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An Omicron Hypothesis
Omicron doesn’t kill people nearly as much as earlier variants of Covid. But does it kill people much at all? Not long ago, you could look at global data or country-specific data for places that have a lot of cases of Omicron at Worldometer and see something interesting: Despite epic spikes in the case numbers, deaths were fewer than for any previous spike.
That seems like it would be a big deal: The rates skyrocketing in these Omicron waves with the death numbers falling in absolute terms and the death rates plummeting dramatically.
But deaths are a lagging indicator, and we needed a few more weeks to confirm that Omicron is killing fewer people overall despite its massive transmissibility. And we still need a few weeks.
It sure looks good in the UK: The Omicron wave seems to be receding, and the death numbers are nowhere near the numbers for the last wave. Likewise South Africa, ahead of the UK. And in some other places that appear to be a bit earlier in the Omicron wave, it sure looks promising. Turkey. Italy. Brazil.
Enter the USA: If I’m reading this chart right, death rates look like they’re just about to pass the Delta wave death rates.
Dang.
So maybe Omicron is still killing people, and killing them in numbers enough that its dominance is not a good thing in absolute terms: massive transmission rates, massive case numbers, much lower death rate, and still more deaths overall.
Or . . . maybe not that exactly.
Suppose for a moment that the way things look just now is the way they are: In the UK and South Africa, Omicron killed fewer people than any previous version of the virus, even while spreading to more people and, conveniently, giving them the best immunity so far; but in the USA it actually killed more people!
Why would that be?
Is it because the USA has a lower vaccination rate? Not likely. Check the NY Times vaccination tracker: In the second-dose and third-dose numbers, the UK is significantly leading the US, but it only leads 78 percent to 75 percent in first-dose numbers. More importantly, South Africa’s rates are much lower than the USA.
But here’s something that fits that data, something that the USA has more of than either the UK or South Africa:
America is a very fat country.
So here is an Omicron hypothesis for your consideration: Maybe Omicron has massive transmission rates and case numbers, a much lower death rate, and lower deaths overall–except for where obesity rates are high.
If that’s the truth, things are still worse than I’d hoped. But still a lot better than they were.
But I don’t know what’s true. We could look at the numbers over the next few weeks and compare them to this Wikipedia chart of countries by obesity rates: Find countries with obesity rates comparable to the USA, wait until their Omicron waves come and go, and then look over the death rates. And watch various countries now having Omicron spikes, see if they follow the pattern of the UK and South Africa, and then check to see if they are significantly less obese than the USA.
In the meantime, and speaking of not knowing things, I don’t know how the CIA figures out obesity rates; but that’s where the Wikipedia chart comes from–the CIA World Factbook. And I don’t know if the USA is overreporting in some way that makes its data largely useless–deaths with Covid reported as deaths from Covid, that sort of thing.
And I didn’t know, in a previous post drawing in part from Worldometer numbers, how much the case rates were going to go up and down again and again and again. (An updated post, including a partial retraction of the earlier one, is in the works.)
Hello, my name is Socrates, and I don’t know anything. But here is a plausible hypothesis about Omicron. What do you think?
Published in General
My hypothesis is that Omicron is the new big hype so people will sacrifice their own children to the New God Of Vaccines.
The same people that told us two weeks to flatten the curve when they meant two or three years, who stated like the scientists they aren’t that HCQ did not work and ivermectin is only for horses, they have to keep the goal posts moving so that they can bring us to our knees and then the Global Reset kicks in. (Maybe about the same time there is the mandate you only get your Soc security check if you get vaxxed. Because there is simply not enough money to keep sending it out to Baby Boomers, so a lot of us have to be eliminated.)
Alex Berenson who I respect greatly no longer uses any statistics from US or individual states as far as COVID case or fatality counts.
And over in England, the National Health Services has recorded such dismal case numbers and deaths – really low numbers – that the government spokespeople are saying “Well these numbers must not be accurate.”
