A New Theory Asks: Could a Mask Be a Crude 'Vaccine'? (nytimes.com) 147
A reader shares a report from The New York Times: As the world awaits the arrival of a safe and effective coronavirus vaccine, a team of researchers has come forward with a provocative new theory: that masks might help to crudely immunize some people against the virus. The unproven idea, described in a commentary published Tuesday in the New England Journal of Medicine, is inspired by the age-old concept of variolation, the deliberate exposure to a pathogen to generate a protective immune response. First tried against smallpox, the risky practice eventually fell out of favor, but paved the way for the rise of modern vaccines.
Masked exposures are no substitute for a bona fide vaccine. But data from animals infected with the coronavirus, as well as insights gleaned from other diseases, suggest that masks, by cutting down on the number of viruses that encounter a person's airway, might reduce the wearer's chances of getting sick. And if a small number of pathogens still slip through, the researchers argue, these might prompt the body to produce immune cells that can remember the virus and stick around to fight it off again. "You can have this virus but be asymptomatic," said Dr. Monica Gandhi, an infectious disease physician at the University of California, San Francisco, and one of the commentary's authors. "So if you can drive up rates of asymptomatic infection with masks, maybe that becomes a way to variolate the population."
That does not mean people should don a mask to intentionally inoculate themselves with the virus. "This is not the recommendation at all," Dr. Gandhi said. "Neither are pox parties," she added, referring to social gatherings that mingle the healthy and the sick. The theory cannot be directly proven without clinical trials that compare the outcomes of people who are masked in the presence of the coronavirus with those who are unmasked -- an unethical experimental setup. And while outside experts were intrigued by the theory, they were reluctant to embrace it without more data, and advised careful interpretation.
Masked exposures are no substitute for a bona fide vaccine. But data from animals infected with the coronavirus, as well as insights gleaned from other diseases, suggest that masks, by cutting down on the number of viruses that encounter a person's airway, might reduce the wearer's chances of getting sick. And if a small number of pathogens still slip through, the researchers argue, these might prompt the body to produce immune cells that can remember the virus and stick around to fight it off again. "You can have this virus but be asymptomatic," said Dr. Monica Gandhi, an infectious disease physician at the University of California, San Francisco, and one of the commentary's authors. "So if you can drive up rates of asymptomatic infection with masks, maybe that becomes a way to variolate the population."
That does not mean people should don a mask to intentionally inoculate themselves with the virus. "This is not the recommendation at all," Dr. Gandhi said. "Neither are pox parties," she added, referring to social gatherings that mingle the healthy and the sick. The theory cannot be directly proven without clinical trials that compare the outcomes of people who are masked in the presence of the coronavirus with those who are unmasked -- an unethical experimental setup. And while outside experts were intrigued by the theory, they were reluctant to embrace it without more data, and advised careful interpretation.
Follow the science, folks (Score:4, Insightful)
Any honest science and any honest science journalism about covid will begin and end with the words "insufficient information available to date" for about another 9 months at the very least.
Re: Follow the science, folks (Score:5, Insightful)
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"insufficient information available to date" for about another 9 months at the very least.
A cautious attitude is justified for an ivory tower academic debate.
It is not reasonable when we need to be making hard policy decisions far sooner than 9 months from now.
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There is a lot of research into the effectiveness of masks at preventing the spread of respiratory diseases already. However there is no practical way to prove it on a large scale to the standard you require - we can't set up a closed city environment and have people live in it for a year to see if they get sick, and then an identical control one where they don't wear masks.
It's like the old parachute debate. Do they work? Maybe... But you won't get many volunteers for the double blind study.
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Hear the one about the new Chinese automatic parachute?
Opens on impact...
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Hear the one about the new Chinese automatic parachute?
Opens on impact...
I vote one of theses and a free mandatory trial for all anti-vaxxers and anti-maskers. I think we should keep the flat-earthers though, they serve an useful purpose in reminding everybody how disconnected from reality seemingly intelligent and educated people actually can become.
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And that is exactly the problem. Because things need to be done under extreme time-pressure, a lot of information that would otherwise have been available is not. And because things are done under public scrutiny where reporting has to be "dramatic" and present absolute "facts" (or the deranged masses will stop listening and hence stop generating ad revenue), completely normal scientific steps like generating ideas and formulating hypotheses get misreported dramatically.
