[HN Gopher] Vaccines Are Effective Against Covid Variants
___________________________________________________________________
Vaccines Are Effective Against Covid Variants
Author : 11thEarlOfMar
Score : 163 points
Date : 2021-03-21 15:37 UTC (7 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (jamanetwork.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (jamanetwork.com)
| spchampion2 wrote:
| This is not well aligned with other research[1] showing the
| Pfizer and Moderna vaccines perform little better against the
| B1351 (South Africa) variant than they do against plain old SARS
| and distantly related bat COVIDs. They're also only semi-
| effective against the Brazilian P1 variant.
|
| Right now, all of the vaccines are reasonably effective against
| the variants commonly circulating in the US (including B117),
| which is what the JAMA article tested. But I worry for how well
| they'll perform in a few months when the other variants get a
| foothold.
|
| [1]: https://www.cell.com/cell/pdf/S0092-8674(21)00298-1.pdf
| anonuser123456 wrote:
| The article is talking about "escape neutralization".
|
| Neutralizing antibodies are not the only mechanism of the
| immune system, and the article even discusses another such
| mechanism: T cell immunity.
|
| T cell immunity appears robust for all variants from the data
| I've seen.
| marcodiego wrote:
| For people arguing that not being part of a risk group is a
| reason not to protect yourself, please take a lesson from brazil.
| Being part of a 'high risk group' does not saves you from
| infecting other people who are part of such groups.
|
| That's basically what happened in brazil: people who were not
| part of risk groups crowded, encouraged by the president
| himself[0][1][2]. The number of infected poeple soared and
| variants that affect younger people appeared[3][4]. The health
| system has now collapsed because there is not enough ICU for such
| a high number of ill people[5][6].
|
| [0]
| https://www.em.com.br/app/noticia/politica/2021/02/26/intern...
|
| [1] https://noticias.uol.com.br/politica/ultimas-
| noticias/2021/0...
|
| [2] https://cultura.uol.com.br/noticias/15258_bolsonaro-
| mergulha...
|
| [3] https://www.cartacapital.com.br/saude/segunda-onda-de-
| covid-...
|
| [4] https://www.brasildefato.com.br/2021/03/19/tres-novas-
| cepas-...
|
| [5] https://www.cnnbrasil.com.br/saude/2021/03/19/17-estados-
| e-o...
|
| [6] https://www.cnnbrasil.com.br/saude/2021/03/19/em-meio-ao-
| col...
| anoncake wrote:
| So getting vaccinated saves me from infecting the people who
| have stolen more than a year of my life? I'll pass.
| pelasaco wrote:
| Sure, the president is responsible for that too
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N3osqOIT7SQ ? One thing is poor
| people arguing to have to work. Other thing is this "funk
| train".. The video is from yesterday. You can count, like 2 or
| 3 masks on the train.
| Tagbert wrote:
| I am hearing from friends and family in Brasil that the
| Brasilian variant is more severe among younger victims than the
| original COVID version. There is an increase of deaths among
| twenty-year-olds as a result.
| paulryanrogers wrote:
| All the more reason to stop all strains as soon as possible.
| If more contagious strains can be knocked below the
| sustainability threshold then they'll die out too.
| irq11 wrote:
| It is not possible to stop all strains. SARS-CoV2 has
| multiple zoonotic reservoirs, transmits easily, and
| persists in the population via asymptomatic infection.
|
| We have eradicated _one_ human virus in all of history, and
| it took a highly effective vaccine and a hundred years. The
| long tail is _very_ long.
| lamontcg wrote:
| It is still important to stop this particular strain and
| to achieve sufficient vaccination levels to achieve herd
| immunity.
|
| That immunity will likely be durable for many years
| (based on the somewhat recent study of HCoV-229E).
|
| That will force the virus to mutate to achieve true
| escape immunity (a strain, not a variant, which can
| reinfect everyone all over) which will likely come at a
| cost to fitness, since one or two mutations to spike
| isn't enough, and there will need to be a few tens of
| mutations to spike.
|
| That virus strain will not be as transmissible or
| virulent as what we are dealing with now, because it has
| had to make those costly "decisions".
|
| And this is important for people who for medical reasons
| cannot be vaccinate or who are at high risk even if they
| are vaccinated. They're much better off being infected by
| subsequent strains down the road than being infected with
| version 1.x of this virus.
|
| This is also what has been observed in the past with 1918
| H1N1 which later evolved into seasonal influenza.
| andy_ppp wrote:
| "That virus strain will not be as transmissible or
| virulent as what we are dealing with now, because it has
| had to make those costly "decisions"."
|
| I'm not convinced you can absolutely guarantee these
| changes will make the virus less dangerous, we could be
| unlucky and it could become worse.
| lamontcg wrote:
| Right now that is what is happening, but as the title
| shows those variants don't achieve immune escape.
|
| The sum total of mutations necessary to achieve immune
| escape and overcome herd immunity is a lot more likely to
| come at a cost to overall fitness.
|
| Also I can't guarantee that West Ham United won't win the
| Premier League, but the safe money is all on Man City.
|
| Paper on the possibility of mild disease endemicity:
|
| https://science.sciencemag.org/content/371/6530/741
|
| AP coverage of that paper:
|
| https://apnews.com/article/common-cold-india-coronavirus-
| pan...
| bredren wrote:
| I'm not convinced we can get an effective global, rolling
| vaccination program in place to set up effective
| population immunity.
|
| From what I can tell, almost all public discussion of the
| future of Covid is similar to a "happy path."
| hu3 wrote:
| Curious, what virus we eradicated?
| dillondoyle wrote:
| Smallpox. I think we're close on polio?
| oblio wrote:
| We're getting there but it's super hard to do it in
| remote areas and conflict regions.
|
| https://www.gatesnotes.com/health/in-pakistan-victory-
| agains...
| celrod wrote:
| Smallpox.
| anoncake wrote:
| Smallpox. Except for some samples in secure laboratories.
| lamontcg wrote:
| The second wave of the 1918 pandemic was also more deadly to
| younger people.
|
| Various theories have been offered as to why, none of which
| are proven, including that it may have been observational
| errors or due to overcrowding conditions due to the war and
| viral dose.
|
| I wonder if it isn't due to the virus coming under pressure
| due to a large chunk of the population becoming immune, so
| evolution favors higher transmissibility. And the easy knob
| the virus has to increase transmissibility is to increase
| viral load, which has the side effect of increasing
| virulence/lethality. That is consistent with that fairly well
| studied mechanism of parasites/viruses, along with being
| consistent with what we're observing.
|
| At any rate considerations like that are why I'm not letting
| my guard down until I'm vaccinated and why it seems stupid to
| do so.
| mherrmann wrote:
| Also for selfish reasons. I know a 24 year old ballerina (so a
| professional athlete) who had it two months ago and is now at
| 80% lung capacity.
| [deleted]
| oblio wrote:
| And the even more selfish evolutionary reason: viruses
| mutate. If we spread it a ton while it's still "safe" for
| someone young, we're risking major mutations. It's like
| playing Russian roulette with 8+ billion bullets x probably
| millions/billions of viruses per person.
|
| We just need one strain to go to something like 5% mortality
| + mortality across all age groups for this pandemic to become
| a civilization ending event. Maybe not ending, but "setting
| back by 20-40-60 years" event.
| outside1234 wrote:
| And to pile on this, I know a triathelete in my group, 24
| years old, who had it in April of LAST YEAR and is still not
| at 100% (can't do any hard aerobics without getting wildly
| out of breath).
|
| We are still in a pandemic. Stay distant.
| Moto7451 wrote:
| I have a coworker that never went to the ICU but can no
| longer taste or smell. Their family was never at a high
| risk and only felt normally sick. None the less the damage
| is done. No one wants to be maimed by this. Claiming "I'm
| not high risk (of death)" does not mean there is no risk of
| damage.
|
| We all need to do our part to stop the spread of the virus.
| bredren wrote:
| We have a friend in their late 30s who also never went to
| the hospital but got sick with covid five months ago.
| They have yet to regain their sense of taste or smell.
| anedcata wrote:
| It used to be common to reply to this sort of fear
| mongering with "anecdotes aren't data." Cool anecdote, bro.
|
| Sorry for that person you, a random internet person I have
| no reason to trust, allegedly know, who is very, very
| unlucky.
|
| The people in power want us to stay afraid and easy to
| control. Fauci says vaccines work but doesn't trust them
| enough to stop going into public with TWO masks! Despite
| being vaccinated!
|
| Why would I get a vaccine that doesn't quell the fears of
| "the nation's top doctor" enough for him to stop wearing
| the masks? Or are the masks just for show?
