Is there now no need to be scared of Covid ?

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I remember someone telling me ''What have you got to be scared of ?, I've been not wearing mask or social distancing all throughout this time and caught it and recovered'' and she said she won't get the vaccine because she didn't believe in it and that there was no point. I reminded her that people in their twenties and thirties have been ill and hospitalised and in some cases have sadly died. One 28 year old was in hospital in recovery and regretted not getting the vaccine.
She didn't respond and I don't know why but her comments just re-ignited the FOMO in me and that seeing other people my age or younger going out and enjoying life without a mask and so on just made me feel like the only one who spending less time going out than what I did before the pandemic and that I am just wasting my life and time being nearly always at home when I am not working. I want to get back to doing things I was doing before all this, but the worries and fears of the virus are nearly always running through my head which dissuaded me at times from going out. But now I have been going out more despite Omicron in now circulation, a week ago I had my hair cut in a salon done which I hadn't done for two years and the place was empty and it was late in the afternoon and the hairdresser reassured my anxiety and told me (when she didn't need to) that she was vaccinated.

Be concerned, but do not fear.

"I must not fear.  Fear is the mind-killer.  Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.  I will face my fear.  I will permit it to pass over me and through me.  And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path.  Where the fear has gone there will be nothing.  Only I will remain." -- Frank Herbert, in Dune

I'm more scared of getting norovirus than I am of covid.

As more people get vaxed, slowly but surely, Covid will become endemic, rather than a pandemic.

Be afraid, be very afraid. Because of human ignorance and stupidity, the @! !%$ing Freedumb Convoy protest, and the fact that there are some things humans can't do anything about whatsoever, the virus will mutate again and again until everyone gets it. It will become an everyday thing, like the flu, and we all know about how most people who died of the so-called Spanish flu in 1818 were young and otherwise healthy.

And about the norovirus? Covid can cause vomiting too. EVERY illness can cause vomiting, even if it's not a stomach disease. Because of this for years I have been very anxious and emetophobic even when I have a cold or when someone else has one.

My body hates me and doesn't care if I'm anxious or miserable, just as long as I "survive".

I can't stand it sometimes the persistent ''What if this'' and ''What if that'' happens if the virus mutates again from some people. I mean we never every year before the pandemic warned and worried people of new flu strains.

It can, but it's not one of the main symptoms. I've never vomited with a cold or a flu, only when I was a small child I vomited a little bit once with flu but it wasn't like a norovirus. Loss of appetite, nausea and vomiting with covid or flu can occur because the glands are swollen in the stomach or something, or if the person swallows too much mucus or coughs too much, and it's more commonly known in infants or the elderly. Norovirus is a completely different bug and directly effects the digestive system, while colds, flu and covid aim for the respiratory system.

I'd say it depends on the individual. Healthy young people who aren't close to nor in close contact with people who are in risk groups don't really have much to fear, especially if they're vaccinated, but practicing healthy caution (take good care of hand hygiene, keep safe distance etc.) is still recommended. Those of us who are in risk groups or have members of risk groups in our family and are in contact with them have more reason to be worried, but again, healthy caution (and vaccines) will be enough for the most of us. Those who're at really big risk due to their health have been informed of it by their health care workers and are likely still avoiding people a lot, but if you haven't been told you're one of them, then you're not.

You can fear whatever you want.

I don't fear anything when it comes to me (got all those marks there). I fear loved ones becoming seriously ill, suffering and/or dying (along with those they care for, as that will upset them; I don't think they should be upset about me, but I don't see myself how others might).

I've always been more frightened of my loved ones getting covid and dying that of myself - but because I have a phobia of vomiting I do panic when I'm around people who have the vomiting bug.

I've heard antivaxxers say "I'll be fine because I'm a fit healthy young man". Maybe you are. Maybe you'll survive. You know what I fear? Giving it to someone else and causing them to die.

Afternoon Chris,

In the UK risk factors have changed greatly for the better regarding SARS CoV 2 and covid.

1. Adaptive immunity. 86% of population over 12 with two doses of vaccine which have been proved very efficacious, plus many others with the less well studied adaptive immunity from surviving infection.

The difference this makes is huge. It means now for the majority of people who encounter the virus, including my 88 year old mum who did in January, Antibodies and memory T-cells are spun up within about 3 days to prevent it spreading through the body ( antobodies) and shutting down infected cells and resolving the infection with sometimes unpleasant but not life threatening illness (T-cells).

The difference is also felt at population level. The adaptive immune response means people are infectious for a shorter time and shed much less infectious virus. All this puts a crimp on spread. Every wave of cases seems to run out of steam, even though there are virtually no controls in place other than shops and public transport asking people nicely if they would wear a mask if able.

2. The fruits of two years of study and drug trials for treatment. It started probably no more than two months in with the studies showing the benefit of broad acting steroids at the stage where the inflammatory response is starting go go out of control. From the start of this year we have had not one but two antivirals available for vulnerable people to deal with the very first stage the five days where the virus would be reproducing, and stopping it - paxlovid shutting down the enzyme which cuts the virus protein onto the components to make the new virus particles and stopping reproduction, and Molnupirivir which takes the virus' natural ability to make mutations each reproduction and winds up the mutation ability so far that the majority of the mutations are either duds or so lacking in fitness that they make British Leyland cars built on night shift look good. Monoclonal antibodies are also available, but need care to ensure they match whatever variant has infected the person.

3. Effects of population immunity on ability to evolve greater fitness. Each reproduction of a virus throws up mutations. The genetic copying is not precise. Mutation is absolutely normal. If a mutation gives an advantage that becomes the one which come to predominate. But, there is only so far a virus can alter before loosing fitness. With populations with high immunity, the mutations most likely to be selected are those which might evade immune responses, but that has two high prices for the virus. Number one, random mutation my throw out a receptor different enough to dodge antibodies, but there is no guarantee that will give as good attachment and entry, and the price of antibody evasion is loss of fitness and 2, the patterns which T cells recognise and act on are at a much more granular level, have not been observed to vary between variants, and even cooler, the operation of the immune system makes those patters different between different individuals so even if a variant manages to dodge T cells in person X, person Y's T-cells will still take down infected cells when that mutuant infects person Y so any T-cell dodging variant can't spread person to person. Evolution may end up in a muck and nettles choice where to evade immunity caused so much fitness to be lost it is a dead end, or keep fitness only to be blatted by T-cells in the next host and game over.

(Full disclosure - information taken from "Principles of Virology, pub American Society of Virology, set book for Virology Live and Columbia university undergraduate virology lectures, Drew University Undergraduate Immunology Course and from the podcast "This Week in Virology " from microbe.tv, producer Prof V Racinello, Higgins Professor microbiology Columbia University)

I've been MUCH more concerned by the way people have been reacting to Covid than I have been of actually catching Covid. My fear was worse in the begging because of the way others were freaking out & getting angry by people not wanting to wear masks & there was the tracking when going in certain places & the restrictions on entering & leaving certain states. Plus there was all the angry protests against the restrictions. Then the same people who supported the restrictions actually went out & publicly protested in support of the post office. I STRONGLY support protecting the post office too but it is completely hypocritical to rant about people not following restrictions & people protesting against the restrictions because they are spreading the dreaded virus, & then go out & publicly protest yourself for a different reason. If people can spread the virus by publicly protesting against the restrictions, people can also spread the virus by publicly protesting for other reasons. People have no f#cking common sense these days & that scares me.

I just wear a mask, it's no big deal to me. Especially now that the weather is warming up and I don't have to deal with foggy glasses outdoors.

Same here. Norovirus is living hell.