how's the pandemic going anyway

haven't heard of a new variant since omicron

not sure where the science currently stands on mask necessity

I received a news push yesterday about a new variant being identified. I didn’t read further, guess I should...

the newest new variant is a delta/omicron hybrid, but seems to be not any more worrying than another variant

the biggest real worry is the BA.2 Omicron variant

Scientists Identify New COVID Variant Called ‘Deltac...

What Em said

which is a mutation off of OG Omicron, and is 30% more transmissible and some studies believe more deadly as well

Covid is just playing Smash Up now

BA.2 is also resistant to usual treatment options which is going to be fun for everybody refusing to get vacc'd

BA.2 also doesn't get detected by older tests, but anything that can detect Omicron will generally spot it, and the same vaccines/antibodies that protect against Omicron still protect against it

so... yeah the biggest thing there is that the antivax circles that somehow haven't gotten it will likely superspread

the big thing rn is not to pay much mind to the graphs the government puts out because they recently changed the criteria for covid

to refer specifically to people who are in the hospital as opposed to actual infection rates and also bumped the threshold up by about 20x

so numbers that are the same as numbers previously considered high are now considered low

yeah we're in the middle of like, ten different axes of propaganda here while some agencies try to act like nothing's wrong, and some others try to act like it's still going to destroy us all, and the truth is honestly "same shit we've been handling for the last two years"

it's tiring but it's less terrifying than some of the other anxiety-inducers we've all had to deal with recently

I mean as somebody who has several "pre-existing conditions" that put me at higher risk of COVID complications working in a place that recently lifted its mask requirements where I deal with hundreds of customers daily and also I live with an elderly woman also at high risk,

it's pretty anxiety-inducing

lol yeah one of my roommates is immunocompromised so my anxiety continues to be high

Covid has ran out of idea about new variants now

Wasn't that one Delta/Omnicron variant a misidentification?

CDC relaxed mask mandates, at least for those who got the vaccine.

Bloodededeborne : the one you're thinking of was several weeks ago

so, still fucked

which is a little bit funny to have gone "look, the LAST delta/omicron fusion was something we were wrong about, but THIS time it's for REAL," but also not really too important because that one's just... not really any different or more dangerous

BA.2 is what to be worried about

Ah, so that's what's happening

I'm not hiding in my house anymore but I guess I'm keeping my mask on for the foreseeable future.

yeah, sorry. spoke from a place of privilege regarding that, it's... it just hasn't changed much is what i meant to mostly say. so yeah, still fucked