S/o Sick Shaming

[SKL]

Aside from the current debate, I hope this makes health care systems look at how they can improve availability of services.  When my kid was 3, she busted her head open, so I drove her to the ER.  The place was almost empty, there was no pandemic, but this was still a 6 hour ordeal, most of which time was us waiting.  I understand this is rather common, and for whatever reason, it's considered acceptable, but why?  Surely there are smart people who can address this and make it better.

And can't there be different rules that kick in when a hospital / ICU nears capacity, so relatively simple things can be done faster or tedious protocols can be scaled back?

This would apply to those hospitals that are filling up with RSV etc. as well as those for which Covid is the greater immediate concern.

Edited August 9, 2021 by SKL

[Halftime Hope]

1 hour ago, Frances said:

They do seem to be for some people, such as @rebot and @Pen. With all of the different covid threads, it’s hard to keep track of who is for and against vaccines. I’m glad to hear you are vaccinated and pro-vaccine.

Let me be clear:  I am not pro-vaccine.  I am pro people deciding for themselves with true informed consent. I am neutral on vaccines: as I see it, there are current benefits, current very obvious dangers, and future unknowns.  

Had I a child, teen or college age student, I would have zero interest in them getting vaccinated. 

 (I am hopeful that there will be other vaccines coming down the pike that will have a clearer risk-benefit ratio. Undoubtedly, development of vaccines will continue because we have failed at driving this pathogen to extinction like we did with SARS-COV-1, and sadly, it will now be endemic.)  

 

 

 

[ktgrok]

Regarding risk/benefit analysis - my area has hospitals full up with unvaccinated covid patients. They are not full up with vaccinated people seriously ill from vaccine reactions. 

So....that seems pretty clear cut to me as to which is more dangerous. 

[rebot]

8 hours ago, rebot said:

both Pfizer and Moderna have admitted to giving their control group the vaccine because it was the right thing to do. That's right, they got rid of their control group.

That's right, I totally just quoted myself. I admit that I'm a little surprised that no one commented on the fact that both Moderna and Pfizer eliminated their control group. Trials are officially ongoing for two more years. 

[ktgrok]

6 minutes ago, rebot said:

That's right, I totally just quoted myself. I admit that I'm a little surprised that no one commented on the fact that both Moderna and Pfizer eliminated their control group. Trials are officially ongoing for two more years. 

I am pretty sure that has precedent. When there is evidence the treatment is life saving, and those in the control group are at risk, the ethical thing to do is to allow them to choose if they wish to discontinue being part of the control group and be vaccinated. 

They are humans and they are the ones that chose to be vaccinated. Should they be banned from vaccination by law or something? 

Edited August 9, 2021 by ktgrok

[SKL]

From a Florida ICU capacity article:

"AdventHealth released this statement late Monday [this was mid-July]:

“It is typical for hospitals to have capacity figures in the 90th percentile even in pre-COVID times, so these numbers do not cause for concern or alarm. While we have seen an increase in hospitalizations in Central Florida over the last few weeks, we still have significantly fewer COVID patients compared to what we saw during the peak. Even during the peak, at no point did we reach capacity.

It’s important to realize that capacity numbers are snapshots in time. Our hospitals are designed in such a way that spaces are flexible and expandable. We have sufficient supplies of ventilators, monitors and other specialized equipment in order to quickly convert spaces in the hospital to both standard and ICU level rooms, should they be needed. AdventHealth also has an extensive health care system in place in Central Florida so we can locate patients to the facility that best matches the level of care they need.”"

A more recent article:

https://www.news-press.com/story/news/coronavirus/2021/08/04/florida-hospitals-desantis-covid-cases-rising-but-not-overwhelming/5481229001/

Edited August 9, 2021 by SKL

[regentrude]

7 minutes ago, SKL said:

"AdventHealth released this statement late Monday:

“It is typical for hospitals to have capacity figures in the 90th percentile even in pre-COVID times, so these numbers do not cause for concern or alarm. While we have seen an increase in hospitalizations in Central Florida over the last few weeks, we still have significantly fewer COVID patients compared to what we saw during the peak. Even during the peak, at no point did we reach capacity.

It’s important to realize that capacity numbers are snapshots in time. Our hospitals are designed in such a way that spaces are flexible and expandable. We have sufficient supplies of ventilators, monitors and other specialized equipment in order to quickly convert spaces in the hospital to both standard and ICU level rooms, should they be needed. AdventHealth also has an extensive health care system in place in Central Florida so we can locate patients to the facility that best matches the level of care they need.”"

OTOH, the Florida Hospital Association reports:

Quote

Percent of Previous Peak (7/23/20): 113%

• Hospitals expecting critical staffing shortage in next 7 days: 60%

https://web.fha.org/news/newsarticledisplay.aspx?ArticleID=33

Edited August 9, 2021 by regentrude

[Sneezyone]

7 minutes ago, SKL said:

From a Florida ICU capacity article:

"AdventHealth released this statement late Monday [this was mid-July]:

“It is typical for hospitals to have capacity figures in the 90th percentile even in pre-COVID times, so these numbers do not cause for concern or alarm. While we have seen an increase in hospitalizations in Central Florida over the last few weeks, we still have significantly fewer COVID patients compared to what we saw during the peak. Even during the peak, at no point did we reach capacity.

It’s important to realize that capacity numbers are snapshots in time. Our hospitals are designed in such a way that spaces are flexible and expandable. We have sufficient supplies of ventilators, monitors and other specialized equipment in order to quickly convert spaces in the hospital to both standard and ICU level rooms, should they be needed. AdventHealth also has an extensive health care system in place in Central Florida so we can locate patients to the facility that best matches the level of care they need.”"

