It’s coming—#DeltaVariant is now >96% dominant in 3 major counties (UK, Russia, Portugal). It is surging exponentially in the US at now 31% of all cases, up from ~10% just a week ago. The #COVID19 rise & divergence hidden by fast dropping #AlphaVariant. 🧵 on.ft.com/3xzeFpZ
2) Notice the strong divergence of #DeltaVariant vs #Alphavariant. This was why the rise of Delta was hidden so long underneath total case counts dropping and plateauing
3) this was hospitalization in the UK one week earlier. Very different than before #DeltaVariant domination. ~30% of deaths even among those fully 2 dose vaccinated, according to PHE (England’s CDC). This is the Delta.
4) let this sink in - #DeltaVariant is still penetrating for vaccine breakthroughs that 10% of all hospitalized #COVID19 cases in last week was among those with 2 dose + 14 days fully vaccinated (2/3rd of UK is AstraZeneca vaccinated)
5) One dose of the vaccine is insufficient now. Two doses much more protection, but even then there is an 8% attenuation. Also this is the average of AZ+Pfizer… the actual 2 dose AstraZeneca efficacy according to PHE is only 60%.
6) here is the relative growth rate of #DeltaVariant versus all other major variants in the past. Delta #B16172 is leaps and bounds faster than any other variant of #SARSCoV2 to date.
7) France is doing no better “While in the UK about 46 per cent of the population has been fully immunised, vaccination rates in most countries in mainland Europe are hovering at between 20 per cent and 30 per cent. About 26% of the population in France has been fully vaccinated.
8) “French authorities are currently trying to contain an outbreak in the Landes region, near the Spanish border, where 125 cases of the Delta variant have been confirmed by genetic sequencing & another 130 are suspected, representing about 30% of recent infections in the area.”
9) “Clusters of the Delta variant have also been identified in recent weeks in the southern suburbs of Paris and an art school in Strasbourg. “
10) there are now #DeltaVariant outbreaks popping up everywhere — even in the most heavily vaccinated country in the world — Israel. Let that sink in!! And Israel is mostly Pfizer (88% efficacy for #Delta in one study), not even AZ
11) The reason #DeltaVariant is quickly dominating all over the world (from India 🇮🇳 to UK 🇬🇧 and countless countries), is because it is by far the fastest and most contagious variant to date. Faster by leaps and bounds.
12) UK hospitalizations soaring. So how did UK miss the damn #DeltaVariant sneak up up on them without reacting? Politics aside, it was ignoring the data because the deceptive drop in Alpha mixed with rise of #DeltaVariant - to create temporary appearance of flattening— see video
14) Notably, it was this phenomenon with dropping #AlphaVariant and rising #DeltaVariant that lulled a lot of naive govt leaders into complacency - because “so what, I don’t see cases rising” is how most uneducated leaders naively react—to their peril.
15) It is high time CDC takes decisive action. That’s why @endCOVID19 & @CovidActionGrp are petitioning CDC to “reinstate mask-wearing indoors regardless of vaccine status, guidance for vaccination verification, & resume breakthrough case identification.” endcoronavirus.org/blog/cdc-unive…
16) Thus, please share this link— and ask friends and family to petition the CDC for urgent action. Nobody is asking for lockdowns right now — but we want urgent action so that we can **avoid** any damn lockdowns. Vaccinate 2 doses and mask indoors again. endcoronavirus.org/blog/cdc-unive…
17) please sign the petition to CDC for urgent #DeltaVariant action. It is by @endCOVID19 & @CovidActionGrp and a “coalition of scientists, public health officials, epidemiologists, health care workers, educators, advocates, parents, & concerned citizens: change.org/p/centers-for-…
18) Just how is #DeltaVariant spreading so much faster than any #SARSCoV2 seen before? Because it spread even via “fleeting” contact. This was not just documented once, but *twice*, and confirmed via 🧬 genomic sequencing and even with security cameras
19) US is now at 31% #DeltaVariant. Aside from New England, most of the US is not higher in fully vaccinated than UK 🇬🇧. And the Deep South and certain Mountain zone states very low vaccination rate. This bodes poorly for when #DeltaVariant surges more. And it will.
20) As result of likely low vaccination, we are seeing both positivity and cases in Missouri. The South needs to vaccinate much much more. And fast. The window is closing while #DeltaVariant spreads further. google.com/amp/s/amp.kans…
21) Did the #DeltaVariant really surge from ~10% a week ago to 31% now that fast? Yes. 6 days ago: Former Biden adviser @ASlavitt: “The delta variant is about 10% of all the cases in U.S. and at some point, it’s going to become the majority.” #vaccinate
22) why else be vigilant, More than 350 doctors and medical workers in Indonesia who received SinoVac’s #COVID19 vaccine have tested positive. Most are asymptomatic but dozens hospitalized with a high fever and other symptoms. Which variant? #DeltaVariant. webmd.com/vaccines/covid…
23) US has about 1 month before it hits UK 🇬🇧 #DeltaVariant levels… let’s don’t do UK complacency and ignore the rise of Delta until too late.