The public will need to get it throug
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I imagine North Korea might have something to say about that ...
Not Science.. (Score:3, Insightful)
This is based on what they teach 3rd graders a 'vaccine' is..
A vaccine however is NOT actually 'a little big of the virus'. It is a very specifically engineered group of similar but weak viruses that trigger antibody generation but not the actual disease.
So the answer is quite simple. NO.
And that NO answer is also somewhat obvious, because if 'a small bit of the virus' worked, then the people working on the vaccines would have just perhaps though of that by now???
This is what we refer to as 'Quackery'
It is
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I guess it's not so much vaccination as just allowing a gentler version of "herd immunity". As I understand there's some evidence that lower viral load correlates with more minor symptoms and lower mortality and transmissibility. So in effect, if everyone eventually gets infected while wearing masks, it's likely that their viral loads would be lower and they'd surive with fewer complications while developing an immunity.
I'm not necesserily saying this is a good idea to go with but seems like it's not comple
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It is also more than bits of the virus...it is the adjuvants that boost the immune response to those bits.
Odd that big pharma is silent on promoting a general enhanced immunity, yet rely on that mechanism for their single-dose products (or better yet, once a year).
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What are you on about? This is an effect that possibly plays a role, but it is not even called "vaccination". Seriously.
except that's how vaccination started, it works (Score:2)
A young person today might well think it's impossible to build a computer without first buying a motherboard. "You can't make a computer with Veroboard! This is what we refer to as 'Quackery'", they might say.
Certainly, you can't build a PHONE that actually communicate with someone else without a SOC, and certainly not with discreet components. If that worked, "then the people working on the phones would have just perhaps though of that by now???", they might say.
Some of us here on Slashdot are old enough
Re:Not informed (Score:3)
Infectious respiratory diseases spread when a healthy person comes in contact with virus particles expelled by someone who is sick — usually through a cough or sneeze. The amount of particles a person is exposed to can affect how likely they are to become infected and, once infected, how severe the symptoms become.
The amount of virus necessary to make a person sick is called the infectious dose. Viruses with low infectious doses are especially contagious in populations without significant immunity
A high infectious dose may lead to a higher viral load, which can impact the severity of Covid-19 symptoms.
Viral load is a measure of virus particles. It is the amount of virus present once a person has been infected and the virus has had time to replicate in their cells. With most viruses, higher viral loads are associated with worse outcomes.
Please, please, PLEASE Google "infectious dose" before you spread any more false rumours.
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Which is presumably why "vaccine" is in quotes, and variolation is mentioned a little further down. Modern vaccines often don't involve any kind of live virus, instead using inert protein fragments designed to trigger a compatible immune response. Initially though vaccines were an intentional infection with a much milder related virus - cow pox protected you against small pox, and the technique spread from there.
Before vaccination was invented though, variolation [wikipedia.org] was in fact used used effectively to prote
Re: Follow the science, folks (Score:3)
I hate that the author seems to not understand the difference between vaccination and inoculation. Exposing yourself to a live virus in order to gain resistance or immunity is inoculation. Like when we were given a cow pox needle scratch in boot camp.
One current theory as to why some people suffer only mild to no symptoms from nCoV-19 is that that person had already been exposed to another coronavirus in the past. Coronavirus has been around for a little while, but not a huge number of people contracted it.
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So when a highly contagious version evolves, people who have never dealt with a coronavirus, now have a relatively stonger one to deal with.
The common cold is a coronavirus, so there probably aren't a whole lot of those people.
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uhh no... the 'common cold' is actually a few virus and you may have never had coronavirus. the virus associated with the common cold are:
Rhinovirus
Adenovirus
Coronavirus
RSV and parainfluenza
the rhinovirus (from the Greek rhis "nose", gen rhinos "of the nose", and the Latin vrus) is the most common viral infectious agent in humans and is the predominant cause of the common cold. Rhinovirus infection proliferates in temperatures of 33–35 C (91–95 F), the temperatures found in the nose.
as of last
Excuse explanation after the fact (Score:3)
Telling healthy people to go about their day would cause a small amount of particle spread too. But wouldn't you guess, the best accidental advice was to follow the government's second recommendation that everyone wears masks all the time.
Here's the other question though, if it "just so happens" that the virus particles going through and around the cloth masks aren't making people sick, doesn't that mean that the more usual recommendation of droplet precaution is accurate, as opposed to the airborne precaution we've all been told?
