Derek Lowe over at Science has a roundup of the status of current (article published 29 June 2020) Coronavirus vaccine trials/research.
This roundup of current vaccine research/trials includes information about many vaccine trials, broken down by vaccine types. These types include (quotes are all from TFA:
- Viral Vectors
This class uses some other infectious virus, but with its original genetic material removed. In its place goes genetic instructions to make coronavirus proteins, and when your infected cells do that, it will set off an immune response.
Number of trials (per TFA): 9
- Genetic Vaccines
These take DNA or RNA coding for coronavirus proteins and inject that directly into the bloodstream. "Directly" isn't quite the right word, though – for these things to work, they have to be formulated and modified to survive destruction in the blood, to be taken up through cell membranes, and to be used for protein production once they're inside.
Number of trials (per TFA): 8
- Recombinant protein vaccines
Here we get to a technique that really is used for human vaccines. The previous two categories force your own cells to make viral antigen proteins, but here you're making them industrially and just injecting them directly. The advantage can be that such protein production can be accomplished in many different ways and is already done on a large scale. That said, every new protein is a new project, with its own idiosyncrasies.
Number of trials (per TFA): 6
- Attenuated Virus Vaccines
This is another well-precedented vaccination technique. It involves producing a weakened form of the actual infectious virus, one that is not capable of causing damage but can still set off the immune system. There are several ways to do this, and it's a bit of an art form involving taking the virus through a huge number of replications in living cells as you select for variants that are less and less harmful.
Number of trials (per TFA): (None listed)
- Inactivated Virus Vaccines
This is also one that's also been used in medical practice for many years, and it's another inactivation step beyond the attenuated viruses. Heat or chemical agents are used to damage the virus to the point that it can no longer infect cells at all, but the plan is for there to be enough of the viral material left unaltered to still raise an immune response.
Number of trials (per TFA): 4
(Score: 0, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @01:13AM (41 children)
https://www.henryford.com/news/2020/07/hydro-treatment-study [henryford.com]
(Score: -1, Troll) by NPC-131072 on Saturday July 04 2020, @01:33AM (19 children)
I did nazi [allthatsinteresting.com] this drug working. Unpossible [lewrockwell.com] orange man bad [cnn.com] - my money is on Gilead Remdesivir. [nih.gov]
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday July 04 2020, @03:16AM (18 children)
Your first instinct is to fucking *politicize* this. I can't say I'm surprised, or even all that disappointed, just disgusted to my very marrow. You sociopaths aren't worth the oxygen you breathe and if there's any justice you'll end up deepthroating a faulty Chinese ventilator with your lungs turning to liquid shit.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 3, Touché) by Bot on Saturday July 04 2020, @07:01AM (5 children)
It takes a lot of hypocrisy to point the finger towards who politicizes this treatment FOR THE SECOND TIME.
Account abandoned.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday July 04 2020, @07:50PM (4 children)
So you didn't notice that I was never one of the "orange man bad, orange man liked HCQ, therefore HCQ doesn't work" crowd? Boy, I have *forgotten* more about organic chemistry and pharmacology than your entire worthless clan has ever *learned.* And according to my diploma I'm a geologist!
Around early March, it occurred to me that nCov-2019 is not a "respiratory virus" per se, and I was speculating with my boss that it is likely provoking systemic, lopsided inflammation...and that HCQ might have some useful effects by bringing down the body's inflammatory response. Reports of spontaneous thromboses, DVT, pulmonary embolisms, and seemingly random, mysterious multi-organ damage bear this out, as does the ongoing investigation of interleukin-6 (IL-6) inhibitors in the inpatient therapeutic milieu. Were I a pharmacist in an inpatient setting I'd be taking D-dimer tests from any suspected Covid-19 admission and recommending LMWH in elevated cases (so long as they had the kidney function to handle it).
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 1, Offtopic) by Bot on Saturday July 04 2020, @09:39PM (3 children)
>So you didn't notice that I was never one of the "orange man bad, orange man liked HCQ, therefore HCQ doesn't work" crowd?
Which is not relevant to what I wrote. I notice, that you speak about politicization of that treatment now, while it happened earlier and from your side.
Maybe you did speak out earlier then I'd be wrong.
Account abandoned.
(Score: -1, Redundant) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @10:59PM
This is going to be hard from your Trump brain to take in, but the backlash was against his recommendations for unproven treatments with serious side effects, while at the same time saying the virus was a hoax.
I guess baseless accusations are perfectly fine from your side but measured criticism is literally white genocide. My favorite part is the hypocrisy and stupidity as some elite twats convince you that goose stepping is totally fine and liberals are only pissed about it because they hate yer freedums.
Fucking idiots
(Score: 5, Informative) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday July 04 2020, @11:38PM (1 child)
Again: I'm not a "joiner," and I've got only so much time and energy to point out when Someone Is Wrong On The Internet (TM). Like you pretty much always are. Besides which, I've largely kept quiet on HCQ because--and I know this is an entirely foreign concept to you--I HAVE A WORKING CONSCIENCE AND SET OF MEDICAL ETHICS.
