Wednesday, July 14, 2021

More time wasted on vaccines

My thanks to Jonathan Engler for the tweet. This is HMS Queen Elizabeth.























She has a complement of 1,600 when fully staffed (dirtied my hands in Wikipedia to check that) so 1,400 on board sounds very plausible.  All are fully vaccinated and work under navy orders specifying social distancing, masks and track-n-trace. Those 1,400 people service a set of warplanes with armaments which you would not want to be on the receiving end of.

There are 100 COVID-19 cases so far, no deaths. I wonder if the case numbers might not have peaked yet.

This is the Diamond Princess.












She had a crew of 1045, looking after a passenger list of 2,666 whose demographic included 14 people sufficiently elderly (and I presume diabetic enough) that they died of COVID-19.

So the crew, who continued to service the passengers at some level throughout the infection period, were exposed to SARS-CoV-2 containing aerosols much of the time. 

In this case 145 contracted COVID-19. None died.

Considering that the HMS Queen Elizabeth's COVID-19 count is likely to be incomplete you have to ask yourself what, exactly, has the vaccine achieved?

Then if you look at the UK, which had a decent COVID-19 wave in spring of 2020, a completion of that wave in autumn 2020 and a marked atypical spike in Jan/Feb 2021 coincident with vaccine roll-out, the two summer nadirs are indistinguishable, you could even argue that summer 2020 had a slightly lower 7 day average death rate than we have currently.

Matt Hancock oversaw massive care-home fatalities in the first wave and failed to set up any way of separating COVID-19 patients from the elderly needing hospital treatment during last winter. So many of the people who might die of COVID-19 today are already dead. Another thing which disgusts me. But if this winter turns out to be a standard influenza year, with real influenza, no doubt the vaccines will get the credit.

Finally, I'd missed Peter Doshi's BMJ letter making some pertinent points about the Pfizer initial trial (or should I call it an advertising campaign?)

Peter Doshi: Pfizer and Moderna’s “95% effective” vaccines—we need more details and the raw data

I guess the real question is: Can you develop and market a massively profitable product to the whole world which doesn't actually work?

The pharmaceutical industry did this in slow motion with the biggest blockbuster drugs of all time.

The statins.

Are the vaccines any better? I hope so. Not looking good at the moment.

Peter

87 comments:

Passthecream said...

In a similar vein Ivor Cummins has a cheery video for all to share:

"A Short Crucial Update on the Delta Variant and Much More"

https://odysee.com/@IvorCummins:f/a-short-crucial-update-on-the-delta:1

Unknown said...

Here is my direct experience with the corona virus vaccines.

I am a semi retired ED physician. To estimate the US experience, multiplying my numbers by about 16,000 should give a rough estimate of the true numbers.

In the past three months I have treated four patients for what appears to be adverse vaccine reactions.

Note that the diagnoses are all rare. I've seen a few cases of each in a busy 45 year career.

One near death: a 56 year old diabetic. This patient presented with severe kidney failure. She had a potassium level of 8 mEq/L. That's a fatal or near fatal number. Her serum creatinine increased from 1.4 ( mild kidney disease) two weeks before corona virus vaccine to 5.6( kidney failure requiring dialysis) a week after vaccination. ICU admission with a dialysis catheter.

A very sick 36 year old with myocarditis. No risk factors for death from Covid. Coronary Care Unit admission

A perfectly healthy 46 year old with an acute inflammatory, noninfectious, poly arthritis that prevented walking. This patient recovered within a week.

A healthy 26 year old with two weeks such severe arm pain that use of the arm was not possible. It was the injected arm. That began within days of vaccination.

Plus one maybe case, a young person with complaints of mental fog and severe diffuse pains.

Peter said...

I think many of us are ware of people who have had serious adverse reactions to the vaccines. One acquaintance had crippling vestibular syndrome after AZ and is now being actively encouraged to have the Pfizer as a second dose. She might go ahead.

Sadly, if we think of the HMS QE crew as care home workers, how much protection is their compulsory vaccination going to protect the residents they care for?

Pass, Ivor is pretty spot on most of the time. I think we all missed the possibility that vaccine roll out might have such interesting effects on immunity last winter.

Peter

Passthecream said...

With our low (almost not at all) vaccinated population here, the hospitalisation rate with Delta is higher than the previous varieties atm.

don.a.van.dyke said...

The Independent reports 100 cases among the "strike group" of 3700.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/hms-queen-elizabeth-covid-royal-navy-b1883699.html

If true, this puts the infection rate much lower at about 1/37 or 2.7%

Peter said...

Pass, but here in the UK it's largely trivial. Vaccine or our susceptible population has already died????

Don.a.van.dyke, hard to say which is most likely to be incorrect. BBC or Independent? Probably both!

Peter

Kevin FST said...

Re QE2, the French site TVA Nouvelles may be most informative. They quote 1600 complement for QE2. The 3700 figure is for the entire Carrier Strike Group 21 and Wikipedia clarifies the CSG: QE2, 3 destroyers, 3 frigates, a couple of auxiliaries, and a submarine. It seems they picked up the unwanted companion in Limassol where the group docked for a few days (30 June-5 July), so presumably at least some of those other 9 vessels will be affected.

karl said...

A story:

A dear friend of mine and his wife got Fauci's engineered virus early last year - he got quite sick. His doctor also got sick. All three got the vaccine. All three just got CoVid AGAIN this week. (Being in Texas - they treated with Ivermectin + hydroxychloroquine + zinc) They got good and sick again - but recovered 36 hours after the Ivermectin.

