The Vaccine

Encouraging:

SARS-CoV-2 Infection after Vaccination in Health Care Workers in California

The rarity of positive test results 14 days after administration of the second dose of vaccine is encouraging and suggests that the efficacy of these vaccines is maintained outside the trial setting. These data underscore the critical importance of continued public health mitigation measures (masking, physical distancing, daily symptom screening, and regular testing), even in environments with a high incidence of vaccination, until herd immunity is reached at large.

https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMc2101927

The results of this modelling study are a worry:

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/laninf/article/PIIS1473-3099(21)00143-2/fulltext

Speaking with an Infectious Diseases expert last night, he said that the natural, raw "R" rate for the novel Coronavirus is around 8. Masks and social distancing, etc. are just about keeping the effective R rate around 1. Remove them, and it goes back to 8 = bad news.

Worse news is that the best case effective R rate with a full vaccine rollout is still only around 2. So, life still can't get back to normal (if, indeed the old "normal" is what we really want, but that's a different topic...). Seemingly, it has to be vaccines plus some other measures to keep the R rate below 1. Either some physical protective measures to slow transmission need to remain in place or we need to develop an actual reliable, quick, easy, cheap treatment for the disease so that people neither die from it nor suffer from "long covid" after having had it, and so that hospitals are not overwhelmed. It really doesn't look like going away any time soon.

On a vaguely groupdiy related note, I do wonder if having UV sterilisers in AC units and strong Ioniser systems in public buildings, offices, shops and so on would be a good part of a solution which minimises disruption to daily life and business. It may sound like quackery, but there is fairly strong evidence for air ionisers both helping to pull viral and bacterial particles out of the air and also for damaging the virility of the virus and bacteria in the air. To date though, I see very little suggestion of it being used to address our present predicament.

Good article. A large part of the protection against SARS-CoV-2 is going to depend on public acceptance of vaccination. The vaccines are being shown to be effective against covid 19, particularly in decreasing serious disease and death among those vaccinated.

Minnesota has identified 89 "breakthrough" infections of the novel coronavirus that causes COVID-19 in people who have been fully vaccinated.
None are among Minnesota's 6,798 COVID-19 deaths, including nine deaths reported Wednesday, and doctors said even those who were hospitalized after being vaccinated had milder illness.

https://www.startribune.com/minnesota-reports-89-covid-19-cases-in-vaccinated-individuals/600038033/

Also important, besides vaccine acceptance, will be efficacy against current and future virus mutants, and vaccination of children, studies of which are ongoing. Although a small proportion of people are unable to be vaccinated for medical reasons, those who decline it through personal choice will be a major factor in the possible continuing prevalence of the disease.

crazydoc said:

Also important, besides vaccine acceptance, will be efficacy against current and future virus mutants, and vaccination of children, studies of which are ongoing. Although a small proportion of people are unable to be vaccinated for medical reasons, those who decline it through personal choice will be a major factor in the possible continuing prevalence of the disease.

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I am not a big fan of social media but posted about getting my first jab to hopefully set a good example for any of my "friends" (cough) who are still not willing. In my state availability is offered down to 16YO. 

I have one friend who is a die hard anti-vaxer and I verbally wrestle with him often.

It seems logical that insurance should cost more for people and parents who don't embrace modern vaccines for themselves or their children (another modern problem beyond Covid). They certainly cost us more as a nation.

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BTW be aware that the primary mode for mainstream news to amp up ratings is to try to scare us into watching so expect to hear that the sky is falling on a regular basis. Covid gives them a convenient parade of concerns to spin up. Despite all the arm waving about variants efficacy against different strains they seem protective against death and hospitalization for most (all?).

Be smart and be well...  I am an unrepentant optimist but I am seeing signs of spring, literally and figuratively, all around us.

JR

I think the shady involvement here of church ,state and medical/pharma in ileagal vaccine trials ,as well as the subsequent cover ups had done great damage to public confidence in vaccinations long before Covid emerged . Ive heard as few as 60% are willing to go for the Covid jab. The unfortunate goings on surrounding  the Oxford/Astra hasnt helped either .

Finally there is some joined up thinking begining to happen with our closest neighbours the UK , who will have a surplus of around 3.7 million vaccines which they have agreed to send to Ireland at some point ,  unfortunately a more joined up 'all Ireland' approach wasnt possible earlier due to the fractious nature of politics in the North .
A stricter policy on travel from the UK mainland to Ireland would have made lots of sense earlier on but the North continues to be a 'back door'  to the republic , on the flip side of that many people in the republic say in Co Donegal are closer to towns and cities in the North than in the republic for food shopping etc , with all the too-ing and fro-ing seems like now the UK variant is the predominant one here in Ireland at this stage .

