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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

#241

Post by ghc »

petertodd wrote: post #6
ghc wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interestingly, the mRNA vaccines produce superior immunity compared to getting infected, due mainly to the two dose regimen. For similarly long-lasting natural immunity you'd probably need to get infected with covid twice.

Do you have a source for that?

My wife is an immunologist who works on this at BioNTech. She explained it to me that this is expected and the data matches it. She explained why as well but there's a big gap in my undergrad-level understanding of bio and her phd + years of experience in the field, so it went way over my head I'm afraid.

Re: Current RNA vaccines protect against worrying coronavirus variants

#242

Post by chitowneats »

Pyramus wrote: post #168
chitowneats wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many of us have preexisting immunity. For that population, the marginal benefit of vaccination is zero. People should be informed about the risks.

Not really. If you are talking about pre-existing immunity from prior infection, the benefit may be less, and in fact it is recommended not to vaccinate within 6 months of infection. If you are talking about innate immunity or cross-immunity from SARS-Cov-1 it's super rare and hasn't been shown to be relevant in most Western countries. To see the (reduced) benefit even with prior infection just look at the numerous r…

It's also riskier for most folks to drive a car than to catch Covid. I agree that people should look at their specific case and do honest risk/benefit analysis.

Most of what I've seen, however, feels more like herd mentality behavior based on one's political leanings. Or people feeling they genuinely don't have a choice, given impending requirements and restrictions from their local governments and employers.

Edit: not sure why I'm being downvoted. It should be common knowledge at this point that people in their 20's, 30's, and 40's have a higher risk of automobile accident, suicide, drug overdose, etc, than of covid death.

Re: Current RNA vaccines protect against worrying coronavirus variants

#243

Post by yonaguska »

greg5green wrote: post #119
loxias wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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 thou…

What about people that personally know those military personnel? By that extension, what about those who know of those military personnel? Can we extend the range of people that are allowed to be skeptical to those that know of the many failed medical experiments done on people?

Are we allowed to be skeptical because pfizer and co are making record breaking profits on an emergency authorized vaccine. That, in the USA, can only be authorized if there are no other approved treatments for covid-19.. meanwhile, the rest of the world is using ivermectin, hcq, etc to successfully treat symptoms? Can we be skeptical of the fact that the pharmaceutical companies clearly have some political influence over the medical field, and have been using that to push this vaccine? Am I allowed to be skeptical of something that is being pushed by companies that have all paid millions in fines over other previous actions? Or am I allowed to have issue with the fact that these same pharmaceutical companies have been caught paying social media influencers to promote the vaccine, while social media companies actively ban people for expressing doubt?

How about expectant mothers and women planning on having kids? There have been reports that menstruation cycles of women and women that have been in close proximity to people recently vaccinated have been adversely affected.

Re: Current RNA vaccines protect against worrying coronavirus variants

#244

Post by XorNot »

wycy wrote: post #231
lamontcg wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"modest antibody evading capabilities“ This generally means that a pseudovirus built with the mutated spike escapes some monoclonal antibodies and has reduced neutralization titers against convalescent sera, which is fairly normal and doesn't add up to an escape mutation. When it mutates enough to form an actual escape mutation that will probably come at a cost to the virus for transmissibility/virulence/viral load b…

> the more it'll have to make those costly evolutionary choices and become less virulent Why would evolution select for less virulence in a virus like this? Given covid doesn't rely on symptoms to spread like the common cold seems to, it would seem like the evolutionary pressure would be the opposite. Rather than moderate symptoms, instead jack up viral loads in the host as quickly as possible to spread before the im…

There's physical limitations on what it can do, basically.

Every mutation runs the risk of reducing its binding affinity to ACE receptors to get inside cells - or might impede cell entry functions.

Given the amount of infection out there, whatever "easy" mutations might've been available to it clearly haven't been very useful in increasing its rate of spread - and haven't touched anything the vaccines target.