|
| We may still be in a pandemic but it's time to stop
| panicking, face the danger, and get on with society and our
| lives before we cause bigger problems like famine societal
| breakdown!
|
| Some people may die of COVID in the process, but someone is
| going to die no matter what choice we make, from
| deprivation, from isolation, from side effects, from
| economic distress
|
| COVID might suck but there are far worse things, I think
| it's safe to say, after a year, this thing isn't Ebola.
|
| Now commence downvoting to show you disagree! Surely it
| will change my mind this time!
| meepmorp wrote:
| > Now commence downvoting to show you disagree! Surely it
| will change my mind this time!
|
| I downvoted you because you obviously do not care at all
| about downvotes.
| paulryanrogers wrote:
| Isn't mask wearing still required after vaccination
| because of the enforcement costs? I.e. it's too difficult
| to prove whose been vaccinated in every situation, so by
| requiring masks until the community reaches the target
| threshold
| okaram wrote:
| Most places don _require_ masks at all. The
| recommendation (for now) is to keep wearing mask as
| before.
|
| I assume this will change as/if/when more people become
| vaccinated.
| inglor_cz wrote:
| I did not downvote you, but I feel need to comment on
| this:
|
| "COVID might suck but there are far worse things"
|
| Compared to, say, Auschwitz, everything else is trivial.
| But that is misleading.
|
| The dead are, well, dead, but we do not yet know how the
| _survivors_ of severe Covid cases will fare long term.
| Given that the cohort was fairly big, they may constitute
| a significant challenge for healthcare capacities.
|
| Even in warfare, crippling an enemy soldier alive is
| considered more efficient than killing him outright. A
| disabled survivor requires much more energy and attention
| than a dead body.
| Tade0 wrote:
| > Or are the masks just for show?
|
| The masks are so that the wearer doesn't infect and the
| vaccine is there to _help_ the immune system fight COVID,
| not prevent infection entirely.
| oliwarner wrote:
| These anecdotes are useful to remind us that many covid
| survivors _still_ suffer from its damage.
|
| The data doesn't quantify these things _yet_ , so cynical
| people, maybe people especially like you, might do well
| to pay them attention. Just because _you 're_ unlikely to
| die from covid, doesn't mean you won't be part of the 10%
| who retain symptoms past 3 months.
|
| It's not a binary outcome.
| [deleted]
| irq11 wrote:
| Here's the problem: you cite _anecdotes_ of second- and
| third-hand stories that are exceptional at best,
| implausible at worst, then you claim these to be
| representative of the common case. They are not.
|
| There have now been hundreds of millions of infections,
| worldwide. Of these, the _vast majority_ ( >99.9%)
| resolve with no major sequelae. These are facts. People
| need to know this.
| sdenton4 wrote:
| 'Earlier studies focused largely on long-term effects in
| hospitalized COVID patients, McCulloch noted. "Our study
| is unique in characterizing a group consisting of mostly
| outpatients: 90% of our cohort experienced only a mild
| COVID-19 illness, yet one-third continue to have
| lingering effects," she said.
|
| '"Many of these individuals are young and have no pre-
| existing medical conditions, indicating that even
| relatively healthy individuals may face long-term impacts
| from their illness."'
|
| https://www.medpagetoday.com/infectiousdisease/covid19/91
| 270
|
| 0.01%, 33%... Basically a rounding error, right?
| irq11 wrote:
| So your best evidence of this phenomenon is an
| uncontrolled survey of people who knew they had covid,
| asking them if they feel bad? And the most commonly
| reported symptom is _hypertension_ , at 13%?
|
| I'll let the researchers do the talking here:
|
| _"Study limitations include small sample size, single
| study location, and potential bias from self-reported
| symptoms, the researchers acknowledged."_
|
| This is certainly not a rebuttal to the fact that there
| have been hundreds of millions of infections globally,
| yet the cumulative evidence for "long covid" continues to
| be a vague constellation of self-reported, mostly mild
| symptoms in a tiny fraction of people.
|
| If even .1% of 100M infections had severe, long-lasting
| damage, it wouldn't be a debate. There would be hundreds
| of thousands of people to point to.
| TheOtherHobbes wrote:
| There _are_ hundreds of thousands of people to point to.
| You 're just trying to ignore them.
|
| https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/the-tragedy-of-the-
| post-...
|
| How many more cites do you want? There are plenty out
| there.
| sdenton4 wrote:
| That was the "let me Google that for you" response to
| your own completely unsupported claim. It seems like
| you're unwilling to look at evidence contrary to your
| opinions; the 'debate' is amongst deniers who aren't
| looking at evidence. I suggest some self reflection is in
| order; you're arguing with the same tactics as a climate
| change denier.
|
| https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/the-tragedy-of-the-
| post-...
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_COVID
| inglor_cz wrote:
| "Of these, the vast majority (>99.9%) resolve with no
| major sequelae."
|
| Citation needed. > 99.9% is an extraordinary number and
| probably needs extraordinary support.
| cheschire wrote:
| Worldwide deaths are a little over 2% of total cases so
| it doesn't seem extraordinary, just wrong.
| mbrameld wrote:
| Answering these two questions will help you uncover the
| errors in your thought process:
|
| 1. Are masks suggested to protect the wearer from
| contracting the virus or to prevent the wearer from
| spreading the virus?
|
| 2. Are vaccinated individuals still able to host and
| transmit the virus, despite not contracting the disease
| caused by the virus?
| WalterBright wrote:
| > Are vaccinated individuals still able to host and
| transmit the virus, despite not contracting the disease
| caused by the virus?
|
| If that is the case, herd immunity cannot be achieved
| with vaccinations.
| simonh wrote:
| Even if vaccinated people can contract the virus, they
| are likely to fight it off relatively quickly and keep
| the virus load in their bodes low, keeping their chances
| of transmitting it much lower than an unvaccinated person
| would.
|
| Lets say being vaccinated halves your chances of passing
| on the virus compared to an unvaccinated person. If
| almost all the population get vaccinated, we can ease the
| lockdown to the point where we tolerate doubling the
| chances of re-infection. The lockdown easing and
| vaccination effect should cancel out. If vaccination
| reduces your chances of passing on the virus by 10x, then
| we can tolerate a 10x increased risk due to easing
| lockdown measures.
|
| Worst case we may have to retain some limitations in
| social contact for a bit longer, but hopefully nowhere
| near as onerous or we've had to so far.
| WalterBright wrote:
| But if the vaccines don't prevent infection, you won't
| achieve herd immunity until 70% have been infected one
| way or another.
| CA0DA wrote:
| Which is a huge problem.
| throwaway122378 wrote:
| Here we go with the "I know someone that..." stories. Stories
| aren't science. Statically those are extremely rare side
| effects.
| rcpt wrote:
| This kind of thing isn't rare
|
| https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanpsy/article/PIIS2215-0.
| ..
| carbocation wrote:
| The title of this article, which performs an _in vitro_ test, is
| "Neutralizing Antibodies Against SARS-CoV-2 Variants After
| Infection and Vaccination". The editorialization in the current
| Hacker News headline ("Vaccines Are Effective Against Covid
| Variants") is not warranted.
| jquery wrote:
| In other words it's a little early to start the victory chants.
|
| Unfortunately this will get used to justify reckless behavior.
| ttul wrote:
| If I can pass on what I've learned in the past 12 months as a
| newly minted virus enthusiast whose peak education in the area
| was human physiology 101:
|
| "In vitro" means testing outside of the human body. Just
| because a result is confirmed in vitro does not mean it will be
| replicated when tested "in vivo" (in the actual human).
| kweinber wrote:
| In vitro literally means "In glass" (like in a test tube). In
| vivo means "in life" (like IRL)
| 2ion wrote:
| Still not getting my vaccine shots. So great they are, my
| government is sabotaging my safety by continueing to deny me
| access.
| standardUser wrote:
| I don't think I've ever seen an HN thread with so many anecdotes,
| assumptions and off-the-cuff theories and so little data or
| useful links.
| rzzzt wrote:
| I might be missing something. Isn't the report solely about the
| neutralizing capabilities of the Moderna vaccine? What other
| vaccines were tested?
| eqvinox wrote:
| 54 patients total? That's not a sample size to draw strong
| conclusions on :(
| nanidin wrote:
| Assuming normal distribution, the law of large numbers kicks in
| at n=30.
| eqvinox wrote:
| The actual number of examined vaccinated people('s serum) is
| 14. The other 20+20 are acute/recovering cases. (I was being
| generous with the 54.)
|
| Also the page itself says _Limitations include the small
| sample size_ under "Discussion".
