Coronavirus

[AlanSubie4Life]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1486846468887560201

C'mon guys, pop some Vitamin C and live your best life! This idea that somehow the government is creating fear is very odd to me. The government is telling people to get vaccinated because it is the best choice for your personal health, and the government has been nearly explicit that you don’t have much to worry about if you’re boosted. The ones doing scaremongering seem to be mostly the people who are against vaccines (though there is definitely a share of nonsense from the other side too, Feigl-Ding comes to mind, though he is mostly guilty of over-dramatizing, not straight up lying). I'm definitely getting tired of the misinformationists removing my freedoms, as I am forced to adapt to a world full of people who believe that nonsense.

This is also helpful:

https://twitter.com/x/status/1486850549928579075

Creating unnecessary drama about imaginary conspiracies is actually really not helpful.

 

[Dave EV]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1486772334635536395

This individual needs to learn to refrain from making such comments regarding anything COVID-19.

That individual also needs to stop hanging out with Joe Rogan. All it does is prove that because you're good at something (in Elon's case pushing revolutionary companies forward and in Joe's case MMA and pretending to be insightful to people), doesn't mean that you are totally blind and ignorant to other realities in the world while abusing the power of their over-sized soap-boxes.

Dunning-Kruger, interesting example

Exactly.

 

[Dave EV]

Cannot read it…but:

I wonder how big the advantage really is over vaccination, especially vaccination/boosting with an updated (or different) spike. Obviously nucleocapsid antigens & antibodies are a big difference here, but people with infection-acquired immunity plus vaccination will in most cases have been exposed to more diversity of spike (B.1.1.7, Delta, etc. in addition to emulated wild type ) than those who have just been boosted, in addition to the nucleocapsid. Their other advantage is the delay between vaccination and infection or vice-versa (though less of a difference when comparing to boosted people), which we know matters for durability of immunity.

I’m not sure if there are other reasons why there would be anything special about infection-acquired immunity.

I’ll still take my super immunity (and natural!) through controlled vaccination (four doses if necessary) over infection any day. And seems likely the difference is not large, but too soon to say at the moment I think. No data.

Here's an article about it that's not behind a pay-wall.

New study suggests two paths toward 'super immunity' to COVID-19

New laboratory research reveals more than one path toward robust immunity from COVID-19. A new study finds that two forms of immunity -- breakthrough infections following vaccination or natural infection followed by vaccination -- provide roughly equal levels of enhanced immune protection. The...

www.sciencedaily.com

Key quote from the authors:

"Immunity from natural infection alone is variable. Some people produce a strong response and others do not," said Curlin, associate professor of medicine (infectious diseases) in the OHSU School of Medicine and director of OHSU Occupational Health. "But vaccination combined with immunity from infection almost always provides very strong responses.

This is indeed interesting and would like to see it confirmed. I know that if you are to get infected by actual COVID, you definitely want to do it after vaccination. How many boosters does it take to have the same risk of adverse effects as a round of vaccines + COVID infection? Eg - does a standard 2-dose Pfizer vaccination + COVID present the same risk as a standard 2-dose Pfizer + how many boosters at regular intervals? Would it ever?

Interestingly, I've been reading anecdotes about people who have been vaccinated and are still somehow managing to get COVID multiple times in Omicron times and this study was done before Omicron, so it would be interesting to see how well this holds up against variants.

 

[madodel]

Here's an article about it that's not behind a pay-wall.

New study suggests two paths toward 'super immunity' to COVID-19

New laboratory research reveals more than one path toward robust immunity from COVID-19. A new study finds that two forms of immunity -- breakthrough infections following vaccination or natural infection followed by vaccination -- provide roughly equal levels of enhanced immune protection. The...

www.sciencedaily.com

Key quote from the authors:


This is indeed interesting and would like to see it confirmed. I know that if you are to get infected by actual COVID, you definitely want to do it after vaccination. How many boosters does it take to have the same risk of adverse effects as a round of vaccines + COVID infection? Eg - does a standard 2-dose Pfizer vaccination + COVID present the same risk as a standard 2-dose Pfizer + how many boosters at regular intervals? Would it ever?

Interestingly, I've been reading anecdotes about people who have been vaccinated and are still somehow managing to get COVID multiple times in Omicron times and this study was done before Omicron, so it would be interesting to see how well this holds up against variants.

