This. Excepting that the Taiping Rebellion might have been worse (estimates vary), just it was in China so the outside world didn't really care.
2019-2020 coronavirus pandemic (Vaccination 2021 Edition)
- Thread starter McElroy
- Start date
Except if it doesn't personally take him to the brink of death and back and leave him with months of complications he'll take his personal anecdote as evidence and continue to say it's overblown.
He might also witness a death in the infirmary from somebody sharing his room. I saw this other guy on youtube who ended up in ICU and witnessed two deaths which changed his mind.
Guy was travelling to places without lockdowns to enjoy himself and caught it.
There's a lot more about Bolsonaro than his Covid-19 response that people hate him for. He's a closet fascist dangerously close to being out of the closet.
Shit news, everyone.
This is only a small study so far from definitive, but if true, it's likely second waves are a'coming.
This is only a small study so far from definitive, but if true, it's likely second waves are a'coming.
That doesn't actually mean anything if true. They found less antibodies over time, that's not a surprise. That doesn't establish if they can get sick a second time.
It does mean something. Fewer antibodies means less resistance. And even if people have some resistance so are likely to experience weaker symptoms, they're also likely to be more infectious.
That's not how that works. And even if it did, if there isn't a susceptible population left to cause an outbreak in, it doesn't much matter anyway. I know it will be at least until like January before we could possibly know if there isn't a second wave, but can you calm down the fearmongering in the meantime unless there's evidence of that actually happening rather than speculation of it?
Sure. Let's all take lessons from the guy who professes to know nothing about such things.
What happens when someone gets infected is that the virus replicates, and the host immune system attempts to destroy the foreign material, the disease ending either in the death of the host or the effective elimination of the pathogen. The strength of the immune response against the pathogen therefore determines the levels of the pathogen in the body and how long it is likely to persist before elimination. What that means is that if there is an acquired immune response to a disease but it is very weak, whilst it may mitigate symptoms, there will still be more pathogen in their system and for a longer time - i.e. they are more infectious.
That people like you don't want to hear bad news is not a good reason to complacently piss people's lives down the drain.
It is by being aware of the risks that we can make informed measures and be persuasive in people's behaviour to control and restrict spread, and save lives. Take infection control seriously: wear a mask, wash or use alcohol rubs regularly, and minimise unnecessary contact and closeness. You might be fine, but you could still pass the illness to others, and those others to others, some who won't be fine: and there are many times as many vulnerable people out there as have already been hospitalised.
I haven't advocated for any behavior different than what you're suggesting. It's not "not wanting to hear bad news". It's that fear makes people stupid. Fear leads to people panic buying toilet paper. It puts people at each others' throats. It actually weakens people's immune systems. It's not helpful.
There's no sign of a second wave. There might be in the fall. I don't think there will be, but we don't know that yet. But freaking out about it now based on barely evidence it might be possible is silly. (Especially since you're still maintaining the position that most people are still very susceptible, reinfection possibilities should be unnecessary for a second wave in your mind).
''But Prof Arne Akbar, an immunologist at UCL, said antibodies are only part of the story. There is growing evidence, he said, that T cells produced to fight common colds can protect people as well. Those patients who fight the virus with T cells may not need to churn out high levels of antibodies, he added''.
Hmm..wouldn't a potential vaccine(even with limited efficacy) be counterproductive then in people with healthy immune systems? Vaccines put white blood cells in a dormant state because they don't have to be activated to fight off infections so a belated T cell response with unknown virus(like covid) might lead to much unnecessary damage or even death. A bad case of the flu really puts those lymphocytes into action and probably puts the immune system in a much higher state of alert for a much longer time than any vaccine or short lived natural immunity against coronavirus. It seems a vaccinated population against covid is just as much a fable as 'herd immunity'. It seems proper antiviral medications might be much more beneficial for treatment with also no nascent consequences.
No one ever planned for this for the long term which I always found dumb strategy. The coronavirus is here to stay so has to be accepted as just one more way to die, even if chances are minimal. Maybe with a proper vaccine(which I personally think is still many years away) and hopefully some antiviral medication then primarily people at high-risk have some proper treatment options. No matter how many quarantine measures are taken it is inevatible everyone will come into contact with the virus sooner or later. People could decide for themselves which risks they want to expose themselves to while respecting the social distancing criteria in public places like supermarkets. So a combination of distancing where low risk and high risk potentially meet with quarantine measures where appropriate. You'd have to create a balance where different groups can concede to for atleast a decade.
