Coronavirus (2021) thread

[M18CTID]

They are only publishing the numbers from what's happening in front if them and their decisions based on those numbers. I don't see it as scaring most of the population at all but I suppose that's a matter of how you interpret these sort of decisions.

I think the scaremongering comes from when the media pick up on it and report it in a way that might shit up some people enough to turn them off wanting to take the vaccine altogether, even if they're not in the demographic that is suspected of perhaps being at risk. This is where I think the messaging needs to be different when these pauses happen. Perhaps make the point that it's absolutely safe for the vast majority but something of concern has been flagged up amongst a particular demographic which requires further investigation.

 

[The Light Was Yellow Sir]

Sadly 2.6% of Covid-19 deaths have been under the age of 50 and Long Covid effects on the under 50s are dramatically higher than in older people (they die rather than survive with problems) 55% have symptoms beyond 8 weeks. 15% of those hospitalised are readmitted to hospital within 5 months for related issues and large numbers are developing diabetes (no body is putting exact figures on this but it is tens of thousands).
Worst of all, high rates of infection on younger people trigger case in older people.

What percentage of those under 60‘s had no known pre-existing health conditions? In absolute numbers, until the end of December, it was 388 in total. What we can’t be attempting is to eliminate any risk of illness, I wouldn’t have thought and, if vaccines are supposed to massively reduce hospitalisations and deaths, numbers getting infected don’t really matter.

Also, I’m not convinced you’re right that long Covid affects younger people more than older people. The evidence I’ve seen is that the older you are and the more comorbidities you have, the more likely you are to have long Covid effects, as it takes you longer to recover from anything in that particular group.

 

[The Light Was Yellow Sir]

Well food shopping is top of the pile as the main infection activity in the weekly PHE test and trace survey data. As it is every week. https://assets.publishing.service.g...-19_and_Influenza_Surveillance_Graphs_W12.pdf

That’s not what that says though. It asks what people were doing in the week prior to testing positive and shopping is top of the list. Given that shopping is about the only thing that most people are allowed to do, it’s hardly surprising. Its like the hospitality industry has been closed down because, astonishingly, when the students were responsible for lots of positive tests, quite a lot of them had been in a pub in the preceding week.

 

[roypaulknewmyfather]

It's fascinating that you both believe this *and* openly state you have no evidence for it!

(The idea that German drug safety evaluation is biased to favour more expensive treatments is really, really hard to find any rational motivation for)

Call it a gut feeling. If the major players also produce contraceptive pills, deflect away from possible links by questioning AZ vaccine. Plus the favour to more expensive treatments is greed.

 

[BlueAnorak]

That’s not what that says though. It asks what people were doing in the week prior to testing positive and shopping is top of the list. Given that shopping is about the only thing that most people are allowed to do, it’s hardly surprising. Its like the hospitality industry has been closed down because, astonishingly, when the students were responsible for lots of positive tests, quite a lot of them had been in a pub in the preceding week.

The only thing many people were doing was shopping.

 

[Healdplace]

I imagine AZ are by now sorry they got involved in this. All this awful press for little reward as they are doing this on a non profit basis which they hardly ever get credit for doing. But why it is so cheap to market to the rest of the world.

I think originally the plan was to go with an experienced US vaccine manufacturer. But having invested money in it they were persuaded to stay British so this would be viewed as an entirely British success.

In retrospect - whilst seeing why that must have looked a good idea to many at the time - it likely would have played out differently in some places had this been perceived as at least in part a US vaccine. Especially from one with a track record in the field.

I suspect they will not be overly eager to take this side of the business further. And who could blame them. Tragic really if so as who knows what wonderful vaccines for the world at prices those nations could afford they might have come up with in future.

 

[MillionMilesAway]

On your second point I do wonder if our distribution of the various vaccines have been different across the age ranges. Ie perhaps those in the top priority groups such as elderly and health care workers both young and old have largely been vaccinated with Pfizer, with AZ yet to really reach those including women of a certain younger age bracket where this is being identified elsewhere as a problem. For us it may yet be encountered later down the line.

As far as I can see this is more of a reshuffle of how the vaccine is distributed in Germany meantime, particularly whilst further investigation is carried out. It could be that they decide that men under 55 are fine to receive it and things are reshuffled again.

Yes, entirely possible - that's pretty much as I see it.

