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Apr 22 • 48 tweets • 29 min read
Another week, another ~47,000 added to the #LongCovid dashboard. Recent studies would double this estimate: put U.S. PASC cases nearer 48M.

Some 1.8–2.2 M too disabled to work—another ~6 million forced to abandon careers.

Where'd all the workers go, Joe? @POTUS

#ThisIsOurPolio Screencap of American Acade...
@POTUS Business journalists have begun to recognize impact of #LongCovid—yet talk about it as if it were due to a one time event, rather than as something that is ongoing and progressively afflicting a larger and larger share of the workforce.

#ThisIsOurPolio

@POTUS Post-acute sequelae of covid infection (PASC) will define our society for generations.

This isn't just slow recovery after some short-term illness.

This is the new normal for tens of millions who once thought of themselves as healthy.

#ThisIsOurPolio

@POTUS To speak of PASC defining our society for generations is far from hyperbole.

#LongCovid is a neurotropic vasculopathic disease.

It doesn't spare the young nor the presumptively healthy.

Even asymptomatic infection shrivels brain mass.

#ThisIsOurPolio

@POTUS That United States reporting few cases doesn't mean PASC went away.

Tens of thousands began living with #LongCovid this week.

Many were vaccinated.

Many were asymptomatic during the acute phase.

Many don't even know they're sick yet.

#ThisIsOurPolio

@POTUS How to lie with statistics:

• Say vaccines prevent infection. ✓
• Deny reinfections happen. ✓
• Push at-home kits—ignore at-home results. ✓
• Dismantle testing sites. ✓
• Ignore reinfections after prior infection. ✓

Cases low!

#ThisIsOurPolio

@POTUS Acute covid leads to PASC for a substantial number of those infected.

Keeping folk from getting tested… doesn't prevent PASC.

Keeping folk from knowing they've been exposed… doesn't prevent PASC.

OTOH not getting covid prevents PASC.

#ThisIsOurPolio

"…7 to 14 million (2–4% of…U.S. population) are expected to result in long-term disability…risk of lifelong complex health problems…economic ruin from health-care costs, unemployment, denied benefits, eviction…homelessness."



solvecfs.org/wp-content/upl…
Encampment sweeps are future for millions to suffer #LongCovid—even before domestic climate refugee crisis takes center stage in coming decades.

Folk who think of themselves as healthy, today—are but one infection away from homelessness.

#ThisIsOurPolio

As with climate, we're already finding out.

Fucking around isn't something we've time for.

So what's it gonna be?

Organize to avert worst outcomes before they happen?

Or wait until we're too busy struggling to survive to do much else?

#ThisIsOurPolio

Crip time is real.

Crip time is the future for tens of millions who thought of themselves as healthy.

Crip time is the future for tens of millions who now think of themselves as healthy.

This is our time:

To choose denial… or action.

#ThisIsOurPolio

Those tens of millions with PASC include medical professionals we rely on for treatment of post-acute sequelae…

Too many of whom choose to wash their hands—historical irony—of ongoing airborne pandemic so to attend superspreader events.

#ThisIsOurPolio

Hospital occupancy of beds for all causes has been high over a year and a half now—as capacity continues steady attrition.

Non-covid bed occupancy crests higher after each wave—our hospitals can't keep pace as we get collectively sicker.

#ThisIsOurPolio

We're leaving the post-omicron wave trough.

Deferred care that wasn't attended to in recent days will have to wait until post-BA.2 wave trough.

At which time, non-covid hospital occupancy will crest still higher.

At yet lower capacity.

#ThisIsOurPolio

Any metric that counts only designated "covid" beds rather than all inpatient beds is—simply put—misinformation.

Many believe CDC semiotics are green until hospitals are overwhelmed.

This ignores all the care hospitals are triaging NOW.

#ThisIsOurPolio

Bed count legerdemain doesn't change the fact that hospitals for entire counties are at or above capacity.

With many more near enough full capacity to make no difference.

Numerical shell games don't change the conditions on the ground.

#ThisIsOurPolio

If hospital runs short of both Remdesivir and Dexamethasone—will patients become non-covid until they get more?

If hospital lacks adequate staff and resources to administer to everyone who needs—are those triaged patients thus non-covid?

#ThisIsOurPolio

CDC semiotics hinge on just such a covid / non-covid distinction.

Narrow definitions furnish narrow perspectives.

CDC map doesn't show where hospitals are stressed—thus unprepared for growing spike in acute covid.

Who does this serve?

#ThisIsOurPolio

This is CDC semiotics in action.

Tell everyone it's fine to spread covid, because "cases are low".

Tell everyone hospitals are fine, because "admissions are low".

Meanwhile—in hospitals—things are going from worse to still more worse.

#ThisIsOurPolio

Masks are off. Cases are rising.

Even despite every effort made not to count them.