A more recent article:

https://www.news-press.com/story/news/coronavirus/2021/08/04/florida-hospitals-desantis-covid-cases-rising-but-not-overwhelming/5481229001/

Yeah, the situation where DH works (not central Florida but Jacksonville, a major hot spot) is far more severe with lots of stories like this. It’s tiresome. https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.wfla.com/news/florida/six-florida-church-members-die-within-10-days-pastor-pushes-for-vaccines/amp/

Edited August 9, 2021 by Sneezyone

[ktgrok]

12 minutes ago, SKL said:

From a Florida ICU capacity article:

"AdventHealth released this statement late Monday:

“It is typical for hospitals to have capacity figures in the 90th percentile even in pre-COVID times, so these numbers do not cause for concern or alarm. While we have seen an increase in hospitalizations in Central Florida over the last few weeks, we still have significantly fewer COVID patients compared to what we saw during the peak. Even during the peak, at no point did we reach capacity.

It’s important to realize that capacity numbers are snapshots in time. Our hospitals are designed in such a way that spaces are flexible and expandable. We have sufficient supplies of ventilators, monitors and other specialized equipment in order to quickly convert spaces in the hospital to both standard and ICU level rooms, should they be needed. AdventHealth also has an extensive health care system in place in Central Florida so we can locate patients to the facility that best matches the level of care they need.”"

First, if that is from mid July, it is no longer accurate. Our hospitalizations are climbing rapidly. See graph below.

Also, Central Florida is not the hardest hit area in Florida. But the nurses I've spoken to in this area are saying they are seeing a LOT of patients. Also, having enough Covid patients to need to convert other spaces into temporary Covid wards is not a good thing. 

Jacksonville, and also the hospitals in Alachua County are having a bad time of if - and my mom's friend who works in Palm Beach County is exhausted and ready to quit as it keeps getting worse and worse. Alachua County has said they don't have the people or ambulances to handle the Covid surge right now. My friend working in a hospital in that county says they don't have enough beds, and are having to stick people in random spaces. Sure, a press release designed to make everything sound okay can say "we can covert other spaces" but those in the hospitals are not making it sound quite so positive when they are treating people in the corridors with no where to put them. 

 

Edited August 9, 2021 by ktgrok

[KSera]

1 hour ago, rebot said:

That's right, I totally just quoted myself. I admit that I'm a little surprised that no one commented on the fact that both Moderna and Pfizer eliminated their control group. Trials are officially ongoing for two more years. 

That was one of several issues in that post I was going to respond to, but I decided to let it go. This is standard procedure in a trial when the evidence is starkly clear the intervention either saves too many people to deny the control group the treatment or if the intervention harms too many people for it to be ethical to keep giving it. Both are ethically important to adhere to. If keeping someone in the control group is causing astronomically higher illness and death rates, it would be plainly wrong to not allow them the treatment that would save them from that. And as mentioned before, at this point in the trial process, it is common for full authorization to proceed while long-term safety data continues to be collected. That’s how it works.

[Frances]

1 hour ago, Halftime Hope said:

Let me be clear:  I am not pro-vaccine.  I am pro people deciding for themselves with true informed consent. I am neutral on vaccines: as I see it, there are current benefits, current very obvious dangers, and future unknowns.  

Had I a child, teen or college age student, I would have zero interest in them getting vaccinated. 

 (I am hopeful that there will be other vaccines coming down the pike that will have a clearer risk-benefit ratio. Undoubtedly, development of vaccines will continue because we have failed at driving this pathogen to extinction like we did with SARS-COV-1, and sadly, it will now be endemic.)  

 

 

 

Bummer. Here I thought we finally had the unicorn of someone who was pro-vaccine, pro-Ivermectin available in the early stages for everyone who gets covid, and doesn’t believe the election was stolen or Biden was replaced by a body double (based on careful examination of his ears).

[rebot]

1 hour ago, KSera said:

That was one of several issues in that post I was going to respond to, but I decided to let it go. This is standard procedure in a trial when the evidence is starkly clear the intervention either saves too many people to deny the control group the treatment or if the intervention harms too many people for it to be ethical to keep giving it. Both are ethically important to adhere to. If keeping someone in the control group is causing astronomically higher illness and death rates, it would be plainly wrong to not allow them the treatment that would save them from that. And as mentioned before, at this point in the trial process, it is common for full authorization to proceed while long-term safety data continues to be collected. That’s how it works.

So you're saying that a huge number of people in the control group must have been either dying from covid or there must have been a much larger group of them getting sick vs those vaccinated, correct? I'm curious, does anyone have any idea what those numbers are? What exactly constitutes astronomical.

Here’s what I don’t get, they already skewed the trial, why not replace the former control group with some of the millions that don’t want the vax? I mean they can say that’s not how it’s done, but they can’t really say that they are concerned about following typical trial protocol. By doing this they eliminated any way to measure the efficacy, effectiveness, or the safety of the vaccine. As a person who questions the safety of the vaccine, this doesn’t inspire confidence. I’d even say that, to me, it almost seems like they intentionally don’t want to have a group to compare to.

I just spent two days last week going over how to set up a good experiment with my fifth grader. We talked about variables, controls, observations, etc… Now I get to figure out how to find two different kinds of bird seed in a foreign country. Thank you for that fun tomorrow, Oak Meadow. I guess I should have been more impressed that he realized that if you get rid of your control group, you have nothing to compare your results to.

 

[KSera]

37 minutes ago, rebot said:

So you're saying that a huge number of people in the control group must have been either dying from covid or there must have been a much larger group of them getting sick vs those vaccinated, correct? I'm curious, does anyone have any idea what those numbers are? What exactly constitutes astronomical.

