TallGuyJohninBKK

Rest, fluids and medications are your friends We’re four years into the pandemic, and by this point, most Americans have had Covid at least once. But when the virus comes for us (again), it can still feel just as alarming as your first bout. Here’s a guide to what Covid looks like now and how to treat it. Symptoms The most common Covid symptoms haven’t changed much since the start of the pandemic, and they remain consistent for the latest dominant variant, JN.1, said Dr. Soniya Gandhi, the associate chief medical officer at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles. They include fatigue, sore throat, congestion, runny nose, headache, body aches and cough. All or any of those in isolation can still be Covid,” Dr. Gandhi said. Some people may develop conjunctivitis, also known as pink eye, or experience gastrointestinal issues, like nausea, vomiting and diarrhea, but those symptoms are rarer. Anecdotally, experts said, one of the most notable symptoms early in the pandemic — the loss of taste and smell — also appears to be less common these days. (more) https://archive.is/8Qqcu https://www.nytimes.com/article/covid-symptoms-treatment.html

Sounds like he already bought his plane ticket prior to successfully having obtained his visa... So the return flight and his intention to stay were both just short of 90 days. PS - I've been out of the tourist visa world for many years... But this was the first time I can recall ever hearing a demand for a signed ID photocopy from the accommodation operator being part of the tourist visa application process.

On a parallel issue here... I had a friend who just applied for a tourist E-visa via the Los Angeles USA consulate. In response to his application, they sent him a message asking for proof of his intended accommodation AND a signed version of either the Thai ID (for Thai accommodation operator) or foreign passport (for foreign accommodation operator). He shared with me the screenshot image of the message he received demanding the accommodation operator ID documentation... He was having a hard time getting the place where he wanted to stay to give him that kind of documentation. One of the things I suggested to him, if he couldn't resolve the ID documentation issue, was to consider going Visa-Exempt instead of the tourist visa... But apparently he intends on a longer stay than the visa-exempt would provide.

Latest weekly COVID report from Thailand's Ministry of Public Health through March 2 -- 91 hospitalized COVID cases on ventilators (the light purple colored section below) Plus 263 COVID cases hospitalized in serious condition (the dark purple section below): https://ddc.moph.go.th/covid19-dashboard/?dashboard=main

After my initial run with EaseUS, I went back and started playing around with subsequent updates to original full backups, and found the program seems to have an odd versioning system. And at least in the free version, I can't find anyway to make a default setting for what kind of backup I want... It seems like I have to manually select it each time. "Full Backup" is always available. But then the program also offers "Differential Backup" which handles all changes from the last full backup, or "Incremental Backup," which handles all changes from whatever the immediately prior backup was. The end result, after the initial backup run for any profile, is the program ends up creating separate and different file folders with separate dates and file sets for each subsequent backup -- which is going to get pretty complicated and unwieldy if someone is re-running a differential or incremental backup every day or every week even. I think that's an implementation of what's called "versioning." But in my case, I just want one set of files and folders that exactly match those on my source drive, not dozens of partial file change folders organized by date. Choosing the "full backup" each time would avoid all that, I think.... But as I mentioned above, at least in the free version, I can't find any way to set a default for what mode of backup I want the program to run for any given profile. It seems to be a manual setting that has to be chosen via a right-click on the Backup Profile entry.

Gave SyncBack Free a try as well... Worked well, not too complicated, maintained the native files and folders structure, included a day and time scheduling component, and also several optional backup modes, including one called "mirroring" that says it maintains an exact version of the content on the destination location by deleting any files there not any longer found on the source location. MS SyncToy also used to have an optional mirroring mode, which is what I wanted, but notwithstanding, it never seemed to delete files on the destination drive that had been deleted or renamed on the source drive, meaning the destination drive over time ended up getting cluttered up with deleted files and folders from the source. https://www.2brightsparks.com/syncback/compare-simple.html PS - I just tested the mirroring function on SyncBack, and quite happily for me, it worked exactly as promised. I deleted some of the folders on my Source location, and then re-ran the backup profile, and sure enough, the deleted Source folders/files were likewise removed from the Destination folder. Good deal!

