Thread on testing & treatment research for COVID-19

[diontechristmas]

My dad is currently recovering from the Rona. He is 69, and in generally good health. He is a bit overweight, and his bp a bit high, but no other chronic conditions.

He’s had it for about 10 days now and is still extremely tired. He didn’t have a fever, and had minimal chest congestion, but after over a week he can do little but sleep and lay on the couch. He seems to be out of the woods as far as getting seriously ill, but it will probably be weeks until he gets his strength back.

Stay vigilant and safe everyone.

 

[The Spin Meister]

i sort of agree, but if health care workers were a major source of spread than the fact a bulk of them are vaccinated would be starting to show some decrease in numbers by now.

Which is what I kept telling you for weeks. And it is also due to nursing home vaccinations where half the deaths are com from. This going to drop significantly through Feb.

 

[katchthis]

i sort of agree, but if health care workers were a major source of spread than the fact a bulk of them are vaccinated would be starting to show some decrease in numbers by now.

According to Tuesday's WSJ, About 12 million doses given nationwide through last Friday. A lot of those are just phase one given . Unfortunately about 25% of healthcare workers opting out . Many of these are the support staff. Janitorial , Cafeteria, and housekeeping have a lot of patient encounters each day . Too low of a number to be significant at this point . About 31 million doses out there and only 12 given . Need a big improvement in the delivery of the vaccines to the patients arm .

 

[The Spin Meister]

About 10 million doses given nationwide . A lot of those are just phase one given . Unfortunately about 25% of healthcare workers opting out . Many of these are the support staff. Janitorial , Cafeteria, and housekeeping have a lot of patient encounters each day . Too low of a number to be significant at this point . About 30 million doses out there and only 10 given . Need a big improvement in the delivery of the vaccines to the patients arm .

But 10 million to the very highest risk would be like 30 million to the total population. Maybe even better.

 

[Cletus11]

About 10 million doses given nationwide . A lot of those are just phase one given . Unfortunately about 25% of healthcare workers opting out . Many of these are the support staff. Janitorial , Cafeteria, and housekeeping have a lot of patient encounters each day . Too low of a number to be significant at this point . About 30 million doses out there and only 10 given . Need a big improvement in the delivery of the vaccines to the patients arm .

i sent out a link earlier for Bloomberg that has excellent Vaccine tracking. We are at 14.7M total doses with 1.8M with double dosage. And even with one dose I think the immunity was in the 55-65% range. So considering those 14.7M doses is a combination of high risk and high spreaders the effect on hospitalization rates, fatality rates, and total positive cases is going to be proportionally much higher.

I was always thinking we would not see the drop in data until February and would not see much bigger drop until the April timeframe as would need time for a lot of the legacy Covid cases would linger for several months and then need more time for the vaccine to have a significant effect, but maybe we are seeing a little earlier.

 

[The Spin Meister]

i sent out a link earlier for Bloomberg that has excellent Vaccine tracking. We are at 14.7M total doses with 1.8M with double dosage. And even with one dose I think the immunity was in the 55-65% range. So considering those 14.7M doses is a combination of high risk and high spreaders the effect on hospitalization rates, fatality rates, and total positive cases is going to be proportionally much higher.

I was always thinking we would not see the drop in data until February and would not see much bigger drop until the April timeframe as would need time for a lot of the legacy Covid cases would linger for several months and then need more time for the vaccine to have a significant effect, but maybe we are seeing a little earlier.

So 13 million got the first dose which is over 50% effective. And they gave it to the highest risk where over 2/3rds of the deaths come from. Reducing that by just 25% would be a statistically significant reduction.

 

[83wuzme]

i sent out a link earlier for Bloomberg that has excellent Vaccine tracking. We are at 14.7M total doses with 1.8M with double dosage. And even with one dose I think the immunity was in the 55-65% range. So considering those 14.7M doses is a combination of high risk and high spreaders the effect on hospitalization rates, fatality rates, and total positive cases is going to be proportionally much higher.

I was always thinking we would not see the drop in data until February and would not see much bigger drop until the April timeframe as would need time for a lot of the legacy Covid cases would linger for several months and then need more time for the vaccine to have a significant effect, but maybe we are seeing a little earlier.

I have seen the Pfizer effectiveness reported as 55 - 60% after one dose and the Moderna at 80%.
Then again, these weren’t long term trials and didn’t involve millions of people.

 

[Cletus11]

I have seen the Pfizer effectiveness reported as 55 - 60% after one dose and the Moderna at 80%.
Then again, these weren’t long term trials and didn’t involve millions of people.

also wonder if after the first dose if not full blown immunity (ie...the 55-80% mentioned), is there some level of antibody or other development such that severity of Covid is lessened. That might have an effect also.

key is now to get manufacturing and distribution up as I actually think that pricking into arms could easily be at 1,000,000 per day with minor effort in getting the CVS/Walgreens fully on line and a few of these larger mass vaccination sites up in major metros. But right now, doesn't appear that manufacturing is able to keep up and we have heard nothing from Pfizer or Moderna on what they can actually produce on a monthly basis.

