Fauci Wants To Make Vaccines for the Next Pandemic Before It Hits (nytimes.com) 267
If funded, a government program costing several billion dollars could develop "prototype" vaccines to protect against 20 families of viruses. From a report: In one sense, the world got lucky with the new coronavirus. By sheer chance, scientists just happened to have spent years studying coronaviruses, developing exactly the tools needed to make Covid vaccines as soon as the virus's genetic sequence was published. But what will happen if the next pandemic comes from a virus that causes Lassa fever, or from the Sudan strain of Ebola, or from a Nipah virus? Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, is promoting an ambitious and expensive plan to prepare for such nightmare scenarios. It would cost "a few billion dollars" a year, take five years for the first crop of results and engage a huge cadre of scientists, he said. The idea is to make "prototype" vaccines to protect against viruses from about 20 families that might spark a new pandemic. Using research tools that proved successful for Covid-19, researchers would uncover the molecular structure of each virus, learn where antibodies must strike it, and how to prod the body into making exactly those antibodies.
âoeIf we get the funding, which I believe we will, it likely will start in 2022,â Dr. Fauci said, adding that he has been promoting the idea âoein discussions with the White House and others.â Dr. Francis Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health, also thought it likely that the necessary funds would be allocated, calling the project "compelling." "As we begin to contemplate a successful end to the Covid-19 pandemic, we must not shift back into complacency," Dr. Collins said. Much of the financial support would come from Dr. Fauci's institute, but a project of this scope would require additional funds that would have to be allocated by Congress. This year's budget for the infectious diseases institute is a little over $6 billion. Dr. Fauci did not specify how much additional money would be needed. If surveillance networks detected a new virus spilling over from animals into people, the logic goes, scientists could stop it by immunizing people in the outbreak by quickly manufacturing the prototype vaccine. And if the virus spread before the world realized what was happening, the prototype vaccines could be deployed more widely.
âoeIf we get the funding, which I believe we will, it likely will start in 2022,â Dr. Fauci said, adding that he has been promoting the idea âoein discussions with the White House and others.â Dr. Francis Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health, also thought it likely that the necessary funds would be allocated, calling the project "compelling." "As we begin to contemplate a successful end to the Covid-19 pandemic, we must not shift back into complacency," Dr. Collins said. Much of the financial support would come from Dr. Fauci's institute, but a project of this scope would require additional funds that would have to be allocated by Congress. This year's budget for the infectious diseases institute is a little over $6 billion. Dr. Fauci did not specify how much additional money would be needed. If surveillance networks detected a new virus spilling over from animals into people, the logic goes, scientists could stop it by immunizing people in the outbreak by quickly manufacturing the prototype vaccine. And if the virus spread before the world realized what was happening, the prototype vaccines could be deployed more widely.
Well, I'll go ahead and be the first. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Yea, to me this is the blatantly obvious outcome of the pandemic. The economic costs have been so massive spending a bit of money preventively is a no-brainer.
For the conspiratorial idiots, governments with covert biological weapons programs have been looking at these since WW2 - we should really get some good guys on this too.
Re: It is NOT surprising that we had the technolog (Score:3, Informative)
The so-called gain if function research prepared the East for COVID. Shame the US had elected someone who admitted how dangerous it was on tape and then pretended it wasn't to the country, killing 600,000 Americans.
Maybe you can explain that?
Oh and the virus was nothing like COVID, which destroys your conspiracy theory.
Trump has nothing to do with Wuhan (Score:2, Informative)
Huh? "Gain of Function" is not "so called", it was a well established term before Covid, was openly done, and it did nothing to help the Chinese in this instance.
The Chinese were not as quick as the should have been, but they still gave plenty of notice which was carefully ignored by the USA.
And which virus "was nothing like COVID"? There are several. And most of the sequences made by the Wuhan labs were taken off line just after the outbreak, so we do not know what they actually had. What we do know is
Re: (Score:2)
Huh? "Gain of Function" is not "so called", it was a well established term before Covid, was openly done, and it did nothing to help the Chinese in this instance.
Except it wasn't gain of function research, so it wasn't done.
And which virus "was nothing like COVID"? There are several.
Covid-19 is called a "novel coronavirus" because it is novel.
Just because you hate Trump does not make everything he says false, even if he has no idea what he is saying.
Right, he is only guaranteed to be saying something false when he does have an idea of what he's saying. If he says something true, it probably came up on the teleprompter, and he has no idea what he's reading. That explains why he so frequently can't pronounce whatever it is.
Re: (Score:2)
Finally, a sensible comment. This forum seems to be infested with idiot trolls.
