Coronavirus

[bkp_duke]

Wait, what or who is Gordo?

Gordon Johnson. Notorious Tesla bear that is frequently on CNBC. He has a "price target" for TSLA stock at $40 currently. . . and his arguments about why TSLA should be at that price are circumspect and based upon cherry-picked data points.

 

[goinfraftw]

Gordon Johnson. Notorious Tesla bear that is frequently on CNBC. He has a "price target" for TSLA stock at $40 currently. . . and his arguments about why TSLA should be at that price are circumspect and based upon cherry-picked data points.

Got it, had no idea!

 

[wdolson]

China now admits to underreporting C19 in Wuhan by ~10:1 - CNN

The article talks about antibodies. Did the study just look at B-Cells which are easy to test for or T-Cells which are more difficult. If they were looking at B-Cells only, then that's just how many people who have had COVID in the last few months as B-Cells start to fade at about 2 months after infection in at least some people and are probably gone entirely after six months.

There is a new T-Cell test available to the public in the US, but it just came out.
Home

Sounds exactly like the United States in March and April!

This is no surprise. What is surprising is that we are losing about twice as many people per week in the US to COVID-19 as China lost during their entire outbreak, 9 months later. (This week we'll probably have reported deaths on a single day close to the number of people they lost in total!)

And no, COVID-19 is not currently spreading significantly in China. Amazing what good testing and adhering (unfortunately forced in China) to guidelines can do! It's really a remarkable accomplishment by China - though having visited there a few times, it's not that surprising, of course.

There are a number of articles early last spring about evidence that the death toll in Wuhan was much greater than reported. A couple of articles:
Wuhan COVID-19 death toll may be in tens of thousands, data on cremations and shipments of urns suggest
Report of Urns in Wuhan Raises Questions About COVID-19 Death Toll

On the ground China is a chaotic mess, but the Chinese Communist Party controls the media and they have legions of people who monitor social media for any mentions of anything that hints of news going around that is contrary to official news. One example is a news story from 30 years ago: Tienanmen Square. It's very well known around the world outside of China, but very few people inside China know anything about it beyond just its location.

There are a couple of westerners, one American and the other South African who lived for many years in China and married Chinese women. They used to make travel videos on YouTube of their motorcycle trips around China.

They both moved to California last year and now do videos talking about the things they didn't dare talk about when living in China. They had several run ins with the government because they were westerners making videos in China. They love Chinese culture, but they have no love for the government.

Pretty interesting development as a byproduct of COVID. How is this a "sneak preview" of 2021?

https://twitter.com/maplecocaine/status/1343652789231214594

Small Number of Covid Patients Develop Severe Psychotic Symptoms

There is growing evidence that COVID can cause nervous system and brain damage in some people. My neurofeedback therapist has two COIVD long haulers (people with lingering symptoms) and both show signs of the same sort of brain damage my partner got from a severe allergic reaction 30 years ago.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

If they were looking at B-Cells only, then that's just how many people who have had COVID in the last few months as B-Cells start to fade at about 2 months after infection in at least some people and are probably gone entirely after six months.

'The Chinese CDC said the study was conducted a month after China "contained the first wave of the Covid-19 epidemic." '

 

[SMAlset]

Two CNN stories that made an impact on me. First, oxygen delivery in some hospitals is becoming a big issue. Not availabilty as such but due to the infrastructure never anticipating so many hospital rooms needing to supply oxygen to patients at one time and they can’t provide the pressure to adequately do so.

California coronavirus: Oxygen supply issues forced five LA-area hospitals to declare 'internal disaster' - CNN

Second story, not unlike so many other families’ really, is of a family that lost the mother and father. Everyone was being careful and the mother and sister, who is a hair stylist, went to the son/brother’s house to give him a haircut. Sister had isolated for three days, but not long enough. She started feeling bad afterwards. Mom likely passed it on to the father and both died in the hospital. Son blames himself for wanting to get his haircut at home and having them over, the sister stylist must also be feeling horrible. In this case spread because of a haircut.

