OT: Corona virus

[BBfanboy]

ORIGINAL: RangerJoe

ORIGINAL: RangerJoe

Doctors At University of Pittsburgh Medical Center: We’ve Developed a Vaccine Against Coronavirus
Posted at 4:00 pm on April 2, 2020

Doctors and researchers at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center have announced amazing news.

They are saying they’ve created a vaccine that can protect against developing COVID-19 and they want federal permission for human trials.

From Penn Live:

They said they began working on it Jan. 21 and found mice had developed antibodies against COVID-19 about two weeks after receiving the vaccine. They said they based the vaccine on work previously done at UPMC that sought to create vaccines to protect against SARS and MERS, which they said are similar to the new coronavirus.

Not only that the doctors say the vaccine is easily deliverable in large quantities.

They further said their vaccine is one that is easily scalable to produce in large quantities. It also includes a unique delivery method in which hundreds of tiny needles are in a patch similar to a Band-Aid, with the needles, made of sugar and protein particles, dissolving into the skin to deliver the vaccine.

https://www.redstate.com/nick-arama/202 ... han-virus/

This was my post from April 2 about the University of Pittsburgh vaccine. How safe is it? Maybe somebody can let us know.

We are so used to 'instant everything' that people have forgotten the CDC info about clinical trials to assess effectiveness and side effects taking at least six months! That kind of mindset drove people to buy up hydroxi-chloroquin (or whatever it was called) at the first mention that it might have some effect. So now people who have been prescribed the drug for other ailments are finding it hard to get their prescriptions filled. Panicked Madness!

[BBfanboy]

ORIGINAL: Zorch

ORIGINAL: Cap Mandrake

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

From that MSN article about revised projections (linked again: https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/key-c ... li=BBnb7Kz):

"The April 5 update predicts the need for 140,823 total hospital beds and 29,210 ICU beds at the peak of the outbreak. Those numbers are down 121,269 and 10,517, respectively." [emphasis added]

Wow.

That model anticipates extension of social discipline through AUGUST [X(]
...

By August every member of this forum will be stark raving mad. Except me. [:D]

No waiting required? [:'(]

[MakeeLearn]

No more P**sy Galore
Mon 6 Apr 2020 13.57 EDT

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2020/a ... es-aged-94


"Honor Blackman, the actor best known for playing the Bond girl P**sy Galore, has died aged 94.



Blackman, who became a household name in the 1960s as Cathy Gale in The Avengers and had a career spanning eight decades, died of natural causes unrelated to coronavirus."

-------------

I'am happy with just one.[&o]

[BBfanboy]

ORIGINAL: Lokasenna

ORIGINAL: obvert

ORIGINAL: Lokasenna




[8|]

If only 15% of people are infected, that's nowhere near close enough for herd immunity... which means that more than 15% of people will become infected unless the virus is eradicated. Fat chance of that.

Currently no country in the world has a 15% infection rate that we know of, and if they had it would be beyond catastrophic. The US currently is at a 0.11% infection rate according to tests taken. Spain is the highest for large countries (1 million plus) at 0.30% of it's total population, according to tests. Even using some experts estimates of a 10x known infection rate, that is considerably lower than 15%!!

I hope that's a not so dumb headline of the day in the other direction, and he's wildly overestimating so people take this seriously, and that such a high rate doesn't end up happening.

DC's mayor is actually a she, currently.

ORIGINAL: MakeeLearn

Key Coronavirus Model Now Predicts Many Fewer U.S. Deaths
2 hrs ago
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/key-c ... li=BBnb7Kz

"A Sunday update of a prominent COVID-19 forecasting model suggests that fewer lives will be lost during the first wave of the coronavirus outbreak than previously thought."

"The University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) now predicts that 81,766 people will die of COVID-19 in the U.S. through early August. When the model was last updated, on April 2, it predicted 11,765 deaths more deaths, for a total of 93,531."

"The April 5 update predicts the need for 140,823 total hospital beds and 29,210 ICU beds at the peak of the outbreak. Those numbers are down 121,269 and 10,517, respectively."

"The model also revised downward the prediction for the number of ventilators needed at the height of the outbreak. It now predicts the need for 18,992 ventilators, down from 31,782."

"Crucially, it also assumes the continuation of social distancing until early August, well beyond the April 30 guidelines currently set forth by the White House."

I also just read this quoted part as part of another story. What really stuck out to me was the bolded part.

