[HN Gopher] Children develop robust and sustained cross-reactive...
___________________________________________________________________
Children develop robust and sustained cross-reactive immunity after
Covid
Author : malchow
Score : 146 points
Date : 2021-12-24 16:22 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.nature.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.nature.com)
| rsfern wrote:
| So one of the main conclusions is that SARS-CoV-2 in children
| produces antibody responses to all the other human coronaviruses
| (this happens in adults too, but the effect is stronger in
| children)
|
| In the discussion section they speculate that maybe recent
| infection with these other coronaviruses could give some level of
| protection against SARS-CoV-2, and that this could possibly
| explain some of the unusual-ness of the age-severity
| relationship, I.e. that very young children are not hit as hard
| by SARS-CoV-2 as by other diseases like the flu (relatively).
| That would be really interesting to see investigated carefully
| mikeyouse wrote:
| Finally some glimmers of hope in moving past Covid.. if Omicron
| continues on its current track of highly infectious but less
| serious --- and infection confers reactive immunity to a variety
| of strains, we could be closer to the endemic but manageable end
| game. Good vaccines + mild severity illness are basically the
| best case.
|
| What a stroke of luck that we are here vs a more infectious
| strain of Delta or some other nightmare that would keep this
| rolling.
| lamontcg wrote:
| Omicron's lower hospitalization rate is likely just due to
| vaccination and recovery from infection with Delta. Delta was
| transmissible enough to complete the vaccination program.
|
| Given that Omicron has higher viral loads, shorter serial
| interval and shorter incubation period than Delta, it is much
| more likely that Omicron is more intrinsically virulent as well
| and would be worse if you dropped it on a totally naive
| population in the summer of 2019. The current population,
| however, is longer immunologically naive, and I think that
| researchers are underestimating the existing seroprevalence.
|
| At the same time if there's still pockets of entirely
| unexposed/unvaccinated people out there in rural areas or
| something, Omicron will likely find them since it seems to
| largely ignore unboosted Nabs to prior infection or
| vaccination. Kids in colleges will be taking Omicron home for
| Christmas to rural families right about now and a few weeks
| from now we should find out how many seronegative people are
| left.
|
| If it Omicron fizzles though it is going to just be that Delta
| didn't leave anyone immune naive in its wake.
| DanBC wrote:
| > a more infectious strain of Delta
|
| What? Omicron is a more infectious version of Delta.
|
| Omicron causes the same number of deaths and hospitalisations
| and long covid as delta. It just also infects a lot more people
| more easily, and those people are at low risk and push the CFR
| down.
| rsfern wrote:
| As the data becomes more available from South Africa, the UK,
| and Denmark, it's starting to look like Omicron is a more
| infectious version of the wild type, maybe 40% less virulent
| than Delta, at least in terms of putting people in the
| hospital.
|
| There's still not enough data to conclude about mortality.
|
| The good news is that prior immunity seems to confer a large
| degree of protection from severe illness still
|
| https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/YBB9yZNJuz5j8hLdP/omicron-
| po...
| oh_sigh wrote:
| Omicron isn't a version of Delta.
| Amezarak wrote:
| The question ever since it became clear that this coronavirus
| was endemic has been what a "manageable end game" is: that is,
| what level of risk and mortality are we prepared to accept,
| given that deaths from Covid will never be zero.
|
| This is, in my opinion, the primary underlying disagreement.
| Some people think that no amount of deaths from Covid is
| acceptable. Some people believe that even the peak pandemic
| mortality is acceptable. And others fall somewhere in between,
| by, for example, focusing on hospital capacity. I don't think
| there is any long-term solution to Covid as a social issue,
| something we talk about and can't move past, until some kind of
| consensus is reached on this.
| epgui wrote:
| And from my point of view as someone in the field, arguments
| on either side are almost always based on an intuitive gut
| feeling about morality.
|
| Very few people actually try to wrangle with putting numbers
| on the cost (in dollars) of a human life, or the economic
| burden of disease. There are no right or wrong numbers, but
| only if you begin there can you say you're rationally
| considering the economic or political tradeoffs.
|
| Edit: and deaths could absolutely reach zero. If we threw
| everything and the kitchen sink at the problem, we would
| eradicate it in absolutely no time. The underlying question
| is the same here, namely whether the cost of eradicating the
| disease would be larger or smaller than what we would gain
| from doing it.
| ummonk wrote:
| I think you overestimate our ability to "eradicate it in
| absolutely no time". Eliminating it from both human and
| animal reservoirs (and permanently quarantining any
| immunocompromised carriers) worldwide would be a long and
| arduous process.
| epgui wrote:
| You make a great point about animal reservoirs, but the
| transmission bandwidth between humans and animals is
| afaik much lower than between humans. If you accept this
| assumption, and if we also assume that we really wanted
| to eradicate this thing, we could limit human
| transmission such as to reduce Rt well below 1 by
| implementing well-coordinated and strict policies.
|
| Then you're left with the "leaky bucket" of transmission
| between humans and animals... But this is a known
| vulnerable point which could be monitored effectively and
| very cheaply.
| nradov wrote:
| This is completely unrealistic. Effective continuous
| monitoring for animal to human transmission would never
| be cheap. In much of the developing world it's not even
| remotely feasible. Have you ever been to places like
| rural Mexico?
|
| The virus is here to stay. Eradication is a total
| fantasy, just a distraction and waste of time.
| retrac wrote:
| Here in Canada, we've been trying to eradicate rabies
| from the wild for half a century or so now. There are
| orally-active rabies vaccines we litter the landscape
| with in edible treat format. We cull rabid animals and
| quarantine or cull their known animal contacts. It's
| common knowledge that exposure to possible vectors means
| you need to go to the hospital. Tens of thousands of
| people are treated preventatively each year.
|
| Despite all this, human cases of rabies still happen.
| Fortunately it's rather hard to spread rabies between
| humans and it's symptomatic by the time it becomes
| infectious. In the case of an easily airborne virus even
| with such measures available like vaccination and
| prophylaxis for possible exposure, it seems daunting to
| the point of impossible even in a very wealthy country.
| In the developing world it would be certainly hopeless.
| epgui wrote:
| Yeah, eradication of a disease _in the wild_ is a whole
| other matter. But so rabies also is another matter. Cases
| are relatively rare here (hello, fellow Canadian!), and
| surveillance is relatively good for the little burden of
| disease it brings.
|
| https://www.canada.ca/en/public-
| health/services/diseases/rab...
|
| Genetic surveillance is just around the corner, and will
| soon be / is now within reach even of developing
| countries, with solutions like Oxford Nanopore's ultra-
| portable sequencers.
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6RRSxWtJPUw
| bcrosby95 wrote:
| Depending upon the specific agency, agencies in the USA
| value a statistical life at anywhere from $7-$10 million.
| epgui wrote:
| As a Canadian, I usually use the US DoT numbers (in the
| same ballpark as what you said) for my mental maths. A
| couple extra things to consider:
|
| - what's the date on these figures?
|
| - can we extrapolate this to other countries?
|
| - are these figures generally accepted, or are they
| controversial?
|
| - how do you account for age, sex (differences in life
| expectancy, child bearing capacity, etc), education level
| or professional skill, etc?
| novok wrote:
| Ironically enough, I think the data set comes from
| lawsuits that determine all of those conditions. A
| surgeon for example with all of their future surgeon
| income ruined by a bad car accident + medical care can be
| around $30 million, while someone who is relatively old
| with no chances of future income + medical care would
| typically get less AFAIK. It probably averages out to
| that $7-10 million figure.
| standardUser wrote:
| The primary concern form day one has been the capacity of our
| healthcare systems. "Peak pandemic mortality" includes scores
| of people dying from unrelated illness due to lack of care.