Got that, you slavering, wild-eyed Opus Dei flunkie?! I don't want to be spreading ill-vetted, ill-tested information and potentially getting people killed. Things are moving very quickly and with limited oversight, and the entire field of immunomodulatory pharmacology is shaky and Protean at best--it's much, much worse when we don't actually know for sure what this fucking virus is doing. WHAT PARTS of the immune system is it suppressing, what parts is it kicking into overdrive, what are the knock-on effects, etc etc.
You don't know this, having never studied any of it, but there are dozens and dozens of different molecules, receptors, cell types, and biological feedback loops, positive and negative, involved in the immune response. Setting off one might upregulate three others, downregulate another, and as a result of that one being downregulated, put a damper on one of the first three but only after the concentrations of the aforementioned downregulated factor remain below X level for Y amount of time, etc etc etc.
Immunomodulatory drugs might only target one particular molecule, such as IL-6 as I mentioned below, or may, as HCQ does, broadly prevent a related family of immune responses from being activated. Their effectiveness may depend on where the patient is in the course of infection, on what his or her kidney/heart/lung/liver function is at any given time, and so on. An appropriate therapy for one patient may be deadly for another, or may turn deadly for the same patient if their vital signs or level of organ function changes.
In conclusion: shut the fuck up and let the grownups handle this.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by Bot on Monday July 06 2020, @09:12PM
I could repeat verbatim my previous comment, anyway, going OT, I don't see why you should censor yourself since you have a domain knowledge. We are not all brainwashed socialists, so when we read something we tend not to consider it the ultimate truth, just your opinion.
Account abandoned.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @07:59AM (1 child)
Can arrange a marrow transplant for a price. Interested?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @09:41AM
Need be a genetic vaccine, actually, given how many are flaunting their lack of one.
(Score: 0, Flamebait) by NPC-131072 on Saturday July 04 2020, @03:20PM (9 children)
Fangirling appreciated as always ms Hazuki but those of us on the morally superior left would never politicize something like this [twitter.com] wish harm on others, attempt to discredit a treatment for political point scoring or personal gain. [ahrp.org] Only Republicunts do that.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday July 04 2020, @07:53PM (8 children)
Hasn't it occurred to you yet that I'm not a "joiner?" I do my own thing. The group that loosely calls itself "the left" tends to be largely correct on most things (reality has a liberal bias by default, since "conservatism" entails tribalism and loyalty uber alles). But where they are wrong, I have no problem breaking ranks and telling them as much.
You are a worthless, shit-stirring troll, and not even a very good one at that. Your schtick is much too transparent and overplayed; the lack of subtlety causes people not to take you seriously. A good Poe should be indistinguishable enough from what it's attempting to satirize that most of the audience isn't sure whether it's satire or not.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @08:07PM (2 children)
Leave the outdated comedic quips to the has-been comedians.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday July 04 2020, @08:14PM (1 child)
I am as deadly serious as an incoming asteroid the size of Rhode Island, and this pandemic bears that observation out. "Conservatism" as a culture brings with it an emphasis on in-group loyalty and obedience so powerful than actual objective reality all too often falls by the wayside.
"Liberal" states are the ones weathering this disaster the best; look no further than New York State and especially NYC proper, my beloved and much-missed hometown, compared to...well, pretty much anywhere south of the Mason-Dixon line. The next couple of months are going to be a sea of virus-ridden blood in the Peoples' Republic of Cousinfuckistan, and as a direct result of "conservative" tendency to prioritize obedience and groupthink above independent thought.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @11:02PM
While convincing themselves they are the exact opposite.
(Score: 1) by NPC-131072 on Saturday July 04 2020, @08:18PM (4 children)
I think to be on the morally superior left is to distinguish yourself from the position you just took.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @11:14PM
Ok sock puppet, please give us more of your cloth based wisdom.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday July 04 2020, @11:23PM (2 children)
And what you "think" isn't worth the proverbial fetid pair of dingo's kidneys, as you've shown yourself to be a troll--a poor one, at that--from day one. No one on this site cares what you claim you think, and that word is much too charitable a use for what it is you're actually doing.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @11:32PM
HEY!
I care. I love shitting on idiots :D
(Score: 0, Troll) by NPC-131072 on Saturday July 04 2020, @11:52PM
I think Azuma Vs. Leftism is exactly why we'll never be frens.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @02:04AM (20 children)
Wow, studies are being done on a drug with no patents.
It's possible for R&D to get done without patents. So maybe more effort needs to be done to determine what R&D needs patents and what R&D doesn't so that we can reduce unnecessary patents from being issued and have more generics. Patents are a monopoly and should only be applicable to things that require them. Also perhaps the FDA hurdles to doing R&D on new substances that have never been tested on people before for anything should be reduced.
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Saturday July 04 2020, @02:25AM (19 children)
https://hmsa.com/help-center/when-does-a-drug-become-generic/ [hmsa.com]
I agree with you and I need to take notes on some ideas I've had regarding patents. I think the biggest problem is that no matter what I or anyone proposes, it will irritate and trigger someone. I think most people would agree it's fair for a company to make money on a patent, but somehow it needs to be reasonable, and other companies need to be licensed to make it as well. My fear is that the whole pharmaceutical research and manufacturing world is so used (addicted) to huge profits, that without the potential for huge profits, there might be (much?) less investment.
