Bear in mind a standard surgical mask protects others from you, not the other way round. An N95 mask, properly fitted, can potentially protect you from catching something.
I haven't stopped wearing them on the London Underground and find it's been quite helpful. Normally I've usually woken up the next morning with a cough and a voice that's dropped an octave, but that hasn't happened since I've been using a mask.
Bear in mind a standard surgical mask protects others from you, not the other way round. An N95 mask, properly fitted, can potentially protect you from catching something.
I wear an N95 mask but for some reason, they do not stay hooked on my left ear, so I top it with a regular cloth mask, now in festive green to keep it in place. Not sure how good a seal that makes.
One of my mother's friends was isolating ahead of surgery, but has somehow caught Covid. Her surgery has been postponed till January, and she is in despair.
Bear in mind a standard surgical mask protects others from you, not the other way round. An N95 mask, properly fitted, can potentially protect you from catching something.
By and large, that's true, but there's still some value in preventing the large droplets of others' um, sickly exhalations, from getting into your lungs. It might be just enough to prevent you getting a dose high enough to guarantee infection...
I know that I've never used the masks I oughtta (I have asthma and can't tolerate anything more restrictive than a surgical mask or ordinary cloth), and yet the number of colds, flu, etc. I've had in the past four years is nearly zero. So I'll take what I can get.
Yeah. Masks. I managed to go through the beginning of Covid, before vaccinations were ready, without getting it, and I'm sure I made loads of mistakes. Got all my vaccinations through the most recent. Obviously, I've been laxed about masks when I should have been careful. Got it last week for the first time.
Only really stuffy. But I'm getting tired of living like a hermit.
When I'm finally out and about again, I'll be masking more.
I only wear N95 masks as I dislike medical masks. I haven't had them properly fitted, but they do seem to fit well. The danger places for me are buses, and in the supermarket.
Well, I forgot to think about covid much except all the vaccinations. Got my first case jist in time for Christmas. Enjoyed a nice walk at the local state park while i am missing the parties. Boo hoo. I will be more careful again.
No mask is ever going to have a complete seal - surely if it did, you wouldn't be able to breathe, which is not good for your health ...
The idea behind the mask is that you breathe through the mask. The mask contains small holes that allow air through, but don't allow larger things. A properly-worn N95 respirator will filter 95% of airborne particles of size 0.3 um (or larger). If air just flows around the edges of the mask, then it's not doing you much good!
Saw someone in the supermarket on Christmas Eve with a mask on. I'd forgotten that back in the day, many people hadn't bothered to put them on over their noses.
Progress - still coughing but tested negative last night after a week. My Dear Wife is feeling fine and tested positive. That is no inconsiderable achievement to hit both Christmas and probably New Year with a certified plague victim in the house.
My social media feeds are currently full of people announcing they've come down with Covid. So much for the "we'll all have to learn to live with it" approach, we are living with it and it's not been making for happiness over Christmas.
Now I think about it, I can't remember the last time I heard of someone having flu - it seems to be either a cold or Covid, depending on whether the sufferer did a LFT or not.
In the UK, people of any age can arrange a private flu vaccination (e.g. at Boots) but cannot arrange a private Covid vaccine.
The NHS free flu jab was also given more widely than the Covid jab. I found it bizarre (and frustrating) to be in an age bracket that allowed me an NHS flu jab, but not the latest Covid jab.
These differences in vaccine availability are going to favour more widespread (symptomatic) Covid than flu, perhaps?
I am hoping we will be allowed to access Covid boosters privately at some point…
Do you think more people are getting it than flu ?
It seems to be - people are posting pictures of their test results and most of them are positive. The trouble is that some test results are coming back negative but that apparently doesn't mean you haven't got it, just that you may have a strain that isn't covered by the test you have.
I still have some home kits myself which may be out of date by now, probably others do too - now that you have to buy your own test kits some people are probably still using the old ones. And viruses do mutate. I don't know whether the kits are able to keep up with all of them.
Or qualify by virtue of your job, which I do.
I had both jabs at a community clinic (because of timing and availability) and was the youngest there probably by some 20-25 years, other than those accompanying more elderly folk. I did rather get the cross-examination - where was my appointment letter? I don't have one, I booked online because I work for the health board. Which was met by a bit of a harrumph and further questions about date of birth etc.
Then when I was finally called up to be jabbed, they took one look at me and asked if I was eligible to receive the Covid vaccine.... Yes. Health & Social Care worker.
At which point they double jabbed me happily enough.
You'd need to check the CDC here in the US or whatever is comparable elsewhere to have a good answer to that question.
That won't do you much good, the CDC has sadly fallen down on the job in terms of its own reliability, and even if that weren't the case, they would still be massively handicapped at this point by all the states and local authorities that no longer gather or report information. About the best you can do is to find a decent source of wastewater monitoring. To be fair, since home tests are so widespread now, even authorities that WANTED to keep proper stats would be missing all the people who see no reason to tell anybody they've had a positive. At least waste-water monitoring will catch those cases too.
