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December 20, 2021
Morning Joe just said Schumer will hold a BBB vote after the holidays, will force Manchin to vote No
https://twitter.com/GarrettHaake/status/1472885692548194309
December 19, 2021
https://www.queerty.com/north-carolina-republicans-declare-war-madison-cawthorns-ambitious-cowardice-20211219
Cawthorn, already a divisive figure within congress, revealed his plan to move from North Carolina’s 11th Congressional District to seek reelection in the state’s adjacent 13th District last month. In his announcement on Twitter, Cawthorn added that the change would prevent a “go-along-to-get-along Republican” from winning the seat. The announcement also prompted Tim Moore, the longest-serving speaker in the history of the North Carolina House, to drop out of the race.
Cawthorn’s plans have not, however, won the approval of the North Carolina GOP. A new report by the Citizen-Times details internal rage at Cawthorn’s announcement, as party leaders fear his run could actually cost the party a valuable seat. “This isn’t a noble effort. This is ambitious cowardice at its worst,” Charles Jeter Jr., an influential former Republican state representative, said of Cawthorn’s run. “He’s an embarrassment that we need to defeat.”
Other Republicans attacked Cawthorn’s allegiance to Donald Trump over party unity, and his increasing extremism. “We are in this divide of us-versus-them in the party,” Catawba College professor and political commentator Michael Bitzer told the Citizen-Times in an interview. “And you cannot pursue the middle ground because there is no middle ground in the Republican Party.”
“What Cawthorn and others are attempting to do is to put a target on the back of anyone who isn’t a follower of Trumpism,” added Bitzer. “And not only on your back; you’ve got a target on your front side.” CEO and president of the John Locke Foundation John Hood derided Cawthorn’s plan over his lack of legislative achievements. “Madison Cawthorn is a callow and appallingly ignorant young man who regularly embarrasses conservatives and Republicans, whether they admit it or not,” Hood said.
snip
North Carolina Republicans declare war on Madison Cawthorn's "ambitious cowardice"
A new report has revealed widening divides within North Carolina’s Republican Party over Rep. Madison Cawthorn’s plan to change districts.https://www.queerty.com/north-carolina-republicans-declare-war-madison-cawthorns-ambitious-cowardice-20211219
Cawthorn, already a divisive figure within congress, revealed his plan to move from North Carolina’s 11th Congressional District to seek reelection in the state’s adjacent 13th District last month. In his announcement on Twitter, Cawthorn added that the change would prevent a “go-along-to-get-along Republican” from winning the seat. The announcement also prompted Tim Moore, the longest-serving speaker in the history of the North Carolina House, to drop out of the race.
Cawthorn’s plans have not, however, won the approval of the North Carolina GOP. A new report by the Citizen-Times details internal rage at Cawthorn’s announcement, as party leaders fear his run could actually cost the party a valuable seat. “This isn’t a noble effort. This is ambitious cowardice at its worst,” Charles Jeter Jr., an influential former Republican state representative, said of Cawthorn’s run. “He’s an embarrassment that we need to defeat.”
Other Republicans attacked Cawthorn’s allegiance to Donald Trump over party unity, and his increasing extremism. “We are in this divide of us-versus-them in the party,” Catawba College professor and political commentator Michael Bitzer told the Citizen-Times in an interview. “And you cannot pursue the middle ground because there is no middle ground in the Republican Party.”
“What Cawthorn and others are attempting to do is to put a target on the back of anyone who isn’t a follower of Trumpism,” added Bitzer. “And not only on your back; you’ve got a target on your front side.” CEO and president of the John Locke Foundation John Hood derided Cawthorn’s plan over his lack of legislative achievements. “Madison Cawthorn is a callow and appallingly ignorant young man who regularly embarrasses conservatives and Republicans, whether they admit it or not,” Hood said.
snip
December 19, 2021
Charli XCX has had to pull out of tonight’s Saturday Night Live as a result of issues around Covid.
