Day 620 – Myths

Just wandering back through the anals of twitter (misspelling entirely deliberate), and came across this gem from 23 May this year:

I checked back to the 23 May on a handy graph supplied by google and found this:

Look what happened just afterwards. Tweet did not age well.

Officially, there were about 30,000 Covid deaths in South Africa in the “mythical” third wave, although the excess deaths figure, which many professionals believe to be far more accurate for this sort of thing, suggests nearer 3 times that number.

Surprisingly, the same account (which ticks all the usual boxes: pro-gun, pro-Trump, anti-vax, “the media have been bought off”, “there’s graphene in the jab”, “the earth is flat”, “Fauci is the devil”, “Nuremberg trial 2022”, “Ivermectin is the answer”) is now choosing not to believe that there is a fourth wave on the way. Talk about doubling down on a losing position.

That said, in one way – obviously – I actually wish that he was right.

But of course, sadly, he’s wrong again.
I do hope that his [checks notes] 84 followers will hold him accountable for his repeated mistakes.

Day 605 – Hello again, old friend

Here’s a little black worm.

The little black worm has raised its head and is looking at the summer sunshine in Gauteng.
The little black worm is from the corner of the this graph:

Of course, the early bird catches the little black worm, but that feathery ship of opportunity has long sailed with an appalling uptake of vaccination and a complete disregard for rules, regulations and general common sense.
And the worm might only just be looking up now, but the last 10 days have shown a steady progression of cases in Gauteng, which led the third wave in SA.

I thought that I was going up there next week, but now I’m not (not because of this). Equal parts relief and disappointment… ish.

We can implore people to go and get vaccinated, to protect themselves, their families and their communities, but we’ve been imploring for a long while already and it’s made very little difference. Even 271,000 excess deaths in the last 18 months don’t seem to have piqued anyone’s interest.

It’s bizarre and scary.

The fourth wave is very much on its way. and conspiracy theorists and tinfoil milliners will tell you that it’s because of something about tyranny and governmental control and chemtrails, but in actual fact, it’s just basic, beautifully ugly virology.

Be sensible out there. Stay safe.

Day 600 – Nothing to see here

It’s Day 600 of our Covid Lockdown in South Africa. And what do we have to show for it?

Well, actually very little Covid, to be fair. Some of the lowest numbers since this whole thing began, which sounds great.

But while being very welcome, this favourable scenario is more just because of where we are in the cycle than specifically because of any government action.

Our State of Disaster (the government/legal definition one, rather than just the actual condition of the country) persists, much to the chagrin of those people on the internet. But the fact is, we’re just sitting here waiting for the Fourth Wave, at which point everything would be reinstated anyway. And there are actually very few limits on living our lives right now. A 4 hour curfew each evening is just about it. And all that keeping nightclubs closed is doing is delaying things a little bit as our frankly terrible vaccination numbers fail to make any measurable difference.

We’re in for another heavy lockdown sometime over Christmas and New Year and while everyone – most especially those people – will tell us “I told you so”, they’re the ones that have done the absolute least to prevent it. Every vaccine helps, and while we could be far in making people safer, and protecting our health service, we have to put up with fake news, hyperbole and hysteria from the idiots in the peanut gallery.

It would be hilarious to watch if it wasn’t going to start costing lives in the next few weeks.