SARS-CoV-2 Coronavirus (COVID-19)

no intent to deminimize the severity of the current strain of covid. The prior poorly worded post was to highlight how many more lives are saved by focusing on the treatment - aimed at the most vulnerable - elderly. That said, wasn't the 1918 strain affecting people in the world population was roughly 23% of what ideas here in 2021?
That's not to DM precise or emphasize the Spanish Flu ..... Smithsonian chancel Channel just last night pointed out that most of the world was running on coal at that time, which caused a LOT of pre-existing conditions - which then skews severity.
By the length of the thread, it's probably already been brought up that then Prez Woodrow Wilson had the Spanish flu, & was severely crippled, & suffered extremely serious after effects just as a contingent of the current world population suffer.

 

While some historical stare and compares can be made between the Spanish Flu [sic] and this bug, they break down rapidly. That outbreak affected many more of the younguns....and treatment modalities were WAAAAY different.
There was also a World War going on during that dampanic.

One of the advantages to a 52 state solution is that (absenting data corruption) you (should) get a pretty good idea of what WORKS and what DOESN'T and you get to conduct social experiments on the fly.

A one-state solution might just be interested in preventing as many deaths as rapidly as possible....which SEEMS to look like a very age weighted thing, since the CDC reports that roughly half of the deaths involve persons over 75.....

Science and data...

 

Fatality rate will fall, but perhaps not as much as one would expect. Vaccination isn't 100% protection. Vaccines reduce the chance exposure to the virus becomes an infection. Without the prevention methods in place, at risk groups will get exposed more often. Which gives the virus more chances to become an infection.

This is where herd immunity comes into effect. Vaccinate those not at risk, and they become less likely to expose the at risk. Looking at the seasonal flu, getting more young people vaccinated would do more to reduce deaths with our current vaccination rates.

 

Well, a prediction is just that predicting the outcome. We will not know the true number shift until the current pandemic is all over.

Just for clarification, I don't think the currently used Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines have been tested for preventing subjects from getting infected by the SARS-CoV-2virus. Rather, the primary efficacy analyses were carried out to count the numbers of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) cases. By the phase 3 testing, both vaccines were shown to be effective in preventing vaccinated subjects from getting coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). Those trial testing did not study the efficacy in preventing the infection nor the spreading of the virus. For Pfzer-BioNTech vaccine, the phase 3 results showed that this primary efficacy for adults over 65 years of age was over 94%. For Morderna vaccine, the efficacy was 94.1% (95% CI, 89.3-96.8) for entire subjects but a lower efficacy was observed in participants ≥65 years of age compared to that in younger adults 18 to <65 years of age.

 

You need to reread the data from the vaccine trials. There were practically NO severe cases among those getting the vaccine (Only one reported of the tens of thousands in the tests). The 5% were mild cases. They didn't document asymptomatic cases. In summary the 94-95% efficacy of preventing Covid was for any symptomatic cases, not severe cases.

The good news is that I'm going out in an hour to get my first vaccine dose.

JeffD

 

Thanks. Yap, coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) was the primary efficacy endpoint analyzed. I corrected my previous comment.

Pfizer and BioNTech Conclude Phase 3 Study of COVID-19 Vaccine Candidate, Meeting All Primary Efficacy Endpoints | Pfizer
Moderna Announces Primary Efficacy Analysis in Phase 3 COVE Study for Its COVID-19 Vaccine Candidate and Filing Today with U.S. FDA for Emergency Use Authorization | Moderna, Inc.

 

That seems to be a plan to reduce infections.
I'm more interested in reducing fatalities.

Either way.....some of the "preventative" methods don't really work in the real world....EVEN IF they are enforced uniformly and non-arbitrarily.
If you rely on the CDC's data....and I know several health care workers who would NOT......the mortality rate in the 0-24 year group is less than 1000 in a nation closing in on 400,000 deaths. This means that closing schools and colleges actually create MORE multi-generational households in many cases, since one presumes that a portion of this cohort will require adult supervision, and some working age adults still get to work.
Some in fact....are "essential."

Several families in my orbit were forced into providing alternative daycare for grandchildren last year when schools and daycare centers were closed....and I personally know grandparents that were infected by grandchildren that they happily babysat instead of facetiming.
Fortunately, my adopted home state has seen the wisdom of discontinuing the practice of manufacturing 3-4 generation households.
Our schools are open, colleges are open.
Daycare is open.
Businesses are open with more lawyer mandated controls and fewer state mandated ones.

