Is this the end of Omicron?
Probably not.
In the UK we’ve seen a rapid fall in cases since the peak of BA.2 variant at the beginning of April. Indeed, the usual throng of commentators are declaring that Covid is now over — strangely, they think this because nearly everyone in the UK has now had Covid and thus will have robust immunity from infection, even though they said the same before about vaccine derived immunity after the Delta wave.
But is it the case?
The Zoe symptom tracker is now showing a flattening out in case numbers:
It looks as though this will level out at about 1,500,000 cases (or about 1:45 in the population infected).
This in itself would be difficult to explain according to the ‘SIR’ model used by all of the ‘official’ models used to predict case numbers — but that’s no surprise, given that the modellers have failed in predicting nearly every stage of the Covid pandemic.
At this point there appears to be three possibilities for the future of Covid in the UK:
It will continue to decline to near zero; this is what we see in South Africa and other low vaccination countries, and also what was seen in the UK in 2020 (ie, before vaccination started).
It will reach a plateau at around 1,500,000 cases, and then hover at around this level for some months; this is what we have seen in the UK since mid 2021 (ie majority of the population vaccinated)
It will quickly rebound up to a new peak; this is what we’ve seen in the UK since late 2021 (ie, majority of the population boosted).
I believe that we’ll see the latter. If this is the case then we should see clear signs of an increase in cases at around the end of May and cases peaking in June. I suspect that cases will match or even exceed that seen during the BA.2 wave. Many will suggest that this is due to a new hyper-infectious Covid variant, but really it is just what Covid does — we get each wave when it is due, and it will be comprised of whichever Covid variant is prevalent at the time.
If we do get another Covid wave in June then it will probably be associated with substantially lower hospitalisations and deaths, due to the seasonality in the severity of Covid. This said, we don’t yet know the impact of newer variants on our population — hopefully it won’t be more pathogenic.
As I understand it, we can count on mutations with this virus, so it seems we'll be riding this ride for a long time. Perhaps similar to the flu but more frequent than yearly.
It would be interesting if no new variants emerged and case numbers stayed the same, perhaps pointing to the prevalence of immune system dysfunction and/or low white blood cell counts in those vaccinated. I talked to someone yesterday who got a booster months ago. He recently got blood work done because he's on an injection to lower cholesterol (I'm not sure if the vaccine affects cholesterol, he did attributed early thyroid trouble to his first vaccine). His white blood cell count is low. He's attributing it to the cholesterol medication. 😐
The SIR model is what they call a "spherical cow". Mathematically elegant, but completely unrealistic. It can't even account for seasonality, one of the most basic characteristics of influenza-like illness. It doesn't take into account so many factors, I find it difficult to believe that credible epidemiologists would be using it without heavy hypothesis augmentation and supplemental data sources.
Of course scientific "credibility" is the most thoroughly debased currency still circulating at present. Sigh.