I gots the Covid.

[ahlgringo]

Wow, that article is filled with so much BS. An entry level microbiology/immunology course would do you much better to read.

But… it’s the interweb- you can find what you want to support whatever opinion you already have. Just please take it with a grain or two.


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[BGnight]

Wow, that article is filled with so much BS. An entry level microbiology/immunology course would do you much better to read.

Well thought out rebuttal. So, they just made stuff up?

 

[MattB]

Wow, that article is filled with so much BS. An entry level microbiology/immunology course would do you much better to read.

But… it’s the interweb- you can find what you want to support whatever opinion you already have. Just please take it with a grain or two.


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So very much BS. I honestly wonder who so many people willingly participate in mis-information campaigns?

 

[Troutnut]

I think the mods should shut this thread down or delete many of the posts. It contains way too much of the kind of misinformation that's winning people "Herman Cain Awards" online, i.e. the award for people who mocked the threat of Covid, spurned precautions, and spread conspiracy theories about the vaccines, right up until they died alone choking on their own lung fluids with a tube down their throat while begging for more dewormer to save them. Some of the posts are even crazier, like the one above alleging that the entire germ theory of disease is a scam. Reasonable people got past this thinking in the 1800s -- how is it still around?!

I have a Ph.D. in biology and a lot of friends who are molecular biologists and medical doctors with degrees from top programs like Cornell and Columbia. Everyone I know with similar qualifications took masking seriously and got the vaccines as soon as we were eligible, and made sure our families (including kids) did the same. We have an overwhelmingly large body of data that proves the vaccines are safe and effective. Effective doesn't mean perfect, which is why masks are still sensible in crowded public places, but vaccines substantially reduce the probabilities of contracting and spreading Covid and VERY strongly reduce the probability of hospitalization or death, especially in otherwise-healthy people. A large majority of otherwise-healthy people will survive the virus itself, but many of those end up with long-term fatigue problems that could really ruin a hunt, and some very fit young and middle-aged people die from it due to genetic susceptibility factors nobody understands or can predict yet. Most people survive one shot in Russian roulette too, but it's still stupid to play the game.

People worry that the lack of long-term side effects is not "proven" because nobody has been vaccinated for several years, but there has literally never been a vaccine with long-term side effects that were not easily detectable in the short term as well, and we know that the molecular instruments used by the Covid vaccines with the new mRNA technology disappear quickly from the body, leaving behind only an immune system trained to fight Covid. A common refrain of anti-vaxxers and future Herman Cain awardees is "I trust my immune system" -- well, if you trust it, then train it. You hopefully don't trust your bow in the mountains without practicing a lot in your yard first. That's all a vaccine is: a practice target for your immune system to train on.

Even the the extremely rare serious side effects of the vaccines, like myocarditis from the mRNA vaccines or blood clots in women on certain birth control drugs with the J&J vaccine, are far more common as symptoms of the virus itself, even though they're not among the most well-known symptoms of the virus because they're just drops in the ocean of things that can go wrong with the real virus. You're more likely to catch Covid and get myocarditis from that than you are to get it from being vaccinated. The math makes getting vaccinated one of the easiest decisions anyone has to make.

It's sad how much bad information is spreading on social media and getting people killed. For some reason, "he's a doctor!" carries a lot of weight when some failed quack wants to make a lot of money setting videos to spooky music alleging conspiracy theories about real doctors and scientists, but the countless competent doctors trying to help people in the real world are ignored by about 25-30 % of the population.

People need to understand that the real Covid-related scam is the movement calling Covid a scam. Follow the science or the money and it's obvious. There's a whole industry of people handsomely profiting from the video/podcast ad revenue and Patreon dollars they get for putting out anti-mask or anti-vax misinformation. You don't have to follow some complex cash trail, because it's literally their direct source of income. They will never adapt their views to new evidence because their income totally depends on their position.

