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Is it theoretically possible that India has a new variant of COVID which is mostly asymptomatic but gives immunity to other variants? Or what explains the low hospitalizations etc.?

Second question, if so, could that replace the vaccines?
The problem with natural immunity is that it's different for different people and there's really no way to tell how protection you are (Russian roulette). And you really don't want to get long COVID which can happen whether or not the infection is asymptomatic. So the answer is "no" it can't replace vaccination--at best it can replace one shot but it would still be a really good idea to the the second shot and a booster later on. The bit about India sounds fake to me. Most likely the low hospitalizations (assuming there are low hospitalization rates--I haven't looked to see) are due to distrust of hospitals and the medical community in general due to some government policies in the past.
 
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Colin Powell, first Black US secretary of state, dies of Covid-19 complications amid cancer battle​


A source familiar with the matter said Powell had multiple myeloma, a cancer of plasma cells that suppresses the body's immune response. Even if fully vaccinated against Covid-19, those who are immunocompromised are at greater risk from the virus.
 
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A recent study showed that the Beta (South Africa) and Delta variants have evolved in “opposite” directions and a vaccine based only on Delta would likely protect relatively poorly against Beta.

Vaccines based on the original Wuhan variant actually protect relatively well on both Beta, Delta, and the other currently known variants because it is the parent of all of them and they have diverged from it less than they have from each other.
 
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Article
Pfizer vaccine 90% effective in warding off COVID in adolescents

on this study/publication
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMc2114290

"The research, which focused on youth between the ages of 12 and 18, was carried out by Clalit Health Services and found that the vaccine was 90% effective against warding off infection and 93% effective against stopping symptomatic infection on days seven to 21 after the second dose - even against the Delta variant.
...
The study compared nearly 95,000 adolescents who received the vaccine against the same number who did not, matching their demographic, clinical and other personal characteristics. The research was conducted between June 8 and September 14, when the Delta variant was the most dominant strain in the country.
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On the same same subject
Pfizer/BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine highly protective in 12-18 age group - U.S. CDC study
Study:
Effectiveness of Pfizer-BioNTech mRNA Vaccination Against ...

"The Pfizer Inc (PFE.N)/BioNTech SE COVID-19 vaccine was 93% effective in preventing hospitalizations among those aged 12 to 18, according to an analysis released by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Tuesday.
The study was conducted between June and September, when the extremely contagious Delta variant of the coronavirus was predominant.
Yet, the data from 19 pediatric hospitals showed that among the 179 patients who were hospitalized for COVID-19, 97% were unvaccinated, providing reassurance of the vaccine's efficacy.
Of the roughly 16% of patients hospitalized with severe enough COVID-19 to require life support, none were vaccinated."
______________________

So it would help a lot with breaking transmission chains...
 
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On booster shots

Pfizer and BioNTech Announce Phase 3 Trial Data Showing High Efficacy of a Booster Dose of Their COVID-19 Vaccine | Pfizer

"Pfizer Inc. (NYSE: PFE) and BioNTech SE (Nasdaq: BNTX) today announced topline results from a Phase 3 randomized, controlled trial evaluating the efficacy and safety of a 30-µg booster dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 Vaccine in more than 10,000 individuals 16 years of age and older.
In the trial, a booster dose administered to individuals who previously received the Pfizer-BioNTech primary two-dose series restored vaccine protection against COVID-19 to the high levels achieved after the second dose, showing a relative vaccine efficacy of 95.6% when compared to those who did not receive a booster. These are the first efficacy results from any randomized, controlled COVID-19 vaccine booster trial."
 
What do you think?
S. V. Subramanian and Akhil Kumar said:
... the median new COVID-19 cases per 100,000 people in the last 7 days is largely similar across the categories of percent population fully vaccinated (Fig. 2). Notably there is also substantial county variation in new COVID-19 cases within categories of percentage population fully vaccinated. There also appears to be no significant signaling of COVID-19 cases decreasing with higher percentages of population fully vaccinated (Fig. 3).
 
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From what I can see, once restrictions are lifted (e.g. mandatory masks and social distancing), people tend to go back to pre-COVID behaviour, or just pay lip service (e.g. masks over mouth only and no distancing). Plus there are many countries that have poor vaccination percentages, so there is reintroduction to highly vaccinated countries. It's going to take a lot of political will to actually stop the pandemic, and if it's not stopped in the entire world, it's not stopped. However, the important points are the number of hospitalizations, ICU patients, and deaths. Vaccines reduce this by a considerable amount.
 
