Just curious, anyone have a plan, or preps for global pandemic?

[Saul]

Hi Gordo!

Hope that your symptoms, if any, remain mild.

  --  Saul

 

 

[Sibiriak]

EU regulators warned that frequent Covid-19 booster shots could adversely affect the immune response and may not be feasible 

Quote

Repeat booster doses every four months could eventually weaken the immune response and tire out people, according to the European Medicines Agency. Instead, countries should leave more time between booster programs and tie them to the onset of the cold season in each hemisphere, following the blueprint set out by influenza vaccination strategies, the agency said. 

The advice comes as some countries consider the possibility of offering people second booster shots in a bid to provide further protection against surging omicron infections. Earlier this month Israel became the first nation to start administering a second booster, or fourth shot, to those over 60. The U.K. has said that boosters are providing good levels of protection and there is no need for a second booster shot at the moment, but will review data as it evolves.

Boosters “can be done once, or maybe twice, but it’s not something that we can think should be repeated constantly,” Marco Cavaleri, the EMA head of biological health threats and vaccines strategy, said at a press briefing on Tuesday. “We need to think about how we can transition from the current pandemic setting to a more endemic setting”  [...]

 

Edited January 17, 2022 by Sibiriak

[Matt]

My sister came over yesterday and I was talking to her about the rapid rise in cases here where we live. She knows so many people who are currently ill with COVID at the moment.

What is interesting, although maybe not that surprising, is that my niece, 4 nephews, and my sister have all been in close contact with a few people that have had COVID recently and none of them have caught it (they test quite frequently). They were even in the same room and sleeping in the same bedroom when they stayed over their friends who tested positive for COVID the next day.

Almost everyone in my nephews class at school tested positive for COVID not long ago as well, but Ethan did not. Perhaps because he had COVID at the same time as my family did around October 2020 (my sister had it, so I assume her kids did as well).

I've been in contact with people that have recently tested positive (likely Omicron) and I'm still testing negative still as well.

I'm gonna get that antibody test done at the end of Feb. It's possible that I already had a "boost" and was reinfected before Omicron and perhaps I was asymptomatic? I guess I'll know either way if I see my antibody titers much higher than my previous level.
 

 

[mccoy]

9 hours ago, Sibiriak said:

EU regulators warned that frequent Covid-19 booster shots could adversely affect the immune response and may not be feasible 

 

Yes, at last, there is some glimpse of hope that reason by chance has hit some public health officials (in Europe). In previous posts, we were discussing the potential health issues of boosters, and now EMA is confirming the suspicions, at least conceptually. 

[alexthegra8]

On 9/25/2021 at 4:20 AM, DHL said:

Yeah, but I have a giant smile on my face by eating ice cream and pizza !

Congrats! your a glutton! 

[alexthegra8]

12 hours ago, mccoy said:

Yes, at last, there is some glimpse of hope that reason by chance has hit some public health officials (in Europe). In previous posts, we were discussing the potential health issues of boosters, and now EMA is confirming the suspicions, at least conceptually. 

Attia's recent podcost w/ a few doctors talked about how omicron was "nature's vaccine" because most cases result in a light respiratory infection. That governments are currently attempting to implement societal wide booster shots is the biggest human rights violation in the history of liberal democracy. 

[Sibiriak]

Israeli trial, world’s first, finds 4th dose ‘not good enough’ against Omicron   

Quote

17 January 2022  

Nearly a month after Sheba Medical Center launched a landmark study to test the efficacy of a fourth COVID shot, the hospital said Monday that this fourth booster was only partially effective in protecting against the Omicron strain.

“The vaccine, which was very effective against the previous strains, is less effective against the Omicron strain,” Prof. Gili Regev-Yochay, a lead researcher in the experiment said.

“We see an increase in antibodies, higher than after the third dose,” Regev-Yochay said. “However, we see many infected with Omicron who received the fourth dose. Granted, a bit less than in the control group, but still a lot of infections,” she added.

“The bottom line is that the vaccine is excellent against the Alpha and Delta [variants], for Omicron it’s not good enough,” she said.

Regev-Yochay added that it is still probably a good idea to give a fourth shot to those at higher risk, but intimated that perhaps the current campaign, which also offers the jab to the over-60s, should be amended to only include even older groups  [...]

 

[alexthegra8]

22 minutes ago, Sibiriak said:

Israeli trial, world’s first, finds 4th dose ‘not good enough’ against Omicron   

 

No dose will be good enough for sub-sets of populations that are in poor health and have comorbidities -- cardio vascular disease, diabetes, etc.

