again to drink too much beer in a crowded bar. It was not nice, but at least we had not these ups and downs.
In the Netherlands for example, they lifted many restrictions even with masks in public transport, had explosions of Delta-variant-cases again and were forced to re-introduce restrictions again. A bit similar in Great Britain with Boris' "freedom day", which our new German minister of health privately called "political nonsense".
This virus is also so annoying because it seems to find all our national weaknesses.
I really hate this virus now, because even I start to feel bored and annoyed by these anti-virus-measures after 2 years now ... and this altough I am - according to my latest Chinese life horoscope - a "dragon par excellence" which / who (?) can sleep for centuries in his cave before he / it (?) wakes up and "astonishes the word by his fire".
I think I will go to sleep now again a little bit because I had my "booster-vaccination" right today and I feel a bit tired again ... (yaaaawn!) ... hope I do not sleep as long as this fairy-tale sleeping-beauty ...
"Delta" was most probably the worst Covid-19-variant which ever hit Germany and I have heard of several cases, in which the parents both died this autumn/ fall 2021 after their holidays and their 2 or 3 children never were as sick as their parents but became orphans within a few weeks. Such children are the most innocent victims of this virus.
The severity of the cases depends on the variant but the problem is sometimes that you have to check the tests by a so-called "sequencing" in order to detemine the variant and this is possibly one reason, why Germany looks relatively good in this moment compared to neighbouring states. Our German laboratories did almost no sequencing during the Christmas holidays and some experts are expecting an Omikron-explosion in the next 2 weeks.
Other experts say, the explosion should already have taken place and "our luck" in Germany could have been our "legislative slowness", because our federal states were warned by the central government to be very careful with lifting precautions and they never dared to lift some restrictions like in other neigbouring countries. In other countries, the measures were like driving a roller coaster with a temporarily stop in a crowded bar; in Germany in comparison we were driving a slow train in a flat desert without ever being able again to drink too much beer in a crowded bar. It was not nice, but at least we had not these ups and downs.
In the Netherlands for example, they lifted many restrictions even with masks in public transport, had explosions of Delta-variant-cases again and were forced to re-introduce restrictions again. A bit similar in Great Britain with Boris' "freedom day", which our new German minister of health privately called "political nonsense".
This virus is also so annoying because it seems to find all our national weaknesses.
I really hate this virus now, because even I start to feel bored and annoyed by these anti-virus-measures after 2 years now ... and this altough I am - according to my latest Chinese life horoscope - a "dragon par excellence" which / who (?) can sleep for centuries in his cave before he / it (?) wakes up and "astonishes the word by his fire".
I think I will go to sleep now again a little bit because I had my "booster-vaccination" right today and I feel a bit tired again ... (yaaaawn!) ... hope I do not sleep as long as this fairy-tale sleeping-beauty ...
Yes, in our region the cases are mostly around Dumfries, the 'big' town, but less than 50,000 pop. (I see St Johns is 113,000+), and between there and the English border ('nuff said
)
Naraku
Draconarius
Florida's Surgeon General has come up with a solution to the state's rising positive test numbers: Stop testing people.
FrankO
Executioner
Translation: "We fucked up."
Silent_Water
Tribune
Mhm, there are also some "very, very conservative" politicians in Germany and Europe, who always complain about this "testing hysteria", which is so dangerous for the economy or the state finances because testing could tell you who is spreading the virus the most and this could lead to much, much more hysteria at work, at schools and in your whole life so that you might become afraid of dying because of Covid-19 almost everywhere and who wants to live forever at all? Especially when dying could be socially so much more acceptable for the economy and pensions funds of the states we live in?
Silent_Water
Tribune
('nuff said
By the way, I often had problems to pronounce or write these Scottish or Irish names correctly: I guess, this " 'nuff" is the "affectionate form" of a famous Scottish philosopher's name from a Scottish clan and his correct full name is "Nuff MacNuff" or somehow similar, right?
