The latest report from the CDC on case and death rates for vaccinated and unvaccinated Americans is about as clear a sign as anyone could ask for.
We're running the experiment in the real world and -- surprise! -- vaccines work. (If that really is a surprise to you, I have got some swamp land for sale, cheap. Sure to be drained and improved soon!)
I do not see any estimates on the CDC website of case rates for asymptomatic infections. I can't believe that the huge spike in cases came only from symptomatic cases, both vaccinated and unvaccinated. Have you seen any such estimates that would be available?
ReplyDeleteI have bad news for you -- that huge spike in cases, the Omicron surge, is *only* for those cases that got tested by a drive-up or inpatient facility. Most of them were symptomatic, with a few tests done ahead of travel or other required testing. Given that a lot of people reported only mild symptoms from Omicron and didn't seek medical treatment, it's an undercount. No home tests are included in the CDC data.
ReplyDeleteYou can cross-check the CDC graphs by going to the websites run by individual State Health Departments. Since state governments vary in their political composition, you can look for any partisan trends. Solidly Republican Indiana had an enormous surge. I don't think they made it up. Case numbers are plummeting now; we're not quite as low as we were during the "trough" of summer 2021, but we're getting there.
That's not it, I assumed the reported cases were all symptomatic. I was just wondering if you had come across any information on how many of these cases might have come from asymptomatic carriers transmitting the virus. I have no idea how they might estimate that, aside from a statistical study focusing on transmission rates.
ReplyDeleteNot seeing any numbers, and there was considerable pushback on contact-tracing, especially in terms of privacy, so.... Don't expect much data along those lines any time soon.
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