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How many microbes does it take to make you sick?

quantamagazine.org

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Re: How many microbes does it take to make you sick?

#91

Post by AnthonBerg »

sfblah wrote: post #89
AnthonBerg wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well said. Thank you. I think I can also pretty decisively say that hospital purchasing optimizations give face-fitting masks a bad rap. The FFP2 masks that hospital staff wear here are cheap and very uncomfortable. This bleeds into society as a negative view. There’s also another aspect: The difference between a N95/FFP2/whatever mask as part of the industrial production of a verifiable sanitization chain in a hospi…

Occam's razor here is that your interest in masks is a mental illness, and not because someone in your family is so immunocompromised or whatever that the mask is standing between that person and certain death. Is it possible that the latter is the case? Maybe. But in my view almost all cases of people stubbornly wearing masks are just psychiatric in nature. I know my comment will just make you angry, because "you're…

I wish upon you severe illness and the humility to deal with the repercussions to your worldview, and happiness.

I wish for your life to be long and healthy; and the lives of your loved ones too. And in that, let me give you advice to trade for your judgement of my place in life and my actions and sacrifices and loss. The advice is this:

Read. The academic. Literature.

Re: How many microbes does it take to make you sick?

#92

Post by AnthonBerg »

sfblah wrote: post #59
maxerickson wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

which provoked the other side to say they do nothing. This somewhat excuses their reactionary stupidity. Like they weren't "provoked", the use of masks wasn't directed at them.

Where I live, in Alameda County, California, masks were required outdoors if you were within 30 feet of another person. This ridiculous policy lasted about a year and provoked all kinds of altercations. It also made exercise, a key way to say fit, much more difficult. So, in this case I would argue mask use was in fact “directed at” people.

That’s bad policy, and obviously harmful.

There we are in perfect agreement.

That policy is also obviously at odds with scientific knowledge.

Policies like that harm high-risks groups immensely too.

Over here, the bad policies were strict social restrictions. Baseless and arbitrary restrictions of the number of people allowed to be at funerals and strict and severe limits to hospital visits. None of these were necessary from the perspective of the reality of aerosolized transmission and how easy it is to strip the pathogen out of the air we breathe.

It’s so absurd that it took a long time to find an analogy. It’s like repairing the flat tire on your bike with a patch of sod. It doesn’t really work, it’s messy, and people will think you’re crazy.

Re: How many microbes does it take to make you sick?

#93

Post by kadoban »

sfblah wrote: post #16
Sakos wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is one of the reasons why masks are so important and why they don't need to be 100% effective. Just reducing the amount of viral load could turn a serious infection into something you might barely notice. edit: Imagine this being controversial. I didn't realize there were Covid deniers and skeptics here, because what I've stated is completely within established science.

What you said isn’t controversial. It’s definitely right. The issue with masks is one side started treating them like a talisman that makes infection impossible, which provoked the other side to say they do nothing. On a population level, masks are probably close to ineffective against a viral pathogen. You can read the relevant Cochrane review to see that. On an individual level they obviously do something, but you…

> The issue with masks is one side started treating them like a talisman that makes infection impossible, which provoked the other side to say they do nothing.

This is an oddly biased framing.

Re: How many microbes does it take to make you sick?

#94

Post by explaininjs »

explaininjs wrote: post #60
Sakos wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is one of the reasons why masks are so important and why they don't need to be 100% effective. Just reducing the amount of viral load could turn a serious infection into something you might barely notice. edit: Imagine this being controversial. I didn't realize there were Covid deniers and skeptics here, because what I've stated is completely within established science.

The simple fact of the matter is that having covid every now and then^ is far superior to wearing a mask always. ^ and the more you have it the less severe it is, until it asymptotically reaches a complete non-issue. As with the common cold.

The downvoters might explain their distaste. But I cant expect them to do more than echo what the government told them.

Re: How many microbes does it take to make you sick?

#95

Post by verve_rat »

Sakos wrote: post #5
curiousObject wrote: post #2

> A tiny enough dose may even serve to remind our immune system of a pathogen’s existence, boosting our antibody response to keep us protected against it. This article should be required reading, whatever your views on Covid and other conditions. Although the attack method of the infection is significant, and the potential victim’s defenses are significant, the raw quantity of infectious agent and the exposure rate a…

This is one of the reasons why masks are so important and why they don't need to be 100% effective. Just reducing the amount of viral load could turn a serious infection into something you might barely notice. edit: Imagine this being controversial. I didn't realize there were Covid deniers and skeptics here, because what I've stated is completely within established science.