My instincts about policing and sick days taken wasnt far off the mark , in figures released today under freedom of information  a force of some 14,500 Gardai ( irish police) took 227,000 sick days last year and those figures didnt even include Covid related sickness which were recorded seperately . I can certainly see how an extended traffic detail for months on end had a huge impact on morale and health within the force . Second time round , even though the same strict rules apply I think they know better than to overextend as they did in lockdown part 1 . There is talk now of a slight relaxation of the 5km limit for recreational purposes after the Easter break , in my county though theres so many (former cow tracks) roads it makes it a bit of a mission impossible for the boys in blue . Were seeing around 500-700(pop. 5 million ) cases a day countrywide for weeks on end now ,public health advice is starting to fall on deaf ears  while the rainbow coalitions 'credabillity' factor is sinking to an alltime low due serious breaches of trust by the people at the top , a paddle isnt much use up sh!t creek. A more cohesive approach to border control might have paid divedends like in NZ and Aus , I heard Neil Finn and Crowded House are playing to 20,000 strong crowds in NewZeland lately , meanwhile here in Ireland not even a glimmer of hope on the horizon for our musicians and performers , dark days indeed 

I'm getting stabbed tomorrow.

JohnRoberts said:

I have one friend who is a die hard anti-vaxer and I verbally wrestle with him often.

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Those who are against getting vaccinated currently have no choice but to contribute to the herd immunity, whether they eventually choose to get vaccinated or not. If the preponderance of new cases shifts to the unvaccinated, as I'm sure it will, they will have two choices:

1) Get the vaccine because of increased risk and fear of serious disease or death, and thus add to the herd immunity, or

2) Those who accept increased risk of the disease, and get it, will gain immunity, and thus increase the percentage of immunity in the population, or die from it, and thus decrease the percentage of the unimmunized, which will mathematically increase the per cent of the population with immunity.

crazydoc said:

Those who are against getting vaccinated currently have no choice but to contribute to the herd immunity, whether they eventually choose to get vaccinated or not. If the preponderance of new cases shifts to the unvaccinated, as I'm sure it will, they will have two choices:

1) Get the vaccine because of increased risk and fear of serious disease or death, and thus add to the herd immunity, or

2) Those who accept increased risk of the disease, and get it, will gain immunity, and thus increase the percentage of immunity in the population, or die from it, and thus decrease the percentage of the unimmunized, which will mathematically increase the per cent of the population with immunity.

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Sadly after this pandemic ends, as it surely will, the vaccine holdouts will declare that they were right all along.


JR

I always agree with anti-vaxxers, but add that it would be a very good thing if a few billion died. Creates space.

By the look on their faces, I hope at least some of them might start using that brain...

In relation to Doc's comment ,
Here in Ireland we've had 234,541(around 5 % of the population) confirmed cases , 4,666 deaths to date.
The actual prevalence (estimated) is a much harder figure to find information on . In a random test back in September last year prevalence was estimated to be around 1.7% averaged out ,  at that stage the number of confirmed cases was around 27,000. Wouldnt we expect a fairly consistant linkage between numbers of confirmed cases and prevalence ? Wouldnt it make sense to test for antibodies especially in people who have either had a close contact with someone who was already infected and more generally as the vaccinations are offered to younger people , who would be more likely to be a-symptomatic ?
Anyway to my untrained eye anything that made the best use of the limited vaccine supplies we do have would be good plan , of course there would be a cost involved in testing but its a drop in the ocean compared to the cost of the economic and health impacts of extended lockdown .

Tubetec said:

Wouldnt it make sense to test for antibodies especially in people who have either had a close contact with someone who was already infected and more generally as the vaccinations are offered to younger people , who would be more likely to be a-symptomatic ?
Anyway to my untrained eye anything that made the best use of the limited vaccine supplies we do have would be good plan , of course there would be a cost involved in testing but its a drop in the ocean compared to the cost of the economic and health impacts of extended lockdown .

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Show your math that testing cost is only a drop in the ocean...

Yes in an ideal world we could test for antibodies and use that to selectively parse who gets vaccinations, I am not confident to trust government bureaucrats to make critical decisions, cost effectively, and in a timely manner. Seems like another opportunity to jam up the process with another layer of bureaucracy (they would love getting more power).