Here’s what I don’t get, they already skewed the trial, why not replace the former control group with some of the millions that don’t want the vax? I mean they can say that’s not how it’s done, but they can’t really say that they are concerned about following typical trial protocol. By doing this they eliminated any way to measure the efficacy, effectiveness, or the safety of the vaccine. As a person who questions the safety of the vaccine, this doesn’t inspire confidence. I’d even say that, to me, it almost seems like they intentionally don’t want to have a group to compare to.

I just spent two days last week going over how to set up a good experiment with my fifth grader. We talked about variables, controls, observations, etc… Now I get to figure out how to find two different kinds of bird seed in a foreign country. Thank you for that fun tomorrow, Oak Meadow. I guess I should have been more impressed that he realized that if you get rid of your control group, you have nothing to compare your results to.

 

Have you looked at any of the vaccine trial data yourself? And follow up data, such as from Zoe and many, many hospitals? There is lots of that data available. I don’t have time right now to look them up again, but with Pfizer and Moderna, the vaccine recipients had ~95% reduction in symptomatic disease and 99% reduction in hospitalization and death. That’s huge (that has dropped slightly with Delta, but still excellent) . If the control group had 100 people die, 99 of those people would not have died if they’d been vaccinated. Can you see how that would be unethical to continue keeping people in the placebo group unvaccinated once they determined that? It would be certainly assigning people to hospitalization and death who didn’t need to be. The efficacy is already proven, as well as the immediate safety. They will continue to collect data over the long term. Comparing to placebo isn’t the only way to do that. They can compare to background rates. Again, this is nothing new or nefarious done just for this trial, this is what is standardly done when a treatment shows such overwhelming benefit. Ethics requires it. 

[Jean in Newcastle]

1 hour ago, rebot said:

So you're saying that a huge number of people in the control group must have been either dying from covid or there must have been a much larger group of them getting sick vs those vaccinated, correct? I'm curious, does anyone have any idea what those numbers are? What exactly constitutes astronomical.

Here’s what I don’t get, they already skewed the trial, why not replace the former control group with some of the millions that don’t want the vax? I mean they can say that’s not how it’s done, but they can’t really say that they are concerned about following typical trial protocol. By doing this they eliminated any way to measure the efficacy, effectiveness, or the safety of the vaccine. As a person who questions the safety of the vaccine, this doesn’t inspire confidence. I’d even say that, to me, it almost seems like they intentionally don’t want to have a group to compare to.

I just spent two days last week going over how to set up a good experiment with my fifth grader. We talked about variables, controls, observations, etc… Now I get to figure out how to find two different kinds of bird seed in a foreign country. Thank you for that fun tomorrow, Oak Meadow. I guess I should have been more impressed that he realized that if you get rid of your control group, you have nothing to compare your results to.

 

Did you get to the part about a randomized blind study?  Because what you say you would do is not that. 

[Terabith]

10 hours ago, Frances said:

Bummer. Here I thought we finally had the unicorn of someone who was pro-vaccine, pro-Ivermectin available in the early stages for everyone who gets covid, and doesn’t believe the election was stolen or Biden was replaced by a body double (based on careful examination of his ears).

I'm fairly agnostic about ivermectin.  I'm pro vaccine and don't think the election was stolen, but I have a friend who is a doctor who does believe in ivermectin.  I haven't seen any studies that convince me of its efficacy, but I trust her antecdata.  If a person contracts covid and doesn't have any conditions that make ivermectin contraindicated, I think it's a reasonable thing to allow.  I don't think I would request it for myself if any of us catch covid, but I would definitely use zinc and quercetin.  I think the theory was that quercetin/ ivermectin could help make zinc more bioavailable?  

Edited August 9, 2021 by Terabith

[Halftime Hope]

7 hours ago, Frances said:

Bummer. Here I thought we finally had the unicorn of someone who was pro-vaccine, pro-Ivermectin available in the early stages for everyone who gets covid, and doesn’t believe the election was stolen or Biden was replaced by a body double (based on careful examination of his ears).

Mockery is a key component of beneficial discourse. 

[Pawz4me]

8 hours ago, rebot said:

That's right, I totally just quoted myself. I admit that I'm a little surprised that no one commented on the fact that both Moderna and Pfizer eliminated their control group. Trials are officially ongoing for two more years. 

 

8 hours ago, ktgrok said:

I am pretty sure that has precedent. When there is evidence the treatment is life saving, and those in the control group are at risk, the ethical thing to do is to allow them to choose if they wish to discontinue being part of the control group and be vaccinated. 

They are humans and they are the ones that chose to be vaccinated. Should they be banned from vaccination by law or something? 

I believe this is also how most trials for new cancer drugs are done, where the trial isn't new drug (or combo) versus a placebo, but rather a new drug/combo against whatever drug/combo is considered to be the current standard of care for the particular types of cancer(s) being studied. As @ktgrokand @KSerasaid, it's considered unethical to NOT offer participants a treatment that shows a clear, marked benefit. That's exactly how trials work.

[ktgrok]

7 hours ago, rebot said:

So you're saying that a huge number of people in the control group must have been either dying from covid or there must have been a much larger group of them getting sick vs those vaccinated, correct? I'm curious, does anyone have any idea what those numbers are? What exactly constitutes astronomical.

Here’s what I don’t get, they already skewed the trial, why not replace the former control group with some of the millions that don’t want the vax? I mean they can say that’s not how it’s done, but they can’t really say that they are concerned about following typical trial protocol. By doing this they eliminated any way to measure the efficacy, effectiveness, or the safety of the vaccine. As a person who questions the safety of the vaccine, this doesn’t inspire confidence. I’d even say that, to me, it almost seems like they intentionally don’t want to have a group to compare to.

I just spent two days last week going over how to set up a good experiment with my fifth grader. We talked about variables, controls, observations, etc… Now I get to figure out how to find two different kinds of bird seed in a foreign country. Thank you for that fun tomorrow, Oak Meadow. I guess I should have been more impressed that he realized that if you get rid of your control group, you have nothing to compare your results to.

