Dieuwer wrote:

I am not sure how to interpret this, but it might give the impression of "kicking the can down the road".

"CDC postpones COVID-19 booster shot review amid debate over third dose"

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has pushed back by one week a meeting set to review COVID booster shots as debate swells about the requirement of a third shot, Bloomberg reports.

https://seekingalpha.com/news/3732601-c ... third-dose

I think we should start to administer 3rd doses sooner rather than later. Seems to me the CDC is overly cautious.

My opinion, the issue is political more than scientific, especially when WHO, PAHO and others are pushing for more folks outside the developed world to get first doses versus boosters, the CDC may be looking at the optics but I suspect if the domestic numbers continue to climb the boosters will get the go ahead, including the option of mixing vaccines.

We know there are too many breakthrough infections. It isn't just to keep the person getting the 3rd jab out of the hospital, but to slow the spread better. We have enough data to know the vaccinated are getting sick. I feel the science is there.

We're not going to magically vaccinate the other half who won't take the vaccine (or in the case of my younger child, are not allowed).

I like good hard data. One hospital 5 of the 107 patients in the hospital are vaccinated.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/medica ... NewsSearch

17 of 20 (85%) of Oregonians were unvaccinated:
https://www.wweek.com/news/state/2021/0 ... accinated/


We can agree it would be better to vaccinate more people. That isn't happening. We know our case rate is high and Israel's is even higher:
https://ourworldindata.org/explorers/co ... rmed+cases

We need to do both. Unfortunately, it is going to take mandates. Since many won't adult and vaccinate, we must take added precautions to keep the virus out of our homes. Vaccines have been easy to get since mid-April (by my 2nd dose, the lines were nothing, my first dose was still a rush to get vaccines).

It is 4 months people could have done the responsible thing and gotten vaccinated. Instead, they have become more hardline in avoiding a vaccine.
So to protect ourselves we need to:
1. Increase outreach campaigns. Pop up vaccination centers are working well in France:
https://www.newsobserver.com/news/article253539299.html
2. France showed us harsh mandates work. France was on the decline in vaccines and spiked up the vaccines with their passport system, it is clear in the daily vaccination rate:
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/dail ... A~OWID_WRL
3. Cost for the decision. Insurance companies were waiving fees for coronavirus, that is starting to end:
https://www.wxyz.com/news/coronavirus/m ... d-19-costs
I've used up my articles, but this link looks to have more: https://www.forbes.com/sites/roberthart ... ions-soar/

Since we have vaccines, why not 3rd jab? We're not going to succeed getting the unvaccinated rapidly vaccinated.
What we can do:
1. The government and military mandates will get millions vaccinated.
2. I think all air travel, except for patients in medical transport, should require vaccination. Including private jets, private aircraft. This will slow the spread. Now, we have a constitutional right to interstate trade, so they can go by road.

But since the risk is elevated, I need something to make it less likely my too young to be vaccinated child has less risk. All that is certain is every adult she encounters has a 3rd jab.

I admit it, I am mentally/emotionally giving up on the unvaccinated.
Since I had coronavirus, I'm sad that the virus reduces fertility in men. This might have a long term plus...
https://www.wionews.com/world/coronavir ... udy-359981

the mRNA vaccines do not harm male fertility: https://www.jpost.com/health-science/co ... udy-671506

Lightsaber

Dieuwer wrote:

I am not sure how to interpret this, but it might give the impression of "kicking the can down the road".

"CDC postpones COVID-19 booster shot review amid debate over third dose"

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has pushed back by one week a meeting set to review COVID booster shots as debate swells about the requirement of a third shot, Bloomberg reports.

https://seekingalpha.com/news/3732601-c ... third-dose

I think we should start to administer 3rd doses sooner rather than later. Seems to me the CDC is overly cautious.

Too cautious on kids vaccines and the 3rd jab. There needs to be clear communication, but not this hesitancy.

Why isn't Moderna available for 12 year olds?
Why no vaccine for younger? We cannot achieve community immunity without the kids (I've given up on national immunity).

While Israel is boosting the over 40s... They're going to reign in this vaccine:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/ ... 0d8b00417c

Much frustration at the 1.1 million Israeli's able to be vaccinated willfully unvaccinated:
https://www.israeltoday.co.il/read/unac ... accinated/

This sad. Billions are begging for the vaccine and we have a hundred million who won't do the right thing.

Lightsaber

lightsaber wrote:

3. Cost for the decision. Insurance companies were waiving fees for coronavirus, that is starting to end:
https://www.wxyz.com/news/coronavirus/m ... d-19-costs
I've used up my articles, but this link looks to have more: https://www.forbes.com/sites/roberthart ... ions-soar/

While it will provide an incentive to vaccinate (and a punishment for the idiots who end up in the hospital after deciding not to vaccinate), I really wish insurance companies would have made a distinction between vaxxed and unvaxxed in terminating the waivers.

Whereas unvaxxed folks will indeed bear the vast majority of the cost - justifiedly so - it still leaves a small minority of vaccinated people who will also rack up large medical bills through no fault of their own.
At least they should increase premiums for the insured who are unvaccinated.

acavpics wrote:

c933103 wrote:

acavpics wrote:

If and when we get a booster shot this fall/winter, will it simply be another dose of this existing vaccine from Pfizer/Moderna/JJ? Or will the booster shot have more mRNA specifically designed to tackle new and emerging variants such as Delta, Omega, Lambda etc?

Also, what is the status on these "anti-viral pills" being developed by Pfizer and a few other companies?

All the booster being discussed now are just another dose of the same to boost antibody and immunity level

Why is that the case?

As the virus keeps mutating, isn’t it essential to update the vaccine to tackle newer variants?

What good will 3rd dose of the current vaccine do if there are more variants on the rise come fall/winter? And better yet, what if one of these variants proves to be resistant to the current vaccine ?

Doesn’t it make sense to plan for a fall booster shot that has enhanced protection against Delta, Lambda, omega and any other variants that can be foreseen to spread? It would be DEVASTATING to find ourselves in a situation where one of these variants is making our vaccines ineffective, right?

Can a vaccine be designed to target a number of the different variants that have emerged? And there is always the prospect of further, more infectious variants emerging during the development of, say, a vaccine optimised for Delta, one of which may oust Delta so that hundreds of millions of doses are produced to protect against a strain that has been eclipsed by a new one.

I wonder if we may always be a step or two behind in trying to protect ourselves from this virus.

art wrote:

acavpics wrote:

c933103 wrote:

All the booster being discussed now are just another dose of the same to boost antibody and immunity level

Why is that the case?

As the virus keeps mutating, isn’t it essential to update the vaccine to tackle newer variants?

What good will 3rd dose of the current vaccine do if there are more variants on the rise come fall/winter? And better yet, what if one of these variants proves to be resistant to the current vaccine ?

Doesn’t it make sense to plan for a fall booster shot that has enhanced protection against Delta, Lambda, omega and any other variants that can be foreseen to spread? It would be DEVASTATING to find ourselves in a situation where one of these variants is making our vaccines ineffective, right?

Can a vaccine be designed to target a number of the different variants that have emerged? And there is always the prospect of further, more infectious variants emerging during the development of, say, Delta, one of which may oust Delta so that hundreds of millions of doses are produced to protect against a strain that has been eclipsed by a new one.

I wonder if we may always be a step or two behind in trying to protect ourselves from this virus.

The key is to identification mutations that are of concern and put into vaccine
But you cannot really predict what kind of mutations will emerge and become dominant

Francoflier wrote:

Would we all really benefit from a third shot vs. allowing more people across the World to finally get some degree of immunity?

All the rest aside, giving anyone that got their first dose in the first two months (!) of the campaign on this planet a 3rd dose would slow down the global campaign by less than 2 days.
At current speed giving everyone on the planet over the age of 11 two doses would take less than 9 months (6 Billion people * 3 Shots at 45 million doses/day). Given that almost 5 billion doses are in arms, we will probably run into logistics problems rather soon. And production is still ramping up....

Best regards
Thomas

lightsaber wrote:

We know there are too many breakthrough infections. It isn't just to keep the person getting the 3rd jab out of the hospital, but to slow the spread better. We have enough data to know the vaccinated are getting sick. I feel the science is there.