I wish there were studies of Long COVID in regard to getting COVID after full vaccination. I've asked my wife about the patients she sees with COVID induced cardiac issues and she has no idea what variant they had and said almost all were unvaccinated. But everything I hear here and from her about the aftereffects of COVID tells me that the disease is way worse than the cure. I will continue to mask up and avoid crowds. COVID sucks.

 

[scottf200]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1486871381279006722

Below via: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/us/covid-cases.html

 

[Jeff N]

Interesting data from the UK on the Pfizer shot’s effectiveness against symptomatic disease & hospitalization at different intervals after 2 shots and after booster for both Delta and Omicron. Also, data on AstraZeneca with and without an mRNA booster.

Basically, Delta effectiveness holds up well over time while Omicron fades. This is possibly good evidence for an Omicron-based booster.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1486754984154873860

 

[golfcart]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1486846468887560201

C'mon guys, pop some Vitamin C and live your best life! This idea that somehow the government is creating fear is very odd to me. The government is telling people to get vaccinated because it is the best choice for your personal health, and the government has been nearly explicit that you don’t have much to worry about if you’re boosted. The ones doing scaremongering seem to be mostly the people who are against vaccines (though there is definitely a share of nonsense from the other side too, Feigl-Ding comes to mind, though he is mostly guilty of over-dramatizing, not straight up lying). I'm definitely getting tired of the misinformationists removing my freedoms, as I am forced to adapt to a world full of people who believe that nonsense.

This is also helpful:

https://twitter.com/x/status/1486850549928579075

Creating unnecessary drama about imaginary conspiracies is actually really not helpful.

Nobody is removing your freedoms by having different beliefs and of course the government is using fear to get power. People are rationally afraid of the impacts of this pandemic and want the government to respond, why wouldn't that lead to more power? In some situations that power is probably justified but that doesn't mean that every response they have is justified or that they won't use those powers for other things once they have them. You don't have to look much further than the growth of the surveillance state since 9/11 to see how fear is used during a crisis to garner powers that aren't given back once the crisis is over and are expanded to include a whole bunch of things that they weren't originally intended for. The communist Chinese governments use of a social credit system to bestow privileges to citizens comes to mind as a possible outcome. Some people are wary of that.

So once again, lets tell the truth and not just mock people with different views. A different view of how to balance the various costs and benefits of policy when it comes to rights, freedoms, and restrictions is not misinformation... it is simply a different view. Misinformation is lying, which there is plenty of, but nothing Elon said in those tweets is misinformation. We are all allowed opinions, Elon included, and his opinion in those tweets seems to be that if we give the goverment the power to fire people from their jobs over vaccinations in this particular crisis that the power will not be given back when the crisis is over but will simply be used to make other things "requirements" down the road. Some people are OK with that but Elon is not for whatever reasons he has.

The Canadian truckers are specifically protesting against vaccine mandates in their industry for cross border truckers handed down by the Canadian government. The government is telling them that they cannot make a living if they do not get their shots. These are essential workers keeping the supply chain moving while we sit at our computers half the day and argue about this nonsense on the internet. The idea that firing these people is a good idea, during a supply chain crisis and worker shortage in that industry, is at least debatable and possibly just dumb. Especially now that we know with Omicron that the infection rate for vaccinated people is pretty high (I've read 75%), prior infection provides robust immunity that is at least comparable to vaccines (many have been previously infected because they've been out working this entire time), and vaccinated people shed similar amounts of the virus as unvaccinated people when infected (for a couple days less on average).

While I agree that they should get their shots, because it reduces their risk of severe disease and death by an order of magnitude which is bad for them and puts extra strain on the healthcare system, I have serious concerns about these types of mandates especially at this stage of the pandemic. The amount of people left after omicron that aren't either vaccinated, previously infected, or both is really not going to be that large and the ill-will that these mandates will create will have both short and long term implications in the economy and future elections.

The newfound tolerance for authoritarianism in traditionally "liberal" circles the last few years is an interesting phenomenon... I suppose it should have been obvious when they proclaimed people "voted against their own self interest" in 2016. Statements like that let you know that they thought they knew better than you did what was good for you. All I am saying is be careful what you wish for. What if these newfound powers are in the hands of some clown like Trump or AOC in 2024... because at this rate those might be our two options.

