Coronavirus. The n(in)th sequel.

[Samson]

provide very little that companies don't already almost freely access from people by tracking their phone movements

This is the bit I find funny. People posting about tracking chips in vaccines from their phones that never go far from their hands. They probably even have google or apple tracking software on them (tracking software = android or iOS).

 

[Lexicus]

I don't think anyone is strongly suggesting that no lockdown would have been better

That is very, very obviously what they are arguing. It is really not ambiguous or unclear in any way.

 

[El_Machinae]

Oh, and an update on the latest in antivaxxer meme-crafting. The new argument is that the PCR test has been incapable of distinguishing the flu from Covid-19 this whole time and that false-positives have made this whole thing Fake News (previously the discussion was about whether they were using the right Cycle Threshold, where I had to explain that epidemiology requires different methodology that simple diagnostics).

I ... didn't handle this new objection well. I guess if you've only heard of PCR last year, you'd not know how solid it is as a technology and how utterly simple it is to do well if you're at all expert in it. The analogy I used is to suggest that someone taking footprint castings and tooth castings couldn't distinguish wolves from moose. The problem was that people doubled down that "it's been wrong this whole time", and I just wasn't able to bridge their gap of understanding in time before my temper took off. I think I handled "aerosolized spike protein was causing menstrual problems" better than this one.

My empathy towards the vaccine-hesitant crowd really has diminished. Honestly, I think that Delta making Herd Immunity so much harder is what did it. I know so many people who volunteered for Astra-Zeneca just as the clot headlines were dominating, so I know the amount of goodwill there was out there for contributing to Herd Immunity.

 

[innonimatu]

Neither that nor the reverse have been "proven" in any country, period.

Lockdowns have impact on immediate and longterm economy performance, and there are actuarial models to use that can estimate resulting deaths.

It was very much proven in China, NZ and even Australia, both in terms of economic performance and in terms of personal welfare, that they had a much better time for having done the lockdowns necessary to suppress the virus. Australia is now being victims of a typhoid Mary government bent on forcing people fo "live with the virus". But the chinese and new zelanders only had to endure short lockdowns, with far less disruptions of their lives (and economy) than the rest of the world suffered. That was the sane policy to have applied.

Remember, a successful containment could easily cause more lockdown deaths than covid-19 deaths. When it comes to a pandemic, a successful response looks like an over-reaction in retrospect, because you have to err on the side of being too aggressive.

But not more that those the virus would have caused if let unconstrained. Governments, and in particular government bureaucracies and the group of people who manage stuff, in most countries tried very hard to block lockdowns. Short of trying to force people to continue traveling and shopping and working (because they can't put a policeman chasing every person) the initial reactions were to sabotage any attempt at stopping things. I do recall the month of February 2020. Until in some countries hospitals filled, many people started dying, panic set in and people by themselves stopped mingling! If our governments could have censored news of deaths I think they would have tried that. But it was too visible. And why did they do this foolishness rather than suppress early and hard? Because they only have short-term vision. We're cursed with a "management" that just can't think ahead, visible in so many problems. Covid exposed that in a very sharp way.

There is perhaps hope that despite having faild to contain this, it will eventually go away. I was wondering if this had been posted here already, doesn't seem so. Very important paper, only one so far doing this analysis in a large population, but I expect for come corroboration from other places:

SARS-CoV-2-naïve vaccinees had a 13.06-fold (95% CI, 8.08 to 21.11) increased risk for breakthrough infection with the Delta variant compared to those previously infected, when the first event (infection or vaccination) occurred during January and February of 2021. The increased risk was significant (P<0.001) for symptomatic disease as well. When allowing the infection to occur at any time before vaccination (from March 2020 to February 2021), evidence of waning natural immunity was demonstrated, though SARS-CoV-2 naïve vaccinees had a 5.96-fold (95% CI, 4.85 to 7.33) increased risk for breakthrough infection and a 7.13-fold (95% CI, 5.51 to 9.21) increased risk for symptomatic disease. SARS-CoV-2-naïve vaccinees were also at a greater risk for COVID-19-related-hospitalizations compared to those that were previously infected.

