On Topic Discussion 2019 Coronavirus (COVID-19/SARS-CoV-2)

[KaraBulut]

^ What one primarily understands from that graph is that our wonderful vaccines' wonderfulness only lasts three months before attaining the level of efficacy that is derired in other vaccines, from the Chinese, or from whoever is not Magic Big Pharma.

Not exactly. The studies were looking at nasopharyngeal (nose-throat) swab positivity. It's measuring viral load and not specifying whether the person had symptoms or whether they had an effective immune response. In the US, we're seeing people with no symptoms or vague "cold" symptoms and it's not until they get tested that we know they have COVID-19. It's still the pattern that 90% of the people presenting to emergency departments with severe symptoms are not vaccinated.

In a good year, the traditional flu vaccines are 40-60% effective. The mumps vaccine is about 80% effective. The COVID-19 vaccines are in line with other vaccines and the 80-95% effectiveness seen in the first 2 months after initial dosing is above average.

Delta has really changed the game. The assumption was that if 70-80% of the eligible people got the shot, then we would see a return to normalcy. That's where we were in the May-June timeframe in the US. Delta has a viral load that can be up to 1,000 times greater than the original strain from 2020. When you're talking that high of a viral load an an R[sub]0[/sub] of between 5-7, then having 60% effectiveness with only 50% of the population immunized, then you're likely to see smaller peaks of infection with those who didn't get vaccinated very likely to get infected.

As long as we have a large number of unvaccinated people (in the US, the estimates are 90 million people unvaccinated), we're going to have to keep antibody levels high to prevent symptomatic illness.

 

[belamyi]

Delta has really changed the game.

Not exactly. The Delta variant has followed developed the rules of the game to a degree that the rest of the players ("us") did not want to think that it would be necessary to ever consider.

 

[purina]

Something to understand about the graph: it's not only the vaccines that are the only distinction. It's also the dosing regimen.

Pfizer/BioNTech gives two doses: the second dose is given 21 days after the first dose.

Astra-Zeneca (Oxford) was given in two doses but in the UK, the second dose was given at 90 days. Astra-Zeneca's vaccine may also show declining antibodies in the future (studies are pending).

That's why Astra-Zeneca's antibody levels remained flat after 3 months- they boosted at 3 months. It's also why Pfizer is adding a 3rd dose at 8 months after the second dose: it's to kick up antibody levels.

https://coronavirus.quora.com/?__ni__=0&__nsrc__=4&__snid3__=25527362450&__tiids__=36015694

 

[metta]

Mu Covid Variant: Los Angeles Officials Say First Cases Of New Strain Have Arrived

Known as B.1.621 or the “Mu variant” according to the World Health Organization nomenclature, it has “a constellation of mutations that indicate potential properties of immune escape,” according to a WHO report released on Monday. “Preliminary data presented to the Virus Evolution Working Group show a reduction in neutralization capacity of convalescent and vaccine era similar to that seen for the Beta variant, but this needs to be confirmed by further studies.”

https://deadline.com/2021/09/mu-variant-los-angeles-first-cases-new-covid-1234827340/

 

[KaraBulut]

https://coronavirus.quora.com/?__ni__=0&__nsrc__=4&__snid3__=25527362450&__tiids__=36015694

There was a reason that I described the AstraZeneca vaccine as "AstraZeneca (Oxford)". You'll note that the above graph cites "Oxford University" as the source and your quote is also is from Oxford and uses the verb "speculate".

Three of the sources that I used are below. They give lower starting numbers for AstraZeneca (69% in the UK NHS study and declining to 61% at 90 days).

The Oxford vaccine has unique advantages, as does Pfizer’s. Using both is Australia’s best strategy [UNSW]
COVID vaccines protect against Delta, but their effectiveness wanes [Nature]
An Israeli study finds that a COVID booster shot curbs the risk of serious illness [Fortune]

Israel has about 85% of their population vaccinated. Israel is providing some very good case studies about Pfizer and it's effectiveness against the native, beta and delta strains that have circulated in the country. Unfortunately, the Israel Ministry of Health has been releasing contradictory statements and not releasing the actual data. They were originally positing that the Pfizer vaccine was >90% effective against both the native and beta strains. With Delta- they've been estimating efficacy at anywhere from 40 to 65 percent (again without supporting data) in preventing infection but still >90% effective in preventing severe disease.

That distinction between infection vs several disease/hospitalization is something that I have been trying to emphasize when discussing the benefits of vaccination. Unfortunately, with millions of unvaccinated people to be viral mutation guinea pigs, the virus is going to keep evolving to become more infectious as it passes from person to person. That's going to drive down the efficacy in preventing infection in the vaccinated but as long as the hospitalization numbers remain consistency high, we can say that the vaccines are effective and they will keep the vaccinated out of the hospitals and out of the morgue.

