A local meteorologist posted this the other day (it's public so I am not sharing private info but I have taken out the names). Guessing she was not vaxxed due to being pregnant but no idea about other family members. Even thought these are one-off anecdotal instances it should still be a wake up call as to how serious this situation is.

It is with a heavy heart that I share my sister-in-law, went home to be with Jesus this evening. Two weeks ago, life was completely normal. My brother and I were trying to figure out how to soon be girl-Dads and our wives were talking nursery plans. Last week my SIL was hit hard with COVID at 30 weeks pregnant. A few days after a positive test she couldn't breathe and went into ICU. A few days later she underwent an emergency C-section and immediately went on a ventilator. For the past week she fought hard, so hard. Today, at 31 years old her heart gave out. Her sweet baby girl made it and is in the NICU. Please pray for my brother, his two sweet boys, that sweet little girl and our family as we walk this road.

How sad...and that's just one of so many heartbreaking stories.

The only good news is, in the hardest hit states, vaccination rates are on the rise. I just hope they aren't too late.

I tried to link to an article about the protection that the shot gives pregnant women and their babies, but the link had the V word in it, and I'm one of those Houzz members that's not allowed to use that word. It's from Johns Hopkins if anyone wants to look it up.

What a nightmare for that family, especially the children, it’s so heartbreaking. I saw a similar story on tv the other day. A woman had been advised against getting the vaccine and got covid just days before her due date. Fortunately, there was a better outcome, as she and the baby are home now and doing well. From what I understand, there’s been a change in the narrative and pregnant women are being advised to vaccinate now.

My sister is high risk, so we’re holding off on our get together indefinately. I haven’t seen her since 2016 and it’s disappointing for sure. I would love to throw out a vent about the circumstances surrounding our decision, but obviously some things are better left unsaid. It’s been a rough 18 months for everyone, I can completely understand the need to live a little and connect. I have no doubt those of us who are traveling have done everything necessary to protect themselves as well as the people they’ll be with. That’s been a common denominator with most of us consistantly.

Many of these travel plans were made before the new variant was widespread, but we knew it was coming. What we needed to do this summer was to take a wait-and-see approach. We needed to continue masking, social distancing, and not gathering while we waited for more to be inoculated and for more to be known about its effectiveness against all variants. If we had done that, we wouldn't be in this surge now. The most important thing we needed to do as a nation was to sit tight this summer so that schools could safely open in the fall. But people hadn't had a vacation or seen their families in a year so everyone rushed to make travel plans, and they are helping to spread the virus.

In the past month, everything has changed yet some think nothing has changed and they continue with their plans. Remember those debates last year when we said we wear masks not only to protect ourselves but to protect others? What are people willing to do to protect others now? Is being inoculated enough or do we need to alter our behavior too?

It's pretty silly that we can't type out the V word.

Well, now my daughter‘s roommate has it. She is surprisingly sick considering she is vaccinated, ,only 25 and in perfect health. Five of their friends, also all vaccinated also have it.

I don’t agree, Eileen. 98-99% of those hospitalized and dying are not jabbed, and to me, that is proof positive that it doesn’t matter what the majority of us are doing to get to the finish line. Until people agree to vaccinate, there’s always going to be new mutations. It’s hard to have empathy for someone who gets sick because he/she refuses to get vaccinated. And that’s who’s getting sick. Kids and the vulnerable are of course exceptions.

I just found out that my other’s sister’s husband drove from SoCal to that Sturges thing in North or is it South Dakota on his Harley. WTH??? He’s been an idiot through out the pandemic but this takes the cake. I bit my tongue and said not a word but it’s sooooo frustrating.

Edited to correct my wording.

Ya I don’t think being vax’d does much to prevent you from getting Delta, just prevents you from getting seriously ill or dead.

Dlm, that was so sad about Chris Justus and his sil. Startling.

I don't mind saying the name because it is public and maybe people need to read it I know it has been a wake-up call for some people

Has anyone read or heard whether or not jabbed people get long Covid or not?

Lukki, when this variant mutates, it may not matter whether you're inoculated or not.

Everyone clings to the belief that they'll only get a mild or moderate case. A mild or moderate case in clinical terms means you won't be hospitalized, but you may feel like you wish you were dead, be out of commission for a few weeks, and have lasting health effects. If you have a breakthrough infection, you spread the virus just as much as a person who isn't inoculated.

And no, being vee'd does not mean you won't get seriously ill or die.