In contrast, the conspiracies about mainstream experts being money-driven make no sense at all. The occasional scientist has been corrupted by funding for sure, but we're talking tens of thousands working directly in some way with Covid and millions more like me following the data closely. These are people with decades of relevant training, working in academia, industry, and government (not just ours but every major government in the world), mostly with zero financial ties to anyone making money from Covid treatments or vaccines. We have no reason to lie. And if we were lying, why would we all be getting vaccinated ourselves? Do people think we're all intentionally poisoning ourselves and our families just to trick the masses? Where's the common sense here?

If somehow the mainstream consensus about Covid or vaccines were wrong, and it isn't, the discovery would be made by mainstream scientists publishing strong evidence in real journals, not Youtube contrarians taking their message straight to the public. Despite what contrarians like to claim, such evidence would not be suppressed by the scientific community. Science is adversarial by nature, and nothing boosts a career more than saying everybody else is wrong IF you have the goods to back it up and turn out to be right. There's a guaranteed Nobel Prize awaiting anyone who can prove these vaccines are a bad idea, but it will almost certainly never be collected, because the vaccines are a great idea in reality. A good pro tip for recognizing pseudoscientific bullshit is that the people who claim other scientists are wrong, but attempt only to convince the public instead of trying to convince the other scientists, are always the ones bullshitting. That rule never fails.

It's also weird and a bit infuriating to see how confidently people who have NO idea what they're talking about have suddenly become armchair experts on virology, epidemiology, and immunology. Most of these people wouldn't think twice about telling their gunsmith or auto mechanic how to do his job, I guess because they know enough about those things to understand that it takes an expert to do it right. But when it comes to scientific research on systems infinitely more complicated, requiring several times more years of intense study to properly understand, suddenly everybody who's spent an afternoon going down a viral video rabbithole or browsing Aunt Karen's Facebook feed has his own personal Ph.D. apparently. Come on already.

 

[fwafwow]

 

[NDGuy]

It contains way too much of the kind of misinformation that's winning people "Herman Cain Awards" online, i.e. t

I found it best to just stop wasting time replying no one is changing each other's mind

 

[MattB]

I found it best to just stop wasting time replying no one is changing each other's mind

The facts will eventually become clear if they have not already. My personal belief is that people who spread misinformation should be called out for doing so in the hope of preventing that sort of garbage from being repeated.

 

[JDBAK]

MMR, about 88% effective against mumps. When everyone has the vaccine, its very effective at keeping mumps out of the community. TDAP, 80-90%. This is part of why I asked about your background. If your understanding of vaccines is that they need to be 98% effective on every individual to be a "real" vaccine then you're dealing with a bad data set. You're infantry, great, me too. We both know what happens when you try to build a mission off bad intel.

First off, my apologies for the length of this. It's not all particularly directed at you, I got to writing and went way beyond the scope of your questions. Had a lot on my mind....


MMR effectiveness: That's a fair point; my spitball estimate was high. But that is also 3-fer vaccine; it 88% effective against mumps, but also 93% effective against measles, and 97% against rubella. More importantly, unlike COVID, the MMR vaccine efficacy lasts... you only take the MMR shot twice. Not now and then every 6 months until forever.
From what I understand, measles vaccines have been through multiple recalls and reformulations. I sincerely hope the COVID shots improve.

BTW, I'm still on the line at 46, by choice, and haven't slowed down. You're absolutely right about intel. But also, to get good intel and SA, you also need to check in with guys on the ground....and a reasonable sampling of all the guys on the ground. Even the ones you're told are nuts. That real world observation is (at least) a sanity check against the received wisdom from the experts...be they brigade S-2, or the CDC. And obviously, that means listening to ICU docs, but it also means the loners out there who have been hurt by the injections, the docs and nurses too scared to speak up, the maverick FLCCC types, your neighbors, friendly EMTs and first responders. All of that experience needs to be weighed and evaluated. The authority's expert and supposedly scientific analysis, no matter how sophisticated, isn't going to always be sufficient.