BTW, this is an article that leads me to think World-O-Meter is a crap shoot:
http://World-O-Meter https://www.cnn.com/interactive/2020/05/world/worldometer-coronavirus-mystery/index.html
As far as the New God of Vaccines, here is one nurse’s take on COV vaxxes:
Stolen from a well educated : #nurse
“Among all the vaccines I have known in my life (diphtheria, tetanus, measles, rubella, chickenpox, hepatitis, meningitis and tuberculosis), I want to also add flu and pneumonia. Never before have I seen a vaccine that forced me to wear a mask and maintain my social distance, even when you are fully vaccinated. I had never heard of a vaccine that spreads the virus even after vaccination.
I had never heard of rewards, discounts, incentives to get vaccinated. I never saw discrimination for those who didn’t. If you hadn’t been vaccinated no one has tried to make you feel like a bad person. I have never seen a vaccine that threatens the relationship between family, colleagues and friends.
I have never seen a vaccine used to threaten livelihoods, work or school. I have never seen a vaccine that would allow a 12-year-old to override parental consent. After all the vaccines I listed above, I have never seen a vaccine like this one, which discriminates, divides and judges society as it is.
And as the social fabric tightens… It’s a powerful vaccine! The vax does all these things except IMMUNIZATION. If we still need a booster dose after we are fully vaccinated, & we still need to get a negative test after we are fully vaccinated, & we still need to wear a mask after we are fully vaccinated, & still be hospitalized after we have been fully vaccinated, it will likely come to “It’s time for us to admit that we’ve been completely deceived.”
All I have left to say is a variation on: ICISB, TRT DAMN Remedies!”
IOISB, TRT DAMN Remedies!”
Well. Thank you. I hope I remember that!
Augie, do you have enough data to see whether vaccination rates correlate to cases, hospitalizations, &/or deaths?
I haven’t checked.
Ben Shapiro keeps saying that the vaccines are mostly a failure in preventing transmissions and infections, but a smashing success in preventing hospitalizations and deaths. I can’t promise that I will never look at the numbers and conclude something different.
But I believe him.
There are indications the vax may predispose people to contract the vid. No good data yet, but not exactly rumor either. e.g. there weren’t positive indications of lab leak in Jan. 2020 but there was a background signal.
A friend (who has always been somewhat fearful of Covid) was in a dither at our Wednesday church dinner because the number of current Covid cases in our semi-rural county this week was five times the peak in mid-2020. I asked her, “But how many of those are hospitalized or have died?” She did know that no one has died from (or maybe even with) Covid in several months in our county, with both of us acknowledging that it may take a while for death data to catch up. Hospitalization data is hard to come by because many hospitalizations (for any cause, not just Covid) of county residents actually take place in the more urban county to our east. But few if any in our county seem to be dying from Covid anymore. I am hoping that helped calm her dither a bit.
Our county has a relatively low rate of Covid vaccination (<50% of “eligible” are “fully vaccinated”), and the even more rural county to our west is even less vaccinated (<40% of “eligible” are “fully vaccinated”). Yet we don’t see a lot of Covid deaths. I have no idea what the obesity rate in these counties is, but anecdotally, the population of these two counties contain a lot of people who do physical work and other physical activities outdoors (many with large animals), and so we don’t see a lot of “obese” people around.
That’s what I would have said, but the aforementioned Clinical Update in Virology by Racaniello and Griffin had them reporting on some new data showing that the vaccines are not too shabby in preventing transmissions and infections, either. I will perhaps say more after I watch the regular session in which Racaniello & participants go over that paper in detail, and maybe I can follow along by looking at the tables and charts in the paper. Griffin just presents the news orally, but I follow and remember better when the data are also presented visually. (I put that last clause in the passive voice on purpose, in order to bug people whom I have chided for using the passive voice.)
One part I do remember, though, is the first question of the Q&A at the end, where they responded to a listener who asked (via e-mail) why the two were sitting at the same desk, unmasked. (Usually they do these sessions from separate locations using zoom, but this time they were both in the same studio.)
