COVID-19 III: No Politics For Thee

[Rooster_Ties]

18 minutes ago, Pim said:

The vaccinated only people policy is meant to force people to take the vaccin. If that's what you want to accomplish, you should be transparent about it.

What's not transparent about trying to strongly-encourage, strongly-incentivize people getting fully vaccinated?  Or providing disincentives to NOT getting vaccinated.

Seems pretty transparent to me -- and from all I've seen and read, these measures save lives.

[Steve Reynolds]

The statement that the Pfizer booster is only good for 2 months simply isn’t true. All evidence is that the Pfizer & Moderna boosters are expected to provide a strong effect against covid (including Omicron) for upwards of 8 months or more. 

[Pim]

2 hours ago, Rooster_Ties said:

What's not transparent about trying to strongly-encourage, strongly-incentivize people getting fully vaccinated?  Or providing disincentives to NOT getting vaccinated.

Seems pretty transparent to me -- and from all I've seen and read, these measures save lives.

I am talking about telling people that the vaccinated people only policy is there because it's safe or that it works because vaccinated people can't hardly contaminate others. That is not true and it's the reason were in trouble again. If you want to make a safe policy you should create a test only policy: you only get acces when you're tested wherever you're vaccinated or not. The only intent of the vaccinated only people policy is to force them to get the booster. If that's you're kind of policy that's fine but you should be transparent about your real motivations. The fact so many people are in the hospitals proof it does not safe live. 

16 minutes ago, Steve Reynolds said:

The statement that the Pfizer booster is only good for 2 months simply isn’t true. All evidence is that the Pfizer & Moderna boosters are expected to provide a strong effect against covid (including Omicron) for upwards of 8 months or more. 

Well, the enormous ammount of information doesn't make it easier to get well informed. The fact that boosters efficence fade out so fast was spoken of today by our own Fauci: Jaap van Dissel. He says the original vaccin was created for the alpha variant and it's getting less effective with every new variant. According to him it does give your system a small boost bud it fades out again fast.

[mjazzg]

26 minutes ago, Steve Reynolds said:

The statement that the Pfizer booster is only good for 2 months simply isn’t true. All evidence is that the Pfizer & Moderna boosters are expected to provide a strong effect against covid (including Omicron) for upwards of 8 months or more. 

I can't see how we know that yet as Omicron hasn't been around that long. Lab experiments obviously give an indication but how the booster responds in the community is still to be seen. The waning of the original vaccinations only really became apparent with time. UK medical authorities are suggesting 5-6 months so we have a range from 2 months in Holland to 8 in the US.  And there in lies Pim's and everyone else's conundrum.  Each new variant brings its own new range of unknowns. 

I will say that Pim is providing a very eloquent counter to many of the arguments that I naturally adhere to and providing some food for thought. Pim you are your middle ground!

[Kevin Bresnahan]

20 hours ago, Dan Gould said:

Nothing you have shared Kevin remotely contradicts what Steve R. stated. That's a death rate of .007.

If you think that the only acceptable death toll for kids is zero, then try to figure out how to make it so. Rational people aren't that likely to agree with you, though, considering the social and educational costs for remote schooling, or rational hesitancy to not agree to vaccinations for  children not that susceptible in any significant way to serious illness.

You're right - I'm not remotely contradicting Steve - I shared data that directly contradicts his assertion that children are "not that susceptible in any significant way to serious illness". We can argue back and forth over "significant" but again, if it is your child, it is VERY significant.

Kids can & do get COVID and they can and do get very sick. Yes, it is at a lower level than adults but it is not something any parent should ignore. I play the lottery. I play even though my chances of winning are minuscule. The same goes for COVID only it's a lottery you don't want to win.

[medjuck]

I thought this from NPR was interesting:  

BEARDSLEY: That brought out violent protesters in several Dutch cities who set cars on fire and battled police. Neimanstverdriet says the government has handled the pandemic in a sloppy and erratic manner. He says southern European countries have done a much better job.

NEIMANSTVERDRIET: I was in Italy over the summer, and they were very disciplined in wearing face masks and sticking to the rules. And they seem to be taking it really seriously.

BEARDSLEY: Neimanstverdriet says the so-called efficient northern countries have fared poorly in comparison. And so far, the figures bear that out. For example, with similar populations, Britain has around 89,000 infections a day and Italy fewer than 8,000. Eleanor Beardsley, NPR News, Paris.