They did everything right. But after one at-home haircut, a husband and wife died of Covid-19 - CNN

So many similar stories like theirs out there now; and given holiday travel, maskless people, and loosening of restrictions in places including use of bubbles, you just know things will get worse. I try to honor these people who are telling their stories by reading them, and think if more people spoke out sooner maybe their messages of loss and warnings about the severity would have reached more who would pay attention. I also can’t help but feel that if more doctors, nurses and hospitals were able to speak out with videos and accounts of what they have been experiencing sooner (no issue by blurring out faces IMO), some of these people who have insisted it’s fake, etc. might have changed their minds. So hard to say, but how does one deny what has been covered around the world?

More locally to me here in the SF bay area one of the local smaller hospitals has filled up ICU beds and now is using surge beds.

 

[madodel]

Louisiana Congressman-elect Luke Letlow dead from COVID-19

Sadly he refused to follow basic public health guidance and refused to wear a mask and campaigned amongst crowds of unmasked people. He was only 41.

 

[madodel]

There is growing evidence that COVID can cause nervous system and brain damage in some people. My neurofeedback therapist has two COIVD long haulers (people with lingering symptoms) and both show signs of the same sort of brain damage my partner got from a severe allergic reaction 30 years ago.

I don't even have COVID and I'm going nuts. I woke up last night coughing and my first thought was I had COVID. Then my next thought was I had to go to the bank in the morning to get my Mother In Law's will out of our safety deposit box to give to the attorney to file at the courthouse and how can I do that if I have COVID. Next I ran down the list of symptoms and figured I don't really have any and I went back to sleep. This is crazy.

 

[SMAlset]

I had a covid dream a few days ago. Had my haircut and went to front desk to pay. Everyone standing there waiting for a cut had no mask on. Looked up to see my stylist didn’t either. At that moment found myself saying that I was screwed. Woke up. My husband told me this morning he had dreamed being in a grocery store where no one was wearing a mask and woke up. He’s the one who does most of the grocery trips. Yeah I think it’s getting to all of us.

 

[SMAlset]

Louisiana Congressman-elect Luke Letlow dead from COVID-19

Sadly he refused to follow basic public health guidance and refused to wear a mask and campaigned amongst crowds of unmasked people. He was only 41.

He probably thought he was in a safe age group. Really feel for his young family. I just read about a healthy 18 year old that had experienced symptoms, got tested, was positive and died days later. Some of these younger infected people seem to be dying very quickly. Is this something hospitals are seeing now?

Healthy Illinois woman, 18, dies days after contracting coronavirus, family says

 

[ggr]

I did an Angel Flight today. This is where a patient with unusual medical problems needs to go to some big city with specialized care from somewhere that really doesn't have it. Or return, in this case. Anyway, we're sitting waiting for takeoff on her return home after a month of treatment when she gets a text from her sister to tell her that her aunt had just died from COVID-19. Now she has to break the news to her mother... who has dementia, so not once, but many times. BTDT. Sucks.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

I had a covid dream a few days ago.

I have recurrent dreams (nightmares!) where I forget my mask and go into stores without it. This has never even come remotely close to happening IRL. I've probably had some variation on this dream about 10 times now.

I also have dreams (nightmares) of having a mask which is woefully insufficient compared to the P100.

I think I need to take a break from this thread, tbh. At this point the outbreak has a life of its own, and basically all the things that epidemiologists predicted would happen if we were incompetent have come to pass. So this thread has very little to add at this point.

Plus, Elon has had COVID, so we have herd immunity, with herd size one.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

Louisiana congressman-elect dies of Covid

First elected member of Congress to have died of COVID-19. The 41-year-old Republican congressman from Louisiana won a runoff election December 5th, and would have been sworn in on Monday. He leaves behind his wife and two young children. I hope that his completely preventable death saves the lives of others.