NBC's research found 125,682 breakthrough cases and 1400 deaths in the 38 states that release that data. As for hospitalizations:

CDC's most recent published data says that as of July 26 there have been 6,587 hospitalizations among fully vee'd Americans and 1,263 deaths. Research by NBC News indicates that the number who have been hospitalized or died has already passed 7,300 in just the 30 states providing data.

Did you know the numbers were that high?

Link has the V word but the article is titled "Breakthrough COVID Cases: Data shows how many vee'd Americans have tested positive".

FWIW, there's some nuance that's not in these reports. Many people who've been fully vaccinated have pre-existing health conditions and/or are on certain medications or treatments that make them more vulnerable and the vaccine not as effective.

Fully vaccinated individuals should be able to gather safely indoors, but now that Delta has entered the picture, it's kind of a wild card. It is certain, tho, that being vaxxed is definitely protecting people from dying. Those thousands seem like large numbers, but keep in mind that's out of many millions who've received the vaccines. That percentage is not extremely high and was not unexpected.

@Zalco/bring back Sophie! - that is the big question. So far I’ve not found anything on that one way or another. I keep talking to DH about that as he thinks I’m overly pessimistic about the current Covid risk.

Katz, this is all I have found on the topic, which is unhelpful. Apparently we are not tracking the course of the infection on jabbed people who are not hospitalized.

From Slate:

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention used to track all breakthrough cases, but as of May 1 it tracks only those that lead to hospitalization and death, using data collected by state and local health agencies. This decision was made to “maximize the quality of the data collected on cases of greatest clinical and public health importance.” But without comprehensive data on breakthrough cases, it will be impossible to know the likelihood that immunized people can get infections that lead to long-lasting symptoms.

“In my opinion, CDC should be tracking all consequences of breakthrough cases, not just hospitalization and death,” Akiko Iwasaki, the Yale University immunology professor at the forefront of long COVID research, said in an email. “Even mild or asymptomatic infection can lead to long COVID. Tracking this on a national scale would be very informative.” Iwasaki is one of the only experts to have stated outright that fully vaccinated people can still get long COVID.

But again, there’s limited data to support that. Right now, there are only two published sources of data on breakthrough cases and long COVID. In a peer-reviewed study of 1,497 vaccinated health care workers in Israel, published July 29 in the New England Journal of Medicine, 39 people had breakthrough infections, 19 percent of whom reported symptoms like fatigue, headaches, and muscle pain lasting more than six weeks. Bob Wachter, chair of the University of California, San Francisco Department of Medicine, tweeted that “I’m not certain that a mild Delta breakthrough case can’t lead to long COVID,” adding that the study from Israel supports that concern.

https://slate.com/technology/2021/08/long-covid-breakthrough-infection-vaccinated.html

I think its too early to know if this new surge will cause long Covid to the vaccinated. Our positive numbers didn’t start moving up until after the 4th of July. The numbers really took off around the 15th.

eta: My vaccinated friend who was very sick for over 11 days, is still feeling weak and blah at 16 days. she’s not considered to be a long hauler. she was told 6-8 weeks is when they might classify her differently,

eta: she was very sick, never hospitalized, so she would not show in any official counts.

Eileen, I posted a link to that article above.

It's not that the numbers are that high, but that they are that low. The data in the article show that the breakthrough cases are less than .08%. Even if the numbers are off by half, it's still less than 1% of the vaxed.

We are talking about a few thousand deaths of vee'd people. I don't find that reassuring at all.

Check out the articles from the Kaiser Family Foundation. I would post the link, but it contains the V word, and I'm apparently barred from using it.

Although the CDC is not tracking all breakthrough cases, 24 states are, and the KFF has analyzed the data. This is one of the graphs from the article showing the percentage of fully jabbed people who have contracted the disease. As you can see, the highest percentage is below 1.0% of those double jabbed.

Heartbreaking about that newscaster’s SIL and preemie baby. I can’t imagine her OB-GYN didn’t advise her to get vaccinated. My niece is a nurse practitioner and got the V while pregnant, had th baby and both are fine. My DIL got her second shot right around the time she conceived—-mom and in-utero baby are fine and she has extra testing done as she’s high-risk.

I have relatives in Sturgis right now. I’m sure they planned it in the spring when it looked like we were headed back to normal but I’m shocked they didn’t cancel the trip. They are not Trumpers and he’s a career scientist. They are vaxxed but it will be a miracle if they don’t get Covid and they will stick out like sore thumbs wearing masks. I sure hope they quarantine when they get home—-they have grandkids under 10, the youngest a newborn.

DLM2000-GW you must be close to me. I follow this weather man on Facebook. So sad.