[Steve Reynolds]

1 hour ago, mjazzg said:

I can't see how we know that yet as Omicron hasn't been around that long. Lab experiments obviously give an indication but how the booster responds in the community is still to be seen. The waning of the original vaccinations only really became apparent with time. UK medical authorities are suggesting 5-6 months so we have a range from 2 months in Holland to 8 in the US.  And there in lies Pim's and everyone else's conundrum.  Each new variant brings its own new range of unknowns. 

I will say that Pim is providing a very eloquent counter to many of the arguments that I naturally adhere to and providing some food for thought. Pim you are your middle ground!

I will say this. Even though many people in this country are fully vaxxed and not yet boostered and most are now beyond the 6 months time frame since their second shots, the rate of hospitalization of those people is still TEN times less per 100,000 people than unvaxxed and death rates are far lower than that. The power and effectiveness of the Pfizer & Moderna two shot regimen is still being undervalued. Really up until this point here in the US it’s very VERY rare for a fully vaccinated (without a booster) to end up in an ICU unless they are very old or immunocompromised. Why the argument that vaxxed and unvaxxed should be treated the same way is foolish, IMO. 

[Kevin Bresnahan]

17 minutes ago, medjuck said:

I thought this from NPR was interesting:  

BEARDSLEY: That brought out violent protesters in several Dutch cities who set cars on fire and battled police. Neimanstverdriet says the government has handled the pandemic in a sloppy and erratic manner. He says southern European countries have done a much better job.

NEIMANSTVERDRIET: I was in Italy over the summer, and they were very disciplined in wearing face masks and sticking to the rules. And they seem to be taking it really seriously.

BEARDSLEY: Neimanstverdriet says the so-called efficient northern countries have fared poorly in comparison. And so far, the figures bear that out. For example, with similar populations, Britain has around 89,000 infections a day and Italy fewer than 8,000. Eleanor Beardsley, NPR News, Paris.

Which brings up the most important aspect of the anti-vax movement - they almost always combine this denial of the benefits of being vaccinated with a belief that no one should wear masks. It's as if they WANT everyone to get sick. It's truly bizarre.

I am vaccinated and boosted and I still wear a mask when I'm in a store. I know that being vaccinated reduces my chances of catching COVID and that if I do, I'll likely not end up in the hospital or dead (as long as I don't lose that lottery). It doesn't matter. I don't want to play that lottery game at all. So I mask up and lather up with hand sanitizer in the car every time I go shopping.

[mjazzg]

1 minute ago, Steve Reynolds said:

I will say this. Even though many people in this country are fully vaxxed and not yet boostered and most are now beyond the 6 months time frame since their second shots, the rate of hospitalization of those people is still TEN times less per 100,000 people than unvaxxed and death rates are far lower than that. The power and effectiveness of the Pfizer & Moderna two shot regimen is still being undervalued. Really up until this point here in the US it’s very VERY rare for a fully vaccinated (without a booster) to end up in an ICU unless they are very old or immunocompromised. Why the argument that vaxxed and unvaxxed should be treated the same way is foolish, IMO. 

I agree, I think AZ has a quicker tail off in efficiency than the others. Majority of early vaccinations here were AZ so that waning has been noticeable. Double vaxxed and boosted are catching Omicron and we're waiting to see what the impact in ICU is.

[sidewinder]

29 minutes ago, mjazzg said:

I agree, I think AZ has a quicker tail off in efficiency than the others.

Not true. AZ lower initial efficacy but tails off more gradually.

https://www.statista.com/chart/25575/pfizer-astrazeneca-efficacy-loss/

Edited December 21, 2021 by sidewinder

[jlhoots]

I'm "very old" as are a number of other members here. Have had 3 Moderna shots including a full strength instead of a half strength booster.

Edited December 21, 2021 by jlhoots

[Dan Gould]

18 minutes ago, bresna said:

Which brings up the most important aspect of the anti-vax movement - they almost always combine this denial of the benefits of being vaccinated with a belief that no one should wear masks. It's as if they WANT everyone to get sick. It's truly bizarre.

I am vaccinated and boosted and I still wear a mask when I'm in a store. I know that being vaccinated reduces my chances of catching COVID and that if I do, I'll likely not end up in the hospital or dead (as long as I don't lose that lottery). It doesn't matter. I don't want to play that lottery game at all. So I mask up and lather up with hand sanitizer in the car every time I go shopping.