But to the point I really wanted to make: that hydroxychloroquine study, and many others like the recent one in Britain where they used dexamethasone on COVID-19 patients and had remarkable results, is more about "off-label" drug use. Which sadly, in the US particularly, doctors are reticent to do due to FDA regulations and lawsuits.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @03:08AM (18 children)
" I think most people would agree it's fair for a company to make money on a patent"
Patents should never be about what's 'fair'. To the extent that their existence is to serve what's 'fair' they should absolutely be abolished.
Per the constitution they are to promote the progress of the sciences and useful arts. They should only exist to serve a public interest. No one is entitled to a monopoly, IP is a privilege and should only exist to the extent it serves the public interest.
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Saturday July 04 2020, @04:00AM (17 children)
I agree with you. I just don't see how to fix it. Maybe I stayed out of these Internet forum / blog discussions too long. I love philosophy, but I'd rather (everyone) put effort into reality. I think capitalism has gone too far, especially in the medical world. I think tough price / profit controls are in order like was was done with food production during and after the Great Depression. But it's late and I'm tired and tomorrow I'll wish I could erase this because I might have a different inspiration.
That a Martin Shkreli can do what he did and get away with it shows how crippled our govt. is. (crippled by greed and love of money, and/or maybe fear of the "too big to fail"...)
(Score: 2, Interesting) by fustakrakich on Saturday July 04 2020, @04:26AM (3 children)
I just don't see how to fix it.
Start with compulsory licensing
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Saturday July 04 2020, @03:07PM (2 children)
I'm intrigued. How would that work?
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Saturday July 04 2020, @04:46PM (1 child)
Government tells the license holder they shall grant a license to people who want to produce and sell the product. I would presume the government will assign proper compensation. It's a little like eminent domain, but you still get to collect royalties. It is something we need very badly, so necessary inventions, like medicine, don't sit on the shelf waiting for the right buyer with the right price. Without compulsory licensing patents and copyrights on medicines and such are more like extortion.
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Saturday July 04 2020, @07:08PM
Agreed, and it's what I wrote several layers up. Thanks.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @04:44AM (1 child)
"I think capitalism has gone too far"
Patents are not capitalism. That's not to say they shouldn't exist but they are not capitalism and should only be used with caution.
(Score: 3, Informative) by RS3 on Saturday July 04 2020, @07:05PM
"Patents are not capitalism."
I never said they were. In fact, I made no direct interconnection or causation between them.
Not willing to discuss the philosophical definition of "capitalism" here, but I'll say that patents damage the free-market mechanism that could/should/would otherwise bring drug prices down to earth.
BTW, don't know if you caught it, but one of the news shows (60 minutes maybe?) did a segment on drug companies, patents, pricing, etc., maybe a year ago. Anyway, one of the things that came out: some drugs are no longer being manufactured because there's not enough profit, and some people are sick and dying and/or dead because they can't get that drug anymore. Some antibiotics were examples. Badly broken system due to systematic greed.
(Score: 2) by PiMuNu on Saturday July 04 2020, @06:35AM (4 children)
> I think capitalism has gone too far, especially in the medical world.
Most countries have a state-run health service; drug prices are negotiated at a national level.
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Saturday July 04 2020, @02:58PM (3 children)
Actually Medicare, the US's federal semi-socialized medical system for age 65+, really does have great power and sets many sort of standard prices. However, medical care providers and drug companies can still try to charge whatever they feel like charging. There's always that greed pushing for higher and higher prices. For example, and this has been chronicled well, someone I know was uninsured and ended up in hospital for a fairly moderate problem. Needed a CT scan and Medicare standard price was like ~$650, but hospital charged my friend ~$2,800. That's no lie nor exaggeration, and there are no laws forcing standard prices.
Medical insurance companies try to negotiate for Medicare prices, but it's a negotiation process (wasteful in itself) and they never quite get the Medicare rate.
That's why you've heard Bernie Sanders and others pushing for "Medicare for ALL".
Not sure how to stem the capitalism tide. Capitalism has saturated our political / legal system, and political/legal trumps medical.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @03:57PM (2 children)
Unless the law changed I thought the U.S. government wasn't allowed to directly negotiate prices?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @09:09PM (1 child)
Under 42 USC §1395w–111(i) DHHS is forbidden by current law for negotiating lower drug prices for drugs paid under Medicare Part D. Other programs, like Medicaid, Part C, the VA, etc. are still free to do so. The problem is the vast majority of drugs paid for by the government are under the Part D program and their ability to negotiate under the other programs is limited by the same provision.
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Saturday July 04 2020, @11:28PM
Thank you. I was thinking more of procedures, but I'm not sure if they negotiate them. They have huge tables of codes for procedures, hospital rooms, etc., and the price they'll pay. There are jobs for "medical coding" where they do something accountingy with the codes. From what hospital staff have indicated to me, they just have to accept what Medicare will pay. And generally the feeling was positive / optimistic. IE, whenever they heard the patient was covered by Medicare, it was always an "okay, you're covered for this or that procedure".
