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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

#541

Post by thehappypm »

podgaj wrote: post #246
thehappypm wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They cost $20 every six months max.

What a meaningless way to phrase it. "Only $20"? Ha! How about this phrasing... Pfizer Expects $33.5 Billion In Vaccine Revenue In 2021 https://www.forbes.com/sites/aayushipratap/2021/07/28/pfizer... https://www.cnn.com/2021/11/02/business/pfizer-earnings/inde... The vaccine business alone was responsible for more than 60% of the company's sales, as vaccine revenue rose to $14.6 billion from only $1.7 billion a year…

You called it “rent”. Rent is something an individual pays. If everyone needs to pay Pfizer a $20 “rent” to not die of COVID I don’t see that as some horrible evil.

Re: Pfizer and Biontech provide update on Omicron variant

#542

Post by dahart »

ifyoubuildit wrote: post #539
dahart wrote: post #512

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it tyranny if it’s what the majority wants and votes for? It seems like “tyranny” is being used to describe situations where democracy is working as expected, and some people just don’t want to accept the majority result. I feel like this word tyranny is being thrown around a lot lately without much rigorous thinking about the fact that we do need laws because we have no choice about having to share a lot of thing…

This may be relevant to your question: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyranny_of_the_majority

Do you believe this is what parent was referring to? I must assume not because they used the word “authoritarian”, which implies they’re complaining about minority groups imposing their will on the majority.

Do you believe that Tyranny of the Majority is a valid concern with the vaccine mandates? Which minority groups are being oppressed?

Re: Pfizer and Biontech provide update on Omicron variant

#543

Post by hcurtiss »

bluGill wrote: post #428
nahqz wrote: post #358

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The vaccine hasn't stopped spread in rich countries, why would it do so in poor countries? Also there haven't been enough variants as to determine that most variants are coming from poor countries. Speaking of delta, India has more population than the entirety of Europe. Mathematically it makes sense than a variant could come from there regardless of whether the vaccine does anything.

> The vaccine hasn't stopped spread in rich countries, why would it do so in poor countries? It has greatly slowed the spread. The highest vaccinated countries have almost stopped it. There is every reason to believe that high vaccination across the world would stop covid, and anything less will ensure continued spread (and mutations). People demanding an all or nothing from a vaccine are missing the big picture.

The highest vaccinated countries have almost stopped it? Israel had among the highest vaccination rates in the world prior to its most recent peak, which has now declined. Other countries are going through the same thing. There is only a very rough/weak correlation between vaccination rate and positive cases.

Re: Pfizer and Biontech provide update on Omicron variant

#544

Post by fluidcruft »

sjg007 wrote: post #506
bavell wrote: post #397

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don’t think that your model of how vaccines work really makes sense. I believe OP is referencing "Original antigenic sin" [0]. "This leaves the immune system "trapped" by the first response it has made to each antigen, and unable to mount potentially more effective responses during subsequent infections." [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Original_antigenic_sin

Doesn’t make sense. If the infection continues the immune system will generate new antibodies and responses. After all it’s a new thing not seen before.

The linked article both describes the mechanism and has plenty of recent references observing and studying the effect whether or not you think it makes sense.

The general mechanism is that recognition of the antigen by memory B cells produces a response that also inhibits (non-memory) B cells from reacting to the antigen. So when the antigen has drifted enough that memory B cells still recognize it, but the antibodies are less effective then at that point B cells are actively inhibited by the memory B cells so new and retargeted antibodies are not produced.

Re: Pfizer and Biontech provide update on Omicron variant

#545

Post by clairity »

BurningFrog wrote: post #399
mitchdoogle wrote: post #304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We get flu vaccine every year, what's wrong with getting vaccinated forever?

It's a different vaccine every year, because the "flu" virus family mutates extremely much, for (at least to me) unknown reasons.

note that it’s not that the flu virus mutates so much more than other viruses, as it’s using the same (imperfect, mutation-inducing) machinery to replicate itself as other viruses, it’s that its genome is sufficiently resilient to mutations that more variations can survive to infect others. perhaps there are many more, or just more flexible, non-critical regions that can be swapped out willy-nilly without damaging the core replication function. or the replication-coding regions of the genome can be swapped around more easily without ill effect. or there’s more error-correcting. or a number of other plausible mechanisms than being better at mutating, because that’s unlikely.

