[HN Gopher] Delaying a Covid vaccine's second dose boosts immune...
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Delaying a Covid vaccine's second dose boosts immune response
Author : throwkeep
Score : 175 points
Date : 2021-05-14 17:17 UTC (5 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.nature.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.nature.com)
| heavymark wrote:
| ...in those over 80... the study says for those only reading the
| title.
| sp3000 wrote:
| I agree that is an important point. While that was the
| population that was tested, I think it is OK to infer that
| there would be a similar response to those under 80 as well.
| ipaddr wrote:
| We can hope and guess it will work at the same rate but
| because the response to covid between the youngest and the
| oldest have been so different we would have to assume it's
| probably different to some degree.
| thepangolino wrote:
| Those over 80 make up half of the covid death count. I'd say
| that's pretty encouraging.
| sharken wrote:
| India seems to be a special case, as only 4.8% of the
| population is above 65.
|
| https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2021/04/will-india-s-
| devasta...
|
| Apart from India it seems that Japan should take notes, it's
| quite a surprise to me that only 1% of the population has
| been fully vaccinated.
|
| No wonder they are reluctant to let spectators be present for
| the olympics.
|
| https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2021/05/only-1-japan-
| fully-v...
| elif wrote:
| I was just watching on NHK that the N501Y mutated strain in
| Japan is putting healthy 30-60 year olds in hospital care
| 66% more often.
|
| They are actively cancelling Olympic training events and
| reducing paralympic events, and only 10% of Tokyo residents
| surveyed said they are happy the games are going to
| continue as planned.
| sharken wrote:
| Yes it doesn't look good for Japan which also have one of
| the oldest populations in the world.
|
| In Denmark the English B.1.1.7 variant needed about 3
| weeks to become dominant, though it's a bit unclear which
| variant will become the dominant one in Japan.
|
| Some additional links
|
| https://asia.nikkei.com/Spotlight/Coronavirus/COVID-
| variants...
|
| https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/science/science
| -br...
|
| And a link that gives some insight as to why Japan have
| vaccinated so few.
|
| https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.washingtonpost.com/opini
| ons...
| hervature wrote:
| We'll soon find out from Canada what the effects of a 4 month gap
| does to response for all age groups.
| x86ARMsRace wrote:
| As a Canadian (read: lab rat) I'm hoping this forced experiment
| I'm participating in, run by someone with no scientific
| background, ends well also. Thousands of lives are depending on
| what, at this point, amounts to a gamble on minimal evidence.
| jeromegv wrote:
| This was not a personal decision from the prime minister,
| this is from the National Advisory Committee on Immunization.
| You can disagree of course, but let's not lie and pretend
| that this is just Trudeau that woke up one morning and
| decided to do that, lots of people are behind that decision
| and they also had the benefit of insight looking at what the
| UK had been doing.
| ahmedalsudani wrote:
| There is plenty of evidence that the first shot reduces the
| risk of the worst symptoms quite significantly.
| x86ARMsRace wrote:
| > reduces the risk of the worst symptoms quite
| significantly.
|
| Right, reduces, but the full dose is needed to render the
| virus mostly harmless. My partner's coworker has Covid and
| one does of the vaccine, they are still severely ill.
| pcbro141 wrote:
| Do you happen to know roughly how long after getting
| vaccinated they caught covid?
|
| It takes ~14 days after the first dose to get the ~80-90%
| protection (Pfizer/Moderna).
| Animats wrote:
| This suggests a third booster shot may be useful for some people.
| That will probably be tested. Good to have such an option, if
| needed.
| fatsdomino001 wrote:
| and a fourth booster... and a fifth... sixth, seventh, etc.
| aledalgrande wrote:
| Which is going to be the future. The CEO of Moderna was
| talking about it. An annual shot that includes COVID, flu,
| cold and other vaccines. We'll get to a point in which we
| will look back at having a cold like you look at a Nokia 3310
| now.
|
| Edit: podcast link for who's curious https://ark-
| invest.com/podcast/understanding-mrna-conversati...
| scythe wrote:
| The CEO of Moderna has a rather obvious conflict of
| interest. If he overestimates future vaccine need, he can't
| be blamed for being 'cautious', but enjoys a potential
| stock boost anyway.
| standardUser wrote:
| It is not yet known if boosters will be necessary for
| COVID-19, let alone annual shots. There is however evidence
| that natural immunity lasts longer than 1 year.
| osenthuortuh wrote:
| I want to say something sarcastic, but I am in genuine
| disbelief that this could be anyone's vision for the future
| of humanity. What an abhorrent nightmare.
| robbrown451 wrote:
| I'm at a loss as to why reduction of suffering and death
| is abhorrent to you.
| osenthuortuh wrote:
| It's an artificial reduction in suffering and death. It's
| a genetic loan that will one day be repaid, with
| interest.
| robbrown451 wrote:
| Ok, well if you want to do your part to contribute to the
| genetic excellence of the human race, don't use medicine.
| If you get an infection, instead of using antibiotics,
| just let it kill you. Don't get glasses, just let your
| bad vision get you killed. How far do you want to take
| this? I'm sure you can increase the immunities of future
| humans by drinking out of puddles like dogs do. It
| doesn't seem to make dogs sick, presumably because all
| the dogs in the past with weaker immune systems died,
| probably with a lot of suffering.
|
| I doubt you do any of these things, because you aren't
| willing to accept the low chance of survival-to-adulthood
| that typical wild animals have. It may keep their
| genetics in tip top shape, but is that really what you
| want?
| 0-_-0 wrote:
| How about... wearing clothes? Cooking food?
| saalweachter wrote:
| The best way to prepare for future evolutionary
| challenges is to stockpile genetic diversity. More
| genetic diversity means both less of a chance of the
| entire population being vulnerable in the same way to a
| new threat, and better chances to reach new local maximas
| that are two or three hops through rough terrain in the
| evolutionary search space.
|
| Continually applying harsh selection criteria just
| homogenizes a population to a local maxima and leaves
| them vulnerable to future change.
| inglor_cz wrote:
| Not really. This is a naive interpretation of Darwinism.
| If anything, humans have become more genetically fit by
| mixing various formerly isolated populations together.
| Which is very much a consequence of global civilization.