[mccoy]

7 hours ago, alexthegra8 said:

Attia's recent podcost w/ a few doctors talked about how omicron was "nature's vaccine" because most cases result in a light respiratory infection. That governments are currently attempting to implement societal wide booster shots is the biggest human rights violation in the history of liberal democracy. 

I listened to that podcast and they talked about a detail which is strangely little known: vaccination shots are usually spaced 6 months apart, so what has been done worldwide, spacing the doses 3-4 weeks apart is very wrong, since the right timing triggers the right response in the immune system. A justification might be found in the emergency situation, where a 6-months wait could make an individual more susceptible to contagion. But I find it exceedingly weird that this aspect has not been divulged. It just seems like we are living in a fairytale where the vaccine is the most benevolent, nice, untouchable main character with no flaw whatsoever.

Bottom line, the booster or third dose may have a benefit in making up for the above malpractice (too close first doses and subsequent partial immune response). From this, I can find some solace from the nazi-fascist mandates the Italian country has actuated.

And of course, I agree about the huge human rights violations, since it has been done without any medical considerations, it was pure policy and ideology. For example, every virologist worth of his/her title agrees that having contracted Covid19 + double vaccination bestows such protection that the booster dose is useless. Yet, the acquisition of natural immunity has been totally ignored by the mandates and a third dose requested just the same. Ditto for age, state of health, and so forth.

Last, what I found even more annoying was the politicians using the no-vaxxers as a scapegoat for their poor performances. In a country where over 80% of people is double vaccinated and many millions are treble vaccinated. Again, my political inclinations have changed after these grotesqueries (I will vote the single party which has opposed the government's absolutist behaviour).

 

 

 

Edited January 18, 2022 by mccoy

[mccoy]

7 hours ago, Sibiriak said:

sraeli trial, world’s first, finds 4th dose ‘not good enough’ against Omicron   

It makes sense conceptually. After the 3rd dose, the only advantage in successive shots is a temporary spike in neutralizing antibodies. But you cannot vaccinate a whole population at the same time, so the spike will wane in the part of the population which has been boosted early; these will return to the original unboosted state and the ostensible advantage is progressively lost. Unless a whole country is able to boost all tens of millions of citizens almost at the same time and repeat the procedure every 3 months. Good luck with that and good luck to the population!

Also, the neutralizing antibodies may not be specific enough for the omicron variant. 

Edited January 18, 2022 by mccoy

[Gordo]

On 1/12/2022 at 9:50 PM, Todd Allen said:

 I've been relying only on my mask for protection and it has worked perfectly so far.  If you want I can send plans.  The material list is short just 2 rubber bands, 2 bread twisties and 1 onion bag.

That looks very innovative, I especially like the breathability of it!  😉

[alexthegra8]

9 hours ago, Gordo said:

That looks very innovative, I especially like the breathability of it!  😉

Don't use that as a Tinder profile pic : )

[alexthegra8]

17 hours ago, mccoy said:

I listened to that podcast and they talked about a detail which is strangely little known: vaccination shots are usually spaced 6 months apart, so what has been done worldwide, spacing the doses 3-4 weeks apart is very wrong, since the right timing triggers the right response in the immune system. A justification might be found in the emergency situation, where a 6-months wait could make an individual more susceptible to contagion. But I find it exceedingly weird that this aspect has not been divulged. It just seems like we are living in a fairytale where the vaccine is the most benevolent, nice, untouchable main character with no flaw whatsoever.

Bottom line, the booster or third dose may have a benefit in making up for the above malpractice (too close first doses and subsequent partial immune response). From this, I can find some solace from the nazi-fascist mandates the Italian country has actuated.

And of course, I agree about the huge human rights violations, since it has been done without any medical considerations, it was pure policy and ideology. For example, every virologist worth of his/her title agrees that having contracted Covid19 + double vaccination bestows such protection that the booster dose is useless. Yet, the acquisition of natural immunity has been totally ignored by the mandates and a third dose requested just the same. Ditto for age, state of health, and so forth.

Last, what I found even more annoying was the politicians using the no-vaxxers as a scapegoat for their poor performances. In a country where over 80% of people is double vaccinated and many millions are treble vaccinated. Again, my political inclinations have changed after these grotesqueries (I will vote the single party which has opposed the government's absolutist behaviour).

 

Agreed, the idea of the 4 week period between shots is very strange; but perhaps each of the Pfizer shots was not "complete" on its own, and the 2nd dose was required? What makes them different than the JJ 1 time shot? I know very little about vaccine timing..