One thing I know that's a good thing- with most US health insurance, you can not just go to a specialist- you must be referred by your PCP (Primary Care Physician). Well, you can go but you pay full price out of your pocket. However, under Medicare you can generally "self refer" - just make an appt. and go. I did that frequently with my parents and a friend's mom.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @03:57PM (1 child)
That's probably true. I've thought about this a bunch and think that a quasi-public pharmaceutical development organization would likely make a big difference.
Research and production facilities can be set up via a quasi-public corporation using public monies (bonds perhaps?). This would be a non-profit organization whose primary function is to provide access to new and existing drugs *at the lowest price possible*.
This organization could then develop and manufacture new (and generic) pharmaceuticals and sell them *at cost*. What's more, Congress can ensure that this organization gets the right of first refusal [wikipedia.org] for development of new drugs created/discovered with government grants/support.
Any excess revenue would be plowed back into research on new pharmaceuticals.
Such an organization would have an incentive to create drugs that for-profit companies shun, like vaccines, malaria drugs, widely used generics. They can also develop/manufacture new, breakthrough drugs the research for which was done with public funds. Note that the quasi-public organization I'm suggesting should be *self-sustaining*.
All of the financials should be completely transparent as well.
This would have several positive effects:
1. Drugs developed can be provided at low(er) cost to those who paid (the public) for its development;
2. This would significantly mitigate efforts by bad actors to buy the rights to specific, widely used drugs and jack up the prices;
3. Financial transparency would shine a light on the enormous lie that charging hundreds of thousands of dollars for courses of new drugs to "recoup development costs."
There are other positives as well, I'm sure.
There are also potential downsides to this, although 'Gub'mint bad! Bad Gub'mint!' isn't one of them, wo unroll that newspaper.
(Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Saturday July 04 2020, @03:58PM
This is an unintentional dupe. Please mod parent 'redundant'.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 3, Insightful) by NotSanguine on Saturday July 04 2020, @03:57PM (1 child)
That's probably true. I've thought about this a bunch and think that a quasi-public pharmaceutical development organization would likely make a big difference.
Research and production facilities can be set up via a quasi-public corporation using public monies (bonds perhaps?). This would be a non-profit organization whose primary function is to provide access to new and existing drugs *at the lowest price possible*.
This organization could then develop and manufacture new (and generic) pharmaceuticals and sell them *at cost*. What's more, Congress can ensure that this organization gets the right of first refusal [wikipedia.org] for development of new drugs created/discovered with government grants/support.
Any excess revenue would be plowed back into research on new pharmaceuticals.
Such an organization would have an incentive to create drugs that for-profit companies shun, like vaccines, malaria drugs, widely used generics. They can also develop/manufacture new, breakthrough drugs the research for which was done with public funds. Note that the quasi-public organization I'm suggesting should be *self-sustaining*.
All of the financials should be completely transparent as well.
This would have several positive effects:
1. Drugs developed can be provided at low(er) cost to those who paid (the public) for its development;
2. This would significantly mitigate efforts by bad actors to buy the rights to specific, widely used drugs and jack up the prices;
3. Financial transparency would shine a light on the enormous lie that charging hundreds of thousands of dollars for courses of new drugs to "recoup development costs."
There are other positives as well, I'm sure.
There are also potential downsides to this, although 'Gub'mint bad! Bad Gub'mint!' isn't one of them, wo unroll that newspaper.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Saturday July 04 2020, @07:27PM
I absolutely agree!! I've commented many times here, other sites, and in person, that the whole medical world should be non-profit.
Interesting (to me anyway) observation: while both of my parents were ill over the past several years, I spent a lot of time in hospitals and other medical facilities. A fairly major metropolitan non-profit hospital system (4 hospitals, more than 1,000 beds total, more than 10,000 employees) had pretty lavish buildings, artwork, etc. A reasonable number of staff, including nurses (well, they're always overworked) but some had great attitudes, some pretty horrible really.
A for-profit small hospital, though, had an older building, small tight rooms, the only decorations I remember were personal photographs and cards on a bulletin board, and all of the staff were awesome, incredibly attentive and competent, got along like the best friends you've ever seen. So for-profit doesn't have to be bad or inefficient, but needs to be well run ... and we can't guarantee nor force that, so... back to your ideas!
So how do we get that to happen? Can we organize a letter-writing campaign to congress?
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Saturday July 04 2020, @10:23PM (1 child)
Ah, the "realist" equivalent of "I'm not racist, but . . . "
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Saturday July 04 2020, @10:39PM
No, it's that I'm not even slightly Greek; philosophy is best left to the experts. :)
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Thexalon on Saturday July 04 2020, @01:33AM (60 children)
Unless you're involved in a trial, you still aren't vaccinated, you aren't immune, and your odds of getting the virus if you're in the USA are now higher than they've ever been. So keep doing the things you know you need to do to not get it until the vaccines are widespread enough that it can be eradicated.
Oh, and apparently there's a nasty flu season expected too, just to add more to the craziness of this year.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @01:40AM (15 children)
Yeah, except dumb ass protesters fucking it up for everyone. I predicted the numbers would start spiking a few weeks after the protests started. Sure enough here it is.