|
| By far the largest problem of any genetic pool (animals,
| plants, whatever) is not having enough genetic diversity
| in it. See: Cavendish bananas, the Tasmanian devil.
| TchoBeer wrote:
| I don't see why eliminating disease is an abhorrent
| nightmare to you. Is the fact that no one gets polio
| anymore also an abhorrent nightmare?
| at-fates-hands wrote:
| Polio was never eliminated. It still persists in poor
| countries and among abject poverty stricken communities.
|
| _Wild poliovirus has been eradicated in all continents
| except Asia, and as of 2020, Afghanistan and Pakistan are
| the only two countries where the disease is still
| classified as endemic.[5][6]_
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polio_eradication
| TchoBeer wrote:
| Sorry, maybe I should've specified _In the United States_
| robbrown451 wrote:
| Eliminated and eradicated are not the same thing.
|
| Polio certainly has been eliminated from the United
| States. The point is, polio is no longer a significant
| problem here.
| hderms wrote:
| I genuinely have no idea why that would be abhorrent,
| except to anti-vaxxers. Can you explain?
| osenthuortuh wrote:
| Pugs cannot give birth naturally. The continued existence
| of pugs is completely dependent on medical intervention.
| In other words, pugs are not real. They exist only to the
| degree that a painting or building exists. They require
| constant upkeep by an advanced society, which has never
| existed beyond a few thousand years at a time.
|
| Why would anyone's vision for the future of humanity be
| an animal that can only exist in the context of an
| advanced civilization? Why would anyone's vision of
| humanity be an animal that is dependent for survival on
| <product> from <company> as though they were cattle? To
| reduce a human being to a dependent component of a
| pharmaceutical production chain is an abhorrent moral
| hazard.
|
| Smallpox was made extinct, and other diseases may be made
| greatly reduced because they are unique to humanity. But
| the many coronaviruses are shared between mammals, and
| are an eternal component of the environment. We have a
| moral obligation to evolve to suit the environment. That
| is what it means to be a successful animal.
| panda-giddiness wrote:
| This is textbook appeal to nature.
| notJim wrote:
| > We have a moral obligation to evolve to suit the
| environment. That is what it means to be a successful
| animal.
|
| I'm not sure how any of this related to morality. What is
| your moral framework here?
|
| However, if we accept it, the unique success of humanity
| clearly does not stem from blindly accepting whatever
| nature throws our way. Humanity's success, and defining
| characteristic is that we're able to bend nature to our
| will, and when that isn't possible, consciously bend
| ourselves.
|
| The vaccines are another example, and the mRNA vaccines
| are incredible example of this. We engineered a way to
| use our own body as a factory.
|
| Humanity's progress doesn't depend on giving up on
| technology, it depends on increasing our abilities with
| it. Evolution is too slow and too random, humanity can do
| better altering our own genome. If we survive, humanity
| will eventually be able to manipulate entire solar
| systems or even galaxies. Possibly the whole universe.
| That's our destiny, not dying of smallpox on our home
| planet.
| p1mrx wrote:
| Evolution is not a moral obligation; it's just the best
| nature could manage without thinking.
|
| If civilization crumbles, then natural selection will
| take the reins and a lot of people will die, but that's
| not a goal we should aim for.
| AbortedLaunch wrote:
| Natural selection is still at the reins. It operates in
| an environment. One that we, fortunately, can shape.
| MarcScott wrote:
| > We have a moral obligation to evolve to suit the
| environment
|
| And we've done that by evolving our mental capacities and
| developing a wide range of tools that have enabled us to
| survive and prosper. We are apex predators of apex
| predators, to the point that we kill other predators for
| sport rather than food.
|
| Stick me naked and toolless in the wilds of Siberia and
| I'd estimate my survival time in hours rather than days.
| Without our tools we're a pretty useless species that
| hasn't even evolved far enough to be able to walk on two
| legs without developing back pain, unlike penguins.
|
| Vaccines taken once in a lifetime, or taken annually, or
| taken daily are just another tool. Why is this any worse
| than brushing your teeth, showering, taking medication or
| even getting dressed. If a doctor told you to take heart
| medication on a daily basis to stay alive, would you
| refuse on the grounds that it's better for humans to
| evolve hearts that are less prone to heart disease?
| [deleted]
| majormajor wrote:
| > We have a moral obligation to evolve to suit the
| environment. That is what it means to be a successful
| animal.
|
| So tools as a whole are just... sins? How far down this
| line do you want us to go? No plastics? No computers? No
| structures? No roads? No clothes?
| rebuilder wrote:
| >Why would anyone's vision for the future of humanity be
| an animal that can only exist in the context of an
| advanced civilization?
|
| That is a textbook description of Homo Sapiens Sapiens,
| IMO. We are not very impressive without an advanced
| civilization.
| saalweachter wrote:
| Niches changing is pretty boringly normal.
|
| Dolphins are evolutionarily unfit to occupy the niche
| they had back on land. The bacteria that precipitated the
| oxygen crisis were very successful until they weren't.
|
| There are many reasons to care about environmental
| destruction, pollution, and the loss of biodiversity, but
| at the same time it's neither particularly rational nor
| natural to obsess about preserving exactly the niches
| which existed at a particular point in time, nor our
| fitness for them.
| gnulinux wrote:
| Why? I honestly don't see what you're suggesting?
|
| We're already half-human half-chemical half-cyborgs. We
| drink coffee which includes caffeine, we use alcohol and
| THC regularly to "socialize", we take ibuprofen et al
| when feel pain, we eat sugar because we're fucking
| addicted. We use internet almost all the time except when
| sleeping and taking a shower. We check reddit, twitter,
| HN, facebook, instagram as if our lives depend on it.
| We're on track to build virtual reality googles that'll
| entertain us in an entire different simulated reality
| that we can only experience via our eyes. Not to mention
| most people look at monitors most of their lives anyway.
|
| We regularly vaccinate against tetanus, HPV, chicken pox,
| flu etc. Do you not get the flu shot every year? I
| vaccinate my cat against rabies and distemper every year.
| I take antidepressants (anxiety) and antihistemics
| (allergy) every day, because I kinda need them to live
| normally. My girlfriend has to take pain medicine once a
| month due to her basic biology.
