Gov. Ron DeSantis falsely claims bivalent booster vaccine increases chances of COVID-19 infection

[Fred Bloggs]

Useless hot air bag doesn't understand basic survey statistics, yet somehow thinks he should be president.

https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2023/jan/20/ron-desantis/gov-ron-desantis-falsely-claims-bivalent-booster-v/

[John Larkin]

https://justthenews.com/sites/default/files/2022-12/2022.12.17.22283625v1.full_.pdf


"This is not the only study to find a possible association with more
prior vaccine doses and higher risk of COVID-19."

See fig 2.

There is reasonable cause to suspect that, at least in some age
groups, the vaccines are not effective and possibly net harmful. "The
Science" is not settled.


https://justthenews.com/world/europe/brits-yank-back-covid-vaccination-program-us-plunges-forward-one-size-fits-all

[Fred Bloggs]

On Friday, January 27, 2023 at 11:52:56 AM UTC-5, John Larkin wrote:
> On Thu, 26 Jan 2023 10:51:14 -0800 (PST), Fred Bloggs
> <bloggs.fred...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> >Useless hot air bag doesn't understand basic survey statistics, yet somehow thinks he should be president.
> >
> >https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2023/jan/20/ron-desantis/gov-ron-desantis-falsely-claims-bivalent-booster-v/
> https://justthenews.com/sites/default/files/2022-12/2022.12.17.22283625v1.full_.pdf
>
>
> "This is not the only study to find a possible association with more
> prior vaccine doses and higher risk of COVID-19."
>
> See fig 2.

Didn't the original link just get through explaining to you the study design was not appropriate for uncovering increased risk of infection of vaccinated versus unvaccinated? For something like that they can only go retrospective as the medical ethics prevents them from asking people to volunteer to stay unvaccinated.

>
> There is reasonable cause to suspect that, at least in some age
> groups, the vaccines are not effective and possibly net harmful. "The
> Science" is not settled.

There was a previous link to an MD on the FDA vaccine advisory panel who, along with a bunch of other clinicians, believes the problem with the bivalent vaccine is that it's two half doses, resulting in weak antibody responses to both antigens. The vaccination series needs to be changed to a two injection sequence of full dosage vaccination, or better, just one full dose of the Omicron antigen.

Of course the older people are going to be affected first because their immune response is so weak to begin with.


>
>
> https://justthenews.com/world/europe/brits-yank-back-covid-vaccination-program-us-plunges-forward-one-size-fits-all

[John Larkin]

On Fri, 27 Jan 2023 09:36:11 -0800 (PST), Fred Bloggs

https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/11/health/moderna-bivalent-transparency/index.html

There are at least six things going on here:

Measuring antibodies is not measuring infections or deaths

The virus keeps mutating, dancing around vaccines

Kids probably don't need vaccinating. Some countries don't do it.

Vaccines may harm certain age groups

The Science is anything but settled

The Science is greatly influenced by money, politics, tribalism, and
more money

[Fred Bloggs]

I previously linked a research article establishing antibody titers as coefficient of performance (CoP) for the effectiveness of vaccine immunity in preventing serious disease. That's why it was adopted very early on in the pandemic by everyone who needed it, like the pharmaceuticals, the FDA, CDC, WHO etc.

[whit3rd]

On Friday, January 27, 2023 at 8:52:56 AM UTC-8, John Larkin wrote:
> On Thu, 26 Jan 2023 10:51:14 -0800 (PST), Fred Bloggs
> <bloggs.fred...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> >Useless hot air bag doesn't understand basic survey statistics, yet somehow thinks he should be president.
> >
> >https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2023/jan/20/ron-desantis/gov-ron-desantis-falsely-claims-bivalent-booster-v/
> https://justthenews.com/sites/default/files/2022-12/2022.12.17.22283625v1.full_.pdf
>
>
> "This is not the only study to find a possible association with more
> prior vaccine doses and higher risk of COVID-19."

That's bafflegab. Is there a statistical measure mentioned?

> See fig 2.

That's not showing anything very significant (the error bars aren't very separate)
and has, for some reason, decided that a timeline is called for; only the right edge
represents current information, all the rest is just older and worse data.
There's no sign of control for populations that have extra exposure so do a prudent
thing, getting more boosters, nor for populations that live in sparse areas,
where getting a booster, or being at risk for passing the disease, are both rare events.

> There is reasonable cause to suspect that, at least in some age
> groups, the vaccines are not effective and possibly net harmful. "The
> Science" is not settled.