We're not going to magically vaccinate the other half who won't take the vaccine (or in the case of my younger child, are not allowed).

We can agree it would be better to vaccinate more people. That isn't happening. We know our case rate is high and Israel's is even higher:
https://ourworldindata.org/explorers/co ... rmed+cases

We need to do both. Unfortunately, it is going to take mandates. Since many won't adult and vaccinate, we must take added precautions to keep the virus out of our homes. Vaccines have been easy to get since mid-April (by my 2nd dose, the lines were nothing, my first dose was still a rush to get vaccines).

It is 4 months people could have done the responsible thing and gotten vaccinated. Instead, they have become more hardline in avoiding a vaccine.
So to protect ourselves we need to:
1. Increase outreach campaigns. Pop up vaccination centers are working well in France:
https://www.newsobserver.com/news/article253539299.html
2. France showed us harsh mandates work. France was on the decline in vaccines and spiked up the vaccines with their passport system, it is clear in the daily vaccination rate:
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/dail ... A~OWID_WRL
3. Cost for the decision. Insurance companies were waiving fees for coronavirus, that is starting to end:
https://www.wxyz.com/news/coronavirus/m ... d-19-costs
I've used up my articles, but this link looks to have more: https://www.forbes.com/sites/roberthart ... ions-soar/

Since we have vaccines, why not 3rd jab? We're not going to succeed getting the unvaccinated rapidly vaccinated.
What we can do:
1. The government and military mandates will get millions vaccinated.
2. I think all air travel, except for patients in medical transport, should require vaccination. Including private jets, private aircraft. This will slow the spread. Now, we have a constitutional right to interstate trade, so they can go by road.

But since the risk is elevated, I need something to make it less likely my too young to be vaccinated child has less risk. All that is certain is every adult she encounters has a 3rd jab.

Lightsaber

I cropped some points here to respond to.

- Does the vaccine actually stop the spread in any meaningful way? From the studies it appears the viral load is the same in both unvaccinated and vaccinated in the upper respiratory tract and in the vaccinated the immune response takes over once the virus tries to go to the lower respiratory tract where the immune system can signal the alarms that their a pathogen here. This happens with vaccinated people and they are left with usually no symptoms or a cold.

- Protecting the upper respiratory tract from a virus replicating is a very hard thing to do especially with an pathogen that doesn't sustain a large retention of antibodies. The other endemic coronaviruses spread like this and are stopped in the upper respiratory tract.

The messaging needs to change that you get this vaccine to keep your but out of the hospital . To keep an R0 less than one you would need to mask forever and most people are not willing to do that.

Eventually the people who played ball will get frustrated. In Canada we have now a 70% plus double dose rate and will increase and most major corporations will mandate them. What is going to be frustrating is that the so called abundance of caution is only really felt by a portion of the people. Not everyone is scared and beyond the pandemic keeping restrictions when hospitals are not stressed will create a backlash.

I have has both my doses and don't fear this virus any more. Yes my mother is immuno-compromised but she got the vaccine fist and will get a 3rd dose if needed but as a 37 year old single male in the prime of his life eventually I am going to get fed up with having to limit my in person interactions for what looks to be many years to protect what is now voluntarily vulnerable people. People of my age who are hustling and starting businesses really are starting to resent doctors who make $400,000 a year telling us what to do. We got the shot and want to move on and with my countries vaccination numbers not probably the highest in the G20 we should be. Some provinces have started to.

I think the 3rd jabs will work for a time but we will be back in the same situation next spring. I think the harsh action might be required that when forced to triage that your vaccination status in considered and you may be left to die if unvaccinated.

Some serious questions should be asked of the FDA and CDC on why they are not allowing all school age children (ages 4-12) first doses while extending 3rd doses. Is there something wrong with the trials?

I think this will be coming in the fall or is the risk still too low for kids that the vaccines are better used elsewhere.

https://www.mag2.com/p/news/508509
Japan government: as of June, death rate for unvaccinated elderlies are 4.31% from corona, compares to 0.89% for elderlies received two dose.
While this is an encouraging evidence showing effectiveness of the vaccine in preventing death, it also shows that people could still die after getting vaccinated, and the.probability of such happening isn't that low

Reports are coming in that full FDA approval for the Pfizer vaccine could be as soon as this upcoming Monday:

https://arstechnica.com/science/2021/08 ... al-monday/

The Food and Drug Administration is aiming to issue full regulatory approval of Pfizer/BioNTech's COVID-19 vaccine as early as Monday, according to a report by the New York Times.

The regulatory agency had previously set an unofficial internal goal for issuing the approval by early September. Officials who spoke with the Times said that FDA officials were working to finish the approval Friday, but they were still going through paperwork and negotiations with the companies. The timeline could still slip past Monday if the process takes longer than expected, but the agency is on track to grant approval as early as next week, Politico reported.

Currently the Pfizer/BioNTech two-dose mRNA vaccine is being offered in the US based on an Emergency Use Authorization. So far, 200 million doses have been administered in the US alone. Though the vaccine has proven highly effective and safe, the full approval may convince some vaccine holdouts that the shot is, indeed, safe and effective. Previous polling by the Kaiser Family Foundation found that 31 percent of unvaccinated people would be more likely to get their shots if a vaccine earned full approval.

Pfizer and BioNTech submitted an application for full approval—or a Biologics License Application (BLA)—in May and in July the FDA fast-tracked the review of their application. According to the Times, the FDA is also reviewing the BLA for Moderna's COVID-19 vaccine and approval could come in the following weeks.

As the article notes, this could spur a large wave of vaccine mandates by states and private employers, and takes away one of the arguments being used by anti-vaxxers that the vaccine isn't FDA approved.

StarAC17 wrote:

lightsaber wrote:

We know there are too many breakthrough infections. It isn't just to keep the person getting the 3rd jab out of the hospital, but to slow the spread better. We have enough data to know the vaccinated are getting sick. I feel the science is there.

We're not going to magically vaccinate the other half who won't take the vaccine (or in the case of my younger child, are not allowed).

We can agree it would be better to vaccinate more people. That isn't happening. We know our case rate is high and Israel's is even higher:
https://ourworldindata.org/explorers/co ... rmed+cases

We need to do both. Unfortunately, it is going to take mandates. Since many won't adult and vaccinate, we must take added precautions to keep the virus out of our homes. Vaccines have been easy to get since mid-April (by my 2nd dose, the lines were nothing, my first dose was still a rush to get vaccines).

It is 4 months people could have done the responsible thing and gotten vaccinated. Instead, they have become more hardline in avoiding a vaccine.
So to protect ourselves we need to:
1. Increase outreach campaigns. Pop up vaccination centers are working well in France:
https://www.newsobserver.com/news/article253539299.html
2. France showed us harsh mandates work. France was on the decline in vaccines and spiked up the vaccines with their passport system, it is clear in the daily vaccination rate:
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/dail ... A~OWID_WRL
3. Cost for the decision. Insurance companies were waiving fees for coronavirus, that is starting to end:
https://www.wxyz.com/news/coronavirus/m ... d-19-costs
I've used up my articles, but this link looks to have more: https://www.forbes.com/sites/roberthart ... ions-soar/

Since we have vaccines, why not 3rd jab? We're not going to succeed getting the unvaccinated rapidly vaccinated.
What we can do:
1. The government and military mandates will get millions vaccinated.
2. I think all air travel, except for patients in medical transport, should require vaccination. Including private jets, private aircraft. This will slow the spread. Now, we have a constitutional right to interstate trade, so they can go by road.

But since the risk is elevated, I need something to make it less likely my too young to be vaccinated child has less risk. All that is certain is every adult she encounters has a 3rd jab.

Lightsaber

I cropped some points here to respond to.

- Does the vaccine actually stop the spread in any meaningful way? From the studies it appears the viral load is the same in both unvaccinated and vaccinated in the upper respiratory tract and in the vaccinated the immune response takes over once the virus tries to go to the lower respiratory tract where the immune system can signal the alarms that their a pathogen here. This happens with vaccinated people and they are left with usually no symptoms or a cold.