| simonebrunozzi wrote:
| It seems that the AstraZeneca vaccine is not effective against
| the South African variant [0].
|
| [0]:
| https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2102214?fbclid=I...
| amelius wrote:
| That's wrt mild to moderate cases. It might still be effective
| against severe cases.
| paulmd wrote:
| nevertheless, you have to actually support that hypothesis
| with research. Just the fact that it's ineffective against
| mild to moderate doesn't mean it _will_ be effective against
| more severe cases. it might _also_ be ineffective against
| severe cases, making it just entirely ineffective against
| those strains.
|
| a year later and people are still trying to twist studies
| into support of their favored medical treatments without
| actual supporting research...
| VBprogrammer wrote:
| > a year later and people are still trying to twist studies
| into support of their favored medical treatments without
| actual supporting research...
|
| This isn't something he has made up on the spot. It's been
| repeated countless times in the British media and
| presumably has some scientific basis. Either that or the
| whole field is keeping quiet on the basis that the UK has a
| large supply of the AZ vaccine and it's better to stop
| deaths from the current dominant strain than to wait for a
| better vaccine. Since the second option requires the
| cooperation of vast number of people I tend to believe the
| former.
| dbetteridge wrote:
| It is being worked on, animal studies only so far with
| human studies to come as SA rolls out their 100k doses of
| AZ I am sure.
|
| Animal model study - Syrian hamsters
| https://academic.oup.com/cid/advance-
| article/doi/10.1093/cid...
| theduder99 wrote:
| good point, it might raise our IQ as well!
| modularform123 wrote:
| They didn't design the study to look for severe cases in
| South Africa and this variant isn't widespread in other
| countries where the vaccine is in use, so it will be hard to
| get evidence on effectiveness against severe disease anytime
| soon.
| WalterBright wrote:
| We've been vaccinating people since December. There ought to be
| statistical evidence now of whether and how much vaccinated
| people still get sick from Covid and its variants. Why do we
| still hear that epidemiologists have no idea about this?
|
| For example, everyone being tested for covid or being admitted to
| the hospital for covid, should be asked if they've been
| vaccinated, when, and which vaccination.
|
| 70 million people in the US have received vaccinations. There
| ought to be plenty of data by now.
| mesozoic wrote:
| Agree we should now have data to look at but don't? They can
| have their kayfabe but when it comes to me injecting stuff to
| believe it I have questions.
| IfOnlyYouKnew wrote:
| There are thousands of actually qualified professionals
| looking at that data, including the licensing bodies of every
| developed nation. The EU has recently gone back-and-forth on
| the AZ vaccine. which would seem to only make sense under the
| assumption that they are actually cognisant of possible risks
| and trying to avoid them (and alternative some might want to
| argue is their hatred of the British, but that cannot explain
| the ultimate resolution, since EU still very much hates at
| least the Johnson government)
|
| If you trust them, get the vaccine. If you don't trust them,
| why would you trust any data they might release?
| yashap wrote:
| We do have real world results, and they're mostly very good.
| For example, analysis of the real world effectiveness of the
| Pfizer vaccine in Israel:
|
| > The latest analysis from the MoH proves that two weeks after
| the second vaccine dose protection is even stronger - vaccine
| effectiveness was at least 97% in preventing symptomatic
| disease, severe/critical disease and death.
|
| https://www.pfizer.com/news/press-release/press-release-deta...
|
| The AstraZeneca vaccine looks not so good, especially against
| the South African variant, but the early real world results for
| the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines look outstanding, and the
| Johnson & Johnson vaccine looks solid.
| Baeocystin wrote:
| Do we have any educated guesses on why we see a difference
| between the J&J shot and the AZ one? Is it just luck of the
| draw regarding different adenovirus vectors, or something
| deeper?
| markus92 wrote:
| For one, AZ doesn't use the pre-fusion stabilized spike
| protein in their vector, while the mRNA and J&J vaccines
| do.
| IfOnlyYouKnew wrote:
| The data from Israel is pretty good:
| https://ourworldindata.org/vaccination-israel-impact
| figaroniguzo wrote:
| To keep the fear and lockdown measures justified.
|
| Just like "we don't know if vaccines affect transmission" or
| "masks work to mitigate the spread" (as if masks were
| discovered in 2020)
| osrec wrote:
| But why? Why would any government want to justify longer than
| needed lockdowns?
| km3r wrote:
| Rather then some government conspiracy , I think it's
| easily explained by media pushing fear to get clicks,
| leading to people supporting unnecessary measures. I still
| talk to people who are afraid to even do outdoor dining
| after they have gotten their second dose (plus 2 weeks
| incubation). People like that vote, post, and message their
| representatives, leading to where we are now.
| IgorPartola wrote:
| Media is funded by advertisers, the same advertiser that
| would greatly benefit from the pandemic ending. Zoom and
| Slack are probably the only stocks that directly benefit
| in the current situation and I don't see any ads for them
| anywhere. Cruise lines are on the other hand huge
| advertisers and are suffering severely right now. Why
| would they want the media to keep causing mass hysteria?
| And if the government is opposed to the media on this,
| why would they issue health guidelines that say we should
| isolate?
| zo1 wrote:
| Depends on how far you want to assume
| nefariousness/conspiracy on the part of "TPTB" or the
| government.
|
| Could just be that it was to help swing a election, or
| allowed them to paint certain parties as "anti-vaxxer
| conspiracy theorists". Maybe it's to cover-up nighttime
| movements by a secretive alien invasion force. Maybe they
| just love what it's doing to the stock market. Perhaps it's
| a bold move by online retailers to kill off small
| businesses or just brick and mortar ones. Maybe they're
| desensitizing us for something bigger. Maybe they're just
| incompetent AF and following along with what the media
| makes them think is what the people want. Maybe it's all
| ad-click and media-consumption driven as one of the other
| posters put it.
|
| My personal take is that they have no clue, and most of
| those in power are just doing things that have been done
| before and doing them only in ways that have been done
| previously.
| offby37years wrote:
| "Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts
| absolutely" -- John Dalberg-Acton
| dekerta wrote:
| That's a nice quote, but still doesn't answer the
| question. No government in their right mind wants to
| continue lockdowns unnecessarily. Lockdowns cost a lot of
| money and make a lot of voters angry
| offby37years wrote:
| Lockdowns were just meant to be for two weeks to "flatten
| the curve", remember?
| arcticbull wrote:
| Unfortunately pesky reality got in the way.
| [deleted]
| oblio wrote:
| Who ever said 2 weeks?
|
| They serve the exact same role they did at the start. If
| we'd open stadiums now the exact same thing will happen,
| that happened 1 year ago.
|
| Lockdowns will continue until we either reach herd
| immunity naturally or through vaccines or we have a
| treatment/mitigation for the disease.
| offby37years wrote:
| Every offical that was selling the initial lockdown. You
| really think the masses would have been OK with a year of
| lockdowns up front?
|
| Your conclusions don't match reality. States like Florida
| have open stadiums and are fairing the same as states
| like California that insist on totalitarian overreach.
| bzzt wrote:
| Well, in Germany three politicians who had to resign
| because of corruption where they had made deals with
| companies manufacturing masks and made hundreds of
| thousands of euros. And this is just facts and no
| conspiracy theories, and I bet this goes on at every
| level. If you find a way to (legitimately) control people
| and peoples behaviours, of course it's lucrative.
| pessimizer wrote:
| You can't just say it's "lucrative." You have to say how.
| Are you saying that a controlling number of powerful
| politicians or their backers are heavily invested in mask
| manufacture, but not in any of the parts of the economy
| that are affected negatively by the lockdowns?
|
| And "hundreds of thousands of Euros?" That's a pittance.
| There has to be more to be made (than maybe enough to buy
| a studio apartment in Berlin) in order to justify the
| shutdown of a large part of world industry.
| oblio wrote:
| That might happen, but when you think about conspiracies,
| always think who would be against them.
|
| Ok, they make money from selling masks. But do you really
| think no shareholders in hotel chains, airlines,
| airports, etc. are trying to push back against that?
|
| Covid is hurting a ton of businesses. A lot of powerful
| people are behind those businesses that feel that pain.
| SteveNuts wrote:
| But don't lockdowns cause a "loss of power" (economic,
| trade, prestige)? This just doesn't make sense to me.
| oblio wrote:
| They do, but people complaining about this tend to
| convenient focus on the powerful people making money
| because of lockdowns while absolutely ignoring the
| powerful people <<losing>> money because of them.
| mrtesthah wrote:
| Your conspiratorial bitterness has no place in a healthy
| discourse. Take it somewhere else.
