Some good information as usual from John Campbell, helpful for those worried by omicron.
Let’s hope you’re right. But for now, as Ancient_Mariner pointed out no one should go out and try to purposely catch it.
Did you watch the video Karen?
Exponential growth of cases in all the countries of the EU and UK but barely a ripple on hospitalisations, those admitted are in for short times so the number is staying level, deaths falling. Its a mindset that has made people very affraid of omicron. Enough said now, we’ll just have to see how this pans out.
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Reading a paper on T-cell (CD8/CD4) response this morning and omicron and that people who’d either had a previous Covid19 infection, or had been vaccinated and boosted, still showed a reasonable T-cell response if they weren’t immunocompromised (and/or elderly), and which was more effective than just the titre of NAbs (which obviously wears off quite quickly and/or is mutation-evaded) . As omicron is already multipel recombinant strain, there is hope that the body’s T-cell response once vaccinated gains and maintains sufficient “memory” to defeat and/or reduce any new strain that might come along.
Obviously, that is poor comfort for the immune compromised and the elderly, but would be like seasonal flu, and also this does not rule out the possibility of more evasive recombinant strains from forming in the zoo of infected populations which might show more agressive clinical symtoms.
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And that’s a very good point. It’s easy to measure antibody, so that’s often what we do, but it’s only one part of the immune response. Assessing the cell mediated response is difficult and requires much more time and often expensive kit.
It’s family and friends risk assessment, do I know it will definitely be omicron and not delta, do I want to bring Corona anywhere near my family of which my 87 year old FIL has to shield, my partner has bad asthma, I have late 60’s, 70’s friends who I don’t know if they have underlying health conditions or not.
I am not afraid of Corona myself but I refuse to take a chance on my family and friends health, while you might be sure about its effects on yourself and maybe your loved ones from reading up about it and looking at figures online and on the TV.
I am not willing to take the risk of the consequences if I was to be wrong, I have had the loss of one partner so I am not taking the chance on lossing anyone else to Corona if I can help it.
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Morning all
I think one of the effects of Covid that many are missing is the consequential effect of the volume of cases.
I think it is generally accepted that Omicron itself, is not as deadly as other variants, but the volume of cases is the issue.
if you have massive numbers of NHS and care staff off with Omicron, they may not be at risk themselves, but their absence from work will result in massive consequences in care and appointments.
I think there will be a large number of people who will die, not of Covid , but of the consequence of the numbers.
Sorry, but a bit depressing
Andy
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Fair enough with an elderly relative, you do what you feel is right. As I said an 83 year old un vaccinated ex work colleague had the usual cold symptoms.
My Friends in Spain isolated on the side of a hill both have serious asthma and nearly died from atacks a couple of times (the main reason they moved to where they are)
Omicron is displacing delta, I would not want to catch delta even with no underlying health issues.
But the death rate is falling, ok it goes up and down but a large percentage of hospital admissions are for other issues but as they are tested on arrival found to have omicron.
Its the unplaced hysteria thats so annoying.
So how are you going to be sure 
Sorry @Corona , but you are missing the point I am trying to make.
The deaths I am talking about will not be registered as Covid deaths but will contribute to an increase in excess deaths over time. These deaths will have no direct link to covid and so, will not be included in the figures.
Andy
Probably better of waiting for pi to come along.
Andy, we’ll have to wait for the data, as people are admitted to hospital they are tested. Those at home receive test kits. All cause mortality is logged so we should be able to view this information but so far it is not showing up. Earlier on people were registered as dying from covid when in fact many had not but had died from co morbidity.
There is a huge and growing quickly sample to pull from but so far its just not showing up to be the case in any of the countries.
The most amazing country being Japan figures so low.
Yes I did watch the video.
I’ve been hoping Omicron is the swan song of mass covid. ie a milder version that pushes the worse versions out.
But we are far, far from being sure of that happening and being sustainable yet.
As everyone’s morphology is different, and mutations are not excluded, nor are we fully sure of any longtem effects, anyone that deliberately tries to get infected is a nutter and anyone who fails to take precautions to protect others is an idiot selfish $hit.
Already happening, Andy. That’s why people who’ve got themselves jabbed resent the fact that such a high percentage of hospital beds are blocked by those who chose not to get jabbed so have landed in hospital with worse forms soaking up available medical capacity. To say nothing of how many diagnostic and other care facilities also aren’t fully available for other conditions that are not being diagnosed or treated while this continues - dentistry being just one.
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Agree about the misplaced hysteria and government incompetence but here’s some figures. (All invented, but it’s the maths.)
Previous variants infected 10 million.
5000 of those infected needed hospital care. This is .05% hospitalised, out of those infected.
1000 died.
This is .01% dying, out of those infected.
Omicron broke through vaccinations and spread much more easily.
200 million got infected with Omicron.
20,000 of those infected needed hospital care. This is .01% hospitalised, out of those infected.
3000 died.
.0015% dying, out of those infected.
Omicron’s hospitalisation percentage is one-fifth of those hospitalised with earlier variants.
Omicron’s deaths are less than one-sixth of the death rate with earlier variants.
But due to the higher number of people Omicron infects, in absolute numbers hospitals still have a problem. As the resulting numbers needing hospital care have tripled.
And a much tinier percentage died of those infected.
All good news. But because so many were infected, especially as the vulnerable were even more vulnerable to being infected by the easier spreading variant Omicron(!), by anyone’s carelessness or by people circulating with fake health pass, the absolute number that now died is 3x higher.
This is why caution is needed till we see where is the peak of hospitalisations.
The good news is if what Dr. John Campbell said is true, then if the average hospital stay is 3 days vs 2-5 weeks, then hospital capacity is greater. But until we reach the peak we can’t start to confirm these ratios.
And anyone that doesn’t continue to take full precautions is still a $hit.
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Quick question. How do you know for sure it is Omicron?
Sorry Fleur, such a short quote I am not sure to which part it belongs.
Some from the symptoms like friend in Spain as the testing is a joke over there. In UK it was confirmed and again the symptoms.
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Its a bit of a mess but we will see, such a large sample to view the data from. Seems slightly more hospitalisations in France at the moment, possibly because of less vaccinated? Or maybe the demographic older population?
Prof Van Tam is on BBC 4 tonight, the last of the Christmas lectures, on, not surprisingly viruses.
I was wondering how it was confirmed. By PCR I’m guessing.