 

Enough people were dying across the country and around the world that it was unethical not to allow the participants to CHOOSE to be vaccinated. Should they not have been allowed to be vaccinated, even if they were very worried about their safety/health? 

[Danae]

8 hours ago, rebot said:

So you're saying that a huge number of people in the control group must have been either dying from covid or there must have been a much larger group of them getting sick vs those vaccinated, correct? I'm curious, does anyone have any idea what those numbers are? What exactly constitutes astronomical.

Here’s what I don’t get, they already skewed the trial, why not replace the former control group with some of the millions that don’t want the vax? I mean they can say that’s not how it’s done, but they can’t really say that they are concerned about following typical trial protocol. By doing this they eliminated any way to measure the efficacy, effectiveness, or the safety of the vaccine. As a person who questions the safety of the vaccine, this doesn’t inspire confidence. I’d even say that, to me, it almost seems like they intentionally don’t want to have a group to compare to.

I just spent two days last week going over how to set up a good experiment with my fifth grader. We talked about variables, controls, observations, etc… Now I get to figure out how to find two different kinds of bird seed in a foreign country. Thank you for that fun tomorrow, Oak Meadow. I guess I should have been more impressed that he realized that if you get rid of your control group, you have nothing to compare your results to.

 

You made your decision that you’d rather catch covid naturally than get the vaccine without reading the vaccine trial results?  

[Dmmetler]

9 hours ago, rebot said:

So you're saying that a huge number of people in the control group must have been either dying from covid or there must have been a much larger group of them getting sick vs those vaccinated, correct? I'm curious, does anyone have any idea what those numbers are? What exactly constitutes astronomical.

Here’s what I don’t get, they already skewed the trial, why not replace the former control group with some of the millions that don’t want the vax? I mean they can say that’s not how it’s done, but they can’t really say that they are concerned about following typical trial protocol. By doing this they eliminated any way to measure the efficacy, effectiveness, or the safety of the vaccine. As a person who questions the safety of the vaccine, this doesn’t inspire confidence. I’d even say that, to me, it almost seems like they intentionally don’t want to have a group to compare to.

I just spent two days last week going over how to set up a good experiment with my fifth grader. We talked about variables, controls, observations, etc… Now I get to figure out how to find two different kinds of bird seed in a foreign country. Thank you for that fun tomorrow, Oak Meadow. I guess I should have been more impressed that he realized that if you get rid of your control group, you have nothing to compare your results to.

 

Uh, my local hospital system IS keeping statistics on vaccinated vs unvaccinated cases. Since the hospital system includes doctor's offices and at least some testing sites, that isn't just hospital cases. So yes, there is  exactly that control group that you say you want. It's just that people are enrolling in it by choice, due to not getting vaccinated. 

 

Everyone I know who participated in a study did so in part because they wanted the vaccine ASAP, and part of the agreement was that they would get the real vaccine if they were in the placebo group when the EUA went through at latest. I would have signed up if there had been one close to me. (there is a 2-11 yr old pediatric Moderna study here now, and I know a decent number of parents who's kids are in that study, and the primary reason they have given is that 2-11 yr olds can't be vaccinated yet. Most have kids who have been extremely anxious about COVID, and wanted to do the study so they could do something). To refuse them the vaccine for the full follow-up time would have probably led to NO ONE signing up. 

[Corraleno]

12 hours ago, rebot said:

That's right, I totally just quoted myself. I admit that I'm a little surprised that no one commented on the fact that both Moderna and Pfizer eliminated their control group. Trials are officially ongoing for two more years. 

The ongoing trials are tracking safety, not efficacy. They don't need to wait two years to find out if the vaccines work, the trials already reached the intended end point for efficacy, and we know they work. There are millions of unvaccinated people currently serving as the control group for efficacy.  

What surprises me is that all the people refusing to be vaccinated because they "won't be part of an experiment" don't acknowledge that they absolutely are part of the experiment — they're the control group, and ongoing calculations of efficacy will be determined by how many more of them are hospitalized and/or die from covid.

[Corraleno]

9 hours ago, rebot said:

So you're saying that a huge number of people in the control group must have been either dying from covid or there must have been a much larger group of them getting sick vs those vaccinated, correct? I'm curious, does anyone have any idea what those numbers are? What exactly constitutes astronomical.

Here’s what I don’t get, they already skewed the trial, why not replace the former control group with some of the millions that don’t want the vax? I mean they can say that’s not how it’s done, but they can’t really say that they are concerned about following typical trial protocol. By doing this they eliminated any way to measure the efficacy, effectiveness, or the safety of the vaccine. As a person who questions the safety of the vaccine, this doesn’t inspire confidence. I’d even say that, to me, it almost seems like they intentionally don’t want to have a group to compare to.

I just spent two days last week going over how to set up a good experiment with my fifth grader. We talked about variables, controls, observations, etc… Now I get to figure out how to find two different kinds of bird seed in a foreign country. Thank you for that fun tomorrow, Oak Meadow. I guess I should have been more impressed that he realized that if you get rid of your control group, you have nothing to compare your results to.

Clinical trials are not laboratory experiments. I don't think you understand how clinical trials work. 

The clinical trials met their predetermined endpoint for efficacy, which was a specific number of infections that were statistically sufficient to allow them to calculate efficacy with a reasonable degree of certainty. They proved efficacy according to the protocol. They are continuing to closely track all study subjects for safety until the final endpoint in the study.