Fauci's idea is great. One thing I'd like to know is why do some vaccines last a decade or more but the Covid vaccines are rapidly losing effectiveness after only months. The British govt is already talking about booster shots. An Israeli study showed vaccine effectiveness was dropping at roughly 10% per month.
Re: Well, I'll go ahead and be the first. (Score:2)
The vaccines target a part of the virus that mutates -- the spikes.
Not sure if other vaccines target more stable proteins or the viruses don't mutate much.
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
How long does it take to update the vaccine for a new variant? Can they target several variants with a booster?
In Israel they had a good early vaccination drive with the pfizer vaccine but now the effectiveness is reducing fast. https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com] (paper and articles linked by Dr John Campbell there)
He mentions the study is about the pfizer vaccine, it'd be interesting to know at what speed other vacc
Boondoggle (Score:2)
Vaccines are tailored for a specific virus. While there are basic techniques that work better or worse of particular types of viruses, the vaccine is always tailored to the virus that is the current problem. This proposal sounds like he is attempting to use the pandemic fear and desperation as a lever to fund an eternal virus laboratory that would be spending its time waiting for a virus to attack. The Pharma companies can do this for us. They are making enough on the pandemic already to fund their rese
Actually no (Score:2)
So yeah, this is something you want. At least if you're not a billionaire who's a) gonna have to pay for it and b) got bailed out with trillions i
Re:Boondoggle (Score:5, Interesting)
The mRNA vaccines change the game a little. Previously, a vaccine was necessarily either the actual target virus killed, or a live weakened virus where if was put through many generations in culture to produce a weak bot otherwise similar version.
The mRNA vaccine requires identifying a particular feature to the virus that is dissimilar to anything in the human body and a good target for antibodies, then synthesizing mRNA to order to produce that particular protein. In that sense, the vaccine is programmable.
Re: (Score:2)
Not only that, but the equipment that's used to make a COVID-19 mRNA vaccine can be reused to make a Flu vaccine, cancer vaccine, or any other mRNA vaccine that they come up with. Just wash the equipment, load the new mRNA sequence in, and pump out vaccines. I've even heard reports that they're trying to make portable vaccine generation equipment. So a hospital could have an mRNA vaccine generator or you could load it on a truck in a third world country and generate vaccines right in the village that needs
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Boondoggle (Score:5, Insightful)
Your understanding is incorrect. Viruses come in families that share most of their basic biology. The details vary, but once you figure out how to make an effective vaccine against one member of a family, it's usually easy to adapt it to other members. That's why we can easily make a new flu vaccine every year. We long ago figured out a recipe for making vaccines against influenza. Now that we have that recipe, we can take whatever new strains are circulating each year and adapt it to them.
There are about 20 main families of viruses that affect humans. The proposal is to create a vaccine for one member of each family. Once we have an effective vaccine against one member of a family, we'll have a huge head start at developing one for any other member.
We saw the value of this last year. After COVID emerged, it only took a couple of months before the first vaccine entered human trials. That's because scientists had spent years studying coronaviruses. They were able to take the work they'd done on SARS and adapt it directly. It's not the same virus, but it's the same family. Without those years of work, it would have taken far longer to get a vaccine.
Re: (Score:2)
The Pharma companies can do this for us.
Why would Pharma companies proactively develop something without monetary incentive?
Could we stop politicizing the pandemic threat? (Score:5, Insightful)
I can see the argument forming against developing a vaccine that is plausibly necessary because we were studying it in the first place. Sure... Viral threats to humankind can jump species or be borne in a laboratory... doesn't really matter.
Addressing problems that threaten us as a species shouldn't be compartmentalized as natural or anthropogenic... mankind is of nature, and not separate from it. We are the greatest threat to us and the rest of the planet's life forms.
Better to develop the vaccines and not need them, than to need them and not have them. Stopping nations from doing this type of research has a statistical likelihood on the order of asking my dog not to kill squirrels.
Careful what you wish for (Score:2)
How do you develop vaccines for future super bugs? Well, you first create the super bugs. Then study them.
But it is not so helpful when the bug gets out of the test tube.
Re: (Score:2)
Given how much we spend on so many other things, throwing $500 million at future vaccine research seems kind of trivial and probably produces a lot of payoff.
Sensible idea (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Actually, we will (and are) seeing a concerted global effort to stop this type of research. It is just too easy for the super bugs you breed to study to get out of the test tube.
Re: Sensible idea (Score:2)
That what we already do with influenza. (Score:3)
Arguably WHO's most important function is to do global influenza surveillance. Every year it picks the four strains -- one H1N1, one H3N2, and two Type Bs -- each thought to be most likely to go pandemic *next year*. It ships to manufacturers who then culture the virus and make a new vaccine which is ready for large scale manufacture shortly thereafter.