 

[justaguy]

Going by what's been happening in Israel, with them having the most infections per capita per day at the moment, it seems obvious the 2 jab pfizer system is seeing a waning of effectiveness over a relatively short period of time. I'm sure governments will be looking at boosters.

 

[belamyi]

^ Yes but, for the moment, the government is basking in self-complacency for the 70+% achievement , and the vaccinated, particularly the younger revelers, in their viva-la-vida.

 

[KaraBulut]

Going by what's been happening in Israel, with them having the most infections per capita per day at the moment, it seems obvious the 2 jab pfizer system is seeing a waning of effectiveness over a relatively short period of time. I'm sure governments will be looking at boosters.

They're already talking about a fourth booster because of the increased R[sub]0[/sub] of Delta.

Israel did a great job of rolling out the vaccine. They have also done a great job on testing and monitoring of the epidemic in the Jewish population.

Israel has made some missteps, though

• Israel has vaccinated about 85% of their eligible population. "Eligible" means Jewish residents age 12 and older who do not have a medical or religious exemption.
• Palestinians are 14.9% fully vaccinated.
• Israel took the position that they were responsible only for vaccinating the Jewish population. They vaccinated 120,000 Palestinians who were legal workers in their cities but they maintained that the Palestinian Authority was responsible for vaccinating Palestinians. About a month ago, Israel offered to donate about 1 million doses of their vaccine that was about to expire to the Palestinian Authority. Since the Palestinian Authority didn't have the ability to refrigerate the Pfizer vaccine and they did not have the ability to mount a mass-vaccination campaign before the supply would expire, ultimately the Israeli excess vaccines were sent to South Korea instead.
• Israel has allowed the ultra-orthodox to be exempt from vaccination. This was about 1 million of their 9 million residents. Many of the ultra-orthodox live in crowded conditions in places like East Jerusalem. The ultra-orthodox have religious beliefs that involve crowded mass-gatherings for religious events and Israel has not restricted religious gatherings.
• Israel relaxed all of their restrictions when their case numbers dropped in May/June. No masks. No vaccine passports. No restrictions on gatherings. Residents were allowed to leave the country for vacations. Basically, the same conditions as Texas and Florida. When cases jumped in late June, they tried to re-implement restrictions but by then Delta had become endemic to Israel.
• Israel has relied upon the "honor system" for isolation. In one case, an Israeli family returned from a vacation to Greece and upon their return, sent their child to school without the 10 day isolation period and a negative test. That one child caused 80 COVID-19 cases in his school.

This is how the pre-vaccine stats in 2020 compare to the post-vaccine stats in 2021:

Weekly New Cases and Deaths for Israel:

• 01-Aug-2020: 72,432 (+10,948 / 17.8%) /deaths:580 (+84) - est mortality: 0.77%
• 08-Aug-2020: 82,556 (+10,124 / 14.0%) /deaths:662 (+82) - est mortality: 0.81%
• 15-Aug-2020: 92,419 (+9,863 / 11.9%) /deaths:750 (+88) - est mortality: 0.89%
• 22-Aug-2020: 102,120 (+9,701 / 10.5%) /deaths:837 (+87) - est mortality: 0.90%
• 29-Aug-2020: 113,778 (+11,658 / 11.4%) /deaths:962 (+125) - est mortality: 1.07%

• 10-Jul-2021: 845,857 (+3,162 / 0.4%) /deaths: 6,425 (+5) - est mortality: 0.16%
• 17-Jul-2021: 851,004 (+5,147 / 0.6%) /deaths: 6,435 (+10) - est mortality: 0.19%
• 24-Jul-2021: 859,677 (+8,673 / 1.0%) /deaths: 6,450 (+15) - est mortality: 0.17%
• 31-Jul-2021: 874,420 (+14,743 / 1.7%) /deaths: 6,472 (+22) - est mortality: 0.15%
• 07-Aug-2021: 897,917 (+23,497 / 2.7%) /deaths: 6,545 (+73) - est mortality: 0.31%
• 14-Aug-2021: 935,906 (+37,989 / 4.2%) /deaths: 6,669 (+124) - est mortality: 0.33%
• 21-Aug-2021: 986,963 (+51,057 / 5.5%) /deaths: 6,820 (+151) - est mortality: 0.30%
• 28-Aug-2021: 1,047,907 (+60,944 / 6.2%) /deaths: 6,997 (+177) - est mortality: 0.29%

Even with the increased transmission of Delta, the new case curve is flatter and the mortality rate is significantly lower when comparing 2020 to 2021.