| dbetteridge wrote:
| Public health England has been tracking that sort of
| information in their SIREN study.
|
| https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/...
| arisAlexis wrote:
| the most bothersome variants (SA,P1 brazil) are not reported in
| the paper
| overcast wrote:
| Good explanation on efficacy of vaccines.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K3odScka55A
| modularform123 wrote:
| The plural 'variants' in the title is a bit misleading. Only one
| of the four viruses they tested is one we are actually concerned
| about at this time. The first is the original virus, which was
| displaced by the second early in the pandemic and against which
| vaccines are already known to be effective. The third one is the
| UK variant, which is of interest and the fourth is an artificial
| virus with a single mutation of interest, which doesn't circulate
| in nature. This is all good but the study doesn't add anything
| that wasn't already known. It appears that better funded groups
| at the NIH, UTMB, Fred Hutch and Columbia beat them to the goal
| and to publication in the even more prestigious publications like
| NEJM and Nature. In any case, reproducing important research is a
| laudable and underrated goal. However, I would suggest a more
| modest title - 'Study adds to data for vaccines' effectiveness
| against the UK variant of SARS-COV-2'.
|
| There are other variants - Brazilian, South African, Californian,
| New York, etc - which need to be studied in more detail. There
| are already data from the aforementioned research groups for at
| least some of these variants that suggest that vaccines will
| continue to be at least partially effective.
| rimliu wrote:
| Nothing is misleading in the title.
| frongpik wrote:
| The title implies that "[All] vaccines are effective against
| [all] variants", but that's a lie. And when people realize
| this, they'll lose trust in vaccines in general.
| cadence- wrote:
| Thanks for sharing this. I actually see very little reporting on
| how this virus spreads among the vaccinated population. I would
| love to see new case numbers broken down by vaccinated and not-
| vaccinated people from countries like UK, US and Israel. So far
| I'm unable to find such data on the internet.
| sjg007 wrote:
| Breakthrough infections have been identified.
|
| https://www.webmd.com/vaccines/covid-19-vaccine/news/2021030...
| jaredsohn wrote:
| This post seems like it might be the closest to what you are
| looking for:
| https://www.reddit.com/r/COVID19/comments/loljxz/effectivene...
| vondur wrote:
| I assume unless the spike protein mutates, these variants would
| still be covered under the current vaccines.
| mcwone wrote:
| A January 2021 study in the annals of internal medicine
| estimating the death rates of non institutionalized patients of
| .26 percent with age breakdowns .
| https://www.acpjournals.org/doi/10.7326/M20-5352?utm_source=...
| ed25519FUUU wrote:
| Some more:
|
| > _Indiana 's IFR for noninstitutionalized persons older than
| 60 years is just below 2% (1 in 50). In comparison, the ratio
| is approximately 2.5 times greater than the estimated IFR for
| seasonal influenza, 0.8% (1 in 125), among those aged 65 years
| and older (5)._
| legulere wrote:
| That is just one factor though in which COVID-19 is worse
| than the seasonal influenza though.
|
| COVID-19 has a basic reproduction number of 3.3 - 5.7, while
| the seasonal influenza has one of 0.9 - 2.1 [1], which means
| that it spreads far more easily. You cannot just wait until
| summer for influenza season to be over.
|
| With influenza you have a higher rate of existing immunity in
| the population. With COVID-19 it is basically non-existent,
| except maybe for a few single people that had SARS or MERS
| before.
|
| Younger people are also more affected [2]
|
| You are longer sick from COVID-19 and if you have to stay in
| the hospital you will stay there longer and are more likely
| to end up on the intensive care unit [2]
|
| In the end you cannot compare a pandemic situation to
| influenza season.
|
| [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_reproduction_number
| [2]: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-021-85081-0
| timr wrote:
| _" Younger people are also more affected [2]"_
|
| The paper you're citing says "younger" means 59, vs 66 for
| influenza:
|
| > Patients with COVID-19 were younger (median age [IQR], 59
| [45-71] vs 66 [52-77]; P < 0001) and had fewer
| comorbidities at baseline with a lower mean overall age-
| adjusted Charlson Comorbidity Index (mean [SD], 3.0 [2.6]
| vs 4.0 [2.7]; P < 0.001) than patients with seasonal
| influenza.
|
| Also, this is data from _a single hospital_ , across two
| different years. The overall trends for SARS-CoV2 are not
| even remotely debatable: the risk of mortality rises
| exponentially with age. It's one of the most striking
| features of the virus. To claim, based on this one paper,
| that "younger people are more affected" is to miss the
| forest for the trees.
|
| _" In the end you cannot compare a pandemic situation to
| influenza season."_
|
| You absolutely can, and in fact, you're _doing it_. What
| you 're trying to say is that Covid is somehow unilaterally
| _much worse_ than influenza, but that isn 't true. It's
| much worse for the elderly (>65), but for most other age
| groups, it's about the same, if not a little bit better.
| You have to squint and split hairs and pick sources
| selectively to start making strong claims of increased
| severity in age groups under ~50, and it's simply not a
| believable claim for people under the age of ~30.
|
| The disease can be bad without exaggerating its threat.
| ed25519FUUU wrote:
| I wasn't comparing it to anything. I was just writing more
| of the _studies_ findings.
| raphaelj wrote:
| That seems pretty low compared to what is happening here in
| Belgium.
|
| We are at 22k deaths with +/- 25% of a 11M of the population
| having been infected (based on serology and statistical
| estimates).
| idoubtit wrote:
| If I'm not mistaken, the rate in the paper is bigger, 0.25%
| against 22k/11M = 0.20% in Belgium.
|
| But if the newspaper I read are right, there is a catch: when
| tests were not available, Belgium counted as a covid death
| every case where it could be suspected. Even nowadays, in
| case of comorbidity, covid is always written down as the
| cause of death. So 22k is probably a maximum, and, taking
| into accound the 25% uncertainty on the denominator, the real
| rate could very different.
| timerol wrote:
| I think you're misreading the comment you replied to. "+/-
| 25% of a 11M of the population having been infected" means
| about 25% of 11M, or 2.75M, officially infected. 22k/2.75M
| would imply a 0.8% fatality rate.
| raphaelj wrote:
| Exactly.
|
| And with respect to the counting, it seems like the
| Belgian numbers more of less match the reported excess
| deaths in 2020 within 10% [1].
|
| [1] https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.01.27.21
| 250604v...
| jquery wrote:
| For every person that dies (an agonizing death akin to medieval
| torture), a few more are in intensive care fighting for their
| lives. For every one of those, others end up in the hospital,
| spread the disease to others, suffer from "long covid", or
| merely suffer greatly. Every person that gets covid adds to the
| likelihood the disease will become uncontrollable in the long
| term and endemic.
|
| Keep wearing your masks and social distancing people. It's
| hard, it's a sacrifice, but together we can conquer this
| disease and return to life "as normal".
| GekkePrutser wrote:
| > Keep wearing your masks and social distancing people. It's
| hard, it's a sacrifice, but together we can conquer this
| disease and return to life "as normal".
|
| This ghost is not going back into the bottle. It's way too
| widespread for that now. Even the WHO has determined that.
| Even if one country manages it, some tourist will bring it
| in.
|
| The vaccines don't stop the spread enough either to kill it
| completely. People will still get sick and spread it, they
| just don't get as sick in large numbers. The simple fact that
| even a country that has the ability to rigidly control all
| outside sources like New Zealand is unable to avoid the
| occasional outbreak. However they do seem to reduce the risk
| of severe illness enough to bring it to a level comparable to
| other endemic diseases. PS: Don't get me wrong, I'm totally
| pro-vaccine and will get at as soon as I finally can.
|
| I really hope that politics will deem the resulting levels
| sufficient to drop the other measures like the masks and
| distancing. Once the danger level is comparable to other
| endemic diseases I think we should.
|
| And I really hope that SARS-CoV-2 mutates to a variant that
| isn't as deadly. Most diseases have, after all as evolution
| favours it (not as deadly means we won't fight it as hard).
| But I doubt we'll ever be COVID free. That point was passed
| once we didn't strictly quarantine China back in Feb 2020.
| But anyway that's water under the bridge.
| maxerickson wrote:
| The vaccines appear to be plenty effective enough to stop
| the spread, if enough people get them.
|
| We don't have great information about the variants, but the
| big improvements in Israel and England are encouraging,
| even with vaccination still ongoing.
| timmytokyo wrote:
| Not sure why the GP is being downvoted. SARS-CoV-2 will
| most likely become endemic.
|
| [1]
| https://science.sciencemag.org/content/370/6516/527.full
| MAGZine wrote:
| > Should reinfection prove commonplace, and barring a
| highly effective vaccine delivered to most of the world's
| population, SARS-CoV-2 will likely become endemic.
