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Covid vaccination linked to 'substantial reduction' in hospital admissions

heraldscotland.com

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Re: Covid vaccination linked to 'substantial reduction' in hospital admissions

#161

Post by Broken_Hippo »

metalliqaz wrote: post #153
wpietri wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I take it you haven't been following what's going on with "Long Covid". But even among people who aren't hospitalized, there's lasting harm: https://www.medpagetoday.com/infectiousdisease/covid19/91270 I know somebody who's had this. Despite never being hospitalized, after getting sick they had to take a long medical leave from work in hopes of getting their strength back. That's worlds away from "sick for a few days…

I have been "fatigued" for 3+ years due to having children. Life goes on.

"fatigued" from not getting enough sleep or being physically active is not the same thing as folks get from diseases. When you are fatigued from children, you can sleep and take care of it. It is solvable.

It isn't like that with disease.

The worse I've had is the complete inability to stand long enough to make a simple dinner, for example, and this was after napping and sitting most of the day. I'm lucky: Mine passed. Some people live with this day after day after day, and this is more similar to what folks with disease-related fatigue.

Re: Covid vaccination linked to 'substantial reduction' in hospital admissions

#162

Post by nickpp »

jedberg wrote: post #152
nickpp wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OK, but if any of those was actually saving lives I'd argue it should've been approved, side effects be damned. Last time I looked, thousands of people were dying every day of Covid. Ignoring those just in case a vaccine is harmful is, IMHO, a bad tradeoff and I don't trust the people making it in my name. I prefer, in life-or-death situations, making my own (informed) decisions.

If the AZ drug were the only COVID vax available, I might agree with you. But there are already two others and a third on a the way, all of which are more effective than the AZ drug. And the USA has already negotiated to get more of the approved ones than the UK is getting on a per capita basis. Allowing a drug you know doesn't work well is a great way to break the public trust, especially when there are plenty of al…

You'd be quite right if we had plenty of mRNA vaccines available, but, if I'm not mistaken, we are supply constrained and we'll be for at least a couple more months. Months in which people are dying, people who could be saved by the AZ vaccine, of course at some risk - but which is very much preferable to death, I'd say.

Re: Covid vaccination linked to 'substantial reduction' in hospital admissions

#163

Post by jedberg »

nickpp wrote: post #162
jedberg wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the AZ drug were the only COVID vax available, I might agree with you. But there are already two others and a third on a the way, all of which are more effective than the AZ drug. And the USA has already negotiated to get more of the approved ones than the UK is getting on a per capita basis. Allowing a drug you know doesn't work well is a great way to break the public trust, especially when there are plenty of al…

You'd be quite right if we had plenty of mRNA vaccines available, but, if I'm not mistaken, we are supply constrained and we'll be for at least a couple more months. Months in which people are dying, people who could be saved by the AZ vaccine, of course at some risk - but which is very much preferable to death, I'd say.

The AZ vaccine still needs to be produced, it isn't sitting in a warehouse somewhere. The amount of time it would take to make AZ vaccine is the same as making the other Pfizer/Moderna vaccines. It's unlikely it would increase supply at all.

Re: Covid vaccination linked to 'substantial reduction' in hospital admissions

#164

Post by Mediterraneo10 »

wpietri wrote: post #150
aclimatt wrote: post #108

Since we're on the topic, shouldn't this (hospital admissions) be the almost singular criterion to influence public policy / restrictive measures? The line I've heard repeatedly is we're waiting for "total" herd immunity, as in ensuring almost all of a population is potentially protected from the virus. Frequently quoting fall / end of 2021, potentially into 2022. Shouldn't the only benchmark be those with medium-to-…

I take it you haven't been following what's going on with "Long Covid". But even among people who aren't hospitalized, there's lasting harm: https://www.medpagetoday.com/infectiousdisease/covid19/91270 I know somebody who's had this. Despite never being hospitalized, after getting sick they had to take a long medical leave from work in hopes of getting their strength back. That's worlds away from "sick for a few days…

I have been following "long COVID" reports. Firstly, much of the mass media coverage is misleading, often intentionally so in pursuit of clicks and advertising revenue. A lot of the people claiming to have debilitating "long COVID" were never actually tested positive for COVID in the first place. They are the broadly the same demographic that, before COVID, were claiming to have "chronic Lyme" or whatever. Certainly mainly of them do have symptoms and distress, but it is questionable what relationship they have to COVID.

