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The UK’s delta surge is collapsing

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Re: The UK’s delta surge is collapsing

#191

Post by AndrewBissell »

newsyyswen wrote: post #53
runawaybottle wrote: post #50

Do we have conclusive numbers on how long these vaccines last? I’m reading that Pfizer lasts about 6 months? There’s no way there won’t be a surge again next summer if that’s the case.

There are no conclusive numbers on how long they last, because there has not been a significant drop-off in efficacy yet. There is some evidence that booster shots after 6 months can provide better even better protection than the second shot after 3-4 weeks, but it's not clear whether they will be necessary yet, especially when so much of the world is still desperate to get the first two shots in peoples' arms.

There's been enough drop-off in the Pfizer vaccine that Israel is starting boosters for people 60+. Their estimate is that protection against mild disease has dropped to 40% and protection against hospitalization to 88%. https://swprs.org/covid-vaccines-the-good-the-bad-the-ugly/

Re: The UK’s delta surge is collapsing

#192

Post by munificent »

timr wrote: post #162
munificent wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From the Nature article you linked to: > The studies did not evaluate rates of less-severe illness or debilitating ‘long COVID’ symptoms that can linger months after the acute phase of the infection has past. “The low rate of severe acute disease is important news, but this does not have to mean that COVID does not matter to children,” says paediatrician Danilo Buonsenso at the Gemelli University Hospital in Rome. “P…

> Death is not the only bad outcome to be avoided. And this is yet another illustration of the point I was making about fear, uncertainty and doubt: the Nature article didn't say that there is proof that children will have "long Covid"...it says that these particular studies didn't address the question . By this standard, anyone can make up any speculation of something that might happen to children someday, and we'll…

> By this standard, anyone can make up any speculation of something that might happen to children someday, and we'll use that speculation to demand fearful responses, indefinitely.

You are also speculating, but simply about different things. You're speculating about harm from the vaccine, or about infection that don't happen. One way to avoid going down that speculation rabbithole is to defer to experts whose job it is to weigh the pros and cons and crunch the numbers.

https://services.aap.org/en/news-room/news-releases/aap/2021...

"The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) recommends vaccinating all children ages 12 and older who are eligible for the federally authorized COVID-19 vaccine."

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/recommend...

"CDC recommends everyone 12 years and older should get a COVID-19 vaccination to help protect against COVID-19."

https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/conditions-and-diseas...

"Yes. Experts, including those at Johns Hopkins, believe that the benefits of being vaccinated for COVID-19 outweigh the risks. Although COVID-19 in children is usually milder than in adults, some kids can get very sick and have complications or long-lasting symptoms that affect their health and well-being. The virus can cause death in children although this is rarer than for adults."

> The myocarditis issue disproportionately affects young boys. Your calculation is incorrect.

I took that into account when calculating.

> including a number of experts here in the US

At national scale, you can find experts that will tell you anything. The consensus opinion of the major US health authorities is that the vaccine is a net benefit for children.

Re: The UK’s delta surge is collapsing

#194

Post by nicoburns »

samizdat311 wrote: post #180
nostrademons wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The herd immunity threshold changed with Delta, which I've heard has an R0 of 8-10 (compare 3.5-4.5 for the UK Alpha variant, and about 2.5 for the original strain). Instead of 60% vaccination, you'd need 90%, and will likely overshoot that. It wouldn't surprise me if the UK's cases are now dropping because they reached that threshold, but I doubt the US is there now. Probably Delta will blow through literally all th…

These are very good points. I'd add that herd immunity isn't a clearly defined threshold, either. It's the point at which the effective R in a population is much below 1 you get, exponential decay might take a few months or even a few years to get down to elimination. The current dip in the UK is trending toward the former. But it's further complicated by the fact that levels of immunity in the population will contin…

> eradication for the UK looks very close to impossible given the near-total-abandonment of public health measures recently.

I don't support the recent abandonment of restrictions, but could that policy, followed up by stricter restrictions in a few months time actually be helpful for eradication? Eradication is likely a hopeless prospect in the UK anyway, because there is no political will for closing the borders. But it's interesting to conjecture.

Re: The UK’s delta surge is collapsing

#195

Post by loonster »

aristophenes wrote: post #122
felipellrocha wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Left out in the discussion seem to be the unvaccinated but already infected. As far as I know, prior infection confers at least some degree of immunity. We don't know how much, though. There are cases in which vaccine performs better than a natural infection, there are cases in which the vaccine performs worse than natural infection. Without time for a study, it's impossible to know where we lie with Covid.

