| I was responding to someone who accused the parent comment of "feigned confusion". They seemed to be justifying the flagging of the story as an "overreaction but understandable" measure to counter anti-vax narratives. Fighting one form of propaganda with another form, is not a game I'd ever participate in. Why would anyone? Surely we want practical measures that suit the changing conditions of a pandemic, rather than broad immovable "rules are rules" policies. > hospitalizations and deaths are down Depending on how you look at it. End of the day where I live...(Jan 18, 2022): > "Victoria has declared an unprecedented system-wide ‘code brown’ emergency across all its Melbourne hospitals and six in the regions as it buckles under COVID-19 pressures." > "Mr Merlino said hospitalisations in NSW, where the Omicron outbreak is a couple of weeks ahead of Victoria, continue to increase by about 100 people per day." > "The number of people in ICU also decreased, by two to 127, although 43 people are now on ventilation, an increase of five." https://www.aap.com.au/news/victoria-declares-hospital-covid... It's not a binary argument. The vaccine prevents serious illness for many people. I thought that was a given by now. Elderly people who weren't vaccinated previously, are now vaccinated. Any drop in hospital admission rates would also be from the less severe Omicron variant; vaccination of elderly and vulnerable; and more people managing their illness from home. At the beginning, many were panicking and rushing to hospital with a headache. They were still reported as covid hospitalisations, even though their hospital admission consisted of basic monitoring then discharged soon after. |
As for the vaccine preventing deaths and hospitalizations, i hope most can agree that is a fact.
When that is said, then we have always had the flu which also causes many deaths and hospitalizations. With Omicron the flu and Corona are now equals regarding deaths and hospitalizations.
Where i come from that is what you can learn from the data.
So when the flu doesn't cause restrictions and is now similar to Corona, then restrictions should be dropped. That is my viewpoint.