It’s a trap: CATCH 22—if you register, ICE will deport you. If you don’t register, you’ve now committed a crime for the first time, and ICE will deport you. Trump doesn’t care if you’ve paid all taxes and followed all laws—ICE will deport you.
2) The Department of Homeland Security announced that it was mandating that all people in the United States illegally register with the federal government, and said those who didn’t self-report could face fines or prosecution. ***Failure to register is considered a crime***
3) Registration will be mandatory for everyone 14 and older without legal status. People registering have to provide their fingerprints and address, and parents and guardians of anyone under age 14 must ensure they registered. The registration process also applies to Canadians who are in the U.S. for more than 30 days, such as so-called snowbirds who spend winter months in places like Florida.
3) “Kennedy is set to announce Thursday the planned changes, which include axing 10,000 full-time employees spread across departments tasked with responding to disease outbreaks, approving new drugs, providing insurance for the poorest Americans and more”.
SICKENING—Trump’s DHS just deported a surgeon from Brown University Medical School—who is here legally on an H1B visa that doesn’t expire until 2027, and has committed no crimes. Trained in the U.S. at Ohio State, University of Washington, and Yale as a **transplant surgeon** (one of the most difficult surgical fields in all of medicine!!!), she is a highly trained doctor on kidney transplants, which cannot be easily replaced. Her phone was seized at the border. A federal judge handed down an injunction against her deportation—but she was already deported on a plane en route to Paris. Brown’s kidney transplant clinic is now strained by her deportation.
2) Full text:
PROVIDENCE — A Rhode Island doctor who had traveled to Lebanon to see her parents was prevented from re-entering the United States at Boston’s Logan International Airport on Thursday evening, her lawyer and a colleague said.
Dr. Rasha Alawieh, 34, who lives in Providence, has been working at Brown Medicine’s Division of Kidney Disease & Hypertension since last July, and she [has] been part of the transplant service at Rhode Island Hospital, according to Dr. George Bayliss, the organ transplant division’s medical director. She has been studying and working in the United States for about six years, he said Friday.
The US consulate in Lebanon had issued her an H-1B visa, which is given to people in specialty occupations requiring expertise. The visa was valid through mid-2027, said Thomas S. Brown, an attorney representing her and Brown Medicine.
Alawieh was detained when she returned to Logan airport, and family members are afraid that she is about to be deported to Lebanon, he said.
“We are at a loss as to why this happened,” Brown said. “I don’t know if it’s a byproduct of the Trump crackdown on immigration. I don’t know if it’s a travel ban or some other issue.”
He said her phone has been seized and he has not been able to contact Alawieh.
Bayliss said a lawyer filed a petition with the US District Court in Massachusetts, and Judge Leo T. Sorokin issued an order saying Alawieh should not be moved outside of Massachusetts without 48 hours notice. But he said that message apparently did not reach immigration officials in time, and a plane carrying Alawieh left for Paris.
“This is outrageous,” Bayliss said in an interview. “This is a person who is legally entitled to be in the U.S., who is stopped from re-entering the country for reasons no one knows. It’s depriving her patients of a good physician.”
A US Customs and Border Patrol spokesperson, Ryan Brissette, was not able to immediately answer questions about Alawieh on Friday evening.
Bayliss said Alawieh graduated from the American University of Beirut medical school and came to the United States for a nephrology fellowship at Ohio State University. She then landed a transplant fellowship at University of Washington and had a residency in the Yale hospital system before starting at Brown Medicine last July, he said.
“She’s really a very humble and able person,” Bayliss said. “She takes care of her patients. She is talented and thoughtful and a great addition to our division.”
Bayliss said Alawieh went to Lebanon to visit parents and planned to be gone for two weeks. He said she texted a colleague at 6:30 p.m. Thursday saying she was back in Boston, but then her family heard from immigration officials.
Dr. Paul Morrissey, surgical director of the organ transplant division at Brown University Health, said Alawieh works on getting people in Rhode Island on the list for a kidney transplants, and that’s a crucial job at a time when there has been a lot of focus on the need for kidneys and their equitable distribution.
He said Alawieh should not have had any problem traveling out of the country with an H-1B visa.
“It’s an unfortunate set of circumstances,” Morrissey said. “It’s putting a strain on our office. Her work has been exceptional.”
3) There is a new Trump ban against many countries, including tourist visa bans against all countries in the red and orange lists. This list is still tentative. And it shouldn’t have affected people with existing visas, such and the Brown kidney transplant surgeon
I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again… once upon a time, liberals did have our own “Leftist Joe Rogan”… his name was Joe Rogan…
Here he is advocating for socialized medicine, healthcare for all, and supporting labor unions to protect workers.
2) Recall, Rogan was once pro Obama and pro Bernie Sanders, and pro Yang Gang, and anti Trump. It’s sad he has since failed to the dark side. But like Vader… maybe he can be redeemed someday and come back to the light.
Joe Rogan was also pro gay rights and pro DACA and pro helping inner city communities that suffer economic and social injustices. It’s sad what he has become. I feel we should try to pull & welcome him back someday. Everyone can be redeemed.