Re: Pfizer and Biontech provide update on Omicron variant

#546

Post by disambiguation »

ptaipale wrote: post #427
TechBro8615 wrote: post #292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hospitals are not designed to be empty, though. So you can’t just point to 80% full ICU beds and say a hospital is overwhelmed. Is there any data showing ICU beds filled above carrying capacity? Or number of patients transferred to a different hospital due to bed shortage?

Even in countries with fairly good covid situation (I'm in Finland) we are going to see excess mortality over the coming years, because right now as we speak, elective operations for heart surgeries and cancer operations are being postponed in order to make room for covid patients. ICU wards are designed for normal operations at near-full capacity. Maintaining a large-scale vacant ICU capacity is both uneconomical an…

This will show up as excess mortality of "preventable deaths".

But those stats will be overshadowed by 2 larger factors:

1. the pendulum will swing back as covid goes to zero .. fewer unhealthy and elderly members of the population will result in overall lower mortality rates in the short term (2-3 years).

2. baby boomers are coming of age .. a baby boom is eventually followed by a death boom. This will drive up the mortality rate long term (5-10 years).

Re: Pfizer and Biontech provide update on Omicron variant

#547

Post by CountDrewku »

biztos wrote: post #459
hef19898 wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone who has quite some experience in running operations based on data, numbers and metrics the German approach to COVID on that front alone really puzzled me from the beginning. First the incidence of 50 that they pulled out of their ass for contact tracing, which was ignored basically the next day. Then the fact that resources weren't really increased to improve contract traceability. Then the decision to use…

Also the "honor system" for quarantine. Also the closure of museums (airy, 25% capacity, everyone masked) but not department stores (crowded, many ignoring mask rules). Also the fact that my art-supply store in Berlin had to cordon off the half of its inventory that wasn't on the "essential" list, so some paint yes, some paint no. Also the refusal to confront the anti-vaxxers (police complicity, etc). Also the very p…

Yes an authoritarian police state enforcing quarantine in Germany sounds like a great idea. I'm sure there are historical examples they can follow.

Re: Pfizer and Biontech provide update on Omicron variant

#548

Post by fullstop »

the_doctah wrote: post #489
Taywee wrote: post #476

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're "literally forced" to do tons of things in order to participate in society in any major degree for the sake of public safety and standards of living. I don't know why you people get so obsessed about this effort to avoid spreading transmissible disease and not things like the requirement to not be naked in public, or requiring your vehicle to be considered safe to drive on public roadways. Don't pretend like t…

Having a properly functioning automobile and wearing clothes are not comparable to having shit injected into my body. Tell me what else I need to be injected with in order to hold a job.

> Tell me what else I need to be injected with in order to hold a job.

If your employer is the US Military, there's an entire list.

Unless you've been home schooled your entire life, there's plenty of vaccines required to attend K-12, and it doesn't matter if it's public, private, or parochial facilities. One could argue that without schooling the job market would be quite slim.

Re: Pfizer and Biontech provide update on Omicron variant

#549

Post by ohyes »

artificialLimbs wrote: post #500
arisAlexis wrote: post #431

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why draw a deadly roulette ticket?

Because this: https://www.forbes.com/sites/adamandrzejewski/2021/11/04/fed... despite this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lepqvdXoA2E&feature=youtu.be Oops, you can't watch that. Senators holding an expert panel is "dangerous misinformation". Here you go: https://rumble.com/vokrf7-sen.-johnson-expert-panel-on-feder...

Just so it is clear to you, the Forbes article you link is an opinion piece.

Re: Pfizer and Biontech provide update on Omicron variant

#550

Post by ptaipale »

makomk wrote: post #492
ptaipale wrote: post #439

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not really. With population vaccination rate nearly 90 % we have something approaching 30-40 % of hospital and ICU bed users vaccinated. The risk of ending up on ICU is about 30 x higher here, when comparing similar demographics. Risk of needing to go to hospital is 19 x higher currently.

The UK is interesting in that only about 70% of the population is fully vaccinated, which seems to be less than the proportion of Covid-releated deaths that were fully vaccinated. This isn't because the Covid vaccines are ineffective at preventing death - it's just that age has a much bigger effect than vaccination on someone's risk of dying from Covid, and the high-risk age groups are almost 100% vaccinated whereas…

Yes, and generally the age risk is so high that proper assessments must be done comparing age cohorts, not the entire population vax/unvax rates.
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