The idea that it always takes years to develop a new vaccine is mistaken; flu vaccines are annually reformulated, although it's a variation on a theme. This year's H1N1 vaccine is much like last year's and made on the same production lines. It'll have the same trade name, but it's a new vaccine.
It is quite possible we may find ourselves doing something similar for new COVID variants, although thus far it hasn't been necessary.
Re: (Score:2)
It is quite possible we may find ourselves doing something similar for new COVID variants, although thus far it hasn't been necessary.
This assumes that the next pandemic will be a COVID variant. What if it's another virus altogether? The case for the WHO to be involved seems to be strong. So far, international cooperation on COVID-19 has meant compressing what would've taken 10 years of research, development & testing into 1 year, more or less. It's also meant that we've proven experimental vaccine technologies that promise to revolutionise vaccine design & manufacturing. The suggestion is to identify the most likely epidemic/pand
Re: (Score:2)
I actually *didn't* assume it would be another COVID variant, although I *did* assume another COVID variant is possible and one important scenario.
WIV's draft genome for SARS-COV-2 was published on January 11, 2020, and Moderna's draft design was ready two days later. The first samples of the vaccine were shipped on Feburary 24. So basically it takes 42 days to go from genome to a vaccine candidate. Since the EUA for the vaccine was issued on December 18, it took 300 days to go from being able to produce
we need to (Score:2)
We *may* have been lucky with these vaccines as they don't seem to cause long-term health complications (at least what we've seen so far), but that's not been the case with all vac
Cost is the difference (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
There are emerging (phase I/II) major improvements in the therapy in both the delivery efficiency and medical efficacy. One company in
Re: (Score:2)
"Naturally" is to die or get crippled when we get sick. "Naturally" is to suffer and weaken from disease. "Naturally" is to suffer lots of side effects from both vaccination and infection.
Screw "naturally". I want the best unnatural protection I can get.
Re: (Score:2)
I believe that if we had an effective test-treat available protocol it would work. It works lik
Re: (Score:2)
Exactly. We are under constant attack. And then we die.
I want the best unnatural protection I can get. Screw natural, it is killing me.
You want to die, you do that, but don't advocate that others should die "naturally" just because of your religious conviction. I want life, not "natural".
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Once you've been infected, you're not "safe from death or debilitation." In fact, that's when your danger is the highest. Letting people get infected and then treating them with Monoclonal Antibodies is a horrible idea. First of all, the supply of Monoclonal Antibodies would quickly be exhausted. Not everyone would be able to be treated with them. Also, Monoclonal Antibodies aren't a cure-all. They can help in some circumstances, but they don't guarantee complete recovery. You can still die or wind up with
Wasn't it Fauci... (Score:2)
Wasn't it Fauci and the wizards at the CDC that hobbled our early response to Covid 19 by implementing a poorly-designed test that delayed our testing protocols for precious weeks at the start of the Pandemic?
Yes, it was:
https://www.technologyreview.c... [technologyreview.com]
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/0... [nytimes.com]
Re: (Score:2)
How dare you not blame Trump?
Also isn't Fauci the one who was funding the gain of function research in the first place? And then used his position as director of the NIAID to career-suicide anyone who dared suggest the virus came from his Chinese lab in Wuhan? And then sent one of his cronies (Daszak) to China to say "nope, it really wasn't the Wuhan lab"?
Re: (Score:2)
I don't know what kind of bureaucratic or linguistic gymnastics he pulled to have his agency describe what is prima fascie gain-of-function research as something else, but that doesn't make it any less a lie. Hell, I tracked down one paper by the North Carolina/Wuhan team that actually included a section on how
Some corrections (Score:2)
But what will happen if the next pandemic comes from a virus that causes Lassa fever, or from the Sudan strain of Ebola, or from a Nipah virus?
It won't, because none of those spread through the air. They all require physical contact, which is easily avoided in a developed country if you are worried about disease spread. Researchers did not focus on coronaviruses "by sheer chance" but rather because they were known to have pandemic potential, due to their easy spread and relatively high mortality.
Don't get me wrong, mRNA technology is flexible enough that it should make creating vaccines for all sorts of diseases vastly easier than in the past, and
Re: (Score:2)
It won't, because none of those spread through the air.
Pathogens mutate. In the case of bubonic plague, it was originally transmitted by contact with infected rats. Later, a variant evolved that was spread through the air. Then all hell broke loose.