Yeah, there is a weird grouping of rabid anti-maskers here. Seems odd given the nominal audience of this site.

I just don't get the rejection of basic facts.

Re: How many microbes does it take to make you sick?

#96

Post by verve_rat »

sfblah wrote: post #87
jeffbee wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nothing was "weaponized" by this order, which 100% of people ignored.

I wish what you were saying were true, but it just isn't. I'm a fairly serious runner -- 40-60 miles per week typically. The amount of nonsense I experienced during that year might surprise you. Dozens of different times I was yelled at on trails, in the street, etc. because I was "too close". I was threatened with violence multiple times. This was all in the context of trying as hard as I could in all cases to stay…

Yes, the policy had people on edge.

The policy, not the global, some times lethal, pandemic.

The policy made people not want you near them.

Re: How many microbes does it take to make you sick?

#97

Post by cutemonster »

southernplaces7 wrote: post #72
dorfsmay wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Vaccination is using deactivated viruses. My question is can we get the same effect from exposure to small doses of live viruses. The articles says exposure to tiny amount can "boost" immunity, which I assume means an immunity acquired earlier from a full blown infection (or vaccination).

As with many things in medicine, it depends on specifics and context. With some viruses, this might work, and with others it could kill you. Vaccination itself is tricky partly for this very reason as far as I know (not a doctor or epidemiologist). Variolation for example, the predecessor to the world's first practice of vaccination (against smallpox) involved taking tiny amounts of live smallpox from scabs or pustul…

Interesting!

I suppose one more dangerous thing with this, could be how popular anti vaccination ideas could become, when the anti-vaxxers start saying that vaccine is live virus

Re: How many microbes does it take to make you sick?

#98

Post by ryanjshaw »

gregwebs wrote: post #33

Great to see statistical thinking. There have been a lot of Covid shouting matches because people are trying to reduce things to binary. Masks don’t work! Actually, they work as advertised- only 95% effective at best (and a cloth mask may be 30%), not a binary protected or not. That’s effective at blocking particles. You are still guaranteed to get some virus particles. They are going to be in your respiratory tract…

If you want to be truly scientific you also need to discuss the risks of mask wearing. Then, in relation to COVID response, you have to weigh up the costs vs. benefits of a mask wearing policy.

Some of those costs are hard to quantify scientifically or intangible e.g. restrictions on individual freedom, and even the scientifically quantifiable data may have large variability so you have to take an opionated position. Different cultures will obviously take different positions due to different weights they place on risks and values.

Therefore, at this point you leave the realm of science and enter the realm of politics. For whatever reason, people like to pretend it's entirely a scientific discussion but it's not.

Re: How many microbes does it take to make you sick?

#99

Post by costigan »

sfblah wrote: post #87
jeffbee wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nothing was "weaponized" by this order, which 100% of people ignored.

I wish what you were saying were true, but it just isn't. I'm a fairly serious runner -- 40-60 miles per week typically. The amount of nonsense I experienced during that year might surprise you. Dozens of different times I was yelled at on trails, in the street, etc. because I was "too close". I was threatened with violence multiple times. This was all in the context of trying as hard as I could in all cases to stay…

I was in the south bay, and walked and exercised outside frequently after about the first month. Santa Clara County had a similar policy concerning separation distance outside, and I never had an unpleasant experience. I'm sorry you did, and I won't defend rude or overly fearful behavior. However, I draw a distinction between unintended consequences and weaponization. I've seen no evidence the officials who instituted the policy weaponized anything or directed it toward any specific group or groups, and you have presented none.

My belief is that they were collectively responding to an uncertain, rapidly changing situation, were incentivized to be very conservative given the early experience in Italy, didn't adjust their approach sufficiently when new information revised the case fatality rate downward, and did a poor job overall of balancing the broad spectrum of risks and costs. I don't think any of these mistakes were intentional. And none of us, including those who criticize these policies in hindsight, really know what would have happened had the policies been more lax, especially early on.

Re: How many microbes does it take to make you sick?

#100

Post by refurb »

dorfsmay wrote: post #8
curiousObject wrote: post #2

> A tiny enough dose may even serve to remind our immune system of a pathogen’s existence, boosting our antibody response to keep us protected against it. This article should be required reading, whatever your views on Covid and other conditions. Although the attack method of the infection is significant, and the potential victim’s defenses are significant, the raw quantity of infectious agent and the exposure rate a…

> boosting ourantibody response What I wonder is if we can develop immunity (not boosting, assuming never been infected before) from being exposed to small doses, or do we need at least one full blown infection.

Generally the stronger the immune response, the more effective the future immunity (not always).
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