COVID-19 Vaccine Candidate Shows Promise

[Benjamin]

@Benjamin : Millions are dying! Millions are dying! We've never seen this before! Help! Help! Shut everything down! Help! Help! House arrest for everyone. Shoot anyone seen walking the streets! Help! Help!

@Aaron : It’s just another flu! Mostly kills the old and sick and I shouldn’t have to give up my freedom. Anyway, this virus ain’t as bad as people think because there are probably millions of asymptomatic people who change the numbers so we can’t know how bad it is. Please don’t make me worry that I won’t have food! These asymptomatic people formed out of thin air in a matter of weeks with no other people showing up to hospital when it happened so STUFF THIS STAY AT HOME CRAP, let it spread and get it over with so I can have my comfortable life back. Who's with ME?! These old and sick people are going to die anyway. Your model from our top experts at the USA CoronaVirus Task Force warning about not flattening the curve could kill millions means nothing, I saw a Youtube doctor that said this is unnecessarily ruining our economy and I miss my donuts!

 

[Gold Dragon]

Your really being dumb here with your scenario, I am talking about cured people who have antibodies and are not sick or infectious, but you can get past your own ignorance, but I don't think anyone with a brain is buying what your hawking. There EXISTS an ANTIBODY test to prove you are immune to the disease having already had it and been cured.

I worked 20 years in a hospital and medical lab setting, I used to work as a Medical technologist ASCP accredited, and have a biology undergraduate degree, not that it really means anything, but I am not being dumb here as you are with the things your saying.

With your background, you should then understand that the way you get to the point of being cured with antibodies that can be detected on the antibody test is to first be sick and infectious. You may end up being one of the lucky ones who end up getting very mild or no symptoms. But you will still be infectious and likely spread the illness. And if you follow your own logic (which I don’t medically recommend), the quickest way to get to that point is by volunteering at your local respiratory ward. Then you can go back to work and help the economy.

You may have heard of chicken pox or measles parties people used to send their kids to so that they could get it over with and develop immunity. That is what people used to do before vaccines were available for those diseases. Unfortunately a small percentage of kids would get one of the complications of measles or chicken pox (encephalitis, pneumonia, shingles later in life, death) which are now all avoidable with a vaccine.

You would be giving yourself the equivalent of a measles party and hoping you avoid the complications of covid19 like pneumonia and ARDS. Because that is the quickest way to get that serology test result you want. And you might help a few people in hospital, but also will likely spread it to 2-3 others. Another caveat to consider is that we don’t know how long your immunity will last. For some diseases, it is very short.

And many here are hoping for effective treatment to save them. If you understood how effective (or more correctly ineffective) the current state of our antiviral treatments are after over 100 years of knowing that many human diseases are caused by viruses, you would not be gambling on that hope alone.

 

[Scott Downey]

With your background, you should then understand that the way you get to the point of being cured with antibodies that can be detected on the antibody test is to first be sick and infectious. You may end up being one of the lucky ones who end up getting very mild or no symptoms. But you will still be infectious and likely spread the illness. And if you follow your own logic (which I don’t medically recommend), the quickest way to get to that point is by volunteering at your local respiratory ward. Then you can go back to work and help the economy.

You may have heard of chicken pox or measles parties people used to send their kids to so that they could get it over with and develop immunity. That is what people used to do before vaccines were available for those diseases. Unfortunately a small percentage of kids would get one of the complications of measles or chicken pox (encephalitis, pneumonia, shingles later in life, death) which are now all avoidable with a vaccine.

You would be giving yourself the equivalent of a measles party and hoping you avoid the complications of covid19 like pneumonia and ARDS. Because that is the quickest way to get that serology test result you want. And you might help a few people in hospital, but also will likely spread it to 2-3 others. Another caveat to consider is that we don’t know how long your immunity wilinl last. For some diseases, it is very short.

And many here are hoping for effective treatment to save them. If you understood how effective (or more correctly ineffective) the current state of our antiviral treatments are after over 100 years of knowing that many human diseases are caused by viruses, you would not be gambling on that hope alone.

You lack reading comprehension. If you read what I said, I said immune people who are cured yet your running down some unknown road I was never on. Either your deliberately troublesome or acting really dumb.

 

[Aaron]

Yes. This is a well known fact and often one of the first things mentioned in FAQs about Covid19. Why do you think people don't know this?

Because, as I said, it's not being reported on.