Whoa!! This one looks a whole lot more sophisticated and complicated than for the basic needs I outlined above. Seems like more of a developer and system administrator's solution, as opposed to a basic consumer software solution. "Beyond Compare is a software application used by developers, system administrators and others to compare, merge, and synchronize data. It runs on Windows, macOS, and Linux." https://www.scootersoftware.com/home

So far, I've installed and tried the free versions of both EaseUS and GoodSync, and they both appear to meet my various needs, including both having automated scheduling functions. The Goodsync website has a chart that appears to say the free version only will allow "Number of files 100". But when I set up and ran my trial backup, it had more than 100 files, and the free version handled that fine... So I'm not sure what to make of their supposed limitation, at least, haven't run into it yet. https://www.goodsync.com/personal Thus far, the EaseUS version seems a bit more simple and uncomplicated in its interface, whereas the GoodSync UI seems more complicated but also more powerful. But they both appear to accomplish the basic needs of a single PC files and folders backup to an external or separate drive keeping intact the basic files and folders structure.

I just tried this (EaseUS Todo Backup), and it appears to offer most or all of the criteria I outlined above: https://www.easeus.com/backup-software/tb-free.html I just ran a quick trial backup with some sample files and folders, and it worked just as expected and promised. And it has a files and folders option for backup that keeps the file/folders structure intact. Also has a basic scheduling component available, and the ability to manually select the specific files or folders you want and where exactly you want them backed up. The one immediate downside I noticed about this free software (which also has paid upgrade options) is that EaseUS when using the free program pretty much bombards you with what I presume will be recurring upgrade offer screens and promotions aimed at getting you to send them some of your money.

Thanks! Haven't tried it. But that's exactly the type of backup solution I'm looking for -- one that keeps the directory structure and file structure intact and directly usable in the backup destination, just as if those were the original files. And $21 is a reasonable, albeit not free, price. Does it have a scheduling feature that allows you to set it to automatically do the backups every day or week or whatever?

Another thing I should mention is, it's important to me to be able to manually select what drives/folders I want backed up, and where the backed up data is stored. That's because, I keep on my personal files on my D drive instead of the standard C drive, which is reserved just for my MS Windows OS. Also, I don't like and don't want to use MS One Drive, which seems to be the standard default destination for backups with MS's latest built-in Windows Backup software, since it is not very customizable. And for this question, I'm not looking to create a full system image of my entire Windows PC. I just want an easily, automatically kept up-to-date local version of my local files kept in a standard folders and files format.

While I have cloud backup solutions, for many years, I've also kept local file backups of my Windows PC documents/data using the free MS SyncToy software and large volume external USB hard drives. But now with the update to Windows 11, MS SyncToy no longer seems to work, or at least is very difficult to get working on a Windows 11 machine, so I've been looking for ideally a free software solution like MS SyncToy that can work on Windows 11 machines? The ability to set and schedule automated backups like SyncToy could would be another plus. Any suggestions? One of the thing I liked about SyncToy was that its backups were in normal, easy to see and access files and folders format, not like some of the Windows and other backup packages that do their backups by amalgamating everything into single mass backup files that have to be unpacked and restored in order to actually see what's there. That's NOT what I want. Thanks in advance for any suggestions to use on a Windows 11 platform! 🙂

The Lancet article linked in the OP makes it clear the guy involved was getting the actual vaccinations (of whatever number) deliberately and for "private reasons." Indeed, seems to have been somewhat proud of himself. "Here, we report on a 62-year-old male hypervaccinated individual from Magdeburg, Germany (HIM), who deliberately and for private reasons received 217 vaccinations against SARS-CoV-2 within a period of 29 months." "To investigate the immunological consequences of hypervaccination in this unique situation, we submitted an analysis proposal to HIM via the public prosecutor. HIM then actively and voluntarily consented to provide medical information and donate blood and saliva." "Throughout the entire hypervaccination schedule HIM did not report any vaccination-related side effects." https://www.thelancet.com/journals/laninf/article/PIIS1473-3099(24)00134-8/fulltext# Source: (graphic on page 13 of the linked PDF file)

I'm guessing the origin of the graphic posted above lies elsewhere, because the cited source website doesn't show or produce side by side graphics exactly like the one posted above.... And whoever went in and chose the two time periods and then added their own text labeling to the created graphic obviously was spelling challenged, as highlighted below.

As Eisfeld noted above, your cherry picked "before and later" comparison is pretty meaningless, and says nothing about the effectiveness of COVID vaccines... Meaningless also because the end date comparison point you (or some anti-vax site) cherry picked not coincidentally was the 2nd highest deaths period of the pandemic driven by the arrival of the immune evasive Omicron variant. When there's a huge spike in COVID cases and death as occurred during the Omicron wave... raw numbers are going to spiral the case and death rates per capita... because more people are being infected and dying... Hardly any surprise about that. Source link:

What I take of it is, that there's a very loud and persistent anti-vaxer community that has grown somewhat during the pandemic... And that the majority of sensible people long ago got sick and tired of listening to and responding to their nonsense. And, that how many smiley icons posts on AseanNow do or don't receive has nothing to do with the veracity of the information being presented.