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We have the same idiocy here with our newly minted premier saying we should only get tested if we have bad symptoms which is great given Omicron typically is asymptomatic for the first several days of infection.
Our “Health Minister” also really encouraged New Year’s celebrations on the 31st when he said “we will all catch CoVid “- such a reasonable fellow.
Instead of the usual 1 million plus people watching the New Year’s Fireworks from the Harbour front, apparently there was only 36,000 of us. If Mr Hazzard’s (yes I know, great name fir a Health Minister in these times) intention was to make people very very scared then he has succeeded. But of course in typical party style, offers no solutions at all. Many testing clinics were closed over the holiday period…
And now Rapid Antigen Testing kits are very scarce, and extremely overpriced (typically $10 per tester, but some places charge $30 per test. I hear in Germany they only cost $2 and are free in Britain. Why am I unsurprised that this conservative federal and state government has failed (again) to secure enough supply? And I had a chuckle when I noticed the test kits all come from China! Irony
24,000 cases yesterday, which was a public holiday. A massive 28% of those actually tested have CoVid, also a third colleague has it (from only 7 of us) I spoke to a lady today who wants to rebook her trip to the USA after recovering from CoVid a couple of days ago. That made me nervous
Silent_Water
Tribune
Mhm, the prices of tests in Germany are often not so easy to understand. When we had fewer cases and most hoped to be soon out of our Covid-19-problems, there were no free tests any more for a few weeks. Now, the "Antigen Tests" are completely free again and even the very best "polymerase chain reaction - or PCR -tests" by laboratories are right now for free, when your doctor or a state health agency demands it because you possibly were a contact person of an infected person or when the corona-warning-app on your smartphone is deeply red and shows several contacts with infected persons.
The costs will be paid right now again since 15th November by the German health insurance companies which are "a bit different organized" in most other countries of the world except in Austria, Switzerland, Scandinavia and a few other states in Europe because here and there, this is in this case the advantage of an European "common'health' & welfare state", I think. The most of our German health insurance companies are with their finances partly in the hands or under control of the state and have no other choice but paying the costs when the state government says:
"This is good for the health of the nation! Pay all the costs of your members for all measures which are declared to be necessary by this government! If you do not have enough money at the end of the year, tell our Ministries of Finance and of Health, why, in our reasonable formulars & documents, and your deficits will be paid by these ministries! Otherwise, you will have visits by controllers from these ministries and you would not like these visits!"
The bureaucracy for all of this is really enormous as you can imagine but most of our population like or love it this way because you usually have not to worry about the costs of a necessary operation or anything else which is good for your health.
But the costs in October, when everything looked much better than today and the German health companies paid not everything, were high like these ones:
Antigen-Tests "as fast as possible" between 10 and 40 Euros ! (But as usual, you could often buy them at "ALDI-Supermarkets" much cheaper and no one really knew why ... ! )
PCR-Tests on private orders "as fast as possible": 128,23 Euros!
When the same PCR-Test is ordered by a German health insurance, this insurance pays only 43,56 Euros for patients without symptoms and 35,- Euros for patients with symptoms.
PCR-Tests on private orders when it has 24 hours time to be finally declared: Between 35 and 69 Euros.
Oh, and what I really love in "diesem meinem Deutschland" (= "this Germany of mine"): We imported everything right and just in time what was necessary in order to fight against this virus or we could even produce everything on our own: Vaccines, ventilators, tests. It is sometimes really more wonderful than most Germans think to live in states like Germany, Switzerland or Austria in spite of all these Corona-downplayers around us, because in principle, we have all the means at hand if we want and if we are well-organized and we often really are.
The costs will be paid right now again since 15th November by the German health insurance companies which are "a bit different organized" in most other countries of the world except in Austria, Switzerland, Scandinavia and a few other states in Europe because here and there, this is in this case the advantage of an European "common'health' & welfare state", I think. The most of our German health insurance companies are with their finances partly in the hands or under control of the state and have no other choice but paying the costs when the state government says:
"This is good for the health of the nation! Pay all the costs of your members for all measures which are declared to be necessary by this government! If you do not have enough money at the end of the year, tell our Ministries of Finance and of Health, why, in our reasonable formulars & documents, and your deficits will be paid by these ministries! Otherwise, you will have visits by controllers from these ministries and you would not like these visits!"