The remarkable vaccine nobody takes? (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Be prepared, but who pays for this? (Score:2)
In the UK, and I believe in most developed countries, epidemiologists have been warning for years that we should be prepared for an epidemic respiratory disease. Reasonable precautions would include stockpiles of personal protective equipment for medical staff, and extra backup supplies of ventilators and the like. This was proposed well before Covid 19 was even heard of.
When the Covid 19 epidemic emerged in China, and it looked like it was spreading to Europe, UK ministers insisted that our health service
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
The real "lab" is the anti-vaxxers, who foster & spread mutations
Re: (Score:2)
The real "lab" is the anti-vaxxers, who foster & spread mutations
Um ... I'm not on the side of the guy you were replying to, nor am I an "anti-vaxxer", but ... there was a literal lab studying exactly those viruses just a few miles away from ground zero.
It's not implausible at all [bbc.com] that it escaped from that lab.
Re: (Score:2, Flamebait)
Funny how, for a whole year, we were told that was debunked and to say otherwise was a silly conspiracy theory.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: good when it leaks out of the lab we will be f (Score:2)
Guess you missed how COVID has mutated about 1000x, with 8 major strains, none of them anything to do with vaccines it other treatment.
Re:good when it leaks out of the lab we will be fa (Score:5, Informative)
No, the danger is the unvaxxed and the idiots like the guy in that video who encourage them.
If vaccines were the cause of mutations, we would have mutations of smallpox all over the planet... but we don't. Smallpox was eradicated. When everyone is vaccinated, viruses go extinct.
Real world examples > idiotic theories.
Re: good when it leaks out of the lab we will be f (Score:2)
Half baked knowledge is a very dangerous thing
Imagine a doctor or medical researcher trying to deduce how kernel code for device drivers might work from common sense and google
Vaccines which are not highly effective are what cause dangerous mutations to get selected and spread.
Am sure you've read about how overuse of antibiotics causes super bugs ???
Re: good when it leaks out of the lab we will be (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
It almost sounds like your solution to antibiotic resistant bacteria is to never use antibiotics, because even today, we don't fully understand how antibiotics work.
Oh, hai! + overlooking details (Score:5, Informative)
Imagine a doctor or medical researcher trying to deduce how kernel code for device drivers might work from common sense and google
Oh, hai! I am a doctor by training and work in medical research.
A decade and half ago, my GPU was a 3DFx Voodoo 3. To handle TV-Out, it relied on a BT869 chip on the I2C bus [fsu.edu].
Sadly by then, 3Dfx was defunct, it was considered legacy hardware, and the TV-out driver wasn't very well maintained.
When the i2c bus changed it's driver model, I was I used the kernel documentation [kernel.org] to patch the driver so it kept running for me.
(Upstream rejected my patch though, telling me tv-out functionality should instead move to the display stack, but that was beyond the amount of work I was ready to pour in).
In Dr "Bones" McCoy's voice: "I am a doctor, Jim! Not a kernel developper!"
Vaccines which are not highly effective are what cause dangerous mutations to get selected and spread.
It's much more complex and you're glossing over a ton of fine details.
Over-all it's not seemingly utter non-sense:
- the presence of antibody in the host population (whether they come from vaccination or from post-infection immunity) are changing the environment in which a virus evolves, thus changing the fitness of the virus in its environment, and thus the darwinian selection would be (slightly) bit different.
- thus yes, the presence of antibodies has a (tiny) bit of impact on the virus' evolution.
BUT.
Identifying a possible mechanism isn't the entire story, you need to check how much it is making an impact overall.
And the data is telling us a completely different story:
- D614G emerged at a time point when vaccine didn't exist yet.
- Alpha emerged in UK at a time when vaccine were barely available.
- Delta emerged in Inda while there wasn't any significant widespread vaccination.
- Rergion with higher vaccination rate have seen an overall decrease in virus circulation, no sudden popping of new variants. (e.g.: there is no current sudden onslaught of multiple greek-letters variant all jumping out of Israel)
So what it seems is that although your model isn't technically entirely wrong (there is a change in environment and therefor change in selective pressure), it has a very insignificant impact in the end.
That's because, you're overlooking other mechanisms at play:
Different polymerases have different error rates, depending on how much they're good at "proof-reading" - i.e.: do they have an "exonuclease" capability, to go back, remove a copy error, and restart (Exonuclease function is the Tipp-Ex of sequence duplication).
Human, as Eukaryotes, use a DNA-Polymerase to make copies of their genome and that one has a good proof-reading capability and stellar low error rate.
