China travel bans from Late 2022

[MEL_Traveller]

If a person contracts HIV and starts treatment within one year there is now no reduction in life expectancy.

Not sure that’s relevant to someone knowingly passing it on. The same rules don’t apply to other potentially life threatening diseases, such as the flu or covid. Likely because you can’t prove it.

 

[drron]

Not sure that’s relevant to someone knowingly passing it on. The same rules don’t apply to other potentially life threatening diseases, such as the flu or covid. Likely because you can’t prove it.

An irrelevant comment. I was commenting on the fact that some members were using HIV as a virus with dire consequences and I was pointing out not neccessarily so.

 

[Mr H]

An irrelevant comment. I was commenting on the fact that some members were using HIV as a virus with dire consequences and I was pointing out not neccessarily so.

 

[Mr H]

FWIW, our workplace seems to be in two minds about Covid. If you get it you are supposed to isolate. But in practice, getting Covid is frowned upon and you are made to feel you have done something wrong, especially if you are not well enough to work. We are supposed to show up in person 3 days a week but compliance is not high, and the slightest hint of a wave of Covid and people work remotely. It feels like a transition stage that is not sustainable, but none of us knows what the future stable state will look like.

 

[JohnK]

You’ve hit the nail on the head.

With chickenpox you can see it. With something like HIV you can probably narrow it down to the person who gave it to you.

With the flu or covid you can’t prove anything. So there are no ramifications. It’s highly unlikely you’ll ever face criminal charges.

So the mentality is that if you die from flu or covid that it's probably because you're too old and you were going to die anyway. Gee I feel great that people are allowed to make their own assessment of what's dangerous and what's not.

And @Pushka you have been hounding me about my individual choices regarding covid but at the same time you are happy that Australia has moved on and assessed the risk of covid is very minimal.

Just so you are aware I still wear a mask in shopping centres and in crowded outdoor places. I try to avoid crowds anyway and I've done extremely well to date and I have not caught covid.

I don't care what the science thinks and recommends as they've got covid totally wrong and are making the same mistake they've done with the flu. I quoted a few viruses in my post above and it's clear that flu and covid are one of the most dangerous viruses around and people dismiss the danger. Note that are quite a few more viruses with less deaths than flu or covid yet people treat them with caution.

Sad state of affairs.

 

[Lynda2475]

I keep going back to my experience just over 12 years ago. I ended up in hospital with chicken pox. It was quite severe.

If you didnt have chicken pox as a child why didnt you have the Chicken Pox vaccine as an adult? It has been available for 25 years or so. Chicken Pox is largely a non-event for kids (yes chicken pox play dates were a thing, that's how my mum made sure i had it during holidays and didn't miss any school) but known to be more serious in adults, so common sense to get vaccinated if you don't already have natural immunity.

And as you have had Chicken Pox, you should be looking to get the Shingles Vaccine if over 50.

There has to be some personal responsibility. In a highly vaccinated society the onus in on individual to get vaccinated to reduce their chances of getting seriously ill. If you want to take extra precautions mask up, but you cannot realistically impose this on everyone else given covid is not proving to be an issue for most.

 

[Pushka]

So the mentality is that if you die from flu or covid that it's probably because you're too old and you were going to die anyway. Gee I feel great that people are allowed to make their own assessment of what's dangerous and what's not.

And @Pushka you have been hounding me about my individual choices regarding covid but at the same time you are happy that Australia has moved on and assessed the risk of covid is very minimal.

Just so you are aware I still wear a mask in shopping centres and in crowded outdoor places. I try to avoid crowds anyway and I've done extremely well to date and I have not caught covid.

I don't care what the science thinks and recommends as they've got covid totally wrong and are making the same mistake they've done with the flu. I quoted a few viruses in my post above and it's clear that flu and covid are one of the most dangerous viruses around and people dismiss the danger. Note that are quite a few more viruses with less deaths than flu or covid yet people treat them with caution.

Sad state of affairs.

You have moved on yourself by the choices you are making in travelling overseas. The death rate from Covid in a highly vaccinated society is well below death rates of illnesses that cannot be prevented. If you don't agree with the science of virology then really the only thing you believe in is your own opinion. That of course doesn't mean decisions made on the basis of 'the science' but the raw science itself.

