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Pfizer and Biontech provide update on Omicron variant

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Re: Pfizer and Biontech provide update on Omicron variant

#411

Post by throwaway2037 »

mrtksn wrote: post #191
1cvmask wrote: post #2

This is the scientific meat of the press release where it claims a 25 times neutralizing antibody titers against the Omicron strain with a third dose of Pfizer-BionTech: The sera were collected from subjects 3 weeks after receiving the second dose or one month after receiving the third dose of the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine. Each serum was tested simultaneously for its neutralizing antibody titer against the wi…

> Does anyone have a list where BionTech distributes directly? It's Germany and Turkey. In a press release earlier this year[0], BioNTech described their relationship with Pfizer and they listed the countries it covers. Also, for China they have another company instead of Pfizer. Why Germany and Turkey, you may ask? Well, the inventors and founders of the company are Turkish immigrants to Germany. So they are able to…

You wrote: >

I double checked on Wiki. There are two founders -- husband and wife. While both have Turkish heritage, only one is a Turkish immigrant. To be fair, I agree with the overall sentiment of your comment!

Husband: Uğur Şahin was born in Turkey, and immigrated to Germany at age 4

Wife: Özlem Türeci was born in Germany. Her parents immigrated to Germany from Turkey.

If anyone is interested to learn more about these amazing scientists, I recommend that you watch the YouTube video where they are interviewed by CEO Mathias Döpfner for one hour after winning the Axel Springer Award in 2021: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B4u4JzAZQoc

Re: Pfizer and Biontech provide update on Omicron variant

#412

Post by maxerickson »

politician wrote: post #294
JamesBarney wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've been following the research closely and haven't seen this anywhere. Mind linking to the studies?

Discussion on HN of the Moderna vaccine released to GitHub. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26628233 Moderna targets one specific feature of one variant of the virus. If the virus evolves to minimize this structural feature, then this mitigation will fail.

It's a functional feature.

Re: Pfizer and Biontech provide update on Omicron variant

#413

Post by hef19898 »

_ea1k wrote: post #396
hef19898 wrote: post #343

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And case numbers are the best metric we have to predict deaths and hospitalization. Together with vaccination rates, age and so on. But overall, if cases go up, hospitalization will go up a couple of weeks later. Why would we not use that to enable to us act instead of reacting once it's too late?

Because as new variants with lower virulence emerge, and we see more breakthrough and reinfection cases, that direct link will become less direct. We don't lock down for the flu because the virulence of the flu is lower than covid and we consider it acceptable. At some point, we'll pass those acceptability thresholds for COVID as well. For some people, and regions, they already have passed those thresholds, as both s…

I'm not into modelling, I would imagine that, depending on how good the vaccines work against variants, even that could be modelled quite well.

For me, the threshold when Covid becomes an acceptable fact of life is when hospitals can work normally without any measures in place. We seem to be quite far from that.

Re: Pfizer and Biontech provide update on Omicron variant

#414

Post by robotmay »

Covzire wrote: post #291
swayvil wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pfizer's reaping 33billion on vax alone this year. Three guesses where that money comes from.

Saying they're free is certainly misleading.

I mean, I pay nothing for mine. I already pay tax to fund our health service, which purchases many drugs from many vendors for many diseases. This is just one more, and by all accounts it's comparatively cheap for the overall cost-savings when it keeps the vast majority of people out of the hospitals.

Re: Pfizer and Biontech provide update on Omicron variant

#415

Post by orbifold »

hef19898 wrote: post #366
orbifold wrote: post #337

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It tells you a lot of the level of expertise in a country, if a physicist like Viola Priesemann previously not involved in any kind of disease modelling is able to be a significant voice in the national conversation. The 'experts' that are listened to are either numerically illiterate like Drosten or non-experts in disease control like Priesemann. Moreover the actual tools and quality of code that is used to model th…

You really think Drosten and Priesemann decide measures? That's politicians, the government decided on it. If I remember well, scientists were worried when hospitalization was declared the only truth. And the RKI predicted the forth basically down to a T, they were a couple of weeks of so. Doesn't matter because they predicted, along with Drosten, already during summer.

I think there is an expert vacuum that was filled by opportunists and enabled politicians to decide non-sensical measures. Compare that to the situation in Taiwan, where the vice-prime Minister is an epidemiologist.

Re: Pfizer and Biontech provide update on Omicron variant

#417

Post by robotmay »

swayvil wrote: post #268
robotmay wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ignoring that the vaccines are free to the individual and therefore not at all similar to a landlord/tenant relationship, you always have the option of not taking it and dying, which is a cool loophole that gets you out of the implied contract. Life hack.

Pfizer's reaping 33billion on vax alone this year. Three guesses where that money comes from.

Er, so? They developed and are producing a vaccine that will save millions of lives. That's a damn sight more deserving of billions in profit than any other number of industries or corporations.

Re: Pfizer and Biontech provide update on Omicron variant

#418

Post by TechBro8615 »

nullc wrote: post #383
shmatt wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hospitalization and death numbers are definitely directly connected to how long its been since you got your shot. So for now, it does not seem like the whole long immunity/T-B-cell thing is happening with Pfizer/Moderna/J&J at least There is a very real per month affect, every month after your latest mRNA shot, your chances of getting seriously sick get a little bigger. After 6 months they get so big that scientists…

> Hospitalization and death numbers are definitely directly connected There has never been a RCT which showed covid vaccination reduces mortality. I believe they do but this has not been rigorously shown. Unfortunately, even though we've had gigantic RCTs on covid none of them showed statistically significant covid-mortality in the unvaccinated population (potentially due to prescreening eliminating people who were a…

If anyone wants more details, I assume you’re referencing this recent blog. If you haven’t seen this, you’ll love it because it makes the same argument: https://probabilityandlaw.blogspot.com/2021/12/possible-syst...

Re: Pfizer and Biontech provide update on Omicron variant

#419

Post by m0llusk »

the_doctah wrote: post #392
plainnoodles wrote: post #298

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't that supposed to be how capitalism funds and incentivizes R&D though? There is market demand for a Thing, if you can figure out how to make Things then the market will reward that with profit. Honestly, for being the firm to develop a vaccine for a global pandemic, $33B in revenue sounds a little light? Apple made 83B in revenue just in Q3 alone and all they do is make phones that aren't even improving that muc…

Capitalism is about a free market, not collusion with the government to force vaccines on citizens.

Capitalism is about allowing ownership of property and profit from labor. Markets work best when there are a range of restrictions and taxes for services and subsidies that tune outcomes. Universal access to education, for example, is extremely expensive, but the benefits that come with having a literate society make the investment worthwhile.

Re: Pfizer and Biontech provide update on Omicron variant

#420

Post by junon »

MadeThisToReply wrote: post #400
listless wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given how sick the second dose made me, I'm not keen on doing this every 6 months. Not keen.

My thoughts exactly. Why suffer through 1-2 days of sickness every 6 months to protect myself against an illness that I've already had and poses no threat to my demographic anyway? Sounds like the cure is worse than the disease. I smell a rat.

Because it reduces spread and thus reduces the chance of mutations becoming dominant. The vaccine is not only about protecting the individual.
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