This piece was written just before the holidays…
Two Years Out: The 6 Vs of COVID-19
It’s now been six months since One Year Out: The 5 Ds of COVID-19 was published and we are nearly two years into the pandemic. While the original 5 D’s have stayed the same, well, sort of, in fact, we have more Deaths, Disparities, new Disinformation, new Discovery and we still Don’t Know much; boy have things changed.
From a July 4th speech shortly after the Viewpoint’s publication in which President Biden said:
“Today, all across this nation, we can say with confidence: America is coming back together,… Today, while the virus hasn’t been vanquished, we know this: It no longer controls our lives, it no longer paralyzes our nation and it’s within our power to make sure it never does so again.”[1]
The United States is now at 807,952[2] deaths and rising, vaccination rates in the United States are not great and we now need boosters. It feels as if most people are just moving on, done with the virus and its potential impact.
So, let’s get to it, in addition to the 5 D’s here are the 6 V’s of COVID-19, Variants, Virulence, Vacations, Vaccines, Values, and Vomit.
Variants – from Alpha to Delta to Omicron, Variants should be the buzzword of 2021. Just when we thought we were near finishing a round of Delta and moving to some sort of lower-level endemic status, here comes the next Variant, Omicron. And suddenly we aren’t.
Virulence – we know Omicron is more contagious but is it more Virulent? Its R0 is estimated to be 10[3] and it’s rapidly spreading around the world. New York City is seeing the highest number of daily infections ever[4] and they continue to rise. Will it impact the hospitals and healthcare system? Some speculate that given its rapid spread, and ability to infect fully vaccinated people, hospitals will be short-staffed as their own vaccinated employees get infected and must take time from work to isolate, and that’s what we are now seeing
Vacations – It’s the holiday season and joy may not be found. Having read twitter accounts of fully vaccinated, well-intentioned people, who do rapid tests prior to getting together in small groups getting infected, seeing the spread in the various sports leagues[5], and around the world; I think this vacation season could be a mass spreader event. There are already calls to scale back if not cancel vacations and family get-togethers.
Vaccines, Vaccines, Vaccines – there are a few updates here, all, important:
- We need more people vaccinated worldwide, it’s as simple as that. Until we have fewer opportunities for this virus to propagate and mutate the better. We also need more people getting the third dose. Evidence shows that the second dose is not effective against Omicron.
- We’ve learned that vaccine immunity wanes and with some of the vaccines it does so rapidly.3
- Early research suggests that many of the world’s vaccines that are not mRNA-based provide little protection from infection with Omicron.[6] Omicron may also not be affected by some monoclonal antibodies.[7]
Values – What are our values? Do we value life? Do we value others? Is it all about the economy? Or is it all about me??? Almost everywhere you turn, you see polarization, our values are splitting us apart as a country and it appears the same is occurring in other nations around the world. Our values are causing this pandemic to go on, and on and on like the Eveready bunny hooked up to a solar charger. People may be done with the virus but the virus ain’t done with us.
Vomit – It’s what I and some others now feel like doing now that we are two years into this pandemic. The event horizon for getting back to some semblance of normalcy, fewer infections, more activities, lower deaths, seemed to disappear again just out of reach. It’s time for all of us to put away the Crystal ball, mine is now obscured by my last lunch.
Taking all of this into account, and of course, looking into my Past Period Crystal Ball with which I’m 20/20; the President on July 4, to be generous, was hitting perhaps 1 out of 3. The virus still “control’s our lives”, it is “paralyzing our nation again”, but and I say this with a tinge of disbelief and a major weasel statement… It MAY still be “…within our Power to make sure it never does so again”…. and then again it MAY NOT.
I finished the first piece with:
We can look back, but we must work forward. As we continue this journey, we must change the structures that caused our failures; get people vaccinated; come together as a society; understand and learn more about this disease; improve our response to future pandemics, including centralizing the approach and building and maintaining the infrastructure to contact trace, quarantine, and isolate; help those in need, and do better. We are only through the first year. There is more to do, and we can improve. Let’s finish this course strong.
And how was my batting average? Well, I may be only 1 out of 6; we now “understand and continue to learn more about this disease”, but that’s a given, that’s human nature and science in action. As to the other changes needed, we continue to fail.
What was once a course has turned into a Ph.D., and we are two years into three? Seven? Who knows? Having learned the basics, it’s now time to do some work and do something about it, or perhaps not.
[1] Bloomberg. (2021, July 4). Biden Declares Success in Beating Pandemic in July 4 Speech. Bloomberg.com. Retrieved December 21, 2021, from https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-07-04/biden-to-appeal-for-vaccinations-after-u-s-missed-july-4-target
[2] Covid-19 map. Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center. (2021, December 21). Retrieved December 21, 2021, from https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/map.html
[3] Burki, T. K. (2021, December 17). Omicron variant and booster COVID-19 vaccines. Retrieved December 21, 2021, from https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanres/article/PIIS2213-2600(21)00559-2/fulltext
[4] The New York Times. (2021, December 21). New York coronavirus map and case count. The New York Times. Retrieved December 21, 2021, from https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/us/new-york-covid-cases.html
[5] Stern, J. (2021, December 20). Sports leagues are showing us just how bad omicron could get. The Atlantic. Retrieved December 21, 2021, from https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2021/12/omicron-sports-leagues-nfl-nba/621079/
[6] Nolen, S. (2021, December 19). Most of the world’s vaccines likely won’t prevent infection from Omicron. The New York Times. Retrieved December 21, 2021, from https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/19/health/omicron-vaccines-efficacy.html
[7] Striking Antibody Evasion Manifested by the Omicron Variant of SARS-CoV-2 Lihong Liu, Sho Iketani, Yicheng Guo, Jasper F-W. Chan, Maple Wang, Liyuan Liu, Yang Luo, Hin Chu, Yiming Huang, Manoj S. Nair, Jian Yu, Kenn K-H. Chik, Terrence T-T. Yuen, Chaemin Yoon, Kelvin K-W. To, Honglin Chen, Michael T. Yin, Magdalena E. Sobieszczyk, Yaoxing Huang, Harris H. Wang, Zizhang Sheng, Kwok-Yung Yuen, David D. Ho bioRxiv 2021.12.14.472719; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.12.14.472719