The numbers of people who have now been vaccinated, and who remain unvaccinated, are large enough that they can continue to calculate efficacy based on population-wide statistics. E.g. Public Health England calculated 88% efficacy for Pfizer specifically against Delta, Scotland found 79%, and Israel found 64%. It is unethical to leave tens of thousands of people in the trials not only unvaccinated but uninformed as to their vaccination status in the middle of a pandemic. They need to be able to make decisions about things like school, jobs, travel, etc., and if they had to wait two years to find out if they'd been vaccinated or not they would have either dropped out entirely or not agreed to participate to begin with.

[rebot]

1 hour ago, Danae said:

You made your decision that you’d rather catch covid naturally than get the vaccine without reading the vaccine trial results?

No, I've read through the trial results. I'm questioning, at what number is it considered astronomical? Do we keep going with their original reported data? Should we consider what's going on in Israel?

 

[Corraleno]

1 minute ago, rebot said:

No, I've read through the trial results. I'm questioning, at what number is it considered astronomical? Do we keep going with their original reported data? Should we consider what's going on in Israel?

 

I'm not being snarky, but I literally don't understand your point. What number of what is astronomical? What do you mean by "keep going with their original data"?  The CDC are absolutely taking into account the population-wide data from the US as well as other countries. They are planning to approve boosters for the immunocompromised within the next few weeks on the basis of what they are seeing in terms of waning immunity in Israel. What exactly are you wanting to happen that isn't happening?

[rebot]

I’m new on social media. It’s definitely different than real life. I’ve found it fascinating the last few days to watch how difficult it is for people (one either side) to admit fault with their side. I guess in real life, people get called out, but on here it’s much easier to ignore what you don’t want to deal with. I admit to posting because I was interested to see if any of the pro vaccine people would say that this was a bad way to conduct a scientific study. We’re on a homeschooling forum. I’m assuming that means most posters either homeschool or homeschooled in the past. Every fall, I get to go over the scientific method and how to set up a good experiment with my kids. What Moderna and Pfizer did, does not make a good experiment.

I don’t actually know where I stand on this. I would assume that most people who signed up for the trial did so because they believe that a vaccine would provide protection against covid. Disregarding the fact that they joined a trial, is it right to withhold the vaccine from them? Again, disregarding the trial that they signed up for, I’m all for people making their own health choices. That doesn’t change the fact, that from a scientific standpoint, Moderna and Pfizer pretty much screwed the pooch.

Edited August 9, 2021 by rebot
context

[lynn]

12 hours ago, ktgrok said:

First, if that is from mid July, it is no longer accurate. Our hospitalizations are climbing rapidly. See graph below.

Also, Central Florida is not the hardest hit area in Florida. But the nurses I've spoken to in this area are saying they are seeing a LOT of patients. Also, having enough Covid patients to need to convert other spaces into temporary Covid wards is not a good thing. 

Jacksonville, and also the hospitals in Alachua County are having a bad time of if - and my mom's friend who works in Palm Beach County is exhausted and ready to quit as it keeps getting worse and worse. Alachua County has said they don't have the people or ambulances to handle the Covid surge right now. My friend working in a hospital in that county says they don't have enough beds, and are having to stick people in random spaces. Sure, a press release designed to make everything sound okay can say "we can covert other spaces" but those in the hospitals are not making it sound quite so positive when they are treating people in the corridors with no where to put them. 

 

I was quite surprised that when a loved one was in the hospital, he did not have covid, in Panama City in June the hospital was practically empty and masks weren't required although we chose to wear.  No limits on visitors.   

[KSera]

2 minutes ago, rebot said:

No, I've read through the trial results. I'm questioning, at what number is it considered astronomical? Do we keep going with their original reported data? Should we consider what's going on in Israel?

 

I'm the one who used astronomical. It's not a precise number. To me, 99% efficacy at keeping people alive and out of the hospital qualifies as astronomical. We could just say "incredibly effective" perhaps? The data is being adjusted as the unfortunate new variants arrive. I do think it's disingenous for people to point to delta data as the reason they didn't get vaccinated when that is very new information, so no one made their initial decision based on Delta. Still, the current vaccines are "incredibly effective" at keeping people alive and out of the hospital, even with Delta.

 

I read this piece in TIME this morning, from an MPH I like as he's a straight shooter and not an alarmist (Ashish Jha, M.D., MPH). It made me think of this discussion as it talks a lot about where we are with the safety and trial data we have on these vaccines, which is pretty much an unprecedented amount of information at this point. The "faster" part of the headline might make people with safety concerns recoil a bit, but the article explains why this is not a concern and that this is a red tape issue at this point:

The COVID-19 Vaccines Are Safe and They Work. The FDA Must Move Faster to Approve Them

Quote

It is critical, of course, that the FDA do its job. A full approval will be empty if it is perceived as anything but thorough. But there is thoroughness on the science versus thoroughness in the paperwork. The science of these vaccines has been thoroughly vetted. The pandemic has allowed the efficacy of these vaccines to be demonstrated far more rapidly than any other vaccine in history, simply because of the sheer number of infections during their trials. The evidence—from both clinical trials and studies of their impact since they were authorized for emergency use—is unequivocal: these are some of the most effective vaccines in history.

They are also the most highly scrutinized medical products ever. The vaccine trials rank among the largest clinical trials in history—literally 100 times larger than a study that formed the basis of the FDA’s approval of an H1N1 vaccine in 2009, for example, and 10 times larger than any of the trials underlying the approval of many other vaccines.

Quote

Nothing is perfect but these vaccines are among the closest thing we have to perfection when it comes to protecting against COVID-19. Yes, it is true that we don’t yet have long-term follow-up—but we rarely do for most therapies and vaccines that are approved. And fortunately, as with all vaccines, adverse events from the currently authorized COVID-19 shots show up within a couple of weeks of vaccination and there is no vaccine where adverse effects first appear more than eight weeks after the shot. So we can be confident that we now know what to expect.

