Nm

I don’t think we can say that. Some of the issues I’ve seen mentioned: - we have never tested every hospital admission for flu the way we have been for Covid. That’s huge. - they pulled out the 46% of cases that were Covid positive but not actually due to Covid (surgeries, OB, interestingly about half were psychiatric admissions), to look at the remaining cases separately, but when they compared the rates to influenza hospitalization- they left these in! So they compared actual influenza admissions to “Covid admissions” where nearly half were not admitted because of Covid-related disease. (And this matches with the two other pediatric studies showing that about 45% of admissions were Covid positive but not because of Covid). - they compared typical flu seasons to a new infection that was surging during the same time period. Fine that they did this, but not fine that it wasn’t accurately. -However, even if Covid was actually worse according to this analysis, that has little meaning for any comparisons from now on. We now have a good level of population immunity for Covid from natural infection and vaccines, and the vaccines are so much better than flu vaccines. Even if this study were a good comparison, and many have said it’s not, we are not in the same situation with Covid anymore, so it isn’t useful for making predictions.

What variants would those be?

It is also even lower than that now. Highly qualified doctors on social media dismayed that this misleading report was highly publicized. Example

Yes. I’ve just assumed they didn’t realize what an awkward thing it is to say.

I think that the emails have to be considered in context of the timeline in which things were studied, known, announced, discussed. They were written over a time period where the situation was rapidly evolving, also during which there were many discussions being had, among different people and organizations, that are not even referenced in the emails.

Tribalism? I would put the same question about those who are so invested in wanting it NOT to be. Different folks who know seem to say there isn’t strong evidence either way. I don’t understand the assumption that scientists cannot lie, have conflicts of interest, or be biased in any way. Not saying anyone here is saying that, just something I’ve noticed. I don’t think that posting about it means anyone is personally invested either way. (Shrug)

I am saying that the bolded is not correct. Unvaccinated are only catching it at the same “rate” if you shrink the denominator and leave out the rest of the population. The mistake is in doing that and comparing with an assumed 100% non-immune population in January. I see that the epi blog may or may not have originated the idea; it was also in a WashPo piece. I think it’s gross assumptions and sloppy math. Anyway, in January, the risk wasn’t equal for everyone, because 15-30% or more of people were previously infected and as unlikely to be infected again as those that are vaccinated are now. There was also a small percentage vaccinated already by January (medical workers and nursing homes), and this number increased through the rest of the surge. It also completely ignores population mixing (unvaccinated don’t only encounter other unvaccinated or previously uninfected people, there is mixing of populations), and varying rates of vaccination and recent infections in different states. The more important info, seems to me, anyway, is the number of hospitalizations in vaccinated vs. unvaccinated. A positive test is not going to be as important, since there can be asymptomatic and minimally symptomatic infections after vaccination and previous natural infection. -The reason I complained in the first place is because it is the same blog that posts bad studies (like the earlier long Covid ones) and other sloppy things without any critique. I have seen a few popular epidemiologists who have a following this past year post links and parrot things without any of the critical insight I’ve seen from certain other experts. In the big scheme of things, though, it doesn’t matter that much. 😉- From what I’m seeing, it is thought that the reason that happened was because it was a naiive population (like the H1N1 flu in its pandemic year). Now that there is a large degree of population immunity, we would expect it to become seasonal. But when they don’t seem to know how much natural immunity there is, I think you’re right that it seems like a question mark in states with lower vaccination rates.

I think it’s two things. One, it’s embarrassing for media to get caught with their pants down, so to speak, on taking previous vehement statements from a relatively small group of scientists as being scientific fact, and reporting them as such. So now they are going back and changing sentences in reports from last year to make it seem like they didn’t dismiss it out of hand. They even had “fact checks” about it. It just illustrates the problem with fact checks for which facts are few, and that depend as much on opinion as on fact. Journalists aren’t always the sharpest tools and are easily manipulated by forces bigger than they are individually. It’s happened with WMD’s, Russian collusion, among other issues. The second thing is more obvious. The pandemic is fading in the US, there are no immediate upcoming elections, and they want our attention back. Unless something else comes up, the next big thing will probably be UFO/UAP’s once people are not clicking on lab leak anymore.

Putting this case series of myocarditis in adolescents, from the US, here. All had chest pain, some with fever, shortness of breath, all admitted to hospital for several days, doing okay with follow-up though follow-ups only mentioned to one week. Some commentary at the end, there’s more in the link.

(Not trying to argue for the sake of arguing, but to try to make myself clearer 🙂). The case rates are much lower everywhere- how much lower is relative, but many times lower everywhere. There are no surges anywhere in the US. Pretending there is a population only of unvaccinated is ignoring the absolute numbers of cases in the interest of making the infection numbers seem worse than they are. There isn’t such a thing anymore as an unvaccinated population with little natural immunity; we are all mixed in together. If someone is unvaccinated and gets Covid, once that occurs, they still have just as high a chance of being hospitalized and dying as they ever did. That part is true. But their chance of catching it is much, much lower than in January, because there is much less disease around. The more people there are in their communities that have immunity, the more that is true. Natural infection and vaccination protects the unvaccinated, to some extent. Seasonality of infection is also protecting the unvaccinated; adults who aren’t vaccinated would be advised to rethink their choice before fall/winter. And I do think there is a point to there being some individual communities where an unvaccinated person will be at higher risk than others; this winter, we might see “pockets” of unvaccinated have larger outbreaks.