Giving jabs of unapproved vaccines (operating with only emergency use authorization) to everybody is yet another grand experiment, that we are deep in the middle of. Good luck to us all.

JR

PS: I am not in favor of just letting billions die if we can afford to prevent that. That said I wouldn't force anti-vaxers to behave. I can easily imagine vaccination proof cards becoming an entry pass for some venues (while those could be easily forged). 

Heres a link to a short article about a gig that took place in Barcelona last week , all the concert goers had the rapid covid test before being allowed to enter .

https://www.irishtimes.com/news/world/europe/it-was-spectacular-5-000-fans-pack-barcelona-concert-after-rapid-covid-tests-1.4522155

I dont like the idea of a covid vaccination cert to go to gigs or anywhere else one bit , with the some of the new variants re-infection is always a possibillity , pre entry testing both for temperature and the presence of the virus would seem a much better option . As far as cost ,I'm not sure what or how it was paid for but if they could do it for a gig I cant see why they couldnt do it for the people most likely to have antibodies from previous infections before vaccinating .

I think theres no major argument that the planet is overpopulated and exponentially consuming more and more resources , they way were living is not sustainable pure and simple . If you think that ideas about population control havent occured to 'big business' and its all just a dreamt up conspiracy theory ask yourself why sugar(carbs) consumption  has been encouraged for decades while fats were demonised , diabeties will cost you or your health care system a vast amount of money and shave 20 years off your life expectancy .
Likewise the sheer volume of anti anxiety/anti depression type meds on the market coupled to social medias vortex of discontent means we end up loosing our innate abillity to cope with the stresses and strains of life and a younger and younger population demographic gets 'hooked' on scripted highly addictive meds , once you pop your very unlikely to stop , ever . The facts of these matters are plain for all to see , it keeps big business in the double digit profit margins they have become accustomed to year on year,  meanwhile the side effects of the pills your on are mitigated with yet more pills , its like a f***ing merry go round and a wheel of fortune in one .

I've been stabbed. I will be a zombie by morning.

Ricardus said:

I've been stabbed. I will be a zombie by morning.

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If it doesn't get you within 15 minutes you might live another day or more.

JR

JohnRoberts said:

If it doesn't get you within 15 minutes you might live another day or more.

JR

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I am sad to report that I am still not a Zombie, nor do I seem to be running Bill Gates' mRNA version of Windows 10. But if it includes free Wifi I'm OK with it.

Keep checking for signs of hair growth on the palms of the hands , just to be sure  ;D

Current vaccins will last one year. Two if we're lucky.

Speaking of lucky, Pfizer just tested their vaccine on 10-15YO age group and registered 100% effectiveness.

So expect more jabs for younger demographic... While it is unclear that they are an especially at risk group... Perhaps the obese or otherwise immune challenged kids.

JR

PS: Speaking of obesity I read a suggestion that the success in reducing cigarette smoking has an unintended consequence of increased weight gain. This is actually logical when people replace the oral gratification of sucking on a cigarette with snacking on food.

cyrano said:

Current vaccins will last one year. Two if we're lucky.

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Nobody knows - at this point it's conjecture, even among epidemiologists:

COVID Vaccines Could Lose Their Punch Within a Year, Experts Say
https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/948425?src=mkm_covid_update_210330_MSCPEDIT&uac=37266AR&impID=3281860&faf=1#vp_1

The take home for me is:
Offit said it will be critical to monitor anyone who gets hospitalized who is known to have been infected or fully vaccinated. Then countries need to get really good at sequencing those viruses, he added.

The great majority of those surveyed (88%) said that persistently low vaccine coverage in many countries would make it more likely that vaccine-resistant mutations will appear.

JohnRoberts said:

Speaking of lucky, Pfizer just tested their vaccine on 10-15YO age group and registered 100% effectiveness.

So expect more jabs for younger demographic... While it is unclear that they are an especially at risk group... Perhaps the obese or otherwise immune challenged kids.

JR

PS: Speaking of obesity I read a suggestion that the success in reducing cigarette smoking has an unintended consequence of increased weight gain. This is actually logical when people replace the oral gratification of sucking on a cigarette with snacking on food.

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The situation as I understand is they are not a risk group, but a risky, they spread very easily, there have been whole kindergarten groups all positive, all without symptoms.

And of all people for them lockdown is most damaging.
Their *relative* safety has been making the situation somewhat bearable for me (as a father).

Ironically smoking and obesity are both bad when infected with Covid...out of the frying pan into the fire