Covid-19 Politics

[Stavros]

Just to add to the WTF ?! Moment - he also won an Emmy.

Blimey, Fred, now I'm lost for words. Even if I can think of something intelligent to say about this, I won't bother, life is too short on this occasion.

[sukumvit boy]

Very interesting article about Russia's race to create the Sputnik V vaccine.
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2...ce-to-immunity

[filghy2]

Johnson and Johnson says it can produce ten million doses in February and that's ten million more people vaccinated. I imagine they can ramp up much further after that. Since the government is paying for vaccines, I'm not sure who would choose a vaccine that is 66% effective rather than 95% effective at preventing covid cases but maybe it has a better side effect profile or maybe some people in a lower priority group would prefer to get some protection earlier.

There's a discussion of different dimensions of efficacy here that may be relevant. In addition to efficacy in preventing people catching the virus, which is the stat that gets most attention, there is also efficacy in preventing people transmitting it to others and efficacy in moderating the effects if people get infected. Different vaccines may perform differently on the three dimensions.
https://www.vox.com/22273502/covid-v...fficacy-deaths

[broncofan]

There's a discussion of different dimensions of efficacy here that may be relevant. In addition to efficacy in preventing people catching the virus, which is the stat that gets most attention, there is also efficacy in preventing people transmitting it to others and efficacy in moderating the effects if people get infected. Different vaccines may perform differently on the three dimensions.
https://www.vox.com/22273502/covid-v...fficacy-deaths

This is extremely important. I was aware of these other endpoints but without data I figured we could only assume they were correlated with each other (though they probably aren't). Efficacy for preventing people getting covid disease was the endpoint for the studies and it makes sense that it would be easier to collect data on it and reach statistical significance. The article makes the point about why it takes longer to measure efficacy in preventing death.

It is an unanswered question whether Astrazeneca's vaccine is effective at preventing death for those exposed to the b.1.351 variant in South Africa. To provide just the superficial info I've gleaned from immunologists, different aspects of the immune response may be involved in protecting one against disease v. severe disease. Antibodies are thought to be important early on and be the most important in protecting against getting covid. But t-cell response may be more important once the virus has replicated and a person is sick. I'm sure it's much more complicated than this but it's one reason they don't assume the different possible endpoints are always correlated with one another.

A couple other issues scientists are trying to work through: As they develop updated boosters that are more effective against emerging variants, does it require them to go through all three phases of clinical trials or is there some expedited process?

The other question is whether efficacy at preventing disease can be inferred from data in the lab, which is not how vaccine efficacy is established in the original trials. For instance, while there is now some data for how well J&J, Astrazeneca, and Novavax perform in South African cohorts, where the b.1.351 variant is thought to be dominant, Pfizer and Moderna have only released statements saying that the antibodies in the blood of people who have been received their shots neutralizes this variant in vitro.

Scientists make a lot of predictions after phase 2 safety trials where they have the blood of people who have received the vaccine and can measure antibody titers. They try to figure out "correlates of protection" by comparing these titers in the blood of vaccinated people to those who have been infected. But they assume they don't really know until they get to Phase 3 and test the vaccine against placebo. I think as new variants emerge regulators are probably going to find ways to make educated guesses about efficacy hopefully without sacrificing safety.

[broncofan]

There's also the fairly obvious point that while safety risks are important to monitor there's a risk in assuming that there's efficacy when there isn't because people take fewer precautions after they're vaccinated. In Israel they found a doubling of the rate of infections in people for the first week after they received their first Pfizer shot because some probably believed they had immunity that hadn't yet developed.

Given that we have indications that both natural infection and some vaccines are less effective at preventing disease for the South African variant it will be important to get guidance about how vaccinated people are supposed to behave. That variant will be making its way around the world obviously.

[blackchubby38]

So much for being the patron saint of Corona virus response.


New York governor's top aide admits administration delayed the release of Covid-19 deaths in long-term care facilities over federal investigation concerns


www.cnn.com/2021/02/12/us/new-york-aide-apology-covid-deaths-facilities/index.html

[filghy2]

There must be something in the water in New York
https://www.theguardian.com/commenti...rk-coronavirus

[fred41]

There must be something in the water in New York
https://www.theguardian.com/commenti...rk-coronavirus

It’s an excellent article. I wish other papers would’ve written it when it mattered - say....back in March or so. The NY Post did, but it’s owned by Murdoch so we’ll just ignore it. I’m glad the orange distraction is out of office now. I hope that means that, here in the States, the media will now look at the actual politicians in front of them and write fair, but critical, pieces on them regardless of whether there’s a D or an R in front of their names. The clown show Cuomo put on with his brother on CNN seems so horrifically tone deaf now....as does his book and his absurd Emmy.

[Stavros]

How many Cuomos are there (other than, more than enough) ? There seems to be a dynastic tinge to Americana these days - the US is threatened with yet more Trumps entering the political arena, and there seems to be an endless supply of Jenners and Kardashians -are they going to enter politics too? Has Chelsea Clinton made any decision on politics?

[fred41]

The dynastic tinge doesn’t just apply to ‘these days’....we’ve always had them - remember the Kennedys? Sometimes dynasties merge..as when Andrew Cuomo married Kerry Kennedy. I suspect that, because we don’t have actual royalty, like you do in the UK, we create our own - whether in politics or , all too often, in Hollywood. How else to explain the Kardashians? They are famous for being famous. The Kardashians are a family that were pretty well off financially..but became sickeningly wealthy by virtue of a sex tape. Kris Jenner (the mom) basically prostituted her own daughters to the media...and it worked! Have you ever listened to Kim Kardashian in an interview? I have. She’s a pretty girl but bland as fuck.