Omicron New Variant Thread 2 *title edited by MNHQ at OP's request*

[Thewiseoneincognito]

Continuation of the last thread

Did anyone see Professor Jason Leach on breakfast this morning. He was asked about the Steps concert. He said none of the cases had any connection to travel and weren't all connected to each other. This was on 22nd Nov. So must have been community transmission well before that.
I knew that people were infected some time before symptoms appeared but didn't realise quite how much difference there could be in the incubation period - he said anything from 2 to 10 days. I know that's why 10 days was the isolation period but I kind of assumed most people got it within a day or two.

It is a bit of a mystery at present @Quartz2208, you’re right.

@rade I think you’re confusing incubation with infection - incubation is when you’ve already been infected but aren’t showing symptoms which could cause you to feel ill and to test yet. The ten days isolation is because a positive case is capable of infecting someone else (transmitting) for 10 days after testing positive or showing symptoms.

So am not quite sure what Prof Leitch was saying.

@idiotfacelicker

Schools closing might well happen, policy or not. If it rips through a staff room the school will be posed. There won't be the staff. And if closed schools isn't an official policy there will be no government support or back up.

Be careful what you wish for.

I am neither in favour nor against closures at this point tbh. I'm more interested in whats practical and what options we will have.

And yes school closures due to staff shortages are a high probability if we have high case load.

Again it depends on how severe this thing is.

It tends to make things lean towards a situation of carry on at all costs scenario.

Because there isn't an alternative. Miserable huh?

*And yes school closures due to staff shortages are a high probability if we have high case load.

Again it depends on how severe this thing is.*

It doesn't necessarily depend on how severe it is, it equally (and poss more) depends on what happens with the isolation policy. If we see the 10 isolation for contacts stay it doesn't matter how mildly ill the positive cases are if half the staff have to stay home.

Hmmm...

South Africa’s daily number of confirmed Covid-19 cases almost quadrupled since Tuesday as the Omicron variant spread across the country.

The country recorded 16,055 infections in the last 24 hours and a positivity rate accelerated to 24.3 per cent from 16.5 per cent on Tuesday, according to the National Institute for Communicable Diseases.

A South African study of infections since the start of the pandemic found that the risk of reinfection from the Omicron coronavirus variant is three times higher than for any previous strain.

More people under 40 are contracting Covid-19 as a fourth wave sweeps across South Africa, early data from the nation’s National Institute for Communicable Diseases showed.>Government officials and scientific advisers in the UK believe that the danger posed by the Omicron variant may not be clear until January, potentially allowing weeks of intense mixing while the variant spreads.

Just checking in!

A few weeks ago the press reported on new drugs that had been found to keep 95% of people out of hospital if given early on. They said the UK had several hundred thousand of these ordered, but didn't say when they would arrive. It seems to me that drugs are the one thing that might still work against Omicron - does anyone know when they'll be available in the UK, or how many doses?

The only other option i can see is reopening the nightingale hospitals, stocking up on oxygen and accepting that everything else (closing schools, masks, wfh, etc) will just create a slight delay on the inevitable.

@Firefliess

A few weeks ago the press reported on new drugs that had been found to keep 95% of people out of hospital if given early on. They said the UK had several hundred thousand of these ordered, but didn't say when they would arrive. It seems to me that drugs are the one thing that might still work against Omicron - does anyone know when they'll be available in the UK, or how many doses?

The only other option i can see is reopening the nightingale hospitals, stocking up on oxygen and accepting that everything else (closing schools, masks, wfh, etc) will just create a slight delay on the inevitable.

"several hundred thousand" "ordered"

The total number of clinically extremely vulnerable (CEV) people in England is 3.7 million. source: ONS

when are we expecting delivery?

I hope we've ordered a few more than that.

@MarshaBradyo

I agree with the very difficult situation we could be in.