|
| And the problem is we'll add COVID and cold to our annual
| flu shots, and that somehow makes our world any more
| dystopic. Makes absolutely no fucking sense. There are
| trillions of shit to be outraged about, this ain't one of
| those. Just chill.
| Mediterraneo10 wrote:
| Who knows what motivated the grandparent post to say that
| [EDIT: OK, now he explained and I definitely don't
| endorse that, geez], but I can see some grounds for
| unease at aledalgrande's vision of a specifically annual
| vaccination mentioned above. The COVID epidemic has been
| accompanied by border closures, followed now by a slow
| and chaotic reopening of them as different countries
| recognize different vaccines and different certificates
| proving vaccination. A future where everyone must get an
| annual jab to prevent even the common cold, and then have
| to prove recent vaccination to cross borders, would only
| continue indefinitely what many people hoped was just a
| one-off thing in their lifetimes.
|
| Incidentally, only half of people or less even in
| affluent countries get the annual flu shot. It is
| frequently believed to be relevant only for the elderly
| and at-risk demographics.
| gnulinux wrote:
| > many people hoped was just a one-off thing.
|
| This was never the case. If you didn't understand that
| COVID is here to stay indefinitely, like flu, after April
| 2020 I'm sorry but you aren't paying attention. Not to
| mention, if we follow perfect vaccination around the
| world, we can eradicate COVID like we eradicated smallpox
| etc, although this will be a lot harder.
|
| So, I still don't see your point. Yes people need to take
| yearly vaccines not to die of horrible diseases. That has
| been the case for the last few hundred years.
| Mediterraneo10 wrote:
| As frequently reported in the last year, only a small
| niche of the scientific community is optimistic that
| COVID can be eradicated through vaccination. Smallpox had
| no animal reservoirs, while COVID does.
|
| > Yes people need to take yearly vaccines not to die of
| horrible diseases. That has been the case for the last
| few hundred years.
|
| No, it hasn't. The only common annual vaccination is for
| influenza, it was introduced only in recent decades, and,
| as I mentioned, only half the population or less take it
| annually.
| gnulinux wrote:
| > No, it hasn't. The only common annual vaccination is
| for influenza, it was introduced only in recent decades,
| and, as I mentioned, only half the population or less
| take it annually.
|
| You only take flu annually but there are other vaccines
| you need to take periodically. E.g. tetanus booster every
| 10 years etc. For example, I'm supposed to take my last
| HPV vaccine this summer and this is the 3rd shot. I'm 25
| and I took approx. one vaccine every year for the last
| few years. I'm not saying strictly one every 12 months,
| it's just that it doesn't make sense to be outraged about
| COVID vax since regular vax is _already_ part of our
| lives.
| Mediterraneo10 wrote:
| Note that aledalgrande's original post above was speaking
| specifically about annual vaccination. That is is a
| completely different league than the common vaccines that
| require a booster shot every decade or so, and are much
| easier for people moving around internationally to plan
| around.
| tzs wrote:
| > Incidentally, only half of people or less even in
| affluent countries get the annual flu shot. It is
| frequently believed to be relevant only for the elderly
| and at-risk demographics.
|
| You are right as far as about half getting it, at least
| for the United States. Quite a few people who are not
| elderly or at risk get it. Here are the age breakdowns.
|
| About 60% of the people under 18 get it [1]. Under 18 is
| about 25% of the population.
|
| About 34% of 18-49 year olds get it. They make up about
| 42% of the population.
|
| That makes under 18s who get flu vaccine about 15% of the
| population, and 18-49s who get flu vaccine about 14% of
| the population. If only 50% of the population get the flu
| vaccine, that would mean that 58% of the people getting
| flu vaccine are under 50.
|
| [1] https://www.thenationshealth.org/content/47/9/E45
| AshamedCaptain wrote:
| You live already in that world. I have already lost track
| of the number of "jabs" I've needed to travel to several
| countries, and this was way before COVID.
| Mediterraneo10 wrote:
| No, the vaccinations required for travel were virtually
| never expected to be taken on an annual basis but rather
| were good for years. For example, not only was the UN
| yellow-fever vaccination certificate good for 10 years,
| but recently the WHO announced that the yellow-fever
| vaccine now appears to confer life-long immunity, so
| border officials should accept the certificate regardless
| of the date on it.
| msbarnett wrote:
| That's just the luck of the draw, though. Yellow Fever
| happens to be amenable to life-long immunity. COVID (may)
| not be.
|
| Had the situation been reversed, you'd have had to get
| Yellow Fever vaccinations a lot more often if you were
| travelling into those regions, and the COVID situation
| would be one-and-done. It just happens that this is the
| way it worked out, instead. There's nothing dystopian
| about this.
| [deleted]
| aledalgrande wrote:
| It might not even be a shot. Would it still be an issue
| if it was a nasal spray that you can buy at your pharmacy
| once a year?
| Mediterraneo10 wrote:
| The issue is really availability of the vaccine at all.
| It would suck if a person from country A traveling in
| developing country B needs to get vaccinated yet again in
| order to move on to country C, but developing country B
| has a poor healthcare system that travelers would
| reasonably want to avoid contract with. One would then be
| compelled to visit a private hospital for expats at great
| expense, but sometimes even that option is not available.
|
| Even if nasal sprays bought from a corner pharmacy are on
| the horizon, they would probably only reach developing
| countries years from now - and merely buying a product
| from a pharmacy in most countries might not get you an
| internationally recognized certificate of vaccination.
| Retric wrote:
| The entire point of such vaccinations would be to prevent
| another major shutdown from a new coronavirus outbreak,
| and thus avoid a much larger issue when trying to cross
| borders. The expectation is nobody is going to care much
| if people get the next shot anymore than they do about
| the annual flu vaccine because significant herd immunity
| will be in play.
|
| The only way that changes is if some new and extremely
| deadly variant is out there, but again past vaccinations
| are likely still helpful. Thus, regular vaccination
| deployment would be a pure win for travelers.
| aledalgrande wrote:
| Availability and inequality is a fair concern, but why
| should we stop working on something that would improve
| everyone's lives? Nobody said it's going to be mandatory
| for travel.