The pop star was set to be the musical guest for this evening’s performance, which is hosted by Paul Rudd.
However, she said that as a result of the limited crew on tonight’s show, caused by Covid caution, she’s unable to perform. She said she was “devastated” by the news.
“Due to the limited crew at tonight’s taping of SNL my musical performance will no longer be able to go ahead. I am devastated and heartbroken,” she wrote on social media. “It can’t happen this time but I’ll be back. I am currently safe and healthy, but of course, very sad. Please look after yourselves out there and make sure you get vaccinated if you haven’t already.”
snip
'SNL': Charli XCX Pulls Out Due To Limited Crew Caused By Covid Caution
https://deadline.com/2021/12/snl-charli-xcx-pulls-out-covid-1234899172/Charli XCX has had to pull out of tonight’s Saturday Night Live as a result of issues around Covid.
The pop star was set to be the musical guest for this evening’s performance, which is hosted by Paul Rudd.
However, she said that as a result of the limited crew on tonight’s show, caused by Covid caution, she’s unable to perform. She said she was “devastated” by the news.
“Due to the limited crew at tonight’s taping of SNL my musical performance will no longer be able to go ahead. I am devastated and heartbroken,” she wrote on social media. “It can’t happen this time but I’ll be back. I am currently safe and healthy, but of course, very sad. Please look after yourselves out there and make sure you get vaccinated if you haven’t already.”
snip
December 19, 2021
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2021/12/manchin-and-sinema-are-blocking-everything/
Build Back Better is the legislative basket in which the Democrats placed all their choicest eggs, including provisions to fight climate change, expand the social safety net, and reform the tax system. During negotiations earlier this year, Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.V.) used his vaunted perch as a moderate holdout to demand that the Democrats whittle down the package from $3.5 trillion to $1.75 trillion over 10 years. The Democrats did what he asked, but in a way that he doesn’t like. Instead of getting rid of the various programs crammed into the legislation, they rewrote the bill so that many of them expire after a shorter amount of time. Manchin finds all this temporary spending to be a duplicitous “budget gimmick,” since many Democrats have made no secret of the fact that they want these programs to be renewed, even though they probably won’t be if and when Republicans take back the legislative branch.
Instead, Manchin wants a bill with fewer but more permanent initiatives. His demand here isn’t unreasonable, but it would also require a drastic overhaul of the Biden domestic agenda, which, at this point, just feels cruel. Manchin has trained his sights on the expanded child tax credit, one of the most transformative provisions in Build Back Better, which could slash child poverty by 19 percent. The argument over the provision is pretty complicated, but the long and the short of it is that Manchin seems to want one of two things gone from the bill: the expanded child tax credit, or every other program in the legislation.
It’s no surprise, then, that one anonymous source told NBC that talks between Manchin and Biden are going “very poorly.” And without Manchin, the bill has no hope of passing. It seems almost certain that Senate Democrats will fail to achieve their 2021 resolution of passing the bill by year’s end. If this turns out to be true, Democrats will be voting on the bill in a midterm year, which could inflate the already heightened sense of urgency around the negotiations and change the risk calculus for various lawmakers backing the legislation.
With Biden’s social spending agenda at a standstill, the Democrats have signalled that they’re going to try to combat Republican voter suppression efforts by restoring the Voting Rights Act that the Supreme Court gutted in 2013. But this effort, too, is almost certain to be blocked by Manchin and his partner-in-crime, Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.). The only way that voting rights legislation would have even the smallest chance of passing is if the Democrats find a way to get around the filibuster—either by abolishing it completely or establishing a temporary carve-out. And Sinema has been dropping hints Kim Kardashian style that she won’t support any moves to amend the filibuster to protect the right to vote. This, of course, would mean that the actions that GOP-run state legislatures have taken to curtail voting rights, gerrymander congressional districts, and lay the groundwork for an authoritarian power grab in 2024 will remain virtually unchallenged by Democrats on Capitol Hill.
