D&D and the rising pandemic

[Zardnaar]

Mask use just kinda automatic now. I suppose it's like training "who's a good boy" have a treatie.

My treatie usually meal or coffee. Woof.

 

[Umbran]

You might want to rephrase that as “people where I live” because it’s certainly not true everywhere.

I think it gets complicated.

In Japan, there's already a culture around wearing masks. So, if the responsible thing is to wear masks, then you can expect that to happen.

That does not mean that, whatever constitutes the "responsible thing", folks in Japan will spontaneously do that.

 

[Cadence]

Just out of curiosity, here is some on 2020 mask usage for a variety of countries from Global trends and predictors of face mask usage during the COVID-19 pandemic - BMC Public Health

Click on attachment for big graph:
View attachment 12889_2021_12175_Fig1_HTML.webp

 

[Hussar]

I think it gets complicated.

In Japan, there's already a culture around wearing masks. So, if the responsible thing is to wear masks, then you can expect that to happen.

That does not mean that, whatever constitutes the "responsible thing", folks in Japan will spontaneously do that.

Well there is more than that.

They asked us to stay home and we did. They asked us to not have big get togethers and we did that.

No mandates. No laws. Just the government making reasonable requests and people being reasonable.

Helps when you have a population that isn’t quite so self absorbed and is actually willing to help neighbours.

 

[Ryujin]

Well there is more than that.

They asked us to stay home and we did. They asked us to not have big get togethers and we did that.

No mandates. No laws. Just the government making reasonable requests and people being reasonable.

Helps when you have a population that isn’t quite so self absorbed and is actually willing to help neighbours.

On the other hand here, we had mandates. People had warehouse parties with a couple of thousand people and some businesses publicly flouted the law.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

On the other hand here, we had mandates. People had warehouse parties with a couple of thousand people and some businesses publicly flouted the law.

 

[Mannahnin]

Italy may also see unenforced good behavior out of fear as Briggart says, Perhaps in part due to the horrors they experienced early in the pandemic, which have no doubt had cultural impact.

 

[Mirtek]

Well, for all it was made up to be the expert's report paper was surprisingly disappointing and every faction now feels supported in their former view on the matter as the expert assessment "clearly agrees with them". There are also reports of quarrel in the 18-people committee that was tasked with creating this assessment, with some members allegedly wanting to come to a much more critical assessment on some of the measures.

Some conclusions are:

Lockdowns work during early stages but lose effect as they drag on.

Masks work too, but not if people wear them wrong (who would have thought that?). Interestingly they do point out that out in real life there's apparently no noticeable difference between medical masks (enough in most states) and FFP2 masks (mandated in only a couple of states). FFP2 should be better (and performs better in controlled test environments) but apparently that advantage doesn't carry over once "real people" become supposed to wear them (correctly). Mask should remain an effective measure indoors, but are not deemed necessary outdoors.

Positive impact of closing schools could not be evaluated due to overlapping with too many other measures, however the negative impacts on children development could clearly be measured and are undeniable.

Restricting events only to people who are vaccinated or recently recovered only has an effect early after a fresh vaccination wave but becomes less effective as effectiveness of vaccinations wears off. At this point just admitting tested unvaccinated people becomes just as well

Also the „Feststellung der epidemischen Lage von nationaler Tragweite“ (declaration of an epidemic situation on a national scope) that was used as foundation for the covid laws is of questionable juridical validity (aka probably outright unconstitutional) and needs to be replaced ASAP (should definately not be used to justify any rules in fall/winter).

As of June 2022 Germany is officially in the 5th wave. The German waves are defined as:

Wave 1: March 2020 - spring 2020
Wave 2: October 2020 - December 2020
Wave 3: March 2021 - May 2021
Wave 4: October 2021 - December 2021
Wave 5: January 2022 - today

So just when it seems as if the waves become predicable Omikron appears and suddenly the 5th wave just immediately follows the 4th wave (instead of having the good manners to wait until March as it was clearly supposed to ).

We may actually already be in the 6th wave, as the 5th waves was in a clear downward spiral for quite some time until BA.5 appeared.

Measures for fall and winter are yet to be decided, however both the cancelor and the attorney general already ruled out lockdowns, curfews or closing of schools.

Only for the health secretary to publicly disagree and state that he want to at least keep the possibility for closing down schools on the table. Even though that's one of the measures that got the worst grade from the expert committee.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Mom finally went to a restaurant for the first time since March 2020!

 

[Cadence]

We're back down to yellow here from orange (but eep, the yellow and orange have spread).
So, still masking and weighing risks, but not avoiding quite as many places.