“[T]he modeling estimated that COVID-19 vaccination [in the United States] prevented 3.25 million deaths…. Averted hospitalizations were estimated at 18.6 million…. For infections, the model estimated a dodge of 119.85 million.”
“[T]he modeling estimated that COVID-19 vaccination [in the United States] prevented 3.25 million deaths…. Averted hospitalizations were estimated at 18.6 million…. For infections, the model estimated a dodge of 119.85 million.”
“No longer needing to sing at high frequencies that could be heard over the highway’s rumble, the sparrows’ songs became more expansive, occupying more of the soundscape’s ‘acoustic bandwidth.’ Even those with quiet voices became audible; in those first months, ‘you could hear four times as many birds as you could before,’ says [Professor Elizabeth] Derryberry.”
“[M]y professional bias influences my priorities: Ensure the vulnerable around us (like grandparents) do not end up in the hospital with COVID-19 (or flu or RSV). This means we are going to do everything in our power to break transmission chains before gathering for the holidays.”
“Whenever COVID-19 cases doubled, climate-related tweets dropped by about 5 percent. The doubling of COVID-19 deaths saw climate tweeting decline by over 7 percent. … [A] big boost in case counts could easily offset the arrival of a major hurricane.”
“The majority of long Covid patients — more than 75 percent, according to some estimates — were never hospitalized for their original infection. For these people, uncovering the reasons for their enduring illness is less straightforward, though scientists have several leads.”
“A study from J&J in September [2021] showed that after a second dose, the J&J vaccine was about 91% effective, nearly matching the efficacy of the Pfizer and Moderna shots after two doses.”
“‘If the Black Death caused the Renaissance will the COVID pandemic cause a golden age?’ You see the problems with the question now: the Black Death didn’t cause the Renaissance, not by itself, and the Renaissance was not a golden age, at least not the kind that you would want to live in, or to see your children live in.”
“Think of it this way: SARS-CoV-2, the virus, causes COVID-19, the disease — and it doesn’t have to. Vaccination can disconnect the two.”
“If there is any reason for hope in the growing epidemic of long COVID, it is that some academic medical centers are taking these patients seriously and tailoring treatment to them. Medicine’s history with hard-to-identify chronic illnesses, particularly those that mainly affect women, has not been a good one.”
“Here we encounter our first surprise. The normal RNA characters are A, C, G and U. U is also known as ‘T’ in DNA. But here we find a Ψ, what is going on?”
“The toilet paper made for the commercial market is a fundamentally different product from the toilet paper you buy in the store. It comes in huge rolls, too big to fit on most home dispensers. The paper itself is thinner and more utilitarian. It comes individually wrapped and is shipped on huge pallets.”
“[A] new report published in The Lancet describing 41 early cases in the outbreak indicate that the earliest identified person sickened had no epidemiological links to the [Wuhan animal] market.”
(Added November 2022: This was the first thing I posted about the plague, and the first thing that really made me think it might be something that would affect my family.)