The practical concern here would be that infected persons who are asymptomatic (incubation phase) and are breathing virus particles but not sneezing on others will be hitting them with "immunity" doses of the virus without overloading.
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Here's the other question though, if it "just so happens" that the virus particles going through and around the cloth masks aren't making people sick, doesn't that mean that the more usual recommendation of droplet precaution is accurate, as opposed to the airborne precaution we've all been told?
Mu.
It's not possible to know what meaning of "airborne" you're using here. Are you using it as a layman, or as an epidemiologist would use it? Because there is no evidence that Covid is airborne in the latter sense. But droplets currently suspended in air can transmit it.
Ask your question in a precise and complete manner.
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Might I ask what "Mu" means in this context? I've seen it around a few times now, but can't find any explanation.
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It means "the question as asked cannot be answered"
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I know the difference between airborne and droplet precautions as are used in healthcare facilities. There are different mask requirements for example. The n95 that everyone talks about is required for airborne but not droplet precautions for example.
As you mentioned, there's no evidence that covid is airborne, yet that's been how it's treated regardless.
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The practical concern here would be that infected persons who are asymptomatic (incubation phase) and are breathing virus particles but not sneezing on others
If you're suggesting that breathing emits bare virus particles not encapsulated in droplets, and only sneezing spreads droplets, I believe that is not correct. Or if it is I would like to see a source.
Handwashing/sanitizing somewhat unnecessary? (Score:2, Interesting)
Wondering if this is an area we've overblown?
It seems like a lot of the cases come from exposure to breathing...given that a certain quantity of virus is required for infection (this amount isn't known, but exposure to 'one' virus won't likely result in infection, but dozens, hundreds or thousands may be the threshold), and it appears it's mainly airborne and comes from actually being around someone (and presumably inhaling COVID-19), I'm wondering if the handwashing is really required?
Put another way: is t
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To what extent are we not seeing substantial fomite transmission because most people are washing and sanitizing their hands more?
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The way I see it is we'd see a lot more 'mystery' transmissions - if you touched something someone infected touched, you'd have a hard time identifying that event if also infected.
It seems most reported cases are from known direct contact, but given how much external 'stuff' we're in contact with, if fomite transmission was high, wouldn't some sectors (say, mail carriers, couriers, grocery clerks) have HUGE transmission rates, given their exposure to a wide variety of potentially exposed items?
And if there
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I don't think there are any definitively documented cases of fomite (via touching contaminated objects) transmission of COVID-19, but you wouldn't necessarily expect any. To prove fomite transmission you'd need a set of circumstances that enable you to absolutely rule out other forms of transmission like droplet or aerosol.
There is circumstantial evidence that people may have been infected through fecally contaminated objects, e.g. on cruise ships, but again this isn't hard proof.
Fomite and aerosol transmi
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From what I've heard it does seem as though inhalation is the primary infection route - but if you've got virii on your hands and touch your face, or eat a bag of chips, that'll still do the trick. Once the virus is in your mouth or nose, your lungs are just a short hop away, a brief layover at the border isn't going to make a big difference.
Please do not suggest this (Score:4, Interesting)
The editors should delete this story to avoid spreading dangerous misinformation...
Re:Please do not suggest this (Score:5, Insightful)
I propose a corollary: "If the headline of an article posted by BeauHD ends in a question mark, the article will be so full of dangerous misinformation it should be deleted immediately."
We can name it the Slashdot special corollary.
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The problem is people are *already* doing that.
And if this can convince a subset of teeth grinding weirdos that no the Government isnt trying to beam Autism into their brain using 5G chemtrail microchips embedded in masks and that yes you should absolutely be wearing them, thats still a net positive.
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What makes you think it will ever be "safe?" Or that it ever was?
No? (Score:5, Insightful)
Most vaccinations are made with dead (inactived) viruses or in some cases very weakened (live attenuated) ones that trigger the immune response without causing an actual widespread infection. The dead ones trigger a response so it might seem like you're sick, but you can't possibly get a viral infection from dead viruses. In rare cases the response can be strong for some people.
It is possible to actually get a widespread viral infection from the weakened virus type vaccination but it's also quite rare.