Masks are off. Cases are rising.

Even as new variants seek willing hosts to reinfect.

Masks are off. Cases are rising.

Even as we deny and bargain.

#ThisIsOurPolio

Takes just as many spoons to harness one's anger as it does to invest in denial or engage in bargaining.

Only where anger can be constructive—especially in solidarity with others—denial is retreat and bargaining an embrace of status quo.

#ThisIsOurPolio

When do we get angry about this?

When do we harness that anger?

When do we do something constructive with that anger?

We just filed our taxes…

So a private company can keep us better informed than our government?

Where's the anger?

#ThisIsOurPolio

When do we get furious about this?

When do we do something constructive with that fury?

We just filed our taxes...

So government can tell us they'll cancel our covid test when we're reinfected?

Where is the fury?

Where is the action?

#ThisIsOurPolio

Quote above is from NYS health and hospitals site.

Where BA.2, BA.2.12.1, BA.2.9 spread like climate fires well, nearly everyfuckingwhere.

New York State is promising to cancel your covid test if you're reinfected.

Where is the rage?

When do we act‽

Map of real-time map of wil...
Foreign media puts events in our own capitol in context.

As with climate, so with covid.

We're running out of fucking time!

How many times do we need to be reinfected…

How many of us need to be too disabled to act…

Before. We. Act?

#ThisIsOurPolio

As states are ignoring reinfections—even cancelling covid tests…

They've likewise redefined previously counted covid deaths as non-covid deaths.

At federal government's coaxing.

No matter what we count them as…

Dead people are dead.

#ThisIsOurPolio

Current annualized trend translates to a 2022 covid death toll of ~360,000.

As Democrats rest on laurels of not being the other guy.

Are we just gonna let them coast into midterms?

Are we just gonna watch another year of this happen?

#ThisIsOurPolio

Slight-of-hand death reporting? Hardly new in U.S. of A.

Hiding the systemic injustices—the structural violence—killing Americans… didn't begin with covid-19.

But you know, blue pennant over the Oval—so why take action?

How many dead?

#ThisIsOurPolio

In past four weeks, U.S. share of global covid deaths was ~4× that of our share of global population.

Our society has failed in handling the pandemic—while governments are busy revising numbers down rather than address continued deaths.

#ThisIsOurPolio

That U.S. continues to represent so disproportionate a share of global covid deaths is direct consequence of public health policy…

…that continues to mischaracterize viral transmission as matter of personal risk and individual comfort.

#ThisIsOurPolio

Telling folk what they want to hear isn't public health.

Telling folk to harm themselves and others isn't public health.

Telling folk "live your best life" isn't public health.

Telling folk what they want to hear isn't public health.

#ThisIsOurPolio

At what point do we collectively declare enough is enough?

At what point do we refuse to continue sacrificing our children?

At what point do we stand in solidarity to demand change?

'Cause—folks—awareness ain't enough.

We need to act.

#ThisIsOurPolio

This should not be the future for any of us—least of all our children.

This should not be the future we embrace with "live your best life".

This should not be the future we welcome as not our problem.

This should not be. It's up to us.

#ThisIsOurPolio

It's up to us.

Until we act, the deaths will continue.

Until we act, the mass disabling event will continue.

Until we act, the ableist trundling genocide will continue.

Collective action starts with you.

What. Are. You. Waiting. For?

#ThisIsOurPolio

National hospital utilization holds (75%)—as occupancy falls slightly (↑avg ~900/wk over 1¾ yrs); capacity falls steadily (↓avg ~900/wk over 1½ yrs).

Non-covid beds include covid cases past two weeks ("post-covid"), readmissions for #LongCovid & deferred care.

#ThisIsOurPolio Chart: Weekly Hospitalizati...
Hospital utilization has been over 70% nationally for well over a year now. This reflects fact that many local hospitals continue to be at full capacity… and even well beyond.

This impacts everyone. Not just designated covid patients.

#ThisIsOurPolio

Three-week cases are rising as testing plummets to levels not seen since late July, right as delta wave was gearing up.

We're leaving trough between waves. We know how this plays out. We know what's coming—we've done the very same before.

We could be preparing.

#ThisIsOurPolio Chart: Covid Tests and Case...Bubble chart of Covid-19 ca...
A comparison between covid cases and covid-like symptoms is striking.

This is what gutting testing capacity & ignoring reinfection by new variants can do—when much of the population believes they can't even get infected because of a vaccine or a prior infection.

#ThisIsOurPolio Beehive Map: Covid Cases Su...Beehive Map: Covid-Like Sym...
CDC Variant Nowcast has BA.2 share of genomic sampling as majority strain; BA.2.12.1 carving more share weekly.

Regions where BA.2.12.1 has largest share:

NY/NJ—58.1%
Mid-Atlantic—31.9%
Southeast—29.9%
New England—28.2%

BA.2 wave began all of four weeks ago.