 

[83wuzme]

also wonder if after the first dose if not full blown immunity (ie...the 55-80% mentioned), is there some level of antibody or other development such that severity of Covid is lessened. That might have an effect also.

key is now to get manufacturing and distribution up as I actually think that pricking into arms could easily be at 1,000,000 per day with minor effort in getting the CVS/Walgreens fully on line and a few of these larger mass vaccination sites up in major metros. But right now, doesn't appear that manufacturing is able to keep up and we have heard nothing from Pfizer or Moderna on what they can actually produce on a monthly basis.

I wonder if anything could be done to get additional pharm companies to produce these approved vaccines under license ?
The idea of having dozens of companies making dozens of vaccines of varying effectiveness probably isn’t helping to speed this along. It also looks like this is going to have to be a long term effort to cope with the ever changing variants of the virus.

 

[Cletus11]

I wonder if anything could be done to get additional pharm companies to produce these approved vaccines under license ?
The idea of having dozens of companies making dozens of vaccines of varying effectiveness probably isn’t helping to speed this along. It also looks like this is going to have to be a long term effort to cope with the ever changing variants of the virus.

flip side is that with 4 or 5 vaccine makers out there all with different vaccines, better chance that at least one of them will have effect on these mutant strains that are coming along. so short term just need J&J and AZ to be approved as that then should be enough production to keep the 1 million vaccine per day production for USA. And then rest of year is to get the USA and world vaccinated.

 

[83wuzme]

flip side is that with 4 or 5 vaccine makers out there all with different vaccines, better chance that at least one of them will have effect on these mutant strains that are coming along. so short term just need J&J and AZ to be approved as that then should be enough production to keep the 1 million vaccine per day production for USA. And then rest of year is to get the USA and world vaccinated.

What I especially like about the mRNA vaccines is that it should be possible change the sequence relatively rapidly to adjust to changes in the virus. Polyvalent versions of the vaccine could also be made.
Hopefully, as the pandemic numbers decline, the need to come up with newer versions of the vaccine will decrease.

 

[Tom McAndrew]

 

[Tom McAndrew]

 

[Tom McAndrew]

 

[Tom McAndrew]

 

[Tom McAndrew]

 

[Tom McAndrew]

 

[83wuzme]

Stop making stuff up! What's your purpose?

This is something that came up on an infectious disease podcast.

 

[Tom McAndrew]

 

[Tom McAndrew]

 

[interrobang]

More warnings on the over reliance on PCR tests to diagnose covid

WHO Information Notice for Users 2020/05

Product type: Nucleic acid testing (NAT) technologies that use polymerase chain reaction (PCR) for detection of SARS-CoV-2 Date: 13 January 2021 WHO-identifier: 2020/5, version 2 Target audience: laboratory professionals and...

www.who.int

 

[cramx3]

Israel is starting to believe one dose is not the advertised ~50-80% effective

Israel is warning that a single dose of the Pfizer vaccine is 'less effective than we hoped' against COVID-19, and it could be a blow to the US and UK strategies

Israel has led the world in vaccinating its population, but one official said the virus is still proving harder to beat than it expected.

news.yahoo.com

Pfizer says that a single dose of its vaccine is about 52% effective, while getting a second dose makes it around 95% effective.

According to Israel, the single dose appears to only be around 33% effective, a significant loss.

 

[83wuzme]

I was listening to Bret Weinstein’s Dark Horse podcast and the subject of the bad science being used to make policy decisions came up. Three oft - cited papers reporting on the levels of asymptomatic transmission were discussed, along with the misrepresentation of the methods and data in the three specific publications.
We have seen this during the pandemic. Above all, science has to be about an absolute pursuit of truth to the extent that is humanly possibly. When it isn’t it becomes something entirely political.

 

[The Spin Meister]

Israel is starting to believe one dose is not the advertised ~50-80% effective

Israel is warning that a single dose of the Pfizer vaccine is 'less effective than we hoped' against COVID-19, and it could be a blow to the US and UK strategies

Israel has led the world in vaccinating its population, but one official said the virus is still proving harder to beat than it expected.

news.yahoo.com

But, but, but aren’t we just following the science?

 

[83wuzme]

Israel is starting to believe one dose is not the advertised ~50-80% effective

Israel is warning that a single dose of the Pfizer vaccine is 'less effective than we hoped' against COVID-19, and it could be a blow to the US and UK strategies

Israel has led the world in vaccinating its population, but one official said the virus is still proving harder to beat than it expected.

news.yahoo.com

Might need to give it more time. The prevalence of the virus in the population of Israel was likely much higher than the vaccine study population before vaccination.