| Does anyone truly think its acceptable to let people die in
| ambulances outside of hospitals because a highly contagious
| disease filled all the hospital beds and medical staff is too
| fatigued to work? Maybe people with a political axe to grind
| pretend to think that.
| DrHilarius wrote:
| > _The primary concern from day one has been the capacity
| of our healthcare systems._
|
| This is clearly not the case for the vast swaths of our
| public health institutions who have supported and eagerly
| carried out mass terminations of healthcare workers who
| refuse the Covid vaccines.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| > Does anyone truly think its acceptable to let people die
| in ambulances outside of hospitals because a highly
| contagious disease filled all the hospital beds and medical
| staff is too fatigued to work? Maybe people with a
| political axe to grind pretend to think that.
|
| Given widespread availability of vaccines, I think it is
| acceptable to turn away any non vaccinated people without
| medical exemptions to preserve hospital capacity.
| nradov wrote:
| In the US, hospitals aren't legally allowed to turn away
| non vaccinated people due to EMTALA. Also note that there
| is no 100% reliable way for hospitals to determine a
| particular patient's vaccination status.
|
| https://www.cms.gov/Regulations-and-
| Guidance/Legislation/EMT...
| kaczordon wrote:
| Regardless of the legality of turning people away the
| commenter you're responding to sounds pretty heartless.
| brippalcharrid wrote:
| When you say "unvaccinated" here are you using the
| currently-accepted official definition which includes
| people that have received a COVID-19 EUA
| vaccination/booster within the last 14 days? Do you think
| that this would be likely to make people that were were
| concerned about side-effects from the vaccines more or
| less likely to get vaccinated?
| [deleted]
| mythrwy wrote:
| Would you also be of the opinion that, due to the
| widespread availability of healthy food options and
| Richard Simmons exercise videos it's acceptable to turn
| away the overweight to preserve hospital capacity?
| logifail wrote:
| > Given widespread availability of vaccines, I think it
| is acceptable to turn away any non vaccinated people
| without medical exemptions to preserve hospital capacity.
|
| Person A is "fully vaccinated", last dose five months
| ago, hasn't taken a Covid test since.
|
| Person B is unvaccinated, but had a PCR test yesterday
| and is negative for Covid19.
|
| Let's say you're clinically vulnerable, which of A or B
| would you rather sit next to during a meal?
| smugglerFlynn wrote:
| Will it be you turning these people away?
|
| Always puzzles me to see people suggesting all these
| "just let them die" silver bullet algorithms.
| novok wrote:
| It wouldn't be explicit turning away, but if your in a
| triage situation, most doctors and medical systems will
| focus on the most time serious and the people they are
| most able to save if they have limited capacity. And if
| your not vaccinated, the ability to save you will be less
| than the vaccinated and the people with other acute
| medical issues that are not COVID. That is what will
| happen in practice in such a regime.
| guimplen wrote:
| I think the real problem is that in most countries the
| healthcare system was "optimized" to such extent that even
| seasonal flu was almost clogging it every year. And now
| SURPRISE, any disease, even a tad bit more deadly and
| contagious than the seasonal flu would make it collapse.
| TOTALLY UNEXPECTED.
| DrHilarius wrote:
| As always, the standard gimmick of neoliberalism is to
| pin the blame for the collateral damage of its policies
| on the relatively powerless people who refuse its self-
| serving "solutions."
| xyzzyz wrote:
| Which non-"neoliberal" (whatever that means) country had
| plenty excess hospital capacity to handle peak Covid case
| counts?
| Maarten88 wrote:
| Cuba?
| Reichhardt wrote:
| From examining Swedish death spike data, you can see that
| viruses like COVID occur about once a decade, the last
| being Swine Flu in 2009:
|
| https://swprs.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/sweden-
| monthly-...
|
| Its just that, using Swedish data again, Western societies
| are significantly more aged: eg. there 120,000 80-84 year
| old men (prime COVID death territory) in 2020, vs only
| 101,000 in 2009. Its similar in many other Western
| countries: about 20% more elderly people, in absolute
| numbers.
|
| As such, the 'same' types of respiratory viruses will
| simply kill more people.
|
| The decisions is thus a social and political one: do we
| lockdown and force 6-monthly vaccinations on everyone,
| based on elderly deaths that will occur anyway simply due
| to the baby boomer cohort entering their twilight years?
|
| I think we need to just get more efficient at end-of-life
| care, focusing on simpler treatments and comfort, as well
| as euthanasia-on-demand for anyone over age 75.
| zaat wrote:
| I think taking a shot every six month is totally worth it
| if that will let your grandma live two years longer.
| Reichhardt wrote:
| zaat wrote:
| I'm afraid you have no more relevant knowledge in the
| subject then I do, which means your claims shouldn't be
| considered as an authoritative in any way, despite being
| stated as such. I'm out of here.
| Reichhardt wrote:
| "U.S. COVID-19 Deaths in 2021 Surpass 2020 Total"
|
| https://www.webmd.com/lung/news/20211122/us-covid-
| deaths-202...
| xyzzyz wrote:
| I agree. However, the currently existing vaccines don't
| seem to do anything at all to stop the spread, so your
| biannual vaccination does not help grandma much.
| Imnimo wrote:
| How are you estimating what the spread would have been in
| the absence of vaccination to draw that conclusion?
| EB-Barrington wrote:
| "Our vaccines are working exceptionally well. They
| continue to work well for Delta with regard to severe
| illness and death - they prevent it, but what they can't
| do anymore is prevent transmission."
|
| CDC Director Rochelle Walensky
| logifail wrote:
| It would seem fairly important to actually ask the
| grandmas what they think about this, rather than decide
| on their behalf.
|
| The four elderly members of our immediate family are all
| fairly adamant that the young have suffered enough, and
| "hell, yes" they want to see their grandkids, and no,
| they aren't asking about vaccinations and negative tests.
|
| I'm minded to respect their opinions.
| ifdefdebug wrote:
| Yes, and we don't ask them either if they'd feel better
| if we took them, we just do it for them, it's understood.
| novok wrote:
| IMO casual masking (stores, airplanes, etc) and a shot
| every 6 months isn't the annoying part about covid, it's
| the economic damage of lockdowns, school closures, social
| gatherings missed, extreme isolation of the vulnerable,
| travel not happening and the supply chain logjams it has
| been creating everywhere as a result. You can't go to an
| office consistently and have face to face lunches
| coworkers with as a result.
| rgrieselhuber wrote:
| Capacity of healthcare systems shouldn't be the primary
| concern, preventative immune defense and avoiding
| hospitalization in the first place should be.
| throwaway55421 wrote:
| No, lots of people do actually think that, but we believe
| that three main methods can be employed to mitigate this:
|
| 1. aggressive triage based on chances and QALY remaining
|
| 2. increased healthcare funding
|
| 3. voluntary isolation of individuals who see lockdown as
| being preferable to their personal coronavirus risk
|
| Will it result in more deaths than February 2020? Sure. But
| we don't have that choice because sars2 exists now.
|
| We think it's better to ration healthcare and therefore
| doom an unlucky minority, versus rationing life itself for
| everyone (via lockdowns and restrictions) and slow killing
| everyone.
|
| As far as I can tell, most of the lockdown debate centres
| around an erroneous idea that we can just do X, Y, Z, and
| then immunosuppressed Harriet can rejoin the world and
| avoid contracting coronavirus.
|
| But she just can't. Even the original strain would have
| eventually infected her with high probability unless we
| continued to cycle lockdowns or she voluntarily isolated.
| [deleted]
| 2muchcoffeeman wrote:
| I agree that in most countries this is the underlying
| disagreement. I wonder if we thought this through at a global
| community though.
|
| Imagine if China didn't or couldn't pursue a zero covid
| policy. What happens when the world's manufacturer closes?
| We've already seen huge supply chain issues.
