Conoravirus ...

[Benno von Humpback]

Well, I don’t think temporary effects similar to other vaccines (injection site pain, mild fever, fatigue) are reasons not to take a COVID vax. Had a discussion with my Oncologist about that just yesterday. He is pretty dismayed that folks who happily take other vaccines (flu, Shingles, pneumonia, tetanus and others) with mild if unpleasant side effects are so worried about the COVID side effects. He was massively supportive of me getting the Pfizer vax between chemo rounds that are given on a 3 week cycle. He’s also amazed the vaccine resistance is most prevalent in “educated Western countries”.

It was only about 50% worse than Shingrix for me and you get sick twice with that.

[BeauV]

Distrust of officials, even medical, has been increasing across western countries. Can you blame us? A series of events making it painfully clear that our governments have been lying to us for my entire adult lifetime (Watergate to Trump), makes that a rational response.

What my number was based upon was an adverse side effect of a serious nature, meaning shock or real illness, not a sore arm and mild fever.

[LarryHoward]

Distrust of officials, even medical, has been increasing across western countries. Can you blame us? A series of events making it painfully clear that our governments have been lying to us for my entire adult lifetime (Watergate to Trump), makes that a rational response.

What my number was based upon was an adverse side effect of a serious nature, meaning shock or real illness, not a sore arm and mild fever.

While I agree, I am dismayed by the lack of faith in science. I can certainly understand the lack of trust, particularly from minority communities. It takes generations to get past some of the medical experimentation.

[BeauV]

Distrust of officials, even medical, has been increasing across western countries. Can you blame us? A series of events making it painfully clear that our governments have been lying to us for my entire adult lifetime (Watergate to Trump), makes that a rational response.

What my number was based upon was an adverse side effect of a serious nature, meaning shock or real illness, not a sore arm and mild fever.

While I agree, I am dismayed by the lack of faith in science. I can certainly understand the lack of trust, particularly from minority communities. It takes generations to get past some of the medical experimentation.

Amen!

[Olaf Hart]

Distrust of officials, even medical, has been increasing across western countries. Can you blame us? A series of events making it painfully clear that our governments have been lying to us for my entire adult lifetime (Watergate to Trump), makes that a rational response.

What my number was based upon was an adverse side effect of a serious nature, meaning shock or real illness, not a sore arm and mild fever.

While I agree, I am dismayed by the lack of faith in science. I can certainly understand the lack of trust, particularly from minority communities. It takes generations to get past some of the medical experimentation.

Not sure I understand, could you expand on this please?

[Slick470]

Olaf, unfortunately here in the US there are examples of various minority groups being tested on without their knowledge. The Tuskegee experiment is probably one of the most well known and has instilled a deep distrust of medicine in the Black community.

[Slick470]

We'd like to get the vaccine, but being relatively younger and mostly healthy we can't currently sign up anywhere. If our county were following the state system, we could at least get on a list as being willing, but our county decided to do their own thing and we don't check any of the requirements needed at the moment. Oddly enough, a good friend is a bit shorter than I am, but is very fit so has a BMI that puts him into a risk category and so he is on the list.... grr...

[Benno von Humpback]

Janell figures she’ll have to wait until June...when she turns 65.

[LarryHoward]

Olaf, unfortunately here in the US there are examples of various minority groups being tested on without their knowledge. The Tuskegee experiment is probably one of the most well known and has instilled a deep distrust of medicine in the Black community.

Exactly. Basically some 400 African American syphilis patients were left intentionally untreated to research the long term progression of the disease for more roughly 40 years even after it became clear that penicillin was safe and effective. Not only was there no informed consent to the essentially secret trials, the USPHS reaffirmed the effort multiple times.

Add in Jim Crow laws, voter suppression (still happening) and there is good reason to not buy into “trust us”.

[Olaf Hart]

Wow, I am in the business and had never heard those stories.
I have had to terminate a study early because it was unethical to leave controls untreated..

[SemiSalt]

Olaf, unfortunately here in the US there are examples of various minority groups being tested on without their knowledge. The Tuskegee experiment is probably one of the most well known and has instilled a deep distrust of medicine in the Black community.

I read about a survey which reported that despite lots of talk about the Tuskegee experiments in the press, blacks are more likely to cite more immediate concerns as reasons to avoid the vaccine. As a generality, "I'm from the government and I'm here to help you" is not an approach blacks are open to for obvious reasons.

[Slick470]

Olaf, unfortunately here in the US there are examples of various minority groups being tested on without their knowledge. The Tuskegee experiment is probably one of the most well known and has instilled a deep distrust of medicine in the Black community.

I read about a survey which reported that despite lots of talk about the Tuskegee experiments in the press, blacks are more likely to cite more immediate concerns as reasons to avoid the vaccine. As a generality, "I'm from the government and I'm here to help you" is not an approach blacks are open to for obvious reasons.

Also sadly true. Continuing on the medical angle, there are pretty well documented disparities in health outcomes between races. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4181672/

These are all things that we as a society need to figure out a way to correct.

[BeauV]

Olaf, unfortunately here in the US there are examples of various minority groups being tested on without their knowledge. The Tuskegee experiment is probably one of the most well known and has instilled a deep distrust of medicine in the Black community.