- Protecting the upper respiratory tract from a virus replicating is a very hard thing to do especially with an pathogen that doesn't sustain a large retention of antibodies. The other endemic coronaviruses spread like this and are stopped in the upper respiratory tract.

The messaging needs to change that you get this vaccine to keep your but out of the hospital . To keep an R0 less than one you would need to mask forever and most people are not willing to do that.

Eventually the people who played ball will get frustrated. In Canada we have now a 70% plus double dose rate and will increase and most major corporations will mandate them. What is going to be frustrating is that the so called abundance of caution is only really felt by a portion of the people. Not everyone is scared and beyond the pandemic keeping restrictions when hospitals are not stressed will create a backlash.

I have has both my doses and don't fear this virus any more. Yes my mother is immuno-compromised but she got the vaccine fist and will get a 3rd dose if needed but as a 37 year old single male in the prime of his life eventually I am going to get fed up with having to limit my in person interactions for what looks to be many years to protect what is now voluntarily vulnerable people. People of my age who are hustling and starting businesses really are starting to resent doctors who make $400,000 a year telling us what to do. We got the shot and want to move on and with my countries vaccination numbers not probably the highest in the G20 we should be. Some provinces have started to.

I think the 3rd jabs will work for a time but we will be back in the same situation next spring. I think the harsh action might be required that when forced to triage that your vaccination status in considered and you may be left to die if unvaccinated.

Some serious questions should be asked of the FDA and CDC on why they are not allowing all school age children (ages 4-12) first doses while extending 3rd doses. Is there something wrong with the trials?

I think this will be coming in the fall or is the risk still too low for kids that the vaccines are better used elsewhere.

Does the vaccine stop the virus? If you cannot get it, you aren't going to spread it. There is a variation in what 2-dose vaccines do.

Vaccines are but one part of the swiss cheese model: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swiss_cheese_model

I don't like talking fear, I'm talking about taking on responsibility for others. I have three relatives and a few friends at risk. My youngest cannot be vaccinated. I don't want her to have the long haul symptoms I have.

As to how long the 3rd jab will work, I look at Israel.

https://www.msn.com/en-xl/news/other/co ... NewsSearch\
In any case, as it stands, the data suggests that even if there are breakthrough cases among fully vaccinated Israelis, their infections are less severe than among those who have had no jabs at all.

Taking a sample from August 16, 2021:

154.7 severely ill patients in Israel were unvaccinated. 48.4 severely ill patients were partially vaccinated And 19.8 severely ill patients were fully vaccinated

I'm not sure how they got fractions of a patient... In particular as the sum is 222.9
But what it shows is there are breakthroughs, but the older. I've seen reports that focus on the age 60+ (who were all vaccinated early) showing a higher fraction of them in the hospital were vaccinated, but as they were vaccinated earlier and are more "fragile," that just makes sense to me. Also, I'm seeing a lot of bad reporting on Israel vaccination rates. Currently 62.81% fully, 5.14% partial. (Many report "near 70% fully vaccinated" which is quite a round up...). I'm not going to link to reports I think are exaggerating...
https://ourworldindata.org/explorers/co ... by+dose%29

3rd jab 86% effective in elderly:
https://www.rt.com/news/532408-pfizer-j ... ael-third/

Vs. 2 jab 39% effectiveness:
https://www.arkansasonline.com/news/202 ... -delta-in/

That is enough of a scientific basis to 3rd jab in my book. The question becomes how often a booster and is there an age component to the "top off?" e.g., do elderly need boosters more often than middle aged or young?

Lightsaber

lightsaber wrote:

StarAC17 wrote:

lightsaber wrote:

We know there are too many breakthrough infections. It isn't just to keep the person getting the 3rd jab out of the hospital, but to slow the spread better. We have enough data to know the vaccinated are getting sick. I feel the science is there.

We're not going to magically vaccinate the other half who won't take the vaccine (or in the case of my younger child, are not allowed).

We can agree it would be better to vaccinate more people. That isn't happening. We know our case rate is high and Israel's is even higher:
https://ourworldindata.org/explorers/co ... rmed+cases

We need to do both. Unfortunately, it is going to take mandates. Since many won't adult and vaccinate, we must take added precautions to keep the virus out of our homes. Vaccines have been easy to get since mid-April (by my 2nd dose, the lines were nothing, my first dose was still a rush to get vaccines).

It is 4 months people could have done the responsible thing and gotten vaccinated. Instead, they have become more hardline in avoiding a vaccine.
So to protect ourselves we need to:
1. Increase outreach campaigns. Pop up vaccination centers are working well in France:
https://www.newsobserver.com/news/article253539299.html
2. France showed us harsh mandates work. France was on the decline in vaccines and spiked up the vaccines with their passport system, it is clear in the daily vaccination rate:
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/dail ... A~OWID_WRL
3. Cost for the decision. Insurance companies were waiving fees for coronavirus, that is starting to end:
https://www.wxyz.com/news/coronavirus/m ... d-19-costs
I've used up my articles, but this link looks to have more: https://www.forbes.com/sites/roberthart ... ions-soar/

Since we have vaccines, why not 3rd jab? We're not going to succeed getting the unvaccinated rapidly vaccinated.
What we can do:
1. The government and military mandates will get millions vaccinated.
2. I think all air travel, except for patients in medical transport, should require vaccination. Including private jets, private aircraft. This will slow the spread. Now, we have a constitutional right to interstate trade, so they can go by road.

But since the risk is elevated, I need something to make it less likely my too young to be vaccinated child has less risk. All that is certain is every adult she encounters has a 3rd jab.

Lightsaber

I cropped some points here to respond to.

- Does the vaccine actually stop the spread in any meaningful way? From the studies it appears the viral load is the same in both unvaccinated and vaccinated in the upper respiratory tract and in the vaccinated the immune response takes over once the virus tries to go to the lower respiratory tract where the immune system can signal the alarms that their a pathogen here. This happens with vaccinated people and they are left with usually no symptoms or a cold.

- Protecting the upper respiratory tract from a virus replicating is a very hard thing to do especially with an pathogen that doesn't sustain a large retention of antibodies. The other endemic coronaviruses spread like this and are stopped in the upper respiratory tract.

The messaging needs to change that you get this vaccine to keep your but out of the hospital . To keep an R0 less than one you would need to mask forever and most people are not willing to do that.

Eventually the people who played ball will get frustrated. In Canada we have now a 70% plus double dose rate and will increase and most major corporations will mandate them. What is going to be frustrating is that the so called abundance of caution is only really felt by a portion of the people. Not everyone is scared and beyond the pandemic keeping restrictions when hospitals are not stressed will create a backlash.

I have has both my doses and don't fear this virus any more. Yes my mother is immuno-compromised but she got the vaccine fist and will get a 3rd dose if needed but as a 37 year old single male in the prime of his life eventually I am going to get fed up with having to limit my in person interactions for what looks to be many years to protect what is now voluntarily vulnerable people. People of my age who are hustling and starting businesses really are starting to resent doctors who make $400,000 a year telling us what to do. We got the shot and want to move on and with my countries vaccination numbers not probably the highest in the G20 we should be. Some provinces have started to.

I think the 3rd jabs will work for a time but we will be back in the same situation next spring. I think the harsh action might be required that when forced to triage that your vaccination status in considered and you may be left to die if unvaccinated.

Some serious questions should be asked of the FDA and CDC on why they are not allowing all school age children (ages 4-12) first doses while extending 3rd doses. Is there something wrong with the trials?

I think this will be coming in the fall or is the risk still too low for kids that the vaccines are better used elsewhere.

Does the vaccine stop the virus? If you cannot get it, you aren't going to spread it. There is a variation in what 2-dose vaccines do.

It appears that the vaccine in fact does in fact not stop the virus. What is does stop is severe disease. The Covid vaccines are closer to the flu shot as opposed to the MMR vaccine. Not because the vaccine is poor but because of the nature of respiratory viruses.

The upper respiratory tract is essentially external tissue with limited blood flow. The virus is going to spread there until the virus spreads far enough for the immune system to be alerted. You might have cold symptoms or feel nothing at all, but this virus is no longer novel to those who are vaccinated.

