How can there not be a COVID-19 thread?

[User.168]

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[User.45]

Yeah, I intend to continue wearing my assortment of awesome masks in shops. I dig it. It makes me feel like a ninja. You mentioned booster in the previous shot. Did you see the headlines about Pfizer wanting approval to administer a third jab? I assume this is because the vaccines run out of battery power, or the magnetic effect wanes with time. Perhaps it's a firmware upgrade?

Pfizer wants approval for 3rd Covid shot to boost immunity against Delta variant

A third dose of the vaccine could help boost antibodies and ward off new coronavirus variants

www.independent.co.uk

I didn't see the headlines but it's been obvious from the get go. Antibody titers drop after 2 months of natural infection. Titers get higher for those who got 2 shots than those who had the natural infection, meaning the effect will last longer. The low number of reinfections until now were due to the effective preventative measures, less symptomatic/severe second infections and a level of durable immunity, but coronaviruses are 1) heavily seasonal (COVID is an exceptionally virulent one in between seasons) and 2) people can get reinfected every 6 months if unlucky (based on a 40-year long coronavirus/cold study). So we knew this.

The thing is, getting the unvaccinated vaccinated would still be more desirable for a first run. We need the evidence on the booster so let 'em finish the trials for that. I also want to see what role antibody titers play in assessing immunity. If it's like >80% predictive (arbitrary number), we can test and jab and time the booster appropriately, etc. IMHO we have until September to make decisions on this.

 

[SuperMatt]

The news on the radio this morning had a story about the resurgence of the virus, and that most cases are now of the Delta variety. Unsurprisingly, rural areas in the south and midwest are hardest hit due to low vaccination rates. The correlation is direct and obvious.

Where Are The Newest COVID Hot Spots? Mostly Places With Low Vaccination Rates

As the delta variant takes over in the U.S., new, localized outbreaks are emerging. Those surges are likely driven by pockets of dangerously low vaccination rates.

www.npr.org

 

[Hrafn]

The correlation is direct and obvious.

That's a weird way to spell "it's a hoax" and "fake news."

It would be funny if it weren't tragic and typical. "OMG, if you don't get vaccinated, and don't social distance, and you are around someone who is infected, you can get infected, too! Who could have guessed? Someone should have said something..."

 

[lizkat]

LA Times has interesting piece up today about ongoing efforts to develop treatment for effects of covid-19 infection, as well as advancing research in messing with the virus' ability to clone itself and also in preventing overreaction of the immune system to infection.

Vaccines are terrific, but where are the COVID-19 treatments?

It may seem like biotech companies are focused solely on developing vaccines for COVID-19, but some are hard at work on drugs that could treat those who become sick.

www.latimes.com

 

[SuperMatt]

That's a weird way to spell "it's a hoax" and "fake news."

It would be funny if it weren't tragic and typical. "OMG, if you don't get vaccinated, and don't social distance, and you are around someone who is infected, you can get infected, too! Who could have guessed? Someone should have said something..."

Oh there are still people that think Trump was “on to something” with his “shine a light in your ear” strategy. A company (that previously got in trouble for selling unapproved Chinese COVID tests in April 2020) tried to sell investors on the “Healight” - yes, a light you stick down your throat to kill COVID. They got a bunch of investment money for it. I’ll post a couple articles about it here so you can make up your own mind... a real cure? Or somebody trying to cash in on Trump’s ignorant ramblings? They tested their technology on 5 (yes FIVE!) people. I guess that counts as a trial? Only one of them died, so not bad right?