This study demonstrated that natural immunity confers longer lasting and stronger protection against infection, symptomatic disease and hospitalization caused by the Delta variant of SARS-CoV-2, compared to the BNT162b2 two-dose vaccine-induced immunity.

A retrospective cohort study was conducted, leveraging data from MHS’ centralized computerized database. The study population included MHS members aged 16 or older who were vaccinated prior to February 28, 2021, who had a documented SARS-CoV-2 infection by February 28, 2021, or who had both a documented SARS-CoV-2 infection by February 28, 2021 and received one dose of the vaccine by May 25, 2021, at least 7 days before the study period.
MHS is a 2.5-million-member, state-mandated, non-for-profit, second largest health fund in Israel, which covers 26% of the population and provides a representative sample of the Israeli population. Membership in one of the four national health funds is mandatory, whereas all citizens must freely choose one of four funds ...
Overall, 673,676 MHS members 16 years and older were eligible for the study group of fully vaccinated SARS-CoV-2-naïve individuals; 62,883 were eligible for the study group of unvaccinated previously infected individuals and 42,099 individuals were eligible for the study group of previously infected and single-dose vaccinees.

 

[Gorbles]

Ah, yes. The classic/classy "I am going to call you out for not having an argument, present none myself, and suggest it would be beneficial to silence opinions I don't agree with" move. Not the least bit hypocritical, nope.

So, better or worse when you quote people and reply with single words like "derp"?

 

[Samson]

I was wondering if this had been posted here already, doesn't seem so. Very important paper, only one so far doing this analysis in a large population, but I expect for come corroboration from other places:

That is indeed an interesting paper. 13 fold difference is enormous.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

It was very much proven in China

Unless you're going for some kind of ironic reference to Taiwan, then no.

CCP is lying. Again.

Since you ignored earlier discussion on it I won't address what you're saying beyond this.

 

[innonimatu]

COVID vaccines and blood clots: what researchers know so far

Despite fervent work by researchers, the mechanism that links the vaccines and immune thrombotic thrombocytopenia (VITT) is still uncertain. Establishing a mechanism could reveal ways to prevent and treat the condition, and improve the design of future vaccines. Over the past few months, researchers have gathered clues and developed a host of hypotheses.

Working through these possibilities is a daunting task. “You can have your hypothesis, but how do you find which is the one that caused an event in maybe 1 in 100,000 people?” asks John Kelton, a haematologist at McMaster University in Hamilton, Canada. “It’s really, really hard.”​

Imo the idea that some partly made spike protein may be produced true to flawed DNA sould be researched on. Most plausible hypothesis I've seen so far.

And I'm not going to pass on the "told you so" about two-dose vaccines. The only justification for two doses was that they raised the antibody level higher. But it would have been wiser to save the second dose for a delayed booster. In practice what the british did. Compare their results to the ones from Israel. Mismanagement across most of the world in going after whatever the vaccine makers decided to test in their hasty and very incomplete phase 2 studies, where only one thing got tested. The vaccines ware crappily tested.

Finally, if the study above is confirmed elsewhere, it's proven that the allegations about the vaccine being inducing better immunity than having had the virus itself were just more lies made up on the spot to praise the vaccine wonder. It made no sense that someone who had had its immune system fighting the virus itself would have less immunity that someone vaccinated with a piece of the virus. But this crazy story was pushed without any evidence to back it.

Lying is never good public policy, things should be explained and promoted as they are. Reality ends up exposing the lies and people who were lied to get pissed.

That is indeed an interesting paper. 13 fold difference is enormous.

And the group studied is very big.