In vaccinated people this will protect to a very large extent the lower respiratory tract and any systemic issues. Thus a lower viral load in total as compared to an unvaccinated individual as the risk to the lower respiratory system will be minimized to almost 100%. It will absolutely delay the emergence of additional variants.

It will not stop the spread but will protect the infected from serious disease and death. Hopefully along with that, long haul symptoms. A booster will enhance the antibody numbers but won't be a permanent fix as the antibodies will drop again over time.

What they should be working on is a nasal spray vaccine and we need some antivirals to assist fighting this.

StarAC17 wrote:

lightsaber wrote:

StarAC17 wrote:

I cropped some points here to respond to.

- Does the vaccine actually stop the spread in any meaningful way? From the studies it appears the viral load is the same in both unvaccinated and vaccinated in the upper respiratory tract and in the vaccinated the immune response takes over once the virus tries to go to the lower respiratory tract where the immune system can signal the alarms that their a pathogen here. This happens with vaccinated people and they are left with usually no symptoms or a cold.

- Protecting the upper respiratory tract from a virus replicating is a very hard thing to do especially with an pathogen that doesn't sustain a large retention of antibodies. The other endemic coronaviruses spread like this and are stopped in the upper respiratory tract.

The messaging needs to change that you get this vaccine to keep your but out of the hospital . To keep an R0 less than one you would need to mask forever and most people are not willing to do that.

Eventually the people who played ball will get frustrated. In Canada we have now a 70% plus double dose rate and will increase and most major corporations will mandate them. What is going to be frustrating is that the so called abundance of caution is only really felt by a portion of the people. Not everyone is scared and beyond the pandemic keeping restrictions when hospitals are not stressed will create a backlash.

I have has both my doses and don't fear this virus any more. Yes my mother is immuno-compromised but she got the vaccine fist and will get a 3rd dose if needed but as a 37 year old single male in the prime of his life eventually I am going to get fed up with having to limit my in person interactions for what looks to be many years to protect what is now voluntarily vulnerable people. People of my age who are hustling and starting businesses really are starting to resent doctors who make $400,000 a year telling us what to do. We got the shot and want to move on and with my countries vaccination numbers not probably the highest in the G20 we should be. Some provinces have started to.

I think the 3rd jabs will work for a time but we will be back in the same situation next spring. I think the harsh action might be required that when forced to triage that your vaccination status in considered and you may be left to die if unvaccinated.

Some serious questions should be asked of the FDA and CDC on why they are not allowing all school age children (ages 4-12) first doses while extending 3rd doses. Is there something wrong with the trials?

I think this will be coming in the fall or is the risk still too low for kids that the vaccines are better used elsewhere.

Does the vaccine stop the virus? If you cannot get it, you aren't going to spread it. There is a variation in what 2-dose vaccines do.

It appears that the vaccine in fact does in fact not stop the virus. What is does stop is severe disease. The Covid vaccines are closer to the flu shot as opposed to the MMR vaccine. Not because the vaccine is poor but because of the nature of respiratory viruses.

The upper respiratory tract is essentially external tissue with limited blood flow. The virus is going to spread there until the virus spreads far enough for the immune system to be alerted. You might have cold symptoms or feel nothing at all, but this virus is no longer novel to those who are vaccinated.

In vaccinated people this will protect to a very large extent the lower respiratory tract and any systemic issues. Thus a lower viral load in total as compared to an unvaccinated individual as the risk to the lower respiratory system will be minimized to almost 100%. It will absolutely delay the emergence of additional variants.

It will not stop the spread but will protect the infected from serious disease and death. Hopefully along with that, long haul symptoms. A booster will enhance the antibody numbers but won't be a permanent fix as the antibodies will drop again over time.

What they should be working on is a nasal spray vaccine and we need some antivirals to assist fighting this.

Dr. Daniel Griffin with Vincent Racaiello discussed the very topic of boosters, vaccines, and protection of vaccination against infection and serious disease and death:

https://youtu.be/uD5R71z69gQ?t=1094

The studies mentioned:

https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/mm7034e1.htm

https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/ ... mm7034e2_w


The nutshell is that vaccines were never designed to protect against infection; they protect against severe disease and death. The current authorized mRNA vaccines seem to both protect against severe disease and death, AND also provide some level of protection against infection, which is something they were NOT designed to do.

India has given emergency authorization to the ZyCoV-D vaccine for people over 12 years old, which is a DNA-based vaccine given in a 3 dose regime:

https://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSKBN2FL1FN

BENGALURU (Reuters) -India's drug regulator has granted emergency use approval for Zydus Cadila's CADI.NS COVID-19 vaccine, the world's first DNA shot against the coronavirus, in adults and children aged 12 years and above.

The big benefit is that the vaccine is administered using a needle-free applicator as opposed to traditional syringes.

StarAC17 wrote:

lightsaber wrote:

StarAC17 wrote:

I cropped some points here to respond to.

- Does the vaccine actually stop the spread in any meaningful way? From the studies it appears the viral load is the same in both unvaccinated and vaccinated in the upper respiratory tract and in the vaccinated the immune response takes over once the virus tries to go to the lower respiratory tract where the immune system can signal the alarms that their a pathogen here. This happens with vaccinated people and they are left with usually no symptoms or a cold.

- Protecting the upper respiratory tract from a virus replicating is a very hard thing to do especially with an pathogen that doesn't sustain a large retention of antibodies. The other endemic coronaviruses spread like this and are stopped in the upper respiratory tract.

The messaging needs to change that you get this vaccine to keep your but out of the hospital . To keep an R0 less than one you would need to mask forever and most people are not willing to do that.

Eventually the people who played ball will get frustrated. In Canada we have now a 70% plus double dose rate and will increase and most major corporations will mandate them. What is going to be frustrating is that the so called abundance of caution is only really felt by a portion of the people. Not everyone is scared and beyond the pandemic keeping restrictions when hospitals are not stressed will create a backlash.

I have has both my doses and don't fear this virus any more. Yes my mother is immuno-compromised but she got the vaccine fist and will get a 3rd dose if needed but as a 37 year old single male in the prime of his life eventually I am going to get fed up with having to limit my in person interactions for what looks to be many years to protect what is now voluntarily vulnerable people. People of my age who are hustling and starting businesses really are starting to resent doctors who make $400,000 a year telling us what to do. We got the shot and want to move on and with my countries vaccination numbers not probably the highest in the G20 we should be. Some provinces have started to.

I think the 3rd jabs will work for a time but we will be back in the same situation next spring. I think the harsh action might be required that when forced to triage that your vaccination status in considered and you may be left to die if unvaccinated.

Some serious questions should be asked of the FDA and CDC on why they are not allowing all school age children (ages 4-12) first doses while extending 3rd doses. Is there something wrong with the trials?

I think this will be coming in the fall or is the risk still too low for kids that the vaccines are better used elsewhere.

Does the vaccine stop the virus? If you cannot get it, you aren't going to spread it. There is a variation in what 2-dose vaccines do.

It appears that the vaccine in fact does in fact not stop the virus. What is does stop is severe disease. The Covid vaccines are closer to the flu shot as opposed to the MMR vaccine. Not because the vaccine is poor but because of the nature of respiratory viruses.

The upper respiratory tract is essentially external tissue with limited blood flow. The virus is going to spread there until the virus spreads far enough for the immune system to be alerted. You might have cold symptoms or feel nothing at all, but this virus is no longer novel to those who are vaccinated.

In vaccinated people this will protect to a very large extent the lower respiratory tract and any systemic issues. Thus a lower viral load in total as compared to an unvaccinated individual as the risk to the lower respiratory system will be minimized to almost 100%. It will absolutely delay the emergence of additional variants.

It will not stop the spread but will protect the infected from serious disease and death. Hopefully along with that, long haul symptoms. A booster will enhance the antibody numbers but won't be a permanent fix as the antibodies will drop again over time.

What they should be working on is a nasal spray vaccine and we need some antivirals to assist fighting this.