So it's quite likely that whatever needs to happen to evade the vaccines is otherwise deleterious to its virulence.

Re: Current RNA vaccines protect against worrying coronavirus variants

#245

Post by aeyes »

cetiniz wrote: post #238
DiogenesKynikos wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The AstraZeneca and Sinopharm vaccines have similar efficacy: they're about 80% effective at preventing symptoms. They're even more effective at preventing serious illness and death. The Seychelles is still 40% unvaccinated. Even people who are vaccinated have some chance of getting infected, though if they get infected, their chance of showing symptoms is lower, and their chance of ending up in the hospital is much…

It would be easier believing you if you didn't spend all your time on this site defending China...

Just have a look at the (non China) data from a real world Sinovac vaccination campaign yourself: https://www.minsal.cl/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Effectivene...

I see 67% effectiveness of preventing symptomatic cases for Sinovac. I'm not sure where the 80% comes from, they could be talking about AstraZeneca.

Re: Current RNA vaccines protect against worrying coronavirus variants

#246

Post by trompetenaccoun »

tinus_hn wrote: post #213
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

‘Modest evading capabilities’ means there is some protection. It’s just a glass half full or half empty statement.

It means whatever you read into it, it's not in any way scientific, or even just objectively quantifying an effect.

The current hysteria has really opened my eyes in regards to mass media. We all know mainstream reporting is bad in fields we're experts in, but with the many crazy and often self-contradicting things that are currently reported you don't even have to have any expertise to see the problems in the story.

Re: Current RNA vaccines protect against worrying coronavirus variants

#247

Post by stjohnswarts »

prox wrote: post #156
lamontcg wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"modest antibody evading capabilities“ This generally means that a pseudovirus built with the mutated spike escapes some monoclonal antibodies and has reduced neutralization titers against convalescent sera, which is fairly normal and doesn't add up to an escape mutation. When it mutates enough to form an actual escape mutation that will probably come at a cost to the virus for transmissibility/virulence/viral load b…

In a r/askscience , there was a report that they are also working on a surface identifying vaccine, which doesn’t mutate (as much?), instead based on the spike protein. They didn’t earlier because it takes a longer time to develop and is harder.

vaccines don't "mutate" ?? Are you saying they're developing more broadband vaccine that can handle more mutation by the virus?

Re: Current RNA vaccines protect against worrying coronavirus variants

#248

Post by bart_spoon »

torcete wrote: post #197
killingtime74 wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe you should ask for sources instead. Authority is the wrong thing to trust in science

However, isn't this how Bayesian thinking works? You give a higher prior to your believe depending of the source.

Yes, but in this case authority would be your prior, and a source would be the data to update that prior. If you are only relying on authority, you are solely going off of your personal biases, which while potentially informative, isn't as useful as actual data.

Re: Current RNA vaccines protect against worrying coronavirus variants

#249

Post by bart_spoon »

randomsearch wrote: post #155
killingtime74 wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe you should ask for sources instead. Authority is the wrong thing to trust in science

Authority is constantly used as an effective source of trust in science.

There is also a massive reproducibility crisis in science, and the two points are not not unrelated.

Re: Current RNA vaccines protect against worrying coronavirus variants

#250

Post by mywittyname »

csunbird wrote: post #162
takeda wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The side effects you get is your body immune system fighting an intruder. The reason why second shot is typically worse is because your body already produced antibodies so when you get 2nd shot it immediately goes into attack mode. BTW: different people have different immune systems, and their body reacts differently. I got my first dose in the morning. By afternoon I just felt tired and wanted sleep (I felt like I d…

I had exactly the same reaction to the first dose, except I had muscle pain in the vaccinated arm for 3 days. Everyone says the second dose is worse although.

Mine wasn't. I had some very mild soreness at the shot site. I felt well enough to go to the gym 5 hours after my shot.

Not to detract from people who did have side-effects, merely pointing out that it's possible to have none.

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