BNT162b2 and mRNA-1273 COVID-19 vaccine effectiveness against the SARS-CoV-2 Delta variant in Qatar - Nature Medicine

mRNA COVID-19 vaccines are highly effective at preventing severe outcomes and death caused by the SARS-CoV-2 Delta variant (B.1.617.2) in Qatar despite substantially lower effectiveness at blocking infection.

www.nature.com

This study is showing above 90% against the Delta variant, dunno where you're getting 50%.

Fair enough. We're talking about different definitions of effectiveness. And largely about protection vs immunization. Here, they are defining effectiveness as prevention of severe outcome or death. And by that measure, the data seems fair, and conclusions reasonable....given the conditions of the study, at the time of the study. Particularly since, in this study, we're talking about a pretty young population (only 9% above age 50). The US population is something like 30+% over 50. Presumably that would decrease protection against serious illness...which sounds about right.


I'm glad the mRNA injections are largely protective. My big concern now is how effective are the COVID injections at immunization and preventing transmission.

We've been sold the idea that the only way to stop the spread is for everyone to get vaccinated.
"Do your part, get vaccinated to protect others."

Is "vaccination" stopping the spread? How's that working out? Does anybody really still think it's 90% effective at stopping delta (and whatever is coming next) infection and transmission in the real world right now? Look around.

Here's a particular study I was thinking of,

Breakthrough SARS-CoV-2 infections in 620,000 U.S. Veterans, February 1, 2021 to August 13, 2021​

Breakthrough SARS-CoV-2 infections in 620,000 U.S. Veterans, February 1, 2021 to August 13, 2021

National data on COVID-19 vaccine breakthrough infections is inadequate but urgently needed to determine U.S. policy during the emergence of the Delta variant. We address this gap by comparing SARS CoV-2 infection by vaccination status from February 1, 2021 to August 13, 2021 in the Veterans...

www.medrxiv.org

It deals with waining effectiveness of the 3 big COVID shots in the U.S., and it paints quite a bit worse picture. Efficacy here is defined as prevention of symptomatic COVID. Basically any illness, not just severe. Which is important to me, because that presumably gives an indication of COVID infection transmission after vaccination.

The short version, efficacy dropped from basically 94% percent overall (March 2021) down to 54% by August. Moderna dropped to 64%, Pfizer 50%, and Janssen to 3%. This is largely attributed to the the variant change (Delta variant). Again, all the usual caveats...that's for the conditions at the time. There's no reasons to assume the authors of this study are "anti mRNA vaxers". Granted, with the subject population being veterans, that's likely more immunocompromised ....but that older population is largely the vulnerable one I care about.

Note, that data was from August. Is there any reason to think the efficacy of the injections, that were made for the alpha variant, has improved since then?

Again, that's 54% prevention of symptomatic COVID. But transmission doesn't require symptomatic cases, so transmissibility is likely worse.

I rounded to 50%, because it's an impossibly developing situation, with too many variables, and the data was from back in August. It's a moving target: What population are we talking about, when were they vaccinated (what percentage Pfizer, vs Moderna vs J&J), what's the interval between doses, what was the dosage, what is the state of the population's immune system, what % had previous infection, % immunocompromised (and how, and to what extent), and what specific variants or sub-variants are we talking about?


Infectiousness/transmissibility is my big concern.

No Significant Difference in Viral Load Between Vaccinated and Unvaccinated, Asymptomatic and Symptomatic Groups Infected with SARS-CoV-2 Delta Variant​

No Significant Difference in Viral Load Between Vaccinated and Unvaccinated, Asymptomatic and Symptomatic Groups Infected with SARS-CoV-2 Delta Variant

We found no significant difference in cycle threshold values between vaccinated and unvaccinated, asymptomatic and symptomatic groups infected with SARS-CoV-2 Delta. Given the substantial proportion of asymptomatic vaccine breakthrough cases with high viral levels, interventions, including...

www.medrxiv.org

The results of this study seem to jive with experience in Boston and Gibraltar lately. As well as just casual observation. As good a thing as the "vaccines" are at protecting the individual who takes it, it doesn't appear that taking the vaccine does that much (if anything) to protect others. That's my big concern.