snip
Manchin and Sinema Are Blocking Everything
Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), Joe Biden’s bitterest ex in the Senate, went on Hannity yesterday to crow that the Build Back Better bill was “dead forever,” and the sad thing is that he might be right.https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2021/12/manchin-and-sinema-are-blocking-everything/
Build Back Better is the legislative basket in which the Democrats placed all their choicest eggs, including provisions to fight climate change, expand the social safety net, and reform the tax system. During negotiations earlier this year, Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.V.) used his vaunted perch as a moderate holdout to demand that the Democrats whittle down the package from $3.5 trillion to $1.75 trillion over 10 years. The Democrats did what he asked, but in a way that he doesn’t like. Instead of getting rid of the various programs crammed into the legislation, they rewrote the bill so that many of them expire after a shorter amount of time. Manchin finds all this temporary spending to be a duplicitous “budget gimmick,” since many Democrats have made no secret of the fact that they want these programs to be renewed, even though they probably won’t be if and when Republicans take back the legislative branch.
Instead, Manchin wants a bill with fewer but more permanent initiatives. His demand here isn’t unreasonable, but it would also require a drastic overhaul of the Biden domestic agenda, which, at this point, just feels cruel. Manchin has trained his sights on the expanded child tax credit, one of the most transformative provisions in Build Back Better, which could slash child poverty by 19 percent. The argument over the provision is pretty complicated, but the long and the short of it is that Manchin seems to want one of two things gone from the bill: the expanded child tax credit, or every other program in the legislation.
It’s no surprise, then, that one anonymous source told NBC that talks between Manchin and Biden are going “very poorly.” And without Manchin, the bill has no hope of passing. It seems almost certain that Senate Democrats will fail to achieve their 2021 resolution of passing the bill by year’s end. If this turns out to be true, Democrats will be voting on the bill in a midterm year, which could inflate the already heightened sense of urgency around the negotiations and change the risk calculus for various lawmakers backing the legislation.
With Biden’s social spending agenda at a standstill, the Democrats have signalled that they’re going to try to combat Republican voter suppression efforts by restoring the Voting Rights Act that the Supreme Court gutted in 2013. But this effort, too, is almost certain to be blocked by Manchin and his partner-in-crime, Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.). The only way that voting rights legislation would have even the smallest chance of passing is if the Democrats find a way to get around the filibuster—either by abolishing it completely or establishing a temporary carve-out. And Sinema has been dropping hints Kim Kardashian style that she won’t support any moves to amend the filibuster to protect the right to vote. This, of course, would mean that the actions that GOP-run state legislatures have taken to curtail voting rights, gerrymander congressional districts, and lay the groundwork for an authoritarian power grab in 2024 will remain virtually unchallenged by Democrats on Capitol Hill.
snip
December 18, 2021
LONDON, Dec 17 (Reuters) - Amazon.com Inc was marketing a collection of President Xi Jinping's speeches and writings on its Chinese website about two years ago, when Beijing delivered an edict, according to two people familiar with the incident. The American e-commerce giant must stop allowing any customer ratings and reviews in China. A negative review of Xi's book prompted the demand, one of the people said. "I think the issue was anything under five stars," the highest rating in Amazon's five-point system, said the other person.
Ratings and reviews are a crucial part of Amazon's e-commerce business, a major way of engaging shoppers. But Amazon complied, the two people said. Currently, on its Chinese site Amazon.cn, the government-published book has no customer reviews or any ratings. And the comments section is disabled.
Amazon's compliance with the Chinese government edict, which has not been reported before, is part of a deeper, decade-long effort by the company to win favor in Beijing to protect and grow its business in one of the world's largest marketplaces.