The bureaucracy for all of this is really enormous as you can imagine but most of our population like or love it this way because you usually have not to worry about the costs of a necessary operation or anything else which is good for your health.
But the costs in October, when everything looked much better than today and the German health companies paid not everything, were high like these ones:
Antigen-Tests "as fast as possible" between 10 and 40 Euros ! (But as usual, you could often buy them at "ALDI-Supermarkets" much cheaper and no one really knew why ... ! )
PCR-Tests on private orders "as fast as possible": 128,23 Euros!
When the same PCR-Test is ordered by a German health insurance, this insurance pays only 43,56 Euros for patients without symptoms and 35,- Euros for patients with symptoms.
PCR-Tests on private orders when it has 24 hours time to be finally declared: Between 35 and 69 Euros.
Oh, and what I really love in "diesem meinem Deutschland" (= "this Germany of mine"): We imported everything right and just in time what was necessary in order to fight against this virus or we could even produce everything on our own: Vaccines, ventilators, tests. It is sometimes really more wonderful than most Germans think to live in states like Germany, Switzerland or Austria in spite of all these Corona-downplayers around us, because in principle, we have all the means at hand if we want and if we are well-organized and we often really are.
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Loxuru
Graf von Kreuzigung
That's a quote from Frederick The Great.
On another occasion, he must have said : "Who wants to control everything, controls nothing!"
The latter quote also applies to the way the Covid problem is sometimes handled by politics;
Migoz2
Senator
I've never heard Freddie Mercury called Frederick..............
Silent_Water
Tribune
I really can understand your surprise, but it is not impossible, because there once was a beautiful Austrian actress in a "strange & wild relationship" with Freddie Mercury, when he was in Munich / Bavaria. She was also to be seen in one of Queen's videos (=> "It's a Hard Life") and she in fact is said to have called him different German names for fun or in order to tease him. So, it is not impossible although hard to believe that he was called "Fritz" or "Friedrich" by her:
Rias
Neko Girl
Jackie1111
Tribune
Things had gone relatively well during the time of Covid in the state where I live, but they have turned to shit recently. Hospitalizations are at a record high, and some epidemiological models are predicting they may almost double in the next few weeks. Back in the summer I read about a hospital in the south (Alabama maybe) that converted garage space to hold some of covid patients they were overwhelmed with. They may be doing that here soon. 
Loxuru
Graf von Kreuzigung
Don't worry! No one missed you!
And Loinclothslave, they opened things up because Omicron was less serious, but apparently most of the recent large influx of hospital and ICU admissions are Delta. Well done, opening the door once more to Delta.
They are stupid, they think that people can't make their own decisions. Many will welcome opening up, but many will not, people will stop going to shops and restaurants etc, and they will not get the wave of economic activity that they were hoping for. I heard plenty of cancelation stories over the Christmas / New Year period. A lot of people don't want to get it, or to kill their granny (sorry Jolly)
Kerry Chant is the Chief Health Officer of NSW, and has served under 7(?) premiers. I think she is finding this current one difficult.
Dominic Perrottet (Domicron Parrothead)
They say every disaster movie starts with a scientist who is ignored
In our district (Saale-Holzlandkreis) there were 9 new Covid infections today and luckily no deaths. The 7 day incidence that is used in Germany (cases per 100,000 inhabitants) is 415. So that means 344 cases in the last 7 days.
Loxuru
Graf von Kreuzigung
Honestly, I do not follow the Covid numbers in my region. Would it matter? I spend my time out of risk as much as possible, playing banjo, lubricating my automatic assault rifles, and being on CF. If I want to travel, I fly Flight Simulator. As long as Covid stays out of my house and/or does not kill me, why worry? I just try not letting it in.