Now, maybe the study's conclusions aren't precisely true. Maybe there is a statistically significant difference in viral load. OK, how big a difference? Enough to mandate "vaccination" of the young and healthy, over whatever the unknown risk of now until forever boosters? What about those that have already recovered? Is the risk reward worth it?

 

[MattB]

No Significant Difference in Viral Load Between Vaccinated and Unvaccinated, Asymptomatic and Symptomatic Groups Infected with SARS-CoV-2 Delta Variant​

No Significant Difference in Viral Load Between Vaccinated and Unvaccinated, Asymptomatic and Symptomatic Groups Infected with SARS-CoV-2 Delta Variant

We found no significant difference in cycle threshold values between vaccinated and unvaccinated, asymptomatic and symptomatic groups infected with SARS-CoV-2 Delta. Given the substantial proportion of asymptomatic vaccine breakthrough cases with high viral levels, interventions, including...

www.medrxiv.org

The results of this study seem to jive with experience in Boston and Gibraltar lately. As well as just casual observation. As good a thing as the "vaccines" are at protecting the individual who takes it, it doesn't appear that taking the vaccine does that much (if anything) to protect others. That's my big concern.

Now, maybe the study's conclusions aren't precisely true. Maybe there is a statistically significant difference in viral load. OK, how big a difference? Enough to mandate "vaccination" of the young and healthy, over whatever the unknown risk of now until forever boosters? What about those that have already recovered? Is the risk reward worth it?

Looking at peak viral loads is only part of the story. Vaccinated people generally clear the virus faster so are infectious for a shorter period of time and hence less likely to infect others.

Community transmission and viral load kinetics of the SARS-CoV-2 delta (B.1.617.2) variant in vaccinated and unvaccinated individuals in the UK: a prospective, longitudinal, cohort study

Vaccination reduces the risk of delta variant infection and accelerates viral clearance. Nonetheless, fully vaccinated individuals with breakthrough infections have peak viral load similar to unvaccinated cases and can efficiently transmit infection in household settings, including to fully...

www.thelancet.com

Even though the Delta variant shifted the paradigm from the vaccine protecting people from infection to largely protecting them from severe disease or death, the vaccines still makes infection ~5x less likely and severe disease/hospitalization ~90% less likely. While it is unfortunate that the vaccines are not as protective against the newer variants than the original virus, they still provide significant protection with very little risk.

Vaccines prevent severe COVID, even from Delta: study

Vaccination is highly effective at preventing severe cases of COVID-19, even against the Delta variant, a vast study in France has shown.

medicalxpress.com

 

[jmez]

What you will see with each developing variant is a decrease in efficacy. Modernas CEO already stating that their vaccine is likely to going to be ineffective against omicron. Pfizer echoing the same and saying they will need 100 days to change their vaccine.

Will do no good to change it as there will be a new variant by the time the refined vaccine comes out. This is why past attempts at Corona virus vaccines have been ineffective.

Variants will continue to form and come out of third world countries that don't have the means to vaccinate. The pandemic will end when there is enough worldwide immunity to enter the endemic phase. We can get vaccinated every two months and it may save your life. It will do little to nothing to end the pandemic.

The virus will continue to spread and mutate. As it does it will become more infective and less deadly as you would expect.

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[fwafwow]

A few extremely well-written posts in a row on a topic that has been so controversial on RS. I think you three didn’t agree completely but managed to have a civilized discussion without name-calling, etc. Bravo!

I spent a few minutes earlier this evening starting down the path of heterologus boosting, and hybrid/superhuman immunity. I’m personally at natural + J&J (in that order) and debating (politely) with several folks about whether to boost, and if so, whether to mix and match. I’m a novice layperson, so I welcome any information to which you can point me.