The severity of Covid infection seems to be random. From what I've read, the average length of residing in a Nursing care home is 18 months. So its hard to isolate the natural progression of life and age with pandemics such as Covid or flu.

 

[Tropic]

It appears in this "post" Covid world the mainstream mantra when it comes to testing and isolating when positive seems to be every (wo)man for themselves, and God for us all.... While thats consistent with broader societal narrative of the importance of the Individual and the pursuit of happiness, Im just not sure what the end point for this ongoing process of natural selection (survival of the fittest) looks like...esp if another variant arrives with a 50% kill rate...does it matter then?

 

[Mr H]

esp if another variant arrives with a 50% kill rate...does it matter then?

If another virus comes along with a 50% kill rate (case fatality rate?) then we would need a different response. But as it is, the Covid case fatality rate within a vaccinated population is a tiny fraction of a percent.

Risk and response are usually calculated to ensure that a response is not disproportionate to the risk - i.e. that the treatment of the risk is worth it. Change the case fatality rate or the infection rate and you change those pay off matrices and different courses of action become 'worth it'.

 

[Tropic]

Yep understand risk - response response. Just wondering how long it would take to get the immediate behaviorial change required for the risk off/on transition. Guess seeing dead people everywhere might change a few minds fairly quickly...but hopefully that wont happen

 

[Mr H]

Yep understand risk - response response. Just wondering how long it would take to get the immediate behaviorial change required for the risk off/on transition. Guess seeing dead people everywhere might change a few minds fairly quickly...but hopefully that wont happen

I think in the scenario you posit - case fatality rate of 50% - the change would come extremely quickly and have huge popular support. Of course, there's no more likelihood of seeing that scenario now than at any time in history.

 

[drron]

It appears in this "post" Covid world the mainstream mantra when it comes to testing and isolating when positive seems to be every (wo)man for themselves, and God for us all.... While thats consistent with broader societal narrative of the importance of the Individual and the pursuit of happiness, Im just not sure what the end point for this ongoing process of natural selection (survival of the fittest) looks like...esp if another variant arrives with a 50% kill rate...does it matter then?

Except the natural history of mutations to variants is that they generally get more infective but also less severe. it is how the 2018 influenza pandemic faded out even though there are still descendants of the original virus around though mutated.

 

[Tropic]

Yep, understand why virus mutations that are lethal to the host have rather limited evolutionary sucess.
Drron, interested if you have any views on the report by The Lancet Covid-19 Commission on lessons for the future from the COVID-19 pandemic (2022) and the paper by Harrison and Sachs (2022) in PNAS: https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2202769119

 

[drron]

I can't believe that the US organisations that were collaborating with the Wuhan laboratory agreed to the Chinese request to delete the viral sequences that they had been working on. So I suspect there is a link between the Wuhan laboratory and the emergence of Covid. If it was natural why would they want the viral sequences removed.
But it is only a supposition on my part.

 

[JohnK]

You have moved on yourself by the choices you are making in travelling overseas. The death rate from Covid in a highly vaccinated society is well below death rates of illnesses that cannot be prevented. If you don't agree with the science of virology then really the only thing you believe in is your own opinion. That of course doesn't mean decisions made on the basis of 'the science' but the raw science itself.

This has nothing to do with my opinion. This requires a fair amount of logic. The numbers are there for everyone to see.

We have around 6,000 deaths worldwide from chicken pox yet people are required to isolate and not go to school/office/public etc. We have between 250,000-650,000 deaths from flu worldwide and 1,000,000-2,3000,000 deaths from covid worldwide and people can assess the danger they pose to others.

I mean seriously? We isolate for chicken pox but not flu/covid. Which warped mind thinks this is logical?

And I've made the assessment that if I continue taking the right precautions then I will be fine. Flu vaccinations current. Covid vaccinations current. Wear masks amd stay away from crowds.

@Lynda2475 I had no idea what I had and didn't have as a child. Was it my responsibility to know there was a vaccine available in 1995 and I should check? Well blow me down with a feather. I found out the hard way in 2010 and nearly died.

 

[Mr H]

We have around 6,000 deaths worldwide from chicken pox yet people are required to isolate and not go to school/office/public etc. We have between 250,000-650,000 deaths from flu worldwide and 1,000,000-2,3000,000 deaths from covid worldwide and people can assess the danger they pose to others.