Then, if one starts digging into more serious discussion – even your link above – one finds that "long term" in medical parlance may mean a series of months but not necessarily years, and similar months-long impacts are known from diseases that we have generally tolerated among society. It also isn’t clear that these lingering symptoms affect enough people to impact the economy if measures are lifted once hospitalizations fall.

Re: Covid vaccination linked to 'substantial reduction' in hospital admissions

#165

Post by rhino369 »

garmaine wrote: post #147
maxerickson wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's preferable to have very low infection numbers, to reduce the likelihood of mutations taking hold. Doesn't mean you go on forever waiting for 0 infections, you just wait a bit longer than the minimum number of vaccinations to go back to activities with highest risks of transmission.

With both travel restrictions and lockdown, It takes about 6 weeks to get to (effectively) zero new cases. Not forever.

That depends on how many cases you started with and how low you can get the transmission rate.

No way could the EU or USA get to zero in 6 weeks. It took Victoria Australia about 6 weeks to get from 500 cases to 20. America and Europe have a 100X more than 500 cases.

And the longer you need to lockdown, the less restrictive the lockdowns can be.

Re: Covid vaccination linked to 'substantial reduction' in hospital admissions

#166

Post by nickpp »

jedberg wrote: post #163
nickpp wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You'd be quite right if we had plenty of mRNA vaccines available, but, if I'm not mistaken, we are supply constrained and we'll be for at least a couple more months. Months in which people are dying, people who could be saved by the AZ vaccine, of course at some risk - but which is very much preferable to death, I'd say.

The AZ vaccine still needs to be produced, it isn't sitting in a warehouse somewhere. The amount of time it would take to make AZ vaccine is the same as making the other Pfizer/Moderna vaccines. It's unlikely it would increase supply at all.

I disagree, 3 vaccine sources should be better than 2.

Now, if the US hasn't contracted any AZ vaccine, then you're right and the whole discussion is moot.

Re: Covid vaccination linked to 'substantial reduction' in hospital admissions

#167

Post by lordnacho »

kop316 wrote: post #122
ageitgey wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I sorry to hear about your brother's Mother-in-Law. I just wanted to concur for anyone who is not yet aware: all the data so far (from multiple studies) shows that there is zero or near zero protection for the first two weeks after the first dose. It's not until the third/fourth weeks after the dose that you start to see substantial protection, with higher protection the fourth week.

Thanks. Sadly we just heard she will not make it and is being moved to Hospice.

So sorry to hear this. My mother also died of covid, and I also feel there's a warning in her story for everyone.

She'd been sad for several months from my father dying, so during the summer she went to visit her sister abroad. Until then she'd been shielding at home. They both knew about the virus but thought it wouldn't happen to them, arranging group meals with old friends.

Three of them went to ICU, and everyone tested positive.

It's of course up to people themselves what risk they want to take, but with this disease in particular the numbers are deceiving. The general figures seem so low but are actually a heck of a lot higher than flu. They're also markedly higher if you're in a risk group.

It's also terrible because as family you think the odds are okay, most people at every stage (cough, hospital, icu) survive, until the doctor calls you and says it's tonight.

