Mitigation Measures This paper from eastern Massachusetts found that school districts which dropped mask mandates right away had 44 cases of COVID-19 per 1000 students/staff (accounting for 30% of cases) compared to schools which kept masks. (Before they were allowed to drop mask mandates, the case rates were similar.) Here’s a Twitter thread with an… Continue reading week ending 2022-08-11 General
Category: Mitigation Measures
week ending 2022-08-04 General
Variants The current data, while confusing and somewhat contradictory, at least shows that our wave is not getting lots worse, and might even be going down. This seems really strange, when compared to how many other jurisdictions have gotten hammered. According to this blog post, the US had large shares of BA.2.12.1 — which shares… Continue reading week ending 2022-08-04 General
week ending 2022-07-21 General
You might have noticed that I now frequently put the country where the research was carried out next to the link. I do think because different countries have different demographic profiles, different vaccination programs/history, different wave histories, etc. Sometimes this matters, and I am not clever enough to figure out when. If work is done… Continue reading week ending 2022-07-21 General
week ending 2022-07-14 General
Vaccines This article reports that Moderna has been approved in Canada for kiddies between six months and five years old. This article reports that an Alberta judge ruled that it was okay to require transplant patients to get a COVID vax, given the scarcity of organs and the much higher likelihood that unvaxxed organ recipients… Continue reading week ending 2022-07-14 General
week ending 2022-07-07 General
Long COVID This paper says that they have found a really good blood marker (IL-2 release) for Long COVID. This paper from Italy found that risk of Long COVID decreased as the number of vaccines increase. (It was still 16% with three vaccines, however, still not good.) It found that things that decreased your risk… Continue reading week ending 2022-07-07 General
week ending 2022-06-30 General
Folks, BA.5 is coming and it’s going to be bad. Mentally prepare yourself for a big wave this summer. I don’t know where to put it, but this paper says that compared to peer countries, Canada: Did really well on per capita vaccinated, cases, and deaths. (You could argue that we’re fudging the numbers, but… Continue reading week ending 2022-06-30 General
week ending 2022-06-16 General
Long COVID This article about Long COVID in the US is interesting. It says that a lot of the indicators which you would expect to see Long COVID shift (e.g. number of disability claims, health care expenditures), have not in fact shifted. The article gives a number of possiblities: A lot of disabled people died… Continue reading week ending 2022-06-16 General
week ending 2022-06-02 General
Long COVID I was puzzled for a long time: all the statistics I saw said that Long COVID was really common — from 5% to 50%, depending on which study you looked at — but I didn’t know anybody with Long COVID! How could this be? I thought maybe it was because my echo chamber… Continue reading week ending 2022-06-02 General
week ending 2022-05-05 General
Mitigation Measures This site has links to a boatload of studies on masking. 21 of 24 studies found masks to be effective; one was inconclusive and one found that masks were not effective. Ten of the studies date from Dec 2021 or more recently. Long COVID There were three studies I found last week which… Continue reading week ending 2022-05-05 General
week ending 2022-04-28 General
Vaccines This article says that Moderna has formally filed a request that the US FDA approve their vax for children between 6 months and 5 years, yay! Moderna says the two-dose regime is 51% effective against infection. That doesn’t sound like much, but it is compared to kids without vax (who don’t get sick as… Continue reading week ending 2022-04-28 General