| parkingrift wrote:
| I disagree.
|
| I think the endgame is clear in the US. Most states have
| dropped all restrictions and those that haven't will suffer
| economically and politically until they drop their
| restrictions. The only question is how much economic and
| political suffering individual cities and states will
| tolerate.
|
| Virginia voters threw out their entire Democrat government
| and governor and will likely join the list of states banning
| restrictions.
|
| In the end I don't think it will be about Covid at all. One
| by one we'll move on because the people will demand an end to
| restrictions.
| kQq9oHeAz6wLLS wrote:
| You've been downvoted, but you're not wrong. Witness the
| number of people who have left California.
| parkingrift wrote:
| I'm not making a values argument either way. It just
| seems apparent that people are tired of restrictions, and
| those people seem more likely to vote. The result in
| Virginia was shocking and should have been a wake up call
| to Democrats.
| redis_mlc wrote:
| johnchristopher wrote:
| I wonder if people would be OK with less restrictions, no
| vaccine mandates but perma n95 in public indoor and
| outdoor spaces ?
|
| Because whether we like it or not the virus is still
| going to be around and kill people and saturate
| hospitals.
|
| So, to me, the question seems to be: will
| living with the virus means "we don't treat covid
| patients anymore, if you get covid, tough luck, you are
| free to choose to wear a mask if you want, beyond that
| don't expect anything from public authorities"
| edmundsauto wrote:
| According to a UC study last summer, there hasn't been an
| abnormal number of people leaving California.
| https://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/press-room/uc-
| studies...
|
| "Despite California losing a congressional seat for the
| first time in history due to slow population growth and
| some high-profile technology companies and billionaires
| leaving the state, there is no evidence of an abnormal
| increase in residents planning to move out of the state"
| dbcurtis wrote:
| Recently released (days ago) US census data disagrees.
| Only New York had higher outmigration in absolute numbers
| than California.
| tshaddox wrote:
| California would be expected to have the largest
| outmigration given that it has the largest population.
| zdragnar wrote:
| "Better than New York" is damning with faint praise.
| rootusrootus wrote:
| > what level of risk and mortality are we prepared to accept
|
| IMO, the rational answer to this question is 'the same risk
| and mortality that we have already accepted from influenza.'
| There is a lot of variability there, of course, but it is way
| above zero in any case.
| phonypc wrote:
| That would seem to make sense if covid displaced flu
| entirely. But flu + equivalently harmful covid is twice as
| bad as historical flu.
| eo3x0 wrote:
| Influenza B is thought to have been made extinct recently
| due to the pressures introduced by SARS-CoV-2
|
| https://www.webmd.com/lung/news/20211025/covid-pandemic-
| may-...
| rsfern wrote:
| Wow, webmd made it really hard to find the primary source
| for that.
|
| To be clear, they are attributing this drop off of this
| flu strain to be likely due to pandemic mitigation
| efforts, as well as maybe lucky timing and some specifics
| of how this strain spreads
|
| Since it doesn't seem plausible to repeat the wide scale
| pandemic mitigation controls any time soon, I doubt we
| can keep wiping out flu strains, but we could certainly
| reduce the damage the flu does if we want to
|
| https://www.nature.com/articles/s41579-021-00642-4
| johnchristopher wrote:
| > Good vaccines + mild severity illness are basically the best
| case.
|
| If it was a common cold or a flu ? Maybe.
|
| > "Although COVID-19 has been described as a respiratory
| syndrome, evidence supports the involvement of multiple organ
| systems, with fibrosis, and inflammation in the lung, heart,
| kidneys, central nervous system (CNS), liver, adrenal glands,
| bone marrow, lymph nodes, and gastrointestinal tract. SARS-
| CoV-2 infection has also been associated with serious
| thrombotic complications, including strokes, pulmonary
| embolism, and cardiac injury."
|
| https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2021/11/10/leon-n10.htm
|
| Endemic we want ? Then we want yearly (or 6months it seems)
| vaccines. And masks. And ventilation.
|
| Reinfections will get more severe with age once vaccine or
| infection elicited sera wanes.
|
| > What a stroke of luck that we are here vs a more infectious
| strain of Delta or some other nightmare that would keep this
| rolling.
|
| Omicron being the new kid on the block doesn't mean another
| more dangerous variant isn't building itself up in a body
| somewhere.
|
| Maybe two years into the pandemic is not enough to let the
| reality sink in that we will _never_ come back to before. Maybe
| we need ten years but by then we 'll all be used to the new
| normal anyway. "Learn to live with the virus", they said.
| Indeed.
| iamdamian wrote:
| I'm not sure why we wouldn't be able to go back to normal,
| and taking a stance that we never will strikes me as somewhat
| defeatist.
|
| I'm more of an optimist. Having a small percentage of the
| population that's at greater risk of serious implications
| from infection (respiratory or otherwise) is something we've
| learned to live with before (see: the flu) without masks,
| mandates, or dramatically rearranging the way we live.
| johnchristopher wrote:
| > I'm not sure why we wouldn't be able to go back to
| normal,
|
| There are no path back to normal unless the virus
| disappears. We have vaccines that work for a limited time,
| we'll soon have pills@home. It will still not be `back to
| normal`.
|
| > and taking a stance that we never will strikes me as
| somewhat defeatist.
|
| We'll also never have FTL spaceships or teleportation star
| trek style.
|
| > I'm more of an optimist. Having a small percentage of the
| population that's at greater risk of serious implications
| from infection (respiratory or otherwise) is something
| we've learned to live with before (see: the flu) without
| masks, mandates, or dramatically rearranging the way we
| live.
|
| Covid is not the flu. Hoping it'll magically turn into a
| flu or that we can manage it like a flu is ignoring the
| reality currently unfolding.
|
| 40 years later and we still need condoms. We are not back
| to sex as it was in the 70's. Generations of teenagers have
| had their first time with a condom. This is what is normal
| now.
| lamontcg wrote:
| We clearly do not have a choice about endemicity. It will be
| endemic given that it very clearly evolves antigenically to
| achieve escape from waning neutralizing antibodies and it has
| animal reservoirs all over the place, including white tailed
| deer. It was pretty easy to see eradication was off the table
| in summer of 2020. At this point is kind of fucking stupid to
| talk about it. Even if you could snap your fingers and make
| it go away in humans it would just spill back from animal
| reservoirs. You'd have to eradicate all the deer, mink and
| every species you don't know about that has been infected
| with it. At this point it isn't humanly possible.
|
| We won't be taking precautions forever though. Reinfection
| and vaccine breaktrhoughs will be mild. T-cells and B-cells
| don't wane the same way Nabs does and protection against
| severe disease and hospitalization will be durable.
|
| There will be loss of protection as you age, but we already
| have that with all the ILI illnesses and viruses that lead to
| pneumonia and death in old people.
|
| There won't be some worse virus that somehow punches through
| T-cells, that's getting into the realm of science fiction.
| While there's about 20 epitopes on spike that need to change
| for the virus to escape Nabs there's a few thousand T-cell
| epitopes that would need to change and many of those will be
| concentrated in conserved regions of the genome that can't
| mutate or the virus stops working.
|
| And once you have a mature B-cell response your body can
| quickly respond with NAbs to prevent the viremia that leads
| to multiorgan infection. In fact with vaccine boosters it
| seems we may already have this level of protection, even
| against Omicron, and the jury is of course still out as to
| how durable that is and it may be more durable than initial
| shots were.
|
| Once the virus completes the vaccination campaign the hard
| way then the pandemic is over and the human race has a new
| cold/flu virus, and we should treat it like a cold/flu virus.
| It is also unlikely that we'll continue boosting with
| vaccines. We're unlikely to get enough people boosting with
| vaccines every year to make a dent in spread and boosting
| will mostly be confined to people over 65 and those who are
| immune compromised. We won't ever boost our way to zero
| virus.