I posted links upthread, the vaccines have some effectiveness stopping illness:

lightsaber wrote:

Unfortunately, with Delta, the vaccines have reverted back to protecting mostly oneself instead of a great protection to the community; not zero though, we have links in thread showing effectiveness:
J&J 1 dose 30%, 2 dose 60%
Pfizer effectiveness 42%
Moderna: 76% effectiveness

The above are effectiveness against sniffles, in other words spreading the disease. I couldn't find AZ effectiveness, other than 92% vs. hospitalizations:
https://www.astrazeneca.com/media-centr ... riant.html

This link has claims for AZ and Pfizer that, in my opinion, don't quite line up with what is going on in Israel (too effective):
https://www.theguardian.com/society/202 ... ta-variant

This is why we need a 3rd jab (J&J probably need 3 jabs, just some debate what regimin).
Pfizer 3 jab is 86% effective in the elderly (thus we should expect better in younger):
https://www.reuters.com/business/health ... 021-08-18/

The trials are being dragged out for younger kids. I'm not aware of anything now below age 5. Just getting age 5+ ensures the elementary schools are protected. Prior variants didn't get the kids hard (theory was mucus in the lungs). Now we have pediatric wings filling up:
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/ch ... 1-n1277119

However, the #1 way my pediatrician says kids are getting infected is from an unvaccinated parent. I want the 3rd jab to protect my child, but I would happily wait if my younger child was vaccinated... TODAY!

They're being very cautious with kids, instead, they missed an opportunity to protect them. Sigh...
Pfizer expected to be full approved, for adults, next week:
https://www.wsj.com/articles/fda-poised ... 1629498450

Hopefully my employer will put in a mandate ASAP. Say vaccinated by Nov 1st (both jabs). Heck, I'd be happy if the unvaccinated took J&J.

Lightsaber

I thought who had the breakthrough infections was interesting:
https://qz.com/2050181/booster-shots-ke ... nfections/
breakthrough Covid-19 infections were immunocompromised—despite making up only 2.7% of the US adult population. In comparison, the rate of breakthrough cases among vaccinated people who are not immunocompromised was less than 1%.

I'm personally in favor of the boosters to slow the spread. Yes, better if magically there was a younger child's vaccine and those unvaccinated would take it up. Since that isn't happening, we have to see what knobs we can turn and right now, that is a booster.

Lightsaber

lightsaber wrote:

I thought who had the breakthrough infections was interesting:
https://qz.com/2050181/booster-shots-ke ... nfections/
breakthrough Covid-19 infections were immunocompromised—despite making up only 2.7% of the US adult population. In comparison, the rate of breakthrough cases among vaccinated people who are not immunocompromised was less than 1%.

I'm personally in favor of the boosters to slow the spread. Yes, better if magically there was a younger child's vaccine and those unvaccinated would take it up. Since that isn't happening, we have to see what knobs we can turn and right now, that is a booster.

Lightsaber

I disagree, and I think the figures you gave in your own post show why...
If you have a problem that affects a group of people, where 97% of these people happen to be unvaccinated and 3% of them are, then focusing on the 3% rather than the 97% is a complete non-starter when it comes to trying to solve that problem.
Sure, you may help the tiny minority who is at risk even when vaccinated, but other than that, you're spending a lot of resources to fix an inconsequential part of the issue.

Until the unvaccinated get jabbed, they will keep crowding the hospitals until they build their immunity the hard way... or die.

Here is a great article from the BBC which came out yesterday and has interesting expert insights on what the course of action regarding Covid should be going forward, now that the vast majority of the population has some form of immunity (in the UK at least).

https://www.bbc.com/news/health-58270098

Well worth a read. The gist being that getting immunity from the vaccine and the disease itself are not the same thing, and that once vaccines have turned the virus into a much more benign disease, it may be worth letting natural exposure 'complete' everyone's immunity rather than endlessly and feverishly pushing for regular booster shots.

Good snippet at the end:

But Prof Riley said there was potential in using vaccines to "take the edge off" Covid, followed by infection, to broaden the immune response.

She said: "We really need to consider, are we just frightening people rather than giving them the confidence to get on with their lives? We're close to just worrying people now."

Of course, with cases continuing to rumble on, there may not be much choice.

"I'm wondering whether it's inevitable," said Prof Klenerman, as if the virus continues to spread then "there will be this ongoing boosting effect".

Francoflier wrote:

Here is a great article from the BBC which came out yesterday and has interesting expert insights on what the course of action regarding Covid should be going forward, now that the vast majority of the population has some form of immunity (in the UK at least).

https://www.bbc.com/news/health-58270098

Well worth a read. The gist being that getting immunity from the vaccine and the disease itself are not the same thing, and that once vaccines have turned the virus into a much more benign disease, it may be worth letting natural exposure 'complete' everyone's immunity rather than endlessly and feverishly pushing for regular booster shots.

Quite enlightening content in that article. It provides further confirmation to me that focus should be on vaccinating the unprotected of the world. The following could not put that view more starkly:

Prof Adam Finn, a government vaccine adviser, said over-vaccinating people, when other parts of the world had none, was "a bit insane, it's not just inequitable, it's stupid".

Prof Adam Finn, a government vaccine adviser, said over-vaccinating people, when other parts of the world had none, was "a bit insane, it's not just inequitable, it's stupid".

[/quote]
One sentence says it all.

Flip side is most folks still believe in the Australia and New Zealand mentality, if you can close your borders you can manage the infection coming from unvaccinated countries. Now how you protect yourself from your own people who want to and demand the right to travel to these unvaccinated countries is another story.
At the end of the day it is all about control, and this pandemic has emboldened that political class who believe it is their right to rule, not govern, rule.

par13del wrote:

Flip side is most folks still believe in the Australia and New Zealand mentality, if you can close your borders you can manage the infection coming from unvaccinated countries. Now how you protect yourself from your own people who want to and demand the right to travel to these unvaccinated countries is another story.

It’s a mistake to think vaccination equals not spreading the virus. Vaccination helps to reduce spreading the virus and reduce getting severely ill (hospitalization or worse).

https://www.jiji.com/sp/article?k=2021081300785&g=soc
According to Japanese National Infectious Disease Research Center,
- There are report that Delta have an R0 of 8-10
- With such chickenpox level of infectivit, some say it might require chickenpox level of vaccination rate, aka 80-90%, to.sufficiently suppress outbreak
- But even with 80-90% vaccination rate, what will happens will still be unknown, and data from countries like UK and Israel should be referenced.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newslett ... inal-goals
Meanwhile, Bloomberg published an article, saying "Herd immunity might be a mirage"

Looks like a lot of unvaccinated people suddenly have become scared they might end up in a hospital.

"COVID-19 vaccinations pick up as some states face with a ‘tsunami of patients’"

A surge in COVID-19 hospitalizations across the U.S. seems to have prompted more Americans to seek the protection of vaccines improving the country’s vaccination rate, which will likely get a further boost this week with full approval expected for Pfizer (NYSE:PFE)/ BioNTech (NASDAQ:BNTX) shot.

https://seekingalpha.com/news/3733039-c ... f-patients

Pfizer is now officiall FDA approved.

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/08/23/fda-pfi ... dates.html

The Food and Drug Administration on Monday granted full approval to Pfizer and BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine – becoming the first in the U.S. to win the coveted designation and giving even more businesses, schools and universities greater confidence to adopt vaccine mandates.

Up until now, the mRNA vaccine, which will be marketed as Comirnaty, was on the U.S. market under an Emergency Use Authorization that was granted by the FDA in December. Since then, more than 204 million of the Pfizer shots have been administered, according to data compiled by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Comirnaty? That is an interesting name.....

Taiwan is deploying a vaccine that went through phase 2, but yet phase 3 testing, as good or better than AZ, but only in phase 2.

https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-paci ... 021-08-22/

Denies approval for another vaccine, not as effective as AZ:
https://sports.yahoo.com/taiwan-denies- ... 29226.html

Lightsaber

casinterest wrote:

Pfizer is now officiall FDA approved.

I felt a great disturbance in the Force, as if millions of anti-vaxxer goalposts just moved at once.

Comirnaty? That is an interesting name.....

Bit of a mouthful, huh? Apparently, "Com"=community, "mirna"=mRNA, "ty"=immuniTY.

