191–200 of 204 posts
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Deprivation equals poverty. Asian in Britain will primarily be Indian/Pakistani descent. I wonder if this is vitamin d related? Darker complexion of black and Asian could cause higher risks of vitamin d deficiency in UK.
But Indian/Pakistani aren't dying at much higher rate in their own country or are they? I've no data.
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Hand sanitizer is also easy to manufacture and I haven't seen it in a local store for over 10 weeks. The ease to manufacture is just one of the steps to getting it on the shelves. Also getting vitamin D from the sun isn't an option for some people, especially those with darker skin. The difference between masks and vitamin D is that one is proven to work and one might work. If vitamin D doesn't help as much as people…
What does "proven to work" mean with regard to masks? A lot of the measures put in place are unproven but thought to be reasonable. Hand washing and social distancing appear to be the most important. That means soap and 6+ feet for at least the next 2 years. That is definitely doable. I don't see masks as a long-term strategy.
When the primary vector of spread is through water droplets expelled while talking, coughing, or sneezing, I would think the importance of reducing the travel distance of those droplets would be self evident.
It’s an interesting counter factual to imagine how differently the media would be covering the situation if the genders were reversed and women had about twice the chance of dying from COVID-19..
> being male (hazard ratio 1.99.. It’s an interesting counter factual to imagine how differently the media would be covering the situation if the genders were reversed and women had about twice the chance of dying from COVID-19..
> being male (hazard ratio 1.99.. It’s an interesting counter factual to imagine how differently the media would be covering the situation if the genders were reversed and women had about twice the chance of dying from COVID-19..
I'm surprised they even mentioned this, considering how often my wife has told me to shut up about my "man cold"
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It means poor. It's unclear to me (only skimmed the figures) if the various ethnic/racial hazard factors correct for poverty (deprivation) or not.
They took that into consideration: > People from Asian and black groups are at markedly increased risk of in-hospital death from COVID-19, and contrary to some prior speculation this is only partially attributable to pre-existing clinical risk factors or deprivation;
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Another critical question: Why hasn't this been properly researched, yet? There were indications before, that Vitamin D insufficiency increases risk of respiratory diseases.
because big pharma wont get rich.... err richer from vitamin d.
It seems like a lot of people are interpreting this data as causal. I've already had people tell me they were surprised to learn that smoking protects against Covid! Here's a fantastic explanation of why you should not let your brain tell you that you're learning about things that cause Covid complications and death: https://twitter.com/EpiEllie/status/1258607277357006849
You're much more likely to have lung cancer if you smoke than if you don't -- but once you DO have lung cancer, a history of smoking makes keytruda more likely to work.
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Sunnier countries can still have large vitamin D deficient populations. I read a study regarding the correlation between mental illness and vitamin D deficiency a few years ago, and Italian patients were still often very deficient. If people don't go out in the sun enough, or wear too much sun cream, it doesn't matter how sunny it is.
Also worth noting that Europe in general is really far north compared to the US. Spain is on the same latitude more or less as NYC.
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This is a real effect. Smoking paralyses the cilia; about 4–6 days after cessation, the cilia become active again and start to bring up mucus from the lungs. The good news is that these symptoms are temporary. Public health communications on the benefits of cessation don’t usually mention this. I wonder if that’s a mistake. I would have thought it puts a lot of people off quitting, and maybe if they knew what was hap…
This is definitely useful to know. I reckon some smokers suffering from this upon withdrawal would suspect immunosuppression, and choose to continue. When I have a week or so apart from the crowds, I’ll see how long it takes to push through those symptoms. (I thought if withdrawal causes immune system suppression, this effect could explain the apparent COVID statistic correlation mentioned by 0-_-0 in parent comment,…
(This would explain why former smokers are worse off, since they have residual lung damage but no protective nicotine.)
Of course this is all quite hypothetical, and may turn out to be wrong, but I gather it’s biochemically plausible.