Really highlights how businesses are pitting themselves against overall public health. I sympathize - it's an impossible position. Hopefully we get a bit more guidance from the federal level... Now, if only Congress hadn't decided to go on vacation until April 20 as scheduled... Although I understand that business as usual for them would have hundreds of people in close proximity, there's a leadership vacuum right now. Dr. Fauci can't fill it all. Maybe they could've found a way to conduct at least some business while also practicing social distancing.

There have been enough mentions by Senators and Congressmen/Congresswomen about "working on ways to have sessions electronically" that it would not surprise me if the "vacation" is a break in face-to-face meetings so they can install some hardware for teleconferencing hundreds of people and hiring techs to run it during sessions. I hope they find a way. Canada is working on the same issue.

[RangerJoe]

Buy milk and cheese!

COVID-19 has US cheese and milk industries on the brink
https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/markets ... r-BB12ew0e

[RangerJoe]

Passengers started leaving the Coral Princess. Then the CDC changed its stance on coronavirus-stricken cruises.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/passe ... r-BB12eJvx

[RangerJoe]

Not yet peer reviewed:

Fewer Coronavirus Deaths Seen in Countries That Mandate TB Vaccine

Countries with mandatory policies to vaccinate against tuberculosis register fewer coronavirus deaths than countries that don’t have those policies, a new study has found.

The preliminary study posted on medRxiv, a site for unpublished medical research, finds a correlation between countries that require citizens to get the bacillus Calmette-Guerin (BCG) vaccine and those showing fewer number of confirmed cases and deaths from Covid-19. Though only a correlation, clinicians in at least six countries are running trials that involve giving frontline health workers and elderly people the BCG vaccine to see whether it can indeed provide some level of protection against the new coronavirus.

Gonzalo Otazu, assistant professor at the New York Institute of Technology and lead author of the study, started working on the analysis after noticing the low number of cases in Japan. The country had reported some of the earliest confirmed cases of coronavirus outside of China and it hadn’t instituted lockdown measures like so many other countries have done.

Otazu said he knew about studies showing the BCG vaccine provided protection against not just tuberculosis bacteria but also other types of contagions. So his team put together the data on what countries had universal BCG vaccine policies and when they were put in place. They then compared the number of confirmed cases and deaths from Covid-19 to find a strong correlation.

Among high-income countries showing large number of Covid-19 cases, the U.S. and Italy recommend BCG vaccines but only for people who might be at risk, whereas Germany, Spain, France, Iran and the U.K. used to have BCG vaccine policies but ended them years to decades ago. China, where the pandemic began, has a BCG vaccine policy but it wasn’t adhered to very well before 1976, Otazu said. Countries including Japan and South Korea, which have managed to control the disease, have universal BCG vaccine policies. Data on confirmed cases from low-income countries was considered not reliable enough to make a strong judgment.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/medica ... r-BB123ji1

[RangerJoe]

A polio survivor:

James Drury, who starred in one of the longest running Westerns in TV history, "The Virginian," has died. He was 85.

His assistant, Karen Lindsey, shared the news on Facebook Monday, writing that he "passed away this morning of natural causes." TheWrap reached out to his agent for additional comment.

While his most famous role was "The Virginian," Drury also starred in Westerns on the big screen, including 1959's "Good Day for Hanging," 1960's "Ten Who Dares" and "Ride the High Country." His other credits include "Love Me Tender," alongside Elvis Presley, and "Bernardine," opposite Pat Boone.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/tv/celebrity/ ... r-BB12eBj6

[Ian R]

ORIGINAL: USSAmerica

This thread still contains a wealth of information that I find very useful. Unfortunately, the incessant personal attacks are drowning the usefulness.

I wish you all the best.

"Gentlemen should never discuss politics or religion."

Who said that?

[BBfanboy]

RJ, I hope that vaccine research pans out soon, but I have seen so many suggestions that a cure/treatment/immunity method is at hand that I keep my hopes low and my "Show Me" expectations high!

[Ian R]

The thing I find odd about this thread, is not that it has become immersed in US matters (given the demographics of the forum).

What I find odd is there seems to be pre-occupation with doom and gloom, and the sky falling in.

Is this epidemic a bad thing, that kills some people, and is causing economic damage indirectly via lockdown? Yes.

Is it being controlled by the measures taken? No, not entirely, but the impact has likely been mitigated.

Do we really know how many people have had it with no or minimal symptoms and recovered before being tested? Definite 'no' there.

Has it killed more people than the flu has in the last 6 plus months that it has been around? No.