I am hearing that the vaccines are not working as advertised from other places. If the vaccines don’t work to stop infection is getting the jab worth the risk? If they prevent death - perhaps - but what if they don't prevent the long term symptoms?

One last vaccine bit - if one needs boosters every few months - the risk from the vaccine ends up multiplied..

There is a vaccine coming out - perhaps this winter? - that is not based on the spike - but other bits - I suspect it will be safer and more effective. Hope they get a safe and effective one soon. They really need to be much more forthright and honest with the public - no one will believe anything they say - like calling wolf..

One other bit - It might be - reports of - that getting asymptomatic Covid might leave long covid symptoms behind... yuck..

The biggest problem is they are not being forthright with the risk information. I was quite impressed with the efforts to cancel Dr. Robert Malone -- Orwellian - I think he has done what he can to spill the beans.

What I am seeing is a lower death rate with new cases - if I can believe the data. This could be because of the vaccines, or the delta strain, or the vulnerable that are already gone.

What is clear is the current vaccines are not really 'sterilizing' - that is people still get (and apparently transmit) the virus. So evolution would favor viruses that escape the vaccines and don't make people so sick as to stay home.

If at the beginning of all this - if they had listened to Malone (they did ask him) and focused on repurposed drugs instead of a vaccine ( he spent his life working on vaccines - not an antivaccer) I think it would have saved lives.

I do think it is appropriate and we should rename and call this Fauci's engineered virus - he deserves the credit for seeing that it was developed.

The death rate from the vaccines could be known if they had carefully collected data - we do have an under estimate via government data --
https://www.openvaers.com/covid-data/mortality

Passthecream said...

Peter I'm prepared to accept that the vaccines do have some effect even if it is far less than advertised. atm with 90% of the UK adult population having had a first dose and 66% having had both, it us plausible that the vaccines are preventing infections from Delta leading to hospitalisation when you compare the Au vax rate of about 10% and our much higher rate of hospitalisation per case.

An effort has been made to vaccinate all care home residents here as a priority and there are restrictions as to who is allowed to be on-site but of course these always get broken, misapplied, stuffed up. Then there are the terrible consequences of isolating the elderly. On the news this morning, a cleaner at one home has tested positive but 90% of the residents have been fully vaccinated and there are no cases yet. It will be a few days before we see how that turns out --- it is an analogue of the Q.E. situation and we will definitely get to hear about this one. Will we ever get to hear how many of those vaccinated sailors develop a serious infection requiring hospitalisation?


So many confounders: vax rate, which vax?, seasonality, political shenannigans.




karl said...

@Passthecream
There is work on sub-unit vaccines that may turn out to be safe and effective - the current vaccine does not appear to be 'sterilizing' - probably saves lives in at-risk-elderly, but what if in the mean time they have destroyed public trust by ghosting and cancling? They have cut corners - they have not been forthright - saying the current vaccine is "perfectly safe" is disinformation - when the public eventually figures out that a ghosted drug would have saved lives, that they were fed disinformation - that they violated accepted bio-ethics - will they listen the next time? A very good take on this ( you can speed it up )..

https://odysee.com/@NoNewAbnormal:4/dr-malone-bioethics:1

LA_Bob said...

LA County is going back to indoor mask mandates on Saturday night.

"Vaccinated people are, in essence, being asked to make a sacrifice to help slow coronavirus spread among the unvaccinated."

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2021-07-15/l-a-county-will-require-masks-indoors-amid-covid-19-surge

I'm charmed. Take a knee for Neanderthals like me!

I expected something like this. Just not this soon. And it's been warm and humid out here, too!

Passthecream said...

Karl, the vax situation in Aus. is a little different. It's free but there are only two available (approved) atm and not much of either. They may or may not be of some use but our Govt. has stuffed up the supply so badly that we won't find out anytime soon.

Under 60s can have Pfizer and over 60s can have Astra Zeneca. That's it.

I am in the former category, my children and their partners in the latter. My son in law who has severe allergy problems consulted his GP who spelled out the risks to him very clearly, there is no concealment:

" ... for my age/gender group there's a 1-in-30,000 chance of getting TTS with Astrazeneca, while there's a 1-in-10,000 chance of getting heart inflammation with Pfizer."



Fwiw I am putting it off as long as possible and at least until we have more choices, later this year.

ChrisErHam said...

Peter,

What are your thoughts on the conspiracy theories that the vaccines are actually a means of population control and that +20% of the population only has ~2 years to live?

Passthecream said...

Argh, former, latter = latter, former.

cavenewt said...

@ChrisErHam

"What are your thoughts on the conspiracy theories that the vaccines are actually a means of population control and that +20% of the population only has ~2 years to live?"

I know you didn't ask me, but this is why some of us who are skeptical of some vaccines keep our heads down, because we get tarred with the same brush as the kind of nutcases that believe stuff like that.

cavenewt said...

@Pass

Darn, and here I thought maybe you had a time machine in your basement!

LA_Bob said...

ChrisEHam,

You didn't ask me, either, but I second cavenewt's response.

Why go with an extremely unlikely notion when a perfectly reasonable one will do? And be more convincing?

karl said...

@passthecream
There is a cheap drug that is supposed to give better protection than the vaccine via a weekly dose. Even Fauci takes vit-D. https://ivmmeta.com/

@ ChrisErHam

I think the leak was unintentional - GoF should be banned - if you want to blame China - you need to blame the USA just as much - it was our tax dollars that created this mess.

I think it is very important to give Fauci the credit he deserves for seeing to it that this virus was created.

Passthecream said...