Masking does nothing to prevent you from getting infection. That's been known for at least a year. It's to prevent you from infecting others.  It's just like in a surgical suite: surgeons and nurses where masks and gloves to avoid infecting open wounds on people. Not because the patient has cooties and might give them something. The layers in the mask function in one direction only: outward.

I will go out on a limb here and trust that Kevin is wearing KN95s or better masks but cloth masks are far more common than the actual useful kind, and cloth masks had what, like a 5% effective rate in studies?  

[Steve Reynolds]

4 minutes ago, Dan Gould said:

Masking does nothing to prevent you from getting infection. That's been known for at least a year. It's to prevent you from infecting others.  It's just like in a surgical suite: surgeons and nurses where masks and gloves to avoid infecting open wounds on people. Not because the patient has cooties and might give them something. The layers in the mask function in one direction only: outward.

I will go out on a limb here and trust that Kevin is wearing KN95s or better masks but cloth masks are far more common than the actual useful kind, and cloth masks had what, like a 5% effective rate in studies?  

Either as low as 10-12% or possibly as high as 25-30% for a non KF-94 or non KN95 or N95.

but they also help protect the mask wearer to some extent as well. 
 

non KF94 or non KN95 or N95 mask wearing somewhere 10 times less effective than vaccination. Fwiw there is a pro-mask anti-vaxx slice of society that I discovered at an urban area recovery meeting a few months back. True insanity that.

 

[mjazzg]

23 minutes ago, sidewinder said:

Not true. AZ lower initial efficacy but tails off more gradually.

https://www.statista.com/chart/25575/pfizer-astrazeneca-efficacy-loss/

And is a lower efficacy throughout

[Kevin Bresnahan]

12 minutes ago, Dan Gould said:

Masking does nothing to prevent you from getting infection. That's been known for at least a year. It's to prevent you from infecting others.  It's just like in a surgical suite: surgeons and nurses where masks and gloves to avoid infecting open wounds on people. Not because the patient has cooties and might give them something. The layers in the mask function in one direction only: outward.

Dan - you have hit the nail on the head! You are correct that the masks are mainly to prevent me from infecting others which is exactly why EVERYONE should wear one! If I wear one and I am infected, my chance of infecting someone else goes down. Ditto the guy walking toward me in the store. Ditto the lady picking up a loaf of bread next to me. Ditto the guy.... well, you get the point.

If everyone was vaccinated and everyone continued to mask up for just a little while, we'd probably be out of this thing by now. But no. Instead, we either get a bunch of people being told, "I'm vaccinated so I don't need a mask." or the anti-vax/anti-mask crew with their "I ain't getting vaccinated and I ain't wearing a mask." Strangely enough, the result is more cases. Who would've thought that? Oh, I don't know - maybe every scientist studying these things?

[sidewinder]

5 minutes ago, mjazzg said:

And is a lower efficacy throughout

Maybe - but your statement was specific to rate of tailing off and was incorrect. Sorry !

[mjazzg]

16 minutes ago, sidewinder said:

Maybe - but your statement was specific to rate of tailing off and was incorrect. Sorry !

I realise that, not questioning the correction at all.  My original statement was also preceded by "I think..." so wasn't meant in any way to be definitive. And after all it is the efficacy that's important and if that is lower throughout then it kind of makes my initial statement redundant but reinforces the point I was making that there is less protection from AZ.

Edited December 21, 2021 by mjazzg

[sidewinder]

11 minutes ago, mjazzg said:

I realise that, not questioning the correction at all.  My original statement was also preceded by "I think..." so wasn't meant in any way to be definitive. And after all it is the efficacy that's important and if that is lower throughout then it kind of makes my initial statement redundant but reinforces the point I was making that there is less protection from AZ.

There has been so much guff put out there about AZ, much of it not by the likes of us but by various big wigs who should know better, that we should all be careful what statements we make about it. I repeat - my statement addressed your original assertion.

[mjazzg]

3 minutes ago, sidewinder said:

There has been so much guff put out there about AZ, much of it not by the likes of us but by various big wigs who should know better, that we should all be careful what statements we make about it. I repeat - my statement addressed your original assertion.

So it did

[Larry Kart]

Pim writes: "The real danger and problem that caused our rising numbers of contaminations were vaccinated people visiting the restaurants, museums and parties with the false idea that they would be safe. They didn't have to hold distance to each other: they were free to do whatever they liked to do. That is exactly the problem with the vaccinated people only police: they are still able to spread the virus and contaminate people and therefore bring others in a dangerous situation."