It also compares the risks of the very rare adverse events to the risks of the actual disease. For example, the lower risk, younger age cohort of young men that is at risk of heart inflammation (which is thankfully usually mild and no one has died from yet) has a 100 time higher death rate from Covid than their risk of having any heart inflammation.

 

[Frances]

7 hours ago, Terabith said:

I'm fairly agnostic about ivermectin.  I'm pro vaccine and don't think the election was stolen, but I have a friend who is a doctor who does believe in ivermectin.  I haven't seen any studies that convince me of its efficacy, but I trust her antecdata.  If a person contracts covid and doesn't have any conditions that make ivermectin contraindicated, I think it's a reasonable thing to allow.  I don't think I would request it for myself if any of us catch covid, but I would definitely use zinc and quercetin.  I think the theory was that quercetin/ ivermectin could help make zinc more bioavailable?  

As stated previously, I’m absolutely fine with a doctor prescribing Ivermectin or any other drugs they see fit for covid and with people seeking out a doctor who will prescribe the covid drugs they desire or acquiring them OTC where legal. At this time, I just don’t see the data that supports pushing for widespread usage of Ivermectin, especially in lieu of vaccination.

[Meriwether]

14 hours ago, Jean in Newcastle said:

Also- I know that this will infuriate some but people who refuse vaccines (whether temporarily or not) should be the ones staying out of stores, restaurants, theaters etc while the rest of us get to “start living life again “. They have the choice of a vaccine and refused it. That is a reasonable consequence for that choice. 

Yup, infuriated. I am not surprised that some people support this rhetoric, but I find it very troubling.

 

Disclaimer: I am fully vaxxed. 

[KSera]

10 minutes ago, rebot said:

I’m new on social media. It’s definitely different than real life. I’ve found it fascinating the last few days to watch how difficult it is for people to admit fault with their side. I guess in real life, people get called out, but on here it’s much easier to ignore what you don’t want to deal with. I admit to posting because I was interested to see if any of the pro vaccine people would say that this was a bad way to conduct a scientific study. We’re on a homeschooling forum. I’m assuming that means most posters either homeschool or homeschooled in the past. Every fall, I get to go over the scientific method and how to set up a good experiment with my kids. What Moderna and Pfizer did, does not make a good experiment.

I don’t actually know where I stand on this. I would assume that most people who signed up for the trial did so because they believe that a vaccine would provide protection against covid. Disregarding the fact that they joined a trial, is it right to withhold the vaccine from them? Again, disregarding the trial that they signed up for, I’m all for people making their own health choices. That doesn’t change the fact, that from a scientific standpoint, Moderna and Pfizer pretty much screwed the pooch.

I'm so confused. I, and others, have shared multiple times now that this is literally how it works. Did my earlier post about how many people would be assigned to die based on how you think experiments should work make any sense to you? Did that trouble you to think that a drug company could require people to be denied life saving medicine becasue they wanted to keep their placebo group intact after the study endpoint? (The efficacy endpoint has been reached, safety data now comes from the hundreds of million of doses that have been administered to the public.) You keep asserting that what they did violates experimental design in some point, and it does not. Again, this is how it works in medicine. They are not experimenting on robots. They can't make people die by witholding vaccines that are proven life saving. None of that is screwing the pooch. I'm thinking maybe it would be helpful for you to read about how other medicines and treatments have been discovered so you can see this is standard procedure.

 

I'm going to give one more try at an example. If there is a trial studying a new method for performing heart transplants in children, and they find eureka! this new method means they have NO deaths in children receiving heart transplants, whereas 10% died before (made up number), once they determine that, it would be totally wrong for them to not switch to the new method from that point further. It would be wrong to continue the study for years, killing 10 out of every 100 kids having a heart transplant when they know that the other method would be successful and keep them alive.

 

[Corraleno]

4 minutes ago, rebot said:

I’m new on social media. It’s definitely different than real life. I’ve found it fascinating the last few days to watch how difficult it is for people to admit fault with their side. I guess in real life, people get called out, but on here it’s much easier to ignore what you don’t want to deal with. I admit to posting because I was interested to see if any of the pro vaccine people would say that this was a bad way to conduct a scientific study. We’re on a homeschooling forum. I’m assuming that means most posters either homeschool or homeschooled in the past. Every fall, I get to go over the scientific method and how to set up a good experiment with my kids. What Moderna and Pfizer did, does not make a good experiment.

So basically you don't understand how clinical trials work, and mistakenly believe that they are just like homeschool lab experiments, and you're calling out the people on this board who DO understand how they work for not being willing to admit that the vaccines trials were bad because they weren't designed to be  just like homeschool experiments. 

[Danae]

14 minutes ago, rebot said:

I admit to posting because I was interested to see if any of the pro vaccine people would say that this was a bad way to conduct a scientific study. We’re on a homeschooling forum. I’m assuming that means most posters either homeschool or homeschooled in the past. Every fall, I get to go over the scientific method and how to set up a good experiment with my kids. What Moderna and Pfizer did, does not make a good experiment.

 

It is not a bad way to conduct a scientific study.  The endpoint of the phase 3 trial was reached, and because the results showed significant efficacy the vaccine was offered to the control group.  That part of the trial is over.  
 

You might consider that the way you set up experiments with elementary students is a simplified model.  I know disciplinary expertise is viewed with skepticism these days, but in general when people with highly specialized education aren’t doing things the way a fifth grader would it’s not because the fifth grader knows more.
 

 

[KSera]

@rebotI want to add, because I'm afraid this may feel like a pile on, that I'm persisting in trying to explain it to you because I sense that you actually do want to know what is true and what is not. I think you seem like the kind of person who can learn new information and integrate it into your knowledge and change your perceptions based on it. What you are interpreting as people "not admitting fault with their side" is, in this case, people trying to explain 2+2=4 and not 5. It would be silly for us all to just give in and agree with someone that it is 5 because they are persistent in their belief that it is.