 

[Aaron]

It's just strange because I have never mentioned anything about socialism or socialized medicine in any of my posts about Covid19. Yet Aaron is saying I'm promoting socialism. The only thing with "social" that I've mentioned is social distancing.

LOL. We've been on this board a long time. You don't have to mention it. You're always toeing the party line.

 

[Gold Dragon]

Because, as I said, it's not being reported on.

I would say that every introduction to covid 19 I’ve heard for lay people has that as part of its first few lines.

 

[Gold Dragon]

LOL. We've been on this board a long time. You don't have to mention it. You're always toeing the party line.

And what is the socialist party line for pandemics compared to the capitalist party line?

If you are saying that the socialist party line is the one that prioritizes saving lives over the economy while the capitalist party line is the one that prioritizes saving the economy over lives then as a doctor I will always choose what you consider to be the socialist party line. And so will other doctors in the United States and every other country in the world.

And I have already addressed your point that physical distancing measures only delay the lives lost. That is only true if nothing else happens in the delay time, no expansion of critical care capabilities, no transmission reduction strategies in the community, no research into the virus transmission patterns, no research into treatment modalities. Then yes, the lives lost would be the same. Physical distancing measures and temporary economic shutdowns buy us time to prepare for a prolonged global war with this virus.

To use a war analogy, if after Dunkirk, the UK does not rally and do anything to prepare itself for more war, then they should have just all surrendered at Dunkirk.

 

[Aaron]

They are not after they are cured.

Again I ask. How many lives of people over 60 is your boredom sitting around worth?

Liberty is worth about 1.6 million American lives, history shows. That's the number of American boys sent to defend her since the Declaration was signed. So even if the lockdowns were saving lives (they aren't, that's only rhetoric) I'd say we're well in black as far as coronavirus is concerned.

But if lives were your concern, and if these lockdowns really served to stop an infection already in the population, I think we would hear this rhetoric every Flu season. But we don't. Because 'even if it saved only one, it would be worth it.'

I've posted Stanford experts disputing the effectiveness of these blind, despotic lockdowns, but wait, a Bruce Lee devotee from Down Under knows better. You're a subject to Her Majesty the Queen. What do you know of liberty and the price thereof? A great portion of that number of American lives above was sacrificed saving her dimply butt in the 20th Century, so that she could confer knighthood on effeminate artsy fartsy limp-wrists.

But I digress...

So if the question is how many lives are worth our freedom? Every one of them.

But that isn't the question. The question is the virus and how to treat those suffering severe and life-threatening symptoms. It's about applying 21st Century medicine, not Medieval superstitions.

 

[Aaron]

I would say that every introduction to covid 19 I’ve heard for lay people has that as part of its first few lines.

I said established media.

I'll promise you @Benjamin didn't know. Still thinks Influenza isn't an eminent comparison.

 

[Gold Dragon]

But if lives were your concern, and if these lockdowns really served to stop an infection already in the population, I think we would hear this rhetoric every Flu season. But we don't. Because 'even if it saved only one, it would be worth it.

We don’t need lock downs for the flu because while the flu may strain a few hospitals every year, it does not completely overwhelm health systems the way covid 19 does. Again I have to explain to you that the seasonal flu hospitalizes 1% of cases and has a low infectivity rate with each case spreading to 1.3 other cases.

Covid19 has a hospitalization rate around 20% of confirmed cases and infectivity rate of greater than double that of influenza at 2.5.

And we don’t have any vaccines or effective treatments yet, although some trials are underway.

 

[Gold Dragon]

LOL. We've been on this board a long time. You don't have to mention it. You're always toeing the party line.

So what exactly am I saying about covid19 that has to do with socialism or socialized medicine? I have no problem stopping talking about that if that is the case because this has nothing to do with either of those things.

In fact in another thread where someone posted an article suggesting that socialized countries were doing better than the US, I said that the fight against covid19 has nothing to do with whether the health system or government is socialized or not. Because the real tools to fight against covid19 are ones based on basic public health concepts that work in any system and are more about decision making, coordination and communication in leadership so that the country and communities take coordinated action. Once wave after wave of cases has hit your health system, it is already too late.

 

[Use of Time]

Because, as I said, it's not being reported on.

This is one of the most easily disproven things you’ve said in this thread and it really torpedoes any credibility you have. You can go find some minority position (that also doesn’t go as far as you in this thread) but you can’t simply fact check yourself in this blatantly obvious nontruth?