 

What evidence is there that, as you say, vaccinated people, thinking that they and those around them were now safe, caused your rising numbers of contaminations -- that, in other words, it is vaccinated people on the whole, rather than unvaccinated people, who have been spreading the virus? 

[JSngry]

Anybody can carry the damn thing.

[Larry Kart]

6 hours ago, Pim said:

Sorry Larry but I disagree on that. The real danger and problem that caused our rising numbers of contaminations were vaccinated people visiting the restaurants, museums and parties with the false idea that they would be safe. They didn't have to hold distance to each other: they were free to do whatever they liked to do. That is exactly the problem with the vaccinated people only police: they are still able to spread the virus and contaminate people and therefore bring others in a dangerous situation. In fact: at least the unvaccinated people had to test themselves before entering such locations and their presence was of less danger. Hello! I am vaccinated but everybody could understand this system is unjust and not right. The vaccinated only people policy is meant to force people to take the vaccin. If that's what you want to accomplish, you should be transparent about it.

 

It seems not unfortunately and I do not see why it is so hard to admit. Today the head figure of our National Health Service announced that the Pfizer and Moderna vaccins are 5x less resistant to the new Omrikon variant. A booster vaccin would get it up to maybe 60% but only for a short while. This would mean you have to booster again after 2 months. The same sounds are coming from Israel now where they are planning for a 4th injection which is probably going to be even less resistant. Half november, half of the people on our intensive care units were vaccinated. This is data from our National Health Service. They stopped publishing that data ever since.... I know a lot of people who were double vaccinated and still got very, very ill including two of my co workers. 2 of those people were even hospitalized. Almost 90 percent (again data from our government) of the adult population are fully vaccinated here in the Netherlands. Yet contaminations are sky high and so are the hospitalizations. They are so high we need to go in lockdown again. 

All these statistical facts are enough to seriously doubt the effectivity of the vaccins or the boosters. I fully agree that it still is the best way to prevent from serious ilness: I am glad my 70+ mom and dad both got their boosters and hope everyone with a vulnerable health does. But the arguments for a 30 year old healthy guy like myself are getting smaller and smaller. I mostly took my vaccinations to be less contaminatious and to end this crisis. It prooved to not work for both of these arguments. 

The mandatory vaccins you are refering to (polio, tetanus etc.) have prooved to be 1. effective, 2. safe 3. give livelong protection and beneftis. If the COVID vaccins were like this, I'd might be pro-mandatory. But they are not. They are actually far from that. And in such a case it's not always wrong to be a little critical. I have a healthy trust that the vaccines are probably not harmful and results up to now fortunately show nothing serious. But lots of things are also uncertain and we are still in the experimental phase. It's my body and more important my health: so may I please have the right to worry about what I am putting in it? Or better: in my childrens bodies? Again: if vaccins were the definite way out of this crisis I took the shot right away. But the harsh message people do not want to hear is: they are not...

They are making those nazi-Germany comparisons here too. It's digusting. They have no idea what they are talking about. What I hope everyone could see here is that I am not a conspiracy loony or something. I am not using data from Breitbart or weird conspiricary blogs. I am using the same data as the Dutch government does. In that way I try to explain why I am doubting the current vaccination program and oppose mandatory vaccines under current circumstances. But you can't say one critical thing on government policy these days without being placed in the loonatic camp. That is what I mean with the missing middle ground: the people I work with, my family and friends are taking the crisis very serious. They are all double vaccinated and so am I. We have all followed government instructions about what to do and what not to do. But they are also skeptical about the current vaccination policies. I miss that moderate critical sound in the media very, very much. It's either you are with us or against us but its not that easy.

I know that the Netherlands and the USA are different places in terms of population density etc., but why then are those states and regions in the US where vaccination rates are the lowest have the highest rates of contamination by large margins, while those states and regions where vaccination rates are high have much lower rates of contamination? Also as far  as your claim that in the Netherlands vaccinated people behaving "freely" in museums etc. have then thoughtlessly contaminated unvaccinated people, how does a person, unvaccinated or not, know  by whom (and how)  they have been contaminated?