So, another 'we need more research'? That's weak. The whole analysis shows signs of
having been created with intention of this weak claim, having study decisions that
amount to poor data control. The claim of 'reasonable cause' is a lie, the population
selection issues being unresolved.

[Martin Brown]

On 27/01/2023 16:52, John Larkin wrote:
> On Thu, 26 Jan 2023 10:51:14 -0800 (PST), Fred Bloggs
> <bloggs.fred...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Useless hot air bag doesn't understand basic survey statistics, yet somehow thinks he should be president.
>>
>> https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2023/jan/20/ron-desantis/gov-ron-desantis-falsely-claims-bivalent-booster-v/
>
>
> https://justthenews.com/sites/default/files/2022-12/2022.12.17.22283625v1.full_.pdf
>
> "This is not the only study to find a possible association with more
> prior vaccine doses and higher risk of COVID-19."

Correlation does not prove causation!

There is a good reason why the most vulnerable have been given more
vaccine doses than the rest of us. They are also much more likely to be
seriously ill if they do catch Covid and the vaccine can't entirely
prevent that with Omicron.

> See fig 2.
>
> There is reasonable cause to suspect that, at least in some age
> groups, the vaccines are not effective and possibly net harmful. "The
> Science" is not settled.
>
>
> https://justthenews.com/world/europe/brits-yank-back-covid-vaccination-program-us-plunges-forward-one-size-fits-all

What it actually shows is that the people who are most at risk of dying
of Covid have typically had 1 or even 2 more boosters than normal people
of the same age. The virus is always going to be a big problem for
people who are immunosuppressed or otherwise compromised.

Even with the vaccine some people can still be unlucky. It has taken a
friend who got Omicron for Xmas until now to be back on their feet. They
spent a while hospitalised with pneumonia as a side effect of Covid - it
appeared to develop very fast - just as they seemed to be recovering.

UK strategy seems quite reasonable to me. I was never convinced that
vaccinating the under 12's was reasonable. The risk to them from the
vaccine is worse than the risk from catching Covid and gets worse the
younger they are (and the dose calculation gets more tricky too).

--
Martin Brown

[Anthony William Sloman]

On Saturday, January 28, 2023 at 10:47:08 PM UTC+11, Martin Brown wrote:
> On 27/01/2023 16:52, John Larkin wrote:
> > On Thu, 26 Jan 2023 10:51:14 -0800 (PST), Fred Bloggs <bloggs.fred...@gmail.com> wrote:

<snip>

> UK strategy seems quite reasonable to me. I was never convinced that
> vaccinating the under 12's was reasonable. The risk to them from the
> vaccine is worse than the risk from catching Covid and gets worse the
> younger they are (and the dose calculation gets more tricky too).

You aren't vaccinating the under-12s to stop them getting Covid on the basis of the risk to them. You are vaccinating them to make it less likely that they will catch the disease and pass it on to older people.

If you could reduce the chance of passing on the infection far enough, the disease would stop being epidemic, and die out, as small pox has.

Getting enough people vaccinated does seem to be in the too-hard basket.

--
Bill Sloman, Sydney

[Don Y]

On 1/28/2023 4:46 AM, Martin Brown wrote:
> Correlation does not prove causation!

Exactly. But too many people fail to understand that!

I recall, as a kid, hearing the "old timers" commmenting on folks
Dxed with cancer. At the time, the only rememdy was surgical
excision.

When <someone> died from it, they would comment "Once the air
gets to it (surgery opening the body cavity allowing 'air' to
get to the cancer), it's over!"

WTF? Even as a child this made no sense (and, everyone
knows you have to open the body in order to administer the
BLEACH! <rolls-eyes>)

They died because the cancer had progressed to the point that
surgery was required. Which increased the likelihood of a
"bad outcome".

The ability of humans to see patterns where none exist is
mind-numbing! Talk to a gambler at a casino and they will
tell you (in hushed words) of their *secrets* for success
at the tables/slots. (Hmmm... and why are they frowning if they
have such effective "secrets"?)

> There is a good reason why the most vulnerable have been given more vaccine
> doses than the rest of us. They are also much more likely to be seriously ill
> if they do catch Covid and the vaccine can't entirely prevent that with Omicron.

"I've been taking these little yellow pills for years, now, and
I've not been attacked by a bear, once! They must be working!!"

> What it actually shows is that the people who are most at risk of dying of
> Covid have typically had 1 or even 2 more boosters than normal people of the
> same age. The virus is always going to be a big problem for people who are
> immunosuppressed or otherwise compromised.
>
> Even with the vaccine some people can still be unlucky. It has taken a friend
> who got Omicron for Xmas until now to be back on their feet. They spent a while
> hospitalised with pneumonia as a side effect of Covid - it appeared to develop
> very fast - just as they seemed to be recovering.

I have a friend in a similar predicament -- 5 weeks.

Another is dealing with his *third* infection. (He is of the
belief that the vaccine gives him a get-out-of-jail-free card
to conduct his life with total disregard for the virus. He's
been lucky in that each infection has been relatively mild
but took him out of circulation, regardless. He's ~75)

> UK strategy seems quite reasonable to me. I was never convinced that
> vaccinating the under 12's was reasonable. The risk to them from the vaccine is
> worse than the risk from catching Covid and gets worse the younger they are
> (and the dose calculation gets more tricky too).

I think the push, there, was to minimize the young ones as vectors
to bring the disease home to their families. Consider that they
1) tend to be in close proximity to other children for long
stretches, DAILY and 2) can easily "forget" to worry about hygiene
and distancing when caught up in interactions with their peers.

Add to that the fact that they may be asymptomatic and you've
got a clandestine way for the virus to evade a family's
"outer defenses" ("We're home, now, so we don't have to
take precautions in the house...")

[Martin Brown]

On 28/01/2023 13:52, Anthony William Sloman wrote:
> On Saturday, January 28, 2023 at 10:47:08 PM UTC+11, Martin Brown
> wrote:
>> On 27/01/2023 16:52, John Larkin wrote:
>>> On Thu, 26 Jan 2023 10:51:14 -0800 (PST), Fred Bloggs
>>> <bloggs.fred...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> <snip>
>
>> UK strategy seems quite reasonable to me. I was never convinced
>> that vaccinating the under 12's was reasonable. The risk to them
>> from the vaccine is worse than the risk from catching Covid and
>> gets worse the younger they are (and the dose calculation gets more
>> tricky too).
>
> You aren't vaccinating the under-12s to stop them getting Covid on
> the basis of the risk to them. You are vaccinating them to make it
> less likely that they will catch the disease and pass it on to older
> people.

But that isn't ethical if it increases the risk of killing *THEM*.

> If you could reduce the chance of passing on the infection far
> enough, the disease would stop being epidemic, and die out, as small
> pox has.

You stand a chance against a nice stable DNA based virus but there is
literally no chance against an RNA virus like Covid-19. We got lucky
with smallpox - it is the only example where we have managed to do it.

Our immune system pretty much gives up making antibodies against Covid
within a few months and you can be reinfected by the same strain again
and again. The newer strains have managed to infect people as little as
3 weeks after they had recovered from a previous bout of Covid.

> Getting enough people vaccinated does seem to be in the too-hard
> basket.

It is well beyond the too hard basket. The rate at which the vaccination
acquired immunity declines for catching it you would have to do the
entire global population every 4 months to even stand a chance.

Best estimates are that the disease has now become endemic and in the UK
at least. There is an oscillatory phase of preditor prey behaviour now
with gradually decreasing amplitude and period sat on a fairly high
baseline. It remains to be seen if it will back off this summer.

Hospital admissions with Covid are harder to fake so that is about the
best metric we have (home tests are chargeable now so no-one bothers).

https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/details/healthcare?areaType=nation&areaName=England

For the first two years the summer was enough to drop it back to very
low levels but it became much more infective in July 2021 and has been
stuck at a comparatively high level ever since. Omicron evolved toward
Xmas of that year and has been driving the oscillations.

It is qualitatively different now to how it behaved in the early phase.


--
Martin Brown

[Don Y]

On 1/29/2023 10:14 AM, Martin Brown wrote:
> On 28/01/2023 13:52, Anthony William Sloman wrote:
>> On Saturday, January 28, 2023 at 10:47:08 PM UTC+11, Martin Brown
>> wrote:
>>> On 27/01/2023 16:52, John Larkin wrote:
>>>> On Thu, 26 Jan 2023 10:51:14 -0800 (PST), Fred Bloggs
>>>> <bloggs.fred...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> <snip>
>>
>>> UK strategy seems quite reasonable to me. I was never convinced
>>> that vaccinating the under 12's was reasonable. The risk to them
>>> from the vaccine is worse than the risk from catching Covid and
>>> gets worse the younger they are (and the dose calculation gets more
>>> tricky too).
>>
>> You aren't vaccinating the under-12s to stop them getting Covid on
>> the basis of the risk to them. You are vaccinating them to make it
>> less likely that they will catch the disease and pass it on to older
>> people.
>
> But that isn't ethical if it increases the risk of killing *THEM*.

Do you make that decision independent other risk factors? I.e.,
the risk of death or disability from NOT having it?

Would it be ethical to isolate them from the at-risk populations
(which may include their family members) for the duration of the
risk exposure? What cost do you assign to that?

>> If you could reduce the chance of passing on the infection far
>> enough, the disease would stop being epidemic, and die out, as small
>> pox has.
>
> You stand a chance against a nice stable DNA based virus but there is literally
> no chance against an RNA virus like Covid-19. We got lucky with smallpox - it
> is the only example where we have managed to do it.
>
> Our immune system pretty much gives up making antibodies against Covid within a
> few months and you can be reinfected by the same strain again and again. The
> newer strains have managed to infect people as little as 3 weeks after they had
> recovered from a previous bout of Covid.

But there are other measures that can be employed. De Santis is an
anti-masker. In the name of personal liberty, he is more than happy
to let his constituents die.

I wonder how much he'd stand for personal freedoms if his neighbor
opted to leave his yard well lit when an enemy's aircraft were flying
overhead on a bombing run? How did Britain treat folks who failed
to deploy blackout curtains?

>> Getting enough people vaccinated does seem to be in the too-hard
>> basket.
>
> It is well beyond the too hard basket. The rate at which the vaccination
> acquired immunity declines for catching it you would have to do the entire
> global population every 4 months to even stand a chance.

Again, that assumes there are no other measures being employed.

> Best estimates are that the disease has now become endemic and in the UK at
> least. There is an oscillatory phase of preditor prey behaviour now with
> gradually decreasing amplitude and period sat on a fairly high baseline. It
> remains to be seen if it will back off this summer.
>
> Hospital admissions with Covid are harder to fake so that is about the best
> metric we have (home tests are chargeable now so no-one bothers).

Home tests, here, don't require reporting. And, as you don't need
some "agency" to process the test to give you your results, there's
no way to eavesdrop on the process.

> https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/details/healthcare?areaType=nation&areaName=England
>
> For the first two years the summer was enough to drop it back to very low
> levels but it became much more infective in July 2021 and has been stuck at a
> comparatively high level ever since. Omicron evolved toward Xmas of that year
> and has been driving the oscillations.
>
> It is qualitatively different now to how it behaved in the early phase.

Here, folks have largely "moved on". You don't see much masking, no
police officers standing by businesses to handle "conflicts" over
masking requirements, no nightly news coverage, etc.

"Covid is over" -- or so says our fearless leader...

[Anthony William Sloman]

On Monday, January 30, 2023 at 4:14:16 AM UTC+11, Martin Brown wrote:
> On 28/01/2023 13:52, Anthony William Sloman wrote:
> > On Saturday, January 28, 2023 at 10:47:08 PM UTC+11, Martin Brown
> > wrote:
> >> On 27/01/2023 16:52, John Larkin wrote:
> >>> On Thu, 26 Jan 2023 10:51:14 -0800 (PST), Fred Bloggs
> >>> <bloggs.fred...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > <snip>
> >
> >> UK strategy seems quite reasonable to me. I was never convinced
> >> that vaccinating the under 12's was reasonable. The risk to them
> >> from the vaccine is worse than the risk from catching Covid and
> >> gets worse the younger they are (and the dose calculation gets more
> >> tricky too).
> >
> > You aren't vaccinating the under-12s to stop them getting Covid on
> > the basis of the risk to them. You are vaccinating them to make it
> > less likely that they will catch the disease and pass it on to older
> > people.
>
> But that isn't ethical if it increases the risk of killing *THEM*.

It protects them as well. Covid-19 is much less likely to kill young children than adults, but it does kill some, and that risk is larger than the risk that vaccination itself will lead to damaging or fatal side-effects. It's less urgently necessary to protect kids against Covid-19, and most of the lives it will saved will be amongst the adults the kids might otherwise have infected, but it does protect the kid as well.

> > If you could reduce the chance of passing on the infection far
> > enough, the disease would stop being epidemic, and die out, as small
> > pox has.
>
> You stand a chance against a nice stable DNA based virus but there is
> literally no chance against an RNA virus like Covid-19. We got lucky
> with smallpox - it is the only example where we have managed to do it.

The vaccines against Covid-19 are unique in using the relatively highly conserved spike protein as their antigen. They do work against the next generation of mutants of the original Covid-19 vaccine (if less effectively), and I've now had a dose of the bivalent vaccine that should work better.

We would need to get a pretty much everybody vaccinated for the approach to work, and we haven't got there yet, and so far seem to have slacked off on trying to get there, but it's not an impossible dream.

> Our immune system pretty much gives up making antibodies against Covid
> within a few months and you can be reinfected by the same strain again
> and again. The newer strains have managed to infect people as little as
> 3 weeks after they had recovered from a previous bout of Covid.

You are about seven times less likely to die of the infection if you have been previously vaccinated. You may produce less antibodies but you killer-T cells still seem to work

> > Getting enough people vaccinated does seem to be in the too-hard
> > basket.
>
> It is well beyond the too hard basket. The rate at which the vaccination
> acquired immunity declines for catching it you would have to do the
> entire global population every 4 months to even stand a chance.

Something of an exaggeration. And we do vaccinate pretty much every against the new strains of seasonal flu every year.

> Best estimates are that the disease has now become endemic and in the UK

> at least. There is an oscillatory phase of predator prey behaviour now

> with gradually decreasing amplitude and period sat on a fairly high
> baseline. It remains to be seen if it will back off this summer.

With most of the people passing on the infection still being members of the unvaccinated minority, who develop a higher viral load and sustain it for longer than the vaccinated majority.

>
> Hospital admissions with Covid are harder to fake so that is about the
> best metric we have (home tests are chargeable now so no-one bothers).
>
> https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/details/healthcare?areaType=nation&areaName=England
>
> For the first two years the summer was enough to drop it back to very
> low levels but it became much more infective in July 2021 and has been
> stuck at a comparatively high level ever since. Omicron evolved toward
> Xmas of that year and has been driving the oscillations.
>
> It is qualitatively different now to how it behaved in the early phase.

Actually merely quantitatively different, but you do like your alarmist rhetoric.

--
Bill Sloman, Sydney

[Fred Bloggs]

It's hard to find just exactly what viral loads they're getting with this thing. Then this, they draw a sharp line of infectiousness at 10,000 copies/ml:

https://chs.asu.edu/diagnostics-commons/blog/how-do-we-use-quantitative-tests-quantitatively#:~:text=This%20varies%20by%20virus%20and,a%20viable%20COVID%2D19%20infection.

The collective wisdom is that asymptomatic people have turned out to be not very infectious:

https://www.webmd.com/covid/covid-viral-load

So much for the initial hysteria about asymptomatic superspreaders, they never existed.







>
> --
> Bill Sloman, Sydney

[Martin Brown]

On 30/01/2023 15:19, Fred Bloggs wrote:
> On Sunday, January 29, 2023 at 10:27:54 PM UTC-5, bill....@ieee.org
> wrote:
>> On Monday, January 30, 2023 at 4:14:16 AM UTC+11, Martin Brown
>> wrote:
>>> On 28/01/2023 13:52, Anthony William Sloman wrote:
>>>> On Saturday, January 28, 2023 at 10:47:08 PM UTC+11, Martin
>>>> Brown wrote:
>>>>> On 27/01/2023 16:52, John Larkin wrote:
>>>>>> On Thu, 26 Jan 2023 10:51:14 -0800 (PST), Fred Bloggs
>>>>>> <bloggs.fred...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>> <snip>
>>>>
>>>>> UK strategy seems quite reasonable to me. I was never
>>>>> convinced that vaccinating the under 12's was reasonable. The
>>>>> risk to them from the vaccine is worse than the risk from
>>>>> catching Covid and gets worse the younger they are (and the
>>>>> dose calculation gets more tricky too).
>>>>
>>>> You aren't vaccinating the under-12s to stop them getting Covid
>>>> on the basis of the risk to them. You are vaccinating them to
>>>> make it less likely that they will catch the disease and pass
>>>> it on to older people.
>>>
>>> But that isn't ethical if it increases the risk of killing
>>> *THEM*.

https://www.webmd.com/covid/covid-viral-load

>> It protects them as well. Covid-19 is much less likely to kill
>> young children than adults, but it does kill some, and that risk is
>> larger than the risk that vaccination itself will lead to damaging
>> or fatal side-effects. It's less urgently necessary to protect kids
>> against Covid-19, and most of the lives it will saved will be
>> amongst the adults the kids might otherwise have infected, but it
>> does protect the kid as well.

In the under 12's it is the other way around. They have no individual
benefit from being vaccinated. The risk of the vaccine causing them
permanent harm is greater than the risk of a Covid infection.
(both are incredibly low - driving to school is more dangerous)

The risk profile might be changing now for the very youngest but in the
early phase of Covid there was an almost perfect correlation of risk
with age doubling for every 8 years older you are.

>>>> If you could reduce the chance of passing on the infection far
>>>> enough, the disease would stop being epidemic, and die out, as
>>>> small pox has.
>>>
>>> You stand a chance against a nice stable DNA based virus but
>>> there is literally no chance against an RNA virus like Covid-19.
>>> We got lucky with smallpox - it is the only example where we have
>>> managed to do it.

>> The vaccines against Covid-19 are unique in using the relatively
>> highly conserved spike protein as their antigen. They do work
>> against the next generation of mutants of the original Covid-19
>> vaccine (if less effectively), and I've now had a dose of the
>> bivalent vaccine that should work better.

It is only as good as your body can make the antibodies. Once the
primary antibody response wears off you can catch Covid again just as
easily as anyone else (same with every other coronavirus too).

The vaccine prevents it from doing you more serious harm but it cannot
prevent you getting infected once your antibodies fall too low again.
The timescales for this seem to vary from 3-9 months depending on which
researchers you believe (and can be as little 1 month if there is a new
strain). Our vaccination policies have driven Covid in the direction of
becoming ever more transmissible into the vaccinated population.

>> We would need to get a pretty much everybody vaccinated for the
>> approach to work, and we haven't got there yet, and so far seem to
>> have slacked off on trying to get there, but it's not an impossible
>> dream.
>>> Our immune system pretty much gives up making antibodies against
>>> Covid within a few months and you can be reinfected by the same
>>> strain again and again. The newer strains have managed to infect
>>> people as little as 3 weeks after they had recovered from a
>>> previous bout of Covid.

>> You are about seven times less likely to die of the infection if
>> you have been previously vaccinated. You may produce less
>> antibodies but you killer-T cells still seem to work

Including the preventative effect on catching it too it is about an
order of magnitude protection compared to being unvaccinated.

What is much less clear is how useful it is to keep boosting otherwise
healthy individuals for the benefit of Pfizer and Moderna's profits.

>>>> Getting enough people vaccinated does seem to be in the
>>>> too-hard basket.
>>>
>>> It is well beyond the too hard basket. The rate at which the
>>> vaccination acquired immunity declines for catching it you would
>>> have to do the entire global population every 4 months to even
>>> stand a chance.
>> Something of an exaggeration. And we do vaccinate pretty much every
>> against the new strains of seasonal flu every year.

Only in the first world. Covid is never going away now.

>>> Best estimates are that the disease has now become endemic and in
>>> the UK at least. There is an oscillatory phase of predator prey
>>> behaviour now with gradually decreasing amplitude and period sat
>>> on a fairly high baseline. It remains to be seen if it will back
>>> off this summer.

>> With most of the people passing on the infection still being
>> members of the unvaccinated minority, who develop a higher viral
>> load and sustain it for longer than the vaccinated majority.

That isn't even remotely true - at least in the UK. It is a fantasy
scenario that the vendors of expensive vaccines are peddling.

The vast majority of infections and transmissions are between people who
were fully vaccinated and boosted but in high risk occupations and have
had the disease more than once as well! This article in The Lancet sums
up the fallacy that you believe in rather well:

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/laninf/article/PIIS1473-3099(21)00768-4/fulltext

Covid is 10x more effective at killing the unvaccinated it infects but
that is *their* choice and they have to live or die by it.

>>> Hospital admissions with Covid are harder to fake so that is
>>> about the best metric we have (home tests are chargeable now so
>>> no-one bothers).
>>>
>>> https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/details/healthcare?areaType=nation&areaName=England
>>>
>>>
>>>
For the first two years the summer was enough to drop it back to very
>>> low levels but it became much more infective in July 2021 and has
>>> been stuck at a comparatively high level ever since. Omicron
>>> evolved toward Xmas of that year and has been driving the
>>> oscillations.
>>>
>>> It is qualitatively different now to how it behaved in the early
>>> phase.

>> Actually merely quantitatively different, but you do like your
>> alarmist rhetoric.

If you cannot see the difference between the early years when it fell
right back to near zero during the summers (even in an unvaccinated
population) and then in the second year where it exploded in mid summer
into a well vaccinated population than you are dumber than a rock.

Originally it was a seasonal respiratory disease that was only active in
the winter (in the UK). Now it is year round with a fairly high baseline
level of community infection and oscillations putting peaks on top of
that. The peaks do seem to be declining in both amplitude and period.

It may eventually settle to a dynamic equilibrium of near constant
infection levels with minor seasonal variation again - only time will
tell. Right now it is only really a serious threat to the unvaccinated
awkward squad and those with compromised immune systems.

That said the odd person is unlucky even now. A friend (fully vaccinated
and boosted) has been laid low with Covid and after effects since Xmas.
But they are the exceptions now rather than being 5%

> It's hard to find just exactly what viral loads they're getting with
> this thing. Then this, they draw a sharp line of infectiousness at
> 10,000 copies/ml:
>
> https://chs.asu.edu/diagnostics-commons/blog/how-do-we-use-quantitative-tests-quantitatively#:~:text=This%20varies%20by%20virus%20and,a%20viable%20COVID%2D19%20infection.
>
> The collective wisdom is that asymptomatic people have turned out to
> be not very infectious:
>
> https://www.webmd.com/covid/covid-viral-load
>
> So much for the initial hysteria about asymptomatic superspreaders,
> they never existed.

Odd then that asymptomatic transmission in the UK did so much damage to
care homes and hospitals. Though part of the problem there was that
early on the 111 and medical advice line was telling doctors with no
sense of smell to "stop malingering and damn well get back to work!".

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/stories-52638382

I would be very surprised if Covid didn't actually follow the game plan
of just about every other respiratory virus where you are at your most
infective just before you begin to show symptoms (in terms of sampling
of bodily fluids).

Symptoms like violent sneezing spread the virus very efficiently means
that you are a much more effective transmitter of disease once you have
symptoms but peak viral load in many people is just prior to that.

The viral loads of symptomatic and asymptomatic individuals seem to be
pretty similar according to the UK human challenge trials:

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-022-01780-9

--
Martin Brown

[Anthony William Sloman]

Nobody makes the same antibodies to any given antigen.

> Once the primary antibody response wears off you can catch Covid again just as easily as anyone else (same with every other coronavirus too).

Seems unlikely. There are other elements to the immune response and they do seem to wear off more slowly.

Coronova virsuses are all RNA viruses, and they do mutate, like the flu.

> The vaccine prevents it from doing you more serious harm but it cannot
> prevent you getting infected once your antibodies fall too low again.

You are obsessed with antibodies. They aren't the only weapon in the armory of the immune system, though they do seem to be the only one whose activity is easy to measure.

> The timescales for this seem to vary from 3-9 months depending on which researchers you believe (and can be as little 1 month if there is a new strain). Our vaccination policies have driven Covid in the direction of becoming ever more transmissible into the vaccinated population.

Our immune systems do that. All that vaccination does is allow you to get some immunity without suffering the damage cause by a primary infection (and a Covid-19 infection does attack your immune system.

> >> We would need to get a pretty much everybody vaccinated for the approach to work, and we haven't got there yet, and so far seem to have slacked off on trying to get there, but it's not an impossible dream.

> >>> Our immune system pretty much gives up making antibodies against Covid within a few months and you can be reinfected by the same strain again and again. The newer strains have managed to infect people as little as 3 weeks after they had recovered from a previous bout of Covid.

Anitbodies aren't the only weapon in the immune system's armoury, and if you do get infected after you've been immunised, you don't get as sick and don't spread as many viral particles - you are just as infectious in the initial phase of infection but that doesn't last nearly as long.

> >> You are about seven times less likely to die of the infection if you have been previously vaccinated. You may produce less antibodies but your killer-T cells still seem to work.

> Including the preventative effect on catching it too it is about an order of magnitude protection compared to being unvaccinated.
>
> What is much less clear is how useful it is to keep boosting otherwise healthy individuals for the benefit of Pfizer and Moderna's profits.

If it stops at least some unvaccinated people getting infected, it is a good thing.

> >>>> Getting enough people vaccinated does seem to be in the too-hard basket.
> >>>
> >>> It is well beyond the too hard basket. The rate at which the vaccination acquired immunity declines for catching it you would have to do the entire global population every 4 months to even stand a chance.
> >>
> >> Something of an exaggeration. And we do vaccinate pretty much every against the new strains of seasonal flu every year.
>
> Only in the first world. Covid is never going away now.

There's nothing to stop us doing it for the third world. We did it for smallpox, and we are getting close for measles and polio.

