Coronavirus

[PeterJA]

That treatment protocol recommends routine use of steroids and hydroxychloroquine. The latter drug has been shown to likely increase mortality.

Hydroxychloroquine is listed on the last page of the press release, but not in the big red box on the front page. Maybe it was a late and hasty addition, or not part of the core protocol.

https://covid19criticalcare.com/wp-...seTreating-Covid-19-in-ER-April-15-2030_3.pdf

The press release went out on April 15. When was hydroxychloroquine "shown to likely increase mortality" and where is your link to a randomized double-blind trial showing that?

There is no version of double-blind data on this treatment protocol. And anecdotal reports of wonderful cures and other testimonial type statements which you love to post here simply don't cut it in a scientific sense. There needs to be a large randomized controlled trial. In science you cannot support claims with other claims. Claims need to be supported with a data set that is judged to be scientifically adequate (methodologically/statistically). That's not some defense of big Pharma (which has had its own love affair with cooked datasets) it's simply a defense of science.

I have posted several times that randomized controlled trials of IV-C for COVID-19 are underway in China. But I disagree that such trials are necessary before trying to save dying patients with a nontoxic treatment (IV-C), when no other alternative is known. The safety of IV-C has been established by tens of thousands of controlled trials over decades, as shown in the references I linked, and its effectiveness for other types of viral pneumonia is also well-established by science.

IV-C can't hurt, and very likely helps, and the early clinical reports are very promising, such as zero deaths in a group of 50 patients in a Chinese hospital, and zero percent mortality in a Houston hospital.
Hospital treatment of serious and critical COVID-19 infection with high-dose Vitamin C | Cheng Integrative Health Center Blog
Local hospital using experimental drug treatment in hopes of saving lives of COVID-19 patients

The Front Line COVID-19 Critical Care Working Group is literally that: doctors working on the front line of a desperate situation, doing the best they can with the information they have. If you were dying of viral pneumonia, with your plasma vitamin C dropped to zero because of the cytokine storm, would you tell your doctor no, don't give me vitamin C until the clinical trials are complete in China? Would you ignore all the existing science?

I know you don't like hearing that but that's simply the only way you can determine whether or not something is actually working or whether some one is simply cherry-picking anecdotal cases out of enthusiasm and belief. If intravenous vitamin C improves immune function, and there certainly are corollary lines of evidence that it might in terms of its role in neutrophil physiology, then the 'signal' (positive impact) should appear clearly and separate from the noise so to speak in a large trial. Absent that data set you simply cannot make claims. I'm not sure why that's so hard for you to accept.

Here's what I don't like: Folks telling me what I don't like and don't accept, when they clearly have not read or comprehended what I wrote and the extensive evidence I linked. I don't like suggestions that I'm anti-science from folks ignorant of the science that exists. Alas, this deadly combination of arrogance and ignorance is typical of many doctors trained by an industry dominated by pharmaceutical companies.

 

[SDRick]

This thread seems to act somewhat as a barometer. The more TDS and references to old fake news stories continually repeating about Trump advocating bleach,Trumps is a racist, Trump is a Russian, the closer we must be to digging out of this mess.

 

[bubb]

This thread seems to act somewhat as a barometer. The more TDS and references to old fake news stories continually repeating about Trump advocating bleach,Trumps is a racist, Trump is a Russian, the closer we must be to digging out of this mess.

OK, <insert political opinion here> implies <something about a viral pandemic that cares not a bit about politics, money, time, or your wisecracks>, got it, thanks.

 

[SDRick]

OK, <insert political opinion here> implies <something about a viral pandemic that cares not a bit about politics, money, time, or your wisecracks>, got it, thanks.

Exactly!

 

[HG Wells]

Interesting article saying European strain of virus more contagious.

A mutant coronavirus has emerged, even more contagious than the original, study says

 

[Daniel in SD]

Interesting article saying European strain of virus more contagious.

A mutant coronavirus has emerged, even more contagious than the original, study says

Some Twitter threads about why this is unlikely:
Brian Wasik on Twitter
Bill Hanage on Twitter
Dr. Angela Rasmussen on Twitter

 

[EVNow]

A demographic in neat zero danger and posing nearly zero danger to others.

Define "neat zero".

I believe colleges have a lot of … let me check … professors ?

ps : Its funny the "lets kill a lot of people to make some money" crowd completely forget about teachers.