Masks do very little if anything outside a medical setting to stop spread. Might be even counterproductive the way I see some people use a mask. Going for a walk the other day I saw a bloke at a bus station leaning on a railing and then with the same hands removing the mask to grab a smoke and then puffing it out in the mask. LOL xD
"But people do it wrong" is a bad argument against advocacy for people doing something right. The evidence is pretty overwhelming that masks are good at protecting people from you for short periods of time (cloth masks that is, more professional masks aren't so time limited), and I think in my ideal scenario, we would have shut only large gatherings like concerts down and advocated for mask usage in public places much sooner.
This isn't true. Sure, some idiots are going to be defeating the purpose of the mask by acting like that, but the same could be said of practically any safety measure.
One of the primary vectors of transmission for coronavirus is water droplets, either in regular breath or in a cough or sneeze. If you cough and you're wearing the mask, it catches the droplets and prevents them travelling through the air. If you're wearing the mask and someone nearby coughs, the droplets are likelier to land on the mask than directly on your face.
Nah, I don't think that is how it works in an everyday setting. People should distance in enclosed environments for sure as espescially lack of proper ventilation is a major risk factor. Prioritizing proper hygiene is equally important. But claiming face masks prevent spread of microscopic viral particles is just not true. Also if something coughs nearby than the droplets would certainly also end up in the tear ducts which is another route for infection. Walking around with a dirty sock in your mouth just provides a false sense of safety where they might think it's an alternative to distancing. Also breathing through that concentration of mouth bacteria just doesn't sound all that conducive to proper health in my opinion. Masks might work in a medical setting where they are part of an entire package of preventative measures as part of a procedure and with parts of the facility sterile but in everyday life the thing gets contaminated almost immediately.
Some randomised trials also showed pretty much no effect:
''RESULTS: We included 15 randomised trials investigating the effect of masks (14 trials) in healthcare workers and the general population and of quarantine (1 trial). We found no trials testing eye protection. Compared to no masks there was no reduction of influenza-like illness (ILI) cases (Risk Ratio 0.93, 95%CI 0.83 to 1.05) or influenza (Risk Ratio 0.84, 95%CI 0.61-1.17) for masks in the general population, nor in healthcare workers (Risk Ratio 0.37, 95%CI 0.05 to 2.50). There was no difference between surgical masks and N95 respirators: for ILI (Risk Ratio 0.83, 95%CI 0.63 to 1.08), for influenza (Risk Ratio 1.02, 95%CI 0.73 to 1.43).''
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.03.30.20047217v2
I'm not totally sure what you mean, so forgive me if this isn't where you were going. I can only explain it as I know of it. There are lots of white blood cells with differing functions. The main three in simpilified form are:
1) Macrophages, which engulf and destroy pathogens, leaving behind antigens which are picked up by...
2) ...B-cells, which produce antibodies to those pathogens for an antibody-mediated response
3) T-cells which recognise pathattack infected cells (although there are quite a few subvarieties with specialised functions) as a cellular response.
However, all three interact with each other to some degree, and enhance the activity of the others in response to infection.
A vaccine should promote a short-lived immune response. Some of the B- and T-cells are "memory" cells that retain information on prior infections, and can be much more quickly ramp up into action upon re-infection to deliver a faster response.
Naturally, if there is some sort of infection of any sort, production of immune cells should increase, and a generalised heightened immune response against one infection may help combat another in the affected area. However, it doesn't really follow as I understand it that a vaccine would suppress the immune system below a normal baseline - there are an awful lot of infections out there to keep things ticking over.
To an extent, yes. The plan was generally containment, starve the infection of new hosts quickly whilst it's small. It does appear evident that there was a lack of planning about what to do if this containment failed, which occurred with plentiful government incompetence in numerous countries. Hopefully, should have learnt for next time.
No, studies suggest masks can be useful. Not a total game changer, but enough to reduce risk to oneself and (if infected) others to be worthwhile. One can imagine it a bit like taking drugs to prevent further cardiovascular events after myocardial infarction. Individually none of them make a vital difference, but take three or more of them and the cumulative effect affords a substantial protection.