Anyway, the british probably observed this independently in their results, hence the push to open up everything and "let it rip". Looking at the detailed data out of the UK vaccine effectiveness is anyway lower than advertised even for hospitalizations and deaths.
It's still tremendously risky because of variants developing, but that's clearly their current bet. They're just not admitting it. I won't go out to try to get covid on purpose, vaccine or no vaccine! (though I figure I already had a meeting with it anyway...)

 

[Edmund Ironside]

No rugby is still not enough to justify a lockdown ^_^

How dare you, rugby is the best sport in the world, and that is not an opinion, it is a fact!

Their total excess deaths don't seem to be out of line with other European countries. Better than some, worse than others. So it "worked" about as well as other measures (not particularly well).

Their excess death rate is definitely worse then other nearby countries which are similarly cold and sparsely populated. I think most would consider Sweden's approach to have not exactly been a disaster, but to have been a definite fail, sadly.

https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/coronavirus-excess-deaths-tracker

 

[TheMeInTeam]

How dare you, rugby is the best sport in the world, and that is not an opinion, it is a fact!



Their excess death rate is definitely worse then other nearby countries which are similarly cold and sparsely populated. I think most would consider Sweden's approach to have not exactly been a disaster, but to have been a definite fail, sadly.

View attachment 606780

https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/coronavirus-excess-deaths-tracker

1. "Europe" is more than "Northern Europe".
2. Click back to the default "deaths per 100,000" and post that picture instead, so it at least looks like you're trying to make an honest case.

Sweden never got over 10 per 100k. That's still pretty bad...but compare it to UK, Portugal, Switzerland, France, or US states like New York and New Jersey.

~

(No longer directed at above quote) Similarly, citing NZ and claiming that other countries lack of acting like they did is the sole cause of discrepancy ignores performance of several other countries with less draconian measures and very similar performance against COVID (Taiwan for example).

 

[innonimatu]

Honestly, I think that Delta making Herd Immunity so much harder is what did it. I know so many people who volunteered for Astra-Zeneca just as the clot headlines were dominating, so I know the amount of goodwill there was out there for contributing to Herd Immunity.

There will never be herd immunity this way, or probably any other way - that's what people are admitting to when they talk of the virus becoming "endemic" and accept that vaccines' effect wanes fast. That strategy has failed and failed hard. And it was bound to fail. The virus is too contagious and when people who had had it starting showing new infections - this happened before the mass deployment of the vaccines - it was game over for herd immunity ending the virus. 8 months have been wasted pushing a lie. There are ways proven to end this virus but herd immunity has not done it anywhere.

The people who objected to the mass vaccination calling instead for those more at risk to be vaccinated and for treatment and prevention strategies to be widely deployed had it right. But they were silenced in the media, one can in some places say outright censored with false "fact-checks", due to the induced mass hysteria for vaccinating our way out of covid. To question the attainability of herd immunity in this way was to be an "anti-vaxxer". Does it remain so now that breakthrough cases multiply in so many countries? We can now say as a fact that herd immunity through mass vaccination didn't work. As it was called in the UK, it was a "myth". The vaccines were one thing among several to be used to manage this health crisis correctly, not the miracle end for it.

I know that the idiots-in-government in my country overrode the majority of the professional's opinions and promoted a hastily mass vaccination of children because teachers were objecting to open schools next year without that mass vaccination being made. They were histerically demanding mass vaccination because they'd been led believe that the vaccines would provide the miracle of herd immunity. Imo that won't happen, we'll have school closures anyway, and the fight against covid remains hopeful thinking instead of a coherent strategy.

 

[Zardnaar]

1. "Europe" is more than "Northern Europe".
2. Click back to the default "deaths per 100,000" and post that picture instead, so it at least looks like you're trying to make an honest case.

Sweden never got over 10 per 100k. That's still pretty bad...but compare it to UK, Portugal, Switzerland, France, or US states like New York and New Jersey.