[rebot]

8 minutes ago, KSera said:

The "faster" part of the headline might make people with safety concerns recoil a bit, but the article explains why this is not a concern and that this is a red tape issue at this point:

I'm glad you noted this, otherwise I would have probably scanned your quotes and moved on. Instead I took time to read it. It was interesting.

I really struggle with the misinformation label. Who is to determine what constitutes misinformation? At this point, I feel anyone with a differing opinion to the status quo gets that label and not just a differing opinion about the vaccine.

I'm wondering if anyone has really sat down and talked to those that are hesitating and not just relied on informal polls? Pretty sure "sprinting" for approval will have the exact opposite effect than what they are hoping for. I agree the science has been done for the last 1.5 years. 

"there is no vaccine where adverse effects first appear more than eight weeks after the shot. So we can be confident that we now know what to expect." In the entire article, this is what jumps out at me. How can they be confident when they are comparing never before used mRNA vaccine to more traditional vaccines.

[rebot]

22 minutes ago, KSera said:

I'm going to give one more try at an example. If there is a trial studying a new method for performing heart transplants in children, and they find eureka! this new method means they have NO deaths in children receiving heart transplants, whereas 10% died before (made up number), once they determine that, it would be totally wrong for them to not switch to the new method from that point further. It would be wrong to continue the study for years, killing 10 out of every 100 kids having a heart transplant when they know that the other method would be successful and keep them alive.

 

I agree. Save the kids, but they can't then refer to that trial as if it's untainted.

Give the people the vaccine, but they can't toss out their numbers as fact when they have no control group to compare to.

I'm not saying it was wrong to give the vaccine. I'm saying it's wrong to use the data from the trial as if it is from a well-run randomized trial.

[KSera]

Just now, rebot said:

I agree. Save the kids, but they can't then refer to that trial as if it's untainted.

Give the people the vaccine, but they can't toss out their numbers as fact when they have no control group to compare to.

I'm not saying it was wrong to give the vaccine. I'm saying it's wrong to use the data from the trial as if it is from a well-run randomized trial.

I admit, this is frustrating. Because again, I think you really do want to know what is true, but you have some misunderstandings. It’s not a tainted trial. It was a well run randomized trial that did exactly what it set out to do. It’s not even a case where they had to end a study early because of the results as perhaps would have been the case in the heart transplant example I gave. The study was completed all the way to its end point before people were given the opportunity to be unblinded and know whether or not they received the vaccine and receive it at that point. That part of the study was done. Complete. We don’t ever make people stay in a placebo group forever and ever. That’s just plainly not the way it works.

[Danae]

6 minutes ago, rebot said:

I agree. Save the kids, but they can't then refer to that trial as if it's untainted.

Give the people the vaccine, but they can't toss out their numbers as fact when they have no control group to compare to.

I'm not saying it was wrong to give the vaccine. I'm saying it's wrong to use the data from the trial as if it is from a well-run randomized trial.

The Pfizer and Moderna phase 3 trials both met their endpoints in November of 2020.  That part of the study was concluded before they offered the vaccine to the control group. 

[Jean in Newcastle]

1 hour ago, Meriwether said:

Yup, infuriated. I am not surprised that some people support this rhetoric, but I find it very troubling.

 

Disclaimer: I am fully vaxxed. 

I sm glad that you’re fully vaxed. You will be happy to know that I don’t drive or have any impact at all on policies  made by private businesses (which locally are starting to require proof of vaccination. )But I do support their decision. 
 

btw I was infuriated by the people who have said here and elsewhere that those “afraid of getting Covid” should just stay away from stores etc. forever I guess. Those of us who have health issues (which btw aren’t our fault) still need to “live life”. Fortunately we are so blessed in this country to have access to vaccines that allows us to do that. 
 

I don’t see anything wrong with feeling that those who CHOOSE to refuse the vaccine should embrace the consequences of their CHOICE.  It’s awfully brazen of people to refuse the vaccine and then feel like they can do whatever they want in society like thousands of Typhoid Marys.  (And I realize that it totally sucks to be one of those who can’t get a vaccine and don’t have a choice. But reality is that if enough people who fo have a choice get the vaccine then these people can live life too. 

Edited August 9, 2021 by Jean in Newcastle
Typo

[Dmmetler]

3 minutes ago, rebot said:

I agree. Save the kids, but they can't then refer to that trial as if it's untainted.

Give the people the vaccine, but they can't toss out their numbers as fact when they have no control group to compare to.

I'm not saying it was wrong to give the vaccine. I'm saying it's wrong to use the data from the trial as if it is from a well-run randomized trial.

I cannot imagine a IRB accepting a proposal that requires refusing life saving treatment to the control group once it has been proven effective and is available to patients. There have been such studies in the past (The Tuskegee syphilis study comes to mind) and they are the reason why there is so much medical ethics oversight and paperwork required. 

 

 

[KSera]

17 minutes ago, rebot said:

 

I really struggle with the misinformation label. Who is to determine what constitutes misinformation? At this point, I feel anyone with a differing opinion to the status quo gets that label and not just a differing opinion about the vaccine.

I think one of the problems we have today is that a lot of people think that there is no objective truth about anything. There are lots of things there is objective truth about. For example with the vaccine, when people say they have been 48,000 people died as a result of the vaccine, that’s misinformation. That’s not true. same when people say the vaccine makes people magnetic or they contain to microchip. That’s objectively, prove-ably, misinformation. Same with saying the vaccine changes your DNA or the vaccine doesn’t work or that masks cause people to breathe harmful levels of CO2. So, there’s lots of misinformation out there that has nothing to do with opinion. 

