The Reality of Living in Australia and Covid

[Seaworthy Lass]

Originally Posted by HankOnthewater

HI SWL, no I am not aware that numbers of the hospitalisations are published by age group. Hmm in theory I could have access to that, but would not allowed to share that.
In early August, NSW published those numbers, but only for a few weeks.

You are right, the death rate of active cases is a lot lower this time compared with this time last year, about a factor of 4.
It could well be that the elderly now has been largely vaccinated and last year no one was.

Note, the cause of death is a mute issue. For instance a patient dies when they have covid, but has also multiple comorbidities... was the covid the actual cause of death or just a contributing factor?
Therefore we must remain cautious in interpreting the number of deaths.

I do not use the numbers of death my overviews.

The UK publishes hospitalisations by age.

My comment about co-morbidities was not made to imply they would have died soon anyway, although for the 80+ year olds in nursing homes it is not impossible they may well have died within months.

If figures for co-morbidities are given, it helps present a much clearer picture. Co-morbidities are sometimes given by the Australian media, but my impression is that this tends to be more when they want to explain why someone double vaccinated has died.

A while back Gord found a link for me that stated only 6% of those dying did not have co-morbidities in the US, but I haven’t seen much else and nothing recent.

This is some information deaths under the age of 18 in England when there had been around 120,000 deaths in total:
“The studies found that COVID-19 caused 25 deaths in that age group between March 2020 and February 2021. About half of those deaths were in individuals with an underlying complex disability with high health-care needs, such as tube feeding or assistance with breathing.[/I]”
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-01897-w


None of this takes away from the tragedy of the lives lost, but if almost no one “young” (maybe under 40ish or 30ish?) who is healthy (and not at high risk for other reasons) is severely ill when infected, as I suspect from the scraps of information available, it should alter management of the pandemic.

SWL

[HankOnthewater]

regarding posts #1394 and 1395:
Indeed, if there is an outbreak in a nursing home often all positive residents go to a hospital, as nursing homes do often not have the skills or facilities to manage very infectious residents. Or sometimes ALL residents, like in Queensland in the first week of august, ~30 nurse home residents, and only a few of them were positive. Reason for that that many/most staff of the nursing home had to self-isolate and no carers left, or only carers/nurses that were not qualified enough.

Regarding children, there is a small proportion of children admitted for 'covid' reasons, ie as other family members are positive, and the children need to be in self isolation themselves (hence they are in hospital with the working diagnosis of covid). Or another reason, children can deteriorate a lot faster, and are then admitted as a precaution. Not because they are critically ill.

[Seaworthy Lass]

Originally Posted by HankOnthewater

regarding above two posts:
Indeed, if there is an outbreak in a nursing home often all positive residents go to a hospital, as nursing homes do often not have the skills or facilities to manage very infectious residents. Or sometimes ALL residents, like in Queensland in the first week of august, ~30 nurse home residents, and only a few of them were positive. Reason for that that many/most staff of the nursing home had to self-isolate and no carers left, or carers/nurses that were not qualified enough.

Regarding children, there is a small proportion of children admitted for 'covid' reasons, ie as other family members are positive, and the children need to be in self isolation themselves (hence they are in hospital with the working diagnosis of covid). Or another reason, children can deteriorate a lot faster, and are then admitted as a precaution. Not because they are critically ill.

Yes, I agree with all that, although early in the pandemic both in the UK and in Melbourne nursing homes even severely ill residents were refused entry to hospital, tragically infecting more in the home. Given roughly 10% of those over 80 die if infected and given they are residing with others at extreme risk of severe illness/death, if the focus is on saving lives then hospitalising any infected nursing home elderly is critical.

It is so hard to tangle out information from the data. I am sure this is available, it just needs analysing. Why is this not a priority? Or if it is being done, why are we not being informed of the actual situation?

SWL

[Dockhead]

Originally Posted by Seaworthy Lass

Yes, I agree with all that, although early in the pandemic both in the UK and in Melbourne nursing homes even severely ill residents were refused entry to hospital, tragically infecting more in the home. Given roughly 10% of those over 80 die if infected and given they are residing with others at extreme risk of severe illness/death, if the focus is on saving lives then hospitalising any infected nursing home elderly is critical.

It is so hard to tangle out information from the data. I am sure this is available, it just needs analysing. Why is this not a priority? Or if it is being done, why are we not being informed of the actual situation?