|
| The thing is, we don't know if reinfection will prove
| commonplace. We don't know how long immunity will last
| given a two-shot regimen--though the strong immune
| response that people are having on the second shot might
| be cause for hope. We don't know how the virus will
| mutate on it's point/spike, the main infection vector
| that the RNA vax target. We just don't know.
|
| Research is emerging, time will tell. In the meantime,
| it's fear mongering.
| GekkePrutser wrote:
| Well I will get the vaccine as soon as I can get it
| (which is not very soon, sadly). I'm not anti-vax, but
| the last few weeks the news has been all about "Don't be
| surprised if people still get COVID after being
| vaccinated". Like here:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26522853
|
| With that in mind I don't think eradication will be
| achievable. It only takes one person with a resistant
| mutation. I think we can hope to bring it under control.
| But not eradicate it.
| maxerickson wrote:
| What does 'control' mean? In humans, if a small number of
| people are sick and you know who they are, you can
| eradicate the infection with isolation (it would only
| take a couple months).
|
| That it infects various animals may make that unworkable,
| and the difficulty in vaccinating a large percentage of
| people globally is another problem.
|
| But the effectiveness of the vaccines against the current
| variants does not appear to be a problem, high levels of
| vaccination will slow the spread of the virus
| dramatically in those populations, to the point where it
| barely exists (compare to polio, which is still endemic
| in some places around the world).
| inglor_cz wrote:
| As far as zoonosis (animal-transmitted human diseases)
| go...
|
| Rabies infects a lot of animals, but many places of the
| world are now effectively rabies-free thanks to smart
| inoculation of foxes etc. with baits.
|
| We had last proven rabies case in the wild in 2002. (The
| Czech Republic, a landlocked continental country, not an
| isolated island.)
|
| You can still fall to rabies contracted from bats if
| _extremely_ unlucky, but compared to countries like India
| where the disease still runs rampant, rabies is a solved
| problem in most of Europe.
|
| Maybe there will be a similar way to inoculate the wild
| mustelids against Covid one day. To be honest, human
| antivaxxers strike me as a bigger problem than random
| mink. I don't meet many mink on a regular day, but people
| with their masks halfway down are all too common.
| maxerickson wrote:
| Yeah, I would describe myself as optimistic that we can
| achieve a good outcome and concerned that we'll
| collectively make choices that delay it.
|
| Convincing other people to stay optimistic can be part of
| improving the choices we make.
| tamaharbor wrote:
| Sounds a lot like the flu.
| idoubtit wrote:
| > For every person that dies (an agonizing death akin to
| medieval torture)
|
| I think this is wrong, at least in rich countries, at least
| those that are sane enough to cure their ill citizens.
|
| A friend of mine died of covid last year. Then a family
| member this year. They were both sedated, and did not suffer
| at all on their last days in hospitals.
| jquery wrote:
| Sedation is death with a respiratory illness like this. How
| were they feeling before they were sedated? Probably like
| they'd been drowning for hours. For all intents and
| purposes, that was the end of their life as far as their
| experience of it.
|
| Don't get me wrong, it's great that we can provide
| palliative comfort for those final hours/days. But it
| doesn't tell the full story.
| mlyle wrote:
| Just for clarity/augmentation/pedantic detail: you might
| be sedated and end up an a ventilator.
|
| But ventilators are really bad for COVID survival and
| really a last ditch, long-shot chance try to salvage your
| life. Practitioners hold off on the sedation and
| associated required ventilation as long as possible to
| try and spare your life.
| mrfusion wrote:
| I don't see any reason new variants would ever stop coming.
| What are you proposing is the end point of all of this?
| inglor_cz wrote:
| New variants are going to come, but vaccinated people may
| have some protection against them, or they may recieve a
| booster tailored to new variants, if they are extra
| vulnerable.
|
| Also, treatments are being developed. If we can turn future
| variants of Covid into something like a common cold, we are
| going to be fine living with it. We just need to prevent
| bilateral pneumonia with a cytokine storm that threatens to
| kill the patient.
| acdha wrote:
| Think about what leads to new variants: every time someone
| is infected, the virus replicates and has 10e9 chances to
| come up with something which is advantageous for it. If,
| like the U.K variant, it lucks into someone with a
| compromised immune system it might get even more chances to
| evolve an effective combination.
|
| The way we get it to stop winning is to stop buying it
| lottery tickets. Masks, vaccines, and other measures like
| paid sick leave cut into that number enormously.
| evgen wrote:
| Here is something for you to consider: this is the new
| 'normal'.
|
| That world you lived in 18 months ago? Gone. Not coming
| back. There is no 'end point', it just goes on and we learn
| to adapt. Eventually we get better at it, learn more about
| what is and is not a risk, and a few things start to look
| like the 2019, but most things don't go back.
|
| This is the reality you need to adjust to.
| feanaro wrote:
| Why are you saying this with such an absolute certainty
| without providing a convincing argument?
| jonplackett wrote:
| Regular vaccinations, just like the flu
| raducu wrote:
| Plus widely available monoclonal antibodies to be
| administered as soon as a positive test.
|
| Plus the development of other antivirals.
| psychlops wrote:
| The immune system still works as advertised.
| jquery wrote:
| What's the purpose of comments like this?
|
| EDIT: I see someone mentioning Trump below and I can't reply.
| Trump was never interested in managing covid-19 or effective
| border control. This would've been the perfect opportunity for
| him to show why having _smart_ borders was useful. He would've
| received support from within the government. He would've
| managed covid-19 successfully perhaps, and won re-election.
|
| The problem was Trump was a completely ineffective and
| incompetent leader, who didn't care at all about the things he
| claimed to care about. Mandatory quarantines and tests for
| people traveling to America would've been a lot of _work_ and
| Trump was allergic to that. He was a man who preferred the
| cheers at his rallies over the difficult work of administrating
| and governing.
| war1025 wrote:
| Probably that patience has worn thin for the extremely overly
| cautious people who have been hiding in their homes for a
| year when they are realistically at zero risk of severe
| illness.
|
| We have known since early summer of last year that being fat
| or being old are your two biggest risk factors. Beyond that,
| if you have some serious pre-existing condition that makes
| you susceptible to all illnesses.
|
| The messaging should have been "Stay home if you are a high
| risk group. Otherwise live your live." All current data shows
| areas that have taken that approach are significantly better
| off today than the places that hid in a hole the past year.
|
| We have let people treat this like it's an end of the world
| scenario and it's been good for no one.
| jquery wrote:
| So you'd prefer we be like Brazil?
|
| Because the alternative for us was not Taiwan or Korea.
| They went far and beyond what Americans were willing to
| tolerate.
|
| Never mind the bad statistics behind your claim that covid
| is no worse than the flu. A athlete friend of mine in his
| 20s has permanent heart damage caused by the virus.
| Covid-19 is not a joke, no matter how much you wish it was.
|
| Americans could be out free, today, if we took this virus
| more seriously from the start. Now people like you want to
| make the disease endemic when the end is in sight.
| AlchemistCamp wrote:
| Because the alternative for us was not Taiwan or Korea.
| They went far and beyond what Americans were willing to
| tolerate.
|
| I'm in Taiwan (and was for SARS in 2003). We had early
| travel restrictions and have to quarantine for 14-days
| after returning from abroad, and have to wear a mask on
| the subway.
|
| For the past few months there's been a mask rule at some
| indoor venues but it still allows for restaurants and
| bars to stay open and maskless. There was a marathon a
| few months ago with tens of thousands of people.
|
| There hasn't been a lockdown here. Businesses haven't
| been wrecked. The economy is great. What was so "far and
| beyond what Americans were willing to tolerate"?
|
| Edit: serious question here! I know there's quite a bit
| of ignorance about Taiwan internationally, but the rules
| truly have not been onerous at all. It's gone well
| because of travel restrictions and an, IMO, justified
| trust in civic institutions.
| mafribe wrote:
| I agree, Taiwan of all countries arguably handled Covid
| best. It seems irresponsible to discuss Covid policies
| without reference to, and good understanding of, Taiwan.
|
| I found that people in the West, often simply don't
| believe me when I tell them that Taiwan didn't lock down
| at all, and had hardly any Covid deaths. Reactions I have
| come across have been: "yeah but Taiwan is a
| dictatorship" and "They are lying about numbers ..." The
| amount of ignorance is astonishing.
|
| I think it's a psychological problem: most people are
| perfectly happy to believe that their home countries have
| somewhat flawed political systems, but find it near
| impossible to accept that they are orders of magnitude
| worse than some others.
