The worldwide outlook (with a few exceptions) is looking a bit better these days isn't it. Beginning to feel better and less anxious already.
SARS CoV-2 coronavirus / Covid-19 (No tin foil hat silliness please)
- Thread starter Don't Kill Bill
- Start date
Except on March 13th he was more than happy to say herd immunity was his strategy of choice. I appreciate that the clip has most likely been edited to his detriment, but even still, it's not a good look for him.
The results of Moderna vaccine seem to be nice. All eight people who have been vaccinated have developed anti-troops which should be able to fight the infection.
Moderna planning to start soon the next trial stage with a few hundred people.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/18/health/coronavirus-vaccine-moderna.html
Moderna planning to start soon the next trial stage with a few hundred people.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/18/health/coronavirus-vaccine-moderna.html
Two meter stick though, please.
Ventured out for the first time today after being in shielding, I'm still meant to be shielding but my mental health was starting to take its toll from not seeing the outdoors for 2 months.
Found a piece of countryside with no one around and had a 20 minute stroll, felt strange being outside again.
Found a piece of countryside with no one around and had a 20 minute stroll, felt strange being outside again.
He said herd immunity is how this gets under control, which is one of 2 possible outcomes, the other being eradication of the virus, which is unlikely. So either you achieve herd immunity through a vaccine (hopeful but not even close to guaranteed) or through the virus spreading to everyone (grim).
That's got to be better than seeing the 10 album covers that inspired them for the millionth time
I don't know if anyone's previously mentioned this very recent study of excess mortality, but I read about it in the Italian press and the full paper is available online - it's quite alarming for England. Apols if it's been posted before.
From the summary :
From the summary :
https://www.oxfordmartin.ox.ac.uk/d...England-vs.-Europe-and-the-COVID-pandemic.pdf
Just to be pedantic, herd immunity is the same thing as eradicating the virus. Just takes a long time to achieve. If/when we get herd immunity that’s the end of the virus. That’s what we did with smallpox.
There’s a 3rd outcome. The virus becomes endemic and we have to live with it, indefinitely. In this scenario it will likely become less and less dangerous as the virus and our immune system evolve together to make it less lethal. If I was a betting man, this would be the one I’d put money on.
I think the more revealing thing is the fact they didn't really think a lockdown would be accepted by society, so mitigation was preferred over suppression almost by default. Sounds a lot like the behavioural scientists persuaded them that a lockdown was hardly a viable option.
The interview with this guy can be found here: https://www.channel4.com/news/it-wa...ople-would-go-along-with-it-prof-john-edmunds
Are you sure? We can have herd immunity, but also the virus to still circulate (essentially being endemic). Herd immunity which will eradicate the virus can happen only if having the virus means that you cannot get infected from it in the future (which is extremely unlikely).
Totally agree with your last paragraph. It is almost sure that the virus is gonna become endemic. Hopefully a good vaccine will make most people immune from it, and good anti-virals will give some protection to the remaining, but I think that likely this is gonna become another seasonal 'flu' (despite not being caused from influenza viruses).
I don’t think you need permanent immunity for herd immunity to eradicate the virus. Just a year or two would probably do it. Which is possible, based on SARS/MERS, right? Could be wrong though. The fact measles is still hanging round works against this theory!
You might be right. If let's say 85% of the world gets infected, then the virus will just die cause there won't be enough people for it to jump. And when those people will lose the immunity, the virus would be long gone.
However, this would assume that these 85% of people would be infected at the same time. If it is a gradual process within a few years, then I guess it won't work, cause all the times there will be some vulnerable people.
I am using the 85% figure, cause it seems that the R0 of the virus might be close to 6, which means that more than 80% of people need to get it before we achieve herd immunity. For what is worth, measles is much more infectious (an estimated R0 of around 12, meaning that 95% or so of people need to catch it - or get vaccinated - for the remaining to be safe).
Good for you.
Now get back in your foxhole soldier!
20-30% of colds are due to a few different coronaviruses. The main reason we haven't developed vaccines for them is cost benefit considerations. Drug companies would need to develop 4 vaccines to address on a small proportion of colds which would only really have a small benefit (and thus market).
I'm not sure if it is a case of it being the wrong sort on monkey or mammal in general neccesarily rather than the inherant limitations of animal testing.
Yeah I'm back in now for the foreseeable
Reading between the lines of this NYT article, it seems the author suspects the UK is already stockpiling tests to push for Boris's 200k testing target at the end of the month: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/15/...-tests-uk.html?smid=tw-nytimesworld&smtyp=cur
I think true herd immunity requires you to exceed HIT so as to reduce R to below 1. If you actually do this then eventually the virus will be functionally eradicated. Of course getting everywhere in the world above the HIT and below an R of 1 for the entire period of time required to eradicate is not at all easy.
Yeah, that is the thing. When you consider the entire world (and that there is a likely chance that people might get reinfected within 1-3 years), then it is hard seeing herd immunity eradicating the virus. It is also the reason why no disease ever has been eradicated from herd immunity (smallpox was eradicated and measles eradicated in the Western world until its revival recently, but that was because of vaccines).
What I think herd immunity is gonna achieve is to make the virus much less contagious (by the virtue of most people having caught it before), but it will still be endemic. In fact, even with a vaccine there is a high chance that it will still be endemic (considering that we likely need over 80% of people to both get vaccinated and for the vaccine to work on them).
I criticized the UK before when it comes to testing, but now they are doing an excellent job at it and putting most other countries to shame. They surpassed the US and Germany at tests per capital (despite being in a much worse position just a few weeks ago), and if they continue like this, they will surpass Italy and Spain soon.