SWL

One of the biggest lessons I hope mankind will have learned from this pandemic is not to make such a hash of dealing with care homes during pandemics

In many, many countries it was a complete clusterfumble. A particularly notable fiasco with care homes was in Sweden in the early days of the pandemic.

I hope there will be intense study and maybe issuance of model protocols by the WHO. I don't think it needs to be like this.

[El Pinguino]

The information is out there, but there is that much information out there that it is hard to find.
It is not a plot to conceal it.
This is from mid July, three months ago, when fewer than 2 dozen people were in ICU in Sydney.
'In hospital presently 25 people are under the age of 55, 14 under the age of 35 while those in intensive care is made up of one in their 20s, one in their 30s, one in their 40s, five in their 50s, six in their 60s, three in their 70s and one in their 80s.'
https://www.skynews.com.au/australia...f65dd8782a0932
I think that it is safe to say that people across all age groups are getting seriously ill.

We seem to be quite good at keeping people alive now. With over 1500 new cases each day in Victoria we 'only' have 500 hospitalised and about 50 of them in ICU.
With only a handful dying each day - across a wide spread of ages - we would appear to be doing something right.

[Seaworthy Lass]

Originally Posted by El Pinguino

The information is out there, but there is that much information out there that it is hard to find.
It is not a plot to conceal it.
This is from mid July, three months ago, when fewer than 2 dozen people were in ICU in Sydney.
'In hospital presently 25 people are under the age of 55, 14 under the age of 35 while those in intensive care is made up of one in their 20s, one in their 30s, one in their 40s, five in their 50s, six in their 60s, three in their 70s and one in their 80s.'
https://www.skynews.com.au/australia...f65dd8782a0932
I think that it is safe to say that people across all age groups are getting seriously ill….

I think more than one data point is needed to conclude that “it is safe to say that people across all age groups are getting seriously ill”.

Anyway, of the 18 cases you report who were in intensive care at the time, despite case numbers markedly being driven by the under 30’s, there was only 1 person under 30 in intensive care and 17 over 30.

Did that one person have any co-morbidities? Even without knowing this, I think the figures you present tend to support my view that for anyone young and healthy the risk of severe illness is very low.

By the way, you notice that the article stated that anyone is at the risk of being hospitalised with COVID not due to COVID?

Although looking at hospitalisations does not give a complete picture, we would have a much clearer idea of the situation if data for hospitalisations due to COVID (not just with COVID) was available broken down by age as it is for case numbers, and even clearer if this was split to show those with and without co-morbidities. Data for deaths displayed the same way would be invaluable.

Rather than coercing people to get vaccinated by offering the possibility of winning a lottery, this data may truly encourage those at high risk not just to get vaccinated ASAP, but to take additional precautions to reduce the risk of infection (particularly limiting indoor contact with others in public places) even when restrictions are lifted. I think this above all else would help reduce deaths and the stress on our hospitals, without mandating vaccination for many who wish to keep their jobs.

SWL

[El Pinguino]

Originally Posted by Seaworthy Lass

I think more than one data point is needed to conclude that “it is safe to say that people across all age groups are getting seriously ill”.

Anyway, of the 18 cases you report who were in intensive care at the time, despite case numbers markedly being driven by the under 30’s, there was only 1 person under 30 in intensive care and 17 over 30.

Did that one person have any co-morbidities? Even without knowing this, I think the figures you present tend to support my view that for anyone young and healthy the risk of severe illness is very low.

By the way, you notice that the article stated that anyone is at the risk of being hospitalised with COVID not due to COVID?

Although looking at hospitalisations does not give a complete picture, we would have a much clearer idea of the situation if data for hospitalisations due to COVID (not just with COVID) was available broken down by age as it is for case numbers, and even clearer if this was split to show those with and without co-morbidities. Data for deaths displayed the same way would be invaluable.

Rather than coercing people to get vaccinated by offering the possibility of winning a lottery, this data may truly encourage those at high risk not just to get vaccinated ASAP, but to take additional precautions to reduce the risk of infection (particularly limiting indoor contact with others in public places) even when restrictions are lifted. I think this above all else would help reduce deaths and the stress on our hospitals, without mandating vaccination for many who wish to keep their jobs.