[rebot]

3 minutes ago, KSera said:

admit, this is frustrating. Because again, I think you really do want to know what is true, but you have some misunderstandings. It’s not a tainted trial. It was a well run randomized trial that did exactly what it set out to do. It’s not even a case where they had to end a study early because of the results as perhaps would have been the case in the heart transplant example I gave. The study was completed all the way to its end point before people were given the opportunity to be unblinded and know whether or not they received the vaccine and receive it at that point. That part of the study was done. Complete. We don’t ever make people stay in a placebo group forever and ever. That’s just plainly not the way it works.

No, I understand what you are saying and I can also see how I could be frustrating. Like I said previously, it comes down to a persons perceived fear. The trial has been completed, but out of safety to the control group, they offered the vaccine before the observational portion was supposed to be complete. My hesitation of the vaccine is with the long term safety of a brand new, never to be approved before vaccine.

[rebot]

4 minutes ago, KSera said:

I think one of the problems we have today is that a lot of people think that there is no objective truth about anything. There are lots of things there is objective truth about. For example with the vaccine, when people say they have been 48,000 people died as a result of the vaccine, that’s misinformation. That’s not true. same when people say the vaccine makes people magnetic or they contain to microchip. That’s objectively, prove-ably, misinformation. Same with saying the vaccine changes your DNA or the vaccine doesn’t work or that masks cause people to breathe harmful levels of CO2. So, there’s lots of misinformation out there that has nothing to do with opinion. 

I agree. There is a lot of crazy talk out there, but what about the doctors that were ostracized for promoting ivermectin? What about the people kicked off social media for claiming the virus came from a lab?

and I'm not going to lie... I totally had everyone I know that got the vaccine try to stick a magnet to their arm. As expected, none of them stuck but it was fun to try.

[Corraleno]

12 minutes ago, rebot said:

I agree. Save the kids, but they can't then refer to that trial as if it's untainted.

Give the people the vaccine, but they can't toss out their numbers as fact when they have no control group to compare to.

I'm not saying it was wrong to give the vaccine. I'm saying it's wrong to use the data from the trial as if it is from a well-run randomized trial.

Can you explain what you mean by the bolded? What numbers do you think Pfizer is continuing to "toss out" based on trial data that are no longer legitimate without a control group?

 

[Jean in Newcastle]

11 minutes ago, rebot said:

No, I understand what you are saying and I can also see how I could be frustrating. Like I said previously, it comes down to a persons perceived fear. The trial has been completed, but out of safety to the control group, they offered the vaccine before the observational portion was supposed to be complete. My hesitation of the vaccine is with the long term safety of a brand new, never to be approved before vaccine.

Go back and read the posts before this one. What you are saying has been explained as not true. 

[KSera]

19 minutes ago, rebot said:

No, I understand what you are saying and I can also see how I could be frustrating. Like I said previously, it comes down to a persons perceived fear. The trial has been completed, but out of safety to the control group, they offered the vaccine before the observational portion was supposed to be complete. My hesitation of the vaccine is with the long term safety of a brand new, never to be approved before vaccine.

I understand being worried about long term effects. There are some vaccines I didn’t give my kids when they first came out for the same reason. A difference in this point is that none of those vaccines were for diseases that there was any remote concern that they were actually likely to get. If there was a pandemic outbreak of one of those and it were highly contagious and not spread mostly by sex or sharing needles, my calculus would have been totally different. I wouldn’t have the luxury of waiting in the case of an actively circulating disease, which is the situation I found myself in with Covid. There’s no luxury of waiting years in case something turns up. By that point, I will have contracted Covid, and I’m not willing to play the odds with that. And I feel pretty comfortable with that decision based on the fact that that just hasn’t ever happened with a vaccine. I realize mRNA vaccines are new, but the mRNA is gone pretty  quickly, broken down by the body and excreted. There is no actual mRNA from the vaccine hanging around for long. 

Edited August 9, 2021 by KSera

[ktgrok]

1 hour ago, rebot said:

What Moderna and Pfizer did, does not make a good experiment.

 

But it does make an ethical, legitimate clinical trial. 

1 hour ago, lynn said:

I was quite surprised that when a loved one was in the hospital, he did not have covid, in Panama City in June the hospital was practically empty and masks weren't required although we chose to wear.  No limits on visitors.   

Yeah, we have had a very nice exponential curve going on since then. Hospitalizations doubling quicker than every 2 weeks. 

 

 

[ktgrok]

We need to remember that we have more long term saftey info on the vaccines than on the Delta variant. 

[Corraleno]

2 hours ago, lynn said:

I was quite surprised that when a loved one was in the hospital, he did not have covid, in Panama City in June the hospital was practically empty and masks weren't required although we chose to wear.  No limits on visitors.   

The 7-day case rate in Florida for all of June was around 1500/day; it's now around 17,000/day, with nearly 24,000 last Saturday.

[BronzeTurtle]

36 minutes ago, ktgrok said:

We need to remember that we have more long term saftey info on the vaccines than on the Delta variant. 

I thought delta popped up in late 2020? We hadn't seen widespread vaccination here by then. Then again, there will always be a prevailing variant of covid around, just like there will always be a prevailing strain of flu or whatever other virus is floating about.

[Jean in Newcastle]

33 minutes ago, BronzeTurtle said:

I thought delta popped up in late 2020? We hadn't seen widespread vaccination here by then. Then again, there will always be a prevailing variant of covid around, just like there will always be a prevailing strain of flu or whatever other virus is floating about.

Delta did not show up in the US until March of this year.  (It was in India prior to that and no, there was not widespread vaccination there).  Even in March, while there was some vaccination, it was still not available to most adults under age 60.  https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/22/health/delta-variant-covid.html