I read about a survey which reported that despite lots of talk about the Tuskegee experiments in the press, blacks are more likely to cite more immediate concerns as reasons to avoid the vaccine. As a generality, "I'm from the government and I'm here to help you" is not an approach blacks are open to for obvious reasons.

Also sadly true. Continuing on the medical angle, there are pretty well documented disparities in health outcomes between races. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4181672/

These are all things that we as a society need to figure out a way to correct.

I think we start with fair treatment from the Police, which is the highest point of contact between the "Government" and most people of color (PoC). Treat folks well and they'll trust you. It is painfully obvious from the data that the Police generally treat PoC far worse than they treat White and Asian folks. This isn't a north/south or rural/urban problem, and it's not correlated to the crime rate committed by PoC.

To put it bluntly, PoC know that a white guy like me will "get off with a warning" while they will not. Fixing that would increase the trust PoC have in the Government tremendously.

[LarryHoward]

Well, Isn't this nice of the Bishops.

https://www.cnn.com/2021/03/03/health/bishops-catholics-johnson-and-johnson-vaccine/index.html URL edited as the pdf link to the actual statement didn't come through.



About 7 pages so won't post full text. The US Council noting that COVID vaccines have used "morally compromised" cellular tissue that traces to tissue from a fetus aborted in 1985. Pfizer/Moderna to support testing and AZ and (according to the late news last night) J&J directly in production. They go on to say that its likely OK to use Pfizer or Moderna but caution that there is a moral trade on using AZ or J&J that should be considered. Just what we need. Priests and Preachers telling folks they will go to hell if they get the Vax. Of course, the Pope has been vaccinated and is on record that not getting a VAX is morally wrong.

[Jamie]

The Pope Francis is a Jesuit, so he’s going to think different.

[Steele]

Here is an interesting take on Jesuit thought by Malcolm Gladwell, http://revisionisthistory.com/episodes/ ... ndard-case

[Slick470]

Here is an interesting take on Jesuit thought by Malcolm Gladwell, http://revisionisthistory.com/episodes/ ... ndard-case

I really enjoy that podcast. I'm a couple seasons behind though.

[Olaf Hart]

Here is an interesting take on Jesuit thought by Malcolm Gladwell, http://revisionisthistory.com/episodes/ ... ndard-case

Thanks, I wondered where my disdain for people who approach a problem from first principles came from. The Jesuits ran our local parish, my brother and sons went to a Jesuit school, but this was never explained so clearly.

Puts the boot into identity politics...

[Jamie]

Thanks for that!

Generally I think trying to mix logic with something that is faith (belief without proof) is a terrible idea - looking at you St Thomas Aquinas - But I've always had a grudging respect for the early Jesuits. They conducted a lot of ground breaking work. I also think Jesuits took some of the sharp edges off of colonization and when they were suppressed, a lot of abuse, loss of culture and knowledge followed. I don't believe the Church has ever recovered intellectually.

[BeauV]

Jamie, the history of western philosophical thought wouldn't be the same without 'em. I'm not sure if it's better or worse, but it's different.

The intentional dumbing down of the European population by the Church was an astounding error. Sort of like what's going on in some groups in the US right now.

[Olaf Hart]

We just had our Coronavirus shots, first day of our category, first day of Aussie made AZ vaccine...

Watch this space.

[BeauV]

Yesterday was 14 days after our second shot of the Moderna vaccine. I guess this is as good as it gets. But, only 1:18 folks have caught COVID-19 in our County, although about 40% of the County has been vaccinated. We're still hearing that "herd immunity" is at least 75% vaccinated-or-immune, and maybe 80%, to really stop the disease transfer.

I was pondering what our odds of catching COVID-19 are now. We'll probably want Keith or another math-type to weigh in here.
- The vaccine is about 95% effective at protecting one from catching the disease. I suppose that means we have a 1:20 shot of catching COVID-19 if exposed.
- It is 100% effective (I believe) in preventing death
- We have a local population that has about 10 cases reported per 100,000 or 1:10,000
- It seems that at only 1 out of 10 people with the disease around here go to the doctor and/or get tested. So, the real number is probably 1:1,000
- The way we live now, we're interacting (masks on etc...) with about 10 people during a busy day, usually less than half that
- Thus, our chance of interacting with someone who is sick is 1:100
- If our chancesof getting sick are:
- - - 1:20, so, I guess we have a 1:2,000 chance of getting sick and a zero chance of dying on a busy day
- - - 1:5,000 or better on a normal day

Did I do that right? If so,

I'm feeling pretty good about the odds now and even better about the other factoid about our area, we expect to have very high vaccine coverage by the end of April or Mid-May.

All of the above is not adjusted for demographic. Cases around here are highly concentrated in the Hispanic agricultural community in the S. County. Here in the N. County the case count is much lower.

[Olaf Hart]

Don’t forget to factor in lower immunity for known variants, and future variants.

While will be an ongoing race between them and new vaccines for some time, the real question is will existing vaccines prevent hospitalisation.

Best plan is to continue masking and distancing where possible.