I mean seriously? We isolate for chicken pox but not flu/covid. Which warped mind thinks this is logical?

Logic requires smart thinking.

Chicken pox has a very high chance of serious consequences if caught by an adult. People get it once and numbers of adults who get it are small. The cost of asking those people to isolate is small and the benefit is great.

Flu is much more widespread, people can get it multiple times and the consequences for most people are not serious. It would be a high cost to mandate isolation and low benefit - nevertheless, people are asked to use common sense and isolate if they have it.

Covid mortality rates are skewed by early variants and an unvaccinated population. It is very virulent and almost everyone seems to get it, often multiple times a year. For vaccinated people the consequences are generally not very serious. The cost of mandating isolation for people with Covid was very, very high and the benefit now would be minimal. Nevertheless, just like with flu, people who have Covid are asked to use common sense and isolate.

 

[drron]

This has nothing to do with my opinion. This requires a fair amount of logic. The numbers are there for everyone to see.

We have around 6,000 deaths worldwide from chicken pox yet people are required to isolate and not go to school/office/public etc. We have between 250,000-650,000 deaths from flu worldwide and 1,000,000-2,3000,000 deaths from covid worldwide and people can assess the danger they pose to others.

I mean seriously? We isolate for chicken pox but not flu/covid. Which warped mind thinks this is logical?

And I've made the assessment that if I continue taking the right precautions then I will be fine. Flu vaccinations current. Covid vaccinations current. Wear masks amd stay away from crowds.

@Lynda2475 I had no idea what I had and didn't have as a child. Was it my responsibility to know there was a vaccine available in 1995 and I should check? Well blow me down with a feather. I found out the hard way in 2010 and nearly died.

And the low estimate for the 1918 flu epidemic deaths was 17.4 million of a total population of 1.8 billion.
So to have the same death rate from covid seeing the world population is now 7.7 billion it would need 77 million covid deaths to have the same death rate as that pandemic.

So what happened in 1920s? Everyone got out and partied and started the roaring 20s. And what happened to their health. Nothing much.

 

[Tropic]

Not clear if the US sponsored biolabs in Ukraine were also tasked with similar work the Wuhan lab was funded to do....eg.the labs the Sanitary-Epidemiological Department (SED) of the Medical Command of the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense received under the US DoD Biological Threat Reduction Program (DTRA)

Biological Threat Reduction Program

The U.S. Department of Defense’s Biological Threat Reduction Program collaborates with partner countries to counter the threat of outbreaks (deliberate,

ua.usembassy.gov

 

[Tropic]

So what happened in 1920s? Everyone got out and partied and started the roaring 20s. And what happened to their health. Nothing much.

Except perhaps catching a venereal disease. Apparently, in the US by the end of the 20s:

• Approximately 1 out of every 10 Americans suffered from syphilis.
• Each year, Americans contracted almost half a million new syphilis infections (twice as many cases as tuberculosis, and 100 times as many cases as polio).
• 18 percent of all deaths from organic heart disease could be attributed to syphilis.
• Up to 20 percent of all mental institution inmates suffered from tertiary syphilis.
• 60,000 children were born each year with congenital syphilis.

But other than that, nothing much

 

[Princess Fiona]

This has nothing to do with my opinion. This requires a fair amount of logic. The numbers are there for everyone to see.

We have around 6,000 deaths worldwide from chicken pox yet people are required to isolate and not go to school/office/public etc. We have between 250,000-650,000 deaths from flu worldwide and 1,000,000-2,3000,000 deaths from covid worldwide and people can assess the danger they pose to others.

I mean seriously? We isolate for chicken pox but not flu/covid. Which warped mind thinks this is logical?

And I've made the assessment that if I continue taking the right precautions then I will be fine. Flu vaccinations current. Covid vaccinations current. Wear masks amd stay away from crowds.

@Lynda2475 I had no idea what I had and didn't have as a child. Was it my responsibility to know there was a vaccine available in 1995 and I should check? Well blow me down with a feather. I found out the hard way in 2010 and nearly died.

There is one very important thing about varicella that does not apply to flu / covid.
Whilst all of them have a greater risk of causing serious illness in pregnant women, varicella (Chicken Pox) can have devastating effects on the developing foetus.
As with Rubella we as a society accept that we have to take some responsibility for the prevention of disability in unborn children. Hence the need to isolate yourself.