|
| The "its just a flu" people were dead wrong in 2020, but very
| soon they're going to be entirely right. That doesn't fit
| neatly into the way that we carve up our society into Team
| Blue / Team Red though so its difficult for a lot of people
| to understand.
| skocznymroczny wrote:
| There's no moving past covid until an exit plan is announced.
| If there isn't one, the only hope of moving past covid is
| resistance. If people stopped rushing for the latest vaccine,
| stopped getting tested regularly, even without symptoms, we
| would be past covid already.
| runjake wrote:
| You're going to have to lay down the logic behind this one
| for me. I am not getting it.
| adam_arthur wrote:
| The gist OP is getting at, though not put so eloquently, is
| that covid is endemic and there will continue to be deaths,
| even in a world with 100% vaccinated and boosted people.
|
| So covid being "over" is really a state of mind/choice of
| when to accept that it's endemic and drop the
| hysterics/restrictions.
|
| Omicron should be cheered as an effectively natural vaccine
| that looks to quickly end the worst of covid, yet media
| continues to fear monger about case counts, by and large. I
| am seeing some articles speaking to it as beneficial
| though.
|
| The fear a lot of people have over covid is totally out of
| proportion with the actual data, and media by and large
| continues to stoke these fears.
| zerocount wrote:
| That was elegant and much more insightful.
| bonzini wrote:
| > Omicron should be cheered as an effectively natural
| vaccine that looks to quickly end the worst of covid
|
| In the medium term yes; in the short term, with millions
| of unvaccinated people and a very fast exponential
| growth, it still has potential to overflow healthcare.
| hinkley wrote:
| If infection grants more generalized immunity, doesn't that
| mean a tailored vaccine would do the same?
| nradov wrote:
| Possibly yes.
|
| https://www.defenseone.com/technology/2021/12/us-army-
| create...
| soperj wrote:
| >What a stroke of luck that we are here vs a more infectious
| strain of Delta or some other nightmare that would keep this
| rolling.
|
| How do we know we won't end up with that? Omicron evolved from
| Beta, which had pretty well disappeared when Omicron sprung up.
| ummonk wrote:
| The better omicron is at spreading the more people it will
| confer natural / hybrid immunity to, reducing the dangers of
| a future variant.
| bmitc wrote:
| Do you have sources for that? Because isn't that exactly
| what has not happened with all the existing variants?
| soperj wrote:
| Hopefully... the history of diseases before vaccines
| (polio, measles, smallpox, black plague, etc) doesn't
| exactly fill me with a lot of hope for it just becoming
| less deadly naturally, even if there are examples (Spanish
| flu) where they have.
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| What are the histories of the other coronaviruses? And
| would those histories be more relevant than histories of
| non coronaviruses?
| mlcrypto wrote:
| Common cold has a variety of coronaviruses
| nradov wrote:
| Another coronavirus probably caused a worldwide pandemic
| starting in 1889. It killed a lot of people, but the
| survivors gained natural immunity which gave them
| significant protection against symptomatic reinfections.
| The same virus HCoV-OC43 is still endemic today. This
| seems relevant to the current pandemic.
|
| https://sfamjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/
| 175...
|
| https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7252012/
| soperj wrote:
| 'The evidence 1889-1890 outbreak was caused by a
| coronavirus has been referred to as "weak" and
| "conjectural" in an analysis of the literature'
|
| Seems this theory has only gained traction in the last 2
| years.
|
| Looking into it further, case fatality rate of during the
| 1889-90 outbreak seemed to be 0.1-0.28, much lower than
| Covid-19 has been.
| nradov wrote:
| Our data on the 1889-90 pandemic is pretty thin. We don't
| have any reliable records on deaths in poorer countries
| so the error bars are quite wide.
|
| A lower infection fatality rate in that previous pandemic
| is not at all surprising. Back in 1889 elderly people
| made up a much lower fraction of the population. And
| there was a lower rate of co-morbid conditions such as
| obesity, diabetes, and hypertension.
| soperj wrote:
| Sure, there have been a lot of Flu pandemics with lower
| case fatality rates as well. Prior to this pandemic, they
| had actually narrowed down the flu subtype:
|
| "the reanalysis of seroarcheological data suggested
| Influenza A subtype H3 (possibly the H3N8 subtype) as a
| more likely cause for the 1889-1890 pandemic"
|
| There was no thoughts that it was Coronavirus related
| before this pandemic.
|
| edit: Interestingly though, the 1889-90 pandemic was
| thought to have originated in Bukhara, part of the
| Russian empire at the time, which has been historically a
| cattle raising area. H3N8 is Equine influenza virus,
| where as HCoV-OC43 was a Bovine coronavirus.
| nawgz wrote:
| I understand this is a reoccurring theme throughout
| history that lead to most of the endemic coronaviruses
| today. Omicron is truly fantastic; for example look at
| Ontario's case count vs ICU count. Omicron has completely
| decoupled those graphs.
| maxerickson wrote:
| It's not really clear whether that is because it is less
| severe or if it is because there are lots more
| breakthrough infections.
|
| (but a larger number of mild breakthrough infections is
| not itself terrible news either as the mildness indicates
| a population becoming more resilient against the virus)
| [deleted]
| jokethrowaway wrote:
| Indeed! I really hope governments will start recognising this
| and give us back our freedom. Media messages and restrictions
| are still pretty negative, despite the lack of severity. I
| don't know how can they talk about another lockdown.
|
| Delta also had lower mortality than the first wave: this was
| confirmed by some fact-checkers and not by others (depending on
| how alarmist the fact-checker is) but looking at numbers, it
| does seem to be case.
|
| It seems to be an evolutionary trend where the virus mutations
| that are successful became more transmissible and less deadly
| (probably because a dead host doesn't spread as much as an
| alive one).
| nradov wrote:
| Freedom is seldom given. It usually has to be taken.
| ummonk wrote:
| Delta had equal or higher severity per infection than alpha
| which in turn had higher severity than the original variant.
| It just had lower mortality than the first wave because
| people had higher preexisting immunity, treatment had
| improved, and some of the most vulnerable had already been
| culled from the herd.
|
| You have to compare between two variants at the same time,
| not against previous waves. Omicron is the first major
| variant to actually be less severe on this metric.
| johnchristopher wrote:
| > It seems to be an evolutionary trend where the virus
| mutations that are successful became more transmissible and
| less deadly (probably because a dead host doesn't spread as
| much as an alive one).
|
| Covid spreads while still being non-symptomatic so that
| explanation doesn't stand that much. Flu is not getting
| milder.
|
| Also, how many times more do you think you can get hit in the
| face by Manny Pacquiao instead of Mike Tyson and survive
| because his punches are milder ?
|
| How many times can we keep catching mild covid and escape
| long term damages (edit: and death and everything in between)
| ?
| kiba wrote:
| _Indeed! I really hope governments will start recognising
| this and give us back our freedom. Media messages and
| restrictions are still pretty negative, despite the lack of
| severity. I don 't know how can they talk about another
| lockdown._
|
| A lockdown is probably impractical at this point, but we are
| stuck with a disease that will be a health burden on humanity
| that will be difficult to eliminate.
|
| For example, if a disease kills 40,000 people per year.
| That's 400,000 people in a decade. A drop in the bucket of
| humanity for sure, but that's about a city size population.
| That's not counting the collectively lost days in term of
| feeling terrible.
| indigochill wrote:
| > For example, if a disease kills 40,000 people per year.
| That's 400,000 people in a decade. A drop in the bucket of
| humanity for sure, but that's about a city size population.
| That's not counting the collectively lost days in term of
| feeling terrible.
|
| Heart disease kills 659,000 people a year in the US alone
| (https://www.cdc.gov/heartdisease/facts.htm), but for some
| reason we're not having COVID-level panic about it.