 

[roubaixtuesday]

Propaganda and censorship.

I suggest you drop this. It makes you sound like a nutter.

just another lie

I am not interested in a discussion where your argument relies, in one instance on the official figures, but equally insists on the other hand that those same figures are "lies".

we do not vaccine the entire population for the Flu even though it is just as infectious,

Ah, so your bottom line is that COVID and flu are equivalent? (It's hard to understand from such a rambling paragraph).

This is wrong. Flu is not "just as infectious" as COVID. It is both less transmissible, and less deadly. Figures are readily available for Ro (transmissibility) and IFR (Infection fatality rate)

Here is a comparison of published data for IFR:




And here is a comparison of Ro for different viruses (it's from July last year and current estimates for COVID are a little bit higher.

COVID-19 Compared to Other Pandemic Diseases - PMC

In December 2019, the first cases of a new contagious disease were diagnosed in the city of Wuhan, the capital of Hubei province in China. Within a short period of time the outbreak developed exponentially into a pandemic that infected millions of ...

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

You can note that this is all published scientific research, and involves no propaganda or censorship.

COVID is something like 10x more deadly than flu (age dependent) and maybe twice as transmissible.

 

[Healdplace]

Russia has developed the first vaccine for pets! Claim 100% success.

 

[Tim of the Oak]

I imagine AZ are by now sorry they got involved in this. All this awful press for little reward as they are doing this on a non profit basis which they hardly ever get credit for doing. But why it is so cheap to market to the rest of the world.

I think originally the plan was to go with an experienced US vaccine manufacturer. But having invested money in it they were persuaded to stay British so this would be viewed as an entirely British success.

In retrospect - whilst seeing why that must have looked a good idea to many at the time - it likely would have played out differently in some places had this been perceived as at least in part a US vaccine. Especially from one with a track record in the field.

I suspect they will not be overly eager to take this side of the business further. And who could blame them. Tragic really if so as who knows what wonderful vaccines for the world at prices those nations could afford they might have come up with in future.

Values are a big factor and AZ can take pride (not profit) in what they are doing for the U.K. and other parts of the world eg through Covax. Sarah Gilbert and the Oxford team have been recognised through awards and I’m sure the Government will recognise the leaders of AZ at the appropriate time.

BioNtech are making the big buck but the decision to partner with Pfizer (and give Americans priority for vaccines) is taking a heavy toll in terms of loss of life across Europe. The German Government let down the rest of the EU in allowing that to happen.

 

[roubaixtuesday]

Well food shopping is top of the pile as the main infection activity in the weekly PHE test and trace survey data. As it is every week.
Page 17
https://assets.publishing.service.g...-19_and_Influenza_Surveillance_Graphs_W12.pdf

Thanks.

It doesn't at all support your conclusion that shopping is a main transmission vector.

All it shows is that most people who tested positive also went shopping in the previous week. As almost everyone goes shopping, that's highly unsurprising.

The previous slide, if I've interpreted it correctly, gives some indication as to where contacts take place (it's not clear to me if this is data from the app, or from tracing calls, or something else)

1. Household/friends/relatives dominate.
2. Work
3. Education

Shopping is way down.

 

[Healdplace]

Wales data:

1 death - was 3 last week

60 cases - was 159 last week

1.3% positivity - was 1.8% last week

Wow! Lowest numbers I ever recall seeing here.

Hospital numbers in Wales have been falling a lot too. Down to 320 patients and 17 ventilators.

 

[MillionMilesAway]

I imagine AZ are by now sorry they got involved in this. All this awful press for little reward as they are doing this on a non profit basis which they hardly ever get credit for doing. But why it is so cheap to market to the rest of the world.

I think originally the plan was to go with an experienced US vaccine manufacturer. But having invested money in it they were persuaded to stay British so this would be viewed as an entirely British success.

In retrospect - whilst seeing why that must have looked a good idea to many at the time - it likely would have played out differently in some places had this been perceived as at least in part a US vaccine. Especially from one with a track record in the field.

I suspect they will not be overly eager to take this side of the business further. And who could blame them. Tragic really if so as who knows what wonderful vaccines for the world at prices those nations could afford they might have come up with in future.

Some of this may be the case - I don't know, as it may still open doors in other countries outside Europe. It was reported that they were blocked from joining up with Merck as Trump's vaccine nationalism would mean it would have first rights to it.