Aytu BioScience (AYTU): The Moonshot Continues To Orbit Awaiting The Next Giant Steps

Solid progress advancing Healight technology and the merger confirmation with Neos Therapeutics should help propel Aytu BioScience's share price to a more rational valuation.

seekingalpha.com

Healight: A highly implausible treatment for COVID-19

Last week, President Trump proposed using internal light to treat COVID-19. The existence of Healight, a device to do that, doesn't help him.

respectfulinsolence.com

Column: How Cedars-Sinai got sucked into the battle over Trump's claim of a COVID-19 treatment

Cedars-Sinai is embroiled in a political battle over Trump's remarks on a potential virus treatment.

www.latimes.com

 

[User.45]

Oh there are still people that think Trump was “on to something” with his “shine a light in your ear” strategy. A company (that previously got in trouble for selling unapproved Chinese COVID tests in April 2020) tried to sell investors on the “Healight” - yes, a light you stick down your throat to kill COVID. They got a bunch of investment money for it. I’ll post a couple articles about it here so you can make up your own mind... a real cure? Or somebody trying to cash in on Trump’s ignorant ramblings? They tested their technology on 5 (yes FIVE!) people. I guess that counts as a trial? Only one of them died, so not bad right?

Aytu BioScience (AYTU): The Moonshot Continues To Orbit Awaiting The Next Giant Steps

Solid progress advancing Healight technology and the merger confirmation with Neos Therapeutics should help propel Aytu BioScience's share price to a more rational valuation.

seekingalpha.com

Healight: A highly implausible treatment for COVID-19

Last week, President Trump proposed using internal light to treat COVID-19. The existence of Healight, a device to do that, doesn't help him.

respectfulinsolence.com

Column: How Cedars-Sinai got sucked into the battle over Trump's claim of a COVID-19 treatment

Cedars-Sinai is embroiled in a political battle over Trump's remarks on a potential virus treatment.

www.latimes.com

It's an interesting case study. When the first HCQ study came out suggesting the efficacy (where they used a virologic and not clinical endpoint and removed all patients transferred to the ICU [meaning it was a meaningless study]) you could see the major problems with HCQ but what Trump was regurgitating was based on inadequate data interpreted inappropriately. When I pointed this shit out on reddit at r/TheDonald they started trying to interpret UV therapy and posted PubMed articles to me even. If Trump came up with (or read on the internet) something he would just blurt it out w/o filter. UV is used on non-cellular blood products to kill pathogens as UV has a frequency that disrupts DNA/RNA so as long as it's like packed blood you can disinfect it without spoiling it (mature red blood cells don't have nuclei anymore, etc). Shining UV in organs with living cells could cause an internal sunburn and where there's about a single cell layer covering things like a lung it could lead to ARDS (adult/acute respiratory stress syndrome) which COVID causes on it's own too... A bad one at it. Additionally, it would still be just superficial treatment. So no, overall it was a really dumb idea, Trump is just an epitome of the Dunning-Kruger phenomenon.

 

[thekev]

Potatoes FTW

View attachment 6680

The word "toxin" is grossly misused by a large number of people.

 

[lizkat]

The word "toxin" is grossly misused by a large number of people.

Exceeded only but surely by the number of people misusing Twitter.

 

[thekev]

Exceeded only but surely by the number of people misusing Twitter.

Believe me, I'm with you. People come up with some truly silly notions though. The additives in typical vaccines (not sure about mRNA types) are typically regarded as toxic. I hesitate to use the word, because a lot of seemingly innocuous stuff could be toxic if injected in large amounts. To the best of my knowledge, they're added to incite an immune system response.

Also, potential side effects do sometimes surface from various vaccines. There's a recent one reported for the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines. They probably don't know enough yet. Personally, it wouldn't dissuade me. I got it, realizing side effects might surface later. I did not want to test how long I could evade covid, particularly because I figured that most social restrictions would start to be relaxed.

EU finds potential link between heart inflammation and mRNA COVID shots

Europe's drug regulator has found a possible link between very rare heart inflammation and COVID-19 vaccines from Pfizer-BioNTech (PFE.N), (22UAy.DE) and Moderna (MRNA.O), it said on Friday, stressing that the benefits of the shots outweighed any risks.

www.reuters.com

 

[User.45]

Believe me, I'm with you. People come up with some truly silly notions though. The additives in typical vaccines (not sure about mRNA types) are typically regarded as toxic. I hesitate to use the word, because a lot of seemingly innocuous stuff could be toxic if injected in large amounts. To the best of my knowledge, they're added to incite an immune system response.