[BeauV]

Don’t forget to factor in lower immunity for known variants, and future variants.

While will be an ongoing race between them and new vaccines for some time, the real question is will existing vaccines prevent hospitalisation.

Best plan is to continue masking and distancing where possible.

Completely agree on all count.

In some areas (EG: Michigan) cases are going up rather rapidly. (45%/week). Locallly here, hospitalizations are way way down. What we don't know about our area is the number of cases which are the British variant.

My expectation is that we'll need boosters (which cover other varients) for a number of years and possibly forever as mutations will be arriving from non-vaccinated areas for at least a decade.

[Olaf Hart]

Interesting interview on origins of COVID

https://youtu.be/YBq-LV3Jm1M

[kdh]

Yesterday was 14 days after our second shot of the Moderna vaccine. I guess this is as good as it gets. But, only 1:18 folks have caught COVID-19 in our County, although about 40% of the County has been vaccinated. We're still hearing that "herd immunity" is at least 75% vaccinated-or-immune, and maybe 80%, to really stop the disease transfer.

I was pondering what our odds of catching COVID-19 are now. We'll probably want Keith or another math-type to weigh in here.
- The vaccine is about 95% effective at protecting one from catching the disease. I suppose that means we have a 1:20 shot of catching COVID-19 if exposed.
- It is 100% effective (I believe) in preventing death
- We have a local population that has about 10 cases reported per 100,000 or 1:10,000
- It seems that at only 1 out of 10 people with the disease around here go to the doctor and/or get tested. So, the real number is probably 1:1,000
- The way we live now, we're interacting (masks on etc...) with about 10 people during a busy day, usually less than half that
- Thus, our chance of interacting with someone who is sick is 1:100
- If our chancesof getting sick are:
- - - 1:20, so, I guess we have a 1:2,000 chance of getting sick and a zero chance of dying on a busy day
- - - 1:5,000 or better on a normal day

Did I do that right? If so,

I'm feeling pretty good about the odds now and even better about the other factoid about our area, we expect to have very high vaccine coverage by the end of April or Mid-May.

All of the above is not adjusted for demographic. Cases around here are highly concentrated in the Hispanic agricultural community in the S. County. Here in the N. County the case count is much lower.

Beau, your math is right, the chance of getting sick, which is obviously the same as the probability of getting sick and getting exposed, is the probability of getting sick given you're exposed times the probability of getting exposed.

For the time being, given I've been vaccinated I'm assuming it's a risk small enough not to worry about. I spent a couple of hours with my dad, also vaccinated, at his place yesterday talking about radars and my grandmother. For both of us it was well worth the small risk.

[SemiSalt]

My understanding of the origin and meaning of the 95% effectiveness number is a little different. (If someone who really knows speaks up, I'll go back my corner and keep quiet.)

When they ran the double blind trials for effectiveness, they had a pretty huge test group, but for purposes of explanation, assume 25,000 vaccinated and 25,000 given a plecebo. They counted the number who got sick in each group. Suppose it was 50 in the vaccinated group and 1000 in the placebo group, thus the vaccine was held to be 95% effective.

So the 95% applies to all the risk of daily life, not just to one exposure. The number that got sick was not huge by statistical standards, so the effectiveness percentages are way more imprecise than the general public perceives.

[Anomaly]

Must be nice to debate, after you've had the vaccine.... trying to fly back to US (for vaccine among other reasons) but flight was cancelled. Rebooking is proving challenging.

[LarryHoward]

Beau, left out in your analysis is that those who catch the virus are generally infectious from a few days after exposure until a few days after symptoms are no longer present. For most cases, that’s about 14 days so you would have to be exposed to them and receive a significant enough exposure to become infected during that 14 day period.

Cases per 100K population is a pretty bad metric as it is test number sensitive to a large degree. We experienced that in MD last fall when we were doing very significant testing at a low positive percentage. More tests at that percentage over a fixed population denominator gave us a “cases per 100K population” above the travel restriction despite a very low positive test rate.

[kdh]

My understanding of the origin and meaning of the 95% effectiveness number is a little different. (If someone who really knows speaks up, I'll go back my corner and keep quiet.)

When they ran the double blind trials for effectiveness, they had a pretty huge test group, but for purposes of explanation, assume 25,000 vaccinated and 25,000 given a plecebo. They counted the number who got sick in each group. Suppose it was 50 in the vaccinated group and 1000 in the placebo group, thus the vaccine was held to be 95% effective.

So the 95% applies to all the risk of daily life, not just to one exposure. The number that got sick was not huge by statistical standards, so the effectiveness percentages are way more imprecise than the general public perceives.

My understanding as well. The ratio of those who got sick in the treatment group over those that got sick in the placebo group is the number quoted. But assuming both groups got the same amount of exposure, and "exposed" means you were untreated and got sick, the ratio is an estimate of the probability of getting sick while treated given you've been exposed.

Probability and Statistics as a theory are never precise--that's the whole point. But I think too often in our culture, and from just human nature, we throw out conclusions based on imprecise yet reasonable assumptions. People hate chance and naturally look for a tidy world that just isn't the one we live in.