 

[cramx3]

I didn't share that because I don't believe in the science or am anti-vaccine. Just to note that 1 dose probably isn't going to do the trick, you need that second dose. Also, Israel's vaccinations (~25% of the population already vaccinated) may start to be making a difference already. It's a proof of a concept on a smaller nation. It's really the only data on a mass scale we have at this point other than the trials, and it's actually encouraging so far.

 

[Cletus11]

I mean, whether or not it is33% or 50% or 75% effective is important if you are only getting one dose, but any of those numbers basically means you need to get the second does to make sure that you are protected. Just sheds some doubt on countries that were looking to go the one does for everybody route and then the second does would be given if and when it was available at a much later date. Isreal saying basically that might not be a good idea.

 

[interrobang]

Might need to give it more time. The prevalence of the virus in the population of Israel was likely much higher than the vaccine study population before vaccination.

Are they testing everyone before being given the vaccine as a baseline to know how well it's working?

 

[83wuzme]

Are they testing everyone before being given the vaccine as a baseline to know how well it's working?

I don’t believe there was prevaccination testing in any of the study populations.
Just wondering if the high levels of community transmission in Israel, which has started to decline, might have affected the expected signal ?

 

[interrobang]

In reading the article linked 3 layers deep, the whole gist of the article is that UK made a mistake in delaying the second dose on some assumption that 1 dose was 89% effective (Pfizer itself only said 52%), not that there's a problem itself with just one dose. They even say they expect that 33% number to increase as they incorporate data from younger patients since their study group was all over 60 yrs old.

All in all just a jab at the UK more than any concern with the vaccine.

 

[Tom McAndrew]

 

[Tom McAndrew]

 

[The Spin Meister]

No one ever said "if available and a a much later date". No one. It's always been stated "when they are available".

Also, did you read the article on Israel? They 33% isn't supported by numbers, but the Pfizer 52% is supported. The article is meant to drum up fear and it appears to have hit a target right here.

But ‘when they are a available’ is an unknown time period. And since they are hundreds of millions that want and need the vaccines that unknown could be several months or more. There are already reports of difficulties in getting the proper precursor chemicals slowing down the process.

 

[Tom McAndrew]

 

[Tom McAndrew]

 

[Tom McAndrew]

 

[Tom McAndrew]

 

[Cletus11]

One good note, the total cases and death appear to be trending down via a steep drop from week over week and the 7 day trend line continues to be substantially down. Daily cases 7 day average down from 250K per day to 200K per day and deaths from 3400 to 3000.

7 day trend on vaccines has almost a million a day average with a couple of days reporting over a million per day. 17.2 million shots administered so far. 36M vaccines released.

Next up is to start to see hospitlizations going down which based on charts is occurring in most states, appear to be about 10-15 that are still trending up or flat line.

I think we are starting to see a little light at the end of that tunnel and it is not an oncoming train this time.

Although I thought all the negative press last week about the 'reserve' being there or not being there and how some states were doing really bad was mostly about politics, I think it did kick some states in the pants a little bit to get their act together and start vaccinating people in higher numbers.

 

[interrobang]

Lilly's neutralizing antibody bamlanivimab (LY-CoV555) prevented COVID-19 at nursing homes in the BLAZE-2 trial, reducing risk by up to 80 percent for residents

Bamlanivimab (LY-CoV555) significantly reduced the risk of contracting symptomatic COVID-19 among residents and staff of long-term care facilities, Eli Lilly and Company (NYSE: LLY) announced. The...

lilly.mediaroom.com

 

[bison13]

One good note, the total cases and death appear to be trending down via a steep drop from week over week and the 7 day trend line continues to be substantially down. Daily cases 7 day average down from 250K per day to 200K per day and deaths from 3400 to 3000.

7 day trend on vaccines has almost a million a day average with a couple of days reporting over a million per day. 17.2 million shots administered so far. 36M vaccines released.

Next up is to start to see hospitlizations going down which based on charts is occurring in most states, appear to be about 10-15 that are still trending up or flat line.

I think we are starting to see a little light at the end of that tunnel and it is not an oncoming train this time.

Although I thought all the negative press last week about the 'reserve' being there or not being there and how some states were doing really bad was mostly about politics, I think it did kick some states in the pants a little bit to get their act together and start vaccinating people in higher numbers.

Montgomery Co here in MD was caught last week or so fudging their numbers a bit on hospitalizations. Hospitals are at about 70-80%, they were using some ER room data that was lumped in to hospitalizations. This directly from the supervisor of an ER who I had lunch with on MOnday. Not a huge number but enough to change your data pts