 

[deonb]

Why/how does the virus take weekends off?

 

[EVNow]

Why/how does the virus take weekends off?

View attachment 538961

Reporting takes the weekend off in some hospitals / counties.

 

[dfwatt]

Hydroxychloroquine is listed on the last page of the press release, but not in the big red box on the front page. Maybe it was a late and hasty addition, or not part of the core protocol.

View attachment 538915
https://covid19criticalcare.com/wp-...seTreating-Covid-19-in-ER-April-15-2030_3.pdf

The press release went out on April 15. When was hydroxychloroquine "shown to likely increase mortality" and where is your link to a randomized double-blind trial showing that?


I have posted several times that randomized controlled trials of IV-C for COVID-19 are underway in China. But I disagree that such trials are necessary before trying to save dying patients with a nontoxic treatment (IV-C), when no other alternative is known. The safety of IV-C has been established by tens of thousands of controlled trials over decades, as shown in the references I linked, and its effectiveness for other types of viral pneumonia is also well-established by science.

IV-C can't hurt, and very likely helps, and the early clinical reports are very promising, such as zero deaths in a group of 50 patients in a Chinese hospital, and zero percent mortality in a Houston hospital.
Hospital treatment of serious and critical COVID-19 infection with high-dose Vitamin C | Cheng Integrative Health Center Blog
Local hospital using experimental drug treatment in hopes of saving lives of COVID-19 patients

The Front Line COVID-19 Critical Care Working Group is literally that: doctors working on the front line of a desperate situation, doing the best they can with the information they have. If you were dying of viral pneumonia, with your plasma vitamin C dropped to zero because of the cytokine storm, would you tell your doctor no, don't give me vitamin C until the clinical trials are complete in China? Would you ignore all the existing science?


Here's what I don't like: Folks telling me what I don't like and don't accept, when they clearly have not read or comprehended what I wrote and the extensive evidence I linked. I don't like suggestions that I'm anti-science from folks ignorant of the science that exists. Alas, this deadly combination of arrogance and ignorance is typical of many doctors trained by an industry dominated by pharmaceutical companies.

I don't have any issue with compassionate use of a non-toxic medicine vitamin or nutritional supplement. It might help. And it's probably less toxic than a lot of other things. So no issues there, but I just have an issue with representing something as proven if it has not cleared certain basic scientific hurdles. Obviously we have to await the results of the Chinese double-blind randomized trials and then of course depending on what that shows you want it ideally have that result replicated one way or the other. I realize that's a tedious and drawn-out process but it's the only way to vet the real value of any biologic treatment. As for the meme of Suspicion about the corrupting effects of big Pharma you are singing to the choir.

 

[Daniel in SD]

Hopeful article for the day: With Crispr, a Possible Quick Test for the Coronavirus

Dr. Zhang’s team has been working on a test of their own as well. They built it on research they published last year, before the pandemic. They created a Crispr-based system for detecting viruses they called Sherlock, short for Specific High-sensitivity Enzymatic Reporter Unlocking.
Earlier this year, they adapted the Sherlock test to find the coronavirus. But their test, like those from other groups, required moving a sample into a series of tubes to carry out separate reactions.
It’s a little inconvenient, especially if you want to scale it up,” Dr. Zhang said. “So we focused our efforts on turning it into something that’s easy to run.”
Recently, the researchers figured out how to combine a lot of the reactions in a single tube, allowing them to run the test faster and more cheaply. They called the method STOPCovid.
The process starts with putting samples in a tube with chemicals that can tear open viruses. The researchers then use an eye-dropper-like device to move some of the liquid into a second tube containing the Crispr molecules.
For the reactions to finish, the tubes need to sit in water at 140 degrees Fahrenheit for an hour. To see if the coronavirus is present, the researchers devised a procedure similar to a pregnancy test: They stuck a piece of paper in the tube. Two lines appearing on the paper meant the coronavirus was present.
The researchers tried out the test on samples from 12 patients with Covid-19. For 11 of them, they successfully detected the virus on 3 out of 3 tries. For the 12th, they succeeded 2 out of 3 times. When they tested five healthy people, all consistently tested negative. The researchers found that the test worked both on nasal swabs and saliva.
The researchers estimate that the materials for one test would come to about $6. They are in discussions with manufacturers to create a single cartridge in which the two steps could take place. They expect that with mass production, the cost would go down even further.
Dr. Zhang and his colleagues have set up a website with the instructions for STOPCovid in the hope that other researchers will try out their procedure and find ways to improve it.