Most Polymerases using RNA as a source tend to make mistakes - a lot of RNA viruses rely on RdRp (RNA-dependent RNA-polymerase) and retroviruses (such as HIV) rely on an rt (Reverse-transcriptase, it goes RNA->DNA - i.e.: the opposite of eukaryote's RNA polymerases).
Coronavirus family have gene nsp14 which *does have* exonuclease functionnality (SARS-CoV-2 has a metaphorical pencil eraser at disposal to fix its mistake).
Thus Coronavirus family members (including SARS-CoV-2) have a lower mutation rate than other RNA viruses (e.g.: compared to influenza or HIV) my colleagues working at Nextstrain used to mention 1:4 slower rate than flu, and in our national sequencing project we don't see a very high intrahost diversity, (that could also be a possible explanation while base analgos such as remdesivir work poorly - the virus could be as easily removing them as the human host).
The end result is that in order to see variants to emerge, you need to have large pools in which the virus has opportunity to mutate. The larger th
Re: good when it leaks out of the lab we will be f (Score:5, Informative)
They introduce mRNA into the body, in nanosized fatty encapsulations that allow it to enter cells. There the ribosomes read and transcribe it like anything else and manufacture, in this case, the virus' spike protein. Which then drifts to the surface of the cell, and gets recognized by the immune system, and triggers immune memory and production of antibodies.
Which is... just what live-virus vaccines, dead-virus vaccines and (if you want to go way back) variolation do: Expose the body to the signature of the pathogen without infecting it.
The difference is, proffering the exact protein we know the immune system needs to neutralize in order to first round KO the virus, and nothing else, is what every other vaccine *wishes* it could do. The immune system is fooled - by both the flu and covid - into making huge numbers of antibodies against the nucleocapsid proteins, which do not actually stop the virus from infecting anything. Immune assays confirm this: the responses to natural covid infection and mRNA vaccination are very different. And the mRNA-induced one is better, broader and stronger.
Nitpicking (Score:5, Informative)
Which is... just what live-virus vaccines, dead-virus vaccines and (if you want to go way back) variolation do: Expose the body to the signature of the pathogen without infecting it.
I just wanted to nitpick and bring to attention that dead-virus vaccine are slightly different (and common with recombinant vaccine and all those other synthetic antigen vaccine) in that they rely in bringing in *the actual antigen (protein/peptide/glycopeptide)* it self in.
The immune system might not pick-up the injected thing (as it's just an inert thing) and you might need to add some adjuvants in the mix, specially with the synthetic antigens.
Whereas natural immunity post infection, vaccine's namesake, attenuated virus vaccine, viral carrier DNA vaccine and mRNA in fat bubbles all rely on *tricking the cell machinery to produce their proteins* (well that's what initially viruses evolved to do) and the immune system is very good at detecting such hijacking and at immunizing against it (that's what it evolved to do). mRNA are merely the safest of the lot as they introduce the least amount of foreign genetic material (just the target antigen of interest) they've basically turned the concept of "attenuated" vaccine all the way to 11 by ripping everything else out - unlike the virus-based immunity, they are not even capable of replicating, having had the replication machinery ripped out.
But if you squint at it the second list definetely "infects" the cell (for a very generous tolerance for the definition of "infects" specially by the time you reach the mRNA virus): they all rely on tricking the cell to produce foreign material, and tap into the immune system excellent capabilities at detecting it. In contrast, the former list just relies on depositing the foreign material itself and hoping the immune system will notice it.
From a more detailed point of view: only the second list also relies on T-c (cytotoxic) cells (That where their better response comes from, including for mRNA).
Whereas the first list only exclusively relies on macrophages picking up and exposing material laying around, without an inflammation the T-h (helper) cells might not notice.
Re: good when it leaks out of the lab we will be (Score:2)
Congrats for highlighting an example of how mRNA vaccines DON'T work. You talk as though it permanently rewrites DNA or fundamentally changes how our immune systems work. Our immune systems aren't "overwritten".
mRNA is the pathway our bodies use for protein synthesis. The mRNA vaccine jumps in, has our body make proteins that superficially mimic the structure of the virus (without actually including the rest of the virus machinery), and then it dissolves away. Once it dissolves, no more custom proteins made
Re: (Score:2)
"This time we'll pave the road with even BETTER intentions!
Re:Your body does not have a "vaccine shortage" (Score:5, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Your body does not have a "vaccine shortage" (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Your body does not have a "vaccine shortage" (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: Your body does not have a "vaccine shortage" (Score:5, Informative)
Steve Jobs died of a faulty common cancer that can usually be treated, because he delayed medical preferring holistic approaches as I understand.
Andy Kaufman eschewed conventional treatment fit too long, then when he finally saw a proper medical doctor, he was at death's door.
