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The mutation that helps Delta spread

nature.com

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Re: The mutation that helps Delta spread

#281

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Note that it appears that it is still unknown how likely breakthrough infections are to result in long Covid. The very limited data that does exist indicates that the likelyhood is rather high (~20%). https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/16/well/live/vaccine-long-co...

Isn't long Covid caused by damage from the spike proteins? In that case, repeatedly giving people the vaccine might do damage as well since it gets you to produce those spike proteins right?

What's your source that spike proteins cause long covid?

This article[1] says the cause of long covid is still not clear.

[1] https://www.bbc.com/news/health-57833394

Re: The mutation that helps Delta spread

#282
post #151

Purely anecdotal but I'm double vaccinated (Astra Zeneca) and I caught Covid recently. It was probably Delta as 99% of cases in UK are. I know of quite a few vaccinated friends who've caught it recently too. Mainly AZ I think but one was Pfizer (single jabbed). Anyway, none of us had severe illness although I felt pretty rough for a few days like I had a really bad cold and smell went for a week completely. I was bas…

How long do you think we'll be keeping up the mask wearing given that "more variants are inevitably coming?"

No idea, this is a deeply complex question that I'm not qualified to answer. I'm merely wondering out loud as a member of the public if we have our policy around this calibrated quite right.

Re: The mutation that helps Delta spread

#283
post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I already get vaccinated every 12 months for the flu, so that seems like a fine plan to me.

Why get the flu vaccine anymore? If you believe official reports, it’s basically been eliminated by virtue of simple mask mandates that everyone swears no one is following.

> Why get the flu vaccine anymore?

Because it's safe and easy. I have immuno-compromised friends and elderly family members. Vaccines are almost literally the least I can do to help keep them safe. I have kids and taking care of sick kids is awful. Also I really really really hate having the flu personally. Bleh.

> If you believe official reports, it’s basically been eliminated by virtue of simple mask mandates that everyone swears no one is following.

I have not seen official reports that determined the drop in flu was due to masks. I would assume the drop in flu was due to many factors combined: schools and businesses going remote, other physical distancing, more people getting the flu vaccine to avoid getting sick and potentially straining our strained healthcare system, masking, and who knows what else...

...at any rate I expect the flu will return as kids go back to school, workers return to offices, etc. I'll keep getting vaccinated for the flu as long as my doctor recommends it for my reasons stated above.

Re: The mutation that helps Delta spread

#284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have we perhaps forgotten about Sweden which: - Did not force lockdown / masks onto anybody - Has one of the least vaccinated population in Europe (around 40% afaik) - Has had 0 covid deaths in the last couple weeks. - Has not had it worse than countries with stricter mandates. Are we also forgetting about Iceland / Israel which are among the most vaccinated countries in the world (on top of having stringent mandates…

Have you been actually following how things have gone? Sweden has 1708% more deaths to covid vs Norway, but only 84% higher population. That doesn't sound that great to me.

Per Google stats, Sweden has had 14,664 COVID deaths to this day on a population of 10.23M people which is 0.1%, the vast majority being close to average age of death (82 y/o) in this country. (It's also worth noting that ~24K people die of vascular disease in this country every year to put things in perspective.)

Although death is always unfortunate, it seems to be a very foolish goal to try and prevent everyone from dying in this situation. Well, we might be able to do just that, but how much of your previous way of life / liberties are we willing to sacrifice forever?

Re: The mutation that helps Delta spread

#285

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What really should be happening should be a mass vaccination program Compulsory mass vaccination using the current vaccines poses a serious public health risk [1][2][3]. See my other comments here for more explanation and citations. For these reasons, vaccination strategies should be highly targeted towards vulnerable populations, and should be heavily supplemented by additional therapeutic modalities. > and a mass…

> Compulsory mass vaccination using the current vaccines poses a serious public health risk [1][2][3] None of your references say this or anything remotely implying this. Backing up a provocative claim with a snowblind of irrelevant references is a shameful misinformation tactic and you should stop doing it immediately. Doing it in a public health context is particularly dangerous and frankly disgusting.