| osenthuortuh wrote:
| You do not have to be as you have described yourself. You
| do not have to rely on caffeine, thc, or alcohol. This is
| the practice of sobriety, which is followed by many. You
| can learn to be at peace with your own mind. You do not
| have to have to follow any social media. Many do not and
| billions could not in the past. Of what you listed, I use
| only HN, and that only to distract me at work. You do not
| have to be connected to dopamine goggles from <company>,
| you can be entertained by your own imagination, by the
| allure of the world, by the beauty of the people around
| you.
|
| You do not have to feel that you cannot live without
| pharmaceuticals. The value of a tetanus shot is obvious,
| but it can be something you choose, not something which
| you are burdened to bear as the price of birth.
| Depressive disorders are wholly a disease of our
| malignant society. I would encourage you to examine the
| work of Stephen Ildari, for it has helped me greatly. I
| encourage you to see what happens to you and your gf when
| you eat plants instead of processed <product>.
|
| You can be more than a tax cattle, or someone else's
| paycheck, or the reflection of the vision and will of
| powerful strangers. You are still very young. Take
| control of who and what you are.
| notJim wrote:
| That's all wonderful, but what does it have to do with
| taking an annual covid vaccine? Does contracting covid or
| the flu somehow make me more free? Based on my experience
| with fevers, the hallucinations can be fun, but overall I
| don't think it's worth it. Even salvia is better.
|
| One specific thing I do find freeing about the vaccines
| is that I don't really need to worry about being
| asymptomatically infected and passing the disease onto
| others who are more vulnerable. I guess I could simply
| say "fuck those people", as many have done, but I guess
| for me, responsibility is a counterpart to freedom.
|
| FWIW, Stephen Ilardi appears to support vaccination, so
| you may want to dig a little deeper into his thoughts
| around them.
| cameronh90 wrote:
| Nobody's forcing you to take the flu vaccine or any
| theoretical future cold vaccine.
|
| Meanwhile those who do choose to take it will hopefully
| be able to live a life largely free of these annoyances
| and dangers.
| azinman2 wrote:
| None of that is an argument against getting vaccinated
| against viruses that easily spread amongst the population
| with mild to horrific effect, mutating as it goes along.
|
| We should be celebrating science, the discovery and
| advancement of vaccines, and their ability to give
| immunity or strong protection against diseases that have
| previously debilitated individuals or worse.
|
| The fact that I have never known anyone with Polio is
| because of the strong global efforts to irradiate the
| disease from the face of the planet. Tragically the anti-
| science and anti-vaccine messaging has made that not
| possible for covid... something that's already resulted
| in near equal death of WWII in just over a year and will
| only continue.
| osenthuortuh wrote:
| And, by examination of evidence, everyone who has
| received a vaccine for covid is protected from it. Let
| them be free to make that choice.
| inglor_cz wrote:
| "And, by examination of evidence, everyone who has
| received a vaccine for covid is protected from it."
|
| Are you saying that every covid vaccine has 100 %
| efficacy? ("everyone", "a vaccine"). AFAIK this is not
| true for any extant vaccine.
| [deleted]
| throwawayboise wrote:
| > Do you not get the flu shot every year?
|
| I do not. I have never had a flu shot in my life.
| silicon2401 wrote:
| > We drink coffee which includes caffeine, we use alcohol
| and THC regularly to "socialize", we take ibuprofen et al
| when feel pain, we eat sugar because we're fucking
| addicted.
|
| Who is we? I don't consume caffeine or THC, don't eat
| much sugar or drink much alcohol, and don't remember
| taking painkillers at all in 2020 or 2021 so far. I don't
| use social media like FB or IG. I don't remember getting
| a flu shot ever, maybe in childhood and I forgot.
|
| Despite telling the other commenter to chill, your
| comment is bafflingly aggressive. It's possible to live
| without drugs and social media and we should encourage
| that, not take for granted that everyone should be forced
| to use drugs just to socialize or eat sugar.
| xwolfi wrote:
| I... I use the internet in my shower and I sleep with
| podcasts. Am I a full cyborg ? :D
| sokoloff wrote:
| That would be _amazing_. A needle stick every year and
| significantly less (even mild) illnesses? Let 's do it.
|
| (I say this as someone who fortunately almost never gets
| sick. People who are often sick would relish this even
| more.)
| xwolfi wrote:
| I get sick every year for some reason, often gastro, and
| the bi-yearly AC switch off/on giving me a long cold
| because I grew up in a country without AC. A year out of
| two I have a bad flu, a year out of 5, a bad otitis so
| painful I can't eat for a while...
|
| Well the ONLY year of my life (I'm 33) I wasn't sick was
| 2020-2021. I think... the mask helped a lot. I feel like
| I understand now all these people telling me getting so
| sick every year wasn't normal...
| matwood wrote:
| I didn't get a cold for just over 14 months. It was
| glorious. Now that I'm vaccinated I've been out a bit
| more and have been dealing with a head cold all week. If
| there's a shot to stop colds, sign me up.
| Loveaway wrote:
| Well I'd urge you to not be so hastily. This could very
| well go very badly. There are a lot of unproven,
| hypothetical, assumptions being made, and a lot of people
| are completely ignoring any counter argument. Often valid
| issues simply get deleted, people just don't want to hear
| it, they don't want to see it, and it scares me to be
| honest. It's also getting completely impossible to argue
| against the commitment bias of vaccinated people. You
| really don't even considered once that injecting spike
| protein on a regular basis might not be the best thing for
| you body? This is a harmful protein after all.
|
| I don't know, maybe its all fine and good, but if you ask
| me, I think a lot of people are way too excited to be part
| of this study. Especially since the risk/reward doesn't
| seems to be that great in the first place.
| johnisgood wrote:
| Okay, but you did not need a vaccine cert for having
| received the flu shot.
|
| I personally do not get those seasonal flu shots, and I had
| no issues for years. It was entirely voluntary, and no one
| gave a shit if you got it or not (it was not the first
| question that left people when they met you either), it was
| up to you entirely. We treat the COVID-19 shot very
| differently, I mean, after all, there actually is a vaccine
| cert you receive, and without it, you are pretty much
| doomed these days (it varies between countries, but here
| many employers made it a prerequisite). _What about those
| who cannot receive the vaccine for health reasons?_
|
| Many people here got the vaccine only to get the vaccine
| cert, because that meant that they could go back to work
| (as it was a prerequisite). This artificial limitation or
| restriction goes to extremes somewhere. Here they talk
| about not being able to receive basic health care without
| it! Can you believe that? But of course you have to
| continue paying for social insurance (that covers it).
