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New Concerning Variant: B.1.1.529

yourlocalepidemiologist.substack.com

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Re: New Concerning Variant: B.1.1.529

#371

Post by [deleted] »

markdown wrote: post #178
timr wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All current evidence is that masks have a minor effect, measured in tiny fractions of a percent. https://vinayprasadmdmph.substack.com/p/do-masks-reduce-risk ... To date, I'm aware of no study that has quantified a difference in infection, hospitalization or death that is attributable to travel bans.

> To date, I'm aware of no study that has quantified a difference in infection, hospitalization or death that is attributable to travel bans. Why would you need a study to tell you that if nobody with covid travels to a country, that country remains covid-free? Perhaps you are unaware, but there are countries on this planet that covid hasn't gotten to, and those countries have travel bans.

[deleted]

Re: New Concerning Variant: B.1.1.529

#372

Post by timr »

markdown wrote: post #178
timr wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All current evidence is that masks have a minor effect, measured in tiny fractions of a percent. https://vinayprasadmdmph.substack.com/p/do-masks-reduce-risk ... To date, I'm aware of no study that has quantified a difference in infection, hospitalization or death that is attributable to travel bans.

> To date, I'm aware of no study that has quantified a difference in infection, hospitalization or death that is attributable to travel bans. Why would you need a study to tell you that if nobody with covid travels to a country, that country remains covid-free? Perhaps you are unaware, but there are countries on this planet that covid hasn't gotten to, and those countries have travel bans.

At this point, that list comprises North Korea, Turkmenistan, and a collection of microscopic islands in the South Pacific.

At least some of those are lying.

Re: New Concerning Variant: B.1.1.529

#373

Post by tomjen3 »

ehsankia wrote: post #173
actually_a_dog wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with about 95% of this, but, I don't think "travel bans got a bad name because you-know-who proposed them." I think they got a bad name because you-know-who proposed them previously, targeting countries with you-know-what religion, for a political reason. Had it been just "we're going to reduce air traffic into the country to slow the spread of the virus," I don't think that would have been terribly controver…

It's also worth noting that a lot of the narrative makes it sound like people called him racist for the ban, but it was mostly his use of "Kung-flu" and "china virus" that people had an issue with, not the ban itself.

This was a missed opportunity. Have one group mask up for the China virus* and one for covid, with masks indicating which group you belonged to. Make it a competition to see who can wear the most masks.

* we have always named diseases from where they are found, and China/Wuhan virus would have been more catchy. However that hurt the pride of Xi and suddenly we all changed our minds.

Re: New Concerning Variant: B.1.1.529

#375

Post by ralusek »

johnchristopher wrote: post #241
rel2thr wrote: post #74

> Because the change is small, an updated vaccine doesn’t need Phase III trials and/or regularity approval. So, this whole process should take a max of 6 weeks. This appears to be incorrect, Moderna says it needs 60 days to just get into trials ( https://twitter.com/megtirrell/status/1464225637590310938 ) . The FDA has not said what the approval process will look like, but its safe to say it will be non-zero

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/health/covid-19-vaccines-can-ad... COVID-19 vaccines can adapt to new variants. Here’s what it will take Health Feb 9, 2021 6:37 PM EST > It would take six weeks for researchers to go from “plugging new variants into the vaccine” to “make a new vaccine ready to go into people,” he said, but that does not account for the time it would take to have a drug approved. Weissman compared the pro…

The question has never been about how long it would take to adjust the vaccine. mRNA has been a platform capable of rapid alterations since the beginning. The question is regarding ensuring that the changes are safe and efficacious.

Re: New Concerning Variant: B.1.1.529

#376

Post by ralusek »

refurb wrote: post #220
Anon84 wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, you need to show that the new vaccine works against the new variant but not that it’s safe. So it will be much faster

Why would you not need to show it’s safe? A new mRNA vaccine would be introducing different mRNA, which produces new antigen proteins and elicits a different immune response.