Also, potential side effects do sometimes surface from various vaccines. There's a recent one reported for the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines. They probably don't know enough yet. Personally, it wouldn't dissuade me. I got it, realizing side effects might surface later. I did not want to test how long I could evade covid, particularly because I figured that most social restrictions would start to be relaxed.

EU finds potential link between heart inflammation and mRNA COVID shots

Europe's drug regulator has found a possible link between very rare heart inflammation and COVID-19 vaccines from Pfizer-BioNTech (PFE.N), (22UAy.DE) and Moderna (MRNA.O), it said on Friday, stressing that the benefits of the shots outweighed any risks.

www.reuters.com

US military tracked their cases. 23 cases of myocarditis (heart muscle inflammation), for 2.8M doses (https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamacardiology/fullarticle/2781601). ~1 in 100K. To give a very rough idea about all of this, a phase 1 will give you risk profile to the 1% range, a phase 2 to a 0.1% range a phase 3 to a 0.01% scale. So now that we are getting phase 4 data we uncover the 0.001% risk level data. The media isn't doing a great job at placing this in context. These complications were not captured because of they were below the the sensitivity level of a phase 3 trial.

So in contrast, 0.1% of Americans DIED of COVID last year. Early reports suggested signs of myocarditis in >50% of COVID cases regardless of severity. Even if I adjust for age dependent risks as long as you have a legit personal risk to contract COVID, even as a healthy young person the benefit of the shot will overweigh the risk by orders of magnitude.

 

[hulugu]

US military tracked their cases. 23 cases of myocarditis (heart muscle inflammation), for 2.8M doses (https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamacardiology/fullarticle/2781601). ~1 in 100K. To give a very rough idea about all of this, a phase 1 will give you risk profile to the 1% range, a phase 2 to a 0.1% range a phase 3 to a 0.01% scale. So now that we are getting phase 4 data we uncover the 0.001% risk level data. The media isn't doing a great job at placing this in context. These complications were not captured because of they were below the the sensitivity level of a phase 3 trial.

So in contrast, 0.1% of Americans DIED of COVID last year. Early reports suggested signs of myocarditis in >50% of COVID cases regardless of severity. Even if I adjust for age dependent risks as long as you have a legit personal risk to contract COVID, even as a healthy young person the benefit of the shot will overweigh the risk by orders of magnitude.

Right. Our county had COVID-19 deaths approaching 1 out of every 450 people, which is rather low overall. Still, the death rate of COVID-19, despite all the precautions, is significantly below the potential cases of myocarditis. And, that's before we get into the cases of people who contracted COVID-19 and remain "long-haulers" with severe, long-lasting symptoms. There are also good questions about how COVID-19 affects young athletes.

All told, the vaccine has been incredibly safe.

 

[User.45]

Right. Our county had COVID-19 deaths approaching 1 out of every 450 people, which is rather low overall. Still, the death rate of COVID-19, despite all the precautions, is significantly below the potential cases of myocarditis. And, that's before we get into the cases of people who contracted COVID-19 and remain "long-haulers" with severe, long-lasting symptoms. There are also good questions about how COVID-19 affects young athletes.

All told, the vaccine has been incredibly safe.

You're right, I wanted to write ≥0.1% mortality. Same thing applies to hypercoagulability with AZ vaccine. Of the many hundreds of stroke cases I've treated maybe 5 cases involved sagittal sinus thrombosis. It's super rare and usually happens in hypercoagulable females (autoimmune etiology mostly). Again COVID comes with a hypercoagulable state so again getting the infection generates the same state just many many many times worse.