|
| ---
|
| If I may, I would like to have those down-votes explained
| as I did not say anything that is false, and I did not
| express my opinion regarding the vaccine either. What
| exactly could have been down-voted? I believe everything I
| said is true. If it is not, can you point it out, please?
| shard wrote:
| I caught the flu two years in a row, about 15 year ago.
| Just unlucky, I guess. Never had the flu before that.
| Each of those two times laid me out for two weeks
| straight, just completely miserable, couldn't even sleep
| lying down because it made me cough. After that I
| religiously got my flu shot every year.
| johnisgood wrote:
| Yeah of course, my mom does the same. I stopped a few
| years ago and I was still alright, and I generally do not
| catch the common cold either, it has been years. In any
| case, I do not mind anyone getting the flu shot, of
| course.
|
| I still have diseases, just other kinds. No vaccine or
| treatment for them.
| Spartan-S63 wrote:
| I believe comparing COVID to the flu is a pretty apples
| or oranges comparison, as is comparing vaccine benefits.
| COVID is much more contagious than the flu, hence why
| it's critical more people get vaccinated. Also,
| continuing to let COVID spread increases the chance of
| more mutation outside of the current variants that could
| circumvent both vaccine-induced immunity and natural
| immunity. Combined with the more contagious nature of the
| disease, this could essentially trigger a second
| pandemic. Vaccinating and bolstering immune response is
| critical to preventing such an outcome.
|
| > What about those who cannot receive the vaccine for
| health reasons?
|
| This is why herd immunity is so important. For those
| healthy adults that are able to get vaccinated, should
| get vaccinated. When herd immunity is reached, those who
| cannot be vaccinated for health reasons are protected by
| everyone else.
| johnisgood wrote:
| I am not speaking against vaccination though, nor am I
| comparing the two. I was talking about the vaccine cert
| specifically (which we have for COVID-19 _only_ , so I
| could have replaced "flu shot" with anything else,
| really), and regarding that, what is it that is not true
| (as far as what I said) or worth down-voting? I do not
| understand. Is my comment being perceived as anti-vaxx
| for some reason and thus, gets down-voted?
|
| I do not believe the vaccine cert being fair, I believe
| it is discriminatory. People that cannot receive the
| vaccine for health reasons may not have access to basic
| health care in my country (if they go with it), and they
| already cannot get a job in many places. How is this not
| discriminating?
| odiroot wrote:
| I liked my Nokia 3310. I never liked the cold.
| aledalgrande wrote:
| This was funny! I should have found a better
| comparison...
| rubyist5eva wrote:
| Of course Big Pharma wants you locked-in on annual
| boosters. I'll take my chances with the virus with less
| than 1% mortality rate for people under 60.
|
| Are we even remotely close to having a suitable vaccine for
| a common cold? What is the point of having a vaccine for a
| simple cold anyway...?
| marcodiego wrote:
| Yes. Like yearly vaccination campaigns.
| SketchySeaBeast wrote:
| Like the flu. Or even Tetanus requires boosters. I don't
| know why that makes it a dealbreaker.
| [deleted]
| officialjunk wrote:
| with the current formulas this is true. https://www.forbes.co
| m/sites/williamhaseltine/2021/03/25/mod...
|
| seeing almost half the efficacy after 250 days.
| rebuilder wrote:
| Well, yes. What else? Getting rid of the novel coronavirus
| doesn't seem likely at this point. So, either we control it
| by vaccination or we go back to how it was before any
| vaccines.
|
| Hopefully, eventually the virus evolves into a less deadly
| form and maybe our immune systems develop some more
| resistance. I don't know if the latter is actually reasonable
| to expect.
| bluGill wrote:
| > eventually the virus evolves into a less deadly form and
| maybe our immune systems develop some more resistance. I
| don't know if the latter is actually reasonable to expect.
|
| The more people who die, the more likely it is we evolve
| protection
| ironmagma wrote:
| The same can be said of driving. Should we remove airbags
| tomorrow?
| bluGill wrote:
| If we do, over the next 10,000 years it will make a
| difference in human reaction times. Assuming of course
| that nothing else destroys us all first, or makes cars
| obsolete.
|
| Since I don't have 10,000 years I prefer to make cars
| obsolete.
| ironmagma wrote:
| It has nothing to do with how long you personally have;
| this is about the species, remember? You could very well
| die from lack of airbags, and not because you had a slow
| reaction time but because your skull isn't optimized for
| surviving collisions. Further, there are a lot of stand-
| up people you currently like who would die. There are
| many reasons to protect the weak, even from an
| evolutionary standpoint.
| jbeam wrote:
| Not at all, the vast majority of the people who die are
| past the age of reproduction.
| bluGill wrote:
| you are confusing COVID with a general statement. Though
| COVID is killing enough young people to make a difference
| over many generations if we don't get it under control
| aledalgrande wrote:
| Booster shots are already getting ordered.
|
| https://investors.modernatx.com/news-releases/news-release-d...
| standardUser wrote:
| It is currently not known if or when boosters may be needed.
| nicoburns wrote:
| Here in the UK the plan seems to be to provide a 3rd booster
| ina slightly tweaked form that better targets some of the new
| variants. I read that it could be available from as early as
| september.
| AS_of wrote:
| > For the United Kingdom, extending the interval between doses
| was clearly the right choice, but the country's lockdown deserves
| part of the credit for that success
|
| This is important for anyone who thinks it might be a good idea
| to wait. You have to carefully weigh the risk of being vulnerable
| in the meantime.
| pityJuke wrote:
| It isn't that simple though. The first dose still provides
| _some_ protection. The choice is usually between a lot of
| people having some protection, vs a smaller amount of people
| having full protection.
|
| (and some protection can be in the 70% range [1])
|
| [1]:
| https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6...
| ddlutz wrote:
| The vaccines are still quite effective after the first dose,
| and, I'm saying this without being a researcher in this area,
| should be enough to flatten the curve.