Karl yes, anyone who doesn't aim to keep their vit D levels up by whatever means it takes at this point in time is nuts.

There are important things to UN-take, veg oils and excess sugar and carbs, doing which gives huge health benefits and costs even less than any vitamin pills.

Passthecream said...

Ordinarily yes but the console is offline atm

Passthecream said...

There is a big load of hype about this particular development ( link below ) which is a long way from human trials but I am certain that more effective solutions than the current vaccines are in development all over the world. So much money is being thrown at this problem and so much more up for grabs for a successful treatment! There is a nasally delivered vaccination in some stage of human testing in the US, I'd love to hear how that's going.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-07-14/peter-maccallum-centre-coronavirus-treatment-breakthrough/100292172

karl said...

My worry -- ADE Antibody-dependent enhancement

https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1415989536933490688.html
Doing vaccination during the pandemic might not be a good idea?

Malone explains what ADE is..
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/antibody-dependent-enhancement-vaccine-development/id1455413855?i=1000510671800
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antibody-dependent_enhancement
Worth following. https://twitter.com/RWMaloneMD

When the companies don’t have risk - they cut corners? no skin in the game?
Could be that the vaccine makes the delta-version worse? Rushing this work isn’t a good idea.

Itu Chaudhuri said...

One might also calmly say that as a population control measure it was near zero, and even those that died were mostly way past their reproductive years.

cavenewt said...

@Pass re covid treatments (as opposed to vaccines)—here in the US, there's a reasonable chance that any treatments are being suppressed by Big Pharma (cough ivermectin cough). They've made billions on the vaccines. But one condition of the Emergency Use Authorization which allowed the vaccines to be deployed so quickly, despite incomplete testing, is that there is *no effective treatment* for covid. Not hard to imagine that pressure from powerful forces is feeding the vast propaganda machine suppressing all alternatives to vaccination, censoring sources that even hint about ivermectin or vitamin D.

We can hope that other countries without these perverse incentives will come up with something.

Kevin FST said...

Re hydroxychloroquine - I know that it is/was used extensively by hospitals in China, Iran, N. Africa (Morocco?), Spain (at least Andalucia), Costa Rica, ... However, I am not sufficiently expert in Googling (or DuckDuckGoing) to pull up a list of all the countries that have been using it officially. Do any of you have such a list?

Schuyler said...

@pass

The intranasal vaccine from Altimmune is out of the running :-(

https://ir.altimmune.com/news-releases/news-release-details/altimmune-announces-update-adcovidtm-phase-1-clinical-trial

LA_Bob said...

Schuyler, thanks for that link. Disappointing news.

Does anyone understand this line from the news release?

"We believe that prior immunity in humans may be important for a robust immune response to intranasal dosing with AdCOVID.”

Passthecream said...

Sad about that I.I. vaccine. It had great promise initially. I know of other people working on a similar type of Vax for different diseases.

CSIRO here in Aus (*) has announced a new protein based Vax that can be stored at room temperature and which would be a game changer for eg Africa, remote areas everywhere.

BTW Peter - Aus Nobel laureate Peter Doherty who I mentioned recently is the first ever Vet to receive a Nobel. He started as a Veterinary immunologist. Must give you a good outlook, being a Vet :)



(*) CSIRO is an Au gov funded science quango which invented the photocopier and wifi amongst other useful things.

Passthecream said...

Hmm, local immunology-aware comment on that press release: " they are looking at the wrong markers. It's not all about igg antibodies ..."


Does anyone detect a whiff of decaying rodent ....

Justin said...

Pass, iga is where it's at! Still waiting for that nasaly administered vac. Probably not going to happen. Lol

Passthecream said...

https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fimmu.2020.611337/full

cavenewt said...

More on "tarred with the same brush as the kind of nutcases that believe stuff like that"

Take a look at the list on page 2 of The Disinformation Dozen https://252f2edd-1c8b-49f5-9bb2-cb57bb47e4ba.filesusr.com/ugd/f4d9b9_b7cedc0553604720b7137f8663366ee5.pdf (you can click on each name to go to examples of their "violations").

While some of these people are obvious wingnuts or cynical opportunists, at least in my opinion, some of them make not-unreasonable objections to current government policies. Mercola is the only celebrity doctor that I pay any attention to it all, but of late his headlines have been disappointingly alarmist and he is merchandising himself to the hilt.

Peter, I don't know if you should be sad or glad that you didn't make the list! Nor Ivor Cummins or Mike Eades.

cavenewt said...

@Pass, re https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fimmu.2020.611337/full "Mucosal Immunity in COVID-19: A Neglected but Critical Aspect of SARS-CoV-2 Infection"

Just to remind people that Peter wrote about this early on and that was the first thing that got me thinking I would much rather have immunity from a natural infection than a vaccination.

Passthecream said...

Yup, kudos to Peter!

The link was fwded from my immunology aware family member who was annoyed by the statements in that press release, just to give an overview.

The hysterical calls for censorship are odious and I see those people seeking to control the opinions of others just as much as any of their targets do. Perhaps they should put themselves on that list? Would be a nice bit of recursion.

karl said...

@cavenewt

Even some people that got sick before are getting sick again - perhaps not as bad - less lethal? I am told that MDs are using a drug that comes after H - as quietly as possible for people hospitalized - in some hospitals - could be why the reduced death counts? Sad that the statistics of drugs vs deaths are not available.

I am told that the US gov is not collecting stats on breakthrough cases? NBC claimed 66,000 - don't know if that is true or valid - but I heard first hand of 6 break through cases in Texans in the last week. You would think in exchange for indemnifying pharma that they would have demanded making all the data open to the public.