Source; https://www.vaccines.gov/basic... [vaccines.gov]
Also, common sense. Getting deliberately exposed to covid19 is just dumb. This article is is embarrassing - the authors are chock full of caveats and the study is full of logic issues. People are getting severe symptoms or dying with low viral loads ffs. People are getting sick or dying with high viral load, low viral load, there's really nothing definitive. So don't unnecessarily expose yourself or others to it. NYT clickbait.
Given that this is a coronavirus, I'd be expecting an inactivated style vaccination with boosters.
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If you have actual evidence that viral load doesn't affect disease course for covid-19, do feel free to share. Meanwhile, the article itself says: "With viral infections in which host immune responses play a predominant role in viral pathogenesis, such as SARS-CoV-2, high doses of viral inoculum can overwhelm and dysregulate innate immune defenses, increasing the severity of disease. Indeed, down-regulating immunopathology is one mechanism by which dexamethasone improves outcomes in severe Covid-19 infectio
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All that says that more is statistically worse, it doesn't say that less won't kill you. And it can, even if it's less likely. You'd have to be a dumbass to take the above information and use it as validation for this idea.
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I was responding to this specific quote from the PP: "People are getting sick or dying with high viral load, low viral load, *there's really nothing definitive.*" [my emphasis]
Viral load affects disease course -- statistically, on average, etc etc -- of course, low viral loads will still harm some, but the lower the better. No-one, including the paper authors, is suggesting that low viral load itself guarantees safety or even variolation.
Good Citizens Wear Masks (Score:2)
The single most stupid idea I have heard of. (Score:2, Interesting)
The argument being that the virus enters the body ion lower quantity so that the immune system can respond to the infection better while the body develops immunity.
The problem is this. If the virus does not invade in sufficient quantity to begin reproducing, then you will not develop an immunity. If the virus begins reproducing, then in initial stages it will grow exponentially. Which means in a very short period of time the virus is up to the levels that you would have had ithoput wearing a mask. It bu
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Your last sentence is nonsense. "These doctors" admit that wearing a mask isn't 100% preventing any infection, but that isn't needed. We only need to prevent enough infections to keep the disease from growing exponentially. And they work, just not perfect.
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Unfortunately for you, there is precedent for this "idea". The article also does very clearly state that this is a possible effect at work, not a recommendation to do this in any way. It even says that doing this intentionally is a very risky practice and hence fell out of use. Hence the stupid one here is you.
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Variolation works in one of two ways. Either you inject with some less harsh version of the virus, but close enough so that once you develop an immunity to the softer virus you also develop an immunity to the stronger virus. The second way is to introduce a sample of the vaccine that is mostly inert ie mostly only fragments of the virus not the whole virus.
Though:
- death of a substantial fraction of the virus while it's in transit (possibly for days) from the source case to the inoculee, making it a
Oh... INSIGHTS (Score:2)
Yes, if you want to call it that. (Score:2)
Masks in a pandemic like this one delay infection. That's the whole point of them. This enables medical care [fill in USA healthcare joke of choice here] to treat those truly sick without being overwelmed. The long haul is the population eventually adapting that the effects of the pathogen losing their edge in terms of wrecking serious havoc in a relatively short period of time. It's natural immunization that eventually turns into herd-immunization and that's a good thing.
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what point do you stop wearing masks though?
The original lockdowns were to delay the effects to summer so the healthcare systems could cope. Only we kept lockdown going over summer and are now into "personalised lockdowns" using masks.
I assume Thanksgiving and Christmas (but not Ramadan or Eid, in the UK gatherings of more than 6 are not allowed from Monday. But mosques are exempt. Bizarre huh) will be cancelled to stop mass revelry and maybe in April 2021 we can all start to go about out business to spread
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what point do you stop wearing masks though?
You stop when one of the following happens:
1. An effective vaccine becomes available and you have been vaccinated and the time for that to become effective has passed
2. Medical treatment has advanced to a point where it is easy to do and prevents most negative outcomes, including longer-term damage
3. The infection rates become low enough to not justify the effort. In this case you remain prepared to start using masks again
4. You find out you are reliably immune and have that independently confirmed by scien
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1. vaccine trials are being stopped due to unforseen illnesses. Astrazenica yesterday stopped one. I doubt we'll see a vaccine for a long time.
2. Slashdot had a story about Oak Ridge National Supercomputer that had crunched through genetic data and out that vitamin D mitigates a lot of the effects, as do several pre-existing medicines.