He announced testing positive December 18th, was admitted to hospital on December 19th, and entered the ICU around the 23rd, where he spent Christmas on remdesivir and steroids, and perhaps a ventilator. Sounds like he might have been treated with convalescent plasma early on.

'Asked if Letlow had any underlying conditions that would have made his death more likely, Dr. GE Ghali at LSU-Shreveport said "None. All covid related."'

https://twitter.com/samkarlin/status/1344126179213799425?s=20

Sometimes it kills perfectly healthy people, as everyone knows. Just the latest of thousands of perfectly healthy people to die of COVID-19.

 

[cwerdna]

There seemed to be enough pics of him being at various campaign events where either he or numerous attendees didn't wear masks at https://twitter.com/LukeLetlow.

A few examples below:
https://twitter.com/LukeLetlow/status/1323862214441345025?s=20
https://twitter.com/LukeLetlow/status/1334232903673401346?s=20
https://twitter.com/LukeLetlow/status/1330229723801251844?s=20
https://twitter.com/LukeLetlow/status/1327807559789662208?s=20
https://twitter.com/LukeLetlow/status/1326949890476355585?s=20
https://twitter.com/LukeLetlow/status/1326555385000587266?s=20
https://twitter.com/LukeLetlow/status/1325962671162871809?s=20

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

There seemed to be enough pics of him being at various campaign events where either he or numerous attendees didn't wear masks at https://twitter.com/LukeLetlow.

A few examples below:
https://twitter.com/LukeLetlow/status/1323862214441345025?s=20
https://twitter.com/LukeLetlow/status/1334232903673401346?s=20
https://twitter.com/LukeLetlow/status/1330229723801251844?s=20
https://twitter.com/LukeLetlow/status/1327807559789662208?s=20
https://twitter.com/LukeLetlow/status/1326949890476355585?s=20
https://twitter.com/LukeLetlow/status/1326555385000587266?s=20
https://twitter.com/LukeLetlow/status/1325962671162871809?s=20

Certainly preventable. It is what it is, though. We'll never know where he got it, though most likely the infection was acquired after December 8th.

My condolences especially to the children, who will (completely unnecessarily) have to grow up without a father. It's frustrating how permanent death is; there is no going back to correct mistakes.

I also hope he didn't infect anyone else; hopefully he can be the last in the transmission chain, and no one else will die as a result of his infection and his perpetuation of the virus.

 

[wdolson]

'The Chinese CDC said the study was conducted a month after China "contained the first wave of the Covid-19 epidemic." '

I missed that. It makes sense that they found many more positive for the antibody there than anyone else just after the wave passed. Other places in China probably has more people with the antibody now.

I don't even have COVID and I'm going nuts. I woke up last night coughing and my first thought was I had COVID. Then my next thought was I had to go to the bank in the morning to get my Mother In Law's will out of our safety deposit box to give to the attorney to file at the courthouse and how can I do that if I have COVID. Next I ran down the list of symptoms and figured I don't really have any and I went back to sleep. This is crazy.

I'm socially very paranoid about coughing in public. I realized a few months ago that it must be common when I heard someone cough in public and realized I hadn't heard that in months.

When I went down to California I stayed at the hotel in Mt Shasta with the supercharger. While my car was charging I went in and got checked in. There must have been some lint in my mask because just as I got back to my car I had a coughing fit (felt like something stuck in my throat) and I was paranoid everyone around was going to think I had COVID,

I had a covid dream a few days ago. Had my haircut and went to front desk to pay. Everyone standing there waiting for a cut had no mask on. Looked up to see my stylist didn’t either. At that moment found myself saying that I was screwed. Woke up. My husband told me this morning he had dreamed being in a grocery store where no one was wearing a mask and woke up. He’s the one who does most of the grocery trips. Yeah I think it’s getting to all of us.

I've had dreams like that too. People are so good about wearing masks around here that I felt a jolt of shock when I saw someone in the supermarket without a mask the other day. I didn't get close to them.