There are countless more stories like this, but they don't get talked about because the victims aren't famous.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Surgeon Chris Raynor has some good commentary on the topic [youtube.com]. He says, "Orthopedic surgeons are not better than chiropractors. We are different."
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
FFS stop modding this stupid crap up.
Re: (Score:2)
"Of course Fauci wants more vaccines, he and all his Big Med cartel get a kickback for every toxic vaccine they inject."
Look it, if you want to spout FOX bs, please go there and spout it. Meanwhile, you do realize that Elvis has been spotted on Mars, yes?
Re: (Score:3)
'clip' [Groan]
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
That's not what happens (Score:2)
I guess what I"m getting at is, not only is it kinda terrible to wish for people who've been fooled to die, but it's not even going to work from a practical standpoint. Stop it. You're not helpin
Re: (Score:2)
the virus is "only" about 1% fatal across the entire population. Maybe 2% if we stretch it. Now, that's still potentially over 3 million dead in America alone (way, _way_ more if we "let 'er rip" and the hospitals get overwhelmed) and it might even mean a few close elections are lost, but probably not that many.
I can lose my fingerprints typing before I can get people to focus on anything but the death rate. When in fact, death is a preferable outcome to Covid fog, destruction of the cardiopulmonary system, amputations and getting to go back to the hospital. You probably do not want to get encephalitis, which shows up in 10 percent of Covid "survivors, ischemic stroke. Here's some reading. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p... [nih.gov]
1 in 3 survivors have mental issues after Covid - seems like that number is getting wors
Re: That's not what happens (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Gotta give it to progressives. They sure know how to wish death on those they hate because they're not loving enough.
At least, the racists are honest.
Considering how much hatred con artist supporters spewed out [theguardian.com] in only four years, "progressives" aren't even amateurs.
In fact, one so-called "Christian" adviser to the con artist wanted her imaginary overlord to commit abortion [imgur.com] on a worldwide scale.
Which bit is inaccurate? (Score:2)
We'll wait.
Re: That's not what happens (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Only 36% of African Americans are vaccinated. Only 41% of Latinos. Are you claiming they are Trump Republicans? Trump already got vaccinated by the way, and told people to get vaccinated a long time ago.
No, where in the hell did you learn logic to try to even remotely come up with the claim that I said anything like that? Or are you that kooky British woman who interviewed Jordan Peterson, and kept interrupting him to say "So you're saying that...( fill in the weierdest thing you can think of).
Re: (Score:2)
Why did you mention Republicans (politics), in a discussion about vaccines. Fuck off "Ol Olsoc". You are politicizing science. If you want to talk about politics, let me know why only 36% of African Americans are vaccinated and 41% of Latinos are vaccinated. They are OVERWHELMINGLY DEMOCRAT. So shove your politicization of Science up your asshole and take your buddy rsilvergun with you. You are middle class middle aged suburban white males who work in IT. You know nothing of reality or life. You work with computers for a living. Just fuck off nd SHUT THE FUCK UP.
And you kind sir, have a terrible terminal case of internet muscles coupled with Histrionic disorder. Here's your problem, summer child. The sub groups that you mention? They aren't the Democrat base. Unfortunately, you went insane level triggered as snowflakes are prone to do, and missed that I wrote the Republican base in several places. Have a great day, and maybe try Yoga.
Re: (Score:2)
Shh. Your facts are going to scare people! They've been told otherwise and are quite comfortable believing orange man bad.
Get ye back to OAN, They had Mike Lindell's "proof" that Biden stole the election, Should make you cum in your pants, citizen. It's all you need to know - Next stop, thd supreme court, where they will crown your boy as president for life, this is the moment you've been waiting for your entire life. Orange man not bad - Orange man is the return of Jesus Christ, and will cast the unbelievers into the pit. You do recognize him as Christ returned do you not?
Re: (Score:2)
You still haven't answered why you brought up politics in AN ARTICLE ABOUT VACCINES. Democrats/Republicans were not mentioned in either the article or the summary. So, yhy did you do it? What did you hope to accomplish? Does science deserve to be politicized? Let us know why you did it, Ol Olsoc, or JUST FUCK OFF.
I answered your question in another post, summer child. But let's get serious. If you think that Having Fauci involved isn't political, and especially to the Republican party, you've been living under an old mobile home for the last 5 years.
Google or DDG Fauci vs Rand Paul. He even threatened him with felony arrest.
Political enough for ya, summer child?
Re: (Score:2)
Trump already got vaccinated by the way, and told people to get vaccinated a long time ago.
The con artist got vaccinated in secret and never revealed he got vaccinated [forbes.com], all the while denigrating the doctors who were encouraging people to get vaccinated.