Re V while pregnant, my local fertility clinic is advising to get it in second tri just out of concern for fever/inflammation in first tri. But definitely pushing it.

The numbers above are actually misleadingly higher than reality. They test for covid upon hospitalization so they are listed as hospitalized or died WITH covid even if their hospitalization and death were from other causes they still get put in the counts. I am guessing the real number of break throuh infection is much higher than reported due to asymptomatic disease but the hospitalization and death is likely lower than reports show too.

The health experts I've listened to have said that to understand this virus, it's important to track the entire infection rate, and only tracking the breakthrough infections that lead to hospitalization and/or death is a mistake.

True roarah. There is much dissention regarding the data we are getting. My state is not even testing asymptomatic breakthrough infections anymore, so the breakthrough cases are much higher than you we are told. I am sure that is the case in most hospitals now. Also, it has been a problem from the VERY beginning of this virus that covid deaths are not accurate, listing ANYONE dying with Covid, instead of dying from Covid. That was/is still, a HUGE discrepancy in true death rates. But, we will never know for sure, because CDC is, I will say in the nicest way possible...not on top of things, by far.

My state also had to make a correction in the news/newspaper that was originally reported we didn't have enough ICU for kids, making it like the numbers for hospitalized kids with Covid was really high, when in fact, it was for RSV. The media is not being truthful anymore. Just one small example.

These articles might be of interest.

https://www.wndu.com/2021/03/01/clarifying-the-count-how-covid-19-deaths-are-reported/

““The deaths, I think are really, for the most part counted by way of death certificates.’ Dr. Dan Nafziger says. He is the Chief Medical Officer for Goshen Hospital. “Probably most of the COVID deaths that are being counted are where COVID appears in that chain of causation.”

So what is that chain of causation? When a person dies the attending physician will list a primary, secondary, and/or tertiary cause of death. For a coronavirus death, COVID-19 will appear on one of these lines, or on the other significant conditions portion.

“It probably isn’t going to be the primary cause of death in many cases because people will have respiratory failure or they’ll have pulmonary emboli. They’ll have other things that may result from the COVID but I’m guessing that generally people are counting COVID in that chain of events,” Dr. Nafziger says.

Where it appears on that chain of events, or if it appears at all, is up to that attending doctor, and not every doctor is the same.”

https://www.aamc.org/news-insights/how-are-covid-19-deaths-counted-it-s-complicated

“In an effort to capture some of the missed fatalities, the CDC measured “excess deaths” — the number of people “who have died from all causes, in excess of the expected number of deaths for a given place and time.” The study found that from Jan. 26 through Oct. 3 of 2020, the United States had 299,000 more deaths than “the typical number during the same period in previous years.” (On Oct. 15, the agency’s official COVID-19 death estimate was 216,025.)”

Just got back from the grocery store. I wore a mask.....so did many other people inside. Relieved but saddened at the same time. :(

@schoolhouse_gwagain - same with me yesterday. Started wearing the mask again and many others also now wearing masks again. It saddened me too.

2katz, I hope your friend and husband recover fully from this. Bestyears, your daughter, too.

Thanks to those who provided links and information.

I have travel plans in December, and we just reviewed our options for cancellation if needed. I had tentatively planned a few shorter weekends away in the meantime, but I'm no longer entertaining those options. They were just for fun, and I can find fun without traveling.

Saying that, I'm trying to walk the fine line of "gotta live my life" and not wanting to add to this horrible pandemic. I'm about to the point at which Nini was in a prior post--come on, folks! I understand suspicions about our medical community and news outlets and the numbers being reported. But it seems from my perspective, such suspicions at this point reveal a distinct attitude that we are not all in this together. Which isn't surprising, unfortunately.

My family and those around me are fully v'd, except for a few who I avoid. My DS, who stayed at college this summer, wanted to come home for a few days. He had cold symptoms last week, and it was that familiar dreaded feeling... He got tested, and fortunately, it was negative. He even said, "Yeah, we're going to be dealing with this a long time." A decade? I hope not. But I certainly didn't expect us to still be dealing with it now.

I've gone back to masking indoors and my prior-jab behaviors out of respect for employees, mothers with small children, the immune compromised, etc., who have to unfortunately deal with the ignorant negligence that's contributing to the spread.

I never stopped masking in public because I see many of my students in local businesses and I was hoping to keep mask wearing normalized for when they returned to school in the fall.

I still am socializing with other vaccinated friends and family inside our homes from time to time sans masks. I always prefer outside but if we had outdoor plans and it rains as has been often here in the NE we will eat inside too. I really do feel the danger presently of me getting severe illness is so small after vaccine that the social benefits are worth it.

