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Israel Finds Fourth Covid Booster Is Ineffective

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Re: Israel Finds Fourth Covid Booster Is Ineffective

#151

Post by lambdaba »

LeoPanthera wrote: post #143
lambdaba wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For the vax, with omnicron being so mild, it seems like a bad trade-off to get vaccinated with v1 Covid with it's presumably more nasty spike protein rather than risk infection (which seems unavoidable anyway?) also, it's known that 2 weeks past vaccination your immune system is weakened, you are more susceptible so it seems like a particularly bad idea during a surge

Given that the (vast, vast) majority of doctors are strongly recommending it, do you believe that they are lying, or that they are simply mistaken and you know better?

I don't know, I just see the virus has evolved into a very mild variant that even triple-vaxed don't seem protected from, and that the original vaccine has been designed with a spike protein that has since greatly mutated.

Re: Israel Finds Fourth Covid Booster Is Ineffective

#152

Post by epgui »

the_doctah wrote: post #139
kashunstva wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The intended effect of the vaccines was to reduce the mortality and the severe morbidity of infection and thereby reduce the human burden of the disease and indirectly protect the capacity of healthcare systems to function. In this respect, the vaccines have been enormously successful. Were that not so, the incidence of the omicron variant would have already caused healthcare systems worldwide to collapse.

Revisionist history at its best. If that was the intended effect, officials sure weren't very clear about it.

Uhmm, I don't know where you were getting your information, but yes, it was pretty clear.

Re: Israel Finds Fourth Covid Booster Is Ineffective

#153

Post by Jimmc414 »

mmmrtl wrote: post #105
Jimmc414 wrote: post #59

Rochelle Walensky, the CDC director, has stated that vaccines do reduce severity, but they do not stop transmission. Assuming her words represent the scientific and expert opinion, could someone offer a coherent argument as to why there is so much pressure for others to get vaccinated? Is fear of the unvaccinated clogging up hospitals the primary motivation?

stopping transmission is an impossibly high bar. Vaccines reduce transmission. Really really shockingly unexpectedly well for the first few months, in previous waves, but that sterilizing antibody-mediated immunity wanes. The booster restores that efficacy against transmission, but omicron's immune evasion means that even a booster only gets to ~70% efficacy against cases/transmission, compared to the surprise findin…

I don't believe that is accurate. Several studies show no significant difference between the viral load of vaccinated and unvaccinated. Here is one https://www.ucdavis.edu/health/covid-19/news/viral-loads-sim...

Also, recent reports from Denmark seem to indicate that vaccinated at best have equal protection against Omicron. Too early to declare this as fact, but the initial data actually favors a slight negative efficacy.

Re: Israel Finds Fourth Covid Booster Is Ineffective

#154

Post by jollybean »

Jimmc414 wrote: post #59

Rochelle Walensky, the CDC director, has stated that vaccines do reduce severity, but they do not stop transmission. Assuming her words represent the scientific and expert opinion, could someone offer a coherent argument as to why there is so much pressure for others to get vaccinated? Is fear of the unvaccinated clogging up hospitals the primary motivation?

Because you have misunderstood the statement.

Vaccines reduce infections considerably.

This is something the CDC has repeated over and over. From the CDC's website [1]:

"In October, the unvaccinated were 5x more likely to become infected."

Not only that - 'breakthrough infections' of the vaccinated are more likely to be less severe, and infection severity is correlated with shedding, meaning, even the 'vaxxed and infected' are less likely to spread.

Vaccines do not stop transmission, but they definitely reduce transmission and have a very material effect on R0.

In fact, by far the largest limiting factor on R0 are vaccines. Far more so than masks, for example.

If you think about it from a systematic perspective, the advantage is reducing transmission is the 'big advantage'.

If a giant wave of COVID wallops through the country and everyone gets it, a lot of people will die even those that are vaxxed. 'Flattening the Curve' is a very real thing. If you watch the % hospital beds occupied, it gets scary sometimes, in some places.

By reducing R0 - especially keeping it below 1 (i.e. not growing in the community) - means you reduce the likelihood that people will get it in the first place (and not take up hospital beds etc..).

Omicron has a bit different characteristics, but it's much the same story.

[1] https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#rates-by-vaccine-s...