STOPCovid
Hopefully this research will lead to a cheap at home test.

 

[bkp_duke]

Why/how does the virus take weekends off?

View attachment 538961

Hospitals and labs are minimally staffed on weekends, so tests pile up and reported on Mon/Tues when they catch up.

Even in tertiary referral centers we had this happen. Used to drive me bonkers.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

Hospitals and labs are minimally staffed on weekends, so tests pile up and reported on Mon/Tues when they catch up.

Even in tertiary referral centers we had this happen. Used to drive me bonkers.

The weekend dips should be expected to be more pronounced going forward, since NY is now a small contributor. NY exhibited a lot less of the weekend cycle dips, so previously the data was somewhat more smooth. You can see that as NY has become a smaller component, the dips have become deeper.

 

[EinSV]

Oops

Exclusive: Government scientist Neil Ferguson resigns after breaking lockdown rules to meet his married lover

Prof Ferguson allowed the woman to visit him at home during the lockdown while lecturing the public on the need for strict social distancing​

Exclusive: Government scientist Neil Ferguson resigns after breaking lockdown rules to meet his married lover

 

[bkp_duke]

Oops

Exclusive: Government scientist Neil Ferguson resigns after breaking lockdown rules to meet his married lover

Prof Ferguson allowed the woman to visit him at home during the lockdown while lecturing the public on the need for strict social distancing​

Exclusive: Government scientist Neil Ferguson resigns after breaking lockdown rules to meet his married lover

 

[MXLRplus]

Did they discover "bleach"? A human monoclonal antibody blocking SARS-CoV-2 infection
A potential SARS-CoV-2 syn antibody.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

Some Twitter threads about why this is unlikely:
Brian Wasik on Twitter
Bill Hanage on Twitter
Dr. Angela Rasmussen on Twitter

Yes, the group working on this is a reputable one (Korber is a Caltech alum and has done a great deal of good work with HIV), but probably were a bit strong in their paper conclusions (which still needs peer review). But a lot of damage done by the media here, too.

Mutations to the virus are inevitable, and relatively slow. Certainly things like this are possible, but in this case it is far from clear. It's also not clear what effect it will have on vaccine efforts, if any. It needs to be tested! I would imagine it depends on how much it changes the spike protein conformation, though I honestly have no idea. If it's still infectious, obviously it's still a similar enough shape to be able to bind to cells that I don't really see why it HAS to affect a vaccine. (*Layman here, unfounded speculation.)

There are two primary concerns over time: a virus can become more/less virulent (higher mortality) or more/less transmissible. Either is possible, but usually they are tradeoffs. But it is hard to say for a specific virus - for this virus, a lot of transmission occurs before illness so it can be both virulent and transmissible.

Carl T. Bergstrom on Twitter

It's important to realize this could get worse, just as easily as it could get better (there are arguments to let it rip in the younger population and hope it gets less deadly!!!). In any case, fortunately, the mutations are generally slow, so the most likely situation is that not much changes, the vaccine will work reasonably well (it should be expected to work better than a flu vaccine since the mutation rate is about 4 times slower), and we will be victorious.

The best way to reduce this uncertainty is to eliminate the virus ASAP.

 

[Daniel in SD]

Oops

Exclusive: Government scientist Neil Ferguson resigns after breaking lockdown rules to meet his married lover

Prof Ferguson allowed the woman to visit him at home during the lockdown while lecturing the public on the need for strict social distancing​

Exclusive: Government scientist Neil Ferguson resigns after breaking lockdown rules to meet his married lover

In his defense he's already had COVID-19 and he's not married.
But he definitely did the right thing by resigning, not a good example to be setting.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

CEA on Twitter

"As shown, IHME's mortality curves have matched the data fairly well."

This is the White House council of economic advisers! No wonder there is money to be made in the stock market.

 

[TheTalkingMule]

Oops

Exclusive: Government scientist Neil Ferguson resigns after breaking lockdown rules to meet his married lover

Prof Ferguson allowed the woman to visit him at home during the lockdown while lecturing the public on the need for strict social distancing​

Exclusive: Government scientist Neil Ferguson resigns after breaking lockdown rules to meet his married lover

Is this for real? Lol!!

Idiot should've resigned in March after "2.2M". What a shitshow world we're living in.