Over time, we would expect a virus more infectious and less lethal from evolution - but not necessarily a straight line graph.

The biggest risk in my opinion is not death but long term syndromes from even asymptomatic cases (first/breakthrough/second) - (syndromes might sometimes be helped with a drug that must not be named). I have no way to know the amount of risk - in the USA they did not do the type of tracking they might have - Non sterilizing vaccines seems to me to be a failure on some level - and earlier sickness does not appear to be sterilizing either?

I am taking an unspecified drug plus vit-D plus Curcumin (curcumin data is very slim).. I don't think relying on the vaccine alone appears to be a good idea for those at high risk.

In my mind, if the focus had been on repurposed drugs (no ca-ching) - (as they were advised by a very qualified virus expert from the start) - instead of rushing out a vaccine (big ca-ching)- it would have saved a lot of lives and long term harm. Of course hind-sight is 2020.

RE Ca-ching - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cpbbuaIA3Ds

https://c19early.com/

When the money involved is in the order of $Billions - it appears there are some are quite willing to distort science at the cost of lives.

@cavenewt Re- disinformation claims
Well said - I also notice that people that were claiming that the vaccines were "perfectly safe" are missing from the list - no vaccine is perfectly safe - there is always a balance between risk and benefit. What angers me is the data needed to make such calculations is not available to the public. Therefore I don't know if the 'official advise' is un biased - in fact such Orwellian efforts may well result in serious counter productive results. On average the public isn't nearly as stupid as the experts think - they can spot disinformation/propaganda - on both sides - not perfectly - but over time they seem to get it roughly correct - most of the time. (If they want the public to buy the message they should find someone willing to be totally honest with the public - there are many that can spot the lies from micro facial gestures alone. When people are selling something as "perfectly safe" - it will sound like Soviet propaganda to about 20% - turning them off to even good advise.)

Playing political games with health issues is a crime against humanity. When I saw this get political, I put my full-body-waders on.

LA_Bob said...

cavenewt,

Thanks for the link. The only names I recognize are Mercola and Kennedy, numbers 1 and 2. I don't follow either one. I was surprised Alex Berenson wasn't on the list. He's the former NYT journalist who is making a career lately of all things COVID. Peter first introduced him to us in March. I've read his Twitter feed ever since.

http://high-fat-nutrition.blogspot.com/2021/03/more-musing-about-vaccines.html

Lately he's been banging on about "vaccine failure", both on Twitter and Substack.

https://alexberenson.substack.com/p/vaccines-reasons-for-concern-part

Swiss Policy Research has taken Berenson to task over this. They claim the vaccines are as effective as ever against severe illness and death, just not infection from the Delta variant now dominant. Rightly or not, I've considered Swiss Policy Research a good source, so if they criticize Berenson, I take notice.

https://swprs.org/vaccine-failure-not-really/

Now, Karl says, "I am told that MDs are using a [Drug Which Must Not Be Named] - as quietly as possible for people hospitalized - in some hospitals...". Presumably this is in the USA, and Berenson has cited UK and Israeli data. Still, this "guerilla" treatment might bridge the claim gap between Berenson and SWPRS. Claiming "complete vaccine failure on every level" has enormous implications, and I'm eager to see how the debate plays out.

https://twitter.com/AlexBerenson/status/1416880859462971395

karl said...

@cavenewt

I don't think it is "complete vaccine failure" yet - probably reduces death rates - but I fear mass vaccination during the pandemic ends up creating an unintended gain-of-function.

Bossche put this up in April - at the time, I didn't understand that the vaccines were non-sterilizing - but that is the case and his predictions are coming true. Mass vaccination with a non sterilizing vaccine - during the pandemic could well be a really bad idea.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=w3xq4cEHT0s

Natural immunity responds to the current virus - reacting with the proteins. Mass vaccination is similar to what they do in some types of gain-of-function work - change the environment and select for those that survive. I think an argument could be made that isolation and masking are not perfect - and would select for more infectious virus - now the same for the vaccines.

The law requires full disclosure - are they telling people that this vaccine is non-sterilizing? If the vaccine is only going to be effective for a few months - is it still worth the risk?

Over time, we should expect a less sickening virus - but that path may not be a straight line.
If Bossche is correct -the vaccine may well interfere with innate immunity - dysfunctional vaccine response might block innate immunity. Is this true? I don't know - but it should be understood. I want to understand if Bossche has this correct - I sadly think he is correct right now - but hope smarter people argue this into clarity.

https://odysee.com/@BretWeinstein:f/darkhorse-podcast-with-geert-vanden:b

If the virus is changing quite rapidly - we really need to beef up our innate immunity.

cavenewt said...

@karl who said '@cavenewt...I don't think it is "complete vaccine failure" yet...' I think you meant to direct that to LA Bob, not me.

I think it's pretty apparent that the vaccines do prevent some illness. As to how well they do it? I throw up my hands because I see headlines and studies and stories all over the place. Not just about vaccines, but also masking and social distancing.

For myself it's rather academic since I went ahead and got the Moderna vaccine just so the other residents in my tiny community would feel more comfortable. Like you, I worry about long-term effects. I already have a mystery Progressive motor neuropathy whose cause and even mechanism of damage is unknown; I don't really need another one. I take (perhaps misplaced) comfort in the fact that my cool and groovy superior low-carb lifestyle will keep me from having severe illness even if I do get a breakthrough infection.

You KNOW these guys got vaccinated at the first opportunity, yet eight New York Yankees have tested positive for Covid in post-vaccine breakthrough cases. WTF. I can only hope that someday we will find out the truth about all this, but I'm not very confident in that hope.