Re: Israel Finds Fourth Covid Booster Is Ineffective

#155

Post by lordloki »

kashunstva wrote: post #58
twofornone wrote: post #24

Record cases across the planet regardless of vaccination rates...how much longer until official sources are willing to acknowledge that these vaccines are not nearly as effective as claimed? How long before official sources acknowledge that breakthrough cases are probably drastically underreported? I can't be the only one surrounded by fully vaccinated individuals testing positive. Its happening far too often for me…

The intended effect of the vaccines was to reduce the mortality and the severe morbidity of infection and thereby reduce the human burden of the disease and indirectly protect the capacity of healthcare systems to function. In this respect, the vaccines have been enormously successful. Were that not so, the incidence of the omicron variant would have already caused healthcare systems worldwide to collapse.

Nonsense. That is not what was originally stated. I'm not sure if you're intentionally gaslighting here or what, but the original premise of the vaccine was to reach herd immunity. That is what Fauci was preaching every day last spring to convince the populace to get vaccinated. Once it was realized that the vaccine was not immunizing the population, the narrative changed to what you claim.

Re: Israel Finds Fourth Covid Booster Is Ineffective

#156

Post by lordloki »

epgui wrote: post #150
the_doctah wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I remember right before the Pfizer vaccine came out they touted it as being "95% effective". Like what does that even mean? Clearly it was nonsense.

Your lack of understanding does not make it nonsense.

Your rewriting of history is though.

Re: Israel Finds Fourth Covid Booster Is Ineffective

#157

Post by Jimmc414 »

jollybean wrote: post #154
Jimmc414 wrote: post #59

Rochelle Walensky, the CDC director, has stated that vaccines do reduce severity, but they do not stop transmission. Assuming her words represent the scientific and expert opinion, could someone offer a coherent argument as to why there is so much pressure for others to get vaccinated? Is fear of the unvaccinated clogging up hospitals the primary motivation?

Because you have misunderstood the statement. Vaccines reduce infections considerably. This is something the CDC has repeated over and over. From the CDC's website [1]: "In October, the unvaccinated were 5x more likely to become infected." Not only that - 'breakthrough infections' of the vaccinated are more likely to be less severe, and infection severity is correlated with shedding, meaning, even the 'vaxxed and inf…

>Because you have misunderstood the statement.

“Our vaccines are working exceptionally well,” Walensky told CNN in an interview on Thursday, Aug. 5. “They continue to work well for Delta, with regard to severe illness and death – they prevent it. But what they can't do anymore is prevent transmission.”

I did not interpret her statement or misunderstand it. I quoted her directly.

Also, R0 with Omicron is on par with measles at 7-10, is it not?

Re: Israel Finds Fourth Covid Booster Is Ineffective

#158

Post by lordloki »

epgui wrote: post #152
the_doctah wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Revisionist history at its best. If that was the intended effect, officials sure weren't very clear about it.

Uhmm, I don't know where you were getting your information, but yes, it was pretty clear.

prove it!

Re: Israel Finds Fourth Covid Booster Is Ineffective

#159

Post by khuey »

tick_tock_tick wrote: post #128
kittiepryde wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not really how vaccines work. No force fields are deployed, you'll still catch COVID, but, you're immune system is now got some training in how to handle the situation. I don't remember the promise that, the vaccine would end COVID, I do remember seeing somewhere that if vaccination rates were high enough ( greater than 90%??, been quite awhile now since I read that article ) that herd immunity could be achiev…

> That's not really how vaccines work. No force fields are deployed, you'll still catch COVID, but, you're immune system is now got some training in how to handle the situation. We do have and continue to make "sterilizing vaccines" which for nearly all common use of the words do "deploy force fields". The small pox vaccine was one of the best examples, the measles vaccine is also up there. The COVID vaccines just ar…

Sterilizing immunity probably wasn't real, and we just didn't have the technology to know better back in the day: https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2021/09/steriliz... Plenty of after-vaccination cases of measles have been documented in modern times. Obviously nobody is going around giving people smallpox to test that one.

Re: Israel Finds Fourth Covid Booster Is Ineffective

#160

Post by Retric »

ulfw wrote: post #99
Retric wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Presumably they are referring to other strains of COVID rather than say AIDS. I don’t know if that’s true or false, but it’s best to take peoples statements in a reasonable context.

Considering Omicron is about to outcompete every single other variant I am not sure what 'general immunity' means in this context either. If anyone one could assume that an Omicron specific booster would help better with future variants as those would likely spring up through changes of the current Omicron virus rather than wild type.

Various strains become more or less common over time, but the winner doesn’t totally supplant everything else globally very quickly. Omicron for example isn’t part of the Delta lineage. So, there is some justification in viewing things based on both the short term public health standpoint as well as the longe term evolution of the virus.

That said, I am not an expert just pointing out things are complicated. I would assume a targeted booster for Omicron would be a good idea, but at this point that’s just blind hope without clinical data backing it up.

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