I feel sympathy for the deceased and their families in all the countries where this has taken hold and killed thousands, I am sure we all do.

Here is the key question though:

What is being done differently in countries where the infection rates, and death rates are much lower than in as an example group, the US, Spain and Italy? The overall plan looks the same, but something is working differently - what is it?

Case in point: There were a couple of French backpackers living in Bondi interviewed a few days ago. They had the option to fly back to France (until recently). After talking to their families back home, they decided to stay right where they are for the duration.

Some discussion of that might be more uplifting than body-counts. I can get my fill of the latter on the sensationalist press.

[Canoerebel]

Denmark and Austria relax restrictions, as per the Bloomberg article below. Both countries have modest death totals of 187 and 220.

An oddity. In Austria , the number of cases per day has fallen sharply. But in Denmark it seems like the number is more at the plateau level.

It would be interesting to know how the internal discussions of balancing priorities and risks resulted in the making of these decisions, since others will be in that same position sooner or later.

[RangerJoe]

ORIGINAL: BBfanboy

RJ, I hope that vaccine research pans out soon, but I have seen so many suggestions that a cure/treatment/immunity method is at hand that I keep my hopes low and my "Show Me" expectations high!

From March 23rd:

Vaccine BCG may provide immune boost against coronavirus, herpes, and other viral infections

Share

Vaccination with bacillus Calmette-Guérin leads to a small pustule that can develop into a scar.
Kwangmoozaa/iStock
Can a century-old TB vaccine steel the immune system against the new coronavirus?

By Jop de VriezeMar. 23, 2020 , 6:25 AM

Researchers in four countries will soon start a clinical trial of an unorthodox approach to the new coronavirus. They will test whether a century-old vaccine against tuberculosis (TB), a bacterial disease, can rev up the human immune system in a broad way, allowing it to better fight the virus that causes coronavirus disease 2019 and, perhaps, prevent infection with it altogether. The studies will be done in physicians and nurses, who are at higher risk of becoming infected with the respiratory disease than the general population, and in the elderly, who are at higher risk of serious illness if they become infected.

A team in the Netherlands will kick off the first of the trials this week. They will recruit 1000 health care workers in eight Dutch hospitals who will either receive the vaccine, called bacillus Calmette-Guérin (BCG), or a placebo.

BCG contains a live, weakened strain of Mycobacterium bovis, a cousin of M. tuberculosis, the microbe that causes TB. (The vaccine is named after French microbiologists Albert Calmette and Camille Guérin, who developed it in the early 20th century.) The vaccine is given to children in their first year of life in most countries of the world, and is safe and cheap—but far from perfect: It prevents about 60% of TB cases in children on average, with large differences between countries.
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Vaccines generally raise immune responses specific to a targeted pathogen, such as antibodies that bind and neutralize one type of virus but not others. But BCG may also increase the ability of the immune system to fight off pathogens other than the TB bacterium, according to clinical and observational studies published over several decades by Danish researchers Peter Aaby and Christine Stabell Benn, who live and work in Guinea-Bissau. They concluded the vaccine prevents about 30% of infections with any known pathogen, including viruses, in the first year after it’s given. The studies published in this field have been criticized for their methodology, however; a 2014 review ordered by the World Health Organization concluded that BCG appeared to lower overall mortality in children, but rated confidence in the findings as “very low.” A 2016 review was a bit more positive about BCG’s potential benefits but said randomized trials were needed.
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Eleanor Fish, an immunologist at the of the University of Toronto, says the vaccine probably won’t eliminate infections with the new coronavirus completely, but is likely to dampen its impact on individuals. Fish says she’d take the vaccine herself if she could get a hold of it, and even wonders whether it’s ethical to withhold its potential benefits from trial subjects in the placebo arm.

https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/03 ... oronavirus

There is more to read but this is what I thought is most important.

[witpqs]

ORIGINAL: MakeeLearn

No more P**sy Galore
Mon 6 Apr 2020 13.57 EDT

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2020/a ... es-aged-94


"Honor Blackman, the actor best known for playing the Bond girl P**sy Galore, has died aged 94.



Blackman, who became a household name in the 1960s as Cathy Gale in The Avengers and had a career spanning eight decades, died of natural causes unrelated to coronavirus."

-------------

I'am happy with just one.[&o]

AFAIK, Honor Blackman was the only Bond-Girl actress who was older than the accompanying Bond actor.