I still have some home kits myself which may be out of date by now ...
I threw out a box of kits just a few weeks ago that went out of date last January! (I hadn't actually used any out-of-date ones - I just hadn't got around to dumping them).
I still have some home kits myself which may be out of date by now ...
I threw out a box of kits just a few weeks ago that went out of date last January! (I hadn't actually used any out-of-date ones - I just hadn't got around to dumping them).
Some of them--in the U.S., anyway--are apparently good past their expiration date, and have been assigned new dates. I think they're available online.
A chemist who works at the local hospital told me today that the test kits should be safe for at least three months past the expiry date on the package. This is good, because I just picked up several of them and found the date was 1st January 2024... Interesting that the provincial government is no longer handing them out, and I found them at a pharmacy that happened to have a couple of cartons left. It seems that most people are self-diagnosing.
I had occasion to look into our testing kit situation this morning, having woken feeling rough and having an outing planned which I've had to bow out of. I have heard of a number of people recently who have been poorly for several days before testing positive and wonder if that's to do with the new variants?
We still have a small stock of in-date kits and I'm starting to wonder what we should do when we run out. I also wonder whether, as @Ariel suggested upthread, the kits I have would pick up a new variant and whether people are going about confident that they haven't got it when in fact they have. I felt decidedly odd yesterday, and things tasted strange, much as they did when I had Covid before. But I tested negative this morning.
Oh dear. Yes, the new variants do have a tendency to make you ill for several days before the test turns positive, so you're doing right by protecting your neighbors and staying home. I'm so sorry.
The variants sometimes not showing up for a few days has been an issue for at least a year, I remember advising my yoga teacher not to rely on the tests for the first few days of a cold-like illness. I assume it is not necessarily that a new variant doesn’t show up in a test, it may be that the variant is not as located in the testing area of the unwell person. For instance, when my third covid bout manifested as a runny nose, it showed up very clearly on a covid test. I’m guessing if it manifested as a fever it might not be so obvious. But I am not an expert on viruses (other than eye ones).
I personally, stopped testing 18 months ago and assume every flu/cold-like illness may be covid and act accordingly. That’s what you should do with any flu anyway.
You have to be over 65 to qualify for the Covid vaccine this time (in the UK) or in an increased-risk group.
Or living with someone who is - I got both due to Mrs Feet being in the latter category.
Guess it depends on what the condition is. We’re both under 65; Mr M gets the free NHS flu and Covid jabs on account of some past heart investigations; I have to pay for my ‘flu jab and am no longer eligible for the Covid one.
Why do they restrict such an important vaccination by age? It's not like COVID or flu are going to be less likely to get you because you're younger. And even if you were twenty, you could catch and give it to elderly relatives you live with or visit so easily... I don't get the policy, unless there are shortages.
If so, it reminds me of some short-sighted decisions here. The costs of one contagious COVID case spreading in the community vs. the cost of one shot... sigh. Ugh.
It will be decided by NICE and the age group decision is about balance of risk ie risk of detrimental affects of getting covid and risks of side effects from the vaccine.
(National Institute for Health and Care Excellence)
In Scotland everyone over 50 is offered the winter flu vaccine, free.
We were in England during the Covid years but no longer. I miss the 65 deadline by three days or is it five? Fail to see how those few days make me any less vulnerable (or any less likely to pass the lurgy on to someone who is) but never mind…😕
Sorry! Poor sentence construction. 😳 I meant - we had free ‘flu jabs in England during the Covid years, not that I’ve moved up to sunny Scotland!
Phew - for a brief moment I thought you meant you'd emigrated (to somewhere even more foreign than Scotland) and I'd not been paying enough attention to have registered!
Kid and I rocked up for our shots in Oz mid-Dec. They have health complexities and I have a couple of chronic things. I was surprised that for the first time the nurse did not show me vial they were drawing up from. I am hoping that we did get the xbb vax as that is what we booked for. Good thing is I can check our immunization record online. Normally not a fan of this automated record, but has proved to be handy to check back and see whether we were eligible or not. Other family members have still to have their updated vaxes, one is booked for next week and the other still to be prodded into it. I have a mix of so many emotions around the "no longer following the science" attitude that prevails her e at present. No long term thinking at all and lots of hopium!!!
I am still trying to decide how much I want to engage with others. I have a blood clot on my lung that is taking time to heal and because I have a chronic kidney disease I was told treatment for COVID was not for me. So I double mask up when having to go out to the store or medical appointment. Yet I am staying away from gatherings such as church and social events. Doing so is depressing and makes me feel like a shut-in, although my son does visit each week. Some days I feel like to heck with it this is no way to live, and other days I think things will be better once summer arrives again and doors and windows are open and there are things to do outside.
