We go for our second covid vaccine today. I believe we will get the Astrozeneca again, but last week they gave the J&J to lower risk folks. We need to have our drivers/ rice deliverers a vaccine but they are young so low risk, so not yet eligible.
Manila area is now under full quarantine: we have increased the level of shutdown, closing the "night market" at the Plaza because too many were partying at night. (the food vendors merely moved into the streets with pushcarts during the day, but never mind: The sun and wind slows the spread). The tourist areas are also shut.
And the bad news is that our mayor is now sick with covid. Keep him in your prayers: he actually has improved the city quite a bit, which means he is using the city budget to fix up the town instead of fixing up his family's bank account like other politicians who will not be named.
The bank is reopened. Luckily I now am considered a senior, and they have a priority line for seniors and the guards often let me inside where it is airconditioned to wait my turn instead of sitting outside until it is my turn.
A senior member of Joy's church died of covid, and his wife is now in the hospital with shortness of breath, probably covid. Ten days ago they had a party where he probably caught it, but Joy didn't go since she was home sick... with a viral bronchitis (no covid test of course. Why ask for trouble).
Now her brother and family are sick: Their area has more covid than we do.
I had given Joy Zithromax and prednisone when she was sick, so told her to send her brother to a clinic to get checked and a prescription, so he and his family are on it.
But a neighbor gave him some (human) Ivermectin, which can be bought on line. The gov't here copies the US CDC and has forbidden human usage of this drug. I asked Kuya to buy some at the animal supply store but he is a Christian and too honest to go against the law.
Lukily Joy is a Christian but enough of a Filipino to ignore stupid laws that don't make sense so she plans to order some for us to take in case we get sick.
taken correctly, the side effects are minimal, but the Australian, Israeli, and Indian data suggest it could help.
My take?
when we were in Medical school, we were told the tale of the Onion poultices (an herbal treatment for chest congestion) in the time of the Spanish flu.
the 1918 influenza was especially fatal to the young (not the elderly like most influenza epidemics) and especially fatal to pregnant ladies. So when a local doctor went to check one very sick pregnant woman, he knew her chances to live were low, but tried his best.
But the husband asked if he should use an onion poultice, and the physician mocked him saying it was useless, so the husband refrained from this treatment.
The woman, of course, died, but for years later, every time the husband saw the physician, would reproach him, saying: She would still be alive if you had let me use the onion poultice.
In other words, people need hope, and often grasp at straws and useless remedies... but since Placebo effect is real, these remedies often work.
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