|
| I'm struggling to find annual statistics for COVID, but I
| did find an article written September '21 stating there had
| been over 630,000 COVID deaths in the US since the start of
| 2020, so that's over a year and a half-ish, so a bit less
| than heart disease.
|
| Of course, heart disease isn't contagious (at least not in
| the traditional sense - genetics and lifestyle factors
| could be considered contagious if you're flexible with the
| term), but it's also a cause of death we've grown
| disconcertingly accustomed to for how prevalent it is. I
| expect once this outbreak has run its course, we'll
| probably see annual COVID deaths settle at a much lower
| number thanks to vaccinations/immunity. I'm not sure when
| we'll come to accept it as just another risk of life,
| though.
| toyg wrote:
| Beyond squabbling on numbers (COVID was actively fought
| in most developed countries, otherwise it would have
| killed many more), the difference is control.
|
| Heart disease is well-understood, and largely avoidable
| with education; hence, it's not a problem as far as the
| ruling classes are concerned.
|
| COVID and other infectious diseases, on the other hand,
| can hit literally anybody with a social life. They are
| fundamentally uncontrollable at the individual level, and
| have the potential to upset the social order if the
| numbers get out of control (as they did, shortly, last
| year). Until that continues to be the case, COVID will
| continue to be addressed as a significant problem.
| fader wrote:
| > Heart disease kills 659,000 people a year in the US
| alone (https://www.cdc.gov/heartdisease/facts.htm), but
| for some reason we're not having COVID-level panic about
| it.
|
| I think you answered this yourself:
|
| > Of course, heart disease isn't contagious
|
| If heart disease were contagious and could be effectively
| curtailed by wearing masks and getting a vaccine, I think
| you'd see a similar reaction to it that you're seeing to
| covid.
| conception wrote:
| Heart disease is not collapsing the health system. Why
| are we bothering to compare them.
| nradov wrote:
| Healthcare system capacity is somewhat fungible. If we
| reduced heart disease then there would be more resources
| available to deal with other conditions such as COVID-19.
| The majority of heart disease cases could be prevented,
| or at least delayed, by making better lifestyle choices.
| geofft wrote:
| The difficult thing about measuring causes of death is
| that we take it as axiomatic (and, to be clear, I think
| we're right to do so) that the goal is not for humans to
| live forever, that everyone should die of _something_.
| Heart disease mostly affects people who are at the age
| that people tend to die of "old age." In other words,
| eliminating heart disease entirely would largely only
| cause those people to die of something else. There are, I
| don't know, maybe 100-200K "premature" deaths from heart
| disease which ought to be the focus of public health
| interventions, but addressing the rest of them won't
| meaningfully save lives.
|
| Or put another way: 22% of all deaths in the US happen in
| nursing homes. But we don't say we should get rid of
| nursing homes. If 22% of all deaths in a city happened in
| their college dormitories, there would be an immediate
| outcry to shut down the dormitories.
|
| Now, the harder question is that covid also
| disproportionately affects people near the end of their
| natural life (and probably so does almost every medical
| cause of death besides, like, SIDS and pregnancy).
|
| So the question is then, how many people does covid kill
| "before their time," so to speak, and how does that
| compare to heart disease? One of the common arguments is
| that it does kill lots of people before their time - even
| thought it skews towards the older, it nonetheless kills
| a good chunk of older folks who would have otherwise
| lived happy and healthy lives for several more years.
|
| One way to measure this is by looking at excess deaths.
| How many people are dying of any cause compared to the
| year before covid was around? If covid was, say, killing
| people who were about to be killed by heart disease, we'd
| kind of expect a _drop_ in heart disease death
| statistics. If we 're not seeing that, then that implies
| that covid shouldn't be bucketed as an "old age" cause of
| death, that there's a reason to be more concerned about
| the 630,000 covid deaths over the past almost two years
| than the 659,000 heart disease deaths in 2019. And in
| fact it looks like the number of heart disease deaths
| didn't drop in 2020 (and grew, in fact) even as covid
| killed 350,000 people.
|
| (You can get these numbers out of
| http://wonder.cdc.gov/ucd-icd10.html - which I found
| linked from the site you linked, thanks! - and break them
| down further by age etc.)
|
| A lot of arguments that we should specifically care about
| covid (which is the camp I'm in) are predicated on the
| assumption that this is true; a lot of arguments that we
| should just treat it like we treat the flu are predicated
| on the assumption that it is not. I think this is a
| question of fact (though one that requires the statistics
| to actually be available) and not just a difference of
| opinion or worldview.
| pessimizer wrote:
| I don't understand this argument at all. Are you saying
| that if heart disease went from killing 650 thousand
| people a year to 1.3 million people a year, that wouldn't
| cause a massive freakout?
| TeeMassive wrote:
| Serious question: should we let this more infectious but less
| dangerous run its course to achieve natural immunity? What are
| the arguments for and against this strategy?
|
| I know that if it is 5 times less likely to put people in
| hospitals but 10 times more transmissible then there will be 2
| times more people in hospitals, but are there more arguments?
| philovivero wrote:
| Yes. We should do that. We won't.
|
| Pro: everyone is fine, the hospitals aren't overwhelmed, the
| anti-vaxxers will be fine along with everyone else.
|
| Con: can't speak with disgust and disdain anymore to those who
| disagree with your medical opinions, or have concerns with how
| quickly you're forcing your experimental medications on the
| entire planet.
|
| Not going to happen. I've already seen the usual suspects
| talking about how we need bigger, better, stronger vaccines for
| Omicron.
|
| We're pretty excited by this RNA vaccine tech, and we're going
| to use it, no matter what happens.
|
| There's too much money and too much political power on the pro-
| vax anti-immune-system side of things.
| pavel_lishin wrote:
| > _everyone is fine_
|
| Except the people who aren't.
|
| > _the hospitals aren 't overwhelmed_
|
| Except the ones that are.
|
| > _forcing your experimental medications on the entire
| planet_
|
| No more experimental than any other vaccine; due to how
| quickly COVID spread, we were able to do the same level of
| testing on the vaccine as for any other medication. It's as
| safe as anything else you take.
| donkarma wrote:
| vaccine trials usually last 2 years alone from a quick
| glance
| tonguez wrote:
| "No more experimental than any other vaccine"
|
| you are creating more vaccine hesitancy by saying this
| choward wrote:
| To your first two points, you could say that before covid.
|
| Do you have a time machine or something? You can't study
| long term effects just by having a bigger study.
| beefman wrote:
| Who's "we" and what makes you think they have any control over
| the matter?
| adam_arthur wrote:
| Well, many governments reinstating restrictions, for one.
|
| These work to slow the spread, which given the innocuous
| nature of Omicron, seem more damaging than helpful. Not that
| any government ever considered second order effects of these
| policies to begin with...
| vidarh wrote:
| Many of these restrictions were put in place because the
| effects of Omicron were uncertain when they were decided.
| If these early results bear out, I'm sure we'll start
| seeing the easing of some restrictions again very quickly.
| adam_arthur wrote:
| The restrictions largely don't have any effect anyway, if
| you compare different US state policies with health
| outcomes.
|
| Especially something like a travel/flight ban, as if that
| can stop an exponentially spreading virus.
| TeeMassive wrote:
| In the US there's an important legal document that begins
| with "We the People".
| abduhl wrote:
| So the long Covid we've been afraid of for our children this
| whole time has actually been long term immunity? How ironic that
| our own push to vaccinate and save our children could put them in
| a worse position immunity-wise. Like rain on your wedding day.
| jawns wrote:
| Is there any reason to assume that initial infection with Covid
| can't cause both immunity against subsequent infection AND long
| Covid symptoms?
|
| Think about how chicken pox works. You get infected, you deal
| with (usually but not always) mild symptoms, and then you don't
| get chicken pox again. But you _are_ susceptible to shingles
| later in life.