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(Score: 5, Informative) by Thexalon on Saturday July 04 2020, @01:43AM (11 children)
There have been multiple studies on this: There is no evidence at all that protests have been what's been spreading Covid-19. The protesters you're talking about for the most part have been socially distancing and wearing masks and are outdoors. You're basically relying entirely on post hoc ergo propter hoc, which isn't actually proof of anything.
What's definitely a factor is large gatherings indoors. For example, attending one of those with sick people present is why Herman Cain is now in the hospital.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @01:47AM (4 children)
No, the protesters here in SoCal were not wearing masks and were not socially distancing while they looted and burn't down historic buildings. And the spike in cases is also right here.
(Score: 5, Informative) by barbara hudson on Saturday July 04 2020, @03:05AM (3 children)
But that's okay - the cops die at an average age of 60 from pre-existing conditions - 80% die from obesity and heart disease. Help save a pigs fife - defund the police so they have to get an honest job that requires them to get off their obese butts.
SoylentNews is social media. Says so right in the slogan. Soylentnews is people, not tech.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @02:39PM
"Help save a pigs fife"
STOP THE MUSIC!
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @03:45PM (1 child)
You weren't there, I saw the bullshit go down 3 nights in a row from my yard. Both antifa and white trash came in from other areas, were in large groups across the street from each other, no masks, and lots of clashes between them. You don't see this shit on the news coverage.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @11:16PM
You only hear about it from Anecdotal Cowards.
(Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @02:20AM (1 child)
That is the most amazing virus ever. It knows if you are protesting and will not spread!
(Score: 5, Informative) by Tork on Saturday July 04 2020, @06:23AM
Masks work.
🏳️🌈 Proud Ally 🏳️🌈
(Score: 1, Troll) by ChrisMaple on Saturday July 04 2020, @02:59AM (2 children)
Rioters, as distinct from protestors, try to ensure that they're not recognized. Claims to trace them and their contacts must be considered unfounded.
In any case, these things aren't spontaneous.They're planned in untelevised, unrecorded meetings, most likely in small hidden places. Perfect for transmission. Keep in mind that these are people who want to make trouble, so the desire to spread the disease is limited only by the desire to not be personally infected.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @03:07AM (1 child)
You mean, on Twitter and by text?
These are people who live in fear for their lives. In my country, we have first nations without safe drinking water supplies. They "make trouble" too. George Floyd "made trouble" when he cried for help, and for his mother, as he died.
You're either evil or clueless. I hope the latter, in which case, please go do some reading. Maybe investigate disparities in other nations - Indigenous communities in Colombia and First Nations in Canada, off the cuff - so that your personal local biases get less in the way of seeing the truth.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday July 04 2020, @03:18AM
There is a point where Hanlon's Razor ("do not attribute to malice what may be explained by stupidity") loses its edge. At some point, willful ignorance becomes malicious. The AC you're replying to has long since passed this point.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @03:22AM
There have been weeks of protests, CHAZzes and CHOPs since June. It's too soon for peer unreviewed "studies" to exonerate them.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @12:43PM (2 children)
The parent shouldn't be modded as spam. Someone needs to be punished abusing the spam mod.
According to the actual experts, a person needs to be exposed to quantities of the virus above some threshold in order to actually develop an infection. Weaker exposures won't result in an infection. Masks greatly reduce the extent to which infected people shed the virus. Outdoors, especially with any breeze, the virus is readily dispersed into the air, rapidly decreasing the concentration of the virus in any particular location.
There's considerable hypocrisy from a lot of people on the issue of spreading the virus outdoors. People are happy to condemn people attending outdoor parties and going to crowded beaches, saying they're being selfish and causing cases to surge. But some of these people are happy to defend the protesters. Many people on the right are quick to condemn Black Lives Matter protests but fail to mention the many people on the right who are attending counter-protests. A lot of the criticism seems to be politically motivated, not based on actual science. Otherwise, we would be more consistent about whether large outdoor gatherings are safe or not.
There were large protests in cities like New York, where cases haven't surged at all. There were also large protests in areas where cases are surging rapidly. If protests were the primary factor, shouldn't cases be surging everywhere protests occurred? The same goes for other large outdoor gatherings, which occur both in places where cases are surging and places where cases have not surged. At least in some states, cases are surging more in rural areas than urban areas.
There is undoubtedly some risk of spreading the virus outdoors in large crowds, but the data and the science just don't support this being a primary cause of cases surging. It's more likely that there's some contribution from the reopening of certain types of businesses such as bars. The uneven distribution of cases may also reflect demographic and cultural differences that affect people's willingness to follow guidance from government officials and scientists about how to prevent the spread of the virus. Where people are more likely to distrust those authority figures, they may be less willing to comply with recommendations like social distancing and masks. But I'd much rather have people gathering outdoors on beaches or in protests instead of gathering indoors. The risk isn't zero, but it appears to be much lower.
(Score: 0, Disagree) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @03:47PM (1 child)
New York was already at herd immunity levels before the riots started. Nice try.
(Score: 3, Informative) by NotSanguine on Saturday July 04 2020, @04:06PM
Where is the evidence for this? Or is it that because *you* said it, it must be true?
Except the data [ny.gov] doesn't bear out your statement.
So. You're either misinformed or lying. Which one is it?
