COVID Strikes IPMS-USA

[Space Ranger]

There are reports on Facebook and the IPMS-USA forum that indicate that the recently concluded Omaha national convention may have been a super-spreader event, with fewer than 10% of the attendees masked, and attendees testing positive upon their return home.

 

Be careful out there!

[3DStewart]

As far as I can see no one cares any longer in the UK.  It's become like a cold, or maybe flu if you get it bad.

 

Covid is cancelled.  It's time to get on with life.

 

Edited July 26, 2022 by 3DStewart

[RaceAddict]

1 hour ago, Space Ranger said:

There are reports on Facebook and the IPMS-USA forum that indicate that the recently concluded Omaha national convention may have been a super-spreader event, with fewer than 10% of the attendees masked, and attendees testing positive upon their return home.

 

Be careful out there!

 

The only people masking anywhere for any reason around here are those with severely compromised immune systems... which is sensible in any case.

 

That said, a gathering of people of whatever kind... from a wedding to a convention like IPMS Nats or Comicon is likely to have an "outbreak" of con-crud. This was the case before COVID, and will continue to be the case afterwards.

[iang]

11 hours ago, 3DStewart said:

As far as I can see no one cares any longer in the UK.  It's become like a cold, or maybe flu if you get it bad.

 

Covid is cancelled.  It's time to get on with life.

 

Not perhaps for the 500 people who died last week in the UK from Covid, or their family and friends. Preventing any of these deaths through public health measures (such as requiring mask wearing on public transport and crowded indoor settings, or requiring positive individuals to isolate by law), is clearly too much of an infringement of our individual liberties. 

 

[RobL]

11 hours ago, 3DStewart said:

As far as I can see no one cares any longer in the UK.  It's become like a cold, or maybe flu if you get it bad.

 

Covid is cancelled.  It's time to get on with life.

 

 

That's why hospital admissions have been rising is it?

 

As a person who understands the scientific information, and a former NHS worker, I am fed up with the "get on with it" ignorance in this country and all the nonsense excuses banded around by people who are clearly in denial, and only get their (mis)information from dubious social media accounts.  We've now got Monkeypox being spread around like sweets at a party as well as a new variant of SARS-Cov-2 which is looking like the most problematic variant so far.  Seems like we're back in the 80s when HIV/AIDS first emerged!

 

How many viri and diseases do people want to take the risk of ending up, or putting others, in hospital with?

 

SARS-Cov-2 being an IQ test would be funny, if it weren't for the disruption and pressure it puts on public services, and the consequent negative impact on people's lives.

 

Sorry.  /rant

Edited July 27, 2022 by RobL

[Robert]

I was watching the Comic Con event at San Diego last weekend and to me the majority were wearing masks. I suppose it is down to the organisers of the event and which rules they decide upon.

 

Regards

Robert

[Skodadriver]

21 minutes ago, RobL said:

 

That's why hospital admissions have been rising is it?

 

As a person who understands the scientific information I am fed up with the "get on with it" ignorance in this country and all the nonsense excuses banded around by people who are clearly in denial, and only get their information from dubious social media accounts.  We've now got Monkeypox being spread around like sweets at a party.  Seems like we're back in the 80s when HIV/AIDS first emerged!

 

How many viri and diseases do people want to take the risk of ending up, or putting others, in hospital with?

 

SARS-Cov-2 being an IQ test would be funny, if it weren't for the disruption and pressure it puts on public services, and the consequent negative impact on people's lives.

 

Sorry.  /rant

I suspect that the current laissez-faire attitude is at least partly a reaction to the lockdown measures which were arguably excessive when compared to countries like Sweden. They were worse here in Scotland than south of the border and if the restrictions hadn't been lifted when they were people would almost certainly have started ignoring them anyway.

 

There is a balance to be struck between allowing people to lead normal lives and minimising the risk of transmitting infectious diseases. Whether we are currently striking the correct balance isn't for me to say but I wouldn't be confident that the high level of public compliance with the earlier restrictions will be repeated.