|
| "The Moderna vaccine has been shown to have an efficacy of
| approximately 92 per cent in protecting against COVID-19,
| starting 14 days after the first dose." -
| https://www.who.int/news-room/feature-stories/detail/the-mod...
| aledalgrande wrote:
| Wow that's impressive, I thought it was ~50% after the first
| dose. I guess it's like ML, to get the last percentage points
| you need exponential effort?
| marcosdumay wrote:
| > I guess it's like ML
|
| It's very like simulated annealing.
| williamstein wrote:
| You might be thinking of this paper about very extensive
| data from Israel:
| https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2101765
|
| One conclusion a friend of mine wrote about this is "One
| other surprising thing which is not obvious, but is made
| very clear from the results, is that it really takes real
| _time_ for this vaccine to get effective. It only _starts_
| becoming truly useful after 2 weeks, but even then keeps
| getting better with time. This effect is one reason why
| there was a very real lag between when Israel got
| vaccinated at a very high percentage of population and when
| the cases started freefalling (2-3 weeks+). "
| mikelward wrote:
| It's 50% if you start counting immediately, before the
| first dose has had time to work.
| TMWNN wrote:
| Does this mean that a one-shot vaccine like Johnson & Johnson's
| is inherently less effective?
| tgsovlerkhgsel wrote:
| Is there any evidence one shot of J&J protects better than one
| shot of Moderna/Biontech, or is the main difference that the
| companies chose different strategies for their
| studies/marketing? (Moderna/Biontech hoping to achieve better
| results and 2x the doses sold, J&J hoping to be done with the
| studies 3-4 weeks earlier and having a marketing advantage
| because it only requires one shot)
| robbrown451 wrote:
| I suspect that it is. There may be some reason it is good
| enough with a single shot, but the others aren't, but still...
| I didn't want J&J, not because I think it is a worse vaccine,
| but because it is currently only a single shot.
| suyash wrote:
| I think it only protects about 60-70%
| josefresco wrote:
| Great. My local health clinic auto-booked my next appointment
| (despite telling me I had to do it) just inside 3 weeks from my
| first shot. I think they're a little worried about people coming
| back for their second shot.
| suyash wrote:
| Good reason to delay one's second shot, I already pushed back by
| a week thinking of delaying even more.
| randcraw wrote:
| From the Nature article:
|
| "Peak antibody levels were 3.5 times higher in those who waited
| 12 weeks for their booster shot than were those in people who
| waited only 3 weeks. Peak T-cell response was lower in those with
| the extended interval. But this did not cause antibody levels to
| decline more quickly over the nine weeks after the booster shot."
|
| I care less about short-term peak antibody response than longer-
| term T-cell response or longest-term immunizing antibody
| response. On the latter two points, this study was not
| encouraging or outright silent. Nor was there any indication of
| how well these folks fared after they returned to the wild.
|
| This info doesn't seem sufficient to draw meaningful conclusions
| about longer term protection.
| wutbrodo wrote:
| Some more info from the uni that performed the study[1]:
|
| > In relation to the cellular (or T cell) immune response,
| which plays an important role in supporting and maintaining
| antibody production, the team found that within the three-week
| interval group, 60% had a confirmed cellular response at two to
| three weeks following the second vaccine - although this fell
| to only 15% eight to nine weeks later.
|
| > The proportion of participants showing a cellular response in
| the 12-week-interval group was only eight per cent at five to
| six weeks after the first vaccine, but this rose to 31% two to
| three weeks after the second vaccine. Research is required to
| further explore these variations in responses.
|
| You're correct that the evidence isn't dispositive yet, but
| it's an encouraging signal. Antibody response in the short-term
| is positive and in the medium-term cellular response possibly
| converges.
|
| More importantly, the implications for the first doses first
| strategy are positive. Those who know how to reason under
| uncertainty saw the UK's strategy as a calculated gamble based
| on a model that extended the point information provided by the
| vaccine efficacy RCT; critics were generally incoherent but
| their claim was that it was likely to cause large _negative_
| effects on efficacy, worth paying the cost of vaccinating far
| fewer people.
|
| On top of the priors that led to the decision, we now have
| signal from the way the winter surge played out in the UK, and
| the increased antibody response alone provides further weak
| signal that the delay was worth it - and conversely, that the
| US's approach cost lives).
|
| The evidence still isn't dispositive, but crucially, there's no
| such strong basis for believing the alternative either: that
| extending doses _reduces_ efficacy and that vaccine
| availability should be limited in the name of adhering rigidly
| to the RCT-studied timeline.
|
| The status quo bias of medical culture killed a lot of people
| during this pandemic by continuing their habit of pretending
| that certainty exists where none does and refusing to engage in
| critical thinking about uncertainty. Refusing to explicitly
| extrapolate a model from few high-quality samples really just
| means "implicitly extrapolating a crappy model through bias and
| guesswork". This may be adaptive in the normal medical context,
| where the status quo is generally fine, but is an incredibly
| poor fit for a fast-moving pandemic that was killing thousands
| a day in the US alone.
|
| [1] https://www.birmingham.ac.uk/news/latest/2021/05/covid-
| pfize...
| UncleOxidant wrote:
| Isn't there a potential downside to the UK approach in an
| environment where variants are increasing? I've seen some
| data suggesting that with only one jab the mRNA vaccines are
| only about 20% effective against the UK, SA and Brazilian
| variants (no data yet on the India variant), but that number
| jumps in to the 70% range with the 2nd dose. A delay of 12
| weeks leaves a lot of people in that 20% efficacy range for
| those variants. Now some parts of the UK are starting to see
| increasing cases of the Indian variant.
| wutbrodo wrote:
| > with only one jab the mRNA vaccines are only about 20%
| effective against the UK, SA and Brazilian variants
|
| Do you have a source for this I could see? I did some light
| Googling and couldn't find anything that said as much; it
| also runs contrary to the impact of Britain's choice of
| widespread vaccination over incremental effectiveness gains
| (though this is of course just a correlation). A study I
| did find[1] looking at effectiveness in the UK has first-
| dose effectiveness at 70%, roughly as expected (I'm using
| the UK here as a noisy proxy for the UK variant, but I
| think that's reasonable).
