Thursday, May 04, 2023
Long COVID Hits Trans Population Highest, Blacks & Latinos Hit Worse Than Whites
It is tempting to speculate why transexuals fare so very badly. My guess is that their abnormal state stresses them out. Stress often goes with illness
A study sponsored by the United States Census Bureau suggests Blacks and Hispanic/Latinos are afflicted more than any other ethnic/racial group by long COVID-19 symptoms. This conclusion is the result of the most recent Census Bureau’s Household Pulse Survey (HPS), an experimental online survey representative of the U.S. adult population at both the state and national level. The survey asked about long COVID symptoms in July 2022, over two years after the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.
While TrialSite continues to analyze studies finding that anywhere from 10% to 30% of persons infected with COVID-19 end up having symptoms lasting three months or longer, this most recent survey found that 31.1% of the respondents ages 18 and up experience long-lasting COVID-19 symptoms.
Long COVID afflicting women more than men
Survey respondents were asked if they had ever tested positive for or had been told by a health care provider, “They had COVID-19.” Respondents who answered “yes” were then asked if they had symptoms or that they did not have pre-COVID-19 that they still experienced at least three months later.
The U.S. Census HPS data tool allows users to explore a number of different national, state and metro area estimates, including the percentage of adults who experienced long COVID symptoms.
Who suffers Long COVID?
The U.S. Census reports that Hispanic respondents were the most likely to report long COVID symptoms and non-Hispanic Asian respondents were the least likely (Figure 1).
Though less likely than Hispanic respondents, Black respondents were more likely than White or Asian respondents to suffer long COVID.
Women were more likely than men to say they suffered long-lasting symptoms.
Persons identified as “Transgender” or “None of these” listed genders were far more likely to suffer from long COVID than those identifying as male or female.
Respondents identifying as gay/lesbian or straight were the least likely to suffer from long COVID symptoms and were not statistically different from one another.
People between ages 40 and 59 were the most likely to report long COVID symptoms, while those in the oldest age category (70 and over) were the least likely.
Does Long COVID vary by education and income?
Respondents without a high school degree were the most likely to report long COVID symptoms, while those with a college degree were the least likely (Figure 2). This suggests some socio-economic factors involved with the condition, not surprising, given the influence of the social determinants of health in America.
The U.S. Census reported on an interesting finding---those with a high school degree or less were the least likely to report having tested positive for COVID-19 while those with at least some colleges were the most likely (those with some college educations were not significantly different from those with a college degree). This could potentially be explained by the fact that young people may not get tested due to several factors.
The HPS income question is categorical, so to avoid conflating different types of households the universe was limited to two-adult/two-children’s households.
Not all estimates were significantly different but it is clear that those at the top income distribution (more than $100,000) were less likely than those at the bottom (less than $100,000) to report long COVID.
Are Long COVID sufferers worse off in other areas?
What about measures of well-being?
The recent U.S. government release shared some definitions. A person faces financial insecurity if they respond that it had been very difficult for their household to pay for usual household expenses. They are in multidimensional hardship (MHI) if they reported at least two of the following:
Mental health.Feeling down, depressed or hopeless more than half the days in the previous week.
Job insecurity. Not being employed due to illness, caring for others or losing a job due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Food insufficiency. Living in a household that sometimes or often did not have enough food to eat in the last 7 days.
Housing insecurity. Little or no confidence in their ability to make mortgage or rent payments the next month.
Approximately 27% of long COVID sufferers were financially insecure, compared to 18% of people who never tested positive for COVID-19, and 15% of people who did but did not have long COVID symptoms. The overall pattern was the same for each measure. Respondents with long COVID symptoms reported the highest level of hardship defined by each measure.
Respondents reporting that they never tested positive for COVID-19 actually faced higher levels of hardship than those who did test positive but reported no long-lasting symptoms.
************************************************
Major US Agency to Keep COVID-19 Vaccine Mandate Despite White House Announcement
A major federal agency is keeping its COVID-19 vaccine mandate in place even as most agencies are ending their vaccination requirements.
The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) is retaining its mandate, Secretary Denis McDonough said in a message to employees reviewed by The Epoch Times.
The White House’s announcement that many mandates are ending “will not impact” the VA, McDonough said.
“To ensure the safety of veterans and our colleagues, VA health care personnel will still be required to be vaccinated at this time,” he told workers.
“As we transition to this new phase of our response to the pandemic, the vaccine (including booster shots) remains the best way to protect you, your families, your colleagues, and veterans from COVID-19.”
A VA spokesperson declined to provide any data that informed the decision to keep the mandate in place.
The VA’s website claims that vaccines “help protect you from getting severe illness” and “offer good protection against most COVID-19 variants,” pointing in part to observational data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) that indicate the vaccines provide poor protection against symptomatic infection and transient shielding against hospitalization.
No clinical trial efficacy data has been made public for updated shots from Moderna and Pfizer, and none of the vaccines prevent infection or transmission.
The VA is the second largest federal agency, employing nearly 400,000 people. It was the first U.S. agency to mandate vaccination for its workers.
“We’re mandating vaccines for Title 38 employees because it’s the best way to keep veterans safe, especially as the Delta variant spreads across the country,” McDonough, an appointee of President Joe Biden, said in a statement on July 26, 2021.
The mandate was later expanded to most Veterans Health Administration (VHA) employees and volunteers. It covers personnel such as psychologists, pharmacists, housekeepers, social workers, volunteers, and contractors.
“Effectively, this means that any Veterans Health Administration employee, volunteer, or contractor who works in VHA facilities, visits VHA facilities, or provides direct care to those we serve will still be subject to the vaccine requirement at this time,” McDonough said on May 1.
VA employees who aren’t health care personnel aren’t covered by the mandate.
Mandates imposed by two other agencies, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the Indian Health Service, are also remaining in place while the agencies review the requirements, the Biden administration stated.
The NIH didn’t respond by press time to a request by The Epoch Times for comment, and the health service declined to provide more details.
Most of the administration’s mandates are ending on May 11, the White House stated this week. That includes mandates for federal workers and contractors imposed by Biden that were struck down by courts, a mandate for foreign travelers arriving by air, and the requirement that some foreigners arriving by land present proof of vaccination.
Biden had ruled out such requirements before taking office but later claimed that not enough people were getting vaccinated. The mandates were imposed after evidence began emerging that indicated that the protection bestowed by the vaccines waned over time, and officials have since cleared multiple booster shots in a bid to restore the flailing protection.
More than 1.13 million people in the United States have died of COVID-19 since the pandemic began more than three years ago, including 1,052 people in the week ending April 26, according to the CDC. That was the lowest weekly death toll from the virus since March 2020.
“While I believe that these vaccine mandates had a tremendous beneficial impact, we are now at a point where we think that it makes a lot of sense to pull these requirements down,” White House COVID-19 coordinator Dr. Ashish Jha said.
Critics decried statements from White House officials regarding the lifting of the mandates.
“They’re patting themselves on the back for unnecessarily coercing people to get a medical product they may not have wanted or stood to benefit from. It didn’t even protect others,” Dr. Tracy Hoeg, a U.S. epidemiologist, wrote on Twitter.
More than 270 million people in the United States, or about 81 percent of the population, have received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, according to the CDC. But booster uptake has been low, and so has the receipt of vaccines among children, the last population for whom vaccines were authorized.
**************************************************
Also see my other blogs. Main ones below:
http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)
http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)
http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)
http://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)
https://immigwatch.blogspot.com (IMMIGRATION WATCH)
https://awesternheart.blogspot.com (THE PSYCHOLOGIST)
http://jonjayray.com/blogall.html More blogs
***********************************************
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment