Generic Virus Thread

[snowychap]

1 hour ago, sidcow said:

Is it?

Yes, it is.

To draw a comparison between people who support vaccination programs but who question the effects of changing the regimens on which the trials have been conducted because they fear that this might create circumstances where an escape variant, which could significantly reduce the effectiveness of these vaccines, is created to Andrew Wakefield's fraudulent work suggests either a massive misunderstanding of the points being made by those people or a particular agenda behind the comment.

1 hour ago, sidcow said:

If in 3 months time we are overrun by vaccine resistant strains I'll agree he was right. 

This would suggest a massive misunderstanding. If he said that doing this will mean being overrun by vaccine resistant strains then you might be making a valid point, but he (and others) are not saying that. They are saying that there are risks to the policy and the experts in the various fields appear only to be disagreeing about the level of risk and whether the risk is outweighed by other considerations.

Edit: I’ll leave most of the original comment even though, after reviewing it, I think the reply could be somewhat different –

I do think it’s shoddy because of all that we know about the Wakefield issue, even though I can see some of a point that you are making between the potential result of how the general public may and do react to discussions of subjects that are largely beyond their (our) understanding.

There are a number of issues at play and a couple of them are:

Are there risks from the policy decision to stretch the time between doses (or perhaps even not to give a second dose)? It would appear that the expert consensus is yes but there is a great range of opinions on the matter with some even suggesting that they think it might be beneficial to increase the time between doses beyond the regimen that was the case in the trials.

Should experts raise matters in public when there is a possibility for those opinions and questions to be misinterpreted by some, be misreported or badly reported (headlines which don’t and can’t appropriately capture the nuance in the debate) or, simply, be misused? I think they should be allowing for these possibilities but there’s also a responsibility on all people, here – from those experts to be careful about how they raise these questions; by people reporting to be as accurate as possible and to report all of the relevant opinions (which is one of the reasons why I posted this latest article and put in the excerpts the bits from other experts who suggest that the issues being raised about escape variants is of secondary importance), and from those who read these articles and headlines to look further than merely the headline and to look at what is actually said rather than coming at the story from a particular angle.

Edited January 18, 2021 by snowychap

[blandy]

2 hours ago, snowychap said:

The point is that we don't know and can't be sure and that we ought to be cautious(ly optimistic) until we do know for sure.

Our brains work differently, because I take the opposite as the point

My brain think goes like this:

1. We know 3 weeks is good and supported by plenty of evidence. This is safe, effective and protects the vulnerable. That's "what the science says"

2. As you say in another post scientists are saying that there are risks to the 12 week policy and they disagree about the level of risk and whether that risk is outweighed by other factors. Some are for, some against. The science is unclear, but it identifies risks and probabilities

3. We know the Guvmint and Bunter are desperate to appear "good" in terms of numbers - be it PPE (1 pair gloves = 2 items), tests (in the post) and so on. They deceive, by instinct. 12 weeks instead of 3 allows them to pretend that more people have been vaccinated, when they haven't. Vaccination requires 2 jabs, not just the first.

4. We know the Guvmint and Bunter have got just about every call wrong, to date.

Therefore we ought to be concerned, but not disproportionately so.

 

[snowychap]

9 minutes ago, blandy said:

Our brains work differently, because I take the opposite as the point

That's fair enough.

If we were assessing it as a purely political decision then I'd tend to agree with you but we can't view it solely in that way, can we?

I put the ly optimistic in brackets because the main point was about being cautious until we know for sure but that the consensus, even allowing for and including those expressing their concerns at the risk, is that it should be okay and, in this situation, okay is a good outcome.

Edited January 18, 2021 by snowychap

[darrenm]

3 hours ago, Genie said:

We keep hearing that experts don’t agree with the upto 12 week gap between injections, there must be some that agree and signed off on it. I can’t believe Johnson and Hancock cooked this idea up themselves and just pushed ahead.

I believe a single dose of the Oxford type is pretty standard practice. It's a bit more dodgy with the Pfizer because it's not been tested that way over the years like viral vector vaccines.

It's not some magic thing, it's simply a booster to top up antibodies. The calculation is that after 2 weeks the antibodies are at their maximum so the booster is to keep the body making them.

The JCVI are happy with pushing this out to 12 weeks because, as Van-Tam said, it's a simple calculation of the effect of getting double the amount of people vaccinated vs having an earlier booster.