|
| Leaving aside the veracity of this concern, the
| counterfactual was facing the massive winter surge many
| countries saw while intentionally choosing to vaccinate
| half as many people. It's not clear at all that it would be
| good policy, especially given the ability to change
| policy[2] as the reality on the ground changes. Seeing how
| public health has conducted themselves throughout pandemic,
| I simply don't have the blind faith that they handled this
| cost-benefit analysis competently.
|
| To pick just one example I came across[3]: as much as I
| respect Bob Wachter, the Chair of Medicine at UCSF, he was
| exemplary of this flaw in critical thinking ability that
| medical culture indoctrinates into HCWs. He came around to
| FDF on New Year's, after a month of arguing against it.
| It's amazing to see him discover the concept of
| quantitative rigor in the face of uncertainty when speed is
| crucial. This is especially striking when contrasted
| against his prior argument in the opposite direction, which
| consists of handwavy platitudes around "unnecessary
| curveballs".
|
| My sister and her husband are both (Ivy League-educated,
| very successful) physicians, one a clinician and one a
| clinician scientist. We've had a decade-long conversation
| about this tendency, the degree to which it exists, the
| degree to which it's salutary, how it should affect
| patient/informed-citizen behavior, etc. Part of my relative
| confidence in my model of this epistemic culture is that
| these pitfalls were entirely predictable, and indeed, I
| pre-registered concerns[4] about the pandemic's
| characteristics and how modern medical culture was likely
| to interact with it.
|
| This isn't as damning an indictment of medicine as it may
| sound (the FDA's Vogonic bureaucracy fetish has way more
| blood on its hands than any of the flaws in medical
| culture). And one thing I've picked up from all my
| conversations with my brother-in-law is that the average
| consumer of medical information is almost unbelievably
| stupid (not how he would phrase it) and is far better off
| following public health (and nutrition) advice as dogma
| than trying to understand and pick it apart. But if you are
| basically scientifically-literate, say to the point that
| you can read and mostly understand the paper I shared in
| [1], you're likely far worse off uncritically accepting
| their epistemic flaws than using them as a baseline and
| doing your own research (and as always, retain a heaping
| dose of epistemic humility around your error bars and
| counterfactuals)
|
| [1] https://www.bmj.com/content/373/bmj.n1088
|
| [2] https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/14/world/india-covid-
| second-...
|
| [3]
| https://twitter.com/Bob_Wachter/status/1344667655324585986
|
| [4] This was in conversation with them. Sadly, I have no
| online proof I can share without self-doxxing
| graeme wrote:
| Is having a lower peak cellular response meaningful in the
| long run, or not so much?
| wutbrodo wrote:
| Great question, that I don't know the answer to. The answer
| to that question is part of the uncertainty that attenuates
| the signal I described as "weak". I think the reason I like
| the approach I'm describing is that you can model
| uncertainty at every level of knowledge: you don't need to
| become an epidemiologist to reason about the facts (with
| correspondingly higher error bars than a domain expert
| would have), _and_ you don't need to blindly trust that
| experts in every domain are somehow magically optimal when
| it comes to reasoning under uncertainty.
|
| To put it another way, that's the kind of information I
| would spend the time digging into once knowing the answer
| would push my model across a decision threshold. I look
| forward to seeing the follow-up research, which is usually
| the quickest way to fill in gaps in the "primitives".
| arcticfox wrote:
| I completely agree with everything you said.
|
| That said, the most effective defense I've seen for the
| seemingly incoherently cautious status quo approach is that
| the medical community doesn't operate on the span of one
| pandemic, but is rather in a perpetual struggle. So even if
| the short-term expected value of an excessively cautious
| approach is negative, resulting in more deaths and a longer
| pandemic, it might be outweighed by reducing the chance of
| damaging public faith in medicine long-term by an erroneous
| more aggressive move.
|
| I still don't agree, but that very long-term view is the only
| defense I see for the approach given what we knew at the
| time.
| wutbrodo wrote:
| Thank you for bringing that up. That makes a lot of sense,
| and public health absolutely does need to consider mass
| psychology and their credibility.
|
| The theory that they're overindexing on protecting that
| credibility doesn't really comport with their behavior the
| rest of pandemic, however. Leaving aside all of the blood
| on the hands of mindless bureaucracy (like effectively
| banning testing for Covid in the early pandemic when it was
| most crucial), there has been decision after decision that
| prioritized status quo bias and RCT-worship even when the
| long game suggests it would damage their credibility (the
| fervent anti-mask recommendations in the early pandemic is
| a great example, as is the bizarre insistence on
| recommending precautions against fomites over aerosols
| until extremely late).
|
| More importantly, "public health is misleading you at the
| cost of your health/life because they're playing the long
| game" doesn't actually preserve much credibility. It
| certainly casts public health figures in a more positive
| light, but I'm not really thinking in terms of blaming
| individuals over institutions/cultures anyway. It doesn't
| really matter _why_ public health advice is wrong in
| obvious and significant ways. What matters is the ultimate
| conclusion: if you have basic scientific literacy and an IQ
| over 105, form your own broad understanding of the science.
| This isn't a call to jettison epistemic humility: you're
| not going to be able to understand things anywhere close to
| as well as an individual epidemiologist can. But the point
| is that listening to the science as filtered through public
| health advice _is even worse_, in the same way that getting
| nutrition advice from the USDA will.
| hprotagonist wrote:
| in particular, a linear change in antibody levels, which
| trigger an exponential response, doesn't really mean very much!
| throwawayboise wrote:
| And how much antibody response is enough? Is more always
| better? Or is it diminishing returns?
|
| IIRC one of the tricky things in the development of mRNA
| vaccines was being careful to not overstimulate the immune
| systems, triggering autoimmune types of reactions.
|
| It seems plausible to me that there is a "safe" level of immune
| response, and either too much or too little could be less
| desirable (maybe for different reasons).
| whiddershins wrote:
| Yes, this is why I'm curious whether the MRNA interacts badly
| with pregnancy, since pregnancy involves a poorly understood
| modulation of the immune system (so it doesn't attack the
| fetus)
| kenjackson wrote:
| The data on pregnancy shows no impact. In fact if I
| remember correctly there were fewer incidents than the
| placebo group. So maybe it helps reduce pregnancy related
| issues??
| hinkley wrote:
| And GI function, which affects us all, every day.
