Coronavirus Outbreak: Part 2

Ha! I think we know we don’t always agree- but I completely agree!

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I’ll second this thought! I’ve been really impressed w/ the dissection of data shared here.

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I agree with you, and the idea of letting this one max it and then not open a new one was kinda what I had in mind. Not a direct lock today.

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Thank you to everyone here for being civil and mature. We should all be able to listen, understand, respect, and learn from other views. When we start putting up a wall or silencing others is when we compromise our very important free speech. :slightly_smiling_face:

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Thanks for the input. I wasn’t referring to that retracted article. I was referring to one in 2020, but I won’t say more given the concerns about my comments confusing or misleading people about the vaccines.

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I like the idea of letting this thread run its course and then not starting a new one. And I nominate @Pod to post the very last post (the last one was automatically capped at 10,041 (or 2) - not sure if that will hold true).

Here is the very first post @Pod made back on January 29, 2020, when Covid was just a glimmer in our collective eye:

By the way, the Vox article that she shared is fascinating with 2020 (heh) hindsight. This part in particular turned out to be unintentional foreshadowing:

Julia Belluz

I’ve read that the virus can spread even when people aren’t showing symptoms, like the recent case in Germany. What do you make of that?

Isaac Bogoch

I want to see more data to support the notion that truly asymptomatic people may have transmitted the infection. Even if there have been cases of asymptomatic transmission of this infection — those will be typically rare cases and with just about every other respiratory tract infection known to humankind, those are not the people who are driving an epidemic.

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I remember reading a lot about the German case because I was concerned as soon as I heard the phrase “asymptomatic transmission”. The crazy thing about the German case is that at first it was reported that the person was asymptomatic, but then later it came out that she had taken fever reducing medicine before the business meeting where the other people were exposed.

So even after that situation, no one really knew if asymptomatic transmission was possible.

Also, it raises the question of what asymptomatic means … many people with very mild symptoms would say they had no symptoms if asked, but upon detailed questioning, it may turn out that a medical professional would define the person as symptomatic. How does a person with allergies, everyday discomfort, fatigue from working all day and then coming home to take care of 2 kids, etc know if they have very mild Covid symptoms?

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Made You Look! :wink:

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A professional summary from MLE on the latest in the possible link between myocarditis and vaccination.

Highlights:

Is the rate of myocarditis after vaccination (i.e. observed) higher than the rate of myocarditis in the background (i.e. expected)?
Yes. The observed rate is higher than the expected rate. So, myocarditis is probably due to the vaccine.

What are the case details?
There are now 484 cases of myocarditis following vaccination among people <30 years old in the United States. Among the 484 patients, 67% (or 323 cases) had been fully investigated by the CDC. Among the 323 investigated cases…
-96% (309 patients) were hospitalized
—295 of these patients have been discharged from the hospital. 79% had full recovery of symptoms
—9 were still hospitalized at the time (2 were in the ICU)
-The majority of symptoms popped up, on average, 4 days after vaccination
-Myocarditis is higher among males and higher after the second dose

There is good news though. We expect 4-6% of people to die from myocarditis. We haven’t seen that death rate of vaccine-induced myocarditis, which is encouraging.

Does benefit outweigh risk?
Yes, the benefits still clearly outweigh the risks for COVID-19 vaccination in adolescents and young adults.

COVID19 is still very much a risk. And there have been 133 million vaccine 2nd doses administered and 636 reported myocarditis cases as of June 11, 2021.

The CDC also ran some future projections. For every 1 million vaccinations among males aged 12-17, 5,700 COVID19 cases will be prevented, 215 hospitalizations prevented, and 2 deaths prevented. On the other side, for every 1 million vaccinations, there would be 56-69 myocarditis cases.

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If you are unvaccinated, you are 120 times more likely to die of Covid than if you are vaccinated. The vaccines prevent over 99% of Covid deaths and as much as 95% of Covid hospitalizations. Almost every Covid death (a little less than 300 a day currently) is entirely preventable. At this rate 100,000 Americans will needlessly die this year, more if a variant starts spreading. Please get vaccinated and encourage your loved ones to do so!

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I have been shocked by the fact that hardly anyone under 12 is wearing a mask except on the buses. There are soooo many people here! At home (at least before we left ) most people was were still wearing masks indoors. I do not like being around so many people. All I can think is what germs are flying around? Although it wrecked my health ironically I didn’t get any colds during the pandemic! I’ll be one of those people masking indoors for the rest of time…if I go inside anywhere again! I’m glad my unvaccinated nephews are not on this trip!

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Delta is doubling every two weeks, so highly likely it will be the dominant variant in the US by mid July.

Israel is ahead of the US in vaccinations (57% vs 47% fully vaccinated) so it’s interesting to see how Delta is impacting them.

The good news is it looks like the vaccines ARE still effective at preventing severe illness even with Delta. The not-so-good news is that the vaccines may not be as effective at preventing infections as they’ve been with the other variants.

So anyone unvaccinated that was counting on everyone else getting vaccinated to bring the spread down, that plan may be out the window.

Israel’s 7 day average of new cases per day was under 20 total nationwide for almost 3 weeks (population of 9M). Now it’s back over 100 again. And the early data is that 40-50% of the new cases are in people who have been vaccinated. It’s still early, so that could be just a temporary blip, but bears watching.

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YLE helped create this in case it’s helpful to anyone else. She also did an interesting analysis of a study regarding the risk of birthday gatherings.

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The numbers of people who continue to get infected there is concerning, especially since they are highly vaccinated. As you’ve said, the vaccines still seem to protect against hospitalizations and deaths, however. Multiple stories this week about doctors noticing deaths occurring only in the non-vaccinated. Cases are beginning to rise in some places, with correlation to vaccine rates.

But as has been warned for months, we are staring at a wholly preventable tragedy caused primarily by obstinacy for obstinacy’s sake.

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Based on the context of the rest of the post, I think he just meant to say "un"vaccinated. :slight_smile:

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I think you should correct this obvious typo before an anti-vaxxer takes this and runs with it.

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YIKES! Fixed. whew.

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That’s what I hope b/c I don’t’ need anymore insecurity in my life right now :laughing:

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and I deleted my question to not add to the confusion :wink:

This thread was a big factor in getting myself and my family vaccinated when we did, so thank you everyone for helping me evolve a bit on this. As many have said, it’s a very minor thing to go through for proven high level protection. I respect everyone’s choice, and especially for those who had covid and have antibodies, the remaining risk can be hard to calculate. But at this point I honestly feel bad for the unvaccinated who get covid the same way I feel bad for people with financial trouble who keep going to the casino. It’s their right, but it’s a gamble that can backfire.

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