 

 

[mccoy]

6 hours ago, alexthegra8 said:

I know very little about vaccine timing.

I too, but this is a detail the Columbia professors of virology underlined and which was reiterated by the experts which Peter Attia alluded to in his podcast.

They did not provide the fine details, only the fact that for the immune response to be complete and 'mature' and to include some cross-immunity against other variants, the timing of about 6 months must be respected. 

[Gordo]

I'm finally completely recovered from covid, did normal exercise/workouts today and back to regular sleep schedule.  Cases are peaking now in the US and falling off a cliff in the UK which is a couple weeks ahead of the US.

 

End of Covid! All restrictions in England to be scrapped within DAYS

"ALL covid restrictions in England will end in 10 days, a senior Government source has confirmed."

 

I wonder if the "pandemic over" celebrations are coming soon, and will that be premature?

If you were vaccinated AND exposed, does that provide longer lasting protection than vaccinated but NOT exposed? 

Omicron: Infection after Covid jab builds immunity, says study

I wonder if there is any hope that covid does NOT stay with us forever like the flu?  Maybe the "universal / all variants" vaccine could end it forever? 

[mccoy]

4 hours ago, Gordo said:

If you were vaccinated AND exposed, does that provide longer lasting protection than vaccinated but NOT exposed? 

Yes, natural infection plus full vaccination has been observed to provide cross-immunity, but many now-absolutist western states like Italy ignored this, compelling people to have a 3rd booster anyway, even if infected and double vaccinated. Joseph Stalin, as history teaches us, liked to bend science to his own convictions, ideology, and policy. Some governments have recently done exactly the same with SARS-COV2.

Edited January 20, 2022 by mccoy

[alexthegra8]

4 hours ago, mccoy said:

Yes, natural infection plus full vaccination has been observed to provide cross-immunity, but many now-absolutist western states like Italy ignored this, compelling people to have a 3rd booster anyway, even if infected and double vaccinated. Joseph Stalin, as history teaches us, liked to bend science to his own convictions, ideology, and policy. Some governments have recently done exactly the same with SARS-COV2.

There is also no basis to popular claims being voiced in media right now that "natural immunity" can only be achieved after a vaccine. In fact, it can be achieved without a vaccine, that is why it is called natural immunity.

[Matt]

In December, the government said there would likely be a huge rise in hospitalizations and deaths because of the Omicron outbreak.

Largely thanks to the vaccines, this has not been the case. But I suspect that given the fact that millions of people in the UK have still not had a vaccine at all, they believed the toll would be much higher.

It seems to me they could be ignoring the data that shows 95%+ of people in the UK have antibodies to the virus and the vast majority of those have longer lasting cellular immunity that is still effective at preventing severe disease (true for previous infection and those vaccinated).

This is despite official government reports and other data showing that previous infection is hugely protective against severe disease if reinfection occurs (and that it was just as good or better than vaccines at preventing alpha and delta infections; though less effective at preventing Omicron), the level of immunity in the population may not have been taken into account when coming up with the figures. The sole focus was only on vaccination rate.

Of course, Omicron is also intrinsically less virulent, which is great, and that played a part too.

Edited January 20, 2022 by Matt

[mccoy]

9 hours ago, mccoy said:

Joseph Stalin, as history teaches us, liked to bend science to his own convictions, ideology, and policy. Some governments have recently done exactly the same with SARS-COV2.

The theory supported by Stalin (and other communist countries) is called Lysenkoism. How absurd as the concept may seem, that's not a factor, as far as it fits into the government's narrative.

Welcome into the era of the new Lysenkoism!

 

Lysenkoism

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

 

 

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Lysenko speaking at the Kremlin in 1935. Behind him are (left to right) Stanislav Kosior, Anastas Mikoyan, Andrei Andreev and Joseph Stalin.

Lysenkoism (Russian: Лысенковщина, romanized: Lysenkovshchina, [ɫɨˈsɛnkəfɕːʲɪnə], Ukrainian: лисенківщина, romanized: lysenkivščyna, [ɫɨˈsɛŋkɪwʃt͡ʃɪnɐ]) was a political campaign led by Soviet biologist Trofim Lysenko against genetics and science-based agriculture in the mid-20th century, rejecting natural selection in favour of a form of Lamarckism, as well as expanding upon the techniques of vernalization and grafting. In time, the term has come to be identified as any deliberate distortion of scientific facts or theories for purposes that are deemed politically, religiously or socially desirable.