| paulryanrogers wrote:
| Having gotten chicken pox intentionally then again as a teen,
| only to learn it significantly increases my risk for shingles
| later in life, I don't recommend natural infection when there
| is a vaccine. The second infection was particularly painful.
|
| Please vaccinate your kids.
| nradov wrote:
| Chicken pox is caused by varicella, a herpes virus which
| remains permanently in most infected people. It is in no way
| comparable to COVID-19.
| jawns wrote:
| I'm not suggesting that Covid and chicken pox are related
| as viruses. I'm merely pointing out one example of how
| long-term symptoms are not incompatible with immunity. We
| know that Covid causes long-term symptoms in some people.
| So it would be interesting to see whether the differential
| between natural immunity and vaccinated immunity (if there
| is one) is outweighed by the acute and long-term symptoms
| of active infection.
| epgui wrote:
| Biochemist here: your claim that vaccination puts children in a
| worse position is neither supported by this paper, nor
| substantiated by any other data point to the best of my
| knowledge.
| Consultant32452 wrote:
| Boys at least appear to be more in danger from the vaccine
| than the virus.
|
| https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/sep/10/boys-more-
| at-r...
| objektif wrote:
| This article is pretty much garbage. You need to compare
| getting myocarditis from vaxx vs covid. And chances of
| getting it from covid is ~11x higher.
| chana_masala wrote:
| Myocarditis didn't become a concern until the jabs were
| rolling out
| jacquesm wrote:
| From vaccination no, but from COVID it has been a concern
| right from day #1.
|
| https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/mm7035e5.htm
| phonypc wrote:
| No they don't. The study that article references is hot
| garbage.
|
| https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/dumpster-diving-in-vaers-
| do...
| Consultant32452 wrote:
| 85% of VAERS reports are made by physicians. 100% are
| validated by the CDC.
|
| What's important is to disqualify the best information
| available so you just have to accept vague assertions
| from authority.
| phonypc wrote:
| VAERS is not the _best_ information available by any
| means, but it is indeed _a_ valid source of information.
| The issue with the paper is that it _misuses_ the
| information and draws conclusions that aren 't actually
| indicated.
| Consultant32452 wrote:
| What other dataset are you using to inform yourself about
| vaccine related harm in the public?
| bhk wrote:
| "Garbage"?
|
| > In an FDA analysis of the Optum healthcare claims
| database, the estimated excess risk of
| myocarditis/pericarditis approached 200 cases per million
| fully vaccinated males 16-17 years of age and 180 cases
| per million fully vaccinated males 12-15 years of age.
| [1]
|
| This rate is close to the findings of the Hoeg study
| (even higher, actually). [2]
|
| On the one side we have the FDA and multiple scholarly
| publications largely in alignment. On the other side, we
| have an internet blog article with hyperbolic language
| and a generally unprofessional tone.
|
| [1] https://www.fda.gov/media/153447/download
|
| [2] https://twitter.com/TracyBethHoeg/status/143579638284
| 1860099
| rsfern wrote:
| I think there's a bit more nuance to it than that
|
| The paper in question found that in this age group risk of
| hospitalization for cardiac adverse events (CAE) is a few
| times higher than risk of hospitalization with Covid.
|
| It's unclear (to me at least) how to quantify the level of
| danger in terms of acute and long term health effects from
| just this data.
|
| > Further research into the severity and long-term sequelae
| of post-vaccination CAE is warranted. Quantification of the
| benefits of the second vaccination dose and vaccination in
| addition to natural immunity in this demographic may be
| indicated to minimize harm.
|
| https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.08.30.21262866
| v...
| abduhl wrote:
| The paper itself asks the question I've suggested if you read
| between the lines: "COVID-19 vaccines are now being
| administered widely to adult populations and are also being
| delivered to children in some countries. Therefore, it is
| imperative to understand the profile of SARS-CoV-2-specific
| immune responses in children after natural infection to
| inform vaccination strategy."
| lern_too_spel wrote:
| The policy question this answers is whether to vaccinate
| children who have previously been infected, not whether to
| vaccinate children who have never been infected. The best
| decision for the latter group remains vaccination.
| chana_masala wrote:
| Children have nearly no risk of complications with covid
| vs. quite a large risk with the vaccine.
| epgui wrote:
| This is unequivocally incorrect.
| chana_masala wrote:
| https://stevekirsch.substack.com/p/weve-now-killed-close-
| to-...
| jacquesm wrote:
| That is a substantial misinterpretation of the data.
| chana_masala wrote:
| Who wants to win a million dollars? The author has a $1
| million dollar offer to debate him and prove him wrong.
| tomwojcik wrote:
| Without a reputable source for these claims you're just
| spreading misinformation.
| chana_masala wrote:
| I'm pretty baffled by this reply. It used to be (last
| year?) common knowledge that children were largely
| unaffected by covid. I guess the vaccine rollout has
| changed people's minds, but it hasn't changed the data.
|
| https://stevekirsch.substack.com/p/weve-now-killed-close-
| to-...
| rtsil wrote:
| > children were largely unaffected by covid
|
| The issue is not with that, it's with your second claim
| re: large risk with the vaccine. That's the claim that
| needs to be substantiated.
| oezi wrote:
| Among all infectious diseases children are facing Covid
| is one of the most severe.
|
| The worst side effect of the vaccine (myocarditis in
| young males) has been eliminated with better dosing
| protocols.
| chana_masala wrote:
| https://stevekirsch.substack.com/p/weve-now-killed-close-
| to-...
| oezi wrote:
| There was an excellent refutation of using Adverse Events
| Reports for anything but safety signalling.
|
| The author of the linked substack could have uploaded the
| death reports himself. And he didn't even think about
| comparing his numbers to expected numbers.
|
| So, no: children don't die from the vaccine.
| chana_masala wrote:
| The author has a $1 million dollar offer to debate him
| and prove him wrong.
| epgui wrote:
| You can "read between the lines" many different things,
| none of which are said explicitly. Scientists love to be
| explicit whenever they can.
|
| I don't see this as being indicative of any particular
| policy, but I see it as a data point which could inform
| decisions such as:
|
| - whether boosters should be given to children, or whether
| they should be given them last in line
|
| - whether we should allocate limited supplies to children,
| or to other vulnerable populations (eg.: vaccine inequity
| around the world)
|
| - whether we need the same schedule for children and adults
|
| - ...
|
| Again, I don't think this paper pushes too hard either way
| on any of these types of questions, it's a data point in a
| sea of data.
| jokethrowaway wrote:
| I think his point is that the immune response from the
| vaccine is lower than from just getting covid and the risks
| from getting covid for children are really low.
|
| Still, I don't think it makes much of a difference either
| way, especially for kids who don't have much to fear from
| covid.
| epgui wrote:
| "immune response from the vaccine is lower than from just
| getting covid"
|
| {{citation needed}}
|
| My point is that this is unsubstantiated.
|
| And it does make a big difference, because this reduces the
| likelihood of children going through multiple periods of
| infectivity: the fewer times children are infectious to
| others, on average, the more herd immunity we have,
| collectively, against SARS-CoV-2.
| abduhl wrote:
| epgui wrote:
| I have no idea what you mean. I believe (and at least I
| was hoping that) my comment was helpful.
| abduhl wrote:
| Your comment was made intending to shut down discussion
| by appealing to authority rather than engaging in the
| substance of the discussion. Note that the last large
| paragraph you wrote which does engage with the discussion
| was added via an edit. This was the entirety of your
| original post:
|
| "{{citation needed}}
|
| My point is that this is unsubstantiated."
| epgui wrote:
| I was not "appealing to authority". The fact that I'm an
| expert in the field is, imo, valuable meta-information.
