The COVID-19 pandemic

[jeffster]

A key thing to look at is hospitalizations and ICU admissions. Keep in mind we dont try for net zero flu cases each year. Covid cases arent inherently bad, and if the vaccines are truly effective at preventing severe cases but the variant is still enough for people to get sick with mild symptoms that's ok. Its possible we may have to shift our viewpoint from any number of covid cases being bad. 20,000 cases doesn't have to be bad if it's all just mild cold like symptoms and vaccinated people get over it and dont have any lasting effects. 

I'm not saying this is the case but its definitely something to keep an eye on. Were never going to eradicate this disease and we will have to determine what an acceptable threshold for deaths is annually

NHS data says UK daily hospital admissions have gone up from 100/day at the beginning of May to 300/day now. So those, too, have increased strongly. NHS doesn't publish an ICU count but the number of patients on ventilators is up more than 50% over the same two-month period as the chart above (and up about 100% from mid-May).

So, NHS data, too, says that the UK situation is grim. Charts here if you would like to see details:
https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/details/healthcare

Most who are in the hospital are those without a vaccination. I believe that 2-doses plus 4 weeks of mRNA vaccines will keep most out of the hospital. The delta variant itself hasn’t proved worse medically for patients, but rather it seems much more contagious.

The UK, and indeed the USA also, and Canada, will need to figure out a way to get more vaccines into arms. Really critical that we reach 80% of the entire population, which might only happen if 6m to 11y are able to get a shot (most like Pfizer). If approved for those under 12, immunization can be completed at school in a short time.

So everyone in my household now vaccinated, though one is still waiting for their second shot.