An internal 2018 Amazon briefing document that describes the company's China business lays out a number of "Core Issues" the Seattle-based giant has faced in the country. Among them: "Ideological control and propaganda is the core of the toolkit for the communist party to achieve and maintain its success," the document notes. "We are not making judgement on whether it is right or wrong."
snip
Special Report: Amazon partnered with China propaganda arm
https://www.reuters.com/world/china/amazon-partnered-with-china-propaganda-arm-win-beijings-favor-document-shows-2021-12-17/LONDON, Dec 17 (Reuters) - Amazon.com Inc was marketing a collection of President Xi Jinping's speeches and writings on its Chinese website about two years ago, when Beijing delivered an edict, according to two people familiar with the incident. The American e-commerce giant must stop allowing any customer ratings and reviews in China. A negative review of Xi's book prompted the demand, one of the people said. "I think the issue was anything under five stars," the highest rating in Amazon's five-point system, said the other person.
Ratings and reviews are a crucial part of Amazon's e-commerce business, a major way of engaging shoppers. But Amazon complied, the two people said. Currently, on its Chinese site Amazon.cn, the government-published book has no customer reviews or any ratings. And the comments section is disabled.
Amazon's compliance with the Chinese government edict, which has not been reported before, is part of a deeper, decade-long effort by the company to win favor in Beijing to protect and grow its business in one of the world's largest marketplaces.
An internal 2018 Amazon briefing document that describes the company's China business lays out a number of "Core Issues" the Seattle-based giant has faced in the country. Among them: "Ideological control and propaganda is the core of the toolkit for the communist party to achieve and maintain its success," the document notes. "We are not making judgement on whether it is right or wrong."
snip
December 18, 2021
Debussy - Prélude à l’après-midi d’un faune
Claude Debussy - Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun 💙
Debussy - Prélude à l’après-midi d’un faune
December 17, 2021
https://www.thedailybeast.com/adam-jenne-banned-from-united-airlines-for-life-for-wearing-red-thong-as-a-mask
A man in Florida has been banned from ever flying United again for wearing a lacy red thong on his face instead of a mask on multiple flights. He told local station NBC 2 after his most recent attempt, “I think the best way to illustrate absurdity is with absurdity.” He was booted from a flight from Fort Lauderdale to Washington, D.C., before it took off, and the Broward County sheriff met him at the gate.
Other passengers went so far as to doff their masks and walk off the aircraft with him, he said. “Every single flight has been met with different reactions from the flight crew. Some with a wild appreciation, others confrontational,” he said, adding that he got a full refund for the flight and used the money to buy another ticket for Saturday. “COVID doesn’t know that we’re at cruising altitude. It’s stupid. The whole thing is theater. Hopefully, Spirit Airlines has a better sense of humor tomorrow,” he said.
United said in a statement, “The customer clearly wasn’t in compliance with the federal mask mandate and we appreciate that our team addressed the issue on the ground prior to takeoff, avoiding any potential disruptions on the air.”
Read it at NBC 2
Man Banned From United Airlines for Life for Wearing Red Thong as a Mask
https://www.thedailybeast.com/adam-jenne-banned-from-united-airlines-for-life-for-wearing-red-thong-as-a-mask
A man in Florida has been banned from ever flying United again for wearing a lacy red thong on his face instead of a mask on multiple flights. He told local station NBC 2 after his most recent attempt, “I think the best way to illustrate absurdity is with absurdity.” He was booted from a flight from Fort Lauderdale to Washington, D.C., before it took off, and the Broward County sheriff met him at the gate.
Other passengers went so far as to doff their masks and walk off the aircraft with him, he said. “Every single flight has been met with different reactions from the flight crew. Some with a wild appreciation, others confrontational,” he said, adding that he got a full refund for the flight and used the money to buy another ticket for Saturday. “COVID doesn’t know that we’re at cruising altitude. It’s stupid. The whole thing is theater. Hopefully, Spirit Airlines has a better sense of humor tomorrow,” he said.
United said in a statement, “The customer clearly wasn’t in compliance with the federal mask mandate and we appreciate that our team addressed the issue on the ground prior to takeoff, avoiding any potential disruptions on the air.”