|
| I weigh people's opinions differently if they're rooted
| in expertise than if they're random anonymous people on
| the internet. Do what you want with that information, and
| please forgive my hasty edits: sometimes when I read back
| what I wrote, I notice that I'm missing something.
| There's no bad faith there.
| clairity wrote:
| sorry, being 'an expert' has no bearing on the veracity
| of your claims. and further, claiming the nominative of
| 'expert' tends to negatively correlate with veracity. at
| best, you're an expert at the thing you study deeply, not
| the whole field. you perhaps may be more knowledgeable
| about different aspects of a given field, but that
| doesn't give you extraordinary powers of insight or
| reasoning.
|
| the exact opposite of your appeal is what teases out the
| known from the unknown, by triangulating from many
| arguments/opinions (the more, the better) whether they be
| 'expert' or not (the less correlated, the better).
| epgui wrote:
| We're no longer talking about the subject matter, but
| there is absolutely value in knowing whether an opinion
| is informed by expertise or not. I did not "appeal to
| expertise", I merely signalled that I had expertise in
| the field. This has value.
|
| I suspect that a small minority of Hacker News
| participants are biochemists/biologists/life scientists,
| so the default assumption when you read comments on these
| topics is that they probably come from smart non-experts.
| By adding this extra information, I wasn't making my
| argument any better: I was only providing the readers
| with extra meta-information.
|
| I won't bother explaining the dangers of the appeal to
| authority, because I am persuaded that you are already
| familiar with the fallacy. However, I will say that not
| every form of "expertise signalling" is an appeal to
| authority, and it is usually a very good idea to defer to
| expertise.
|
| I recommend this article on the subject, if you're
| interested in seeing where I'm coming from:
| https://thelogicofscience.com/2015/03/20/the-rules-of-
| logic-...
|
| Edit: and I will happily and readily admit that I am not
| the "most expert" person on any subject, and I myself
| pretty much always defer to the expertise of those who
| are more expert than me.
| clairity wrote:
| > "...it is usually a very good idea to defer to
| expertise."
|
| this is exactly what i'm pointedly disagreeing with.
| expertise gives you no such esteem to have others defer
| to you by default. what it does confer is an expectation
| of novel (to the non-expert) information and perhaps
| reasoning, but explicitly not deference. we are all often
| wrong, especially in our areas of expertise because of
| the disproportionate amount of time we spend in that
| area. have some humility that you may bring a relatively
| unique or more considered perspective to the table, but
| not infallibility or almighty 'truth'.
|
| and earnest consideration of an 'expert' opinion is the
| best you should hope for. all the rest is by definition
| beyond the realm of science and into the realm of (small
| p) political. that is, expertise signalling is always an
| appeal to authority, no matter the magnitude or
| centrality of the claim. only the reasoning/evidence
| matters, not the titles of the person presenting them.
| you may expect some correlation there but should never
| assume it.
|
| (note that i've also scienced in my past life, if that
| meta-information matters to you in the way you seem to
| believe it should.)
| jacquesm wrote:
| I'm fine with you disagreeing with it, everybody has a
| right to their opinion.
| jacquesm wrote:
| > sorry, being 'an expert' has no bearing on the veracity
| of your claims
|
| Actually, it does.
|
| > claiming the nominative of 'expert' tends to negatively
| correlate with veracity. at best
|
| Not in my experience.
|
| > the exact opposite of your appeal is what teases out
| the known from the unknown, by triangulating from many
| arguments/opinions (the more, the better) whether they be
| 'expert' or not (the less correlated, the better).
|
| So, by your reasoning we should all ask out bakers for
| information about software development because they
| definitely aren't experts and they certainly will have
| opinions about it.
|
| This isn't a popularity contest, we're talking about
| actual knowledge here, and experts have usually spent a
| good chunk of their life acquiring it. You can't just
| toss that overboard in some kind of 'equal time' play (or
| in your case, even worse, a less than equal time) simply
| because everybody's opinions are equally valid. Expertise
| counts for something, no matter what the field.
| chana_masala wrote:
| When you're already late...
|
| I appreciate the humor and I totally agree with your
| point
| chana_masala wrote:
| I would agree with the other sibling reply that asking
| for citation for natural immunity vs vaccine protection
| is a bit like asking for a citation for claiming that
| frozen water floats. Sure, you could prove it but it's a
| well accepted understanding in epidemiology and virology.
| It's only lately been.... Politicized.
| heurisko wrote:
| I was reading this article recently about natural vs
| vaccine immunity (mostly in adults I think). Didn't seem
| to reach any strong conclusions either way.
|
| > "It appears from the literature that natural infection
| provides immunity, but that immunity is seemingly not as
| strong and may not be as long lasting as that provided by
| the vaccine...
|
| > But not everyone agrees with this interpretation. "The
| data we have right now suggests that there probably isn't
| a whole lot of difference" in terms of immunity to the
| spike protein
|
| > Memoli highlights real world data such as the Cleveland
| Clinic study18 and points out that while "vaccines are
| focused on only that tiny portion of immunity that can be
| induced" by the spike, someone who has had covid-19 was
| exposed to the whole virus, "which would likely offer a
| broader based immunity" that would be more protective
| against variants. The laboratory study offered by the
| FDA22 "only has to do with very specific antibodies to a
| very specific region of the virus [the spike]," says
| Memoli. "Claiming this as data supporting that vaccines
| are better than natural immunity is shortsighted and
| demonstrates a lack of understanding of the complexity of
| immunity to respiratory viruses."
|
| https://www.bmj.com/content/374/bmj.n2101
| epgui wrote:
| This is pretty close to my area of expertise, and I don't
| think this is a well established principle at all.
| tomwojcik wrote:
| 3maj wrote:
| This is complete nonsense. https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10
| .1101/2021.07.01.21259785v...
|
| In Israel (I use them because they have a fantastic
| dashboard) not a single individual under the age of 19 has
| died of covid.
|
| Stop fear mongering.
| [deleted]
| pacerwpg wrote:
| I don't think he claimed anybody died.
| pessimizer wrote:
| Children _have_ died. It 's just that the numbers are
| very small, and the hospitals are not in any way packed
| with young people.
| logic_beats_pro wrote:
| And the most unverifiable scare tactic comment of this post
| award goes to...
|
| Newborns with serious post-covid issues, eh? Do you have any
| proof whatsoever of this or your other claims or are we just
| taking your word on it.
| epicureanideal wrote:
| Can you provide some data about this?
|
| Others replying to you have provided links showing that very
| few children die of Covid. Do you have specific links about
| long term disability DUE TO covid (not a disability caused by
| a car accident where the child was also found to have covid,
| for example).
| nradov wrote:
| It's very common for children admitted to hospitals for other
| conditions to be diagnosed with asymptotic COVID-19 as part
| of admission screening. There is no reliable evidence of
| frequent serious post-COVID issues in children. I support
| vaccination, but let's not exaggerate the risks of disease.
| davzie wrote:
| Horseshit!
| temptemptemp111 wrote:
| epgui wrote:
| Biochemist opinion: somewhat speculative, but what I take from
| this is that immunity in children makes them less likely than
| adults to shift from 'removed' to 'susceptible', in the SIR
| model. [1]
|
| [1]
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compartmental_models_in_epidem...
| nradov wrote:
| So it's the same as other coronaviruses like HCoV-OC43. There's
| no vaccine available for those other ones so most of us get
| infected as youths, and the resulting immunity protects us as we
| age. But they can still be dangerous to immunologically naive
| older patients.
|
| https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7252012/
| clairity wrote:
| it's been obvious since march of last year that this was the
| inevitable outcome of covid, yet we've spent nearly two years
| hand-wringing and fearmongering over it. it's the novelty of
| the virus combined with the general unpreparedness of our
| immune systems (obesity, sickness of all sorts, and age
| correlate with lowered immune preparedness) that's created this
| wave of initial severity as the virus works it's way to a
| steady-state similar to other coronaviruses.