I didn't even have to book for my last covid vaccination as there was a pop-up clinic in the hall adjoining the community library where I volunteer. I wandered in and gave my details and they confirmed that it was long enough since my last one and jabbed me on the spot.
Actually, thinking back it was only the first two I had to book for otherwise it's been pop up clinics. Very handy for the disorganised. Some even had fruit available free or a supermarket voucher.
Comments
I wear an N95 mask but for some reason, they do not stay hooked on my left ear, so I top it with a regular cloth mask, now in festive green to keep it in place. Not sure how good a seal that makes.
By and large, that's true, but there's still some value in preventing the large droplets of others' um, sickly exhalations, from getting into your lungs. It might be just enough to prevent you getting a dose high enough to guarantee infection...
I know that I've never used the masks I oughtta (I have asthma and can't tolerate anything more restrictive than a surgical mask or ordinary cloth), and yet the number of colds, flu, etc. I've had in the past four years is nearly zero. So I'll take what I can get.
Only really stuffy. But I'm getting tired of living like a hermit.
When I'm finally out and about again, I'll be masking more.
The idea behind the mask is that you breathe through the mask. The mask contains small holes that allow air through, but don't allow larger things. A properly-worn N95 respirator will filter 95% of airborne particles of size 0.3 um (or larger). If air just flows around the edges of the mask, then it's not doing you much good!
The NHS free flu jab was also given more widely than the Covid jab. I found it bizarre (and frustrating) to be in an age bracket that allowed me an NHS flu jab, but not the latest Covid jab.
These differences in vaccine availability are going to favour more widespread (symptomatic) Covid than flu, perhaps?
I am hoping we will be allowed to access Covid boosters privately at some point…
It seems to be - people are posting pictures of their test results and most of them are positive. The trouble is that some test results are coming back negative but that apparently doesn't mean you haven't got it, just that you may have a strain that isn't covered by the test you have.
I still have some home kits myself which may be out of date by now, probably others do too - now that you have to buy your own test kits some people are probably still using the old ones. And viruses do mutate. I don't know whether the kits are able to keep up with all of them.
I had both jabs at a community clinic (because of timing and availability) and was the youngest there probably by some 20-25 years, other than those accompanying more elderly folk. I did rather get the cross-examination - where was my appointment letter? I don't have one, I booked online because I work for the health board. Which was met by a bit of a harrumph and further questions about date of birth etc.
Then when I was finally called up to be jabbed, they took one look at me and asked if I was eligible to receive the Covid vaccine.... Yes. Health & Social Care worker.
At which point they double jabbed me happily enough.
That won't do you much good, the CDC has sadly fallen down on the job in terms of its own reliability, and even if that weren't the case, they would still be massively handicapped at this point by all the states and local authorities that no longer gather or report information. About the best you can do is to find a decent source of wastewater monitoring. To be fair, since home tests are so widespread now, even authorities that WANTED to keep proper stats would be missing all the people who see no reason to tell anybody they've had a positive. At least waste-water monitoring will catch those cases too.
Or living with someone who is - I got both due to Mrs Feet being in the latter category.
Some of them--in the U.S., anyway--are apparently good past their expiration date, and have been assigned new dates. I think they're available online.
We still have a small stock of in-date kits and I'm starting to wonder what we should do when we run out. I also wonder whether, as @Ariel suggested upthread, the kits I have would pick up a new variant and whether people are going about confident that they haven't got it when in fact they have. I felt decidedly odd yesterday, and things tasted strange, much as they did when I had Covid before. But I tested negative this morning.
I personally, stopped testing 18 months ago and assume every flu/cold-like illness may be covid and act accordingly. That’s what you should do with any flu anyway.
Guess it depends on what the condition is. We’re both under 65; Mr M gets the free NHS flu and Covid jabs on account of some past heart investigations; I have to pay for my ‘flu jab and am no longer eligible for the Covid one.
(National Institute for Health and Care Excellence)
https://cks.nice.org.uk/topics/coronavirus-covid-19/management/immunization/
We were in England during the Covid years but no longer. I miss the 65 deadline by three days or is it five? Fail to see how those few days make me any less vulnerable (or any less likely to pass the lurgy on to someone who is) but never mind…😕
What... when... how did I miss that? Where are you now ?
Sorry! Poor sentence construction. 😳 I meant - we had free ‘flu jabs in England during the Covid years, not that I’ve moved up to sunny Scotland!
Phew - for a brief moment I thought you meant you'd emigrated (to somewhere even more foreign than Scotland) and I'd not been paying enough attention to have registered!
Actually, thinking back it was only the first two I had to book for otherwise it's been pop up clinics. Very handy for the disorganised. Some even had fruit available free or a supermarket voucher.