 

[Moserkr]

@Troutnut Long, yawn, post. I know a bunch of people who have had covid with little to no issues, and one who ended up on a vent. Know of 3 vaccinated males that went haywire with heart issues, one died. I dont trust the government, media, or pharmaceutical companies for what should be obvious reasons. The worst part is the forcefulness of “do as I say” for everyones sake (comrade) or be exiled from society…. On top of that, natural immunity is being completely ignored. Bottom line - gov/politicians should have NO business in our personal health and privacy.

I could say some stuff to get this thread shut down instantly (done it before), but Im genuinely concerned for the OP @rclouse79 Hope you’re doing alright. Believe you checked out of this thread though…

 

[pkelly000123]

Lots of rest! Be sure to take vitamin D3, vitamin C and zinc supplements. Keep in mind vitamin D is a fat soluble vitamin so it requires you to eat it with a meal in order for your body to absorb it. Best of luck! Feel better soon!

 

[Troutnut]

I know a bunch of people who have had covid with little to no issues, and one who ended up on a vent. Know of 3 vaccinated males that went haywire with heart issues, one died. I dont trust the government, media, or pharmaceutical companies for what should be obvious reasons.

Instead of relying on personal anecdotes, somebody should do a systematic survey of Covid cases and their outcomes and then run appropriate statistical analyses to estimate the rates of each outcome. And somebody else should do the same thing with vaccines, and health problems people experience after getting vaccinated, and have skilled doctors examine those cases and see which ones might actually have been caused by the vaccines and which were coincidences. Then run those numbers through a competent statistician to compare the risks from the vaccine versus the virus itself. And just to make sure all this is done right, it should probably be done many times over by independent groups of people, from different organizations, with no financial conflicts of interest in the results.

Does that sound like a good idea? I hope so. But it's exactly what the scientific community has already done with Covid. And the conclusion is that the vaccines are safe and effective, serious side effects are very rare, and the math points to everybody's risk being MUCH higher from the virus itself than from the vaccines, unless they have a 1-in-100,000 history of severe allergic reactions to certain ingredients.

The problem with not trusting "the government, media, or pharmaceutical companies" is that you don't understand who you should trust and you end up going with some anonymous creator of Facebook memes or the former host of Fear Factor and his favorite failed biology teacher. You don't have to trust any one government when practically every government on Earth (except a few third-world despots) agrees. You don't have to trust any one media outlet when every credible media outlet is getting the main points right. You don't have to trust any one pharmaceutical company when three different companies have vaccines approved in the US and they've all been vetted by researchers outside those companies. The mainstream consensus is supported by countless scientific papers from outside the sources you said you distrust.

However much you distrust the government, you should put far less trust in the amateurs saying, "Hey, you don't trust the government? Me neither! Trust me instead! And buy these supplements I'm selling, and support my sponsors, and donate to my Patreon!"

 

[MattB]

Instead of relying on personal anecdotes, somebody should do a systematic survey of Covid cases and their outcomes and then run appropriate statistical analyses to estimate the rates of each outcome. And somebody else should do the same thing with vaccines, and health problems people experience after getting vaccinated, and have skilled doctors examine those cases and see which ones might actually have been caused by the vaccines and which were coincidences. Then run those numbers through a competent statistician to compare the risks from the vaccine versus the virus itself. And just to make sure all this is done right, it should probably be done many times over by independent groups of people, from different organizations, with no financial conflicts of interest in the results.

Does that sound like a good idea? I hope so. But it's exactly what the scientific community has already done with Covid. And the conclusion is that the vaccines are safe and effective, serious side effects are very rare, and the math points to everybody's risk being MUCH higher from the virus itself than from the vaccines, unless they have a 1-in-100,000 history of severe allergic reactions to certain ingredients.