 

Ironically a friend of mine who was still wearing a mask when everyone else had given up contracted the virus a few weeks ago and was ill enough to teeter on the brink of hospital admission. Fortunately he is now beginning to recover but on any view he was seriously unwell and religiously wearing a mask failed to prevent that. 

 

Having said all that, I will be exhibiting at a show this coming weekend and I will be wearing an FFP2 mask for the simple reason that in Scotland about one person in fifteen has Covid and you don't have to be a mathematical genius to work out the likelihood of coming into contact with such a person at a busy model show. While I'm a tad sceptical of the value of masks, wearing one won't harm the wearer and I'm happy to take advantage of whatever protection it offers.

 

Dave G

[RobL]

With all due respect @Skodadriver you seem to be repeating some nonsense (hopefully inadvertently) that has been around the internet since early in the pandemic.

 

I would hope that this thread does not turn into one that perpetuates the spread of such nonsense, disguised as opinion or otherwise.

 

 

Mask wearing is not to protect you, it's to protect other people.  That's been repeated since day 0 of the pandemic and there are countless studies proving it, that are freely available to read and hosted by reputable sources, including Cambridge University.

 

So, whilst your "friend" caught SARS-Cov-2, it wasn't ironic.  However if he carried on wearing a mask he will have reduced the likelihood that he passed it on.  Sadly though, if the majority are not wearing a mask at the event you are going to, you may as well be in a boat with other people, plugging a hole with your thumb, whilst others drill further holes in the boat.

 

Sweden is an outlier in their approach, due to their population density and geography, and their approach may not have worked elsewhere.  They also didn't do quite as well as the anti-lockdown, anti-any public health measures at all, crowd would like to believe.  If you want an example of not taking necessary measures, Brazil took a much more ignorant approach of doing nothing at all to begin with, and fared far worse than most countries besides the US.  I recall at one point it was 600k dead from Covid and 60% unemployment as a result of the disruption caused by the spread of SARS-Cov-2.

 

Again, that's all confirmed by data freely available and hosted by reputable sources.

 

You are right however that with an estimated 1 in 15 people in Scotland and 1 in 17 in England (don't know about Wales/NI, likely to be similar) carrying SARS-Cov-2 you don't have to be a mathematical genius...

Edited July 27, 2022 by RobL
spelling, grammar, clarification of points

[Skodadriver]

1 hour ago, RobL said:

With all due respect @Skodadriver you seem to be repeating some nonsense (hopefully inadvertently) that has been around the internet since early in the pandemic.

 

 

 

There has been an awful lot of "nonsense" around Covid for the past two years. I am fully aware that wearing a mask is primarily intended to protect other people (I'm not quite that stupid ...) but there is also evidence that wearing a mask helps to protect the wearer. I'm not a scientist and don't read scientific papers with any regularity but to give just one example the British Heart Foundation, an entirely reputable organisation, has a section on its website about "Learning to live with Covid" which includes detailed guidance about the best type of mask to wear for your own protection.

[Graham Boak]

I note that whereas the US is able to quote figures of the spread of Covid from an IMPS convention,  but the the UK was not able to quote any equivalent figures from ours.  Leaving the incurably optimistic dreamers to suggest no effect.  Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

 

A couple of weeks ago I stopped wearing masks in shops.  Bang- my wife and I came down with Covid.. Don't try to tell me it's all over.  Fortunately, being topped up with vaccines, we only had a couple of days being pretty dodgy, but I took eleven days to show negative.  I am still weak and get very tired just walking to the coffee shop and back.  I don't recall taking six monthly vaccinations against colds, and have never been affected for quite as long afterwards - My brother-in-law took four weeks to get back to normal..  Another more remote family member ended up in hospital.    Some cold.  Of course, this is just anecdotal evidence...But there is large holes in the statistics.  You can catch Covid, attempt to report it, and if you didn't use an NHS test you will not be included in the official figures.  These understate the true spread of the disease - it isn't even necessary to test, or isolate if you can't be  bothered because it affects your precious "rights"  And if you take an unacceptable time to die (over 28 days) you are not counted in the death toll.