I like Moderna's "SpikeVax" name much better.

casinterest wrote:

Pfizer is now officiall FDA approved.

I felt a great disturbance in the Force, as if millions of anti-vaxxer goalposts just moved in unison.

Comirnaty? That is an interesting name.....

Bit of a mouthful, huh? Apparently, "Com"=community, "mirna"=mRNA, "ty"=immuniTY.

I like Moderna's "SpikeVax" name much better.

Working in this industry, I am continually amazed at the weird names our marketing folks come up with for approved drugs. Sometimes I wish we just stuck with the chemical names, which can actually be better.

casinterest wrote:

Pfizer is now officiall FDA approved.

A lot of people have said they haven't gotten the vaccine because it wasn't fully/officially approved by the FDA. I wonder what excuse these people will come up with now?

lightsaber wrote:

Francoflier wrote:

lightsaber wrote:

I thought who had the breakthrough infections was interesting:
https://qz.com/2050181/booster-shots-ke ... nfections/
breakthrough Covid-19 infections were immunocompromised—despite making up only 2.7% of the US adult population. In comparison, the rate of breakthrough cases among vaccinated people who are not immunocompromised was less than 1%.

I'm personally in favor of the boosters to slow the spread. Yes, better if magically there was a younger child's vaccine and those unvaccinated would take it up. Since that isn't happening, we have to see what knobs we can turn and right now, that is a booster.

Lightsaber

I disagree, and I think the figures you gave in your own post show why...
If you have a problem that affects a group of people, where 97% of these people happen to be unvaccinated and 3% of them are, then focusing on the 3% rather than the 97% is a complete non-starter when it comes to trying to solve that problem.
Sure, you may help the tiny minority who is at risk even when vaccinated, but other than that, you're spending a lot of resources to fix an inconsequential part of the issue.

Until the unvaccinated get jabbed, they will keep crowding the hospitals until they build their immunity the hard way... or die.

Here is a great article from the BBC which came out yesterday and has interesting expert insights on what the course of action regarding Covid should be going forward, now that the vast majority of the population has some form of immunity (in the UK at least).

https://www.bbc.com/news/health-58270098

Well worth a read. The gist being that getting immunity from the vaccine and the disease itself are not the same thing, and that once vaccines have turned the virus into a much more benign disease, it may be worth letting natural exposure 'complete' everyone's immunity rather than endlessly and feverishly pushing for regular booster shots.

Good snippet at the end:

But Prof Riley said there was potential in using vaccines to "take the edge off" Covid, followed by infection, to broaden the immune response.

She said: "We really need to consider, are we just frightening people rather than giving them the confidence to get on with their lives? We're close to just worrying people now."

Of course, with cases continuing to rumble on, there may not be much choice.

"I'm wondering whether it's inevitable," said Prof Klenerman, as if the virus continues to spread then "there will be this ongoing boosting effect".

I think we should try to get the unvaccinated to take the vaccine, but one should always pursue a strategy that has the greatest benefit for the effort. People who are vaccinated will be more willing to get a booster. This isn't to keep them out of the hospital, the vaccines do a good job of that. This is to make it less likely they spread the virus (shorter illness time or better, no illness time).

If the unvaccinated were lining up to get vaccinated, I would agree with you. They aren't and they won't. Our current rate of jabs per day is a quarter of the peak:
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/dail ... untry=~USA


Lightsaber

American's won't get it but I know of two nations in the South Pacific that need supply yesterday. Fill up a few QF A380's with vaccines and send them to Australia and New Zealand. Or the dozens other nations that need vaccines. Their populations will use them.

As much as you go on about 3rd doses I do not believe any healthy person needs them just yet. Also if you want to make the American people play ball. Take away their ball.

Biden can simply say. This pandemic isn't over for anyone until it's over for everyone. We will hold 2-3 doses for each American but the rest are going to the countries that need it. When Americans realize they can't get the vaccine easily they might change their mind on getting it now.

Think also beyond just Covid. If you want to ensure the US still has a lot of influence. Help the world out and the US might have a more willing coalition of nations to collaborate on the bigger issues that will make Covid look like peanuts.

Excellent graphic by the Financial Times illustrating why higher numbers of vaccinated being hospitalized is a good thing.



Further analysis by data scientist John Burn-Murdoch in this thread on the significant known/unknowns of vaccine efficacy at this point, based on the recent Oxford study:

https://twitter.com/jburnmurdoch/status ... 11936?s=20

StarAC17 wrote:

American's won't get it but I know of two nations in the South Pacific that need supply yesterday. Fill up a few QF A380's with vaccines and send them to Australia and New Zealand. Or the dozens other nations that need vaccines. Their populations will use them.

Based on what is reported, the two of the nations on the other side of the world appear to have two different strategies, NZ I believe is pushing for zero covid. One new infection and the entire country went into lockdown, now they are tracing a dozen or more potential infections from that single individual. So in NZ case, is the low national vaccinated rate due to having no vaccines or not doing anything that could detract from the zero covid initiative? I am not saying that is what they are doing, just asking the question because I can see where a vaccination program running along side a zero covid program will have conflicts with the civilian population, if we are zero why vaccinate?

https://www.businessinsider.com/new-zea ... lta-2021-8
https://edition.cnn.com/2021/08/20/asia ... index.html

dragon-wings wrote:

casinterest wrote:

Pfizer is now officiall FDA approved.

A lot of people have said they haven't gotten the vaccine because it wasn't fully/officially approved by the FDA. I wonder what excuse these people will come up with now?

They don't trust scientists.
They are waiting for their kids to get vaccinated.
They are young and indestructible
....
...
The list goes on and on.

par13del wrote:

StarAC17 wrote:

American's won't get it but I know of two nations in the South Pacific that need supply yesterday. Fill up a few QF A380's with vaccines and send them to Australia and New Zealand. Or the dozens other nations that need vaccines. Their populations will use them.

Based on what is reported, the two of the nations on the other side of the world appear to have two different strategies, NZ I believe is pushing for zero covid. One new infection and the entire country went into lockdown, now they are tracing a dozen or more potential infections from that single individual. So in NZ case, is the low national vaccinated rate due to having no vaccines or not doing anything that could detract from the zero covid initiative? I am not saying that is what they are doing, just asking the question because I can see where a vaccination program running along side a zero covid program will have conflicts with the civilian population, if we are zero why vaccinate?

https://www.businessinsider.com/new-zea ... lta-2021-8
https://edition.cnn.com/2021/08/20/asia ... index.html

They are doing Covid 0 because they feel that they feel that this is the best way manage the pandemic. However Delta has thrown the Covid 0 to a point where it really isn't possible anymore.

Both Australia and NZ now know that they will have to live with the virus and vaccines will get them out. Perhaps the fact that their initial lockdowns worked so well and they haven't lived with any real mitigation measures, vaccines uptake has been slow. Where the rest of the developed world jumped at the vaccines when they had the chance.

Excellent data from Israel. You can see the sharp drop in infections of vaccinated age 60+ as the 3rd jab became effective. What I find interesting is all the illness seemed to drop off for everyone as the under age 60 were given the 3rd jab. To me, this shows that triple jabbing arrested the spread of Delta. Obviously in work. This justifies the booster strategy, please see the chart. Hint, every change in slope in a chart must be explained; for many the only hypothesis I can come up with is that the booster is arresting transmission.

https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-ea ... 021-08-24/

What I do not know is how long lasting the benefit is. I will boost ASAP to protect my family and the few friends I interact with in my bubble. I hope we get towards the upper band of those willingly getting a booster.

For better or worse, this is proving a 3rd jab is required.

Lightsaber

lightsaber wrote:

Excellent data from Israel. You can see the sharp drop in infections of vaccinated age 60+ as the 3rd jab became effective. What I find interesting is all the illness seemed to drop off for everyone as the under age 60 were given the 3rd jab. To me, this shows that triple jabbing arrested the spread of Delta. Obviously in work. This justifies the booster strategy, please see the chart. Hint, every change in slope in a chart must be explained; for many the only hypothesis I can come up with is that the booster is arresting transmission.

https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-ea ... 021-08-24/

What I do not know is how long lasting the benefit is. I will boost ASAP to protect my family and the few friends I interact with in my bubble. I hope we get towards the upper band of those willingly getting a booster.

