[sreque]

There have been chronic nursing staff shortages for years. We were treating patients in tents during the 208 flu epidemic: https://time.com/5107984/hospitals-handling-burden-flu-patie...

The much larger problem is that our medical system isn't designed to handle any kind of case surge at all, because, for cost efficiency reasons, it purposely wants to operate at 80-90% capacity. Instead of us focusing on how we can improve our hospital systems for future pandemics, we vilify the unvaccinated for political points.

People should be skeptical that hospitals almost never provide thorough or accurate information about their true capacity, constraints, and current cases broken down by primary causes. But at the end of the day, one's views on the situation seem to primarily depend on political identity and whether one blindly trusts the chronically dishonest mainstream media.

[trainsplanes]

> Instead of us focusing on how we can improve our hospital systems for future pandemics, we vilify the unvaccinated for political points.

Because globally, yes, they are the cause.

Even in countries where hospitals don't run close to max capacity at all times in order to maximize profits, hospitals have been filling up with unvaccinated patients. Japanese hospitals in major cities haven't been able to take in new patients, and those waves of patients are unvaccinated.

Although in Japan's case, the problem is there simply aren't enough vaccines here to meet demand. America's problem is there's an overabundance of vaccines but people are going out of their way to get sick, choosing to overwhelm hospitals, and then dying as an act of rebellion for facebook political points.

[throwawayfear]

No, they are not the cause. The vaccinated still spread the virus and could cause it to mutate all the same as the unvaccinated.

Also, over 100 million Americans have past covid. [0] And we know that past covid gives antibodies which are superior. [1][2] And the hospitalization situation is overblown. [3]

[0] - https://www.publichealth.columbia.edu/public-health-now/news...

A new study published in the journal Nature estimates that 103 million Americans, or 31 percent of the U.S. population, had been infected with SARS-CoV-2 by the end of 2020.

[1] - https://www.science.org/content/article/having-sars-cov-2-on...

The natural immune protection that develops after a SARS-CoV-2 infection offers considerably more of a shield against the Delta variant of the pandemic coronavirus than two doses of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine, according to a large Israeli study that some scientists wish came with a “Don’t try this at home” label.

[2] - https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-08-27/previous-...

[3] - https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2021/09/covid-hos...

In other words, the study suggests that roughly half of all the hospitalized patients showing up on COVID-data dashboards in 2021 may have been admitted for another reason entirely, or had only a mild presentation of disease.

It's entirely possible that media-induced panic is sending people to hospitals over a sniffle, being that half of those hospitalized in 2021 so far may have been admitted for non-covid related reasons or only have mild / asymptomatic covid and still been included in the count.

So stop being so interested in finding a scapegoat to blame, because as you can see from other commentary here it'll lead to dehumanization and the creation of a two-tiered society. Which is dangerous.

[ezekiel68]

Your just-so story does not match the facts [0] and your tendency here and below to spray-and-pray with external links does not support your position as the other commenters have already shown. People showing up at the ER with the sniffles due to media hysteria (as you suggest) do not, in fact, translate into full ICUs. ERs have triage procedures and examination protocols which keep the trivial cases out of the ICU beds.

People are already unable to get emergency care in a timely manner due to the problem of unvaccinated people developing symptoms they statistically would not experience if they were vaccinated. [1] This is really happening. Meanwhile, you are arguing in the realm of hypotheticals, using phrases such as "could cause" and "may have been".

Your goal to prevent a two-tiered society is admirable, but "the ends do not justify the means" of spreading misinformation by summarizing only bias-affirming portions of the articles & studies you cite. The simplest of natural search phrases on the topic such as "ICU COVID-19 unvaccinated" returns results which directly contradict your position (without the hypothetical contingencies) such as this one. [2]

[0] https://www.cnbc.com/2021/08/24/cdc-study-shows-unvaccinated...

[1] https://www.npr.org/sections/coronavirus-live-updates/2021/0...

[2] https://baltimore.cbslocal.com/2021/09/13/3-states-have-full...

[trainsplanes]

Yes, the vaccinated still get covid. But they're not being hospitalized in significant numbers. The issue is hospitalization. Hospitals have indeed been overwhelmed[1] and considerable numbers of people have been dying at home, many in their 20s and 30s, with covid because hospitals simply can't take them in. Natural immunity comes as a result of being infected, which brings a huge risk of hospitalization and death.