[Pim]

@Larry Kart I try it this way for the quoting function does not work on my phone. Interesting statistics that indeed might indicate it helps against conteminations. I think it has been scientifically proven it does: at least a little. I think it’s a little too little anyhow and my countries situation is a perfect example of that. 

what I said about the museums, restaurants, bars etc. It’s pretty sure that contaminations there were from vaccinated people as unvaccinated people had to get tested before which is always the safest option and most sure way to know if someone has COVID or not. What I was trying to say, and I know this happens: once you’re vaccinated all control is gone. Because I am vaccinated twice I could easily go into a restaurant or theater with a fever and a sore throat. And I know people do this. This makes the vaccinated only policy not only unfair but also very questionable in the sense of effectiveness.

[Guy Berger]

On 12/20/2021 at 7:39 AM, Larry Kart said:

You do understand that unvaccinated people are a significant threat to the health of the rest of the population. The virus doesn't care about your privacy, liberty, etc. it just wants to proliferate. So if the government exists in part to protect the well-being of the population, it shouldn't take the one act, make vaccinations and mask wearing mandatory, that is at present the best and only step toward that goal? What "middle" is there here, especially when the loss or injury of getting vaccinated is nada by and large.

We mandate vaccination in lots of contexts, in most countries.  George Washington mandated variolation against smallpox for soldiers in the US continental army!  This idea that it's somehow liberty-destroying to require vaccines is kooky and ahistorical.

It's comparable to requiring people not to drive when they are inebriated with alcohol.

On 12/20/2021 at 10:07 AM, Steve Reynolds said:

everything else is common sense - and this is from someone who is no liberal. I’m all for freedom but public health supersedes it. But lockdowns when vaccines almost eliminate any chance of serious illness or death is another kind of insanity. So there is a middle ground. 

This is in fact the middle ground - vaccine requirements (with some allowance for immunity via prior infection), and relatively light restrictions otherwise (I'd put indoor masks during periods of high transmission, and requiring contagious people to isolate, in the same bucket).

On 12/20/2021 at 0:26 PM, Steve Reynolds said:

Kevin - there are so many more activities that are more dangerous than Covid is to children - 24 deaths over a 16 month plus period is a tiny number. Swimming is exponentially more dangerous. So is putting a child in a driving car. There is no middle ground if this is the response to my thoughtful post. I think the data you shared proved a point.

I'm mostly in Steve's camp here.  Per infection, COVID is less dangerous to kids than a lot of other things that we take for granted in our day to day lives.  A case of RSV (for very young kids) or the flu is more dangerous.

That said... when transmission is extremely high in an area, that can move the meter in terms of the number of bad outcomes for kids.  If COVID is half as dangerous as RSV for kids but three times as many kids contract it...

Edited December 21, 2021 by Guy Berger

[Larry Kart]

3 hours ago, Pim said:

@Larry Kart I try it this way for the quoting function does not work on my phone. Interesting statistics that indeed might indicate it helps against conteminations. I think it has been scientifically proven it does: at least a little. I think it’s a little too little anyhow and my countries situation is a perfect example of that. 

what I said about the museums, restaurants, bars etc. It’s pretty sure that contaminations there were from vaccinated people as unvaccinated people had to get tested before which is always the safest option and most sure way to know if someone has COVID or not. What I was trying to say, and I know this happens: once you’re vaccinated all control is gone. Because I am vaccinated twice I could easily go into a restaurant or theater with a fever and a sore throat. And I know people do this. This makes the vaccinated only policy not only unfair but also very questionable in the sense of effectiveness.

Pim: Thanks to you, I have been doing as much reading as I possibly can about all or some of this in a rather brief time, and a key element seems to be that of so-called "breakthrough cases" -- that is, cases among people who have been fully vaccinated. Such people, the medical consensus so far seems to be, will be less susceptible to serious symptoms, but they will be capable of transmitting the virus to others. Thus, perhaps and in part, the situation you have described taking place in the Netherlands. This is particularly so in today's era of Omicron.In this regard I particularly recommend Eleanor Cummins' story in the Monday 12/20 issue if the New York Times, "Most Covid Infections May Soon Be Breakthroughs." I'll try to post a link to that story below.

BTW, that development may answer a question I've been asking myself: "Why are so many professional athletes coming down with Covid when one assumes that most of them are fully vaccinated?" Fully vaccinated though they may be, they are playing and practicing and associating in locker rooms in close contact with each other, and those of them who are so-called breakthrough cases can transmit the virus to others who are vaccinated, even though most of these athletes who are vaccinated may go on to have less than severe symptoms. A minor matter in the overall situation we're facing but a perhaps revealing part of the puzzle.

Cummins Covid story:

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/19/opinion/omicron-breakthroughs.html?smid=url-share