| tstrimple wrote:
| > What was so "far and beyond what Americans were willing
| to tolerate"?
|
| All of these things:
|
| > We had early travel restrictions and have to quarantine
| for 14-days after returning from abroad, and have to wear
| a mask on the subway.
|
| There have been multiple people shot for the audacity of
| asking customers to weak masks.
| scrollaway wrote:
| There aren't only americans on this site. FWIW as a
| european (Belgium resident), your statement doesn't
| apply. Belgium did a shitty job since the second wave: We
| didn't go far enough and only applied a weak lockdown
| which has been in effect since _October_. So life here
| has been just bad enough to test everybody 's patience
| for about six months. And now we're in a new uptick and
| everyone's losing their shit.
|
| Korea meanwhile applied strict, severe, surgical
| lockdowns and then were able to fully reopen after
| containment.
|
| People haven't been able to go see their families out of
| the country. I've not been able to practice my sport
| (figure skating) since October (they even banned it
| outdoors during winter!!). And there is a pages-long,
| ever-changing document on social bubbles, checklists on
| who you can see which take things such as age and
| household size into account, etc. It's dumb, people don't
| follow it, and it has deeply eroded trust in
| institutions, and it has pushed people into antivax
| groups because those are the most vocal ones against
| measures like these (so they are the sole ones sounding
| like the voice of reason).
|
| The "alternative" to the above is not brazil, and I would
| personally much rather be in Korea.
|
| And these measures, while on paper sound like they're
| slowing the spread, are also pushing people to be against
| government measures as a whole and feed into much more
| dangerous sentiments. Would you apply a measure that
| reduces the spread by 0.1% if it also meant a 0.1%
| decrease in mask usage? Or a 0.25% decrease in vaccine
| uptake? What if you can't know any of those numbers, you
| just know they exist?
|
| ----
|
| Edit: Just to really drive home my point: I've been
| advocating for this for months. Just as I posted this
| comment, the following article shows up on the Brussels
| Times: "Belgium needs a short 'real' lockdown, warns
| expert"
|
| https://www.brusselstimes.com/news/belgium-all-
| news/161157/b...
| hef19898 wrote:
| All EU countries screwed up, not just Belgium. Case in
| point, German states agreed on an "emergency brake" once
| cases increase over 100 per 100k, 7 day average. Now we
| are there, 3 days in a row. So, one would assume they
| would close schools again. No, because it has to be 3
| days in a row, weekends don't count so. After that, two
| days to implement measures. Which means schools will be
| open next week despite a heavy case load. Only to fulfill
| the political goal of opening schools before Easter.
| Nevermind we will close down everything after Easter
| through April.
|
| There is no strategy, no planning, no logic involved.
| yorwba wrote:
| The whole concept of restrictions that only apply for
| high infection rates shows lack of foresight.
|
| If you have a way to halve new infections in x weeks, you
| can wait for y weeks during which infections double, then
| apply your countermeasures and after x+y weeks you're
| back where you started.
|
| Or you could start implementing countermeasures
| immediately, ease up after x weeks, and after y weeks of
| growth you're also back where you started.
|
| The only difference between the scenarios is the
| ordering, but the first leads to a mountain of infections
| and the second to a valley, i.e. lower total case count
| and fewer deaths. (Also a chance of extinction if the
| expected number of infected falls below 1.)
|
| So anything you're willing to do when 100 of 100k are
| infected is just as good when it's 50 of 100k or really
| any number greater than zero.
| hef19898 wrote:
| The funny thing is, the 50, or 100, is completely
| arbitrary. Initially it was 50 because authorities
| couldn't follow up cases above that. They couldn't below
| 50, as it turned out. Also, this threshold changes as
| seems fit. When 50 wasn't realistic anymore it became
| 100. Only for one state to choose 200. It is utter chaos.
| And still, a majority still supports these measures.
| Funny times indeed.
| rconti wrote:
| I'm a healthy male who's been "hiding in [my] home for a
| year". I mean, other than shopping trips, and running, and
| cycling, and skiing, and.. However, I've done no social
| events, seen no friends, etc.
|
| But, sorry if you think trying to avoid illness, trying to
| avoid passing on illness to others who don't have the
| comfort of working from home, passing on the illness to
| elderly family members, etc, is a waste of time. It's a
| pretty minor inconvenience for me to be largely isolated
| for a year, compared to those who are less fortunate than
| me.
|
| How about a big 'ol [citation needed] on
|
| > All current data shows areas that have taken that
| approach are significantly better off today than the places
| that hid in a hole the past year.
|
| You know, a citation that doesn't involve correlation with
| countries that happened to have extreme lockdowns
| initially, acceptance of mass testing and screening and
| social restriction when necessary, etc.
|
| By the way, my wife works in rehab in a hospital, and sees
| your "low risk" young people whose lives have been, as far
| as we can tell, permanently altered by the virus that
| _some_ of us are seeking to avoid.
| raducu wrote:
| This whole situation is just so sad.
|
| My uncle is in the hospital in pretty bad shape, on
| oxygen so far. He was spewing conspiracy shit non-stop on
| facebook. My father urged him to take the vaccine, then
| to come to the hospital sooner, he did a CT scan on my
| uncle, told him, showed him how messed up his lungs were,
| my uncle refused to be administered in the hospital, made
| a big fuss that the doctors wanted to kill him in the
| ICU; two days later he was brought in in an ambulancr.
|
| If he was a stranger, maybe I would have laughed "serves
| you right", I just cannot understand how an above average
| intelligence person got himself brainwashed with anti-
| covid conspiracy theories.
| cassalian wrote:
| It's nice that you have been able to deal well with the
| situation this last year, but try to remember that your
| experience is not necessarily representative of the
| whole:
|
| > The districts, large and small, rural and urban, serve
| more than 2.2 million students across the United States.
| Of the 74 districts that responded, 74% reported multiple
| indicators of increased mental health stresses among
| students. More than half reported rises in mental health
| referrals and counseling. Nearly 90% of responding
| districts cited higher rates of absenteeism or
| disengagement, metrics commonly used to gauge student
| emotional health
|
| https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-
| report/health-c...
| (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26532588)
| mynameisvlad wrote:
| > All current data shows areas that have taken that
| approach are significantly better off today than the places
| that hid in a hole the past year.
|
| Source?
|
| I'd argue current data shows that those that showed an
| overabundance of caution, like New Zealand, are the ones
| _significantly_ better off than everyone else.
| war1025 wrote:
| > like New Zealand,
|
| You mean an island nation with strict control over their
| ports and borders?
| Spivak wrote:
| And had mandatory lockdowns
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| Mandatory lockdowns make a lot more sense when you're an
| island nation that can plausibly eradicate the disease.
| You reasonably can expect a month of pain and then resume
| business as usual, but the America's, Europe, and Asian
| enjoy no such hope.
| Spivak wrote:
| I know! Which is why it's silly to use NZ as an example
| of anything.
| war1025 wrote:
| Mandatory lockdowns are like cancer surgery. They can be
| very effective if everything is still localized, but if
| the cancer has already metastasized, it really doesn't
| solve the problem.
| Spivak wrote:
| I'm not saying it would actually solve anything in the
| US, only that you can't just say "look NZ resumed
| business as usual -- the US should too!" because the
| situations are not at all similar.
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| Not sure why this is downvoted; it's absolutely correct.
| European, Asian, and North/South American supply chains
| are internally integrated. A truck driver transports
| goods from the Czech Republic to France and unloads them
| at the destination. For New Zealand it's not like the
| ship's crew is unloading goods at the last mile. A
| similar effect is at play in Hawaii, but the latter can't
| deny entry to US residents because unlike New Zealand it
| isn't a sovereign nation.
| yorwba wrote:
| > European, Asian, and North/South American supply chains
| are internally integrated. A truck driver transports
| goods from the Czech Republic to France and unloads them
| at the destination.
|
| But does that truck driver need to have direct contact
| with other people to do their job? Why can't they unload
| their cargo, sleep at a quarantine facility, and then
| drive a new truckload in the opposite direction, without
| an opportunity to infect anyone else?
|
| Also, island nations still have internal traffic. What's
| different about the borders between parts of Australia
| that allowed them to be closed when European borders had
| to stay open?