Malcolm said...

I just read this elsewhere, thought it might be of interest to people here:

However, there is another bigger issue here. Vaccination, nor infection, give you 100% immunity. So even if you vaccinated everyone, but the vaccine is <85% (HI) effective in stopping transmission, then it still spreads.

We have a population to study this - Gibraltar. It was almost 100% vaccination. There the virus is spreading, and in fact levels are much higher than the UK.

Peter said...

Malcolm,

I've never been against spread, except to the elderly/vulnerable. For everyone else it's a flu, potentially a bad one. Support those with long covid in addition to those with long influenza/EBV (CFS/ME, especially stop telling them they're malingering) and let the rest of us get on with a normal life in a bad flu season.

Do not go to work, the pub or shopping if you feel crap and need to take a gram of paracetamol and 400mg of ibuprofen to get out of bed. That would seem sensible to me. It had already turned infection rate weeks before lockdown-one started in the uk.

If we had done that and stuck with it in March 2020 we would be in a lot better position now.

Peter

cavenewt said...

Because obviously, preventing Covid is the number one 100% most vitally important priority of everybody's life today. Also obviously, cholesterol evolved to serve absolutely no physiological purpose except to cause heart disease and allow coronavirus infections.

"Draining cholesterol from cell membranes blocks SARS-CoV-2 entry"

"Statins Reduce COVID-19 Severity, Likely by Removing Cholesterol That Virus Uses to Infect" https://health.ucsd.edu/news/releases/Pages/2020-09-23-statins-reduce-covid-19-severity-likely-by-removing-cholesterol-virus-uses-to-infect.aspx

Note, I haven't had time to read this yet. Above comments are based entirely on my biased preconceptions.

Peter said...

It never fails to amaze me how anyone taking a statin manages to die... Of anything!

Peter

Passthecream said...

Brains being made of large amounts of cholesterol, it seems obvious that Statins = Zombies and after you've had your brains sucked out by Statins (and also if your soul is pure), the disease will not harm you!

LA_Bob said...

"Brains being made of large amounts of cholesterol, it seems obvious that Statins = Zombies and after you've had your brains sucked out by Statins..."

So this explains why the Establishment seems so nuts over SARS-CoV-2.

Justin said...

The Olympics this year.....smh.

Passthecream said...

53m ago 11:48
"42 of the 43 people in ICU are unvaccinated
Important update: NSW health’s Dr Jeremy McAnulty has clarified that of the 43 people in ICU with Covid-19, only one has had any dose of the vaccine. The remaining 42 have not been vaccinated."


Australia continues to be a series of scientific trials on how this virus can spread or be prevented from spreading in a predominantly unexposed and unvaccinated population. No more than 20% of the Au pop. Have had their first dose of Vax and only 13% are fully vaccinated. The above report is still hard to interpret but suggests that the vaccines do give protection against the worst effects.

Peter said...

Pass, I'm not sure that scientific is quite the correct term. More like trying to extract some information from a largely politically designed set of random actions. But yes, in Auss the elderly and susceptible have not been eliminated from the population and appear not to have been exposed yet. This will give us some insight in to whether the vaccine works in this population, currently an unknown.

But yes, a hopeful signal...

Peter

Peter said...

Slightly off topic, I've seen reports that Sydney is considering essentially permanent lockdown in some form. And (some) people don't seem too happy about this.

It's also clear in the UK that anti-lockdowner protests (with which I agree) are now providing a platform for our own somewhat extreme antivaxx viewpoints, some of which are as incomprehensible to me as zero-covid is.

Peter

Peter said...

Also in Auss, it is surprising to me quite how slowly the case numbers are rising. You would have thought that a winter population would have allowed more explosive growth. Is it possible TTT is actually doing something???? This can't be completely discounted!!!

P

Passthecream said...

Yes, more of an observational trial with a bunch of hypotheses needing evaluation.

You mean the test and trace there? I think it's pretty effective. Is your ping system in the UK a version of that? The pollies in Sydney are trying to support people financially through this but the $$$ costs are significant and rapidly mounting.

The Daily case count in Sydney is approximately steady maybe slightly declining, definitely not going exponential. If they shut down just a little harder it would probably fall but at great cost. I think many of the protestors are people who are not well supported and falling on hard times.

The case rate is constant but the new vaccination rate is high about 1 million doses per week atm nationwide.

Passthecream said...

Here's another possibility, that the prep (oligomer/primer???) kits used in Aus for feeding the RNA fragments to the PCR machine are more accurate ?!?

You can take RN/FTA however you like to find him but this is an interesting, maybe startling, bit of news:

https://www.freetheanimal.com/2021/07/lab-alert-changes-to-cdc-rt-pcr-for-sars-cov-2-testing.html

Oh and I just noticed another news item, that Florida tops the list for the number of newly identified cases and mostly in the unvaccinated. It's always necessary to tease that apart because naturally if fewer people are vaccinated any random sample of cases may include more of them. But there are limits to that adjustment as was the situation with those reported Sydney icu numbers

Peter said...

Pass yes TTT is the tracing system. It is dysfunctional and achieves nothing trying to suppress an endemic virus. In Auss the virus is not yet endemic so I guess you're on a better wicket...

Florida looks fine to me, they had a similar peak last year and this year deaths look to be going to be lower and there will be far less collateral damage. Further north the next challenge will be September onwards. New York will be interesting, Cuomo executed the elderly and the rest of the urban parts of the state may be at herd immunity w/o the vaccines.

Time will tell.