Re: Covid vaccination linked to 'substantial reduction' in hospital admissions

#168

Post by psychlops »

dragontamer wrote: post #129
aclimatt wrote: post #108

Since we're on the topic, shouldn't this (hospital admissions) be the almost singular criterion to influence public policy / restrictive measures? The line I've heard repeatedly is we're waiting for "total" herd immunity, as in ensuring almost all of a population is potentially protected from the virus. Frequently quoting fall / end of 2021, potentially into 2022. Shouldn't the only benchmark be those with medium-to-…

> Since we're on the topic, shouldn't this (hospital admissions) be the almost singular criterion to influence public policy / restrictive measures? Given the high correlation between COVID# cases (or %Positive) and hospitalizations, why not just use COVID# and "gain" 2 weeks of information? Hospitalizations are weeks delayed from COVID# or %Positive spikes. Its a slow moving disease: taking 5 to 14 days before peopl…

I'm curious about your data set. The correlation of cases to deaths using data from covidtracking.com for the US over the past year is 0.28-0.3 when I ran it. I slid it by two, three and four weeks.

Re: Covid vaccination linked to 'substantial reduction' in hospital admissions

#169

Post by BurningFrog »

jedberg wrote: post #85
mchusma wrote: post #75

The UKs adoption of First Dose First is amazing and inspiring in a time when governments worldwide seem unable to operate effectively. There are 2 things every country can do to save lives that have effectively zero cost and zero negative externalities: - lifting lingering vaccine bans (the US's ban of AZ is most glaring) - first dose first - the evidence is overwhelming at this point. These two things, which could b…

> the US's ban of AZ is most glaring People said the same thing about the US's ban on thalidomide until it turned out they were right. In this case I'm ok with a little conservatism on the part of the FDA. The US is already in 4th place on vaccinations per capita, just barely behind the UK, without either of those policies. Copying from my comment below, a bunch of other examples of times when the FDA was right and E…

This is a very dangerous argument.

Decisions to approve or ban medications are difficult because they're about probabilities, and whichever decision you make, there is an expected body count attached to it.

The "but Thalidomide!" argument only considers one side: If you approve a medication that ends up hurting/killing people. That is bad, and everybody understands that.

The other side is that if you delay the approval of a life saving drug, that also kills a lot of people who die while you wait. That is bad, and very few understand that.

The same people who died before, keep dying today. This does not make news, no one has to resign, and as a result regulators become very prone to err on the side on delaying approvals.

How many Americans have died from this bias since Thalidomide is unknowable, but it's definitely in 6 figures, maybe more.

Re: Covid vaccination linked to 'substantial reduction' in hospital admissions

#170

Post by scrollaway »

dragontamer wrote: post #137
scrollaway wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Given the high correlation between COVID# cases (or %Positive) and hospitalizations, why not just use COVID# and "gain" 2 weeks of information? As we vaccinate the people at the highest risk of hospitalization, the correlation will change: Numbers may stay very similar, but hospitalizations should go way down.

> As we vaccinate the people at the highest risk of hospitalization, the correlation will change: Numbers may stay very similar, but hospitalizations should go way down. Then we'll know in 2 weeks to change the policy and account for it. Note that vaccinations will *also* cause the %positive and case# to decline. USA is approaching 15% vaccinated at over 95% efficacy means that you'll have 15% fewer cases (as well as…

Pretty much all countries are distributing vaccine to the elderly / at-risk population first. We're doing that for the obvious reason that the most-at-risk population is most-at-risk, and thus most at risk of hospitalization.

Concretely, that means hospitalization rates should decline a LOT faster than community spread. This is going to be less visible in countries that have their shit together and are able to vaccinate very fast / have already moved on to genpop, but in most of the EU (sigh), we've just finished vaccinating care homes and 75+. So now, a couple of weeks from now, we should see hospitalization numbers sharply decline because that share of the population represents the most hospitalizations, and will now be mostly immune.

So despite being at like, 5% total vaccinated, we should see a decline in hospitalizations of up to 75%.

Furthermore, given that most of the spread happens outside the most-at-risk in the first place (since those most at risk were those with the most protective measures before vaccines), 5% vaccinations should not mean 5% less cases total.

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