More than 3,000 mainstream biologists were dismissed or imprisoned, and numerous scientists were executed in the Soviet campaign to suppress scientific opponents. The president of the Soviet Agriculture Academy, Nikolai Vavilov, who had been Lysenko's mentor, but later denounced him, was sent to prison and died there, while Soviet genetics research was effectively destroyed. Research and teaching in the fields of neurophysiology, cell biology, and many other biological disciplines were harmed or banned.

The government of the Soviet Union (USSR) supported the campaign, and Joseph Stalin personally edited a speech by Lysenko in a way that reflected his support for what would come to be known as Lysenkoism, despite his skepticism toward Lysenko's assertion that all science is class-oriented in nature.^[1] Lysenko served as the director of the USSR's Lenin All-Union Academy of Agricultural Sciences. Other countries of the Eastern Bloc including the People's Republic of Poland, the Republic of Czechoslovakia, and the German Democratic Republic accepted Lysenkoism as the official "new biology", to varying degrees, as did the People's Republic of China for some years.

[Matt]

CDC finally says that previous infection resulted in BETTER immunity than vaccination against Delta. 

Quite obvious for a long time now. 

Surviving a previous infection provided better protection than vaccination against Covid-19 during the Delta wave, federal health authorities said, citing research showing that both the shots and recovery from the virus provided significant defense.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Wednesday that data from 1.1 million Covid-19 cases in California and New York last year showed people who were unvaccinated and hadn’t previously contracted Covid-19 faced a far greater risk than both people who had gotten the shots and people who had been infected."

https://www.wsj.com/articles/prior-covid-19-infection-offered-better-protection-than-vaccination-during-delta-wave-11642619009

[Matt]

CDC Study: Basically, the vaccine did very little to improve the protection already given from naturally acquired immunity. 

COVID-19 Cases and Hospitalizations by COVID-19 Vaccination Status and Previous COVID-19 Diagnosis — California and New York, May–November 2021

"By the week beginning October 3, compared with COVID-19 cases rates among unvaccinated persons without a previous COVID-19 diagnosis, case rates among vaccinated persons without a previous COVID-19 diagnosis were 6.2-fold (California) and 4.5-fold (New York) lower"

"Rates were substantially lower among both groups with previous COVID-19 diagnoses, including 29.0-fold (California) and 14.7-fold lower (New York) among unvaccinated persons with a previous diagnosis, and 32.5-fold (California) and 19.8-fold lower (New York) among vaccinated persons with a previous diagnosis of COVID-19"

Delta wave: " Rates among vaccinated persons without a previous COVID-19 diagnosis were consistently higher than rates among unvaccinated persons with a history of COVID-19 (3.1-fold higher [95% CI = 2.6–3.7] in California and 1.9-fold higher [95% CI = 1.5–2.3] in New York) and rates among vaccinated persons with a history of COVID-19 (3.6-fold higher [95% CI = 2.9–4.3] in California and 2.8-fold higher [95% CI = 2.1–3.4] in New York)."

"During October 3–16, compared with hospitalization rates among unvaccinated persons without a previous COVID-19 diagnosis, hospitalization rates were 19.8-fold lower (95% CI = 18.2–21.4) among vaccinated persons without a previous COVID-19 diagnosis, 55.3-fold lower (95% CI = 27.3–83.3) among unvaccinated persons with a previous COVID-19 diagnosis, and 57.5-fold lower (95% CI = 29.2–85.8) among vaccinated persons with a previous COVID-19 diagnosis."
Basically, the vaccine did very little to improve the protection already given by naturally acquired immunity.

https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/71/wr/mm7104e1.htm

Edited January 20, 2022 by Matt

[mccoy]

3 minutes ago, Matt said:

CDC Study: Basically, the vaccine did very little to improve the protection already given from naturally acquired immunity. 

So, the narrative has been reversed now. Welcome into the era of flickering science!

[AlanPater]

5 hours ago, Matt said:

CDC Study: Basically, the vaccine did very little to improve the protection already given from naturally acquired immunity.

A single vaccination helped considerably:

Comparing SARS-CoV-2 natural immunity to vaccine-induced immunity: reinfections versus breakthrough infections
Sivan Gazit, Roei Shlezinger, Galit Perez, Roni Lotan, Asaf Peretz, Amir Ben-Tov, Dani Cohen, Khitam Muhsen, Gabriel Chodick, Tal Patalon
medRxiv doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.08.24.21262415

[corybroo]

Another benefit to the vacciine is the reduction of anxiety and depression in Americans:

[Saul]

20 hours ago, mccoy said:

Joseph Stalin, as history teaches us, liked to bend science to his own convictions, ideology, and policy

Yes, Comrade McCoy?

  😀

    --  Saul