> >>> Best estimates are that the disease has now become endemic and in the UK at least. There is an oscillatory phase of predator prey behaviour now with gradually decreasing amplitude and period sat on a fairly high baseline. It remains to be seen if it will back off this summer.
>
> >> With most of the people passing on the infection still being
> >> members of the unvaccinated minority, who develop a higher viral
> >> load and sustain it for longer than the vaccinated majority.
>
> That isn't even remotely true - at least in the UK. It is a fantasy scenario that the vendors of expensive vaccines are peddling.

The vaccines aren't that expensive, and having people get seriously ill with Coviud-19 is.

> The vast majority of infections and transmissions are between people who were fully vaccinated and boosted but in high risk occupations and have had the disease more than once as well! This article in The Lancet sums up the fallacy that you believe in rather well:
>
> https://www.thelancet.com/journals/laninf/article/PIIS1473-3099(21)00768-4/fulltext

It just says that peak viral shedding is just as high. Nothing about how long it goes on for - if vaccination is effective, and it clearly is the vaccintged will stop shedding viral particles faster. Running the rests for long enough to make that point would have cost more money. Medical publications are self-advertisements, and the people boosting their professional standing that way count numbers of publications as more important than the content.

> Covid is 10x more effective at killing the unvaccinated it infects but that is *their* choice and they have to live or die by it.

The other people they infect can also die from the consequences of their choice.

> >>> Hospital admissions with Covid are harder to fake so that is about the best metric we have (home tests are chargeable now so no-one bothers).
> >>>
> >>> https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/details/healthcare?areaType=nation&areaName=England
> >>>
> For the first two years the summer was enough to drop it back to very
> >>> low levels but it became much more infective in July 2021 and has
> >>> been stuck at a comparatively high level ever since. Omicron
> >>> evolved toward Xmas of that year and has been driving the
> >>> oscillations.
> >>>
> >>> It is qualitatively different now to how it behaved in the early
> >>> phase.
>
> >> Actually merely quantitatively different, but you do like your
> >> alarmist rhetoric.
>
> If you cannot see the difference between the early years when it fell
> right back to near zero during the summers (even in an unvaccinated
> population) and then in the second year where it exploded in mid summer
> into a well vaccinated population than you are dumber than a rock.

Except that is wasn't a well vaccinated population

https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/healthandsocialcare/conditionsanddiseases/articles/coronaviruscovid19latestinsights/vaccines

I lived in the UK for 22 years, and am well aware that the well-off might have been well vaccinated, but the less-well will have received less attention.

> Originally it was a seasonal respiratory disease that was only active in
> the winter (in the UK). Now it is year round with a fairly high baseline
> level of community infection and oscillations putting peaks on top of
> that. The peaks do seem to be declining in both amplitude and period.
>
> It may eventually settle to a dynamic equilibrium of near constant
> infection levels with minor seasonal variation again - only time will
> tell. Right now it is only really a serious threat to the unvaccinated
> awkward squad and those with compromised immune systems.

The unvaccinated won't be just only the awkward squad - anybody with low social standing is going to find it hard to get themselves vaccinated and even harder to get themselves boosted.

That does seem to be peak viral load. If you aren't shedding for as long you aren't going to infect as many people.

--
Bill Sloman, Sydney

[Don Y]

I'm not sure that the vaccines, themselves (and their frequency) is
the blame as much as the sense of security it provides (to the vaccinated
AND to those who think they don't have to get vaccinated because "it's
under control, now" -- despite evidence to the contrary).

The folks that I know who have been infected have taken to assuming
themselves immune and not taking *any* other precautions.

Those who (also vaccinated) who have managed to evade infection for
these three years are the ones who continue to wear masks, wash hands,
etc.

I've a friend who is "out shopping" every single day (he gets enjoyment
out of spending money... <shrug>). Were it not for his being "high risk"
(age, cardio-vascular problems, etc.) he would be one of the right-wing
wack-jobs belittling masks, elbow bumps, etc. Strangely, with HIS life
on the line, he seems incredibly cautious (yet still going to car shows,
shopping, etc.)

Another friend "boosted to the max" is facing his third infection.
He just can't bring himself to wear a mask when out. And, his
"socializing" is strictly limited to eating out (hard to wear a mask
while chewing food -- but, do you really NEED to be eating out
instead of doing takeout or having meals delivered, if you don't
want to cook?).

Yet another friend hasn't recovered the ability to speak after covid
necessitated an emergency trach around XMAS (she'd previously had throat
cancer so there were breathing complications from the covid infection).

A neighbor who is a respiratory therapist brought it home to her kids
(I suspect trying to maintain a high level of vigilance in the hospital
is tedious; most healthcare providers I know have had it at least once).