 

[golfcart]

When a person is making choices that open them up to be an incubator for a potentially lethal virus, the concept breaks down. Their choices aren't just impacting their lives anymore. It's impacting their neighbors too.

I appreciate the long post and share many of your beliefs. That said, I do feel the need to point out that we are all incubators for this potentially lethal virus whether we are vaccinated or unvaccinated. Breakthrough rate of infection with Omicron is around 75% from the studies I've read and vaccinated individuals who become infected shed just as much virus as unvaccinated individuals who become infected (though for a marginally shorter period of time). This is not a polio vaccine where three shots are basically 100% effective against infection this is more akin to a flu shot where it just reduces the risk of infection, severe disease, and spread by some amount.

So while I agree that staying up to date on your COVID vaccines is a better choice to make for a multitude of reasons, I think we need to be careful when we imply that only the unvaccinated are vectors for spread or mutation because that is not the case.

 

[bhzmark]

Some may find this link useful:

Cancel Premium plans - Spotify

support.spotify.com

In the reason for cancellation I shared these links:

Joe Rogan interview with Peter McCullough contains multiple false and unsubstantiated claims about the COVID-19 pandemic and vaccines

To date, more than 241 million people in the U.S. have received at least one dose of COVID-19 vaccine. Clinical trials as well as the safety monitoring of COVID-19 vaccination campaigns provide overwhelming evidence that the vaccines’ benefits far outweigh their risks. There’s no evidence...

healthfeedback.org

The VPZD Show Ep. 10 | Dr. Robert Malone's Joe Rogan Interview, Decoded - ZDoggMD

We dive deep into the antithesis argument, talk Rogan, Malone and more!

zdoggmd.com

The Joe Rogan & Dr. Peter McCullough Interview, Explained

Joe's interview went viral, so here's a dissection of McCullough's claims.

zdoggmd.com

 

[Yuri_G]

I appreciate the long post and share many of your beliefs. That said, I do feel the need to point out that we are all incubators for this potentially lethal virus whether we are vaccinated or unvaccinated. Breakthrough rate of infection with Omicron is around 75% from the studies I've read and vaccinated individuals who become infected shed just as much virus as unvaccinated individuals who become infected (though for a marginally shorter period of time). This is not a polio vaccine where three shots are basically 100% effective against infection this is more akin to a flu shot where it just reduces the risk of infection, severe disease, and spread by some amount.

So while I agree that staying up to date on your COVID vaccines is a better choice to make for a multitude of reasons, I think we need to be careful when we imply that only the unvaccinated are vectors for spread or mutation because that is not the case.

The breakthrough rate is 75% for what level of vaccination? Also, what is your source for virus shedding?

It has been clear to most of us that a booster is necessary for decent protection against symptomatic infection from omicron.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1486798246986932224

 

[JRP3]

The Canadian truckers are specifically protesting against vaccine mandates in their industry for cross border truckers handed down by the Canadian government.

We all had government vaccine mandates before going to school. No one lost their minds. (OK I'm sure there were a few fringe loonies but not enough to matter).

 

[shinytop]

Yes, vaccine mandates for school, vaccine mandates for the service were required. Why is this so different? Antibodies from the disease and from vaccines wane over time and unless the disease just disappears we may need further shots. In my ignorance of anti-vaxxers I had assumed they would be a small minority like below 10%. I guess the American education system is not as good as I thought.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

How many boosters does it take to have the same risk of adverse effects as a round of vaccines + COVID infection?

Would it ever?

My guess is it would effectively never have anywhere near the risk of adverse effects, given the extremely low rates observed so far (sounds like 1 in 10000 risk of myocarditis in some specific groups, far lower risk than the risk of infection in those same groups, which appears to be about 1 in 1000 chance of landing them in the hospital (based on infection, not case numbers)). Infection by any virus can lead to autoimmune disorders, in addition to reactivating prior viruses (EBV, etc.). It’s just partially (and poorly) controlled chaos when a virus invades and starts killing cells and infecting anything it can reach. If safe vaccinations existed for every possible common virus out there (unfortunately they don't), I'd get every one - just because it would reduce risk of other issues (there's recent research pointing to a potential link between EBV and MS, for example, which needs further investigation) so much - but I think we're getting a glimpse of that future being a possibility at some point, maybe in 20-30 years. Plus they would give my immune system a good workout!