| arcticfox wrote:
| I'd also be curious to hear about an expert weigh in on
| "original antigenic sin" in this context. (My lay
| understanding: your immune system gets partially locked onto
| its first response to an antigen, and may fail to respond as
| well as it could to future variants).
|
| If you power up the response to massive levels, does it also
| augment the downsides of that "original antigenic sin"?
| elif wrote:
| This is exactly what they are finding.
|
| https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.05.03.21256520v.
| ..
|
| The Pfizer vaccine is shown here to elicit increased cytokine
| immune response to many types of non-covid agitants like mold
| and bacteria. The danger there would be cytokine storm in the
| extreme or cytokine-induced inflammation in mild cases.
| s1artibartfast wrote:
| It is worth noting that cytokine responcse is implicated in
| many models of dementia, including alzheimer's. It is
| terrifing to imagine senarios where this leads to a billion
| early onset cases a few decades from now
| muttled wrote:
| Might be chance (it is spring) but my allergies were rocked
| after the shots. I wonder if revving up your immune system
| also revs up allergies since they're just an immune over-
| response?
| myself248 wrote:
| It hadn't occurred to me that the two could be related,
| but my allergies were pretty quiet until I got the first
| shot, then it was like I'd just motorboated a vase full
| of pollen.
|
| Again, could just be timing.
|
| Second shot in a week, so we'll see if it happens again!
| QuercusMax wrote:
| Fascinating - that was my experience as well. But I can't
| say whether it's just been an especially bad allergy
| season in general.
| lamontcg wrote:
| I was hammered by allergies before I had any shots. After
| the second shot my allergies got a lot better. Probably
| totally cured my allergies. Magic.
|
| Except it didn't because past week or so they've been
| back again.
| joshgel wrote:
| Lots of people in the medical/scientific community expected
| this result. The best explanation I have heard is that the
| vaccine companies planned these sub-optimal trials with 2-3
| weeks between shots, because it meant getting the vaccines to
| market much more quickly. Instead of having vaccines available
| in December, they might not have been available until February.
|
| So far, the evidence is pretty compelling that the vaccines
| have continued efficacy 6-7 months post-administration. It's
| obviously impossible to know much beyond a couple months
| however.
| jfengel wrote:
| Does this suggest anything about side effects? Is it likely to
| make them better, worse, or none at all?
|
| I'm aware that there's not enough information to say yet, but
| it's something I'd like to see them look out for. The side
| effects are absolutely not a good enough reason to avoid
| getting vaccinated, both for your own sake and as a participant
| in herd immunity, but I've personally witnessed enough
| unpleasantness to know that there will be people who avoid it
| just to avoid the side effects.
|
| Being able to provide good advice to help the rational but
| fearful may help get us over the threshold, despite the large
| numbers of irrationally fearful. We'll need every single one to
| get there.
| Havoc wrote:
| Can't help but feel the UK had incredible luck on their side
| here. Being in the UK I'm thankful it played out well...but
| wow...talk about a roll of the dice.
|
| (As best as I know there was little scientific evidence available
| when they decided to delay)
| Hallucinaut wrote:
| Depends what you mean by "little". At the start of the year, if
| not the end of 2020, there were studies showing the prevailing
| effectiveness with delays on the second shot so it was pretty
| clear where the trend was.
|
| And then, merely hours ago, they decided because of the Indian
| variant they'd instead change the recommendation from 12 weeks
| to 8. So, at least in my opinion, it's a bit of a random walk
| down statistics street.
| breakfastduck wrote:
| I know our govt can be swines but we still have a pretty
| amazing scientific / medical community here.
|
| Not much positive to say about the handling of covid but when
| it comes to vaccine plans they've really done brilliantly.
|
| Probably because it's scientists, doctors and the NHS that have
| handled it and not the government.
| mohammad_ali85 wrote:
| You're correct, no evidence at the time JCVI (joint committee
| for vaccination and immunisation) made the call. However the
| decision was made on best interests [1] from a public health
| perspective. Delaying to 12 weeks allowed absolute numbers of
| people to be immunised once and build up some immunity versus
| absolute numbers of people vaccinated twice and having higher
| number of vulnerable populations without any immunity. Of
| course, this wasn't taking into the people who had had COVID-19
| and had a level of immunity to the virus from exposure.
|
| [1] https://www.gov.uk/government/news/statement-from-the-uk-
| chi...
| Closi wrote:
| > You're correct, no evidence at the time JCVI (joint
| committee for vaccination and immunisation) made the call.
|
| This isn't true, the JCVI did have evidence. In fact their
| statement showing reasons behind the call said:
|
| "There is evidence that a longer interval between the first
| and second doses promotes a stronger immune response with the
| AstraZeneca vaccine."
|
| https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/prioritising-
| the-...
|
| (Statement first released on 31st of December 2021, only
| available via google archive https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&
| rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&c...)
| mchusma wrote:
| Delaying the 2nd dose to 12 weeks was always most likely going
| to elicit a better response, this is customary for vaccines. It
| would have been much more supposing scientifically if this much
| shorter timeline did better. The UK's approach was never much
| of a gamble.
| Closi wrote:
| > Can't help but feel the UK had incredible luck on their side
| here.
|
| Some people might call it incredible luck, while others might
| say that it was a good decision made by world leading vaccine
| experts informed directly by the scientists who created the
| vaccine.
|
| In fact, the BMJ said at the start of January:
|
| > The trials of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine did include
| different spacing between doses, finding that a longer gap (two
| to three months) led to a greater immune response, but the
| overall participant numbers were small. In the UK study 59%
| (1407 of 2377) of the participants who had two standard doses
| received the second dose between nine and 12 weeks after the
| first. In the Brazil study only 18.6% (384 of 2063) received a
| second dose between nine and 12 weeks after the first.3 The
| combined trial results, published in the Lancet,4 found that
| vaccine efficacy 14 days after a second dose was higher in the
| group that had more than six weeks between the two doses
| (65.4%) than in the group that had less than six weeks between
| doses (53.4%).
|
| So there was knowledge/thoughts when the decision was made that
| an extended gap could change efficacy.
|
| Besides, let's give the UK's biomedical community more credit
| than assuming it was a fluke anyway!
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