 

[Aaron]

We don’t need lock downs for the flu because while the flu may strain a few hospitals every year, it does not completely overwhelm health systems the way covid 19 does. Again I have to explain to you that the seasonal flu hospitalizes 1% of cases and has a low infectivity rate with each case spreading to 1.3 other cases.

Covid19 has a hospitalization rate around 20% of confirmed cases and infectivity rate of greater than double that of influenza at 2.5.

And we don’t have any vaccines or effective treatments yet, although some trials are underway.

So some lives are worth lockdowns, and others aren't. Gotchya.

And again, your 20% number is meaningless.

 

[Aaron]

This is one of the most easily disproven things you’ve said in this thread and it really torpedoes any credibility you have.

Let's see the rebuttal.

 

[Gold Dragon]

So some lives are worth lockdowns, and others aren't. Gotchya.

And again, your 20% number is meaningless.

I don't see how that is socialist.

The reason covid19 needs lockdowns is about what it does to health systems. If covid19 did not overwhelm health systems and had an infection rate of 1.3 like influenza and a hospitalization rate of 1% like influenza and a death rate of 0.1% like influenza then our health systems would be able to mange it. Any added benefit of lockdowns to reduce burdens on hospitals and death would be minimal since our health systems are already well equipped and designed to manage that level of cases. As good as our health systems are, we cannot prevent every death. This is true whether it is a socialist or capitalist system.

However because covid19 has an infection rate of 2.5, a hospitalization rate of 20% and a death rate just closer to 1%, it overwhelms any health system in a very short period of time with patient loads 5-10 times, maybe more, what they were designed to handle. After that happens, lots of people who normally would live with usual care end up dying.

But if there are systematic things that makes sense to implement that we could do to improve influenza rates in the future, we should. Every year we try to optimize influenza vaccinations and public health messaging around flu season to minimize deaths. And adding lockdowns to the situation would not dramatically change those rates.

I don't see how socialist or capitalist systems would view this any differently. Are you saying a capitalist system would lockdown health systems for normal influenza cases that their health system already manages pretty well? Or that capitalist health systems would never need lockdowns to manage infectious diseases?

 

[Gold Dragon]

You lack reading comprehension. If you read what I said, I said immune people who are cured yet your running down some unknown road I was never on. Either your deliberately troublesome or acting really dumb.

How do you get cured and immune without getting sick and being infectious or getting vaccinated?

If saving the economy is so important to you and Covid19 is just the flu, the logical extension of that thinking is for you and all the people who think like you to get infected as soon as possible to develop immunity, do the serology test and get back to work. That would be the right thing to do if you really believed that.

I would not medically advise that because your understanding of Covid19 is incorrect. And we don't actually know how long Covid19 immunity lasts so even if your serology test shows immunity today, we don't know if that still will be the case in 1 month's time.

 

[Use of Time]

Let's see the rebuttal.

'We'd like to get this into patients as soon as possible': Researchers in Pittsburgh have developed a potential coronavirus vaccine

Easy enough. I’ll wait for the goalposts to move now.

 

[Aaron]

'We'd like to get this into patients as soon as possible': Researchers in Pittsburgh have developed a potential coronavirus vaccine

Easy enough. I’ll wait for the goalposts to move now.

LOL. You haven't reached the goal yet.

 

[Aaron]

If saving the economy is so important to you and Covid19 is just the flu, the logical extension of that thinking is for you and all the people who think like you to get infected as soon as possible to develop immunity, do the serology test and get back to work. That would be the right thing to do if you really believed that.

Saving the economy is saving the nation, comrade. Wrecking the economy is forcing others to wreck their lives, their livelihoods and their health on the false premise of saving a few lives who through no fault of their own are falling victims to a hyped up pandemic.

It's also a form of collectivism, and of saying there is too high a price for freedom, which is where your Socialism, aka, Communism, aka despotism is coming in.

It is coming to light that China's despotism did little to stop the spread of this virus, and I have posted analysis of your betters that say that lockdowns will do little in the U.S.

What is needed is a response that preserves liberty, infrastructure, essential services and that minimizes the disruption of community life. That means testing, targeted quarantines of epicenters based on real and reliable data, mobilization, surge prep, and treatment.

 

[Use of Time]

LOL. You haven't reached the goal yet.

I’ll wait for your rebuttal