Link from Trevor Bedford about 21K (BA.1) and 21L (BA.2) variants of Omicron (the stories about BA.2 have been percolating for weeks now). Sounds like maybe a bit longer tail on this wave, but he doesn't expect an explosion of cases in the US even though it probably has higher (!!!) transmissibility. I expect we might see smaller sub-peaks on the way down in some areas, especially those with lower prior infection levels (for example, Maine - though if these places can get very high vaccine and booster coverage in the meantime, they might escape it).

https://twitter.com/x/status/1487105396879679488

The thing I've learned from all of this is that we should be going balls to the wall on getting people vaccinated and boosted, no matter how much infection-acquired immunity we may have. There's just no substitute for strong vaccine coverage building that natural vaccine-acquired immunity in the community, and that's what the data say.

The amazing thing in that San Diego data from yesterday is how many prior infected must be included in the "unvaccinated" category. At this point, it's probably quite a large proportion of the unvaccinated, and they're STILL getting infected at incredible rates (it would be interesting to see the breakdown - obviously I expect lower rates in prior infected vs. completely naive, but clearly at this point, given cumulative infection incidence, it's not working that well). It's either completely astronomical rates in the naive (implying spectacular vaccine efficacy; way better than implied by the data when comparing to unvaccinated in general (which includes the infection-acquired immunity group)), or it's quite mediocre performance of infection-acquired immunity in the presence of Omicron. Has to be one or the other or a blend of the two. Vaccines are clearly working well at reducing infections and transmission.

 

[Doggydogworld]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1486846468887560201

So he's saying if we scare people enough about global warming they'll demand removal of freedom to buy ICE cars and let tyrannical governments force purchase of cars he sells instead? Ha.

Australia is an interesting case study. They've had four distinct waves, with returns to zero in between the first couple.

This makes it easy to do rough math:
1: ~100 deaths in 8k cases, CFR = 1.25%
2: ~800 deaths in 20k cases, CFR = 4%
3: ~1330 deaths in 200k caess, CFR = 0.66%
4: 2000 deaths (projected) from 2.2m cases so far, CFR = 0.1%

I don't know what's up with that 2nd wave, were they really short on tests or something? Anyway, 0.1% for Omicron getting close to "just a flu".

 

[Dave EV]

So he's saying if we scare people enough about global warming they'll demand removal of freedom to buy ICE cars and let tyrannical governments force purchase of cars he sells instead? Ha.

To be fair (and I'm saying this as someone who is not a fan of his remarks regarding COVID), he has remained consistent with his capitalistic / libertarian views on EVs and global warming - his stance is to make EVs that are better than ICE vehicles so that people naturally buy EVs - and put a tax on CO2 emissions, naturally driving up the cost of pollution - naturally driving people towards cleaner products. He has never talked about or suggested that having the government ban things that create CO2 emissions.

But all this assumes that people do the right thing - and my beef with libertarianism in general. People do NOT do the right thing in general, they do the easy thing. Sometimes they even do things that are harder because old habits are hard to break. We also live in a community with other people, where one's actions have an effect on others.

As the classic saying goes "your freedom ends where my nose begins".

This is particularly relevant in today's COVID world - if you are unvaccinated, you are significantly more likely to get and spread COVID. And even though personally, I'm at low risk of adverse effects from COVID being fortunate enough to be relatively young and healthy, I would still like to avoid rolling the dice and potentially face a week of illness or worse. After all, I still wear my seatbelt in the car and a helmet when I ride my bike.

Maybe the capitalist take is to add a no-vax tax? The longer you remain unvaccinated, you must pay some amount of money to help pay for the heathcare of those who get COVID. I know, let's just call it an insurance surcharge.

Anyway, 0.1% for Omicron getting close to "just a flu".

I think you're still ignoring a few things - just how many more people Omicron is infecting compared to the flu - the rate of hospitalization, and the rate of long-COVID. How often does one get the flu and end up with long-flu symptoms?

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

Anyway, 0.1% for Omicron getting close to "just a flu"

It depends on whether you're talking about CFR in the presence of vaccination (and prior immunity) or not. Our influenza CFRs are generally in the presence of partial vaccination. But for a very virulent disease, a small subset of unvaccinated individuals can really raise the CFR. So comparisons like this are very tricky.