SWL

Have you ever thought of writing a letter to the editor of The Age?
You would reach a far greater audience. On this thread I think your Victorian audience is somewhere south of six and this one at least is quite happy with mandatory vaccinations for certain workers, esp health care and teaching ( teaching coverage was at 98.1% the other day - pre mandate ).

[HankOnthewater]

Regarding above 3 posts:
I agree numbers of each age group do not tell the whole story, as pointed out, reasons can be 'due to' covid or 'with' covid.
Any admission to a hospital (in a ward or ICU) is complicated because of covid. And often people with comorbidities or lack of help at home, are admitted to hospital for that reason, not always because of covid symptoms or need for covid treatment. In the same vein, there might be patients with particular care needs moved from a ward to an ICU, and covid not being the primary reason.
I tried to PM SWL, but could not.

[Wotname]

Meanwhile in Launceston (epicentre of Tassie's current single covid case), spring is in the air, hot sunny day (about 17-19C), school holidays, crowds everywhere, zero social distancing, not a mask in sight, hand sanitisers unused but most diligently using the QR check in codes.

Let's hope the crowd complacently is not a harbinger of a lock downed community; we will know by next week I guess...

[Seaworthy Lass]

Originally Posted by El Pinguino

Have you ever thought of writing a letter to the editor of The Age?

Crikey, I don’t think the editor would cope.

Maybe Penthouse letters instead? .

[goboatingnow]

Originally Posted by Seaworthy Lass

Thanks for the link.



Number of participants were not included:

“After injection into the human dermis, we could document the translation of the exogenous mRNA. Our results pave the way toward the use of mRNA as a vehicle for transient gene delivery in humans.”



I have tried where possible to provide links to papers in reputable journals to support my comments. This lead me to finding the paper I reported.



This does not detract from the fact that last year Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine was the first mRNA vaccine of any kind to receive provisional/conditional/emergency approval (designation has varied between countries) and that clinical trials are incomplete.



It also does not detract the fact that these vaccines have been lifesaving for the vulnerable and risk/benefit is overwhelmingly in their favour for this group. My concern is the use of these vaccines where risk of severe disease is extremely low, specifically the healthy young.



SWL

Vaccines help even in the healthy young. Helping is enough reason for me. No one is forcing young people to be vaccinated . All vaccines were offered on a voluntary basis.

Here 90% take up suggests the anti Vaxxers argument held very little sway.

This argument is now stale. Vaccines for COVID are here to stay. Most people will take them. Move along now nothing to see here

[GILow]

Originally Posted by Wotname

… hand sanitisers unused but most diligently using the QR check in codes.

I generally found the hand sanitiser dispensers either expelled a sad little puff of air or dumped a litre of sticky goo in your hands which took an hour to massage in or had to be wiped on your trousers.

You wouldn’t have wanted to light a match near me, that’s for sure.

[El Pinguino]

I despair for Australia.
Beer Factory?
The CUB beer factory??

https://www.theage.com.au

[El Pinguino]

Originally Posted by goboatingnow

Vaccines help even in the healthy young. Helping is enough reason for me. No one is forcing young people to be vaccinated . All vaccines were offered on a voluntary basis.

Here 90% take up suggests the anti Vaxxers argument held very little sway.

This argument is now stale. Vaccines for COVID are here to stay. Most people will take them. Move along now nothing to see here

Exactly - in Australia over 90% of over 60's ( who it is safe to assume are under no employment mandate ) are vaccinated.
In the ACT - which has a very young population - 95% first vax was reached today.
Through the SE coast states its 85%.

Sometimes I think I am listening to some one from Destiny ChurchCity Impact Church in NZ
https://www.stuff.co.nz/pou-tiaki/30...e-megachurches

[Dockhead]

Vaccination program in Australia is absolutely unbelievable, if these numbers can be believed:





Oz passed the U.S. a week or two ago and will pass the EU in the next days, for people with at least one dose in them.


Who would have expected such a zero to hero feat?


The people fully vaccinated numbers are much less than this, but that's not the important metric. The rate of vaccination continues at over 1 per 100 per day despite already reaching a fairly high vaccination rate. This is phenomenal.


And reflected already in the daily case numbers, which are increasing at a non-exponential rate.


I would thinking about pulling off the restrictions pretty soon. This is what the end looks like.


Norway and Denmark have already declared an end to the pandemic and have pulled off everything. I hope Sweden and Finland will follow soon. I was starting to think normal life would never return.