#ThisIsOurPolio CDC's Variant Nowcast showi...
To be clear, BA.2.12.1 was only added to CDC Nowcast last week.

Meanwhile, other strains, among them BA.9 and BA.3, are taking full advantage of a population of earnest hosts.

Welcome to the perpetual reinfection phase of the pandemic.

#ThisIsOurPolio

Rolling annual has been below inauguration benchmark—for all but four days—since ~3K dead were resurrected on Mar 14. (Believed to be largely due to reclassification dump by Mass.)

CDC forecast, meanwhile, anticipates an upswing in covid deaths in coming weeks.

#ThisIsOurPolio Covid Deaths Cumulative vs....Chart: National Forecast: C...
(It seems clear now that CDC will not be revising their cumulative death reporting to address the negative death toll from March 14.

Hoping to find time next week to normalize data myself, working from JHU CSSE data patch.)

~15% of all global covid deaths in past 28 days were in U.S.—despite only 4% of world population.

~15% of G20 covid deaths were in U.S.—yet U.S. represents only 7% of G20 population.

~31% all G8 covid deaths were in U.S.—was last below share of G8 pop. in Aug.

#ThisIsOurPolio Chart: U.S. Share of 28-Day...
On the left, CDC's Community "Levels" by county; on the right, HHS hospital capacity data by county.

That acute covid admissions are low—per CDC semiotics—don't mean hospitals ain't already overwhelmed w/ post & Long Covid + deferred care—so unprepared for BA.2.

#ThisIsOurPolio Map: COVID-19 Integrated Co...Map: Hospital Capacity by C...
Counties by hospital capacity, color coded per CDC semiotics:

🟡Utuado Municipio (PR)—194% (Medium per CDC)
🟢Smyth (VA)—133% (Low)
🟠Warren (NY)—132% (High)
🟢Polk (GA)—122% (L)

🟢Wise (VA)—119% (L)
🟢Peach (GA)—115% (L)
🟢Carroll (GA)—108% (L)
🟢Washington (VA)—106% (L)
Of 44 counties ≥100% capacity, all but five are "Low", per the CDC.

Top non-Low counties:

🟡#1 Utuado Muni. (PR)—194% (M)
🟠#3 Warren (NY)—132% (H)
🟠#16 Yates (NY)—100% (H)
🟡#32 Ketchikan Gateway Boro. (AK)—100% (M)
🟠#35 Oswego (NY)—100% (H)
🟡#47 Walla Walla (WA)—99.7% (M)
Note to self:

Revise hospital capacity map to take into account Health Service Areas.

Follow search link for latest edition daily update thread on the mass disabling event—the ableist trundling genocide—that is rentier society's pandemic response in U.S.

Rewoven each Friday.

As always: statistics are structural.



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More from @beadsland

WTF are Community
Apr 29
Another week, another 110,000 added to the #LongCovid dashboard. Recent studies would double this estimate: put U.S. PASC cases nearer 48M.

Some 1.8–2.2 M too disabled to work—another ~6 million forced to abandon careers.

Where'd all the workers go, Joe? @POTUS

#ThisIsOurPolio Screencap of American Acade...
@POTUS If you think there's a #LongCovid labor shortage now—just see how bad it is after another year of unmitigated transmission.

Another two years. Three. &c

At some point maybe we can stop past tense magical thinking to consider future we're trundling into?

@POTUS Millions have trained for careers—for passions that defined them—now face future where they can no longer do that work.

Millions more to join their ranks as repeated reinfections of increasingly vulnerable population continues unabated.

#ThisIsOurPolio

Read 20 tweets
WTF are Community
Sep 13, 2021
Have thought much this week on how—from a quoicapitalist perspective—to address this query.

Here I shall endeavor to pour that stream of thoughts into a thread.

This's gonna be some 35 tweets, all told. There's quite a bit of terrain to cover to address the question posed here.
OP follows up:

From quoicapitalist frame, this is less category of valuation than of dispossession.

Childcare represents an exchange of possibility of reproductive-power—distinct from & antecedent to producing value—for possibility of engaging in labor-power exchange.

Read 37 tweets
WTF are Community
Sep 11, 2021
Ah, the confidence of the activist white liberal that "humanity" is the problem, and that there's nothing wrong with citing to "humanity" as an explanation for the state of the world when so many of the vast majority of humans aren't the ones who brought us here.
Coming off a phone call w/ roommate's friend who kept insisting that "humanity is insane". Didn't even have the space to check them on the ableism there, they were so committed to it being the fault of "humanity" that the United States is handling both climate and covid so badly.
Should have politely excused myself from conversation when they got to Australia "doing so much worse".

Or maybe when they started dropping credentials of all the letter writing and petitioning operations they're a member of.

White usaian liberals will liberal usaian white.
Read 4 tweets

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