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Saturday July 04 2020, @02:02AM (13 children)
Are you sure, or is that just the statistics talking? Several people have said the increasing numbers are due to better testing. I admit I'm pretty confused at this point. However, I watched an interview with a top epidemiologist / biostatistician (statistics again) at a major US university hospital / medical school, and I have a friend who is an NP / phd medical researcher and she is completely at peace over virus spread. She said CDC et al know enough about who has the disease and contact tracing is complete enough at this point. I'm wearing mask, washing hands, etc. - easy to do, better safe than sorry.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @02:19AM (5 children)
Orange man is only partially correct here - you measure it by deaths against recorded infections. Correcting for prevalence of obesity, diabetes and heart disease may show lower death rates but the transmission rate in some states remains higher than it should be.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @02:28AM (3 children)
The death numbers are borked because people who died with their head sticking through a windshield tested positive for covid after death. All causes of death that have a post mortem positive covid test died of covid on paper.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @03:04AM (2 children)
You mean in the USA? They aren't testing for covid in car accident fatalities. There isn't enough testing capacity for living persons, let alone DOA corpses. Why post that bullshit here?
Or do you mean in another nation? In which case: I don't believe you. Citation?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @04:30PM (1 child)
Google it yourself. Hospitals get paid more for covid deaths than stiffs that come in without a heartbeat, so they're testing and listing the cause of death as covid.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @11:30PM
Google says you're a fucking idiot.
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Saturday July 04 2020, @04:09AM
Not sure why you brought "orange man" into it- I did not refer to him at all. And please don't infer things and put words into my mouth (although I know you're the otherwise intelligent AC and pretty sure I know who your login is, but that's okay.)
Otherwise yes, I agree. Too many people have relaxed precautions far too much and I see it happening. The sad thing is that one idiot who won't wear a mask could be spreading virus to the rest of us who do wear masks. Not sure what to do about it. Then you have the idiots (criminals) who charge $7 (or much more) for 3 masks which before COVID-19 were available for anyone to freely grab in hospitals (because I was there a lot and saw them every day).
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @03:19AM (3 children)
Funny. I'm good friends with an epidemiologist. She knows I'm into stats, math, and computer modelling. She's worked with HIV/AIDS (longitudinal) and Ebola. She's "at peace" the way that visitors to hospices can be at peace. She's at peace the way she was when she was a resident and had to CPR a cold corpse because the person who brought it wouldn't admit that he hadn't checked on his mother for a week. There are a handful nations with sufficient contact tracing - S.Korea! - but she's convinced me about the coming tsunami of death which is coming as obviously as the ground to a parachutist. It's a big world, and it won't be a Black Plague, but it's already bad and if you think this is the worst of it, you should review contemporary models and try to see how you can wrangle such a result out of them, because barring China-style lockdowns or S.Korea-like hyperaccurate contact tracing, I can't.
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Saturday July 04 2020, @04:18AM (2 children)
You might be right. I forgot to add- the PhD researcher I know also said that even though the infection rates might rise, the death rates are dropping.
One of the things I remember hearing at the start of the pandemic is that it's nearly impossible to stop it from spreading; they just wanted to slow it enough that medical treatment and research wouldn't be overwhelmed.
During WW1, WW2, space race, and maybe other events we poured huge resources into the effort. Any thoughts as to why we're not ramping up medical research? I know there's increased activity, but not on the scale I'd like to see, and preferably well coordinated and collaborative.
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Saturday July 04 2020, @02:31PM (1 child)
IIUC, the second strain of the virus is more infectious than the first, though no more deadly. It *MAY* be less deadly, as people with higher virus levels of the second strain don't do any worse than those with lesser levels of the first strain. OTOH, they tend to *have* higher levels, so probably a wash.
That said, there are various indications which can be read as there being a higher level of immunity to COVID than has been assumed. (They can also be read in other ways. Whoops!)
When I speculate, my guess is that the models are all wrong, and that things aren't *quite* as bad as they're predicting. I'm assuming that antibodies don't persist, but that immunity is more dependent upon TCells which do persist. (That the TCells persist isn't known. I assume that to account for some of the data on susceptibility. There are other explanations.) Unfortunately, it's quite difficult to check on TCells.
That said, even if the models are correct, this isn't a civilization ending plague. It's nothing like "the plague years" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Journal_of_the_Plague_Year [wikipedia.org] , and civilization survived that just fine. The major long term problem will be the massive disability it leaves behind in the survivors, which we're only starting to understand, and which the press has been ignoring.
Caution: I'm a programmer, not an expert in the field. These statements are the result of casual reading I do think they're correct, but I don't put a huge amount of certainty in them.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Saturday July 04 2020, @07:57PM
Agreed. And your "caution" statement should apply to all of us implicitly. There are few true experts here. I would take Azuma Hazuki's advice on many things, esp. pharma. And several other people's of course. But most of us are just tossing around ideas and our limited knowledge (which is why I'm so against the mod system but I won't get into that here- even I'm weary of it.)
So there's another layer to think about. We know that as with most diseases, there's a Gaussian distribution of cases in that some people get exposed and never develop symptoms, and some die rather quickly. So that leads me to: well, a lot of the weakest people have died, so maybe the rest are stronger, therefore biasing the measurement of susceptibility.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @05:10AM
It isn't just better testing. Otherwise, hospitals wouldn't be running out of room, the positive rate wouldn't be increasing, excess deaths wouldn't be increasing, and certainly not all of them at once.