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| > Island nations still have internal traffic
|
| Internal traffic among 4 million people is a much easier
| problem than traffic among a continent of 800 million
| people.
|
| > But does that truck driver need to have direct contact
| with other people to do their job?
|
| I'm sure there are better ways to do things, but truck
| drivers often unload shipments, confirm receipts, etc and
| they still need to visit truck stops and restaurants for
| supplies, food, etc.
|
| > Why can't they unload their cargo, sleep at a
| quarantine facility, and then drive a new truckload in
| the opposite direction, without an opportunity to infect
| anyone else?
|
| Quarantining between shipments would mean drivers are
| mostly idle, driving the cost of shipping through the
| roof. Changing supply contracts so drivers exchange cargo
| at the border requires completely reworking highly
| optimized logistics networks and isn't going to happen in
| a few years, certainly not by fiat from some bureaucrat
| or politician that has no experience in logistics.
| yorwba wrote:
| > Internal traffic among 4 million people is a much
| easier problem than traffic among a continent of 800
| million people.
|
| Can you fill in the details of how exactly it is easier?
|
| > Quarantining between shipments would mean drivers are
| mostly idle, driving the cost of shipping through the
| roof.
|
| Well, if they don't need to sleep between shipments, I
| guess they can drive back directly and get their supplies
| and food at home. I wasn't suggesting a full two-week
| quarantine if they don't intend to have any contact with
| locals anyway, just staying for the night isolated from
| anyone they could potentially infect.
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| New Zealand's results are largely due to it being a
| small, isolated nation. Hawaii similarly enjoys the
| fewest COVID cases per capita of the US.
| ghaff wrote:
| And furthermore their border is still essentially closed.
| Their approach was almost certainly the right one for
| them but locking down access in that way was never
| practical for most countries.
| donovanian wrote:
| You're totally right. It's strange to see random self-
| righteous, presumably highly-educated, safety-minded
| people suggest that the US should just be New Zealand.
| There's been some really wildly unworkable things offered
| as though it's just obviously correct.
| mynameisvlad wrote:
| Hawaii, the only state that requires a COVID test within
| 36 hours of flying there? I mean, of course they'd have
| the lowest cases per capita when they're the only ones
| actively refusing entry to those who have it.
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| How many entry points does Hawaii have compared to the
| average state? How do those points of entry compare in
| terms of staff and systems to operate those restrictions?
| Hawaii gets a lot more mileage out of its restrictions
| than Iowa is going to do. We can acknowledge these
| differences without conceding that restrictions aren't
| worth the squeeze; it just means that New Zealand isn't a
| good reference point.
| ghaff wrote:
| A fair number of states did have travel restrictions in
| place but there were oodles of exceptions and AFAIK no
| real enforcement although it probably did limit cross-
| border travel some.
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| Right, but if all states had a handful of ports of entry
| manned by TSA who could enforce those restrictions and
| supply chains that were already inadvertently optimized
| to prevent disease transmission, then the US would
| probably look a lot more like New Zealand!
| ghaff wrote:
| And if I looked like an eagle I could flap my wings and
| fly.
|
| We didn't even shutdown widespread commercial traffic
| between the US and Canada (although otherwise travel was
| largely shut down).
| throwaway894345 wrote:
| > And if I looked like an eagle I could flap my wings and
| fly.
|
| ???
|
| > We didn't even shutdown widespread commercial traffic
| between the US and Canada (although otherwise travel was
| largely shut down).
|
| Why bother? It's not like any significant number of
| transmissions are coming via commercial transit with
| Canada. I don't pretend to be an epidemiologist but it
| seems pretty intuitive that a small island nation and one
| of the largest countries are going to differ.
| ghaff wrote:
| I think I misread the tone of your reply. Yes, the
| situations are nothing like the same and the idea that
| the US could have been just like NZ if only is silly.
| war1025 wrote:
| Almost like having strong borders is useful.
|
| Not a very compelling argument when the same people most
| in favor of Covid restrictions also spent five years
| calling Republicans the devil for wanting to reinforce
| our borders.
|
| Also the US has open borders between states on the
| mainland. Any individual state besides Hawaii never had
| even the possibility of isolating themselves.
| mynameisvlad wrote:
| What does building a wall have to do with policies to
| prevent the spread of contagious diseases? Jack squat.
| heterodoxxed wrote:
| | _they are realistically at zero risk of severe illness._
|
| I didn't do it for me.
| war1025 wrote:
| Every single person who "didn't do it for me" relied on
| an enormous network of people putting themselves at risk
| daily to keep the supply chains functioning.
|
| It's virtuization of fear and little else.
| heterodoxxed wrote:
| | _at risk daily to keep the supply chains functioning_
|
| That sounds like crocodile tears to me. I don't see how
| going to bars and flying commercial would have made the
| people working in grocery delivery and amazon safer.
|
| And it would absolutely have put the people in my life
| who are at the highest risk at an even greater risk if I
| had done so.
| jstanley wrote:
| I'm confused. Is it a risk or is it not a risk?
| anoncake wrote:
| That, or "Covid behaves like viruses usually do", describes
| plenty of headlines of the past _15 months_. Remember how
| everyone was worried that antibody levels drop after an
| infection? Judging by the media coverage, you 'd think memory
| cells and T cells were a recent, Covid-related discovery.
| We've known about them since the sixties and they continue to
| work as advertised.
| yosito wrote:
| And it just so happens, vaccines are made based on knowledge of
| how the immune system works. Yay science!
| yawaworht1978 wrote:
| I am very clueless on the vaccine topic (not a denier of covid or
| anti vaxxer). All I know is from listening to some interviews
| with a scientist in the field.
|
| But i still do not know what is the definition of "effective
| vaccine". What does it do? If you have covid and take the
| vaccine, will the covid go away? Are you still contagious after
| having the vaccine or can you still get the covid but without the
| bad effects? What kind of immunity is given by the vaccine and
| how long does it last?
|
| All I remember is that scientist said that herd immunity will
| likely never happen, or not in a long time(years, according to
| him).
|
| There are too little comprehensive sources on the matter and too
| much superficial noise.
|
| Thanks for any input.
| oblio wrote:
| Well, based on my understanding, we don't know for sure.
|
| What we do know, is that they give you a much higher chance of
| avoiding serious symptoms, including that most serious of
| symptoms, death. You won't be "virus-proof" completely, but
| someone vaccinated fully (so 2 doses for vaccines which require
| it), after a certain immunization period, which varies between
| 2-4 weeks after being fully vaccinated, will be super resilient
| to being in contact with Covid patients. Don't go get coughed
| on by 10 Covid patients, though.
|
| Regarding contagion, apparently after vaccination, you can
| still get Covid with most vaccines, you just become
| "asymptomatic", i.e. it doesn't really affect you. However it
| seems that you're also much less contagious, which is still
| great, since it reduces the infection rate, it becomes much
| harder to spread it.
|
| If you get Covid while immunity from vaccination hasn't kicked
| in fully... you can still be screwed. People have died 1 week
| after being vaccinated. So you probably want to stay put for a
| while until your immunity ramps up.
|
| Regarding immunity, as I was saying, it's primarily lack of
| serious symptoms. I think they also make it harder for you to
| catch it, but I don't think we have super solid proof of this
| yet.
|
| And for immunity, it's hard to say. We're basically just
| counting up days from initial vaccinations to see how long it
| lasts. For the other vaccines we know the time intervals
| because... time has passed. So far, for the current vaccines it
| seems that immunity is at least 6+ months. From what I've read
| we should be reasonably optimistic that we'll be immune for 1+
| years. I don't think anyone expects lifetime immunity, yet.
|
| TL;DR: Get vaccinated, it will keep you much safer, it will
| probably also help others around you, by making you spread it
| less if you do get it. You'll still get Covid but it will be
| much less of a deal. Side effects are temporary and not massive
| in the vast majority of cases.
| throwaway122378 wrote:
| How many million people have the vaccine globally? 100-200m?
| Yet we don't simply know the very basic feature of a vaccine?
| And you want everyone to just take it. L. O. L.
| exyi wrote:
| For complete herd immunity we'd need something like 100% that
| about 80% percent take, which is hard. So, our current goal is
| to get rid of the bad effects of Covid by limiting spread and
| limiting severe symptoms.
|
| > But i still do not know what is the definition of "effective
| vaccine".
|
| I'm not aware of a rigorous definition, but effective vaccine
| is something that helps us significantly to accomplish the
| goal. All the vaccines provide very good (90%+) protection from
| severe symptoms and it seems to be good even with the current
| variants. The protection is not as good against any kind of
| infection, but it is still very significant (like at least 66%
| even with some variants).
|
| > If you have covid and take the vaccine, will the covid go
| away?
|
| No, you have to take the vaccine before Covid. Usually it takes
| some time before the vaccine is efficient. Like you have to
| patch your server before it becomes part of a botnet.
|
| > Are you still contagious after having the vaccine
|
| You may be, but with significantly lower probability.
|
| > can you still get the covid but without the bad effects?
