cross-posted from: https://hexbear.net/post/9843661

And we all know that still selfish people won't wear masks.

36F, I had COVID in early September and I'm still not better. I have daily brain fog, exhaustion, dizziness, horrible headaches. It's been horrible, impacting my ability to not just work but live my regular life. I've seen my doctor multiple times and went for blood testing and an ECG this week. Doc says it's likely long COVID.

I'm sharing this because, folks, you do not want this. COVID is still very much a problem and it does have the ability to impact your health long-term.

I get the flu & COVID shots every year, I was unlucky that I caught it before they were available. And yes, the vaccines aren't always going to target the specific strain, but it's worth getting whatever protection you can.

Luckily, this week I've started to improve significantly so I'm hopeful that I'll be recovered in the coming weeks. But it's 6 weeks I've lost to this so far and I wouldn't wish it on anyone.

Every fall this sub is full of posts people asking "is anyone else sick"...COVID and flu are inevitable. And every COVID infection is a roll of the dice.

So if you are able, get the shot. It's free.

cross-posted from: https://lemmygrad.ml/post/13042177

Archive link: https://archive.ph/KiM8h

Fascism is successfully making so many of us ill and disabled, but radical ableism turns our being ill and disabled into moral failings. We are sick and disabled because we don’t have enough political discipline, not because our comrades symptomatically and asymptomatically transmit a life threatening and disabling virus. Not because orgs have made refusing collective care into a 'revolutionary' stance.

Key points you should know:

• A petition signed by 1,700 people asks for a pause and independent review of a trial run by McMaster University researchers who want to test the Lightning Process.

• The Lightning Process is a pseudoscientific mind-body program to try to treat Long COVID that has been accused of exploiting people with Long COVID and related diseases.

• The trial is designed in part by a Lightning Process practitioner and prescreens participants for motivation using a questionnaire that isn’t validated for Long COVID.

• There are very few trials and little funding in Canada for Long COVID research, and advocates believe that studying the Lightning Process instead of pathobiological pathways is a waste of funding.

LitCovid is the most comprehensive resource on the subject, providing a central access to 493,191 (and growing) relevant articles in PubMed. The articles are updated daily and are further categorized by different research topics (e.g. transmission) and geographic locations.

The CDC raised its benchmark for levels of the Covid virus in wastewater, adjusting a key metric for assessing the disease’s transmission. As a result, officials may now classify a level that once counted as high transmission as moderate instead.

instagram post from the bar

boston globe : A Western Mass. lesbian bar required KN-95 masks. When it changed the rules, all hell broke loose.

saw this initially on tiktok with the user cornpop

was looking at queen of headaches who is also going through alot of woes caused by covid, and seeing all the times she spoke of covid.

according to her tweet, jerry messing or the tips fedora guy got disabled by covid and is now paralyzed

The latest round of the COVID-19 epidemic in China has peaked and plateaued, with the upward trend now markedly slowing, the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention said on Thursday.

The country reported 522,000 confirmed infections last month, including 487 severe cases and one related death, compared to 79,000 total cases in June.

All tested infection samples were identified as the Omicron variant, with the NB.1.8.1 strain and its sublineages dominant in circulation.

The China CDC said COVID-19 has now become a common respiratory infectious disease, and the country is expected to experience one to two epidemic waves each year.

The current outbreak remains a routine, periodic fluctuation, with intensity comparable to that of the previous two years.

The upward trajectory has noticeably slowed, and the epidemic is now at a peak plateau, with signs of fluctuation.

The China CDC added that the severity of the disease has not changed, with the vast majority of infections presenting as mild cases. The elderly and individuals with chronic underlying conditions continue to face a higher risk of severe illness, though targeted and effective therapeutic options remain available.

Surveillance has detected no variants of major public health concern, and the recent wave has not caused any significant disruption to the overall medical system.

Disappointing to read this. I know in Asia masking is much more normalized than anywhere else, but still sad to see China promoting that its "mild" and a "common respiratory disease" we hear of in the West, when they don't have an incentive to do that. And I've read recently of studies coming out of China about Covid and they're very insightful.. Do the Shanghai libs really have that much influence? Extremely disheartening to not see AES even care about Covid anymore. Aside from the DPRK to my knowledge

I'm in internal turmoil as to whether or not I can afford to post hundreds of dollars for them. It is ridiculous that I must make this choice. They were covered for years, reducing strain on our overtaxed emergency medical response system. I fear that our hospitals will not be able to survive the upcoming influx of respiratory infections that typically comes with the autumn season. Several regional hospitals are already on the brink, with nurses demanding better conditions or having to close overnight due to lack of staff.

Because of the energy drinks.

It could not have been a more cliche moment. The conversation topic kicked off with the nurse commenting on my bestie's vape. And how it was so much more dangerous than smoking, with a detailed description of popcorn lung (if you need a reminder) and that people were being put on respirators and still being unable to catch their breath before dying.

She then followed this up with an incredibly passionate, heart wrenching account about the state of things in medicine and how they're seeing more and more young folks coming in with maladies typically reserved for the elderly... you could have copied and pasted her warning with that of a CC influencer; heart attacks, strokes, etc 19 year olds coming in with things for people in their 50s, yada, yada. All the hits... right up until she concluded on how it's the fault of energy drinks.

Meanwhile, I'm just sitting there in my n95.

Fast forward later in the night, to the end of this poorly written scene, with the nurse giving me a fistbump and telling me she 'hopes I feel better' as we said our goodbyes.

And no, i did not get into it. It was my besties bday and it was not a scenario in which me getting into a debate was going to end well.

So, yeah. I'm just sharing this to remind y'all that there are people are out there in the medical field noticing something is wrong. And that you're doing the right thing by masking... and/or not drinking energy drinks, I guess. Lol🤷

Hey; for anyone from the U. S., would you know where to get any PCR tests?

I can't tell if they're just out, now, but every place I use eventually stops selling them.

Apparently, the https://www.thehealthhub.com/ sells some, still, but their checkout page seems like a mess and keeps throwing CORS errors; https://www.labcorp.com/ seems to, as well, though I can't seem to load the site on my Wi-Fi, for some bizarre reason (loads on the phone just fine when using data, though). Regardless, the tests seem backed by 23andMe which doesn't inspire great confidence but, also, 23andMe lists their PCR tests as out of stock on their own site (so I suspect LabCorp will eventually list these as out of stock someday, as well).

Anyway, may be a long shot but figured I'd ask.

Archive link: https://archive.ph/wbYMl

Everyone around me is veryyy sick but I've been fine so far wearing my Zimi N95. Sadly have to cohabit with my family and I'm just having relatives come over via plane and go to restaurants... I hope I'll be fine it's very stressful and I wish people took Covid seriously. Got harassed for masking in a hospital by the staff recently.. :/