I am amazed that it’s now already week 100. I started tracking the development of Covid numerically since I write my own blog on a weekly basis. I really wish that we are nearing the finishing line of this 2+ years nightmare as the whole world was turned inside out and upside down over the last 100 weeks.
Covid fatigue is seeping in everywhere and many are saying screw it, let’s try to live with it as we aim to return to a near-normal again. The UK is already making masks optional and lifting most virus restrictions next week. Or could it be Boris fighting for his political life too?
Just when you thought that it was safe to get out of the house, Omicron’s little brother (BA.2) decided to show himself. Over the last few days, Denmark had published data to suggest that it is 1.5 times more contagious than the original Omicron strain. If Omicron is 7x more contagious than Delta, doesn’t it mean that BA.2 is 10.5x (1.5 x 7) then? Are we going to see a new spike ahead?
Data so far indicates that its effect is mild and another study says that those who had the booster shot is likely to have 95% protection against this new strain. Apparently, 3 strains of Omicron were detected in South Africa last Nov and 2 were deemed to be the weaker ones that could die out by themselves. But one of them decided to turn around and now becomes a new variant of concern.
The local authorities had flagged out warnings that we have not reached the peak yet and daily positive cases can go up to 30k. As of yesterday, we have also already seen about 200+ of BA.2 cases out of a total of 5k+. It seems that it is a matter of time when all of us will eventually get Covid anyway.
Indeed, this might be the variant that sweeps across the world so rapidly that it will provide full herd immunity to all in a matter of weeks and months. Normally, a virus just wants to survive and not kill its host. Omicron may become like our common flu and travels around the world soon. This may be our ticket to the finishing line to live with a virus. It has mutated itself to become less toxic but more contagious in order to survive.
Our Chinese New Year (CNY) celebrations this year will be subdued as Omicron is expected to peak only into Feb, unlike last year when things were looking up before the Delta wave hit everyone. We will be restricted to 5 visitors per household versus 8 in 2021. Most reunion dinners cannot happen for extended families now and visitations will also have to be scaled down drastically.
The workaround would be to have fewer but more substantial meetups instead of the regular “hit as many locations” CNY tradition. My group of close friends have decided to split the annual dinner into 3 household locations in order to comply with the rules on day 3. Having smaller groups with longer get together sessions would make the interaction more meaningful as we usually only catch up once a year during these CNY celebrations.
On Wed, I attended an interesting full-day course on Sake. After the Skillsfuture subsidies, the $300+ fee was essentially free for me. We had a physical class of 18 strangers in a room listening to the trainer who introduced 8 types of Sake as part of the tasting menu. As expected, as we move into the afternoon session and many glasses of Sake later, my classmates became friendlier and rowdier. The required assessment paper at the end of the class was a party pooper though. But the trainer made it so much easier for us with encouragement and hints as we went through 7 (720ml) and one (1.8L) bottle of Sake to enlighten ourselves.
More eating and food into the next week. I can’t believe that Jan is almost over. The horrible markets did a nice recovery last night powered by Apple. I hope that it can pull back the losses suffered in the last 2 weeks as more companies are showing record profits for 2021. The easing of the supply chains will also help to lighten inflation concerns as we get used to Fed rate hikes this year.
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