The two are definitely proponents of masks, but Racaniello asked Griffin to handle the question, as he himself couldn’t do it using polite language. Griffin explained that he didn’t think there was that much risk. (He does see covid patients every day.) He was double-vaccinated and boostered, and he said this is an example of how we’re just going to have to learn to live with the virus. And Racaniello is also double-vaccinated and boostered. (Griffin didn’t mention that Racaniello’s booster was very recent, because he had been holding out on the booster until he saw solid data showing that it really helped. A few sessions ago he finally saw data that convinced him.) Griffin also pointed out that he was healthy, and that if Racaniello did catch covid by hanging out with his friends in a bar and transmitted it to him in the studio, he wasn’t worried about being able to handle it. Griffin doesn’t have an ideal body weight, which he is working on, but he just didn’t think he was in a situation where he is vulnerable to severe covid. So while he is very much in favor of wearing masks, and the two do wear masks (according to what they have said in other sessions) he thinks people need to think through their situations and and use them accordingly. In this situation they didn’t think they were necessary.
Can you please interpret these?
1) There is probably some variance in existing cross- resistance among different nations because we all don’t get the exact range of exposures in addition to possible genetic difference.
2) US and Europe are significantly older populations than other places.
3) The US hospitalized people at a much higher rate than other places, testing frequency among jurisdictions varies and attribution to COD may also vary so numbers are no always apples to apples.
4) Obesity matters. In the US you are more likely to die of COVID if you or obese or live in NY or ND. Using diabetes as a proxy for obesity:
from Phil Kerpen:
Massachusetts is getting slammed right now. Every hospital in our state is full. The statisticians think it is peaking now and on the decline, but what force of nature is making that decline happen in the dead of winter when no other variables have changed is beyond my understanding of viruses.
I have had some version of this e-mail from all three major hospital systems this week (this one from Lahey’s letter):
And our governor Charlie Baker had this to say this week:
The last instruction is ludicrous. We are way short of primary care doctors in this state. That’s a luxury too many in our state don’t have.
I definitely do not want to go to a Massachusetts hospital right now under these conditions. And if I am feeling that way, most other people are too. That means there will be collateral damage from this newest virus attack.
I feel especially sorry for caregivers. There’s this burden to do something when the person they are caring for needs help. But at the moment there’s no one to call.
Umm. Declines happen after everyone getting it that is going to get it gets it. The number of cases invariably decline after that happens. Given how contagious omicron is you reach that number pretty quick. Although I have occasionally heard of a voter turnout in excess of 100% you will never get in excess of 100% of a population getting a virus. Most times it never gets higher than 80% because some people are naturally immune.
That assumes a fixed number of variants on the loose. I’m not sure we can assume that at this point. Throw in the issue of waning immunity–either from prior exposure or the vaccines–and it’s hard to know for sure.
When it was just the alpha variant in circulation, it was a little easier to ascertain what was happening with it as it traveled through a community. I think the picture is far more complicated now.
The alpha strain was unstable to begin with because it was not a natural variant but rather a human-engineered variant. Some of the offspring of the alpha strain may be acting in unusual ways as well.
People who get Covid rarely get it again, and if they do it is almost always milder. If you get “a cold” every few months or so, they are generally different viruses. The press has panicked people into believing Covid is a death sentence. It’s not. I am obese and have hypertension. My Covid adventure was trivial. With omicron I wonder if half the people who have ended up hospitalized have hyperventilated themselves into critical care.
I think this is accurate. First, hospitals are short staffed because they are firing people. Second, hospitals always run at capacity in the winter. Third, covid hysteria means there are a whole lot of people presenting at hospitals who have no business being there. If be willing to bet that, for a good percentage of these people, of their doctors were to just say “test is negative for covid, you’ve just got the flu,” they would breathe sighs of relief and happily go home.
I don’t know what the hospitals and doctors are like in other states, but in Massachusetts, no one gets admitted who doesn’t need to be there.
In fact, if anything, it’s the opposite here. I’ve known quite a few people who really needed 24-hour care who couldn’t get it.
I admire your and Seawriter’s confidence in assessing what’s happening with this. :-)
As for me, I have far many more questions than answers. :-)
Funny how crises give us a clearer picture of how existing structures are built on vested interests, bureaucratic capture, inertia and intrusive politics. The barriers to rapid responsive reconfiguration and front-line triage appear to be significant.
We are not well-prepared for mass casualty events, even a slow-moving killer like COVID. Major earthquakes, meteor hits, terrorist Chernobyls, new weaponized bio agents… FEMA basically pays states to write a plan which is a bunch of government employee names and some schools to use as shelters but mostly advises governors to keep the Red Cross on speed-dial and then ask the feds to write checks once disaster hits.