 

[thekev]

US military tracked their cases. 23 cases of myocarditis (heart muscle inflammation), for 2.8M doses (https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamacardiology/fullarticle/2781601). ~1 in 100K. To give a very rough idea about all of this, a phase 1 will give you risk profile to the 1% range, a phase 2 to a 0.1% range a phase 3 to a 0.01% scale. So now that we are getting phase 4 data we uncover the 0.001% risk level data. The media isn't doing a great job at placing this in context. These complications were not captured because of they were below the the sensitivity level of a phase 3 trial.

So in contrast, 0.1% of Americans DIED of COVID last year. Early reports suggested signs of myocarditis in >50% of COVID cases regardless of severity. Even if I adjust for age dependent risks as long as you have a legit personal risk to contract COVID, even as a healthy young person the benefit of the shot will overweigh the risk by orders of magnitude.

I don't disagree with you at all. Covid is just far too high of a risk by orders of magnitude for me to wait for long term studies to surface. If it was a common strain of rhinovirus, I might think differently (not sure that will ever happen, given their diversity).

Note, I got mine shortly after they became available to people in my age group.

 

[User.45]

I don't disagree with you at all. Covid is just far too high of a risk by orders of magnitude for me to wait for long term studies to surface. If it was a common strain of rhinovirus, I might think differently (not sure that will ever happen, given their diversity).

Note, I got mine shortly after they became available to people in my age group.

I didn't say it explicitly, but with COVID, the "no-brainer" risk-benefit ratio for the vaccine was established on a phase 2 level. I.e. a year ago.

Less cute but more accurate for rhinoviruses:

 

[SuperMatt]

Less accurate description of a RINO-virus:

 

[thekev]

I didn't say it explicitly, but with COVID, the "no-brainer" risk-benefit ratio for the vaccine was established on a phase 2 level. I.e. a year ago.

Less cute but more accurate for rhinoviruses:
View attachment 6886

Oh I get that, although I prefer my rhinovirus visual**. To be clear, I wasn't even remotely considering foregoing vaccination. Even after vaccination, I continue to avoid crowded areas, buy groceries at off peak hours, and wear a mask indoors in case I ever unknowingly contract it.

**I drive by and make jokes. This is what I do.

 

[User.45]

Oh I get that, although I prefer my rhinovirus visual**. To be clear, I wasn't even remotely considering foregoing vaccination. Even after vaccination, I continue to avoid crowded areas, buy groceries at off peak hours, and wear a mask indoors in case I ever unknowingly contract it.

**I drive by and make jokes. This is what I do.

I know and Rhinoceroses are cute too It's just one thing with which my stuck up upbringing gets the best of me: the inaccuracy of unjustified abbreviations

 

[hulugu]

You're right, I wanted to write ≥0.1% mortality. Same thing applies to hypercoagulability with AZ vaccine. Of the many hundreds of stroke cases I've treated maybe 5 cases involved sagittal sinus thrombosis. It's super rare and usually happens in hypercoagulable females (autoimmune etiology mostly). Again COVID comes with a hypercoagulable state so again getting the infection generates the same state just many many many times worse.

My sense has been that anyone who suffered from complications because of the vaccine were probably fated for real trouble if they caught the actual virus.

Talked to a hospital doc and nurse this week, they're still seeing patients in the ICU and most of those cases are hitting people in their 30s.

I'm nervous about school starting, because kids 5-11 are not vaccinated.

 

[User.45]

My sense has been that anyone who suffered from complications because of the vaccine were probably fated for real trouble if they caught the actual virus.

Talked to a hospital doc and nurse this week, they're still seeing patients in the ICU and most of those cases are hitting people in their 30s.

I'm nervous about school starting, because kids 5-11 are not vaccinated.

It makes sense because people in their 30s are less vaccinated than those 40+ but higher risk than <30.

Once the pediatric studies finish, 2+ will be eligible by Sept. It's just for them the risk-benefit ratio is different (pediatric mortality of COVID is insanely low, so the vaccines have to be insanely safe).