You either control a pandemic, or you let it control you. - Professor John Edmunds.
The CDC's estimate that 20% of infections will become Long Covid.
Let's do some math!! If we take the lowest numbers out there, if just 10% of Covid infections become Long Covid, and almost everyone gets infected yearly since 2022, then in just 5 years, by 2028, half the population will have Long Covid, right??
Consider that Long Covid shows up in a variety of ways, sometimes like Alzheimers, sometimes ME/CFS, and many people can barely sit up in bed for 15 minutes at a time. Check out the documentary Unrest to get the picture. How will the schools (and all businesses and government and just about everyone) cope with THAT?? Who, in your life, will take care of you if you can't get out of bed or feed yourself? And who will take care of both of you if you both get it?
The other problem with that stat, besides how it will affect basic functioning in the world, is that the number of newly acquired Long Covid cases will reduce each year as the not-yet-LC population reduces (assuming that people only get Long Covid once, which we're not sure of at the moment).
Here's what 10%/year looks like in a population of 100,000, as an example (in this sample, nobody dies of it -- it's just to show what 10%/year looks like)
New LC Total with LC Total no LC yet
2022 - 10,000 10,000 90,000
2023 - 9,000 19,000 81,000
2024 - 8,100 27,100 72,900
2025 - 7,290 34,390 65,610
2026 - 6,561 40,951 59,049
2027 - 5,904 46,855 53,145
2028 - 5,314 52,169 47,831
And can't you just hear politicians in 2028 talking themselves up because they cut the number of new people with Long Covid in HALF!! Only 5,000 cases in 2028 - but remember when it was 10,000 with the other party in charge?! Mark my words!
At this rate, by 2043, in just 20 years, there will be fewer than 10% of the population left that are fully functional. Another 20 years, we'll be down to 1%. (Meanwhile - climate change will do a number on us all.)
ETA: Barry Hunt just did some calculations that are specific to Canada, and they're much nicer:
"Based on an average of 150,000 daily cases continuing, 14.6% Long Covid rate reported by Stats Canada continuing, an estimate of 40% of Long Covid cases being persistent, and an estimate of 20% of persistent Long Covid cases being disabling, these are the numbers:"
For context, Canada has a population of about 38 million, so 100% will have had Long Covid within three years, and only 10% will be permanently disabled by then instead my guestimate of 40%. I didn't factor in the percentages whose Long Covid isn't persistent. So that's good news in a warped and twisted way! Except that 100% will have been affected by Long Covid instead of just 60%. In. Just. Three. Years.
Ontario is at severe level right now, Tara Moriarty does bi-weekly stats using all data possible to estimate risk in each province. She said,
"By waste water or our model, daily infections in Canada are now as high/higher than prior Omicron peaks except the December 2021 wave. High risk people need shots ASAP, wear N95 masks, avoid non-essential indoor activities. It's URGENT that you let others know and ESPECIALLY help people who are high risk/pregnant/65+ to get their shots ASAP, preferably in an outdoor setting. Make sure people know to wear masks--good, N95-type masks. You should postpone non-essential gatherings indoors, or move them outdoors, ESPECIALLY if higher risk people would be attending. Healthcare, work, school are essential, but if you can, really limit any time indoors you can if it's not essential. And please, please, if you're sick, even just under the weather or with a headache, stay home if you can at all. And test--it's taking as long as 4-5 days for tests to show up positive. Be aware of this. PLEASE protect others, especially those who don't have their booster yet."
I rarely see a single other person with a mask on despite the death rate being 20 times baseline. And no mainstream media considers this newsworthy (or they're somehow unable to report it).
Last May, in Canada's Long Covid "Framework for Action," they wrote,
"In Canada, there are almost 30 times more people living with long-term symptoms of a SARS-CoV-2 infection (1.4 million) than have tragically died from it (46,000) in the past three years. The number of individuals suffering from PCC [Post Covid Condition - aka Long Covid][ may be an underestimate given the lack of a clear definition of PCC, the challenges of getting a Covid-19 diagnostic test at many times during the past 3 years, and the lack of diagnostic criteria and biomarkers for PCC."
We're now at 54,276 deaths, so maybe 1.6 million with Long Covid? That's only 4% of the population, so, with any luck, all the predictions are wrong! Alternatively, the assumption that we're all getting Covid at least once a year is wildly incorrect. In some of my Covid-cautious groups, the vast majority are pretty sure they've never had it. Elsewhere I know people who have had it twice in six weeks. I can't imagine how anyone could figure out the average rate of infection when nobody's testing and everyone thinks their illness that has all the symptoms of Covid is anything but Covid, despite there being a variety of ways Covid shows up.
We're losing about 15,000/year to deaths, half a million to significant longterm illness. Compare that to the almost 1,800 Canadians that die in motor vehicle collisions each year and almost 9,000 seriously injured. Every level of government keeps working on more and better ways to reduce that number of traffic fatalities by putting out PSAs (even though they're often pedestrian-blaming) and advertising tips to everyone and ensuring better standards for vehicles and safer street design. We're not perfect at it, but at least we never stop working on it!! But nada about preventing Covid infections beyond occasional handwashing bullshit.
HIV and SARS-CoV-2 are both viruses that destroy T cells. But when CD4 counts go below 200 from HIV, it's considered AIDS. When the CD4 counts go below 200 from SARS-CoV-2, we call it a cold or the flu or allergies (or anxiety). Like AIDS, a weakened immune system means people can end up dying from a minor illness, like a cold, so, in a way, it is a cold that's killing you, but it's because of the prior Covid infection that wiped out your immunity.
And now Covid is a disease of the young: in the states, young healthy people are dying at a rate of 1,500 each month, a 20% jump in annual deaths from disease, compared to only a 10% increase in the old and frail demographic. More 18-44 year olds died of Covid in 2022 than died of the flu in the 22 years from 1999 to 2020 combined. If you don't mask, you could be spreading this virus to a young healthy person that doesn't make it.
We really need to better educate the public somehow and consider bringing back mask mandates - specifically N95s - for healthcare, schools, stores, and public transportation. This is just nuts.
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