Read it at NBC 2
December 17, 2021
Leftfield R&B, rave euphoria, ambient jazz—the RA staff and contributors pick their favorite albums of the year.
https://ra.co/features/3950
Album of the Year
DAIS RECORDS
Space Afrika - Honest Labour
Listening to Honest Labour feels like street lights burning onto tired retinas and long nights of feeling small in a big city. On their sophomore album, producers Joshua Inyang and Joshua Reid created a series of nocturnal meditations, a series of nineteen short tracks bleeding into one another, in tribute to their hometown of Manchester. The duo's instrumentation is replete with field recordings of urban white noise, balanced by resonant cellos, hazy guitars and spectral guest performances with fragments of profound conversations—as if overheard from the night before—resulting in the audio equivalent of subconscious dreamscape.
Put simply by Inyang and Reid themselves, Honest Labour is "an album about love and loss." The track "Indigo Grit," for instance, abruptly ends just as the speaker is about to explain the difference between liking and loving someone—a fleeting snippet of wisdom lost just before listeners could grab hold of it. But as with any inquiries into life’s most existential questions, the artists weren't intending to arrive at any conclusions. Through their album, they embraced the sheer mystery of the human experience, remaining at the mercy of their emotions just like the rest of us.
Listen:
Bandcamp / Apple Music / Spotify / Soundcloud
4AD
Erika de Casier - Sensational
It's difficult to think of any other record this year that united more people from across different electronic music scenes than Sensational. Building on the Danish artist's Y2K R&B obsession and backed with lush yet subdued production from collaborator Central, it is a quiet storm of plucked strings, ornate piano and pitter-patter drums. De Casier's hushed voice alternates between vulnerable and sarcastic, full of biting phrases and memorable one-liners: "You gotta be polite if you wanna roll with me." It’s the kind of music that's made for both memorable dance floor moments and cryptic Instagram captions directed at you-know-who.
Listen:
Bandcamp / Apple Music / Spotify / Soundcloud
snip
many more at the link
The Best Albums of 2021
Leftfield R&B, rave euphoria, ambient jazz—the RA staff and contributors pick their favorite albums of the year.
https://ra.co/features/3950
Album of the Year
DAIS RECORDS
Space Afrika - Honest Labour
Listening to Honest Labour feels like street lights burning onto tired retinas and long nights of feeling small in a big city. On their sophomore album, producers Joshua Inyang and Joshua Reid created a series of nocturnal meditations, a series of nineteen short tracks bleeding into one another, in tribute to their hometown of Manchester. The duo's instrumentation is replete with field recordings of urban white noise, balanced by resonant cellos, hazy guitars and spectral guest performances with fragments of profound conversations—as if overheard from the night before—resulting in the audio equivalent of subconscious dreamscape.
Put simply by Inyang and Reid themselves, Honest Labour is "an album about love and loss." The track "Indigo Grit," for instance, abruptly ends just as the speaker is about to explain the difference between liking and loving someone—a fleeting snippet of wisdom lost just before listeners could grab hold of it. But as with any inquiries into life’s most existential questions, the artists weren't intending to arrive at any conclusions. Through their album, they embraced the sheer mystery of the human experience, remaining at the mercy of their emotions just like the rest of us.
Listen:
Bandcamp / Apple Music / Spotify / Soundcloud
4AD
Erika de Casier - Sensational
It's difficult to think of any other record this year that united more people from across different electronic music scenes than Sensational. Building on the Danish artist's Y2K R&B obsession and backed with lush yet subdued production from collaborator Central, it is a quiet storm of plucked strings, ornate piano and pitter-patter drums. De Casier's hushed voice alternates between vulnerable and sarcastic, full of biting phrases and memorable one-liners: "You gotta be polite if you wanna roll with me." It’s the kind of music that's made for both memorable dance floor moments and cryptic Instagram captions directed at you-know-who.