For better or worse, this is proving a 3rd jab is required.

Lightsaber

The benefits of a third jab for already-vaccinated healthy people are exceedingly minor compared to getting those vaccines in the arms of unvaccinated populations…doubly true for someone such as yourself who’s been previously infected AND has been vaccinated. Makes a heck of a lot more sense for healthy vaxxed to wait a few more months until an actual updated variant-targeted version of the vaccine becomes available.

I do not know whether to laugh or cry at this one. I put it here, even though it is political in nature, but it highlights for our worldly community the issues we face in getting vaccinations.

https://www.newsweek.com/ex-trump-lawye ... rt-1622497

On Monday via Twitter, Pence hailed the Food and Drug Administration's (FDA) approval of Pfizer's vaccine for COVID-19, allowing it to be marketed in the United States. He used the "big news," as he phrased it, as an opportunity to champion the Trump administration's financial investment that helped deliver safe and effective vaccines within a year of the start of the pandemic.

The tweet.

https://twitter.com/JennaEllisEsq/statu ... 9156254720

Ellis took issue with Pence's celebration of the FDA approval with a tweet of her own, calling it "basically an endorsement of mandates." She added that the "endorsement" was the reason "no conservative will vote for Pence ever again."

How are we going to ever escape Covid, when endorsements of scientifically proven vaccinations are tossed out as taboo because of politics?

flyguy89 wrote:

lightsaber wrote:

Excellent data from Israel. You can see the sharp drop in infections of vaccinated age 60+ as the 3rd jab became effective. What I find interesting is all the illness seemed to drop off for everyone as the under age 60 were given the 3rd jab. To me, this shows that triple jabbing arrested the spread of Delta. Obviously in work. This justifies the booster strategy, please see the chart. Hint, every change in slope in a chart must be explained; for many the only hypothesis I can come up with is that the booster is arresting transmission.

https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-ea ... 021-08-24/

What I do not know is how long lasting the benefit is. I will boost ASAP to protect my family and the few friends I interact with in my bubble. I hope we get towards the upper band of those willingly getting a booster.

For better or worse, this is proving a 3rd jab is required.

Lightsaber

The benefits of a third jab for already-vaccinated healthy people are exceedingly minor compared to getting those vaccines in the arms of unvaccinated populations…doubly true for someone such as yourself who’s been previously infected AND has been vaccinated. Makes a heck of a lot more sense for healthy vaxxed to wait a few more months until an actual updated variant-targeted version of the vaccine becomes available.

We need to increase production, not ration in a way that hurts our people. Thankfully at 5 billion doses in people at 1.15 billion per month. Production is the way out of this.
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/cumu ... A~OWID_WRL

Unfortunately, to slow this down, we need more vaccine in our people. The USA has hit crisis.

Israel showed us boosters work, France that mandates work.

https://ourworldindata.org/covid-hospitalizations
https://ourworldindata.org/covid-deaths

I know no way out of this quickly that doesn't involve boosters, vaccinations for more kids, and mandates.

Lightsaber

lightsaber wrote:

We need to increase production, not ration in a way that hurts our people. Thankfully at 5 billion doses in people at 1.15 billion per month. Production is the way out of this.

A moot point until that actually happens. The on-the-ground reality is that most countries currently have little access to the vaccines. Yes increased production helps, but we also can ill afford the time to wait for increased production to trickle down.

lightsaber wrote:

Israel showed us boosters work

Israel has shown that boosters seem to work in older/unhealthy/immunocomprised populations. It's yet to be demonstrated there that boosters in healthy previously-vaxxed populations have any meaningful effect.

lightsaber wrote:

I know no way out of this quickly that doesn't involve boosters, vaccinations for more kids, and mandates.

Boosters, yes, but likely annual ones actually targeted to the dominant variants in circulation. Targeted triple-jabs for the elderly/immunocompromised this fall, makes sense. Blanket triple jabbing of healthy vaccinated individuals when protection from the vaccines against severe cases and death still holds up...makes no sense and will have little effect.

flyguy89 wrote:

lightsaber wrote:

I know no way out of this quickly that doesn't involve boosters, vaccinations for more kids, and mandates.

Boosters, yes, but likely annual ones actually targeted to the dominant variants in circulation. Targeted triple-jabs for the elderly/immunocompromised this fall, makes sense. Blanket triple jabbing of healthy vaccinated individuals when protection from the vaccines against severe cases and death still holds up...makes no sense and will have little effect.

Please see the prior link where it had a graph showing all cases dropping in Israel, even unvaccinated with the current booster with the current Pfizer. It is having excellent effect slowing the spread. Instead of retooling for a new blend, the existing vaccine was sufficient. Since production is always more effecient if nothing is changed, it works.

It is slowing the spread of Covid19 triple jabbing. This is I believe why Israel is giving booster (3rd) jabs to age 30+, all healthcare, teachers, and vulnerable.

Apparently, it doesn't have to be anything special to help prevent transmission. Please read the chart in the prior link. As soon as Israel started getting quantity triple jabbed cases went down.

It is having, based on preliminary data, a great effect. The Fall is too late, Israel is seeing January vaccinations in the hospital in July. Their 3rd jab 5 months after 2nd jab makes sense based off the limited data available.

The #1 benefit of a vaccine is halting transmission. With Delta, a 3rd jab is unfortunately required to slow the spread.

Lightsaber

lightsaber wrote:

flyguy89 wrote:

lightsaber wrote:

I know no way out of this quickly that doesn't involve boosters, vaccinations for more kids, and mandates.

Boosters, yes, but likely annual ones actually targeted to the dominant variants in circulation. Targeted triple-jabs for the elderly/immunocompromised this fall, makes sense. Blanket triple jabbing of healthy vaccinated individuals when protection from the vaccines against severe cases and death still holds up...makes no sense and will have little effect.

Please see the prior link where it had a graph showing all cases dropping in Israel, even unvaccinated with the current booster with the current Pfizer.

None of those links show "cases dropping." Cases in Israel continue to increase. The Reuters article showed a decrease in the "acceleration rate of daily infections."

Further, from the article:

Scientists said booster shots are having an impact on infections, but other factors are likely contributing to the decline as well. "The numbers are still very high but what has changed is that the very high increase in the rate of infections and severe cases has diminished, as has the pace at which the pandemic is spreading," said Eran Segal, data scientist at the Weizmann Institute of Science and an adviser to the government.

"This is likely due to the third booster shots, an uptake in people taking the first dose and the high number of people infected per week, possibly up to 100,000, who now have natural immunity," Segal said.

lightsaber wrote:

The #1 benefit of a vaccine is halting transmission. With Delta, a 3rd jab is unfortunately required to slow the spread.

Lightsaber

This is a tad revisionist. That the vaccines were initially incredibly effective at halting transmission was a very pleasant surprise, but otherwise their greatest benefit was in avoiding severe infections, hospitalizations and deaths (at which they remain very effective) while also slowing spread of infection. A 3rd jab will likely have a temporary effect, but makes much more sense in my view to focus on getting more newbies vaxxed and waiting for a true booster targeted to the variants. And I also just don’t think you’re going to get a sufficient number of already-vaxxed to get triple jabbed.

Interesting CDC study on Vaccination success:
https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/mm7034e5.htm

Much lower percentages of fully vaccinated persons infected with SARS-CoV-2 were hospitalized (3.2%), were admitted to an intensive care unit (0.5%), and required mechanical ventilation (0.2%) compared with partially vaccinated persons (6.2%, 1.0%, and 0.3%, respectively) and unvaccinated persons (7.6%, 1.5%, and 0.5%, respectively) (p<0.001 for all comparisons). On July 25, the SARS-CoV-2 infection rate among unvaccinated persons was 4.9 times and the hospitalization rate was 29.2 times the rates among fully vaccinated persons.

There is much more in the link. Careful reading media accounts, the CDC is great at disease accounting, not so good as spokesmodels (in my opinion). They do great data.