(Score: 2) by PiMuNu on Saturday July 04 2020, @06:53AM (1 child)
> I watched an interview
Do you have a link to that? Too many posts without citations in this thread.
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Saturday July 04 2020, @08:17PM
I'm a passive skeptic; you're an active one, and remind me of a couple of other people here. I would give a link to the interview but it involves giving away too much of my personal information.
Is there a way to "dm" on this system?
I may try to get the interview and host it with identifying things removed, but don't expect it soon. It was with this guy: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeffrey-morris-94804b8 [linkedin.com]
(Score: 0, Troll) by ChrisMaple on Saturday July 04 2020, @02:43AM (13 children)
The states with explosive coronavirus infection rates are California, Arizona, Texas, Florida, and Georgia. All are deep south states and the first three have serious problems with uncontrolled illegal immigration. The illegal immigration problem sits in the lap of Democrats. I suspect that some people are having to choose between risking coronavirus infection by not wearing a mask, and heat stroke by wearing a mask.
(Score: 5, Informative) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday July 04 2020, @03:19AM (7 children)
Isn't it usually the GOP types who love all that virtual slave labor they get from massive illegal immigration?
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @04:21AM
Hey now, don't stoop to ChrisMaple's politicizing. But yes, we love to look at well-kept lawns and gardens. And eat harvested food.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @06:49AM (5 children)
Shhh, don't point out Schrodinger's immigrants or their cognitive dissonance will collapse. You know, the one about how they are taking all our jobs and are inherently lazy at the same time. Where they are drug-running criminals and the cornerstone of our agricultural and construction industries.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday July 04 2020, @07:25PM (4 children)
I always did wonder about that, LOL. Like, how can Paco and Jose and Ramon be simultaneously stealing jobs and leeching off the welfare and unemployment? That's not physically possible.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @08:19PM (1 child)
Correct, not unemployment, but yes medical system.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @11:37PM
Yet another reason for universal healthcare, also just FYI most immigrants do pay taxes.
https://americasvoice.org/blog/immigration-101-immigrant-taxes/ [americasvoice.org]
The non-tax-paying lie is just another bit of misinformation to keep people angry at illusory problems. If they didn't pay taxes it would be TOO EASY to catch them.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @08:31PM (1 child)
oh they shamelessly get all kinds of benefits while working full time. i know because they've laughed about it to me. there are whole organizations dedicated to stealing from whitey.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @10:33PM
You mean, Banks? Apple? White Claw? Could you be more specific?
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @03:32AM
You are a fucking loon.
CA and AZ deep south states? Illegal immigration sits in the lap of Dems? Lawl you nutters just continue to deliver on the entertaining stupidity. Sadly it adds up to real life persecution of real people, so go fuck yourself for that part!
(Score: 2) by sjames on Saturday July 04 2020, @04:16AM
So many things wrong with your claims. Ca and Az are not Deep South. Tx is only sort of Deep South. All but Ca are red states. A mask isn't going to cause heat stroke.
(Score: 2) by PiMuNu on Saturday July 04 2020, @06:31AM
How does illegal immigration cause coronavirus?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @08:09AM
Georgia... deep south, eh? Next time, don't keep your marbles together with you compass, it seems you are prone to lose the latter quite easily.
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Saturday July 04 2020, @03:51PM
Immigration is irrelevant, when the US case load is so high. I think the key is "southern". I.e. places where it's warm and nice to be outside in groups of people. Outside is less infectious, but people don't STAY outside, and meet, gather, greet friends, and go some place together. This is encouraged by warm weather. Also by hot weather, though then people tend to congregate where there is cool-enough air conditioning. Like bars, theaters, etc.
One key thing that showed up early is that air flow patterns can be important in whether and how COVID spreads. That originally showed up in the early Wuhan restaurant case, where someone sitting at a different table caught the disease, and not everyone at the same table did. (Of course, some people don't have symptoms, and this was before there was any testing, so???)
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 1, Disagree) by ChrisMaple on Saturday July 04 2020, @02:48AM (12 children)
That is a false statement. So far as is known, anybody who has recovered from a COVID infection is immune.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @02:59AM (4 children)
So forget a vaccine. If it's only as effective as the flu vaccine it would be easier to just wear as mask, practice physical distancing, and wash your hands, because a vaccine that is only as effective as a flu vaccine, you're still going to have to do all those things anyway.
Give it 5 years, it will kill off everyone who can't resist it, and then life will go on. That's how we get from pandemic to endemic. Not exactly herd immunity the easy way with a vaccine, but that's how these things have worked through the ages.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @05:12AM
Hi Barb. The least you could do is sign in instead of pretending like you left.