Without time for a study, wouldn’t it make sense to assume the most common thing, that a natural infection provides more immunity than the vaccine? Taking the line of reasoning where we assume the worst case scenario until proven otherwise, would it be reasonable to assume long term medical issues from the vaccinations?

Continuing with your thoughts, is it reasonable to assume that the selective pressure the vaccinated are placing on COVID variants are a good thing?

I have no clue. I hope it works out well.

Re: The UK’s delta surge is collapsing

#196

Post by nradov »

majormajor wrote: post #112
timr wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a perfect illustration of the point. In the face of ample documented evidence of the actual risk, your response is to speculate wildly about future events that are completely inconsistent with what we know.

The "give up and let it be endemic forever" defeatism attitude appears very statistically foolish. It's likely, yes, but why on earth would we want to just accept that? The flu, for instance, bounces around in severity and kills tens of thousands per year in the US. Few of those are kids, so what? If we're happy to let the virus continue to transmit in any populations, it'll change in various ways. One year a variant…

Since there are animal reservoirs for SARS-CoV-2, the virus will always be endemic regardless of what we do. That's not defeatism, just scientific reality.

Re: The UK’s delta surge is collapsing

#197

Post by nawgz »

merpnderp wrote: post #148
nawgz wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually, it's not really my political leanings that are causing this, it's my observation of a complete Republican disregard for any COVID measures whatsoever that is leading me to this next thought. Anti-mask, anti-vax, anti-social-distancing policies are generally Republican. Accordingly, with their complete disregard for the virus / vaccine and what I view as facts about it, I find it to be a small leap to imagin…

Okay Mr. Facts, show me the breakdown of vaccine rates by different groups. And then tell me about how all those groups lean Republican. Because in my state it is groups who overwhelmingly vote democrat who make up the vast majority of unvaccinated. But I have a feeling that bashing Republicans for not getting vaccinated is a lot like publicly pronouncing your hatred of pineapple pizza. Just something the cool kids d…

> show me the breakdown of vaccine rates by different groups

Well, here's the first google result of such a search: https://www.kff.org/policy-watch/the-red-blue-divide-in-covi...

> in my state

Who cares about "your state" which is clearly just anecdata? This is a national trend where Republicans shun mask mandates and vaccines. That article above provides more links for the vaccine related claims

> when you say complete disregard for the virus/vaccine, show me some facts that back it up

How's this for size - Florida (you know, a famously Republican state with a Republican governor) is threatening to withhold EDUCATION FUNDING from school districts that have mask mandates: https://www.politico.com/states/florida/story/2021/07/30/des...

I could go on, but you are being very emotionally charged and disregarding a lot of very obvious rhetoric to try and make a blatantly false point.

Re: The UK’s delta surge is collapsing

#198

Post by edmundsauto »

munificent wrote: post #153
neither_color wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Since when is Texas a pejorative? By itself it would be a world top-15 economy, and its pandemic performance was not an outlier or exceptional. If anything it, along with Florida, demonstrated that extremely strict lockdowns don't correlate to better outcomes. Nothing like Alberta.

The death rate in Florida is 180/100k [1]. That's pretty close to the national average. If the entire US had gone like Florida, then instead of 613k deaths, we'd have 590k. So, yes, Florida was better than average despite not having a severe lockdown. But Florida also has fairly separated populations: a lot of old people very likely to get vaccinated, and a lot of young people very likely to survive. For comparison,…

Didn't Florida just set an all-time 1 day record for new case counts last week? These numbers might shift significantly in the next month or two.

Re: The UK’s delta surge is collapsing

#199

Post by realreality »

ryandrake wrote: post #175
timr wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'd imagine not too long after safe and effective vaccines are authorized for children under 12. Children are at exceptionally low risk from Covid. It's time to stop with fear, uncertainty and doubt, and deal with facts. https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-01897-w In the US, 340 children under 17 have died from Covid. Total. During the same period, 187 have died from the flu, and over 51,000 children have di…

The reason to not want children to get COVID is that they will spread it to their parents and grandparents, who are more vulnerable. It’s not about whether the children will die, which everyone agrees is very low probability.

The current vaccines will not prevent kids from spreading the virus to their grandparents.
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