|
| This seems likely outcome of being vaccinated - your body will
| somehow already know what to do and will with the virus faster.
|
| > What kind of immunity is given by the vaccine and how long
| does it last?
|
| We'll see how long it lasts. It does not seem to be
| diminishing, so it should be at least a year or so. From the
| experience from other vaccines, it will probably last longer,
| but there is the risk of new strains that evade it.
| IfOnlyYouKnew wrote:
| Assuming your chance of getting COVID is "100", two weeks after
| vaccination your chance of getting it will have dropped to "3"
| and your chance of dying from it will be "0". Changes to your
| ability to have a symptomless infection and transmit it to
| others aren't entirely clear yet, but seem to tend towards the
| "3" as well.
|
| This is for the mRNA vaccines (Pfizer & Moderna). The others
| are potentially slightly less effective in preventing
| infection, but seem to be just about as good in preventing
| serious courses and death.
| ddek wrote:
| Vaccines are ways to mimic infection (hopefully) without the
| side effects of real infection, like getting sick.
|
| The immune system is complex and layered. The body's primary
| response to an infection is to make the body inhospitable. We
| know this as a fever. Some infections, like the common cold,
| are defeated here.
|
| There are more tools available for more resilient infections,
| one being _antibody production_. Antibodies are proteins that
| bind to pathogens, to act as a marker. Once marked, other
| mechanisms (white blood cells) can clean up.
|
| It takes time for the immune system to design an antibody that
| can identify the pathogen. The produced antibodies generally
| hang around for a few months, or longer. This is driven by
| chemical factors. Fortunately, _Memory T-Cells_ will last a lot
| longer, and these contain the information needed to identify
| the pathogen and produce new antibodies. If the same pathogen
| appears again, antibodies can be produced quickly.
|
| An _antigen_ is anything that triggers an immune response. This
| includes pollen, if you have hay fever. In the context of
| COVID, the antigens are usually _spike proteins_ , which stick
| out from the surface of the virus.
|
| It's also worth noting that this process isn't perfect.
| Exposure does not mean immunity. Immunity is not binary,
| either. T-Cells may prevent symptoms entirely, or their may be
| a lag.
|
| So, now I think I can answer your questions.
|
| The vaccine provides the antigens using a form of COVID that
| won't, or shouldn't, cause infection. This will still cause an
| immune response, which may be strong enough to cause side
| effects. The body will see the antigens and generate
| antibodies. The antigen/antibody combination is stored in
| memory T-cells. This process takes several weeks, and is
| strengthened by a second exposure.
|
| If you already have COVID, unfortunately the vaccine won't
| help. Vaccines are primarily preventative. There are a few
| diseases with post-exposure vaccination (anthrax), but there
| are usually many contingencies involved. If you have had COVID,
| you should still get the vaccine, because you are not
| guaranteed immunity.
|
| You may still be contagious or symptomatic after having the
| vaccine, but this should (at least) be reduced. There is still
| a lag between becoming infected and immune response, even if
| you have immunity. This will be much shorter in the immune
| group, however.
|
| It's hard to say how long immunity will last for. On an
| individual level, you can find pessimistic cases indicating
| very short immunity. Remember everyone's response is unique,
| and unlikely cases are usually most reported. The wildcard is a
| mutated virus evading immunity. To eliminate COVID would be to
| vaccinate the world, which is highly unlikely given substantial
| portions of the world haven't yet admitted they have it.
| davak wrote:
| This was not testing against the South African and Japan/Brazil
| variants that are much more likely to escape vaccination
| antibodies. This UK variant is mostly problematic against the
| unvaccinated.
|
| In the lab the South Africa and Japan/Brazil variants have severe
| reduction in neutralizing antibodies which is very concerning for
| vaccine escape. That being said, we don't have a great way to
| test for T cell and other immunity which also plays a role.
| Getting the vaccine decreases severity of illness regardless of
| the variant.
|
| The answer is get any vaccine as soon as possible. Then get the
| booster too when it's available.
| ta8645 wrote:
| This is good news. Now maybe Fauci should rethink his idea that
| people need to wear their masks for another year even after
| getting vaccinated. One of his reasons was because of worry about
| the variants.
| halfmatthalfcat wrote:
| Wearing masks have benefits beyond covid. Think about how many
| lives per year we could save from the flu let alone other
| airborne respiratory viruses if mask wearing was normalized.
| JasonFruit wrote:
| Wearing foam rubber padding all the time has benefits, but
| that doesn't mean everyone should do it. There are other
| considerations beyond mere safety.
| brandon272 wrote:
| Wearing a mask is a lot more convenient than foam rubber
| padding.
| ghaff wrote:
| Or at least bike helmets all the time. Lots of people get
| seriously injured or killed because of falling and hitting
| their head.
|
| I expect mask wearing will be more common in cultures where
| it was almost unheard of like western Europe and the US.
| But even in a country like Japan where it wasn't unusual,
| it certainly wasn't anything like the norm.
| postalrat wrote:
| Just think of how many lives will be saved if people never
| leave their homes.
| mrfusion wrote:
| I've heard it argued that our immune systems need exposure to
| germs to keep them effective.
| bluGill wrote:
| I've heard that too. But never does anyone back it up with
| anything that could be remotely called good science.
| jimbob45 wrote:
| Agreed. I think of the 5+ times I've gotten sick from planes
| and airports and I kick myself for not having worn masks
| during air travel in years past.
| ghaff wrote:
| You probably need everyone else wearing masks to have a big
| effect and that's not likely to be the case going forward
| although you can obviously take whatever precautions you
| like.
| brandon272 wrote:
| It's bizarre to me that so many people seem to equate not
| having to wear a mask as the ultimate return to normal.
|
| Mask wearing is probably the least invasive, least
| inconveniencing thing that we have been asked to do throughout
| this pandemic, yet half the population acts as if it is the
| equivalent to being handcuffed to a steel post in their
| basement.
|
| If health officials said "after being vaccinated, do whatever
| you want, please just wear a mask for the next year and wash
| your hands while we monitor efficacy", that would be a success
| story with respect to returning to normal, to me at least.
| IfOnlyYouKnew wrote:
| He's mostly just managing expectations. One problem starting to
| trouble public health professionals is the wish of vaccinated
| people to ditch masks even before enough people are vaccinated
| to reach herd immunity: since it is not easily visible if
| someone is vaccinated (and even then...) the appearance of more
| and more unmasked people in stores etc. could lead to a
| breakdown in adherence.
|
| There will come a time, in early summer for the US, late summer
| for most of Europe, when it'll be safe to take of the mask.
| Until then, it's a minor annoyance.
| idoubtit wrote:
| The current HN title deviates from the original title in a way
| that is misleading. "Vaccines Are Effective Against Covid
| Variants" is a wrong affirmation. The original article only
| states that in vitro experiments show that some vaccines are
| effective against some variants. Not all vaccines, not all
| variants, and no test on human beings.
|
| A counter point is that some vaccines seem to be ineffective
| agains some variants. For instance AstraZeneca against B.A.351
| (South-Africa). From a preprint: "Conclusions A two-dose regimen
| of ChAdOx1-nCoV19 did not show protection against mild-moderate
| Covid-19 due to B.1.351 variant, however, VE against severe
| Covid-19 is undetermined."
| https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.02.10.21251247v...
|
| The US CDC does state that, according to current publications,
| some variants present a "moderate reduction on neutralization".
| Their page about "Variants of Interest" and "Variants of Concern"
| mentions many scientific papers.
| https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/cases-updates/vari...
| dbetteridge wrote:
| I've posted this before regarding the SA paper on AZ, worth
| taking a look at the below.
|
| The probable outcome is minor to moderate symptoms that would
| normally be blocked by antibodies can still present (So no
| reduced transmission) but severe symptoms are still prevented
| by the vaccinated patients T-cells response.
|
| This paper is looking at a small scale human study in SA with
| mostly younger participants, which does make the results
| difficult to apply to the wider population. They also only use
| a 4 week dosing schedule where the suggestion and actual
| rollout in the UK is following the 10-12 week schedule between
| first and second doses which was shown to increase efficacy
| from ~70 to ~80% after the second dose (UK - Kent variant)
|
| The variant in question seems to escape the majority of
| Antibody detection, but T-Cells still seem to provide
| significant protection against severe disease and death.
|
| https://academic.oup.com/cid/advance-article/doi/10.1093/cid...
|
| https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.03.11.435000v1
|
| The main published results aren't yet from human scale studies
| but here is one in hamsters showing a comparison in organ
| damage and results between unvaccinated and vaccinated with the
| Oxford/AZ vaccine.
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