We are one week out from Christmas and Omicron is here. Slate’s Tim Requarth cautions, “Wildfire isn’t quite an apt analogy. It’s more like the shockwave of an explosion. The rate of spread is unlike anything scientists have seen before—in the U.K., cases are doubling every 1.5 days.”
Already I’m wondering about the risks involved in a family gathering in which it is not clear if everyone is fully vaccinated. There may be one or two unknowns. A nephew’s girlfriend here, a niece’s new spouse there, a sister who thinks Dr. Fauci is the Prince of Darkness. (Hope there is no Ivermectin in the cookies.) Not sure who will be there. But there’s a Walgreens down the street that does rapid testing and sells testing kits besides. Sunday the 26th. Putting it on the calendar. And before that: I have an in-person party meeting this morning. Maybe tomorrow as well.
Tim Requarth advises:
Use Rapid Tests Just Before Gathering if You Can Find (and Afford) Them
It’s a crime that at-home rapid test kits cost $24 a pop and are difficult to find (and it’s also a crime that the government’s plan to make insurers reimburse for them doesn’t start until mid-January). But they are useful for determining if someone is currently infectious—which is what you want to know before sitting down at the dinner table. If you can, take more than one test in the lead-up to a gathering; they’re sold in two-packs for a reason, and they have a surprisingly high, if imperfect, chance of catching someone who’s infectious. It’s important to do the second swab just before the gathering, as results can change surprisingly fast. You could have a negative result in the morning and be infectious by afternoon. If you’re new to rapid testing, here’s an excellent video explainer on how they work.
Come Up With an Isolation Plan
You might catch the virus no matter what precautions you take, and that’s not a moral failing. The good news is that for the vaccinated (and especially boosted), the case will likely be mild. But it’s best to prevent spread by coming up with a plan to hole up for a bit. Because it can be difficult to separate COVID symptoms from those of other circulating viruses, if you feel anything—fever, cough, sore throat—get tested. Over Thanksgiving, a friend of mine thought he was having allergies, but a rapid test revealed he had COVID. He isolated quickly, and no one else in his family—including his medically vulnerable father—caught the virus. Thankfully, expert thinking on isolation protocols for the vaccinated is slowly changing: So long as you’ve had your shots, test negative, and aren’t showing symptoms, it’s probably safe to emerge in about five days.
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That’s about my mean time between seeing anyone indoors anyway.