3. Cases are high currently because we are testing people, but hospitalisations are very low, and deaths are at almost zero.
4. herd immunity will only be determined by 3 above
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deaths are at almost zero
I don't know what the current daily COVID-19 death toll is, but less than a month ago it was around 1000/day. [umn.edu] Personally, I think that's quite a bit more than zero.
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So I think the pandemic is all but over
Please, nobody listen to this deranged freak.
Not a vaccine really (Score:3)
In the UK, the numbers of infected people are going up badly again, while the number of deaths are going up a lot less. Theories why this is happening are that the newly infected today are more often irreponsible young people (and older ones are more careful), but also that because of the lower initial virus load infections have a less bad outcome.
Whether that all is true, I can't say obviously. And if it's true, I wouldn't call it a "vaccine".
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And if it's true, I wouldn't call it a "vaccine".
It is called "variolation", not vaccination and for good reasons. The story states this, but the title is indeed wrong.
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> There have been claims that how severely you suffer from a Covid infection depends strongly on the initial virus load
Yes. And pretty much everyone should be wearing a mask anyway. What they are saying is, a small amount of the virus getting through may be a good thing. And since we know a mask isn't 100% effective, then we can add some hopeful thoughts in to make us feel better about it. Either way, we are in the same boat.
There are numerous things that affect the severity.
1) Age.
2) Your sex.
3) Your bl
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There have been claims that how severely you suffer from a Covid infection depends strongly on the initial virus load that you received.
"The dose makes the poison." [wikipedia.org] However, that usually applies to chemicals, not biologics. Also, the therapeutic index [wikipedia.org] is likely poor. The difference between a therapeutic dose and a deadly one is likely small.
The New York Times (Score:2)
Considering the bias and slant of everything NYT who reads or cares anymore.
Smallpox outcomes depended on infection route. (Score:2)
Like plague (with its bubonic, pneumonic, and septicemic forms), smallpox outcomes were strongly affected by the infection route.
If you got it "naturally" - probably by inhalation or possibly orally - it was widely disseminated in your body by the time your immune system got going against it. Result: High chance of death, extensive and disfiguring scarring if you survive.
If you got it by having a bit of virus-containing matter inserted into your skin, your immune system got started on it while it was stil
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If you got it by having a bit of virus-containing matter inserted into your skin, your immune system got started on it while it was still confined to that location:
I've wondered for months if this would work with COVID-19. But not enough to try it, or mention it to others. (But if you're going to INSIST on exposing yourself by attending a COVID party, you might want to try it this way first - say by maksing and goving, poking yourself with snot or spit from a victim, then band-aid covering the inoculation
No. (Score:2)
Zero Evidence (Score:2)
There is exactly zero evidence to support this "theory". There is no data that even suggests that the fewer viral particles one receives the less damaging the infection will be. That study has never been done because you would need to deliberately infect a very large group of people.
When you receive even a single viral particle that manages to evades your innate immune system and the mucosal IgA line of defenses, the result will be a single infected cell. But that cell then produces many more, thousands, o
Re: Go to hell with your mask BS already. (Score:2, Interesting)
Re: Go to hell with your mask BS already. (Score:2)
The bacteria in those masks won't hurt you. Yes, some of it is pathogenic, but your mouth is already full of it with or without the mask. Covid will hurt though, and the mask helps prevent the spread.
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its about accumulation over time as long as this thing is not under control, with every year you grow your run more risk, every little underlying bit you get increases the chances, people can develop diabetes or certain allergies, and a plethora of other nice things as they progress into regress.
dont get me wrong, i feel its everyones good right to go out and face it - its just not everyone's good right to force those who dont wanna into it
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It's a threat to 100% of the population. It will only kill ~1% of the infected population, with a skew toward older and relevantly comorbid patients but a) the skew is not 100%, it's still a threat to those outside the risk profiles, and b) those people are people too and simply writing them off because you're sure it won't impact you is villainy.