You would think software engineers would understand this. It's like approving subsequent pull requests on any and all code changes because the integration tests already passed once.

Re: New Concerning Variant: B.1.1.529

#377

Post by PastelDeNata »

howmayiannoyyou wrote: post #78
bingohbangoh wrote: post #2

Does anybody think these variants will ever stop? I hate, __hate__ this constant fear of a lockdown. Hell, a good part of europe is in lockdown right now. I get that the lockdown is being haphazardly enforce for those countries who've decided on it but I dislike these even being rules on the books. Leave me the hell alone! If we couldn't overcome it after a year of lockdowns, why is this gonna be the time it changes?…

> Does anybody think these variants will ever stop? RNA viruses have high mutation rates and variants will never end in the same way that flu & common-cold variation continues. The more interesting question is how will our immune systems adapt and will vaccines continue to provide protection against severity of illness at the same time as they apply selective pressure that enhances viral transmissibility? Of further…

> why Japanese and Taiwan infection and severity rates remain comparatively low

Wearing face masks in public places.. indoors and outdoors. Social distancing is non existent considering how crowded places can be.

The same story applies to China, Hong Kong, Macau and S. Korea as well as some countries in SE Asia like Vietnam. Face mask wearing is culturally acceptable/normal in this part of the world so that's why people there started wearing them as soon as stuff started kicking off in Jan 2020 without their governments telling them.

People on HN are arguing over scientific papers on whether face masks are effective. You don't need scientific papers when these countries are proof that face mask wearing is effective.

Less people infected, lower chance of mutations. You will not hear about new SARS-COV-2 variants first being detected in these countries.

Re: New Concerning Variant: B.1.1.529

#378

Post by vishho »

cthalupa wrote: post #266
timr wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We cannot do the science, because such a randomized test would be deeply unethical. Thank you for perfectly illustrating the problem. I was actually sort of worried that people wouldn't take me seriously when I said that science has become so political that we actually can't do any . It sounds conspiratorial, doesn't it? But, alas: 1) I post results of RCTs showing that masks do little, if anything. 2) Someone repl…

It isn't a political issue to not do studies that require doing things that actively and intentionally put people at things we know are highly likely to put them at risk of physical harm. The world decided this was unethical long before the current political climate.

I feel like I am going insane. Pure psychopathy or scientism to want randomized controls for studying infection of a deadly virus. Absolutely disgusted. No wonder we had a lab-leak...

Re: New Concerning Variant: B.1.1.529

#379

Post by ralusek »

ed_balls wrote: post #314
ricardobeat wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think I’ve heard that before, but how is it higher? From the usual dashboards Scotland has 130 cases per million, while England is at 150/million. The number of cases right now is also stable while the UK overall is going up?

it's hard to compare cases without knowing how many tests were done and how they are administered.

And where in a particular wave a given place is. And what the seroprevalence and other demographic factors are between the two populations.

Re: New Concerning Variant: B.1.1.529

#380

Post by tinus_hn »

gfodor wrote: post #303
tinus_hn wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You need to be clear about the cost of these measures and about the benefit of the delays they buy. > to buy time for the “weeks” of analysis needed that could help with further reducing risk, We’re not going to learn anything useful in the few weeks bought by stopping these flights. And remember, even though the general public insists on these bans, international law proscribes no country can prevent its own citizen…

I have no such obligation nor a strong opinion. The author of the article said they don’t work. The burden you state is on them, not me. The passage you quoted had an “if” in front of it on purpose.

> If travel restrictions are good on a risk adjusted basis to buy time for the “weeks” of analysis needed that could help with further reducing risk, let’s talk about it not write it off as “not working” which is non-sensical.

The unstated alternative to writing it off as not working is just enforcing bans on the basis of “better safe than sorry”. To me it’s clear that experience with the other variants shows that it just isn’t safe, so there is no “better safe than sorry”.

Let’s talk about not just writing off the alternative as well.

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