We could have better used this pandemic to get ourselves better prepared.
I am vehemently opposed to government takeover of medicine but the truth is that our byzantine private-public funding system makes efficient large-emergency delivery much harder to tool up. We can do better.
Doesn’t look like it.
I think what may be happening in Massachusetts with the omicron variant is that it is not killing people, and it’s not causing an increase in hospitalizations. But it is making so many people stay-at-home sick that it is causing a huge staffing issue throughout the state, including our hospitals and doctors’ offices. Many businesses on Cape Cod have closed for the moment because of staffing problems.
But if this is the omicron variant causing all of these problems, it will get better on its own because those people will simply recover and be back to work soon.
That’s probably all it is. A very temporary situation.
If it is temporary, however, I wonder why Baker is making all these changes to our healthcare system that he described, which will be permanent. He must be seeing a trend that I can’t see.
Regina Herzlinger would agree:
Same reason all those men in the Stepford Wives replaced their wives with androids. Because he can. It gives him a power rush.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but it seems your governor is mandating some additional flexibility in the state’s healthcare system (if it’s possible for “mandate” to be paired with “flexibility”). That doesn’t seem all bad to me, and maybe is needed regardless of covid.
So they have beds available but not staff.
I guess my earlier guess was correct–omicron is making its way through the state aggressively and quickly, making so many people sick that they can’t go to work although they will get better soon.
On Cape Cod where I live, there are a lot of businesses closed that are normally open this time of year. Staffing challenges everywhere, for a combination of reasons.
Agreed.
If Mass. is like New York, the great majority of patients with covid came in for non-covid reasons and were incidentally diagnosed with covid by routine testing.
When I look at that map, I see Boston and Cape Cod hospitals in red and brown, respectively, which indicates over 90 percent and 80 to 89 percent, respectively.
That’s pretty full.
In a way if you wanted to design virus to effect rich countries more than poor ones SARS-Cov2 would be it. The data on obesity as a primary cause of issues is compelling. Note that other groups suffer much worse, Cystic Fibrosis patients as an example essentially never survive Covid-19. Obesity, a problem in the US almost exclusively, and Western Europe to a lesser extent have been the worst hit by Covid-19. The Favelas, the Indian slums, Mexico…none seem to have had the massive deaths that we expected to see. Perhaps some of that is poor reporting, but even excess deaths haven’t been shown to skyrocket.
So, we have a virus that appears to target and affect rich (fat) countries more than poor (thin) countries. A conspiracy minded person might think it was on purpose.
Of course, some businesses may also shut down if too many people in the community are sick.
In my county’s case, I think people are having problem paying their grocery bills, and it is cutting into “extras.”
We ate out last Monday at the place closest to us. Last year, even on Mondays, the place would be busy.
Arrived at 6Pm. Except for one guy flirting with the waitress at the bar, we were the only customers.
Ate a leisurely dinner. No other folks showed up.
It is expensive to have a cook, assistant cook and bartender running a place with only 3 customers during prime time.
Omicron has not hit our community yet. (Although the fear mongering on the local Pacifica radio station, run by the libs, is full of “Wear your mask. Get your booster. Or you will soon be a fatality, and kill everyone you’ve ever known before you do die.”)
And Newsom has the attitude that he can simply insert people from south of the border into our health care system.
The current wave here is not purely an Omicron wave, as I recall Omicron did not surpass Delta until mid-December. A big Delta wave hit the South last summer, and then a second Delta wave was already underway in the Northeast and West when Omicron arrived and started replacing it.
Do we have a breakdown of hospitalization and death numbers by variant? It could still be that most of the deaths in the current wave are caused by Delta.
In the area of FL that we are in, I can vouch for the tremendous number of overweight people. My sister in law is a home healthcare nurse and they are full tilt. She sees the elderly and many are very overweight, very poor junky diet, smokers, etc. Even with terrible effects from their conditions, she said they just keep doing it. So you make an excellent point.
On another note, she is also recovering from Covid, her office was full of it – some vaccinated, some not. One of my customers from TX said all her kids have it and all were vaccinated (they are grown). I don’t think the vaccine worked against Omicron. The numbers are off the charts here.