UNfortunately, one of the less obvious long term victims for those school districts who incentivize non-public education options will be those families who do not have access to private schools.

Still hull-down on the horizon are the high tech jobs that USED to be concentrated in just a few zip codes.
"Distance" learning and work-from-home changes may cause some pretty interesting demographics changes......

Wars and disease usually do.....

 

won't reducing infections reduce fatalities?

 

You are still promoting information that is being passed around to scare people. There has never been a vaccine that protects from viruses and still allowed propagation of that virus. The chance that this vaccine will allow protected individuals to propagate the Covid virus is practically zero, but as the report said, this has not been tested in the trials.

JeffD

 

i don't believe the cdc or either pharma company has phrased it like that

 

They have lawyers so only actual specific tested results can be reported or lawsuits will prevail.

JeffD

 

That's the point. It has not been tested. The absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. That is why until it is scientifically tested and known for sure, it is prudent to continue face mask and social distancing even after the vaccination.

 

Once I have a significant quantity of Covid-related antibodies in my system (I'll take an antibody test in March a few weeks after my second dose). The virus cannot survive in my body. That's science. I'll wait until my spouse also has tested immunity and then return to my normal life. The only reason for me to continue using a mask and maintaining distance from then on is to make others feel safe which I will do in public surroundings for a while longer. One cannot and should not live in fear,

JeffD

 

Just make sure the antibody your body's immune system is making is the neutralizing antibodies against SARS2-CoV-2 and it is at above an effective titer. But if I am not mistaking, I don't think there are clinically approved antibody tests that will tell you that.

 

Maybe increasing infections will prevent fatalities....

The only thing that a vaccine will accomplish is reaching herd immunity with fewer new gravesites....IF properly implemented.....IF they provide a lasting immunity benefit.
From my purely non-scientific perspective, closing colleges means more near-adult children living at home with their middle aged parents....perhaps going clubbing on Saturday night.....or singing in church on Sunday morning.
Closing daycare centers has already been covered.
Many schools were closed during the second half of 2020 and now reaching for the second half of 2021.
What are the down range costs for THAT?

One thing seems clear.
52 state governments have been fish-slapping each other with "science and data" for over a year now and I'm not seeing much daylight between their overall success rates.
Even Hawaii, which gets to enforce a "secure border" will have to deal with an eviscerated state economy (and they had budget problems BEFORE the COVIDS!!)
They also had to re-open for business, because....hey, California lawmakers have junkets that they have to take....right?
Their numbers are not really anything to write home about either......

If the numbers are to be believed we're at 400,000 COVID blamed deaths.
I know for a cast-iron fact that this number is inflated by at least two souls.....but the real number is almost certainly WELL over 300,000 which places the real-world death per 100,000 persons over the 100-per mark with room to spare.

Me?
I'm a little skeptical of BOTH the "science" and the "data" that we've been....ah....."exposed to" thus far because I'm not seeing very many people doing anything more or less productive with the data than their political opponents.

Fun Fact:
During the 1918 Spanish Flu [sic] there were three places with zero deaths: New Caledonia, some island in Brazil's Amazon delta that nobody has ever heard of, and the US Territory of American Samoa.

As of this posting American Samoa and New Caledonia (and about a dozen more places...) still have zero COVID deaths.

Science and data......

 

every person that gets a vaccine is one less potential death. taken as a percentage of the current deaths to infections, i would think it would be significantly less deaths.

 

It certainly makes sense that since the rate of death correlates strongly with age over 65, then having over 75s, then over 65s get the vaccine first will probably have the biggest impact at reducing the number of Covid deaths per day.

But even if we got the death rate down to the level of the flu, Covid is something entirely different. I just saw this:
COVID 'long haulers': Some who first saw mild symptoms experiencing debilitating problems months later.

Of course this article is from general news source and doesn't give any numbers so we don't know how prevalent this is. Nevertheless, the flu doesn't attack every organ of your body. It doesn't fill your body with blood clots. Even if the death rate was identical, I'd take a mild flu case over a mild Covid case any day. I wouldn't be worrying about more symptoms popping up 3 months later.

 

But do you know if the over-counts exceed the under-counts? Other evidence has been very suggestive that the undercounts are larger.