 

[KaraBulut]

Gunshot Victims Left Waiting as Horse Dewormer Overdoses Overwhelm Oklahoma Hospitals, Doctor Says

https://www.rollingstone.com/politi...-ivermectin-oklahoma-hospitals-covid-1220608/

^You know, the irony of this uniquely American headline just hit me.

 

[Alistair]

^ when an Onion headline turns out to not be an Onion headline

 

[KaraBulut]

Week ending 04-Sep-2021:

Global COVID-19 Weekly Mortality/Morbidity

• Global Cases reported: 220,621,647 (up from 215,882,875 / 2.2%) - *‬*4,738,772 new cases this week
• Global Deaths: 4,566,641 (up from 4,492,818) - **73,823 people died this week

US COVID-19 Weekly Mortality/Morbidity

• Cases reported in the US - 39,941,581 (up from 38,755,381 / 3.1%), 1,186,200 new cases, 25.0% of world's new cases were in the US
• Deaths reported in the US - 648,467 deaths, 11,226 deaths this week , 15.2% of the world's deaths this week were in the US

US Vaccination Weekly Stats

• Approx number of US doses distributed - 450,175,825 (up from 439,428,235 / +10,747,590) - 83.2% of US doses have been administered
  
  Total US residents vaccinated
• 1st dose: - 206,908,710 (up from 203,992,008 / +2,916,702) - 62.7% of US population
• 2nd dose: - 175,968,266 (up from 173,101,292 / +2,866,974) - 53.3% of US population
  
  US residents over age 12 vaccinated
• 1st dose: - 206,679,615 (up from 203,764,031 / +2,915,584) - 72.9% of US population
• 2nd dose: - 175,836,290 (up from 172,296,771 / +3,539,519) - 62.0% of US population
  
  US residents over age 65 vaccinated
• 1st dose: - 50,520,864 (up from 50,255,401 / +265,463) - 92.4% of US population
• 2nd dose: - 44,890,346 (up from 44,640,007 / +250,339) - 81.1% of US population

Coronavirus weekly cases/deaths in active countries (preference to countries with JUB members):

• US: 39,941,581 (up from 38,755,381 / +1,186,200 / 3.1%) - 648,467 deaths (+11,226) - avg daily: cases (+169,457) / deaths (+1,604)
• India: 32,988,673 (up from 32,649,947 / +338,726 / 1.0%) - 440,533 deaths (+3,163) - avg daily: cases (+48,389) / deaths (+452)
• UK : 7,010,540 (up from 6,729,899 / +280,641 / 4.2%) - 133,553 deaths (+854) - avg daily: cases (+40,092) / deaths (+122)
• Iran : 5,129,407 (up from 4,895,448 / +233,959 / 4.8%) - 110,674 deaths (+4,773) - avg daily: cases (+33,423) / deaths (+682)
• Brazil: 20,890,779 (up from 20,728,605 / +162,174 / 0.8%) - 583,628 deaths (+4,618) - avg daily: cases (+23,168) / deaths (+660)
• Russia: 6,912,375 (up from 6,766,667 / +145,708 / 2.2%) - 183,896 deaths (+6,217) - avg daily: cases (+20,815) / deaths (+888)
• Japan: 1,575,383 (up from 1,440,812 / +134,571 / 9.3%) - 16,370 deaths (+451) - avg daily: cases (+19,224) / deaths (+64)
• Mexico: 3,420,880 (up from 3,311,317 / +109,563 / 3.3%) - 262,868 deaths (+5,718) - avg daily: cases (+15,652) / deaths (+817)
• France : 6,921,275 (up from 6,813,516 / +107,759 / 1.6%) - 115,401 deaths (+948) - avg daily: cases (+15,394) / deaths (+135)
• Turkey: 6,412,247 (up from 6,311,607 / +100,640 / 1.6%) - 57,000 deaths (+1,287) - avg daily: cases (+14,377) / deaths (+184)
• Germany : 4,013,808 (up from 3,933,585 / +80,223 / 2.0%) - 92,353 deaths (+228) - avg daily: cases (+11,460) / deaths (+33)
• Israel: 1,117,596 (up from 1,047,907 / +69,689 / 6.7%) - 7,205 deaths (+208) - avg daily: cases (+9,956) / deaths (+30)
• Italy : 4,571,440 (up from 4,524,292 / +47,148 / 1.0%) - 129,515 deaths (+459) - avg daily: cases (+6,735) / deaths (+66)
• Spain : 4,877,755 (up from 4,831,809 / +45,946 / 1.0%) - 84,795 deaths (+795) - avg daily: cases (+6,564) / deaths (+114)
• Argentina: 5,203,802 (up from 5,171,458 / +32,344 / 0.6%) - 112,511 deaths (+1,187) - avg daily: cases (+4,621) / deaths (+170)
• Canada : 1,522,625 (up from 1,495,859 / +26,766 / 1.8%) - 27,072 deaths (+119) - avg daily: cases (+3,824) / deaths (+17)
• Netherlands : 1,990,158 (up from 1,969,228 / +20,930 / 1.1%) - 18,410 deaths (+76) - avg daily: cases (+2,990) / deaths (+11)
• Columbia: 4,918,649 (up from 4,903,304 / +15,345 / 0.3%) - 125,278 deaths (+535) - avg daily: cases (+2,192) / deaths (+76)
• Switzerland : 785,696 (up from 770,765 / +14,931 / 1.9%) - 11,011 deaths (+46) - avg daily: cases (+2,133) / deaths (+7)
• Belgium: 1,192,008 (up from 1,177,909 / +14,099 / 1.2%) - 25,397 deaths (+37) - avg daily: cases (+2,014) / deaths (+5)
• South Korea : 260,403 (up from 246,951 / +13,452 / 5.4%) - 2,321 deaths (+45) - avg daily: cases (+1,922) / deaths (+6)
• Australia : 61,855 (up from 50,029 / +11,826 / 23.6%) - 1,039 deaths (+46) - avg daily: cases (+1,689) / deaths (+7)
• Lebanon: 607,400 (up from 597,978 / +9,422 / 1.6%) - 8,101 deaths (+66) - avg daily: cases (+1,346) / deaths (+9)
• Ireland: 356,819 (up from 348,067 / +8,752 / 2.5%) - 5,112 deaths (+20) - avg daily: cases (+1,250) / deaths (+3)
• Sweden: 1,130,525 (up from 1,123,413 / +7,112 / 0.6%) - 14,692 deaths (+7) - avg daily: cases (+1,016) / deaths (+1)
• New Zealand: 3,769 (up from 3,381 / +388 / 11.5%) - 27 deaths (+1) - avg daily: cases (+55) / deaths (+0)