It wasn't until March, two months after he lost the election, that he said anything remotely encouraging about being vaccinated. Needless to say, it was mainly about him [bbc.com], not the people.
So, the guy who created Operation Warp Speed, who promised a vaccine by year end and was ridiculed in the press for it, who wanted to open the economy and get kids back to school as soon as possible, that guy didn't want people to take the vaccine? That makes no sense at all.
There were certainly many politicians who actively discouraged people from taking the "Trump vaccine", including Kamala Harris and Andrew Cuomo.
Re: (Score:2)
Rofl he said it in March when he was no longer president.
Re: (Score:2)
So what? He said it.
He said it after he already lost his re-election bid, like the coward he is. He cares only about himself, not about The People. If he had said it sooner, many less people might have died, but he was too busy worrying about his polls.
He even fucking fast tracked the vaccine
He was advised to do so, as any president would have been.
and bought the right one with more than enough doses for all of Americans
That is a blatant lie, and you are a blatant liar. Trump did NOT buy enough doses for all Americans. He "promised" to buy enough doses, but he only actually bought 100M doses, which was only going to be enough for 50M Ame
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Even the lies that nobody else still believes, you are actively pushing.
So what is it you care about, chinaman?
It was certainly leaked, probably engineered (Score:2)
But not as a weapon.
Rather as what Fauci was talking about, namely to prepare for future viruses. Build your own and see how they behave, develop ways to beat them. The Wuhan labs were acknowledged world experts, funded partially by the USA. They proudly published their excellent results. Until someone made a mistake which let it out of the labs.
There are now several good papers that dispassionately discuss the Wuhan leak. The main popular one is by Wade
https://thebulletin.org/2021/0 [thebulletin.org]... [thebulletin.org
Re: (Score:2)
No, it did not start in a lab.
Fucking prove it, or stop saying this.
It'll derail serious attempts to address the actual cause of the pandemic (deforestation and the wet markets).
There is literally no proof that it came from a wet market.
There is no public evidence beyond the circumstantial of where it came from, and there is at least as much of that supporting the lab leak theory as the wet market theory. The outbreak is near both the lab and a wet market. The lab is known to have been studying related viruses, and the wet market is a common place for similar viruses to be found. But there is no smoking gun leading to either theory, and asserti
Re: (Score:2)
This country is full of people who believe the earth is flat. This was proven false centuries ago with rudimentary tools and methods. People are just that dumb.
Re: (Score:3)
There's also plenty of scientific evidence that points to vaccines being a) not entirely safe and b) not entirely effective.
Getting out of bed in the morning is not entirely safe. Breathing is not entirely safe. Everyone knows the vaccine is not entirely effective. Come back when you have something more quantifiable.
Re:50% will make this fail. (Score:5, Insightful)
There's also plenty of scientific evidence that points to vaccines being a) not entirely safe
No, there's not. You're just spouting bullshit.
b) not entirely effective.
Body armor isn't entirely effective either. No one should wear it, especially police, since it's not 100% effective at preventing being shot to death. Nor are seat belts. Plenty of people die in vehicle accidents when wearing seat belts. Don't wear them because they're not entirely effective.
And it's not conspiracy theory either, it's the narrative that's being controller by GUESS WHO? The pharmaceutical companies that own media outlets.
Stop smoking whatever it is you're smoking and shut up. You know why we don't have polio in this country? Because of a vaccine. You know why we don't have measles in this country?* Vaccines. You know why we don't have smallpox in this country any more? Vaccines.
Sure is strange the pharmaceutical companies would create something which kills off a recurring source of revenue.
* The last major measles outbreak in the U.S. was in 2018-2019 when a Jew returned from a third world shithole country [nejm.org] who wasn't vaccinated because they believe their mythical being will protect them.
An outbreak of measles in New York City began when one unvaccinated child returned home from Israel with measles; onset of rash occurred on September 30, 2018, 9 days after the child returned home.
Re: (Score:2)
Imagine being devout religious person being told by your leaders that God wants you to vaccinate... but making up excuses.
Christians have a long history of doing what they're told, but Jews have a long history of arguing about their religion. So it's not that surprising.
The only Jews I'd expect to argue about vaccination though are the ones that wear the funny hats. No, not those funny hats, bigger ones. As it turns out, they have a lot of funny ideas, some of which are immediately offensive to the typical modern person — notably around the issue of circumcision. Don't feel like going into it here, there's lots of inform
Re:He'll change his mind tomorrow (Score:5, Informative)
You could get whiplash listening to Fauci, he changes direction repeatedly. He's clearly a politician.