Ohh... but it's not just one absurd example. It's hundreds, probably thousands of false, debunked claims that folks in the COVID deniers / anti-vax / vaccine skeptic camp continue to espouse. 02/07/2024 NewsGuard Reports More Than 300 Vaccine-Related False Narratives Now Spreading Online Nearly four years since the outbreak of COVID-19—and amidst a constant stream of false claims about vaccine efficacy—NewsGuard reports that there are now more than 300 vaccine-related false narratives infecting social media and online search results "These are among the now more than 300 vaccine-related false narratives that NewsGuard’s healthcare information team has identified circulating on the internet, shared by 4,387 websites and other news sources and social media accounts—and counting. Two thirds of all the news and information websites that NewsGuard has rated as untrustworthy since 2018 publish healthcare misinformation." ... “Research continues to show that vaccine disinformation and misinformation have a significant death toll,” said Steven Brill, co-CEO of NewsGuard. “For example, a May 2022 analysis by researchers at Brown, Harvard, Microsoft, and Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, reported that if the COVID vaccine take-up rate in the United States had been 90 percent of eligible adults after the vaccines became available instead of the actual rate of 70 percent of adults being fully vaccinated, 225,427 fewer people would have died between January 2021 and April 2022.” https://www.newsguardtech.com/press/newsguard-reports-more-than-300-vaccine-related-false-narratives-now-spreading-online/

The OP report says the Thai ladyboys were throwing bottles... But I always understood that throwing high heel shoes was more of their style.

That account above from Thai PBS is not exactly what the other news reports say occurred, as the modest police presence there ("over 10" officers) seems to have been pretty much overwhelmed by the angry Thai ladyboys. From the OP Thaiger report: "At around 3:30am, police officers, numbering just over ten, arrived to establish a perimeter around the hotel and escort the first two Filipino individuals out amidst the uproar. Despite pleas from the police, communicated over loudspeakers, to avoid violence, the situation quickly descended into mayhem as the Thai group began hurling bottles at the emerging Filipino individuals. Several members of the Thai group broke through the police line and physically attacked the Filipino individuals, who were dressed in white hoodies and dark glasses. The police struggled to contain the violence, which culminated in the Thai group dragging the Filipino individuals out in front of the hotel to continue the assault." But ya, sure, the RTP had everything perfectly well under control!

Nah, it's just plain denial... COVID denial.... denial of reality. And no credible sources or data to support their "alternate" reality. Just the embracing of conspiracy theories and nonsense, such as below: Where did the microchip vaccine conspiracy theory come from anyway? "In the U.S., polling from March found that 42% of respondents believed at least one COVID-19 conspiracy theory. That survey, commissioned by the nonprofit Surgo Ventures, found that 16% of eligible Americans are a hardened group of COVID-19 skeptics steeped in conspiracy theories, while another 7% are system distrusters." And: "The Surgo survey found that 1 in 14 people believe a tracking chip might be planted with the vaccine. A poll from Axios/Ipsos, also from March, asked 1,000 American adults if the COVID-19 vaccines contained a tracking microchip. More than 1 in 4 said they didn’t know. That’s the equivalent of nearly 69 million people. https://revealnews.org/article/where-did-the-microchip-vaccine-conspiracy-theory-come-from-anyway/

You're surprised COVID deaths went up in the U.S. by January 2022 (compared to April 2020) during the latter period when the Omicron wave hit and cases exploded, leading to the second highest peak of COVID fatalities during the pandemic? "In the battle against COVID-19, Omicron has been a difficult opponent. The variant of the SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes COVID-19 first surfaced in the United States toward the end of 2021 and spread like wildfire, spawning new sub-strains—some more transmissible than others." https://www.yalemedicine.org/news/5-things-to-know-omicron And even so, those who chose to get vaccinated were fortunate they did: Impact of U.S. COVID-19 Vaccination Efforts: An Update on Averted Deaths, Hospitalizations, and Health Care Costs Through March 2022 April 8, 2022 "Through March 2022, we estimate that COVID-19 vaccination efforts in the U.S. prevented over 2 million deaths and 17 million hospitalizations (Table 1). There would have been an estimated 66 million additional infections and nearly $900 billion in associated health care costs in the absence of vaccination. https://www.commonwealthfund.org/blog/2022/impact-us-covid-19-vaccination-efforts-march-update The Omicron spike in the U.S. from early 2022: Source: Not to mention, a sizable portion of the U.S. population (more than 30% during that period) chose not to get fully vaccinated against COVID, and as the above report from 2022 noted: "Unvaccinated Americans have rates of preventable COVID-19 hospitalization and death that are significantly higher than those for vaccinated Americans." Less than 70% primary vaccination rate in the U.S. as of more than a year later as of May 2023, so lots of COVID unprotected people out there at the time: https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#vaccinations_vacc-people-booster-percent-pop5