I've got every reason to be against this method because Tony Blair suggested it and the gov are pushing it but I think it's the most pragmatic way to go.

[LondonLax]

The flu vaccine is also more effective with two doses and it is common practice to give two doses to young children with no history of flu. For adults the benefits of a second flu shot are not really big enough to go to the trouble of rolling it out twice each season.  

The plan to delay the roll out of a second shot of the COVID vaccine is based on the likelihood that a single shot can blunt the virus impacts, significantly reducing the numbers of serious cases and death compared with holding off vaccinating some people in order to give those as a second dose to others. 

[blandy]

26 minutes ago, snowychap said:

If we were assessing it as a purely political decision then I'd tend to agree with you but we can't view it solely in that way, can we?

I guess you're probably right that (realistically) they can use the advice/opinion of the scientists who think it'll be OK to back them up (and ignore the ones who disagree) and say "it's not purely political". Also had they decided to adhere to the actual trials result data and evidence for which there is no disagreement then I'd argue strongly that that would be a wholly scientific decision. So maybe it's a bit of each, but my feeling is politics will have been the driver - 0.7% of the population have been vaccinated. Nearly 6% have been jabbed once. It's good that both have happened, but one number "looks" better than the other. Equally, they could have been really genuinely alarmed by the chaos in the hospitals and asked their scientists what could be done, in which case you'd be very right indeed.

[Dodgyknees]

On 17/01/2021 at 01:31, HanoiVillan said:

I'm sure you're doing this anyway, but keep taking it easy, don't try to do anything much at all for a couple of weeks. You hear so many stories of people who thought they were doing fine/better, and then it suddenly hits them harder later on.

Doing this. Thought I was dying last night but I am ok today. I live alone so it’s kind of worrying, but I have people calling me if I haven’t text regularly

[snowychap]

2 minutes ago, blandy said:

I guess you're probably right that (realistically) they can use the advice/opinion of the scientists who think it'll be OK to back them up (and ignore the ones who disagree) and say "it's not purely political". Also had they decided to adhere to the actual trials result data and evidence for which there is no disagreement then I'd argue strongly that that would be a wholly scientific decision. So maybe it's a bit of each, but my feeling is politics will have been the driver - 0.7% of the population have been vaccinated. Nearly 6% have been jabbed once. It's good that both have happened, but one number "looks" better than the other. Equally, they could have been really genuinely alarmed by the chaos in the hospitals and asked their scientists what could be done, in which case you'd be very right indeed.

I get what you're saying and I think the only point I;d make was one brought up by @HanoiVillana little while back about it being a decision made on public health grounds, which would be a little bit wider, scientifically, than purely on the back of the trial data and would then include political decision-making.

[blandy]

19 minutes ago, snowychap said:

it being a decision made on public health grounds

Sure. It's a faith thing (faith in their [Bunter's] integrity). As in was it done on public health grounds or tory PR grounds? 

I have zero faith in his integrity and fear PR played a large part in any internal Gov't weighing up of options - "we can stick to the absolute backed by data approach, and vaccinate fewer people, but more fully" - or "we can jab many more people partially to slow the flow for a bit, have better PR numbers and hopefully nothing bad will happen, though it might, we don't know - The second one makes me look better in the short term, let's do that"

[LondonLax]

20 minutes ago, blandy said:

I guess you're probably right that (realistically) they can use the advice/opinion of the scientists who think it'll be OK to back them up (and ignore the ones who disagree) and say "it's not purely political". Also had they decided to adhere to the actual trials result data and evidence for which there is no disagreement then I'd argue strongly that that would be a wholly scientific decision. So maybe it's a bit of each, but my feeling is politics will have been the driver - 0.7% of the population have been vaccinated. Nearly 6% have been jabbed once. It's good that both have happened, but one number "looks" better than the other. Equally, they could have been really genuinely alarmed by the chaos in the hospitals and asked their scientists what could be done, in which case you'd be very right indeed.

Getting the vaccine once very likely gives a significant level of protection and getting a booster shot of it a few weeks later gives a greater level of protection. It's not a binary 'unvaccinated at one dose' then 'vaccenated at two doses', like you are implying above. More a sliding scale of protection (up to some 60-70 protection from serious illness with two doses of the Oxford one).  

