i'm very surprised to see remdesivir mentionned in this article at all... Isn't this drug officialy not working at all against covid-19 , and as such should be banned because of perfusion side-effects ? (in addition to the fact that it seems to be known to increase the amount of virus genetic mutations in people treated with it)
Vaccines should end the pandemic, despite the variants, say experts
11–20 of 370 posts
Re: Vaccines should end the pandemic, despite the variants, say experts
#12These kind of pandemic tend to end themselves after about 20-30 months. We’re about half way there anyway.
How?
Re: Vaccines should end the pandemic, despite the variants, say experts
#13These kind of pandemic tend to end themselves after about 20-30 months. We’re about half way there anyway.
The last pandemic with a death toll anything like (actually much worse than) COVID-19 is the still-ongoing HIV pandemic. It's entering its 40th year.
Re: Vaccines should end the pandemic, despite the variants, say experts
#14Biden ended the pandemic.
And the good news is Facebook has pictures of all of us in masks and without masks.
Re: Vaccines should end the pandemic, despite the variants, say experts
#15>Galit Alter, professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and the Ragon Institute of MGH, MIT, and Harvard, said the fast-spreading U.K. variant seems able to evade some vaccine protection, and the South African variant appears able to skirt even more. Despite that, she said, none have completely escaped the body’s post-vaccination immune responses. Weak on facts and strong on persuasive language: >seems able to…
Yeah I make it a point to never trust the opinion of "experts" on such matters which can potentially create panic in society. It's just far easier to sound assuring than tell the naked truth as it is.
Most of these experts earlier said that the UK variant was nothing to worry about. Now we know it not only spreads faster but is also much deadlier. Same thing might happen here.
Re: Vaccines should end the pandemic, despite the variants, say experts
#16This is a hopeful but possible take. But the 501Y.V2 (B.1.351) and 501Y.V3 (P1) lineages have the mutation within the conserved region for coronaviruses near the spike protein cleavage site. These show massively (1000x) decreased monoclonal antibody binding for original genetic sequence designs. It's better for the mRNA vaccine produced human-body-made antibodies which show only 5-10x reduction in binding. But antibo…
The monoclonal data is less concerning since the human antibody response is polyclonal. It’s not surprising that this virus can escape from a single targeted antibody and if I were in pharm, this is why I wouldn’t spend billions on a mAb drug. I agree that the decreased convalescent plasma effectiveness is not ideal but I doubt this virus will be able to fully escape the mRNA vaccines on a population level.
Polyclonal antibodies against spike + t-cells + herd immunity should be enough to quell this pandemic. At least I hope so.
Re: Vaccines should end the pandemic, despite the variants, say experts
#17i'm very surprised to see remdesivir mentionned in this article at all... Isn't this drug officialy not working at all against covid-19 , and as such should be banned because of perfusion side-effects ? (in addition to the fact that it seems to be known to increase the amount of virus genetic mutations in people treated with it)
I’m as skeptical of your last parenthetical as you should be about remdesivir’s overall effectiveness. In any case, the effects are too small to matter.
Re: Vaccines should end the pandemic, despite the variants, say experts
#18These kind of pandemic tend to end themselves after about 20-30 months. We’re about half way there anyway.
How?
If we're lucky the virus mutates into a very transmissible but not very symptomatic or damaging to humans variant. It's speculated that's how the 1918 flu pandemic eventually ended.
Re: Vaccines should end the pandemic, despite the variants, say experts
#19What I don't understand is this: with tens of millions of people already vaccinated, why aren't we seeing a huge drive to collect plasma from vaccinated people with high level of antibodies? In the early days of the pandemic (about 1 year ago), I remember China sent a large amount of plasma to Italy.
Why can't the US do the same now? The US is sitting on millions of AstraZeneca vaccines (that are not even approvad by the FDA), and doesn't want to share. How about sending plasma?
Re: Vaccines should end the pandemic, despite the variants, say experts
#20What I don't understand is this: with tens of millions of people already vaccinated, why aren't we seeing a huge drive to collect plasma from vaccinated people with high level of antibodies? In the early days of the pandemic (about 1 year ago), I remember China sent a large amount of plasma to Italy. Why can't the US do the same now? The US is sitting on millions of AstraZeneca vaccines (that are not even approvad by…
Maybe because it's not profitable?