Delta
The dangerous delta variant has already conquered 20% of the infected in the USA, growing exponentially and thus not far from the 60-80% when Britain's numbers started to revert
Thus, US key numbers will go up again soon. The European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control estimates that by August, this variant will be seen in 90% of all EU cases, and by that time, numbers will have gone up as well.
Chancellor Merkel emphasised in parliament on Wednesday that vaccination is key. That may be true but, if Germany were to maintain the current pace of vaccinations, it would reach levels currently seen in Britain. Or, in other words, when the curves started to go up again in Britain, its vaccination progress was at the level seen in Germany today. The same is essentially true for France and other EU nations. Thus, vaccination progress alone, as much as it is desirable, will not prevent the delta variant to take foot in the EU, or in the USA. Distancing measures must remain in place as well.
In the end though, Delta will just prolong the agony until Covid-19 becomes endemic. Or, much more desirable, until we have reached herd immunity by finally making vaccination mandatory.
| Daily Incidence | Daily Deaths | Daily ICU | Daily Pos. Rate | Average Excess Death | Death Projection | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| USA | 03.2 ↘︎ | 0.085 ↘︎ | 1.2 ↘︎ | 02.4 % ↘︎ | 16.0 % | ↘︎ |
| WA State | 06.2 ↘︎ | 0.120 ↘︎ | 0.4 ↘︎ | 05.2 % ↗︎ | 08.8 % | ↘︎ |
| Britain | 18.8 ↗︎ | 0.023 ↗︎ | 0.3 ↗︎ | 00.8 % ↗︎ | 15.5 % | ↗︎ |
| France | 02.9 ↘︎ | 0.050 ↘︎ | 2.7 ↘︎ | 00.8 % ↘︎ | 15.4 % | ↘︎ |
| Germany | 01.0 ↘︎ | 0.065 ↘︎ | 1.0 ↘︎ | 00.9 % ↘︎ | 07.1 % | ↘︎ |
| Tunisia | 23.9 ↗︎ | 0.740 ↗︎ | 32.7 % ↑ | 15.2 % | ↘︎↗︎ |
With more and more people around me being fully vaccinated, I have noticed a disturbing behaviour: they drop their masks indoors, reasoning that they cannot infect anybody. But hey, I am standing right next to you, wearing my mask. And I am not fully vaccinated.
Please remember, full vaccination makes you akin to the virus affecting a little child: you can get infected, you will mostly not notice it but you pass on the virus, albeit at a lower rate than the unvaccinated adults.
Hence, if you are in a room with only one unvaccinated person, it is you who have to wear the mask, even if you had been just tested (the antigen test is not very reliable). And, to the contrary what most people believe, the unvaccinated person in this room could even go maskless because if she had the virus, your likelihood of getting sick is very very very low.
On the other hand, if you were infected and not wearing a mask, the likelihood of you infecting the masked and unvaccinated person is much higher. And this person could get seriously sick.