What's weak isn't fighting a disease. Weak is surrendering to a disease because you can't even be bothered to fight for millions of lives (if 1% of the populatio
Re:*facepalm* (Score:5, Informative)
Even that thinking is narrow. Just because you survive the virus doesn't mean you're left unscathed. There's a strong possibility that those who survive COVID-19 will end up with chronic heart disease, which could take years or even decades to begin showing symptoms, and ultimately end in heart failure. This includes survivors who weren't even hospitalized.
https://www.statnews.com/2020/... [statnews.com]
Some COVID survivors have ended up with a progressive nerve disease that ultimately ends in paralysis:
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/... [nejm.org]
Some end up with chronic fatigue:
https://www.webmd.com/lung/new... [webmd.com]
This virus hasn't even been around for a year yet, so we currently have no idea what the long-term consequences are. Bottom line: Even if you think you won't experience any major symptoms from the virus, it's still a very, very good idea to do everything you can to avoid being infected.
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He literally said "significantly higher % has nontrivial permanent damage"
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Can't find the article again, but I've heard something like 20% of infected (*including* asympomatic cases) develop heart or lung anomalies still present 2 months after recovery - how many of those will manifest as chronic long-term health problems remains to be seen.
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As I said, how many cases will develop into long-term problems remains to be seen.
It's not a response to pneumonia though, or they wouldn't be present in asymptomatic cases.
Re: *facepalm* (Score:2)
If it's really not such a big deal, why don't you go get infected yourself? It's easy, just go buy a set of scrubs on Amazon, go to your nearest hospital and walk into a covid ward like you belong there, tell a patient that the doctor has asked for a cheek swab and hand them a q-tip, then when they swab and give it back to you, just pull the wet cotton ball off of the stick and swish it around in your mouth. Do this as many times as you want to as many patients as you want for best results. Then you can say
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So be a little more careful when pounding nails. Just like with covid, you can be a little more careful by oh say...wearing a mask and keeping your distance? Novel concept.
You know what else is a threat? (Score:2)
Influenza, and a whole bunch of other diseases that we dont shut down whole economies for...
No, I'm NOT suggesting letting it run rampant either, what I am saying is this is not the end of times - it needs to be managed, not panicked about.
But hey, the media love a good scare story.
The difference with this particular virus is NOT its fatality rates - it is its rate of spread. THAT is what should be managed, for those at risk..
Do YOU have a good exit plan that does kill a lot more people than this virus prob
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At it's worse, when it was killing thousands a day, the vast majority of the economy was shut down.
Today in a relatively average state (Delaware), I can go to the doctor, I can go to restaurant, I can go to a bar, I can go to a store. I go to work, my neighbors both go to work.
The whole economy is not shut down now that it's a slow constant simmer and not growing wildly with 5x as many infections as today.
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Record numbers of restaurants have closed in Chicago and will never open again. People are afraid to go to the doctor or hospital, and many people have died because they didn't get treated for common diseases. Most restaurants are only allowed x capacity and almost all of them are struggling to even stay open.
It's way worse than you think it is. This is insanity and mass hysteria.
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Yeah and that's all our fault and the fault of the Administration and the States as well. We wasted our "lockdown" (which was barely a real lockdown) which was our opportunity to get the issue under control. You shut down and quarantine as much as possible nationwide for 4-6 weeks and get the spread under control at which point you can start to re-open in a much more controlled environment. Instead we had haphazard, inconsistent protocols across the entire country and everyone was out of sync so it never
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The rate of spread is much worse than flu, but that's not the only thing that's worse - including asymptomatic cases of COVID, the death rate is still a few times worse than symptomatic flu, while including the ~75% asymptomatic rate for flu pushes the COVID lethality rate to over 10x as bad.
There's also a much greater risk of long-term chronic health problems that we're still only beginning to understand, with something like 20% of infections (including asymptomatic) causing heart and lung anomalies that p
Re:*facepalm* (Score:4, Insightful)
That's 1% under typical conditions, where there is a functioning health care system. The key thing that many in the "never-mask" or "natural immunity" crowd seem to forget is that, if you let the infection burn uncontrolled, then the health care system quickly becomes overwhelmed. (It's not like there's a lot of slack capacity in the system as-is.) When that happens, the mortality rate increases substantially, and a large number of additional deaths occur from other causes.
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That's 1% under typical conditions, where there is a functioning health care system. The key thing that many in the "never-mask" or "natural immunity" crowd seem to forget is that, if you let the infection burn uncontrolled, then the health care system quickly becomes overwhelmed. (It's not like there's a lot of slack capacity in the system as-is.) When that happens, the mortality rate increases substantially, and a large number of additional deaths occur from other causes.