Listen:
Bandcamp / Apple Music / Spotify / Soundcloud
snip
many more at the link
December 17, 2021
https://newsletters.theatlantic.com/wait-what/61bcecba7097fc002053584d/how-do-you-get-people-to-care-about-democracy/
Every time the January 6 committee holds a hearing, it seems clearer and clearer that Donald Trump was trying to keep control over the government after losing reelection. The past week alone produced the “how to coup” PowerPoint, widely circulated in Trumpworld, and a slew of text messages, including this sorry we weren’t able to pull off a coup note from an unidentified lawmaker to Mark Meadows: “Yesterday was a terrible day. We tried everything we could in our objection to the 6 states. I’m sorry nothing worked.” It’s pretty clear what Trump was up to: trying to reinstall himself as president and end American democracy as we know it.
Trump’s crew surely knew how bad the events of January 6 were even as they were unfolding. “The president needs to tell people in the Capitol to go home … he is destroying his legacy,” Fox News host Laura Ingraham wrote to Mark Meadows in a text message read by Republican Representative Liz Cheney during the opening statements of the Jan 6 committee meeting on Monday night. A range of journalists sent similar messages. Actual reporter Jake Sherman—who had been stuck in the Capitol during the riot, and who released his texts with Meadows “out of transparency”—wrote, “Do something for us. We are under siege in the [Capitol].” Another “journalist” exchanging texts with Meadows at the time: Fox propagandist Sean Hannity, who wrote, “Can he make a statement? Ask people to leave the Capitol.”
Meadows himself turned over a huge tranche of texts and emails to the committee before he decided he no longer wanted to testify. That he’s currently promoting his book about Trump rather undercuts the claim in his excuse for backing out of the testimony— reflected in his new lawsuit, against the January 6 committee and Nancy Pelosi—that his service to the ex-president requires rigorous confidentiality. California Representative Adam Schiff noted that it’s “very possible that by discussing the events of Jan. 6 in his book … he’s waiving any claim of privilege.” The House is now seeking to charge him with contempt.
The book itself, The Chief’s Chief, is quite a puzzling artifact. Kirkus called it a “Trump idolator’s dream book,” but Meadows also slipped up and revealed some extremely damaging information—for example, that Trump tested positive for the coronavirus before the first debate with Joe Biden (though he did, according to Meadows, take a second test, which was negative). “The story of me having COVID prior to, or during, the first debate is Fake News,” Trump responded. “In fact, a test revealed that I did not have COVID prior to the debate.”
snip
How Do You Get People to Care About Democracy?
The preservation of Democracy shouldn’t be a partisan activity.https://newsletters.theatlantic.com/wait-what/61bcecba7097fc002053584d/how-do-you-get-people-to-care-about-democracy/
Every time the January 6 committee holds a hearing, it seems clearer and clearer that Donald Trump was trying to keep control over the government after losing reelection. The past week alone produced the “how to coup” PowerPoint, widely circulated in Trumpworld, and a slew of text messages, including this sorry we weren’t able to pull off a coup note from an unidentified lawmaker to Mark Meadows: “Yesterday was a terrible day. We tried everything we could in our objection to the 6 states. I’m sorry nothing worked.” It’s pretty clear what Trump was up to: trying to reinstall himself as president and end American democracy as we know it.
Trump’s crew surely knew how bad the events of January 6 were even as they were unfolding. “The president needs to tell people in the Capitol to go home … he is destroying his legacy,” Fox News host Laura Ingraham wrote to Mark Meadows in a text message read by Republican Representative Liz Cheney during the opening statements of the Jan 6 committee meeting on Monday night. A range of journalists sent similar messages. Actual reporter Jake Sherman—who had been stuck in the Capitol during the riot, and who released his texts with Meadows “out of transparency”—wrote, “Do something for us. We are under siege in the [Capitol].” Another “journalist” exchanging texts with Meadows at the time: Fox propagandist Sean Hannity, who wrote, “Can he make a statement? Ask people to leave the Capitol.”