I’m still waiting re the reality of data outside SA as different variables

But if it is problematic then most people do not want schools to close, MPs represent them, ditto businesses who will go under

People may change their mind if it starts to affect children more but by then we would be in real trouble. As it stands I don't think people could cope with it.

Refraction it’s hard to know before a situation arises but how long long would people do it for?

Waiting for the vaccine rollout in age group, may be faster for over five, but for under five how long?

It also means limiting contacts as so transmissible so really are people going to isolate their dc to that extent

I don’t think I could curtail their lives that much but it depends - hard to say without being presented with actual choices.

Can I just check something that I’ve now seen a couple of times?

If you’re a contact for a suspected omicron case, do you and your whole household have to isolate?

That will really put people off going out etc.

@JanglyBeads

Can I just check something that I’ve now seen a couple of times?

If you’re a contact for a suspected omicron case, do you and your whole household have to isolate?

That will really put people off going out etc.

It will put people off testing too!

@JanglyBeads

Can I just check something that I’ve now seen a couple of times?

If you’re a contact for a suspected omicron case, do you and your whole household have to isolate?

That will really put people off going out etc.

www.gov.uk/government/publications/covid-19-stay-at-home-guidance/stay-at-home-guidance-for-households-with-possible-coronavirus-covid-19-infection

If you live in the same household as someone with COVID-19, you must stay at home and self-isolate if you are not fully vaccinated or if they have been identified as a suspected or confirmed case of the Omicron variant of COVID-19.

Yep, its your WHOLE house

That'll be interesting for students coming into Christmas...

That is very confusing wording from gov.uk - to be it reads that if the person has confirmed covid that is suspected to be omicron the whole household needs to isolate - not households of people containing omicron contacts who haven't tested positive for Covid. Buy I could be very wrong about that.

People won't bother getting the pcr done if the whole household has to isolate again.

Yes I agree @NotJustACigar, although I misread it the first time.

But have now seen two separate people saying that, not sure if both on MN or what.

Wording looks clear enough to me - you isolate if the person you've had contact with is a suspected Omicron case. But the rest of your household doesn't have to isolate just because you've had contact. Don't think it would put people off testing, but some might decide not to name people as contacts to test and trace if they know it'll screw up their incomes or Christmas plans

Ah the poster on the other thread has now been told by T&T that the initial advice was incorrect, they shouldn’t have said that the whole household of a contact has to isolate!

Red my understanding is that the drugs that target virus replication are supposed to be used to treat immunosuppressed people where the vaccine doesn't work rather than the wider CEV group. That's a far smaller group which numbers 100s of thousands rather than millions.

Pre departure PCRs to be introduced for inbound uk travellers

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-59534685

I am guessing the politicians would like to use an automatic quarantine system but know they can’t set it up in time (significant numbers of people arriving from African countries are testing positive for omicron).

They have just shat a brick when somebody calculated the doubling time from the latest UKHSA briefing and then explained in simple terms what that meant with extra seeding from abroad.

So this is the next best thing in their eyes.

Looks like the pre departure tests can be lateral flows @JanglyBeads. I'm watching this closely as I'm in America visiting family at the moment and trying to figure out what I need to do to get back next week!

It is definitely pre departure LFTs which is fine as can take from here. Unless you are already there!

@vera99

Even if it is milder how would the PCR testing regimen and the requirement to self-isolate impact on health care facilities in the storm of a huge intense wave ? They wouldn't. Difficult to see a route of out of this other than to weather the storm , vax to the max and exercise judgment based on your own risk analysis and appetite for risk. Personally I'm boosted next week relatively healthy have my own medicine cabinet of potions on call and will enjoy life as before. Looking like we are all going to meet the virus head on and soon unless we live in a cave in the back of beyond.

Yep. If that Norway superspreader event is remotely typical, lockdown isn't going to curb it. Even with March 2020 style compliance, not achievable without paying a good chunk of the population to stay at home, the mitigations and measures being discussed wouldn't suffice.