If I was De Santis I'd not be concerned re COVID in Florida. He called it correctly once. No reason to change now.

The other browsing I revisited is Sweden, I've not checked for months. I see their rolling seven day average mortality has been either zero or one for quite some time.

They still have PCR positives but with mortality that low it will just be a matter of watch out in September. I noticed also that Norway, that exemplar of Scandinavian lockdowns, is considering a more Swedish approach and their PM is reported to regret their lockdown approach. Interesting, and I don't have a direct quote for that except the Telegraph (for what that's worth!) https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/05/30/coronavirus-norway-wonders-should-have-like-sweden/

Peter

Peter said...

Pass,

"42 of the 43 people in ICU are unvaccinated
Important update: NSW health’s Dr Jeremy McAnulty has clarified that of the 43 people in ICU with Covid-19, only one has had any dose of the vaccine. The remaining 42 have not been vaccinated."

I've just seen the original clip of him saying the reverse, which he has now clearly corrected.

It reminds me of Whitty (or was it Valance?) recently saying 60% of UK hospitalised were vaccinated, going on to explain exactly how this can happen and it's not a disaster, then having to resort to twitter to correct himself down to 40% of hospitalised being vaccinated. Despite having explained *why* it was 60% in some detail.

When you see booboos on this scale you have to wonder exactly who writes their scripts!

Peter

Passthecream said...

Peter I admire your perseverance in digging down through that! There have been so many press conferences that the eyes just glaze over, head for the daily totals and locations and ignore all the poli-speak.

Numbers wise with the Vax % here still being low and likely behavioural differences between the people who decide to get vaxed or don't it's a simple numbers game that more unvaxxed would end up in hospital. But possibly they will also get more sick. I really can't follow all the twists and turns of your political classes, they seem somewhere in the range from idiotic to greedy to totally loopy dictators. Like I said before, the pollies here look up to yours but lack the skill to be so good at it.

Passthecream said...

I'm probably late to watching this man's testimony, you all already know this, but it is the best thing I have seen for some time.

https://youtu.be/QAHi3lX3oGM

cavenewt said...

@Pass, thanks for that link above to "Peter McCullough, MD testifies to Texas Senate HHS Committee". His bona fides certainly sound credible. You're in Australia so you might not realize that because this took place in Texas, and Texas is a hotbed of right-wing-nuttery, more liberal Americans (me) are tempted to discount anything that comes out of there.

In the United States, the Emergency Use Authorization that allowed the vaccines to be deployed so quickly is contingent on the fact that there is *no* treatment for the disease. So cynics like me see a profit motive in suppressing treatment information. I wonder what the story is in other countries. They can't be following the American example that closely…can they?

Passthecream said...

The vaccine religion is strong here however there are (seemingly) effective nationwide treatment protocols using anti virals and corticosteroid and whatever else works, in place. But we aren't overwhelmed either.

I didn't know about using colchicine before. I used to use it occasionally for gout. It's not without inconvenient and possibly harmful side effects ...

E-S said...

If you understand French: https://youtu.be/oTHuqsdxZak

The founder of the french virology society, Pr. Claverie, calls out « state lies » about the severity (or lack of severity, rather) of delta variant infections in France, live on national TV.

Scotland and now England appear past their delta peak, Ireland is just about to trend downwards too on cases, just in time to pull the rug from under the feet of the scare-mongering ?

cavenewt said...

"When experts or agencies deliver information to the public that they consider possibly or definitively false to further a larger, often well-meaning agenda, they are telling what is called a noble lie..."

In today's climate, this article is unusually straightforward about whether or not it's wise to lie to the public in pursuit of the (perceived) greater good. With examples during Covid.

Sorry about the paywall. I can send the whole thing to someone if they're really interested.

https://slate.com/technology/2021/07/noble-lies-covid-fauci-cdc-masks.html

Peter said...

cave, the current crisis of interventional disasters we are currently living under tends to support the concept that lying might not be a good idea. The heady mix of incompetence, hubris and reputation/financial gain are quite enough on their own!

Having said that, lying seems to be an essential attribute of a politician. Always has been. All colours. What's odd is how above board and honestly displayed it is today. The WHO in particular is now an embarrassment comparable to Bojo but is doing much greater to damage to the world. At least Bojo is limited to that little island off the coast of Europe, Poundland (you might have to be UK based to know Poundland).

Peter

Eric said...

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/30/briefing/coronavirus-delta-mysteries.html?smid=url-share

Eric said...

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/aug/01/is-covid-19-on-the-run-in-the-uk-fall-case-numbers-herd-immunity

Lots of handwaiving about the current fall of infections in the UK. I think the fall in the Netherlands is much more interesting as they don't have as many extrinsic factors as the UK. Also, look at Poland and the Czech republic which had super high numbers into May and are really close to zero right now.

My picture is that every now and then a new (as in new to that area) variant comes along, infects many who should be immune, infects others who have no immunity from previous infection or vaccination and then peters out faster than anyone can explain. Maybe it is genetics, that it only infects those it can infect? Or there is passing immunity from repeated low dose exposure that lasts until the next wave comes along?

Peter said...

Eric, you might just enjoy this piece of garbage from the Grauniad

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jul/16/englands-covid-unlocking-a-threat-to-the-world-experts-say

The "effect" of removing most Covid restrictions on July 19th is associated with a massive fall in PCR positive test results. AKA Neanderthal approach. If we use the logic of NPI-interventionists it is quite clear that if we had removed all restrictions in mid May there would never have been a surge in PCR positive test results at all throughout June. Just being sarcastic there, with good reason.

So, can 1,200 leading scientists all be complete idiots?