I've said before that AZ were an odd choice as they haven't made vaccines before, and all the facilities I've seen named are 3rd parties they've partnered with. AZ supplied the trial muscle.

 

[Healdplace]

Zoe App today - look away if you are are superstitious.


Predicted cases down 351 to 4150

But symptomatic cases down 1521 - biggest daily fall I can recall - to 66,666!

North West range now just 14 to 79 new cases per million - lowest I have ever seen it in here.

 

[salfordbluetrue]

I suggest you drop this. It makes you sound like a nutter.



I am not interested in a discussion where your argument relies, in one instance on the official figures, but equally insists on the other hand that those same figures are "lies".



Ah, so your bottom line is that COVID and flu are equivalent? (It's hard to understand from such a rambling paragraph).

This is wrong. Flu is not "just as infectious" as COVID. It is both less transmissible, and less deadly. Figures are readily available for Ro (transmissibility) and IFR (Infection fatality rate)

Here is a comparison of published data for IFR:

View attachment 13439


And here is a comparison of Ro for different viruses (it's from July last year and current estimates for COVID are a little bit higher.

View attachment 13440

COVID-19 Compared to Other Pandemic Diseases - PMC

In December 2019, the first cases of a new contagious disease were diagnosed in the city of Wuhan, the capital of Hubei province in China. Within a short period of time the outbreak developed exponentially into a pandemic that infected millions of ...

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

You can note that this is all published scientific research, and involves no propaganda or censorship.

COVID is something like 10x more deadly than flu (age dependent) and maybe twice as transmissible.

My argument does not rely on official figures because they have been embellished as proven, it merely points out where, great graphs by the way, can not see the one about the FLU death rate before Vaccination so i will just have to run with the lessons learn from 1918

 

[03 March 2002]

I imagine AZ are by now sorry they got involved in this. All this awful press for little reward as they are doing this on a non profit basis which they hardly ever get credit for doing. But why it is so cheap to market to the rest of the world.

I think originally the plan was to go with an experienced US vaccine manufacturer. But having invested money in it they were persuaded to stay British so this would be viewed as an entirely British success.

In retrospect - whilst seeing why that must have looked a good idea to many at the time - it likely would have played out differently in some places had this been perceived as at least in part a US vaccine. Especially from one with a track record in the field.

I suspect they will not be overly eager to take this side of the business further. And who could blame them. Tragic really if so as who knows what wonderful vaccines for the world at prices those nations could afford they might have come up with in future.

It's actually the opposite. The negative press isn't making the business question their own involvement.

AZ are pressing on with establishing a new vaccine therapy area to focus on a raft of improvements and new therapies targeting COVID 19. That would imply industry knowledge is that this isn't going away any time soon.

It should also be noted that AZ produce 10s of millions of flu vaccine each year, the notion that AZ don't have expertise in the area of vaccines is funny. They are admittedly a self proclaimed CVRM business though.

 

[ayrshire_blue]

 

[babyape]

Employer wants us back in from next week, 2 or 3 days a week. We're a totally digital business, with zero benefit of being in an office, and are thriving away from it, with business booming. Now we'll be clogging up public transport to get there when thousands who need to be going in will be using it. I suspect a lot of businesses will do the same. Some people shouldn't be allowed to run companies.

All seems rushed and totally unnecessary when we should be slowly opening up....

 

[03 March 2002]

I've said before that AZ were an odd choice as they haven't made vaccines before, and all the facilities I've seen named are 3rd parties they've partnered with. AZ supplied the trial muscle.

https://www.flumistquadrivalent.com/

Where do you get the idea that they haven't made vaccines before from?

On your second point about partnered facilities, this is largely the business model for all big pharma. At a certain point it's not economical to run your own plants when you have a portfolio of >20 products. It's a situation driven by competition as these manufacturers WANT to make your product for cheaper than you can make because it affords them the option to make generics when the patent expires. Often these manufacturers make products at cost or just below knowing they are gaining valuable learning and capability from it. Generics are where they make their money.

 

[roubaixtuesday]

great graphs by the way

Lets brush over the fact they entirely refute your argument, shall we?

My argument does not rely on official figures because they have been embellished as proven

So why do you keep on quoting them?

i will just have to run with the lessons learn from 1918

Based on official figures regarding the pandemic, and ignoring the fact that pandemic flu and seasonal flu are not the same.