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Current RNA vaccines protect against worrying coronavirus variants

nature.com

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Re: Current RNA vaccines protect against worrying coronavirus variants

#111

Post by sterlind »

reedjosh wrote: post #94
garmaine wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Go to your local hospital and see for yourself how deadly the disease is.

I can't just walk in. That said I know several people that have had it. Some elderly with existing conditions. Worst case was my aunt who got pneumonia from it. She's in her mid sixties and diabetic. She was in the hospital for a week. Was in the emergency room with my son a few months back, not overflowing or anything, but I wasn't there to track Covid cases.

my coworker's parents caught it. they were in their 50s. the mom became severely ill and was hospitalized for weeks. the dad died. my coworker himself got it and was mostly fine.

it's really hard to intuit how wildly variable this disease is when you only have a couple personal data points and distrust/feel detached from the statistics being reported, but it's real.

Re: Current RNA vaccines protect against worrying coronavirus variants

#112

Post by xwolfi »

ddeck wrote: post #90
simonCGN wrote: post #65

It it a Biontech vaccine. Pfizer is only the manufacturer. After all, you also do not call the MacBook a Foxconn Laptop.

Pfizer (and Fosun) is also the distributor, ran the trials, and handled much of the public/regulator/media facing communications. As such, the Pfizer branding is not surprising. Production is a multi-step process involving both Pfizer and BioNTech. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pfizer%E2%80%93BioNTech_COVID-...

In China we call it Fosun/Biontech and that's fine. I would never call it the Fosun vaccin out of respect for the people who actually made the breakthrough.

Re: Current RNA vaccines protect against worrying coronavirus variants

#113

Post by vmception »

takeda wrote: post #108
vmception wrote: post #33

I literally saw the opposite headline about Pzifer versus a strain in India today The actual article said "modest antibody evading capabilities“ I hate that the internet has become this way

The article that I saw today was contradicting itself. In one place it said that there are 3 mutations and that vaccine might not work on it, and in another place that it should. My understanding is that at this point we don't know yet. The actual testing would probably require a vaccinated person to be exposed to that strain. Chances are that vaccine is probably still fine.

yes, as with all the other variants they should just say "we don't know yet, let's find out", but instead they defer to some scientific language of "no evidence that it protects" that the general population cannot relate to

Re: Current RNA vaccines protect against worrying coronavirus variants

#114

Post by greg5green »

chitowneats wrote: post #86
loxias wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I have an appointment to get my first jab in 43 hours from now and I am bouncing back and forth between getting it and cancellation. Cancellation??!??! WTF? Why? You have a free, safe, live-saving vaccine being offered to you! Why would you not take it?? Putting aside the fact that not being vaccinated is a horrible selfish act that hastens the evolution of a more virulent strain and more death, don't you want to r…

It is an emergency authorization vaccine. We haven't had the full trials. No one can honestly claim these are safe long term. In fact, they don't. The manufacturers do not assume any liability for you choosing to consume their experimental product. https://www.cnbc.com/2020/12/16/covid-vaccine-side-effects-c...

If you're in the US, this is one of the dumbest reasons to use against COVID-19 vaccines, since all vaccines have had the same treatment since 1986 via the National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act.

Re: Current RNA vaccines protect against worrying coronavirus variants

#116

Post by TheGigaChad »

petertodd wrote: post #19
timr wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> [1] A glaring counterexample to your hypothesis is Brazil (Manuas) where prior infections (as high as 60%) didn't stop the P1 variant from ripping through. The prior infection estimates for Manaus were simply wrong . They were based on a paper that "adjusted" the observed seroprevalence rates upward by a factor of ~3x. The parsimonious conclusion is that these corrections were too aggressive and ended up over-estim…

Conversely, we can make the same argument in the opposite direction with the example of Seychelles, which in spite of the highest vaccination level in the world, is still seeing significant growth in cases: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-56992121 Apparently they're using 40% Astra Zeneca, 60% Sinopharm; hopefully the issue is simply the latter being ineffective. But as all the success stories with vaccination…

The Seychelles are using Chinese junk.

Re: Current RNA vaccines protect against worrying coronavirus variants

#117

Post by kjeetgill »

simonCGN wrote: post #65

It it a Biontech vaccine. Pfizer is only the manufacturer. After all, you also do not call the MacBook a Foxconn Laptop.

I get where you're at but if you go to the pharmacist and ask which one they have they're going to call this one the Pfizer one.

Re: Current RNA vaccines protect against worrying coronavirus variants

#118

Post by simonCGN »

xwolfi wrote: post #112
ddeck wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pfizer (and Fosun) is also the distributor, ran the trials, and handled much of the public/regulator/media facing communications. As such, the Pfizer branding is not surprising. Production is a multi-step process involving both Pfizer and BioNTech. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pfizer%E2%80%93BioNTech_COVID-...

In China we call it Fosun/Biontech and that's fine. I would never call it the Fosun vaccin out of respect for the people who actually made the breakthrough.

Good to know. That sounds more reasonable than just Pfizer.

Re: Current RNA vaccines protect against worrying coronavirus variants

#119

Post by greg5green »

loxias wrote: post #88
dnautics wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I advocate getting vaccinated (I am myself) but if people don't want to put foreign substances into their bodies, we should respect their choices, especially since the long-term risk profile is unknown (we are pretty sure it's safe, but who can know?)

> we should respect their choices Honestly, why should I do that? I would if their choices only affected themselves. People have a right to control their own destiny. But their choices affect me, and, more importantly, those I care about. So no, I don't respect anyone's "choice" to be an unvaccinated asshole, increasing the chance that people I care about will die. I don't respect the "choice" to aide a foreign micro…

> But their choices affect me, and, more importantly, those I care about. So no, I don't respect anyone's "choice" to be an unvaccinated asshole, increasing the chance that people I care about will die

I only respect those that choose to be unvaccinated if they:

1. have had adverse effects to a previous vaccination (like the Anthrax garbage they injected into military personnel or have allergies to PEG)

I really thought I had more than one

Re: Current RNA vaccines protect against worrying coronavirus variants

#120

Post by bawolff »

sigmaprimus wrote: post #92
adgjlsfhk1 wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The very TLDR response to this is that MRNA is temporary and not self-replicating. Within a few hours of being administered, all the MRNA in the vaccine has been broken down by the body into amino acids. MRNA can't mutate because it doesn't replicate. It just produces proteins.

Thank You, that is what I needed to hear and it sounds reasonable, what sort of proteins does it produce? Just the spiked ones or longer strands like DNA? Could You also offer up another TL;DR answer as to why the booster seems to present significantly more side effects? Thanks

FYI DNA, is not a protein.

The mRNA molecules in the vaccine just contain the instructions for the spike protein. https://berthub.eu/articles/posts/reverse-engineering-source... has a good breakdown of what specificly it makes.

To use an analogy to a computer - DNA is like the hard drive (long term storage but slow), RNA is like RAM (short term, degrades easily, but easy to transport and gets info where it needs to go), ribosomes are like the CPU (executes the code in the RNA, outputs a protein). Normally, DNA gets copied into RNA, which instructs the ribosome what protein to make. The vaccine is like inserting a fake message. The ribosomes see RNA and follow the instructions, but the RNA came from the vaccine instead of the cell's DNA. This is one of the reasons why the vaccine is so safe, because RNA just naturally breaks down very quickly in the body.

Booster generally causes more side effects, because the body has seen the spike protein before (from the first vaccine) so it recognizes it faster and mobilizes a more robust response. In a certain sense, its already done a practise run, so the body kicks things into high gear right away.

[IANAD]

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