The problem with not trusting "the government, media, or pharmaceutical companies" is that you don't understand who you should trust and you end up going with some anonymous creator of Facebook memes or the former host of Fear Factor and his favorite failed biology teacher. You don't have to trust any one government when practically every government on Earth (except a few third-world despots) agrees. You don't have to trust any one media outlet when every credible media outlet is getting the main points right. You don't have to trust any one pharmaceutical company when three different companies have vaccines approved in the US and they've all been vetted by researchers outside those companies. The mainstream consensus is supported by countless scientific papers from outside the sources you said you distrust.

However much you distrust the government, you should put far less trust in the amateurs saying, "Hey, you don't trust the government? Me neither! Trust me instead! And buy these supplements I'm selling, and support my sponsors, and donate to my Patreon!"

To your point, the few people who I know who are decidedly anti-vax are so because they know “7 people” who either had COVID or got vaccinated and know more people who had bad vax reactions. Lucky for us there have been 400+ million doses of the various COViD vaccines administered in the U.S. so we have a sample size of much more than 7 to consider.

The data continues to be a bit murky and each of our math may differ, but the data suggests that one is orders of magnitude more likely to get most of the vaccine side effects (e.g. myocarditis, blood clots) from contracting COVID than from the vaccine.

 

[Dougosarks]

I am still hoping to get out for a couple days of short range cow season, even if it involves lighter days and shorter hikes. I guess I will see how crappy I feel in the morning. Feel about a 7/10 now.

It zapped me. Didn't have much energy for about 1 week. Some people it don't affect much.

 

[Actual_Cryptid]

Nobody has ever said that vaccination is the only method of protection. Pre-vaccine, public health and pandemic response teams were very adamant about the importance of wearing a mask, minimizing travel and exposure, washing your hands, and avoiding large crowds to mitigate the spread. Each of those in turn was rejected by roughly a third of the country, and as a result we can watch how large political rallies or events that didn't require mask-wearing resulted in surges in infection. More infections means more chances for the virus to mutate, which means new variants of concern, and down the list we go.

We're in this spot because the administration in 2020 had defunded and ignored pandemic response efforts, turned not wearing a mask into a political statement, prioritized the economy over public safety. Then the vaccine conspiracy stuff, along with the companies refusing to release their vaccine formulations so that other countries could produce vaccines and limit the spread abroad. We are here because roughly half of the US and our neighbors decided that the things you do to limit the effect of a pandemic were actually a conspiracy, and each new and entirely predictable event is because we still have people refusing to wear a mask, wash their hands, and get a vaccine but insisting that all the medical research is wrong.

 

[MattB]

We are here because roughly half of the US and our neighbors decided that the things you do to limit the effect of a pandemic were actually a conspiracy, and each new and entirely predictable event is because we still have people refusing to wear a mask, wash their hands, and get a vaccine but insisting that all the medical research is wrong.

I laughed a bit to myself when I read this as it is so very true.

But hey, we are the land of the free and the home of the brave and god damn it you can’t tell people they have to wash their hands.

 

[Moserkr]

Fine Ill bite…

The problem with not trusting "the government, media, or pharmaceutical companies" is that you don't understand who you should trust.

I know exactly who to trust, so dont speak for me.

You don't have to trust any one government when practically every government on Earth (except a few third-world despots) agrees.

Most governments are more corrupt than the US so that makes your argument even worse.

You don't have to trust any one media outlet when every credible media outlet is getting the main points right. You don't have to trust any one pharmaceutical company when three different companies have vaccines approved in the US and they've all been vetted by researchers outside those companies.

Please name a few of your “credible” news orgs. I dont trust any of the pharma companies - all have questionable ethics. They also work in tandem with media companies to silence all opposition to their narratives, with the blessing of the gov (trust thing again).

Final point - 99.997%+ survival rate without a vaccine (including questionable covid deaths). Its not a pandemic - its a scam. Those numbers alone makes everything you, the news, and gov say complete BS. Case closed, Im out.

 

[jmez]

Until poor, third world countries are addressed what we do here is merely window dressing.

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