[Canoerebel]

Other countries will monitor how early experiments in re-opening go, like schools in Denmark in just 9 days. If these pathfinders do well, other nations will take note.

In the USA, our federal system may allow low-risk states or jurisdictions to ramp up things earlier than high risk, once the threat subsides to an acceptable level. Restarting schools in Farmington, New Mexico, will be less complicated than in New Orleans.

Many places are still at the height of battle or nearly so, so much of the focus will be with them, with reason. But it will also be interesting to see what the pathfinders do, how it works, and how quickly the snowball begins gathering momentum in Europe, other shores, and the US.

[BBfanboy]

Amid all the concern with lockdown and social distancing, social togetherness is getting to be a bigger problem than it was before - specifically violence against women. The news article was about Italy but I am sure the cabin fever and stress anger displacement is present everywhere ...

https://www.newsweek.com/domestic-abuse ... us-1496173

[BBfanboy]

And if Covid-19 doesn't get you, maybe Chernobyl will. A forest fire near the reactor site has raised radiation levels in the air 16X normal. I hope they do a better job of protecting their firefighters this time!

[CaptBeefheart]

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

Korea has had low levels of new cases and comparatively few mortalities for many, many weeks, as we've noted previously.

They got it under control well but can't quite eradicate the stubborn critter.

Would it be expected that other countries are likely to have the same issue?

P.S. Many weeks ago, Cpt. Beefheart noted that Korea schools were set to reopen in early April (I think he said the 8th). I wonder if that plan held.

Hello CR,

Schools are still closed here with no re-opening date set yet. I personally think they should open, but that's one thing the government controls (public schools, anyway), and they are keeping them shut. I heard something like 83% of cram schools are open. Cram schools, or “hagwons” in the vernacular, are where a lot of real learning takes place. Most are designed to help kids pass tests (college entrance, English proficiency, etc.) while some are more hobby oriented (taekwondo, ballet, piano, etc.). So, private education is continuing apace. International schools, although private, don’t have the nads to go against government advice and put themselves at risk of a PR nightmare, so they are remaining shut. I think that applies equally to the Brit Embassy pub remaining closed—I can see the ambassador being wary of a social media post showing the toffs enjoying their wee drams overseas while London burns going viral (no pun intended).

Life has returned to about 90% of normal here. We had less than 50 new Kung Flu (hey, I loved that show) cases on Sunday and there may be a spike here and there, but I think that’ll continue approaching zero.

I’ve enjoyed the good weather with my family the last three weekends, and plenty of mask-wearing Koreans are out and about as well. Restaurant/bar numbers seem to be about 70-80% of pre-Covid numbers. I was out for a few pints last Friday afternoon with some mates. No handshaking, but no panic either. Like I told some Stateside college buddies: The taphouses are tapping, the galbi is grilling and the cherry blossoms are blooming.

The missus brought up the TB vaccine thing. It’ll be interesting to see if that has any effect based on the current studies they are doing. When I was here in the 90s TB was big. The missus tells me our three-year-old daughter got the initial vaccine on Day 2 of life.

Short story: Still some caution here, but Korea is well on its way to a full recovery from this microbe.

Good luck to y’all.

Cheers,
CB

[CaptBeefheart]

One additional Korean thing: The big National Assembly (i.e. parliament) election will be held on April 15. An election truck blaring a song at 100dB with three modestly dressed gals in white gloves dancing is on the street below my office window as I type this (to me, this would be a good way to get people to vote for the other guy, but it must work or they wouldn't do it). The election will go as planned, but the interesting thing is every Korean citizen has a right to vote wherever they are, and that is normally done in person at embassies and consulates around the globe. That's causing all manner of heartbreak as certain jurisdictions are on lockdown or "essential travel only." The local embassies don't want to offend their hosts.

Cheers,
CB

[MakeeLearn]

How Prepared Are We For The Next Pandemic? Not Very, Experts Show

Dec 12, 2019,01:06pm EST



"What will happen when an unexpectedly virulent flu, or SARS, or Disease X—any other rapidly spreading viral infections—spreads globally causing a pandemic? How prepared are we? What do we need to do to be ready?"

"These are some of the questions faced by global leaders in public health, industry, and government in a pandemic preparedness exercise called Event 201. The program was a collaboration between the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, the World Economic Forum, and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation."


"The experts ran through a carefully designed, detailed simulation of a new (fictional) viral illness called CAPS or coronavirus acute pulmonary syndrome. This was modeled after previous epidemics like SARS and MERS."


"How much time do we have?"