I agree this is an interesting test case. And that it seems like the overall partially-but-not-completely vaccinated CFR could be approaching that level. I'm not sure how we compare that to influenza though.

The IFR for influenza doesn't exceed 0.1% until about age 70-75. So depending on ascertainment (I don't know our ascertainment rate for either disease), the CFR for influenza probably doesn't reach 0.1% until perhaps age 60-65.

How does the CFR look for Omicron COVID for age 60-65? How would it look for an entirely vaccinated population? How would it look with a population vaccinated at the same rate as our typical influenza vaccination rate? How does that compare to influenza for that age group?

I don't know the answers to these questions, and so I don't know how the comparison works out. I do know that boosted vaccination dramatically reduces CFR, probably to very manageable levels.

In the end, this comparison is valid if the impact on society is similar. Right now that doesn't seem to be the case (and I don't think it's because of gov't interference - it's killing 2-3k people a day in this country), so I suspect straightforward comparisons like this are missing critical pieces of the puzzle, and we're not to influenza-level impacts yet.

I think you're still ignoring a few things - just how many more people Omicron is infecting compared to the flu - the rate of hospitalization, and the rate of long-COVID.

Yep. I do think that if everyone were vaccinated and boosted we could likely move on from COVID, but I'm not 100% sure on how that would work, and how the rates would work out. For sure the transmissibility is a huge difference between influenza and COVID. Vaccination and boosting and widespread multiple infections of the unvaccinated might bring that down to manageable levels, in addition to the increased protection. Would it be enough? I don't know.

It's possible the risk of COVID long term could even end up lower than influenza in a population with widespread immunity. I just don't know. Just like I don't know whether the disease will actually ever become endemic.

We also don't know for sure whether there is a clear strong & immutable link between the reduced Omicron virulence and its increased transmissibility. It's clear that hanging out in the throat is a better place for transmission, but what if a variant could gain additional advantage by spreading for longer, and somehow hanging out in the lungs later in an infection turned out to help in that endeavor? I sure hope it's a clear and robust and "inherent to nature" tradeoff, but my understanding is that we don't KNOW that it's a fixed firm tradeoff - it just happens to be what Omicron ended up doing.

 

[Jeff N]

Here’s a very interesting new paper comparing how antibodies generated from infection with one variant protect against other variants. And then similarly comparing how vaccination with Moderna’s mRNA-1273 (based upon the Wuhan common ancestral parent variant) generates a more broadly consistent antibody neutralization response.

Mapping SARS-CoV-2 antigenic relationships and serological responses

During the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, multiple variants with differing amounts of escape from pre-existing immunity have emerged, causing concerns about continued protection. Here, we use antigenic cartography to quantify and visualize the antigenic relationships among 16 SARS-CoV-2 variants titrated...

www.biorxiv.org

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

Here’s a very interesting new paper comparing how antibodies generated from infection with one variant protect against other variants. And then similarly comparing how vaccination with Moderna’s mRNA-1273 (based upon the Wuhan common ancestral parent variant) generates a more broadly consistent antibody neutralization response.

Mapping SARS-CoV-2 antigenic relationships and serological responses

During the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, multiple variants with differing amounts of escape from pre-existing immunity have emerged, causing concerns about continued protection. Here, we use antigenic cartography to quantify and visualize the antigenic relationships among 16 SARS-CoV-2 variants titrated...

www.biorxiv.org

View attachment 761713View attachment 761714

Too bad they didn’t do boosters; looked like just two shots for the vaccine sera. Maybe they will add it later? Really looks like people will need to be infected about three times, in lieu of vaccination (and boosting). They should also add that data (twice and thrice infected individuals, though maybe they will have to guess at the variants involved)!

The inconsistency of individual responses to infection, relative to vaccination, is also readily apparent in this plot (gray lines). A few lucky people get awesome immunity from infection (B.1.1.7 sera shows a notable example). It’s rare though. Sadly people always think they will be the lucky one.

 

[dhanson865]

The news likes to point out the downturn in new cases

but I can't help but notice the deaths are still on the up slope.

If you go by the 5th US wave the peak in cases and deaths were about 16 days apart. That suggests we are near the peak deaths in the 6th US wave but we can only wait and watch to see if that is true.

 

[JRP3]

Massive drop here in NY

Deaths look as if they might be trending down as well

Stark difference in cases/death ratio early on vs late. Definitely benefit to delaying infection.