~

(No longer directed at above quote) Similarly, citing NZ and claiming that other countries lack of acting like they did is the sole cause of discrepancy ignores performance of several other countries with less draconian measures and very similar performance against COVID (Taiwan for example).

Taiwan had a outbreak it took them someing like 3 months to get on top of it.

NZ go hard go early usually stamps it out in around 4 weeks eliminated in 7.

 

[innonimatu]

Unless you're going for some kind of ironic reference to Taiwan, then no.

CCP is lying. Again.

Since you ignored earlier discussion on it I won't address what you're saying beyond this.

You're another one who just wants very much to believe one thing, evidence-free?

Think, your belief doesn't make sense. If China hadn't (several times!) pushed cases down to zero it would be impossible to hide the consequences of the virus being rampaging there. Its the most populous country in the world, with hundreds of millions of people writing and publishing stuff. A rampaging virus is impossible to hide. It couldn't be done in Wuhan and it can't be done anywhere. If we're not seeing panic there, they suppressed the outbreaks as they announced.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

You're another one who just wants very much to believe one thing, evidence-free?

Evidence is past history of lying by CCP, including directly about COVID in early stages. THAT's the government we're to trust is now handling it well? lol

Think, your belief doesn't make sense. If China hadn't (several times!) pushed cases down to zero it would be impossible to hide the consequences of the virus being rampaging there. Its the most populous country in the world, with hundreds of millions of people writing and publishing stuff.

When stuff behind the great firewall is written and published, what do you think happens when CCP doesn't like what is written?

Are investigations into their COVID numbers even getting half of the (low) effort at investigating their treatment of its Uighurs? CCP is actively committing genocide to minimal mainstream news attention/coverage, and we're to believe that there's no POSSIBLE way they could fudge their COVID numbers without getting attention? Really?

If you're going to pick countries to use as examples, there are ones that have seen success that do not have a longstanding track record of dishonesty and information suppression.

 

[amadeus]

Ignoring issues of the credibility gap, does it strike anyone else as somewhat implausible that they would have 100% accuracy in testing and in population registration? I don’t know how free they are to move around in their country, which I could see significantly influencing results one way or the other.

Something about the whole thing strikes me as suspicious, and I’m not going to deny the credibility gap in influencing my thinking.

 

[r16]

so , it has got to be year or more already , when people on the internet were saying 40 million or so Chinese hsd died and they were being cremated with extreme efficiency .

 

[Takhisis]

Today we finally saw Argentina's ‘president’ formally charged for breaking his own lockdown rules.

 

[Birdjaguar]

Ignoring issues of the credibility gap, does it strike anyone else as somewhat implausible that they would have 100% accuracy in testing and in population registration? I don’t know how free they are to move around in their country, which I could see significantly influencing results one way or the other.

Something about the whole thing strikes me as suspicious, and I’m not going to deny the credibility gap in influencing my thinking.

China is fully capable of of shutting down cities of 10 million or more along with road, rail and air travel.

 

[amadeus]

China is fully capable of of shutting down cities of 10 million or more along with road, rail and air travel.

I don’t doubt that at all. I’m not saying it’s impossible for their measures to be effective—but what seems to me like a massive hurdle is being able to correctly detect 100% of cases knowing what we think we do about the virus.

Here’s what I mean as an example: not all cases are symptomatic, they don’t develop instantaneously, and what with some symptoms being akin to the common cold or flu, how do you go about isolating, testing, and verifying all of that within a timespan under which such measures could be effective?

New Zealand, the best other performer in terms of quashing local cases has found one turn into... 100? 150? Within like a week. That’s a small country with no land borders and quarantine-upon-arrival. So what I’m trying to figure out is that discrepancy.

If there’s a plausible explanation for it, I’m all ears, because I have no way of explaining it myself.

 

[Birdjaguar]

from what my friends in china say, the government has a small "army" of testers and trackers in cities and they test and track thousands and thousands a day when they need to.