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D&D Coronavirus thread

Discussion in 'BBS Hangout: Debate & Discussion' started by NewRoxFan, Feb 23, 2020.

  1. Amiga

    Amiga I get vaunted sacred revelations from social media
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    The virus doesn't care if you are Mexican, Asian (anyone remembers it's was the Asian fault?), or American. It does care if you are vaccinated or not.

    Now if we are talking about policy of containment. The US under most Republican leadership wanted an "open border" policy for the virus. That contributed to the massive initial spread throughout 2020 and 600k dead Americans. And since early 2020, the constant downplaying of Covid, followed by antivaxx messages were the seeds that have now blossom to massive covid vaccine hesitancy in the US. These are some of the key contributors to our covid failures, not the southern border or some Asians. Today, people that choose to not get vaccinated are the driver of covid spread.

    Go get vaccinated. It's for your own good and the rest of American.
     
  2. Os Trigonum

    Os Trigonum Contributing Member
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    https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-ce...-covid-vaccines-11627682562?mod=hp_opin_pos_1

    The CDC’s Delta Variant Panic
    The agency spreads needless worry about vaccinations.

    By The Editorial Board
    July 30, 2021 6:39 pm ET

    As the coronavirus evolves, so does the science. The Delta variant is creating uncertainty about how much vaccines prevent transmission, but the overwhelming evidence shows they are highly protective against severe illness. Please get vaccinated if you aren’t already.

    That should have been the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s straightforward message to Americans this week, along with a candid analysis of its evidence.

    Instead, the CDC on Tuesday issued murky new guidance, without backup evidence, recommending that vaccinated people resume wearing masks indoors in some cases because unpublished studies suggest they could transmit the virus. But on Thursday the Washington Post ran an alarmist story on an internal CDC slide presentation with the unpublished evidence, which triggered a media panic that could undermine vaccinations. Only on Friday afternoon did the agency release some of its evidence and offer a calmer explanation.

    What a fiasco. The CDC should be a source of fact and reason, not a hair-on-fire spreader of fear. The agency could start by explaining that Covid cases have been increasing across the U.S. and that more vaccinated individuals are testing positive. But most of these “breakthrough” cases are mild or asymptomatic.

    Now, let’s go to the slide deck, please. The CDC estimates there are about 35,000 symptomatic infections among 162 million vaccinated Americans a week. As cases have increased nationwide, so have breakthrough infections. This is to be expected. But recent studies show that vaccines are still 88% protective against symptomatic illness and 96% against hospitalization and death.

    Next slide. Vaccinated people are making up a larger share of the hospitalized population and deaths than in the winter. That’s because most older people who are at higher risk have been vaccinated, and vaccines aren’t 100% effective. This doesn’t mean that vaccines don’t prevent severe illness, and the vast majority of people who are hospitalized are unvaccinated.

    Real-world evidence from hospitals indicates that vaccines are only about 87% preventive against hospitalizations. That’s lower than published studies, but this may be because vaccines are less protective for some groups. For instance, vaccines are only about 59% protective against Covid hospitalization among the immuno-compromised and only 85% against severe illness among nursing home residents.

    An important footnote: Vaccines are more protective in nursing homes where a larger share of the population are vaccinated. That’s why it’s so important for nursing-home workers to be vaccinated even if they themselves are at low risk.

    Which brings us to the Delta variant. CDC evidence suggests Delta is more than twice as transmissible as the original virus strain, akin to the chickenpox, which is why cases are rising even in places with relatively high vaccination rates. But don’t freak out like the CDC. Vaccines are still very protective.

    Evidence indicates the Delta variant replicates much faster and produces higher viral loads in respiratory passages that allow it to spread more. There’s also some evidence that people infected with Delta are contagious for longer. It’s still uncertain whether breakthrough Delta cases can transmit the virus as much as unvaccinated individuals do.

    A study of a July outbreak from Provincetown, Mass., found that infected vaccinated and unvaccinated individuals had similar viral loads, indicating that both groups are equally likely to spread the virus. But vaccinated individuals are still less likely to spread the virus because they are less likely to become infected.

    ***
    Now the CDC is recommending masks again based on evidence of the Delta’s increased transmissibility and vaccination rates that are leaving most places short of herd immunity. The risk is that some people may conclude from this new CDC guidance that, since we still need masks, there’s no need to be vaccinated. That is not true. Masks can help modestly limit the spread while we try to increase vaccination rates. The more people who get vaccinated, the less the virus will spread.

    But let’s be clear, unlike the CDC: The virus will never be eradicated. It will eventually become endemic, and the public-health goal is to protect people from getting severely ill.

    Congress created the CDC precisely to address an event like Covid-19. It has some 10,700 employees. Yet time and again in this pandemic the CDC has been a source of confusion or ineptitude. And Washington wonders why Americans have lost confidence in Covid experts.

    Appeared in the July 31, 2021, print edition.
     
  3. NewRoxFan

    NewRoxFan Contributing Member

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  4. NewRoxFan

    NewRoxFan Contributing Member

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    The group of people that are anti-vaxx and anti-mask are largely doing it for political reasons (defend trump and his mishandling of the pandemic, and some to support anti-immigration policies that they typically use a "boogeyman" scare tactics for any problem, eg jobs, health care costs, etc). In this case, they are allowing their political objectives to directly hurt the American people as they allow the virus to spread and mutate and harm more people.
     
