Doctors Telling Their Omicron Stories

It is Horrific Out There

I’m a Boston-based cancer doctor and I’ve been writing weekly fact-based-no-blame-no-rumors-all-science-all-the-time essays about Covid-19 since March 2020.

You can read my views on what we know/knew about Omicron here — or about kids and Omicron here — or you can read about vaccines/anti-vaxxers throughout history here

Things are unbelievably terrible out there.

Forget anything you’ve heard about Omicron being “mild.” It is HORRIFIC how it is ravaging our society and our hospitals and our health care workers.

11,000 cases/day in June in the US.
650,000 cases yesterday (plus a gabillion unreported at-home tests)

Please do everything you can to not get Omicron this month.

Get boosted. (Get vaccinated!) Wear a good mask everywhere. Hunker down. Don’t congregate inside with unmasked people. Don’t eat inside with strangers. Minimize travel. Do what you can to not get hurt or sick or quarantine-stranded.

Our hospital systems are beyond stressed: the ER’s hallways are full of patients, the ICUs are full up, the Urgent Cares have lines around the block, the PCPs are getting pounded, the pediatricians have exploding clinics.

In addition, if you get seriously ill right now, there are essentially no drugs to help you out. They simply haven’t been manufactured in bulk yet; they do not exist. There are almost no monoclonal antibodies available, and the antivirals like Paxlovid will not be readily available until February or March. There are no real out-patient treatments except Tylenol.

Please do everything you can to not get Omicron this month.

Here’s some perspective from the trenches: Quotes from Massachusetts doctor friends and colleagues

Emergency Room Physician: “It is horrendous. I can’t even get to the bottom of how horrendous it is here. The rooms, hallways, waiting room are all filled with COVID…