Obviously yes!

Peter

Eric said...

Peter,

I saw that at the time. Yes, outcomes are sometimes unexpected, that's what I liked about the NYT piece dated 7/30. I don't think the fall of cases in England is completely free of extrinsic factors (such as people deleting their app) but NL might be. That's why it might be interesting to learn more.

This article also has a point: https://slate.com/technology/2021/07/anna-kiesenhofer-principle-experts-cdc.html

By the way, right now Florida and Louisiana are looking very bad, as are some counties in Texas. I suppose on average vaccinations, mask mandates and compliance to what they are supposed to do but there can be extended stretches of time when changes do not have the predicted results.

I must admit I simply don't understand why much of Eastern Europe is looking so good right now after a very nasty spring. Is it less mobility? Less testing? I have no idea. Then there is Denmark where things are developing as expected.

Peter said...

Eric, for your entertainment https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/01/us/covid-santa-monica-icu.html?action=click&module=Spotlight&pgtype=Homepage

Obviously everyone in Florida should be dead by now. Luckily California has had Newsom to save them all. Much as Cuomo has saved New York. Serious sarcasm warning applies!

I see Iceland is doing as well as Israel, too.

Sheesh. The main stream media is just garbage...

Ultimately far too few people have deleted the NHS app here. Deleting that, and stopping all testing outside of seriously ill patients, might put an end to the UK's pandemic.

Peter

Passthecream said...

Fwiw, Iceland at approx 70% vaccinated, pop ~370,000 and I imagine somewhat isolated has about the same case load per day as Sydney which has a pop ~5,600,000 and a much lower vax rate although that is rising rapidly. Fresh vactims are turning up ...


I have no idea what these numbers imply.

cavenewt said...

It's very hard to know what to think these days, with all the swirling contradictory headlines that inundate us. Speaking for myself, two subjects of emerging importance are 1. The official refusal to acknowledge immunity from natural infection; and 2. Deliberately using misinformation to push the official agenda (the noble lie).

1. The immune system has two major divisions, right? Innate and adaptive. Officialdom seems to completely ignore innate, considering antibodies to be the be-all and end-all of immunity. And they can get away with this because your average civilian only knows about antibodies and nothing else. The CDC rather casually dismisses natural immunity (I suspect defined by antibodies) as only lasting a few months—without admitting the same is true for vaccination. Which is what makes these articles especially interesting:
"SARS-CoV-2 infection induces long-lived bone marrow plasma cells in humans" https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-021-03647-4
"The Beauty of Vaccines and Natural Immunity" https://www.smerconish.com/exclusive-content/the-beauty-of-vaccines-and-natural-immunity

2. Based on past experience with a couple of other health issues, I'm predisposed to be skeptical about the accuracy of lab tests in general, and the politics of the CDC in particular. So I don't pay much attention to official reports of number of cases, in favor of the weekly average of deaths (keeping in mind actual cause of death is sometimes hard to determine). From that perspective the hysterical headlines about Delta definitely seem overblown.

Is the vaccine dangerous? I'm not qualified to have much of an opinion. Does it prevent serious disease? I don't think there's much question that it does. Should everyone get vaccinated? I think it depends on your particular health and situation and age. Does the government have the right to mandate vaccination? As Lord Sumption pointed out, if the situation were really dire, such as Ebola spreading around the world, yes. But that has not been demonstrated in this case, despite the best efforts of officialdom and mass media.

And that's not even addressing the corruptive influence of Big Pharma and its profit motive. Vaccines are probably going to be even more lucrative than statins.

In the coming years, perhaps research will show that the modern evolutionarily-inappropriate lifestyle was the main contributor to all the deaths from Covid. Maybe that will provide an impetus for improvement that our current, largely unacknowledged, chronic disease epidemic has not.

Justin said...

Awesome interview with Gabor.

https://youtu.be/MO9kkRP-j3w

Justin said...

Well said Cave. I would add that the microbiom is a possible third component of the immune system.

Peter said...

Justin, nothing from Gabor which I would disagree with...

Peter

Peter said...

cave, there are three things which still seem unanswered me.

1) If you are vaccinated and contract SARS-CoV-2, with or without becoming unwell, will you generate multi-epitope sterilising mucosal IgA immunity in your airway? That is one way out of the current mess.

2) If, like me, you have been grossly exposed to SARS-CoV-2 without ever becoming unwell (innate immunity) will you have developed sterilising immunity in your airway? Will you have a negative or positive IGRA test looking for cell mediated immunity if you take that test? Or do you just need to keep looking after your innate immune system for ever? Not that that is a bad plan.

3) If you have recovered from COVID-19 and decide to take the vaccine despite that, does your pre existing acquired immunity protect you from ADE as the vaccine IgG wanes and the acute immunosuppression in the two weeks post first jab? I sincerely hope so.

Peter

LA_Bob said...

cavenewt,

Great comment. Up to the last two paragraphs, it would almost make a good NYT editorial (in a better journalistic climate).

But the last two paragraphs, especially the last one, are just crazily optimistic. I see a lot of, "if people would only lose weight, the virus wouldn't be a problem". But, if I've read Peter right, much of that "weight" is polyunsaturated fat, and one is in as much danger while losing it as they are holding on to it. I can even imagine a "study" that says, "No, Weight Loss Does Not Protect Against COVID".

Until the paradigm on dietary fat changes, we risk the nuttiness of the last nineteen months.

Malcolm said...

