This year, I spend New Year’s Eve in the emergency room.

More precisely, in the emergency room parking lot behind the hospital – Covid protocols only allow patients to enter emergency rooms (not family members) to seek care. The security escorted me outside very politely, waiting impatiently for an update.

My wife was on antibiotics for a few days for the infection but the bug was resistant due to her previous antibiotic therapy (Lyme).Her pain increased throughout the week and was unbearable by New Year’s Eve, so we went to a non-traumatic Hospital emergency room.

It turned out to be an accidental choice. Hospitals around us are already overwhelmed with Covid patients.State’s 24-hour positivity rate for the day despite 80.6% of New Yorkers being fully vaccinated 22.24%. Regional prevalence estimates for Omicron range from 92-99%. it seems escape previous vaccinations (but the results are much milder).it is sending more kids go to the hospital. We hear a lot of stories of other big hospitals that don’t have beds.

She was one of two patients in the emergency room (Northwell continues to impress as a private hospital). Despite the NYE/Covid situation, she was cared for quickly and efficiently.

She had a bag of antibiotics and painkillers dripping on her arm and she texted me”Happy New Year“From her hospital bed. I looked at her car’s dash clock, took a photo + texted her. After about 2 hours, they released her and we went home.

Omicron has the starkest warning about mutations.The good news is whoever catches it 70% risk reduction Compared to Delta, the condition is severe.The bad news is that it’s very toxic, at least 4X Delta infection rate; previous Covid-19 infections offered little protection; those who did not recover were 10 times more likely Catch up with Omicron than previous variants.

unvaccinated People all over the world have become mutant factories. It evolves a radical, iterative adaptation in real time through endless changes. Virii do not need intelligence; they have no purpose; like all infectious pathogens, the replication process is strictly a test of adaptive evolutionary fitness. That’s why the anti-Vaxx crowd is so pernicious — they’re helping to create the conditions that lead to future variants — and these may not be as viable as Omicron.

Maybe we dodged a bullet. In many parts of the country, not only have elective surgeries been cancelled, but emergency medical services have also become unavailable. We were lucky to find an ER that would take us to (always avoidable septic shock). Others were not so lucky. There are too many news stories about people being denied death at home because of treatable diseases. Nationwide, more than 95% of hospitalizations due to Omicron are unvaccinated. Human ignorance is leading to strained medical outcomes for those who choose to remain at risk and the entire healthcare system under avoidable hospitalizations. My wife is fine. She completed treatment and made a full recovery. Others may not be so lucky.

If you choose not to get vaccinated, you are not only risking your own health, you are putting others at serious risk.

If we’re lucky, Omicron will soar in mid-January and burn quickly. (repeat: if we’re lucky). But that may not protect us from future variants, some of which may be more dangerous.

This is not how we want to ring in the new year.

Before:
The Economic Risks of Anti-Vaxxers (July 15, 2021)

DELTA is here for your economic recovery (August 13, 2021)

How bad is business travel? (August 11, 2021)

source: CDC