Macrohistory

No longer are 25% of South African SARS-CoV-2 cases caused by Delta. An overwhelming majority are now caused by the rapidly-spreading Omicron. Attached graph is from here: https://twitter.com/TWenseleers

Indeed: It suggests that Omicron will surely sicken people who've been vaccinated or who have had another variant before, but it will be less likely than Delta to cause such people serious disease. On the other hand, Omicron may be just as likely as Delta to seriously sicken the unvaccinated and people who've never had another variant before. It is not, in other words, likely to be intrinsically less pathogenic. That will almost certainly prove to have been a pipe dream. Moreover, because Omicron spreads so much faster than even Delta, it will quickly infect huge swathes of the global population. Even if the percentage of people who become seriously ill is lower with Omicron -- because so many are now vaccinated or else have had another variant of Covid before -- the absolute numbers of those needing hospital care, including ICU care, is likely to soar in the coming couple of months. This will put enormous pressure on health care systems, especially in countries or regions of countries that are relatively under-vaxxed. Hard to know how Thailand will fare in such a scenario. With social distancing now a thing of the past, Omicron is likely to spread like wildfire. Thailand needs to continue vaccinating like crazy, taking care of all those who haven't been vaxxed at all yet and moving rapidly forward with boosters.

This is an excellent Twitter thread on such matters, but you have to follow it all the way through to the end

Where exactly have you been hearing such anti-vax nonsense?

With more than 11,000 cases just today in Gauteng, that black curve will have soared well above the dark blue Delta curve by this time next week.

I can certainly see it happening again. After all, it’s happening again in places like the Netherlands and Austria. Thailand needs to keep the virus out so that a new lockdown won’t become necessary. Tougher border controls are essential.

Moderate to severe disease (in some cases requiring ICU treatment) for people in their 20s and 30s, according to the head of the intensive care unit at Soweto's Baragwanath Hospital: https://abcnews.go.com/Health/wireStory/covid-variant-threat-worldwide-scramble-81417682

No doubt it's an issue now because the wild, nonsensical propaganda of anti-vaxxers like you finally metastasized throughout society

Yes, of course, the US is an absolute model to emulate for anything Covid-related.

Wait, you were on the Diamond Princess? Tell us what that was like. Do you think the crew generally handled the situation well?

Absolutely off-the-charts illogic. What is the global vaccination rate? Come back and whine about the restrictions when the global vaccination rate is north of 80 percent.

The surges in Singapore and Israel would have been much, much larger and more devastating if the two countries didn’t have such high vaccination rates. Why do anti-vaxxers have such a hard time understanding such basic logic?

No, the vaccines -- especially the mRNA vaccines -- have been magnificent.

Right, because libertarianism always meshes well with sociopathy.

Fortunately, Thailand — or Siam — has rejected the idea of learning from Cambodia for at least 700 years and this seems likely to continue.

Thanks for reporting this, Brian. It's pretty devastating for the line being sold by the Covid deniers around here that the number of hospitalizations has increased by 14% in one month.

Nope, that's the number of people released from care. How, in any case, could they possibly know how many people had actually "recovered?" They have no handle whatsoever on anything going on outside the hospital (and ancillary) system.

There is no data on "number of recoveries." They very clearly specify that they're reporting the number of people "released from care."

I could read it because I hadn't maxed out my monthly Bloomberg quota yet. Biggest take-home message is that Thailand and Vietnam are tied for worst performers in the world (among these countries) since April. What's more, Thailand isn't getting any better yet in comparative terms. Will be interesting to see what the consequences of the premature reopening to tourists will be.

Lol. See you on the HCAs!

Disgusting.

Yes, that's pretty devastating for all these people bleating that "they have to reopen because it's time to focus on the economy." Yet the Thai Chamber of Commerce says "no, this is not the way to help the economy." Pretty sure the Thai Chamber of Commerce has a good handle on what's needed for the economy.

The upshot of all of this is likely to be that infection rates will rise substantially -- killing hundreds or even thousands of people who otherwise would have lived -- but there won't be enough tourists to do anything positive for the economy. All brought to you by that brilliant pair, Prayut and Anutin.

Increasing by an average of 3.6% a day each day since 5 October. This is going to become a problem. If 3.6% increases each day continue, we'll be at 92,000 people being treated for Covid in real hospitals by November 1st. Can the health care system sustain such a volume of Covid patients? What about other people getting sick or injured, including tourists?

A 14% increase in people being treated for Covid in hospitals in just four days is deeply alarming. But entirely to be expected, given the premature relaxation of restrictions.