I guess I am supposed to be impressed that this person has a PhD, but half the time when I see something from this blog, it’s exaggerated or doesn’t make sense. Worse waves? Spreading faster than the winter surge? Whatever. Cases are so, so low, so comparing cases in the unvaccinated to a surge is ridiculous. Yes, get vaccinated, especially if you are in an age group or risk group that gives you a significant chance of ending up in the hospital. But this kind of thing is just hyperbole. Last week, I looked at data in my area (with a low test positivity) and saw that the cases per day come out to less than 1 in 300,000, and that includes all tests, so probably a few of them are vaccinated. So the chances of one of them being positive and out and about in suburbia, and me coming across them, is minuscule. (And being that I am vaccinated, the chance of me getting infected is that much less, which begs the question, why would I think a mask is going to give me significant benefit). So yes, you are taking a risk if you are unvaccinated, but the risk is not what it was during any of the previous surges, it matters not what the denominator is.

Good question! There just isn’t enough information about any of it. I want to hear from US surveillance people, too. The other thing that seems concerning is that the risk seems higher the younger you go, with the highest age 16-19. So what happens in 12-15 year olds? If it is something to do with the vaccine response, and we know that the immune response is even higher in the 12-15 year olds than in the 16-25 year olds, then could the younger teens have a higher risk? And then we consider that right now, the risk of coming across Covid is much lower than it was, so that the risks of any Covid-related outcome are not what they were a few months ago or a year ago. It seems reasonable to take some time to look at this better. I think that article is outdated. There are studies suggesting it is no more common than with other viruses, linked somewhere at WTM last week in one or the other of these mammoth threads, I can’t keep track. Which means it certainly does happen, just not like often like they were thinking it might. Still could be higher than the risk due to the vaccine, though. ———— Another article. https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2021/06/israel-detects-link-between-myocarditis-and-covid-vaccine.html

I’m so sorry. 🙁 I can understand seeing it that way, too.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/how-do-you-know/202012/dunning-kruger-isnt-real 😂

There will always be some myocarditis. They are saying that when they compare the numbers, the association with the vaccine seems to indicate a causal link. Even if they released all the numbers you’d need to do the analysis, it is complicated. There is also the fact that the clustering is within a few days of the second dose, and that CDC says they do not see any association of cases after the Johnson and Johnson vaccine.

To clarify, it isn’t my location that defines mild that way. When I said “here, mild means...,” I meant “here” as in the articles I linked, as well as a couple of others. The articles keep saying the cases are mild while at the same time saying they spend no more than four days in the hospital. Maybe that is considered “mild” for myocarditis, because the affected people get better. But most of us probably don’t think of something that lands a young person in the hospital as “mild.” It sounds like what they mean for myocarditis is that the heart isn’t (probably?) permanently damaged. ETA now I’m looking at your post again and I’m confused. At the beginning I think you are talking about myocarditis, but then in the second paragraph you are talking about mild Covid. I think that mild will have a different definition depending on the condition and who is defining it.

More about myocarditis, from Israel. https://www.jpost.com/health-science/covid-health-ministry-finds-some-myocarditis-cases-linked-to-vaccines-669835 More here https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2021/06/israel-reports-link-between-rare-cases-heart-inflammation-and-covid-19-vaccination I would like to know what “most” means, and what are the outcomes of those that aren’t considered “mild.” Mild here means hospitalized four days or fewer. 🤔 Interesting that so many had preexisting conditions.

I don’t think it’s quite that straightforward. The 95% reduction in symptomatic cases is relative risk reduction. There could be other reasons other than lack of immunity that someone has a symptomatic breakthrough, like innate immune factors or viral dose. Since they say that they don’t even know what level of antibodies is protective yet, they can’t even look at antibody results and say for sure that the 5% is because there are 5% of people who did not respond to the vaccine.

Interestingly, I have seen articles that suggest vaccine hesitancy is occurring in many places around the world. I just read something last week about a lot of resistance in India, even among healthcare workers and even in the midst of what they are going through. I don’t know if there are videos about magnets or 5G being circulated in other languages or not, but I imagine the primary reason for hesitancy everywhere else is the same as it is here: not conspiracies, but questioning of the unknowns and perhaps some misunderstandings.

This. Also, what I heard about becoming less severe is that it can occur, but that it takes many years of interacting with a population, not a few months. An example is HIV, which has mutated to the point that it apparently is not quite as virulent as it once was. What doesn’t make sense is how each new variant has been said to so much more transmissible than the one before it in the news. If that were literally true, the R0 would be a ridiculously high number by now. Maybe one or another of them is slightly more transmissible, but there can be a lot of other reasons a new variant becomes predominant, and it doesn’t make sense that it is becoming more transmissible with each variant, at least according to what I hear.

Here’s the video with English subtitles where needed.

I thought that Ralph Baric was the most interesting signatory of the open letter in Science. He is one of the foremost corona virologists, and published this paper on a bat Coronaviruses and the creation of a gain of function recombinant virus, along with Dr. Shi of WIV. So if he says it is possible for this to be a lab leak of any sort, I believe it is possible. And he has been on TWiV many times, which is why I knew who he is. https://www.microbe.tv/twiv/?s=Ralph+Baric+ There is also an interview of him in Italian media floating around from last fall, where his answers about the origin are interesting.

Well, a certain select part of the scientific community. Nature has appeared to be political this past year. I understand there is need to tread carefully, but I find these protestations of how those who don’t agree should just shut up and stop asking questions to be very anti-scientific.

My understanding is that one kind of signature is a set of nucleotides, unique to the lab or researchers that the virologist would customarily attach to the engineered virus they create to indicate it was their work. So you would expect to see that if it was lab-manipulated, but these are not necessary so they don’t have to be there for it to be a manipulated virus. But when he says “do not leave signatures,” it sounds like he means something else by that, more like some obvious genetic signs that things have been spliced and rearranged.