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The second sentence in the "study" notes: "For instance, the narrative related to the ongoing surge of new cases". If this were a rigorous scientific study, it would focus on the data and the results drawn from that data rather than focusing on a "narrative" that the authors wish to discredit.

It is also far too easy to discredit the entire "study" when one notes that there is no attempt to control for the prevalence of preventive measures such as masks and social distancing. The variations in those factors strongly influence the rate of transmission.

So, what should one think of this study? Not credible.
 
The second sentence in the "study" notes: "For instance, the narrative related to the ongoing surge of new cases". If this were a rigorous scientific study, it would focus on the data and the results drawn from that data rather than focusing on a "narrative" that the authors wish to discredit.

It is also far too easy to discredit the entire "study" when one notes that there is no attempt to control for the prevalence of preventive measures such as masks and social distancing. The variations in those factors strongly influence the rate of transmission.

So, what should one think of this study? Not credible.

National Institute of Health is a fairly credible source. It could be from fading vaccine protection. Hard to say for sure. Somebody needs to reproduce the study yo make sure.

The bad news is that COVID may be here to stay. Even though people who have been vaccinated have a much lower chance of getting seriously ill, studies have shown that people who are vaccinated can be contagious. Even if less contagious than unvaccinated people, just the fact they can be carriers means it will keep circulating.

And it will prey on the weakened like it did Colin Powell. We will probably have an increased annual death toll, mostly among those who are weakened in some way.

Throughout this pandemic Bill Maher has been just about the only person beating a drum nobody else is beating: COVID outcomes are better among people who have better underlying health and maybe we should be talking about people getting in better shape? Some underlying conditions are not fixable, most that are will take time and effort to fix. But this is a wake up call for the country to get in better shape.

Many of the problems are systemic and there are people and companies making billions perpetuating the current system. Additionally healthy eating and living has also become a political issue which further entrenches the resistance to change. So we're going to see some numbers of COIVD deaths a year until we either come up with a better vaccine or it mutates into a nuisance virus like the common cold.

We don't know, but the cold and flu viruses may have once been as deadly as COVID, but mutated into more mild viruses over time. It could have happened thousands of years ago.
 
The second sentence in the "study" notes: "For instance, the narrative related to the ongoing surge of new cases". If this were a rigorous scientific study, it would focus on the data and the results drawn from that data rather than focusing on a "narrative" that the authors wish to discredit.

It is also far too easy to discredit the entire "study" when one notes that there is no attempt to control for the prevalence of preventive measures such as masks and social distancing. The variations in those factors strongly influence the rate of transmission.

So, what should one think of this study? Not credible.

SPOT ON. This is not a "study", it is a metanalysis of data. And anyone that have done or reviewed one of these "studies" knows you can manipulate the data pretty easily in a metanalysis by selecting what data sets to include vs. exclude, how you run the statistics, etc. Unlike a RCT or prospective study, there are very few accepted guidelines on how the "study" should be run.

These two graphs tell me pretty much all I need to know (that the stats are @#$% - LOOK at that "trendline" and LOOK at those error bars):
Untitled.jpg


Sorry, but anyone that's had STATS 101 would be shaking their head at this "study".
 
Throughout this pandemic Bill Maher has been just about the only person beating a drum nobody else is beating: COVID outcomes are better among people who have better underlying health and maybe we should be talking about people getting in better shape? Some underlying conditions are not fixable, most that are will take time and effort to fix. But this is a wake up call for the country to get in better shape.

Many of the problems are systemic and there are people and companies making billions perpetuating the current system. Additionally healthy eating and living has also become a political issue which further entrenches the resistance to change. So we're going to see some numbers of COIVD deaths a year until we either come up with a better vaccine or it mutates into a nuisance virus like the common cold.

We don't know, but the cold and flu viruses may have once been as deadly as COVID, but mutated into more mild viruses over time. It could have happened thousands of years ago.
Except on Fox News this'll be portrayed as the thin liberal coastal elite imposing political correctness on chubby red staters' church barbecues. And some screaming Fox guest will point out how corn syrup and beef comes from red states and spinach comes from *boo* California *boo*.
 
Except on Fox News this'll be portrayed as the thin liberal coastal elite imposing political correctness on chubby red staters' church barbecues. And some screaming Fox guest will point out how corn syrup and beef comes from red states and spinach comes from *boo* California *boo*.

Even though the spinach is grown in red parts of California.