You mean as new facts and evidence comes to light, someone changes their stance? How horrible! Too bad everyone can't know everything from the get go like you do.
P.S. the con artist regularly changed direction, many times within the same day. A clear sign of a politician.
Re: (Score:2)
You mean as new facts and evidence comes to light, someone changes their stance? How horrible! Too bad everyone can't know everything from the get go like you do.
My issue with Fauci is when given the opportunity he failed to avail himself of this excuse. Instead he elected to lie to the public either about his initial stance on masks or the justification he later gave for his remarks.
He initially said masks don't work. Then he said he said that because mask shortage in hospitals. Either way it is not possible to square both public statements. He directly and unambiguously lied to the public on national television.
Re: (Score:2)
Lying is when you know a statement to be false and you make it anyway. Making a statement which turns out to be false when the information to make it false becomes available is not a lie.
With your logic, every weather forecaster is a liar at some point every week.
Re: (Score:2)
Lying is when you know a statement to be false and you make it anyway. Making a statement which turns out to be false when the information to make it false becomes available is not a lie.
With your logic, every weather forecaster is a liar at some point every week.
By your definition, he lied when he said "masks don't work". He subsequently admitted he said it to make sure there was sufficient supply for medical personnel.
You might say this is a good reason to lie, but what else did he lie about for "good reasons"?
Re: (Score:2)
Ah the Fox News talking point, gain of function. Can you elaborate on what gain of function means and how it pertains to a virus? People that have never strung those words together in their entire life are now suddenly quoting biological research terms. Fauci is a world class physician with credentials to back it up.
Re: (Score:2)
Ah the Fox News talking point, gain of function. Can you elaborate on what gain of function means and how it pertains to a virus? People that have never strung those words together in their entire life are now suddenly quoting biological research terms.
Wikipedia defines it this way"
I don't watch FOX News, but in context, I think people are referring to the Wuhan lab research we (Faucci) funded that took two coronaviruses from bats that were not infectious to humans, and produced a new modified version that is infectious to humans.
Specifically, they engineered a new virus that has hors
Gain of Function (Score:2)
Indeed, the Wuhan labs were rightly proud of their GoF achievements and published them. It was not secretive, not malicious, just ill advised.
Just because Trump et. al. are idiots does not make everything they say wrong. Better to just ignore them rather than putting a "not" in what they say.
There are now several good papers that dispassionately discuss the Wuhan leak. The main popular one is by Wade
https://thebulletin.org/2021/0 [thebulletin.org]... [thebulletin.org]
But I like this one
https://www.independentscience... [www.indepe...science...] [in
Re: It wasn't chance (Score:2)
No, they were prepared because previous viruses 'cleaned their clocks', we were a bit more relaxed about it because it didn't hit us so hard.
To wit:
Obama left a plan on the shelf, but the federal reserves of PPE were very low.
During the presidency of Barack Obama, the national stockpile was seriously taxed as the administration addressed multiple crises over eight years. About "75 percent of N95 respirators and 25 percent of face masks contained in the CDC's Strategic National Stockpile (â¼100 million products) were deployed for use in health care settings over the course of the 2009 H1N1 pandemic response," according to a 2017 study in the journal Health Security.
Again according to NIH, the stockpile's resources were also used during hurricanes Alex, Irene, Isaac and Sandy. Flooding in 2010 in North Dakota also called for stockpile funds to be deployed. The 2014 outbreaks of the ebola virus and botulism, as well as the 2016 outbreak of the zika virus, continued to significantly tax the stockpile with no serious effort from the Obama administration to replenish the fund.
And still the fact checkers call the claim false...
https://www.usatoday.com/story... [usatoday.com]
NY State developed a pandemic response plan, bought up a bunch of ventilators, then Cuomo came into office, sold off the ventilators, then when the pandemic hit later, demanded to be given new ventilato
Re: (Score:2)
While I'm all for vaccines, I wouldn't trust Fauci to create or treat anyone with his so-called bogus treatments for gain.
You seem to be asserting that Fauci pushes treatments which will profit him personally. Provide some evidence or STFU. Meanwhile we KNOW that Trump pushed a treatment which would profit him personally, HCQ. You're doing exactly what the Nazis did by accusing others of what you're doing while your side is doing it. (If it's not your side, why spread FUD?)
Re: (Score:2)
Your immune system is stupid. It fucks up all the time. Everyone's does. They miss things, and react to innocuous things. Yet you trust it? If your immune system were a person it would be Mr. Magoo. It needs help. Help it help you.
I demand safeguards. (Score:2)
Core concept is fine, but Fauci has to go.