 

It is tragic - in some cases quite literally - to see how selfish lazy attitudes "it's too much trouble..." have coloured the public response.  But supporting such a blinkered approach is despicable.  If anyone wants to s off and die he/she is welcome to do it, though preferably in a way that doesn't occupy hospital space,, but taking other people with you is evil.

[RobL]

1 hour ago, Skodadriver said:

 

I am fully aware that wearing a mask is primarily intended to protect other people (I'm not quite that stupid ...)  but there is also evidence that wearing a mask helps to protect the wearer. I'm not a scientist and don't read scientific papers with any regularity but to give just one example the British Heart Foundation, an entirely reputable organisation, has a section on its website about "Learning to live with Covid" which includes detailed guidance about the best type of mask to wear for your own protection.

 

That's good then.  Forgive me for being blunt, but some of the wording you used in your initial post, I have seen crop up many times in anti-mask, anti-lockdown, basically anti-doing anything public health related if it means one has to raise a finger and do something for others, rhetoric, trying to be disguised as innocent opinion, across the internet this past couple of years.  Hence my response.

 

I think we have to be very careful in what is stated in relation to SARS-Cov-2, it's spread, the resulting disease, Covid, and the measures to mitigate it.  Discussions like this are how misinformation spreads in the first place.

Edited July 27, 2022 by RobL

[cmatthewbacon]

My wife and I have got it this week, having dodged it for 2+ years. We’re as vaccinated as two 57 year olds can be, and it’s still pretty horrible. Definitely worse than any cold I’ve had, though having had real actual ‘flu once, it’s nothing like that bad. For four or five days of the flu, I (and my wife who was nursing me) could understand how you could die of it…

 

The permanent symptoms seem to be exhaustion, fever, and aching. The rest are changing day by day, but all pretty unpleasant.

 

Still, these days there’s a good chance that by the end of next week, I’ll be more or less back to normal. I wouldn’t wish it on anyone, and “over and done with” it ain’t…

best,

M.

[Mr T]

Thanks RobL for your posts reminding us that Covid is not finished with us yet. 

Mrs T saw two patients in one day that required hospital admission last week due to Covid, and the local hospitals are beginning to struggle again. This year we will probably see a return to more 'normal' pattern of winter admissions, even without Covid. As has been mentioned elsewhere Covid 19 is a member of the same group of viruses that are responsible for colds. As a group they can mutate quickly, and think what diseases like the common cold and smallpox did to indigenous people in the early sixteenth century and beyond. 

[Chimpion]

I must confess I am somewhat baffled as to how "we have to learn to live with it" is almost invariably used to mean "we should pretend it doesn't exist". These two sentiments are diametrically opposed. I have to live with it being freezing cold in winter but I do that by wearing a warm coat, not by going out in a T-shirt and shorts as I did in the time before winter arrived.

 

 

[IanHx]

On 7/27/2022 at 9:59 AM, Skodadriver said:

 but I wouldn't be confident that the high level of public compliance with the earlier restrictions will be repeated.

 

 

 

Without going into banned territory,  I'd like to put forward that the chances of the public following any future public health advice are effectively zero after the Partygate and Wine Time Friday debacles.

 

Back to modelling.....

[Mike]

Thin-ice time folks. 

 

Let's not get into the whys and why nots of masks and such.  Everyone follow their own counsel, and if you're going to be around any immunocompromised people, think about wearing a mask for their sake.  you know it makes sense

[noelh]

Well I  finally got it. The only 'present' from my teenagers after a scout trip to Denmark. It's  seems mild but uncomfortable so far but I've had all the vaccinations. My wife has avoided up to  this but she may be a day or two behind.

 

I won't  be wearing a mask because I  won't  be leaving the or even the room for a week.

 

Edited August 9, 2022 by noelh

[Mike]

Again.  This is for information and so forth, not to expound your own particular point of view, no matter whether it's cautious or reckless.  Can we stick to the topic in hand please?