The question is, why they did feck all for 2 months, if now they can do so many? Nevertheless, better later than never, and clearly, intensive testing will play an important part in opening the country safely. So credit where it's due.
The question is, why they did feck all for 2 months, if now they can do so many? Nevertheless, better later than never, and clearly, intensive testing will play an important part in opening the country safely. So credit where it's due.
I agree. I was assuming the only way to get true herd immunity was with a vaccine. Even the it will be hard.
Ruled by incompetents
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/ja...uFMCDTinQ5oWpM1paHJlkYQ7dbEsJymuHCeS3-iWH_U3Q
TLDR: Hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin do feck all.
TLDR: Hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin do feck all.
Doomed once Trump thought they would work. He is the truth equivalent of antimatter.
True
To be fair, there weren't many reasons to think it will work. It was created for malaria (so it isn't even an anti-viral), and both WHO and FDA did not have it on the fifty-something drugs they were putting in a clinical trial. Obviously, FDA had to backtrack after Trump's insane shilling and eventually put it on trials, but the hope was always low. Dr. Fauci (who might know a thing or two about viruses) was always extremely skeptical towards it, to the point that Fox presenters couldn't understand why he just cannot see that hydroxychloroquine is the solution.
US and UK 'lead push against global patent pool for Covid-19 drugs'
While the US and China face off, the EU has taken the lead. The leaders of Italy, France, Germany and Norway, together with the European commission and council, called earlier this month for any innovative tools, therapeutics or vaccines to be shared equally and fairly.
“If we can develop a vaccine that is produced by the world, for the whole world, this will be a unique global public good of the 21st century,” they said in a statement.
In the weeks of negotiations leading up to the meeting, which is scheduled to last for less than a day, there has been a dispute over the language of the resolution. Countries with major pharmaceutical companies argue they need patents to guarantee sufficiently high prices in wealthy nations to recoup their research and development costs.
Even more fraught have been attempts to reinforce countries’ existing rights to break drug and vaccine company patent monopolies if they need to for the sake of public health. A hard-fought battle over Aids drugs 20 years ago led to the World Trade Organization’s Doha declaration on trade-related intellectual property (Trips) in favour of access to medicines for all, but the US, which has some of the world’s biggest drug companies, has strongly opposed wording that would encourage the use of Trips.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...against-global-patent-pool-for-covid-19-drugs
While the US and China face off, the EU has taken the lead. The leaders of Italy, France, Germany and Norway, together with the European commission and council, called earlier this month for any innovative tools, therapeutics or vaccines to be shared equally and fairly.
“If we can develop a vaccine that is produced by the world, for the whole world, this will be a unique global public good of the 21st century,” they said in a statement.
In the weeks of negotiations leading up to the meeting, which is scheduled to last for less than a day, there has been a dispute over the language of the resolution. Countries with major pharmaceutical companies argue they need patents to guarantee sufficiently high prices in wealthy nations to recoup their research and development costs.
Even more fraught have been attempts to reinforce countries’ existing rights to break drug and vaccine company patent monopolies if they need to for the sake of public health. A hard-fought battle over Aids drugs 20 years ago led to the World Trade Organization’s Doha declaration on trade-related intellectual property (Trips) in favour of access to medicines for all, but the US, which has some of the world’s biggest drug companies, has strongly opposed wording that would encourage the use of Trips.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...against-global-patent-pool-for-covid-19-drugs
I may have caught it. Will most likely find out between today or tomorrow.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news...king-hydroxychloroquine-covid-19-fda-warningsTrue
To be fair, there weren't many reasons to think it will work. It was created for malaria (so it isn't even an anti-viral), and both WHO and FDA did not have it on the fifty-something drugs they were putting in a clinical trial. Obviously, FDA had to backtrack after Trump's insane shilling and eventually put it on trials, but the hope was always low. Dr. Fauci (who might know a thing or two about viruses) was always extremely skeptical towards it, to the point that Fox presenters couldn't understand why he just cannot see that hydroxychloroquine is the solution.
Hope you haven't or if you have it's mild.
Ouch, hope it all goes good.
The crazy thing is that it wasn’t his own idea. It was Tucker Carlson (who has been desperate for the country to open since before it actually got closed) who mentioned it, and then Trump started tweeting about it. Obviously, considering that he must be never wrong, he then doubled (and tripled) down on it, to the point of becoming a meme.
Tweet
— Twitter API (@user) date
Tweet
— Twitter API (@user) date
You assume BoJo has the concentration levels to read and understand a whole tweet much less 5 of them. Details are for the hoi pulloi.
Tweet
— Twitter API (@user) date
Still seeing some pretty sick patients coming through A&E. Granted, the numbers are small but they are still coming through the door on a daily basis.
A gentleman I treated yesterday in resus had oxygen saturations of 44% on air. I’ve been sensitised so much by seeing these numbers so often that I’ve forgotten how incredibly surreal it is to see numbers that low. He went to ITU yesterday.
I’m glad to see numbers dropping daily but I am very wary of it still. People are taking the easing of restrictions too lightly. Another peak will come - what isn’t clear is how big it’ll be. Hopefully much smaller than our previous peak.
A gentleman I treated yesterday in resus had oxygen saturations of 44% on air. I’ve been sensitised so much by seeing these numbers so often that I’ve forgotten how incredibly surreal it is to see numbers that low. He went to ITU yesterday.
I’m glad to see numbers dropping daily but I am very wary of it still. People are taking the easing of restrictions too lightly. Another peak will come - what isn’t clear is how big it’ll be. Hopefully much smaller than our previous peak.