(Score: 0, Disagree) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @08:00AM
"Coronavirus" is a family distinction. There are thousands of strains of them and immunity to one strain does not necessarily make you are immune to any other. Its like getting immunity to a Chihuahua bite and then complaining that you aren't immune to wolves, let alone foxes. But the fact of the matter is that phylogenetics of the known strains show that COVID-19 is still caused by SARS-CoV-2, which still has not evolved to the point where the proteins are different such that one vaccine won't work for the entire species and possibly sub-genus. But even if it didn't, targeting the strains and clades that are common in mutual travel areas or are the most widespread can drastically alter the number of infections. Unlike the other human coronaviruses that have been endemic for decades, centuries, or millennia, the cross-species transmission of SARS-CoV-2 happened recently. There just isn't the large variety of them out there so far like there are for the others.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @01:02PM (1 child)
Who modded this informative? It's actually a misleading post, particularly because it conflates issues with flu vaccines and the likelihood of only having short term immunity to coronaviruses.
The effectiveness of flu vaccines depends on preparing a vaccine for the correct strains of the virus. Influenza mutates rapidly, but there can be long term immunity to some strains. For example, older people were less susceptible to the Spanish flu. It's believed this is partly due to having been exposed to a similar strain of the virus, particularly the Russian flu in 1889.
The coronaviruses that infect humans don't mutate rapidly in significant ways. There are small amounts of genetic drift, which has been observed in SARS-CoV-2. But more significant mutations are rare. I agree that long term immunity is very unlikely. But there is likely short term immunity for a few months or perhaps a couple of years. This virus hasn't been circulating long enough to really know how long immunity lasts, but it's probably similar to other coronaviruses like SARS and MERS. Because the mutation rate in these coronaviruses is low, that removes one of the main challenges associated with flu vaccines. Even a vaccine that provides partial immunity, such as making infections much less severe, would be helpful. Later vaccines may provide more complete immunity. Even if vaccines only provide immunity for a couple of years, people can periodically be vaccinated to maintain immunity.
Issues with flu vaccines are caused by the high mutation rate associated with the virus. That's not an issue with the coronaviruses that infect humans.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 05 2020, @07:16AM
No shit. "If it's only as effective as the flu vaccine," GP says. Well, if it were that effective then this epidemic would be over in a matter of weeks. Coronaviruses aren't Influenza viruses, and differ in multiple important ways. And that is before you get into this Coronavirus in particular and its properties compared to the entire group of Coronaviruses.
(Score: 4, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @03:10AM (3 children)
Soooo what I'm hearing from you is that you're a bullshitter with no regard for the truth. We literally have studies showing reinfection of COVID-19. People with cold-coronavirus antibodies still catch cold-coronavirus seasonally, like rhinovirus. It doesn't matter how you slice it, you're spreading misinformation.
Please sit down and shut up. Or just fuck off. Don't care which.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @03:37AM (1 child)
Slowly it is becoming clear to more users around here that the rightwing nutters are anti-science and anti-truth led by the nose by the bullshitter-in-chief along with the sociopaths over at the Fox Network. Shep Smith was the last vestige of credibility, the other brown haired older guy (Chris Wallace??) wants credibility but he's a bit too slow on the uptake or eager on the propaganda fountain.
Laura Ingraham is a Nazi, no mistaking her salute. Same with Trump retweeting white supremacy bullshit.
I can only presume the Nazi infestation is worse than we think, or conservatives have been duped so hard they will sodomize themselves to "pwn the libs." I tried to find a source for that one, but the search terms bring up too much nasty shit to wade through.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday July 04 2020, @07:29PM
I've been yelling about this on here for years...that it takes this kind of disaster for people to open their eyes, much too late, does not bode well for us :/
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @10:37PM
But more importantly, we figuratively and allegorically do not have any such studies, or you would cite them. But if you cannot use words correctly, your understanding of virology is suspect. I see there is bleach-flavored Lysol on the store shelves now. Just saying.
(Score: 2) by PiMuNu on Saturday July 04 2020, @06:29AM
I never heard any evidence for that, just speculation - do you have a citation?
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Saturday July 04 2020, @03:56PM (1 child)
Sorry, but no. The evidence for long term immunity to COVID is non-existent. There is lots of evidence that the antibodies aren't reliably persistent. (Of course, perhaps it's the TCells that are more important, but those are so hard to test for that nobody does.)
OTOH, it *is* expected that there is a short term immunity. Just what "short term" means in this context is a bit unsure, but it's probably longer than a couple of months. And perhaps the second case will be a lot milder. Perhaps. There's no evidence indicating that it will be worse. (Unlike, say, Dengue fever.)
That said, I'm a programmer, not a medic, so take this with the appropriate grain of salt.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @10:40PM
No, there isn't. You are wrong, mistaken, misinformed, possibly ignorant. Where do you get such wild speculation from? Are you afraid?
(Score: 2) by legont on Saturday July 04 2020, @03:05AM (2 children)
For this one it would be easy to make vaccine, but it appears nobody wants to; not yet anyway. https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/06/swine-flu-strain-human-pandemic-potential-increasingly-found-pigs-china [sciencemag.org]
"Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @03:12AM (1 child)
That's not strictly true. This is another H1N1 and you might be aware that the last major H1N1 scare, we had flu vaccines available, and they were (and are still) not effective enough to prevent epidemics.
Making a flu vaccine, right now, is quite doable. Making one which is effective, even for a single variant, is still not.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 04 2020, @01:23PM
This is a pig flu - getting arrested by the pigs will make you immune.