As mentioned elsewhere, pushing natural immunity as the solution is as dumb as chicken pox parties that misinformed people of previous decades used to have. It was unnecessarily dangerous. Yes, people who push that should be pushed out of the discussion. Give them an inch and they'll eat away your country from the inside out. There's a reason the US is such a massive disaster with tremendous deaths and growing (but primarily in select states, and primarily states that have opposition to vaccines for political reasons), while other countries that embraced vaccines are finally getting things under control.

Just a few weeks ago, Japan was approaching national collapse of its medical system. Vaccines have thankfully managed to catch up to and exceed the US vaccination rate and things are starting to get back under control.

The reason things are getting better is because nobody is waiting for 100 million people to get infected. Everyone, even past infectees, is getting vaccinated as a community effort.

[1] https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2021/08/26/national/japan-...

[exodust]

> while other countries that embraced vaccines are finally getting things under control.

Are you sure? UK is 89% single dose and more than 80% double dosed but things don't look under control there. Maybe you consider 1,000 hospital admissions per day and rising "under control"?

https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/

[evgen]

Given the fact that we have effectively eliminated all other forms of controlling the spread so that BoJo can go around an pat himself on the back, yes this is about as 'under control' as is possible in these circumstances. While the rate of hospitalization is up, deaths are rising quite slowly; we currently have 50% of the case rate from Jan 2021 but only 10% of the death rate.

[exodust]

Fair enough. To be clear, I agree with what UK is doing by opening up and removing vaccine passports, regardless of how much is considered in control or not.

Here in Australia, the lockdowns have gone too far and doing more harm than good. Children and teenagers stuck at home, not learning or socialising properly, is just the beginning of a long list of negative consequences.

The unknown degree to which long-term lockdown spawns further harm, is a politicised gamble. Every day that gamble becomes less worth it.

[throwawayfear]

Yes, the vaccinated still get covid. But they're not being hospitalized in significant numbers. The issue is hospitalization. Hospitals have indeed been overwhelmed[1] and considerable numbers of people have been dying at home, many in their 20s and 30s, with covid because hospitals simply can't take them in. Natural immunity comes as a result of being infected, which brings a huge risk of hospitalization and death.

I can't speak for Japan. But I did read your link. It calls out that the private hospitals in Japan have always been very small, not prepared for infectious diseases. It also mentions that they're not required to take in patients, which could definitely cause a backlog in other parts of the system. Whereas in the USA, hospitals have to treat you. They'll definitely send you a massive bill, but they have to treat you if they have resources to do so.

So that may be the difference between why Japan got so slammed and why we, despite the commentary in the news, have not experienced actual collapse like we feared at first. Allow me to point you to this:

https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2021/09/covid-hos...

"In other words, the study suggests that roughly half of all the hospitalized patients showing up on COVID-data dashboards in 2021 may have been admitted for another reason entirely, or had only a mild presentation of disease."

So it seems we have an overblown narrative in the media, at least as far as the nature and extent of the hospitalizations in America as a whole. Since we also have over 100 million Americans with past covid (and consequently excellent antibodies against covid including against delta), the narrative about healthcare system collapse seems to have been proven untrue. Source for how many people had covid here once again:

https://www.publichealth.columbia.edu/public-health-now/news...

"A new study published in the journal Nature estimates that 103 million Americans, or 31 percent of the U.S. population, had been infected with SARS-CoV-2 by the end of 2020."

As mentioned elsewhere, pushing natural immunity as the solution is as dumb as chicken pox parties that misinformed people of previous decades used to have. It was unnecessarily dangerous. Yes, people who push that should be pushed out of the discussion. Give them an inch and they'll eat away your country from the inside out. There's a reason the US is such a massive disaster with tremendous deaths and growing (but primarily in select states, and primarily states that have opposition to vaccines for political reasons), while other countries that embraced vaccines are finally getting things under control.

This is nonsense. We already have over 100 million Americans with natural immunity regardless of whether someone likes it or not. It has already happened. And therefore, that solves the debate as far as how we should proceed with covid. It's a false dilemma to keep presenting it as vax or no vax. There is the third reality for a huge chunk of Americans, and that is the fact that for their own bodies, covid is no longer relevant.