Thanks for adding this. Compulsory mass vaccination is one of the greatest medical miracles in human history, possibly the actual single greatest.

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_lung#/media/File:Poumon_a...

Re: The mutation that helps Delta spread

#286

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So here in Ontario where we're @ about 65% of the population totally vaccinated, today's new cases. Source: https://data.ontario.ca/dataset/covid-19-vaccine-data-in-ont... 10.25/100k among people who are unvaccinated. 6.5/100k among people who are partially vaccinated. 1.0/100k among people who are fully vaccinated. For hospitalization: 2.04/100k for unvaccinated, 1.11/100k for partially, 0.21/100k for vaccinated. Fo…

> The disease is spreading primarily among the unvaccinated. What is the evidence for this? Vaccinated people are capable of spreading the disease just as easily as those who aren't. And since they're much more likely to be asymptomatic, may be more likely to spread the disease unknowingly. Those without the vaccination are more likely to end up in hospital, but that says nothing about how the disease is actually bei…

I never said "spreading from the unvaccinated" I said "spreading among the unvaccinated" which is borne out by the fact that the unvaccinated (and partially vaccinated) here are only 35% of the population (25% of the eligible population) but are 75% of the daily new case count (and perhaps higher because there's a % with unknown vaccination status)

Re: The mutation that helps Delta spread

#287
post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I already get vaccinated every 12 months for the flu, so that seems like a fine plan to me.

Why get the flu vaccine anymore? If you believe official reports, it’s basically been eliminated by virtue of simple mask mandates that everyone swears no one is following.

I'm not surprised flu rates are crashing with the current social distancing, mask wearing, and higher skittishness around people with respiratory symptoms. Even if most people do them poorly, and others don't do them out of protest.

The takeaway isn't that official reports are baseless propaganda. It's that we were really bad about handling the flu before 2020. How many times did one of your coworkers show up with a persistent cough, running nose, or sneezing fits? How often did you see people with symptoms in grocery stores or buffets? I'm not surprised even a modicum of care greatly outperforms our previous habits.

Re: The mutation that helps Delta spread

#288

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Stress, anxiety and depression don't show up as lung damage on MRI scans.

What are the stats on that, especially vs. other severe respiratory diseases? Asking because I've had "long covid" since long before there was a COVID, so either everyone's making a bigger deal out of it than necessary, or I'm actually much worse off relative to normal than I thought and I should really be questioning my doctors.

> Asking because I've had "long covid" since long before there was a COVID

Well that isn’t “Long Covid” then. Symptoms can come from a variety of causes, and just because you suffered some of the same symptoms unrelated to a Covid infection doesn’t mean that others won’t experience similar symptoms after Covid.

Re: The mutation that helps Delta spread

#289

Covid is going to be endemic like the flu and cold. It's not going to be eradicated, unfortunately, and I don't think we've come to terms with this yet. Now what's our plan exactly? Get vaccinated every 6 - 12 months indefinitely and always wear masks? What's our goal and what's our new normal?

I've been asking those questions for about 16 months now and hardly anyone of those in charge is willing to even consider an answer. They just botch and bumble their way through from one lockdown to the next. The COVID-19 vaccines are a boon and a vital component for ending this crisis. However, they're not the panacea those in charge made them out to be. Make no mistake, those vaccines, particularly those of the mRN…

Why do 2, 3, 4 when people are already protected?

I don't understand the fear the catch covid once your vaccinated, why not make the same measures for the flu for example?

Re: The mutation that helps Delta spread

#290

I see the sentiment here expressed, that Covid is far from over. To be honest, I stopped following news since being fully vaccinated some time ago, so I am kind of ignorant here. Is the main problem, the unvaccinated, or that the Delta (and co.) variants are still, too dangerous for vaccinated people? Or is it the fear, that they will get more dangerous?

Kind of a combination of Delta and unvaccinated. Delta is more infectious than previous variants., which means that we need more vaccinated people to reach herd immunity.
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