  5. Amiga

    Amiga I get vaunted sacred revelations from social media
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    I get what politicians like Abbot and Cruz are doing.

    As for those that choose to not get vaccinated, in some way, it's no fault of their own. I'll just leave it at that and won't go much into it. But if there are blames to be made, first and foremost are the leaders and media heads that drive these messages leading to massive vaccine hesitancy in the US. Secondary are people that continue to choose to not get vaccinated.
     
  6. NewRoxFan

    NewRoxFan Contributing Member

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  7. Commodore

    Commodore Contributing Member

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  8. durvasa

    durvasa Contributing Member

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    The CDC has been very clear on the efficacy of vaccines from the beginning.
    Not sure whether the WSJ editorial staff has been. The thing that’s unclear is transmissibility with Delta and the extent to which vaccinated people can contribute to this. We’re still learning about this — that’s just a fact.

    If the WSJ wants to assign blame about messaging, they should focus more on the campaign of misinformation from primarily right wing populists in the media. But their agenda is instead to undermine the credibility of the CDC.
     
  9. NewRoxFan

    NewRoxFan Contributing Member

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    newsmax... might as well just let crazy aunt mary representing her facebook friends asking questions...

     
  10. Commodore

    Commodore Contributing Member

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    remember when questioning authority was a bedrock progressive principle? now it's the exact opposite

     
  11. Commodore

    Commodore Contributing Member

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    the reporter asked if/how the delta variant is tested for, and the press secretary couldn't answer other than the robotic "follow the science" mantra
     
  12. Commodore

    Commodore Contributing Member

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    I did not expect Australia to be the place where COVID fascism struck hardest

     
  13. durvasa

    durvasa Contributing Member

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    Big Tech social media platforms are designed for optimal spreading of misinformation (because their profit model depends on this), and the mechanisms they have in place for reducing this spread are imperfect. It’s interesting how analogous this is to the COVID problem itself.
     
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  14. bobrek

    bobrek Politics belong in the D & D

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    @Commodore isn't wrong here. Unless they do a test on every single person who presents with COVID, they don't know for a fact it's the Delta variant.

    Doctors can make assumptions and based on statistics and behavior it is most likely Delta, but scientists and doctors agree that they can't factually say it's Delta unless every single case is evaluated (impractical).

    It was a reasonable question and a poorly worded answer.

    ETA - i responded to the wrong Commodore post, but my point stands
     
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  15. edwardc

    edwardc Member

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  16. Amiga

    Amiga I get vaunted sacred revelations from social media
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    It's sampling of actual cases and using statistical modeling to estimate. Nothing unique to what the CDC is doing here - the world has similar programs to detect for proportions of variants. Not sure where the reporter is leading toward, but this type of question is much better suited toward the CDC personnel than to the press secretary.


    https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#variant-proportions

    Estimated Proportions of SARS-CoV-2 Lineages

    The data below show the estimated biweekly proportions of the most common SARS-CoV-2 lineages circulating in the United States, based on greater than 175,000 sequences collected through CDC’s national genomic surveillance since Dec 20, 2020 and grouped in 2-week intervals. Data are subject to change over time and will be updated as more data become available. Variant proportions are adjusted using statistical weighting to correct for the non-random sampling of sequencing data over time and across states and to provide more representative national estimates.

    Nowcast weighted estimates that predict proportions for more recent time intervals are added when “Nowcast On” is selected in the dashboard controls below.
     
  17. Commodore

    Commodore Contributing Member

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    The answer to bad speech is better speech.

    Book burners (and that's what they'd be doing if social media didn't exist) like to use safety and misinformation as a pretense for their actions.

    I presume the censors are motivated by some combination of (1) suppressing inconvenient truths or (2) don't believe the truth as they see it can stand up to scrutiny and counterarguments or (3) believe that humans are too stupid to have the agency to discern truth, and must have it dictated to them by institutions of supposed authority.

     
  18. Deckard

    Deckard Blade Runner
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    No one would be burning books. This isn’t Nazi Germany. The liar you support might wish it was, because from his view, he’d still be in office, instead of suffering a defeat in a fair election. So he continues to lie, just as you continue to repeat those lies. But hey, search social media. I’m sure you can find someone somewhere in this country burning a book. Knock yourself out.
     
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  19. bobrek

    bobrek Politics belong in the D & D

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    Of course it would be better asked of a CDC person. The deputy press secretary gave a poorly worded answer.
     
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  20. Amiga

    Amiga I get vaunted sacred revelations from social media
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    She didn't have the knowledge to answer the question, gave a poor defensive answer and came back to her main points. The reporter, if sincere, is asking in the wrong forum to the wrong person. Waste of time.

    ps. there is legitimate criticism of the CDC on delta detection. They decided back in May to stop monitoring for breakthroughs among vaccinated when Delta was rampant in India. They also ramped up surveillance for new variants too slowly (only 1.2% of cases are sequenced compared to 9% in UK). With effective vaccines now, the main risk, beyond those not vaccinated, is too slow at detecting a new variant that drastically reduces vaccine efficiency.
     
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