[blandy]

7 minutes ago, LondonLax said:

Getting the vaccine once very likely gives a significant level of protection

Yes, I've posted about that previously. The thing not know is "how long for". The other thing obviously is "could the virus mutate to become resistant" as a result of the lower level of protection from only one dose. These are both unknowns. I posted previously that a trial should be done to get factual data on the protection side, it should be running now, and while it is they should not be doing the 12 week window, they should be doing the 3 week window. When/if they get evidence of a longer window being good, then by all means switch to that, but not in the absence of evidence.

IANAD

[sidcow]

37 minutes ago, blandy said:

Yes, I've posted about that previously. The thing not know is "how long for". The other thing obviously is "could the virus mutate to become resistant" as a result of the lower level of protection from only one dose. These are both unknowns. I posted previously that a trial should be done to get factual data on the protection side, it should be running now, and while it is they should not be doing the 12 week window, they should be doing the 3 week window. When/if they get evidence of a longer window being good, then by all means switch to that, but not in the absence of evidence.

IANAD

In that case it might actually be an advantage.  They keep saying the formula can be easily altered in a matter of weeks.  You may get dose 1 with good protection, then 3 months later get the tweaked version.  Otherwise you may have had 2 doses of the original then need a third one anyway.

So far though the variants seem to still seem to be dealt with by the original jab.    If it hasn't mutated to such an extent that it's unreconisable from it's original form in the last 14 months, I would be surprised if on 3 months it suddenly morphs into something totally new.

And anyway, even if it does what's the worst that will happen?   So the virus mutates, they will just have to give everyone the third jab with the amended vaccine, but in the meantime thousands of people have been potentially saved by the original jab from the original (and currently rampant everywhere) virus.

I think it's less political and more playing the percentages.  There are far far more experts that are OK with it than those firing off warnings.  They can't ALL be in the governments pockets.

[blandy]

19 minutes ago, sidcow said:

So far though the variants seem to still seem to be dealt with by the original jab.    If it hasn't mutated to such an extent that it's unrecognisable from it's original form in the last 14 months, I would be surprised if on 3 months it suddenly morphs into something totally new.

I read that there are now variants in abroadia that are/may be not affected by the vaccine - this is why finally! the government has closed the travel corridors - Brazillian P2 strain for example.

The virus is mutating, some mutations will not be biffed by the vaccine, and so it's really important to ensure that wholly effective measures are available and taken, not half arsed steps. Sure, it seems vaccines can be tweaked, like in a game of cat and mouse, but it's better to get the mouse (or is it the cat?) first time.

[sidcow]

27 minutes ago, blandy said:

I read that there are now variants in abroadia that are/may be not affected by the vaccine - this is why finally! the government has closed the travel corridors - Brazillian P2 strain for example.

The virus is mutating, some mutations will not be biffed by the vaccine, and so it's really important to ensure that wholly effective measures are available and taken, not half arsed steps. Sure, it seems vaccines can be tweaked, like in a game of cat and mouse, but it's better to get the mouse (or is it the cat?) first time.

We're going to be in a cat and mouse game with this forever now. 

It's going to be annual vaccination for the at risk and constant tweaking of the vaccine.  A couple of years ago a load of people died of Flu because they missed a strain when developing the next year's vaccine which went large.  The trick is to identify in advance which mutation is going to establish.

Anyway I'm batting out of this conversation now as I'm worried @snowychap might die of laughter. 

 

Edited January 18, 2021 by sidcow

[stuart_75]

23 hours ago, Seat68 said:

Has anyone know of anyone that has the complete vaccine? Both doses?

My other half's sister (nurse QE) had both Pfizers. 3 weeks apart.

[villakram]

On 16/01/2021 at 11:32, sidcow said:

Report it to Fox News.  They will I am sure run a news bulletin every half hour slagging off the Californian Billionaires now censoring free speech. 

Try and get @villakramon board too. 

There are always those that are blase about other voices being silenced.

[Davkaus]

1 hour ago, villakram said:

There are always those that are blase about other voices being silenced.

Do you think people have an inalienable right to post on social media?

[Genie]

Over 1600 dead today

[trekka]

Horrific number of daily reported deaths which will only increase sadly I fear in the next few weeks.  On a positive note, it looks like the number of cases are showing a sustained fall when compared with the previous week.  

 

[Genie]

Isn’t it roughly 3 weeks from infected to dead in the worst cases?

I hope the turkey was worth it.

Edited January 19, 2021 by Genie