That is a stark difference in hospitalizations. Now, there were a lot of breakthrough infections, but they found far more infections in the unvaccinated. 9.2 tests performed...

That is a real size dataset. Now to get down transmissions.

Lightsaber

flyguy89 wrote:

lightsaber wrote:

flyguy89 wrote:

Boosters, yes, but likely annual ones actually targeted to the dominant variants in circulation. Targeted triple-jabs for the elderly/immunocompromised this fall, makes sense. Blanket triple jabbing of healthy vaccinated individuals when protection from the vaccines against severe cases and death still holds up...makes no sense and will have little effect.

Please see the prior link where it had a graph showing all cases dropping in Israel, even unvaccinated with the current booster with the current Pfizer.

None of those links show "cases dropping." Cases in Israel continue to increase. The Reuters article showed a decrease in the "acceleration rate of daily infections."

Further, from the article:

Scientists said booster shots are having an impact on infections, but other factors are likely contributing to the decline as well. "The numbers are still very high but what has changed is that the very high increase in the rate of infections and severe cases has diminished, as has the pace at which the pandemic is spreading," said Eran Segal, data scientist at the Weizmann Institute of Science and an adviser to the government.

"This is likely due to the third booster shots, an uptake in people taking the first dose and the high number of people infected per week, possibly up to 100,000, who now have natural immunity," Segal said.

lightsaber wrote:

The #1 benefit of a vaccine is halting transmission. With Delta, a 3rd jab is unfortunately required to slow the spread.

Lightsaber

This is a tad revisionist. That the vaccines were initially incredibly effective at halting transmission was a very pleasant surprise, but otherwise their greatest benefit was in avoiding severe infections, hospitalizations and deaths (at which they remain very effective) while also slowing spread of infection. A 3rd jab will likely have a temporary effect, but makes much more sense in my view to focus on getting more newbies vaxxed and waiting for a true booster targeted to the variants. And I also just don’t think you’re going to get a sufficient number of already-vaxxed to get triple jabbed.

The graph showed encouraging trends.

Revisionist? Much of the early discussion was on vaccinating the young to help protect the old:
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32959006/

We're going to have to agree to disagree. This whole thread I have been promoting mass vaccination to slow the spread. I posted a link on estimates on prior vaccinated who would triple jab. Going from memory it was 70 to 130 million of about 170 million vaccinated. I believe that is more than enough to slow spread.

Because of how large the boost in immunity is, it should last longer than the 2nd jab. The chart showed the derivative going the correct way. The chart shows a definite change in the acceleration rate. That is incredibly encouraging. I reposted the link. The curves are going the right way with increased vaccinations. It is acceleration going down, the precursor to cases:

https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-ea ... 021-08-24/

The US is going to advise 3rd jabs. In my opinion later than they should:
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/16/us/p ... shots.html

To others:
Does anyone have a link to the Israeli study showing the drop off in Pfizer effectiveness at 5, 6, and 8 months?

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technolo ... uxbndlbing
"Recent data makes clear that protection against mild and moderate disease has decreased over time," US Surgeon General Vivek Murthy said. "This is likely due to both waning immunity and the strength of the widespread delta variant."

Other vaccines show effectiveness with a 3rd jab:
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa1703309

I was given a 3rd MMR as a young adult and because so few are properly vaccinated, my pediatrician made me get DTaP and MMR boosters before each of my children were born (so 5 MMR for me, 4 DTaP). I've had 37 flu vaccines in my life. So if you cannot tell, when in doubt, a booster.

Recall this all started with Pfizer releasing data that a 3rd jab as a booster was recommended:
https://www.cnn.com/2021/07/28/health/p ... index.html
The data posted online suggest that levels of antibodies that can target the Delta variant grow fivefold in people 18 to 55 who get a third dose of the vaccine.
.

Or about e^2. That gives a person about 4x the protection.

The idea that countries currently facing hospital occupancy crisis (Israel, USA) won't implement solutions is a non-starter. Israel is trying to evade a lockdown:
https://amp.ft.com/content/23cdbf8c-b5e ... 10606ab556

At this point, the USA for better or worse is past lockdowns too, in my opinion. So mask wearing and lots more jabs.

Lightsaber

Late edit:
https://medicalxpress.com/news/2021-08- ... s-30s.html

1.5 million have received 3rd booster shot in Israel
5.4 million 2-jabbed (58%) of 9.3 million.

This is a facinating study on a grand scale. I wonder what fraction will be willing to triple jab?

lightsaber wrote:

This is a facinating study on a grand scale. I wonder what fraction will be willing to triple jab?

Much less than the number of already vaccinated and none of those who refuse to vaccinate...

You will simply discourage people from the idea if you tell them they need a booster every few months and you will give the antivaxxer more reasons to rail against vaccine effectiveness and purpose in the first place.

Give it to the fragile and those who are exposed more frequently, but I'm afraid you shouldn't hope for a massive take-up.

J&J submitting data to FDA for booster:
https://news.yahoo.com/j-j-says-booster ... 50666.html
J&J said in a press release on Wednesday that after the booster shot, antibody levels were nine times higher than after the original single-dose vaccine.

I personally would like more information. Ln(9)~2.2. That is a significant improvement.

Lightsaber

lightsaber wrote:

J&J submitting data to FDA for booster:
https://news.yahoo.com/j-j-says-booster ... 50666.html
J&J said in a press release on Wednesday that after the booster shot, antibody levels were nine times higher than after the original single-dose vaccine.

I personally would like more information. Ln(9)~2.2. That is a significant improvement.

Lightsaber

I always wondered why J&J didn't go for two shots from the get go.

New data from Israel. The change in slope of the vaccinated post booster is staggering:
https://www.republicworld.com/amp/world ... drive.html

What do you call the unvaccinated during a pandemic?
- The control group

The control group slope didn't budge.

R for vaccinated over age 60 dropped (barely) below 1. I believe as Israel triple jabs more, as well as physical measures, we will see a sharp drop in cases.

The rapid divergence in R after 8/16 is impressive. This is definitive data. I thank Israel for providing such information to the world.

lightsaber wrote:

New data from Israel. The change in slope of the vaccinated post booster is staggering:
https://www.republicworld.com/amp/world ... drive.html

What do you call the unvaccinated during a pandemic?
- The control group

The control group slope didn't budge.

R for vaccinated over age 60 dropped (barely) below 1. I believe as Israel triple jabs more, as well as physical measures, we will see a sharp drop in cases.

The rapid divergence in R after 8/16 is impressive. This is definitive data. I thank Israel for providing such information to the world.

Adding the image for effect. It definately seems that the booster is needed.

Brazil will give a booster to elderly (age 80+) and vulnerable. I hope healthcare also receive to minimize transmission. Otherwise, with only 26.5% fully vaccinated, stay the course. I would lower the age to 65 too.

https://news.yahoo.com/brazil-covid-19- ... 06305.html

casinterest wrote:

lightsaber wrote:

New data from Israel. The change in slope of the vaccinated post booster is staggering:
https://www.republicworld.com/amp/world ... drive.html

What do you call the unvaccinated during a pandemic?
- The control group

The control group slope didn't budge.

R for vaccinated over age 60 dropped (barely) below 1. I believe as Israel triple jabs more, as well as physical measures, we will see a sharp drop in cases.

The rapid divergence in R after 8/16 is impressive. This is definitive data. I thank Israel for providing such information to the world.

Adding the image for effect. It definately seems that the booster is needed.

Thank you, I should have done that, but sometimes my cell phone won't grab the image address (I didn't even try).

It really has an effect!

Lightsaber

Boom.
Here we go..

Delta is going to charge the Unvaccinated more for health insurance.

https://www.cnn.com/2021/08/25/business ... index.html

Delta says starting September 12, any US employee who is not fully vaccinated will be required to take a weekly coronavirus test "while community case rates are high." The airline says those with a positive result will need to isolate and remain out of the workplace.
Beginning November 1, all unvaccinated Delta employees "enrolled in Delta's account-based health care plan will be subject to a $200 monthly surcharge."
"The average hospital stay for Covid-19 has cost Delta $40,000 per person," said the airline. "This surcharge will be necessary to address the financial risk the decision to not vaccinate is creating for our company."