|
| most people had, and still have, very little idea about how
| these things work, yet grandstand and moralize on about
| ineffective but distruptive remediations like masks and
| lockdowns that they hear about via propagandized media. even
| vaccines need only be seriously considered by the
| aforementioned immune-deficient (obese, elderly, etc.), not
| everyone (this article providing that evidence for children
| specifically).
| bjoli wrote:
| I think it has been pretty clear for a very long time that
| covid is something we will all get, and that it might even
| become something bot unlike the seasonal flu.
|
| The message has to my ears been "less contact = less
| infection = better access to healthcare for those who really
| need it".
|
| What would you suggest instead? I am all for discussing the
| losses contra gains of lockdowns, but I dont think any
| options have sounded much better.
| disambiguation wrote:
| We're going to look back on our treatment of children these past
| 2 years as one of the greatest blunders in the history of public
| health policy.
| NaturalPhallacy wrote:
| Nothing that happened was an accident or a mistake.
|
| Our oligarchy in big pharma wanted everything that our
| government did.
| jacquesm wrote:
| You may want to read this:
|
| https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2021/12/24/omicron-chi...
| daenz wrote:
| We sacrificed the mental health of the young for the physical
| health of the old.
| beefman wrote:
| Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. Where's
| the evidence that any public health measure adversely
| affecting children worked any benefit to the old?
| wiseowise wrote:
| But hey, grandma gets to live another year now.
|
| Who cares if the poor family never recovers after financial
| crisis.
| objektif wrote:
| I am sure anyone can recover from financial troubles. It is
| possible.. The other one? Not so much...
| [deleted]
| mechanical_bear wrote:
| I would suffer financially greatly if it brought back my
| grandmother, she passed from COVID December of last year. I
| wish she had another year. She would have had a chance to
| meet her great grandson. But sure, complain about the
| numbers in your bank account some more.
|
| Edit after being downvoted: Sure, downvote me and don't
| respond over my dead grandmother, coward.
| gjs278 wrote:
| pilsetnieks wrote:
| Now inverse that statement and see where it takes you, and
| what it tells about you as a human being.
| tonguez wrote:
| pilsetnieks wrote:
| Downvoters: you want your elders (and not just them) to
| die and countless others to suffer long-term consequences
| of a disease not yet fully understood just to earn some
| money right now and keep the endless rat race going as it
| is; you make me sick.
| pavel_lishin wrote:
| That sounds like a good reason to re-think ouf current
| medical and insurance industry, not a good reason to throw
| grandma to the wolves.
|
| Otherwise, the inevitable end of this logic is folks
| committing plausibly deniable suicide to get an insurance
| payout.
| pacerwpg wrote:
| Pandemics aren't easy
| ceejayoz wrote:
| My kids' mental health would be pretty heavily impacted by
| the death of their grandparents.
|
| A pretty large number of kids are _raised_ by "the old",
| too. https://www.prb.org/resources/more-u-s-children-raised-
| by-gr...
| pakitan wrote:
| > My kids' mental health would be pretty heavily impacted
| by the death of their grandparents.
|
| Yes, because without covid their grandparents will live
| forever.
| daenz wrote:
| And here's the impact of how we've treated children during
| the pandemic:
|
| >The pandemic then brought on physical isolation, ongoing
| uncertainty, fear and grief. Centers for Disease Control
| and Prevention researchers quantified that toll in several
| reports. They found between March and October 2020,
| emergency department visits for mental health emergencies
| rose by 24% for children ages 5-11 years and 31% for
| children ages 12-17 years. In addition, emergency
| department visits for suspected suicide attempts increased
| nearly 51% among girls ages 12-17 years in early 2021
| compared to the same period in 2019.[0]
|
| >A total of 83 articles (80 studies) met inclusion
| criteria. Of these, 63 studies reported on the impact of
| social isolation and loneliness on the mental health of
| previously healthy children and adolescents (n = 51,576;
| mean age 15.3 years). In all, 61 studies were
| observational, 18 were longitudinal, and 43 were cross-
| sectional studies assessing self-reported loneliness in
| healthy children and adolescents.[1]
|
| >Children and adolescents are probably more likely to
| experience high rates of depression and most likely anxiety
| during and after enforced isolation ends. This may increase
| as enforced isolation continues. Clinical services should
| offer preventive support and early intervention where
| possible and be prepared for an increase in mental health
| problems.[1]
|
| Experts think this is just the tip of the iceberg for
| issues that will affect us for decades.
|
| 0. https://publications.aap.org/aapnews/news/17718/AAP-
| AACAP-CH... 1. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/articl
| e/pii/S089085672...
| ceejayoz wrote:
| Zero of those mental health emergencies were due to the
| death of a loved one, right? It's all because of masks in
| schools and whatnot?
| daenz wrote:
| It seems like you're skimming the content because you
| have a pre-conceived notion of what you want to be true.
| Both links explicitly mention social isolation and
| loneliness as being driving forces in the negative mental
| health impacts.
| tonguez wrote:
| your kids mental health might also be impacted by seeing a
| horror movie... that does not compare to being locked
| inside and unable to socialize for 2 years
| mint2 wrote:
| Are you comparing seeing a horror movie to people's close
| relatives dying... ?
| NaturalPhallacy wrote:
| Strawman fallacy.
| tonguez wrote:
| appeal to incredulity. bravo!
| ceejayoz wrote:
| > that does not compare to being locked inside and unable
| to socialize for 2 years
|
| Good thing my kids haven't been subjected to that,
| despite being in a blue area of a blue state (New York).
|
| Being angry about _imaginary_ restrictions is silly.
| There 's nowhere in the world kids have been "locked
| inside" for two years.
| novok wrote:
| The effects of the pandemic on children has definitely
| been variable. Higher income kids going to private
| schools are back in school by 6 months, while lower
| income kid's public schools cannot even get zoom classes
| organized or access to such classes (laptops, etc) for
| over a year in some places. Average that out and the
| overall net effect has probably not been great.
|
| Demand for mental health care during the pandemic has
| boomed, and the isolation of lockdown and all the other
| stresses are directly correlated to that.
| tomp wrote:
| > My kids' mental health would be pretty heavily impacted
| by the death of their grandparents.
|
| Hopefully that's not something you could spare them with.
| kyruzic wrote:
| Learning to over come loss is something people have always
| had to deal with. Forced isolation is not.
| ya_throw wrote:
| I had great-grandparents and grandparents die as a kid.
| It's probably happened to most people.
| paulryanrogers wrote:
| Let's not forget that 40% of adults in the US are obese and
| some immuno-compromised. As a parent who falls into one of
| those groups I hope we can find a path forward that
| balances personal liberty and our health.
| randomopining wrote:
| I always said they should've just let all kids, college kids,
| etc just get it super quick. Isolate the colleges, let them
| party etc. Massive herd immunity after 4-6 weeks and then that
| huge part of society is fine.
| yalogin wrote:
| Can you clarify more?
| jlarocco wrote:
| I'm not saying we're doing well, but the bar for "greatest
| blunder in the history of public health policy" is pretty low,
| unfortunately:
|
| https://www.ibtimes.com/scarred-life-canadas-uprooted-indige...
| dijonman2 wrote:
| janeroe wrote:
| > one of the greatest blunders in the history of public health
| policy
|
| Is it a blunder when malice is involved?
| NaturalPhallacy wrote:
| Greed and lust for power. Doesn't need to be malice.
| malchow wrote:
| I couldn't agree more. Children trying to eat lunch outside in
| the cold in NYC. Children in California barred from classrooms
| for a year+, and soon children forced to receive one or more
| medicines they simply do not need.
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2021-12-24 23:01 UTC)