Hard to figure out what to think, isn't it. I came across this table appearing to show good results for the vaccines preventing deaths in a ~6 month period in Scotland (population ~5.5m):
https://www.reddit.com/r/CoronavirusUK/comments/oufna6/public_health_scotland_covid19_statistical_report/
Original report is at: https://publichealthscotland.scot/media/8568/21-07-28-covid19-publication_report.pdf

Numbers seem pretty low for under-60s, as you would expect for deaths, I suppose. Personally I think the risk of hospitalisation from Covid vs risk of noticeable side-effects is what I care about. (Not vaccinated yet but reading up on it now we're heading towards Autumn ...)

Justin said...

Peter, I would pay to see you Gabor and probably Ivor just do a round table nerd out session. It would be epic.

Justin

cavenewt said...

@LA_Bob

Crazily optimistic in the short term, yes. Actually I was thinking more along the lines of…generations.

It's not just dietary fat that's crazy, but a lot of other things about the modern lifestyle. Remember it's only been really evil for about 100 years*, which isn't really that long if you think about things anthropologically. Maybe we could get smarter in the next 100 years. One can dream!

* that's leaving aside the agricultural revolution 10,000 years ago, which, while not great for us, didn't have the compacted-timeline impact of modern living, IMO.

Justin said...

Peter, another epic interview that I know a lot of your long time readers have probably waited for. Can't wait to hear your analysis on the Pete/Tucker podcast. Lol!!!

Justin

https://youtu.be/PR5OqIPNZo0

Justin said...

Exactly! This was my one hang up when my boss wanted to fast while going on chemo. I was so scared of all th PUFA he would be liberating!!!

Passthecream said...

"it's too complex, we just don't understand". I enjoyed this diatribe:

https://youtu.be/YdRZJKG7rhw

Peter said...

Pass, love it!

Peter

Captain Sunset said...

Ha! Everyone's an expert eh? It used to be that we just had to suffer a few of these oh-so-certain Nellie's-on-the-telly, but now they are springing up everywhere. It's becoming a bores charter. Soon, the propaganda tillers & shillers will find a means to turn these Nellie's into their own green-backed mouth-organs. But, 'twas ever thus I guess.

cavenewt said...

@Passthecream, re video "The Delta Surge May Collapse Faster Than You Think | A Doctor Explains".

One of the best rants I've seen yet. Even though pro vaccine he's cool with people who would rather not vax. Finally, someone who acknowledges natural immunity may be better than the vaccine in some ways. Best part of all: mucus!

cavenewt said...

@Justin "This was my one hang up when my boss wanted to fast while going on chemo. I was so scared of all th PUFA he would be liberating!"

According to this group's current PUFA thinking, yes.

But then I'd like to understand why Valter Longo's early work with chemo patients was so promising (before he went disappointingly full-commercial). Or maybe his good results were only short term, being focused mainly on tolerating chemo, and the liberated PUFAs would've had a longer-term deleterious effect…? I haven't seen any follow-up on those clinical trials.

Stefan said...

I would like to know the answers on these questions as well...
I suppose time will tell. If you come up with an idea on this in the mean time I'm curious ;)

E-S said...

Good breadcrumbs re vaccine vs. recovery for long term immunity in this paper: https://www.cell.com/cell-reports-medicine/fulltext/S2666-3791(21)00203-2

Especially figure 4 - this might explain Iceland and Israel ?

As the authors very modestly suggest: « This has interesting implications suggesting that nucleocapsid-specific CD8+ T cells might be more efficient in recognizing virally infected cells. »

Passthecream said...

https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/thailand-start-human-trials-covid-19-shots-via-nasal-spray-2021-08-11/

cavenewt said...

Prompted by something karl said on 19 July 2021, above, as well as a link from Mike Eades' Arrow newsletter, I waded through this, which took me two days:

Vanden Bossche "A last word of caution to all those pretending the Covid-19 pandemic is toning down" https://www.geertvandenbossche.org/post/a-last-word-of-caution-to-all-those-pretending-the-covid-19-pandemic-is-toning-down

...which sucked me down a rabbit hole about viral vaccine resistance caused by mass vaccination with a non-sterilizing vaccine during a pandemic.

For those who want to follow along, I recommend this article

Read and Kennedy 2015 "Imperfect Vaccination Can Enhance the Transmission of Highly Virulent Pathogens", the cautionary tale of Marek's disease in chickens https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4516275/

But don't read that without also ingesting this most excellent comment, M Boots "The Need for Evolutionarily Rational Disease Interventions: Vaccination Can Select for Higher Virulence", with so much to chew on, I'm going to play ruminant and re-digest it in a couple of days. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4548947/. Also from 2015. Boots recommends not undertaking mass vaccination without carefully examining possible unintended consequences — wonder if that happened during the rush to create the Covid vaccines?

Peter said...

cave,

Those ideas look watertight to me.

Blaming the unvaccinated for generating vaccine evading strains is preposterous. Utter bollocks. Total stupidity.

It is the equivalent of blaming people in the general population who are taking no antibiotic medication of any sort for the development of antibiotic resistance.

Antibiotic resistance is directly proportional to antibiotic usage. The best selection pressure is provided by high dose, meticulously timed, extended courses of antibiotic medication. The primary location where this happens is in the ITU.

Ditto for viruses, there will be a marked selection pressure in favour of vaccine evasion if a vaccinated person has an unprotected airway combined with pastures a-plenty in the rest of their body should a vaccine evading mutation occur IN THEIR AIRWAY. What selection pressure would be provided to benefit a vaccine-escape mutation in the absence of systemic IgG to provide that selective pressure?

None.

Fauci knows this. Whitty knows this. Valance knows this. It's very basic.

Peter