Pandemic of the Unvaccinated--Right?

I'm starting to wonder if I should cancel my trip to West Virginia and go someplace without COVID--someplace with a high vaccination rate where they've pretty much gotten rid of COVID. That's how it works, right--when enough people get vaccinated, you get rid of COVID? We only have a 50% vaccination rate here in the US. It's only 43% in West Virginia. The horror! It's put us in a pandemic of the unvaccinated, according to the CDC in an article from a few weeks ago.

People who are fully vaccinated are protected against severe Covid-19, including the delta variant, [CDC Director Dr. Rochelle] Walensky said.

Where to jet off to? England seems like a nice place, so full of pretty scenery, history, and impressive architecture and twee towns. The UK has an impressive vaccination rate of 73%, too. There must not be much COVID there...right?

Source: Spectator UK

Oh! They must have taken most of their vaccines around the end of July...right?

Source: Spectator UK

Wait...wasn't "freedom day" on July 19--the day before positive tests started going down? Weird! Maybe I'll visit when they have COVID under better control. Meantime, Iceland looks interesting. Their vaccination rate is 75% and CNN says they have a rigorous tracking and tracing system, masks required at the airport, and nose and throat swabs to "filter out" anyone carrying the virus. COVID carriers have to quarantine for 14 days. And their death rate is only three per 100,000 people compared to 440 per 100,000 in the UK. It just gets better and better.

Oops--that article is almost 45 days old. Their Chief Epidemiologist said today that

In the past two to three weeks, the Delta variant has outstripped all others in Iceland and it has become clear that vaccinated people can easily contract it as well and spread it to others.

Health authorities in Iceland sent a memo to their government warning them about the "heavy strain on the healthcare system cause[d] by the current record rate of infection." It must be those selfish, irresponsible people who haven't gotten vaccinated...right?

Source: https://www.covid.is/data

Around 24 have had to be hospitalised in this wave, just over 1%...However, 2.4% of unvaccinated people that contract COVID-19 now are hospitalised.

But I thought we were in a "pandemic of the unvaccinated"! Whatever it is that's going on, I don't want to go where there's an outbreak or a strained hospital system or looming restrictions. So I have the answer: Gibraltar--it's nearly 100% vaccinated.

Source: CDC.

Or maybe I'll avoid Gibraltar altogether. But there's finally a clue about what's going on. The CDC admitted that

...even fully vaccinated travelers might be at increased risk for getting and possibly spreading some Covid-19 variants.

Maybe I should take another look at West Virginia, even if they only have a 43% vaccination rate. What does their dashboard say?

Source: WV Covid dashboard

Gee, it's like vaccination rates don't have anything to do with COVID spread. What was it the epidemiologist from Iceland said--

...it has become clear that vaccinated people can easily contract [the Delta variant] as well and spread it to others.

* * * * *

I admit I was kidding about changing my vacation plans. I've already bought a new bikini and Iceland and England seem a bit chilly for it. My beef is with the blaming, shaming, punishment, and at this point, lying about people who don't want an experimental medicine. Anyone with an internet connection and a little curiosity can figure out that we're not going to vaccinate our way out of the pandemic.

Comments

Dana Carpender's Podcast; Dr. Davis on YouTube; Labor Day Sales

Dana Carpender, who's written several recipe books and other works on low-carb, has a podcast and is still writing articles at carbsmart.com. She's a terrific writer and amateur researcher (otherwise known as reading , as Jimmy Dore jokes ). I use her book 500 Low-Carb Recipes all the time and I'm looking forward to hearing more from her. I've embedded her podcast on my blog (click on the three lines at the top right if you don't see it, or go to Spotify or other podcast source if you're getting this by email). Carbsmart.com doesn't seem to have a blog feed, so if you want to see the latest posts there, you can sign up for notifications at their site. Dr. Davis has been putting a lot more videos on YouTube, so I've added his channel to the lineup. Click on the three lines on my blog if you don't see it, or go to his channel here . * * * * * Primal Kitchen is having a Labor Day sale-- 20% off everything. They sell high quality collagen powder, con...

Fermented bread and butter pickle recipe ft. L. Plantarum

After Dr. Davis said the other night that L. plantarum may reduce some of the effects of the herbicide glyphosate (which is everywhere), I'm re-running my recipe for fermented bread and butter pickles. Pickling cucumbers naturally have L. plantarum bacteria on them, and fermenting them with some brown sugar multiplies these bacteria. (Just don't use chlorinated water to wash them.) And if you're growing your own cucumbers, avoid spraying the fruits with Bacillus thuringiensis , or Bt (leaves and vines are OK). It's unclear what effect a big dose of Bt would have on humans. Another benefit of DIY pickles: no emulsifiers like polysorbate 80, which is a common ingredient in pickles. If you have GI problems, it could be from emulsifiers. These sweet-and-sour pickles are the tastiest I've ever made. There's just a little added sugar (some of which the bacteria will consume) and turmeric that gives the pickles their bright color. Special equipment Quar...

Cardio: A Waste of Valuable Dance Time

"I'd rather hold a girl in my arms than a football." -Joe DeCicco, friend and dancing fanatic Have you heard that it takes a woman 77 hours of exercise to lose a kilogram of fat? (For us Americans, that's half a pound.) That's according to a study cited by Dr. John Briffa .(1) The women who huffed and puffed three hours a week for a year ended up 4.4 pounds lighter than the sedentary women. That doesn't surprise me: my own weight loss involved a lot less exercise than what I'd been doing. I did no cardio workouts, just strength training . I had more time and energy for dancing, which is a stress reliever, helps keep me in shape, and it's a ton of fun. It's not expensive to dance (as long as you stay away from the studios). I've found excellent lessons at clubs where the teachers really care about the students getting it. Here in Denver, there are dancing clubs that are run by nonprofit organizations, where the prices are reasonable and...

Avoiding a Nightmare by Using Math

The answer lies in trigonometry. -Sherlock Holmes Don't worry if you never learned trigonometry--the answers here lie in arithmetic. Medical test results often come back positive or negative, as if the result were a certainty. Of course, there is the accuracy, but if the accuracy is 99% or so, what does that really mean? That you should get your affairs in order? Before you call your probate attorney, let's take an example from the book Calculated Risks by Gerd Gigerenzer. Let's say you're a 40-something year old woman with no symptoms of breast cancer. You have a positive mammogram. What are the odds you have breast cancer? Using some assumptions about test accuracy and rates of disease based on real data, the odds that you'd have breast cancer are one in eleven according to Gigerenzer. (If you were way off, don't feel bad--most of the physicians Gigerenzer tested were way off, too--and they had the data in front of them. Not that that's comforting in every...

Lousy Mood? It Could be the Food

Here's a funny AMV(1) on what it's like to be depressed, apathetic and overly sensitive. Note: explicit (but funny) lyrics in the video. Hearing this song brought a startling realization: I used to be emo, but with normal clothes. Sulking, sobbing and writing poetry were my hobbies. When I was a kid, my mother said that she wouldn't know what to do to punish me if I had done something wrong. And yet things got worse. Over a two-week period in 1996, my best friend moved away, I lost my job and broke up with my boyfriend. I lost my appetite and lived on a daily bagel, cream cheese and a Coke for the next few months. I had tried counseling, and didn't find it helpful; in fact, I found reviving painful memories was pointless. Not thinking about them, on the other hand, worked wonders. Later on, so did studying philosophy and learning to think through emotions instead of just riding through them. But what's blown away all the techniques is diet. Since I s...

Pain, Pain, Go Away!

Search This Blog