Not at risk of any ill effects from COVID? You mean like these? COVID deaths by age group thru Sept. 2023 per US CDC: Source: Being dead would certainly seem to suggest risk. Or these? Young kids also at risk of severe illness Infants and young children under age 4 have the third-highest rate of hospitalizations by age group at 1.6% per 100,000 for the week ending Dec. 2, CDC data shows. Although children are less likely to fall severely ill and die from COVID compared to adults, they can get sick enough to be hospitalized. Schaffner said it's a fallacy for a parent to think their child does not need to get vaccinated because they are relatively healthy because children can fall severely ill. What's more, studies have shown that COVID vaccines do decrease hospitalizations among kids." https://abcnews.go.com/Health/covid-19-hospitalizations-increasing-us-rates-highest-oldest/story?id=105452104 More risk... Or these? COVID hospitalization rates in babies as bad as for seniors amid Omicron wave, study shows "Infants younger than 6 months had the same rate of hospitalization as seniors age 65 to 74 during this summer’s Omicron wave, according to a new report. The findings, published by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, show that COVID-19 can still cause severe and fatal outcomes in children too young to be vaccinated. “These findings underscore the continued risk for COVID-19–associated hospitalization among infants [younger than] six months who are ineligible for vaccination,” the report said. https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2022-11-30/covid-hospitalization-in-babies-as-bad-as-seniors-during-omicron-study-shows Even more risk... Though the risk among the elderly is in fact the greatest, all of the above certainly presents a strong case that there in fact risk for younger people, especially for the unvaccinated, as the LA Times report above illustrates. I.e., getting vaccinated for COVID, less risk.

"COVID-19 and influenza are different diseases caused by different viruses." "COVID-19 and seasonal influenza (flu) are both infectious respiratory viral infections. While some of their signs and symptoms are similar there are some important differences between them such as their ability to cause disease in different population groups. COVID-19 and flu are caused by two different kinds of viruses, their signs and symptoms and groups at risk of severe complications are similar but not entirely the same." https://www.who.int/news-room/questions-and-answers/item/coronavirus-disease-covid-19-similarities-and-differences-with-influenza " What's the difference between COVID-19 and the flu? COVID-19 and flu causes COVID-19 and the flu are caused by different viruses. COVID-19 is caused by a coronavirus called SARS-CoV-2, while flu is caused by influenza A and B viruses." COVID-19 and flu spread and severity COVID-19 appears to be contagious for a longer time and to spread more quickly than the flu. With COVID-19, you may be more likely to experience loss of taste or smell. Severe illness is more frequent with COVID-19 than with the flu. Compared with historical flu cases, COVID-19 may cause more hospital stays and death for people age 18 and older, even those who have no other health challenges." https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/coronavirus/in-depth/coronavirus-vs-flu/art-20490339 All the U.S. CDC did here was to shorten their post infection isolation recommendation for COVID cases, and make that recommendation the same as its existing ones for the flu and RSV virus. Nothing else. From the prior CNN report weblinked above: (CNN) -- People who test positive for Covid-19 no longer need to routinely stay away from others for at least five days, according to new guidelines from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued Friday. The change ends a strategy from earlier in the pandemic that experts said has been important to controlling the spread of the infection. The agency says it’s updating its recommendations for Covid-19 to bring them in line with its advice for other kinds of respiratory infections, including influenza and RSV. Offering a single set of unified guidance will make people more likely to follow it, agency experts said in a news briefing Friday."

Shall we instead have a discussion and debate about the actual topic of the thread, as I was trying to do above???

The current CDC announcement has nothing to do with vaccines efficiency... It was solely a statement about revised isolation policy for people recovering from COVID... But obviously, the actual subject of the thread has gotten somewhat lost in people posting unrelated stuff. And all I know is, I didn't start it... I merely answered it. From the OP: ""A case of Covid no longer means isolating for five days, according to the latest guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released Friday."