It's already becoming overwhelmed in some ways. My fiancee is a nurse, and she says that since hospital nurses tend towards female and young (and thus also tend to have young children), they've been quitting and calling out sick in droves, both to protect their own family/children, and because they now have kids that can't go to school and need someone home all day. She's said that some hospitals are having to close entire floors due to lack of nurses, and she literally gets *begged*, daily, to take off fro
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Not sure if you took math .. but 1% of the US population is 3.3 million people. Compare that with WWII in which 420,000 of the US population died.
You are ok with sitting back and doing nothing while 8 times as many people are killed as WWII?
I mean, don't you republicans get mad when there are less than a million abortions? You want police to be able to execute black people on the spot because they might be dangerous -- when (a comparatively few) thousand annually in the whole US are killed by black people.
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That's 100% impossible. 200,000 have *already* died prematurely because of covid.. so thats already well above 33,000. (.01%).
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So how much of the year period is left - about 6 months, with 2/3rd dieing in first half, so the total for the year will be around 0.015% for the US, which is 2 orders of magnitude less than the 1% quoted out of the air above.
The whole Covid thing is severely exaggerated in the US and even worse in the rest of the world, where the death rates are lower.
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The US was not very badly affected by WW2, most of the war was not fought on US territory so there were few civilian casualties, and the total population was lower then too (us population in 1945 was 139.9 million, 130.9 million in 1939 so the population actually increased during WW2, and now stands at 328 million).
Belarus suffered an estimated 25% of their population killed during WW2.
To put things in perspective, more than 1% of the population die each year from natural causes. With a 1% death rate per ye
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COVID-19 is not a threat to 99% of the population.
Source, please.
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[stack overflow error]
(sad nod)
Non-obvious claims require sources. This is not some bland claim like "the sky is blue". If you're disagreeing, cite sources (even if it's yourself), just out of politeness to your conversation partner.
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What's the Lynnwood reference to?
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Correction -- it is only a *mild* threat to about 75% of the population.
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Stopped reading after the second, sickening line. "approximately 15x more than would die if they caught the flu." - in what fucking world? Based on what fucking data? Same old bullshit, same old insanely exaggerated crap, and in the meantime, flu remains far deadlier than anything else, somehow still causing havoc around the world despite all your fucking masks. It's like it has magic powers yeah? JUST GO TO HELL, commies. Seriously.
Great theatrics. Now show me the death rate for flu. Whats that you say say? 0.01? OK fuckface, now match that with Covid. Whats that you say ? inconclusive data. Let me fill in the blanks - divide the number of dead by the number of known infections. You get 3.5%(approximately) for the US and 1.3% (approximately) for the world. All tied to testing of course. but the number of dead don't lie.
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Flu deaths are about 0.0007% of the population per year (with immunizations) and Covid about 0.004% (without immunizations).
Once there is a Covid immunization, it will be about the same as Flu. https://www.aeronetworks.ca/20... [aeronetworks.ca]
There are several other illnesses that are more serious than Covid. World-wide, Covid is about 7th.
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Stopped reading after the second, sickening line. "approximately 15x more than would die if they caught the flu." - in what fucking world? Based on what fucking data? Same old bullshit, same old insanely exaggerated crap, and in the meantime, flu remains far deadlier than anything else, somehow still causing havoc around the world despite all your fucking masks. It's like it has magic powers yeah? JUST GO TO HELL, commies. Seriously.
now lets talk about infection rate. Go ahead , bewilder me with your misinformation
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""Life, Uh, Finds a Way".
That's not life, that's Newman! forgetting to close the gate.
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Oh, so you know things now that the scientific community will still need years to find out? You are a nutcase.
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Wrong, You have misconceptions. Many viruses mutate, that is the reason for repeated colds and flus. Your body does remember how to fight and tool up for antibody production for the infections it has seen, there are cells dedicated to "remembering." People aren't "losing immunity."
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Yep. Bad science reporting. They author clearly decided to override the source article and replace the formal term hypothesis with colloquial theory.
I also checked the NEJM article. 5 uses of hypothesis correctly and 2 uses of theory. One of where it is used to refer to a "long standing theory of viral pathogenensis", which seems like correct usage. The second use is ambiguous due to pronoun trouble. "this theory" might refer to the preceding theory of pathogenesis, but could also refer to the hypothesis.