 

[bkp_duke]

The article talks about antibodies. Did the study just look at B-Cells which are easy to test for or T-Cells which are more difficult. If they were looking at B-Cells only, then that's just how many people who have had COVID in the last few months as B-Cells start to fade at about 2 months after infection in at least some people and are probably gone entirely after six months.

There is a new T-Cell test available to the public in the US, but it just came out.
Home

T Cells don't make antibodies, so by definition it would have only been looking at the antibodies produced by B-Cells.

I would not touch that T-cell test with a 10ft pole.

 

[bkp_duke]

Might have been posted already, but vaccine administration tracker:
Bloomberg Vaccine Tracker

 

[wdolson]

T Cells don't make antibodies, so by definition it would have only been looking at the antibodies produced by B-Cells.

I would not touch that T-cell test with a 10ft pole.

Do you have an issue with Adaptive Biotechnologies specifically, or is your issue with T-cell tests in general? If there is an issue with Adaptive Biotechnologies, please enlighten me.

As I understand how the immune system works is the T-cells hold the memory of how to make the antibodies, so if the body runs into a virus it knows, it can crank up production of the antibody B-cells needed to fight off the virus the second time. With viruses that people only get once, they will carry T-cell memory for their entire lives, so for those of us vaccinated against polio, measles, small pox, etc. if we were exposed to those diseases now (and our immune systems were working properly), our bodies would make the necessary antibodies and beat the virus so quickly that we probably would be unaware we had encountered the virus again.

I know for some viruses T-cell memory can fade for some viruses, commonly rino viruses and flu viruses so we can get reinfected with the same virus in the future. We still don't know if SARS-CoV-2/COVID 19 T-cell memory fades with time or not. There are some rare documented cases of people getting reinfected, but from what I've seen it looks like the exception rather than the rule. Though we don't know what it will be like in a few years.

However a relatively small study done on 23 people who had SARS back in 2002-2003 still had the T-cells. This article discusses it and has a link to the study's report in Nature
Could immunity last 17 YEARS? Singaporean researchers find SARS patients still have crucial T cells | Daily Mail Online

Please enlighten me on what you think I am getting wrong.

 

[bkp_duke]

Your understanding is flawed.

Memory B cells hold the information on how to quickly ramp up and make more B Cells to produce antibodies quickly.

Memory T cells hold the information on how to quickly ramp up and make more T Cells, which act primarily as Antigen Presenting cells for the B Cells and the innate immune system to engulf particles (virus + antibodies). But there are other APCs in the body, the infection can be mediated effectively without the Memory T cells.



T-cells are important, no one disputes that, but they are not the lynchpin to fighting SARS-CoV-2. B cells are.



Everyone keeps focusing on antibody levels, but that is also factually incorrect. The immune system is not designed to keep a high level of anitbodies floating around in our blood to every pathogen we have ever been exposed to. That would be insanely inefficient. Instead the body fights off infection, lets antibody levels wane, and keeps a handful of Memory B Cells around to rapidly divide and re-ramp Antibody production should there be re-exposure to a pathogen.

The only way you would see continued, persistent, high levels of antibody would be:
1) the body doesn't ever clear the infection
2) the body is constantly re-exposed to significant pathogen (not a passing glance, but persistent)

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

Other places in China probably has more people with the antibody now.

Maybe in a few places with reported outbreaks (or in people who have been immunized). But in general, the virus never attained widespread community transmission in China, so I doubt there are many places where people have antibodies. They just crushed it, ruthlessly and effectively.

Have an outbreak in a city? Test everyone in the city in a couple days, lock everyone down for a couple days until you get results. Isolate positive cases and all of their close contacts for a week or two, and move on (continuing to use common sense precautions like masks in higher risk areas). That was (part of) their strategy.

Covid-19: China tests entire city of Kashgar in Xinjiang

It perpetually mystifies me why we are not doing this. We just have to do 50 million tests a day for a while. It would be so simple and easy. This is not a difficult task to execute. It's only 50 million tests a day!!! Think of how many breakfasts we make each day in this country!