We embraced vaccines here plenty. We simply have less of a culture of mandating things, and thankfully we haven't gone the way of Australia yet. You can see my comment history for examples of what's going on there, but I'll paste them here for your convenience. I don't consider this anywhere under control regardless of covid numbers, because the cost will be too high:

They're going to force people who quarantine at home (rather than a government-mandated quarantine "hotel" with guards) to install and use an app. Facial recognition, GPS tracking in your own home. And it will randomly ping you, and if you don't respond within 15 minutes it'll send the police to your house to conduct an in-person quarantine check. Source:

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/09/pandemic-a...

They're arresting people for making Facebook posts against lockdowns. Source:

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-54007824

Australia presumes to say how many people can visit your home. Source:

https://theconversation.com/vaccine-passports-are-coming-to-...

“NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian yesterday announced freedoms for fully vaccinated people once 70% of the state’s eligible population are double dosed. These include being able to go to hospitality venues, hairdressers and gyms, and have five people to your home.”

They can arbitrarily lock you in your apartment building for up to weeks, no one allowed to leave. Source:

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-53316097

[jollybean]

"We already have over 100 million Americans with natural immunity"

This is rubbish, which you have repeated here several times now.

You cited one study, which is a modelling estimate, and ignore the much better studies which actually test for seropositivity and antibodies which show much lower rates of infection.

Your comments about Japan make no sense at all, as they have experienced COVID in a fundamentally different way than the US, initially with considerably lower rates of infection etc, like Australia, Taiwan and New Zealand, these 'Island States' have had better means for containment.

You've completely misrepresented the Atlantic article to suggest that somehow we didn't already know most cases of COVID are not severe - but worse that somehow they don't have COVID when we can and do provide fairly accurate testing for it.

There is no ambiguity about who was in 'all those hospital beds'. We were not guesstimating.

In a pandemic, there's a 100% chance that some people will show up at hospitals and have 'illness' but not the contagious infection causing the pandemic. This is not part of any kind of argument.

Hospitals in many regions are filling up with people who have COVID, that is the material fact here.

[CrazyPyroLinux]

> pushing natural immunity as the solution is as dumb as chicken pox parties

So, pretty smart? But I come from an era before a chicken pox vax.

[jollybean]

This is bad faith, misleading information and rhetoric.

The evidence you sited is a model/estimation and there are much better ways to estimate the prevalence of COVID, namely, literally doing antibody tests.

In Jan 20201, 18% of dialysis patients had COVID at some point - as established by actual testing, not predictive modelling - and they are a population much more directly vulnerable to it, so the actual rate in the healthy population will be considerably lower than that.n it's

The credibility of your thesis falls flat by first offering bad data, when you could have offered something better.

Second, we already know most of those presenting themselves at hospitals have a mild case of COVID. It's normal for people to be concerned, they are not taking up hospital beds. Your 'fact' is a 'non-fact' in this context.

Stop cherry-picking and misrepresenting facts, leaving out important details because it will lead to the 'literal dehumanizing' of people, i.e. their deaths.

What is 'dangerous' is the pandemic.

600 000 Americans have died from it.

[1] https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle...

[jollybean]

For reference, there are no antibody studies which conclude that serpositivity for COVID natural infection is anywhere near 30% in 2020.

It was 3.5% in July 2020, and 20% in May 2021, from testing ~1.5 blood donations, which is roughly consistent with other studies, and parallels sensitivity in the UK.

[1] https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2784013

[dham]

They're filling up with unvaccinated people because people aren't sure how to be sick anymore. Stay at home and check your oxygen. If it dips to 95 or 94 then start thinking about going to Urgent Care. Not really ER. It's like when you have a baby they drill it in your head not to come to the hospital too soon. People still don't listen but yea. Where is that messaging for Covid?

[mike00632]

The hospital morgues are filling up too. What is your advice for the over-capacity morgues? What conspiracy is creating the need for hasty mass graves? Can you think of how that's as common as something like pregnancy?

Literally just have a step back and look at yourself debating this. COVID deniers are literally quibbling over what is written on death certificates as people are dying en masse.

[xaedes]

With all due respect, I rather think the virus is the cause.