I haven't read a lot about this here, so I'll post this, eager to hear other's experiences. I know of four people (including DD's roommate), whose first Covid test came back negative, but subsequent test came back positive. In all cases, these people waited the recommended 3-4 days after exposure before they took the first test, but it didn't come back positive until day 5 or 6. One thing I've read is that as this virus mutates, the false-negative numbers are increasing because it simply looks different than what the test is trying to match. I'm not a scientist, so I don't know if that makes sense, but it's what I've gathered from reading. Any thoughts?

Why, if their initial results were negative, were they prompted to get tested again. My DS got a test about 3 days after symptoms started, and it was negative. We assumed he just has a cold. I wouldn't think for him to get tested again.

Type of test matters too. The at home rapid test have a very high false positive. You need alot of viral load to test and often that happens later then four days post exposure. This is why quarentine is always actually longer than isolation.

Journal Clinical Virology. 2021, Apr 137:104782

Handling and accuracy of four rapid antigen tests for the diagnosis of SARS-CoV-2 compared to RT-qPCR
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7927591/

Thanks for the info. He had one done at his university medical center before he left, but I have no idea what brand it was. I'll talk to him about getting another one here.

PCR test is more accurate, than rapid antigen. Nice flowchart from Illinois Medical Professionals Action Collaborative Team :

Feathers, my friend retested after her first negative (cold symptoms) because she lost her sense of smell a couple of days later. I'm not sure if it was suggested or if she was just using common sense.

In the cases I mentioned, symptoms were persistent after the first test. DD asked her reluctant roommate to test again because she didn’t want to miss a week of work unnecessarily but also didn’t want to expose co-workers. The roommate was surprised when the second test came back positive.

My DB and SIL have Covid right now. My SIL started showing symptoms after about 3 days after my DB tested positive. She then took swab test and it was negative, which they stated it might be too early-waited 3 more days and she tested positive. I don't understand how you can be in the "having symptoms" stage and not test positive, but that's what happened with them.

I'm starting to think my vaxxed kids are highly liked to get COVID when they move into their dorms. Arggh

mtnrd, the data I see is that breakthroughs, even if undercounted by a lot, are still under 1% of those vaxed. Not that there isn't a need to still be cautious as there are so many unknowns yet, but I don't think it's as dire as they are trying to suggest. It is among the unvaxed, but among the vaxed, not so much.

NBC research on breakthrough cases

Me, too, Mtn. I have one moving in next weekend. But I was talking with a friend today who's a nurse practitioner for a downtown Chicago hospital, and she tracks covid numbers. She said there's so far been no noticeable uptick in cases since Lollapalooza. I didn't confirm this myself--just relied on what she told me. Her son went, and another friend's daughters went, too. (My kids did their one-and-done Lolla pre-covid and had no desire to return this year.) The kids I know who attended tested afterward, and perhaps the surge is yet to come. I don't know.

I'm not supporting Chicago's decision to host Lolla again. I believe it was pretty reckless to do so. But it does give me hope that jabs and masks and whatever measures were taken that seemingly--at this early point--to have worked, may also help when our kids go back to college. One of mine has jab and mask requirements. Another doesn't have the jab requirement, but masks are required in class and there are incentives for social gatherings to have the jab. My fingers are crossed.

My youngest is taking a gap year, and my two oldest will be in dorms. Both of their schools require vaccinations. One school is mask optional one school is masked except in dining and residence halls.

Chicago data - as of 8/7

Going back to school is the real issue, not adults who've been vaxxed. I haven't heard anything about being very sick if you have a breakthrough - with the exception of the immunocompromised. Living in close quarters such as dorms is a real issue. Children who can't get the shot are the real issue.

Mdln, those numbers look relatively ok given the mass Lolla crowd. I'm surprised and relieved it's not worse. But many Lolla attendees are from suburbs and other outlying areas that wouldn't register in City of Chicago covid data. Having a large scale music festival during a pandemic just a week or so before the target attendees return to college was a dumb move.

Is elvis still in the Houzz, my cyber friend from N. Wisconsin. Looking to say hello and catch up.

Were there attendees from out of state at the festival too?

Yes I’m sure. Festivals draw regionally and nationally. Cell phone data can be tracked where people came from and went back.

We have a festival next month, 30,000 people. Everyone is likely coming in from somewhere else since it’s a smaller city.

I created this graph from the emails my friend gets every morning, showing the total number of Covid patients at his Houston med center hospital. That curve was looking so nice until about a month ago.