 

[ruggerladirish]

So from today, for the first time in 550 days, live music is allowed in indoor pubs. Apparently, people singing and performing indoors can disperse aerosols further than just chatting. It's a welcome - although probably risky - development. Irish pubs without singing is like Hamlet without the Prince.

 

[Telstra]

Why is 23.6% increase not red color?

Australia : 61,855 (up from 50,029 / +11,826 / 23.6%) - 1,039 deaths (+46) - avg daily: cases (+1,689) / deaths (+7)

 

[purina]

https://qr.ae/pGZ190

 

[purina]

https://qr.ae/pGZ1d8

 

[Kulindahr]

You are correct, in the United States vaccines have become a political thing, just the same as global warming. If you're a Republican, you're unlikely to get vaccinated or wear a mask. Almost all Democrats are vaccinated and faithfully wear masks. It is absurd that it is this way, and I see no remedy as reason, science, and common sense have failed to work.

I know one Republican I'm proud of on this point: he tells people that not getting vaccinated is on par with sneezing all over your friends' pizza when you have the flu -- you're just spreading germs around.

 

[Kulindahr]

It's the mark of the beast then. End times have surely come. At last!

It's astounding how many people are excited about the death toll and are in fact hoping for tens o millions more deaths because they really, really want this to be one of the plagues from the book of Revelation!

 

[cityboy-stl]

It's astounding how many people are excited about the death toll and are in fact hoping for tens o millions more deaths because they really, really want this to be one of the plagues from the book of Revelation!

That's sick. Why would they want that?

 

[purina]

At just over four and a half million, it's still a long way from the Spanish flu pandemic of a hundred years ago.

https://www.euro.who.int/en/health-topics/communicable-diseases/influenza/

Pandemics of the 20th century

Three influenza pandemics occurred at intervals of several decades during the 20th century, the most severe of which was the so-called "Spanish Flu" (caused by an A(H1N1) virus), estimated to have caused 20–50 million deaths in 1918–1919. Milder pandemics occurred subsequently in 1957–1958 (the "Asian Flu" caused by an A(H2N2) virus) and in 1968 (the "Hong Kong Flu" caused by an A(H3N2) virus), which were estimated to have caused 1–4 million deaths each.

 

[belamyi]

At just over four and a half million, it's still a long way from the Spanish flu pandemic of a hundred years ago.

Thanks to post-Depression, post-WWII SS and healthcare system... even the funny American one.