Meadows himself turned over a huge tranche of texts and emails to the committee before he decided he no longer wanted to testify. That he’s currently promoting his book about Trump rather undercuts the claim in his excuse for backing out of the testimony— reflected in his new lawsuit, against the January 6 committee and Nancy Pelosi—that his service to the ex-president requires rigorous confidentiality. California Representative Adam Schiff noted that it’s “very possible that by discussing the events of Jan. 6 in his book … he’s waiving any claim of privilege.” The House is now seeking to charge him with contempt.
The book itself, The Chief’s Chief, is quite a puzzling artifact. Kirkus called it a “Trump idolator’s dream book,” but Meadows also slipped up and revealed some extremely damaging information—for example, that Trump tested positive for the coronavirus before the first debate with Joe Biden (though he did, according to Meadows, take a second test, which was negative). “The story of me having COVID prior to, or during, the first debate is Fake News,” Trump responded. “In fact, a test revealed that I did not have COVID prior to the debate.”
snip
December 17, 2021
https://www.thedailybeast.com/omicron-ground-zero-in-south-africa-has-already-peaked
Even as the world panics in unison over the rapid spread of the Omicron variant of the coronavirus, the health ministry in South Africa has delivered some encouraging news. On Friday, South African health minister Joe Phaahla said not only were hospitalizations down with Omicron cases compared to previous waves like the deadly Delta surge, those who are in the hospital rarely need oxygen and their cases are less fatal.
Phaahla told reporters that the country’s hospital admission rate of COVID patients “fell 90 percent in the second week of the current infection wave driven by the Omicron variant” as compared to the second week of the Delta wave. Boiling down the good-for-a-global-pandemic news further, he said that only 1.7 percent of all Omicron cases are even hospitalized, compared to 19 percent of Delta cases earlier in the year.
Since the variant was first identified in South Africa just three weeks ago, it has already peaked in South Africa’s Gauteng province, according to national statistics, with hospitalizations falling sharply. He added that many milder cases were in the hospital because there was space, unlike in other waves when doctors had to choose who lived or died based on occupancy rates.
“We have seen a decrease in a proportion of people who need to be on oxygen. They are at very low levels,” said Waasila Jassat, a researcher South Africa’s National Institute for Communicable Diseases told Bloomberg. “For the first time there are more non-severe than severe patients in hospital.”
snip
They're Already Past the Peak in South Africa's Omicron Ground Zero (looks like great news)
On Friday the country’s health minister said hospitalizations were falling fast as the new variant has put fewer people on oxygen and is far less lethal than Delta.https://www.thedailybeast.com/omicron-ground-zero-in-south-africa-has-already-peaked
Even as the world panics in unison over the rapid spread of the Omicron variant of the coronavirus, the health ministry in South Africa has delivered some encouraging news. On Friday, South African health minister Joe Phaahla said not only were hospitalizations down with Omicron cases compared to previous waves like the deadly Delta surge, those who are in the hospital rarely need oxygen and their cases are less fatal.
Phaahla told reporters that the country’s hospital admission rate of COVID patients “fell 90 percent in the second week of the current infection wave driven by the Omicron variant” as compared to the second week of the Delta wave. Boiling down the good-for-a-global-pandemic news further, he said that only 1.7 percent of all Omicron cases are even hospitalized, compared to 19 percent of Delta cases earlier in the year.
Since the variant was first identified in South Africa just three weeks ago, it has already peaked in South Africa’s Gauteng province, according to national statistics, with hospitalizations falling sharply. He added that many milder cases were in the hospital because there was space, unlike in other waves when doctors had to choose who lived or died based on occupancy rates.
“We have seen a decrease in a proportion of people who need to be on oxygen. They are at very low levels,” said Waasila Jassat, a researcher South Africa’s National Institute for Communicable Diseases told Bloomberg. “For the first time there are more non-severe than severe patients in hospital.”
snip
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