Pfizer, BioNTech Say Third Dose Neutralizes Omicron Variant (bloomberg.com) 292
Pfizer and BioNTech said initial lab studies show a third dose of their Covid-19 vaccine neutralizes the omicron variant, results that will accelerate booster shot drives around the world. From a report: A booster with the current version of the vaccine increased antibodies 25-fold, providing a similar level as observed after two doses against the original virus and other variants, the companies said Wednesday. Blood plasma from people immunized with two doses of the vaccine has neutralizing antibody levels more than 25-fold less versus omicron than against the original strain of the virus, the companies said. "It's clear from these preliminary data that protection is improved with a third dose," Pfizer Chief Executive Officer Albert Bourla said in a statement. The initial data show a third dose could offer still offer enough protection from disease, BioNTech CEO Ugur Sahin said.
How booster works (Score:5, Informative)
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Um, whilst technically nuanced, that answer doesn't say they know it works. Actually the nuances could be read as, we don't know that it works, and even allows for, it may not work.
Re:How booster works (Score:5, Insightful)
You need to do your own risk analysis to determine how reasonable "everything else equal' assumption.
Re:How booster works (Score:5, Insightful)
There is also the effect of the boster on the Delta, which will still be around for a while.
But either Omicron is significantly less deadly or the vaccination still works, maybe both. Otherwise we should see the start of negative effects from Omicron already. Until we know for sure, it is a very good idea to keep your vaccination status as updated as possible and that means boosting.
Yes, that argument is simplified. But with all the people that had the good sense to get vaccinated, we know the vaccines are safe. No, you will not turn into a crocodile in 2 years, no vaccine _ever_ had side-effects that were hidden more than a couple of months and no vaccination campaign ever was larger or more carefully monitored, exactly because things needed to be rushed. At this time we have excellent data, far better than even a full, slow vaccination testing process would have provided.
Well, to be fair there may be a connection that means anti-vaxxers will get side-effects nobody else gets as they are the only group we have no good data on. On the other hand, no vaccine ever was less effective or less safe for the abysmally stupid, so this is unlikely.
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Unlikely does not mean it is impossible. There are historical precedents [smithsonianmag.com] of medical disasters [wikipedia.org]. We should not dismiss everyone with side-effects as an anti-vaccine, doing so is fundamentally anti-scientific.
At this time it means it is irrelevant in comparison to other risks. There are no long-term hidden negative vaccination effects in medical history ever. Your reference does not say differently. Your "argument" completely misses the point. Yes, there can be negative side-effects that present after a couple of months at the most, but we now _know_ all of these, except ones so rare they are irrelevant.
In actual reality, possible/impossible is not a statement that makes any sense. It is _all_ just probabilities
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Horse paste
Oh, you want a salami?
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Trust the science! [nih.gov]
Because a study involving a cohort size of just 24 patients per arm is large enough to bet your life on I guess. *blinks*
Umm... no. Just no.
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If everyone shows the same result: it is large enough.
If you do not want a booster: your problem (no idea why anyone who already got two shots, would object against a booster, though).
Re:Fuck your decisions (Score:5, Insightful)
Since when is "freedom" the freedom from consequences of your choices?
You are still free to not get vaccinated. Just like you are free to make many other bad decisions. You are not free from the consequences of those bad decisions - you never have been.
Not sure why this is a hard concept for the proponents of "freedom". I'd personally like the freedom from having a bunch of obstinate conspiracy theorists and hypocrite politicians putting on a show of performative outrage feeding the fire of the uninformed guiding public policy on things instead of science and fact, but in a democratic republic we don't all get our way.
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Birth control needs to come with education on how to properly use it. Condom with an air pocket, likely to break, happened to a friend, she ended up in a bad marriage from it. Note that most anti-abortion people are very anti-sex education and uneducated people are more likely to have sex.
Birth control is not perfect, even when used correctly. the pill is not 100% effective and even getting your tubes tied doesn't always work. Different friend, after getting her tubes tied, ended up pregnant and seriously c
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Take this further.. Texas passed rules restricting abortion. We have free birth control and it's a personal choice not to have protected sex (or to have sex at all.)
What other choices should we be able to take from people just so they can face consequences?
Consent to sex is not consent to pregnancy any more than getting into car and driving is consent to being hit by a drunk driver.
There are two different Ahmeds (Score:5, Informative)
> Ah yes the Egypt study that has been debunked many times.
You're talking about a completely different study. The bogus Egyptian study by Ahmed Elgazzar was DOI 10.21203/rs.3.rs-100956/v2 which is the one everyone knows about where they appear to have completely bogus patient data that repeats every 20 rows, making it look like someone just copy pasted some data several times. Everyone sensible knows that study is bogus. The study linked by the anonymous GP comment is DOI 10.1016/j.ijid.2020.11.191 from a different Ahmed and doesn't have these same methodological problems as far as anyone can tell.
It's not easy to keep them straight or even to research the other Ahmed et al. study as was mentioned in this discussion of Ivermectin [substack.com] which discusses the results you get if you exclude the studies that are nonsense due to bad data, numbers that don't add up, etc. There was also the follow-up to the above [substack.com] which points out that it is legitimately confusing if and when Ivermectin helps.
So if we "trust the science" we should still study it instead of discounting it as horse paste and we should still get vaccinated because, even if it works, none of these studies show it to have all that strong of an effect.
Pharma needs to carefully communicate this info (Score:5, Insightful)
I am pro-vaccine. 3 shots of Moderna, all 3 of my kids got 2 doses, etc. BUT I will admit that when I read headlines quoting Big Pharma executives talking about the need for more shots (thus earning them more money), it gives me pause. They could be 100% accurate in the need for 3 shots HOWEVER I don't know if it serves the cause of improving public health for Big Pharma executives to publicly state this.
I think it should be left to public health officials to clearly explain the data and recommendations. The last thing you want is for vaccine-hesitant folks to start thinking "Oh, of course the greedy pharma companies want us to get 3rd, 4th and 5th shots. This is their cash-cow!"
Re:Pharma needs to carefully communicate this info (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't know if it serves the cause of improving public health for Big Pharma executives to publicly state this.
It does not at all matter who says it. If the pharmacos say it directly then it's "big pharma said it, they must want more money" and if it's public health officials then it's "fauci said it so he must be a big pharma tool".
The last thing you want is for vaccine-hesitant folks to start thinking "Oh, of course the greedy pharma companies want us to get 3rd, 4th and 5th shots. This is their cash-cow!"
They were thinking that even before there were boosters. There is literally no getting out ahead of that one,
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People don't trust Fauci because there is a long list of flip flopping
People sure do love certainty. But anyone who is holding on to certainty in the face of the completely unknown is the one you shouldn't be trusting. Especially early on, you need to be ready to change your opinion and advice every single day if you want to follow the science. Humility rather than arrogance is far more useful, even if it doesn't seem masculine enough for you.
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Sorry, but the tail of your post isn't against Fauci, but Science in general. Science is the continuous & never ending act of trying to prove what we know is _wrong_. We should be celebrating every time we find a lesser wrong; not demonizing the initial one.
The vast majority of benefits to mankind have been from researching the harmful stuff. We already had 6 worldwide outbreaks in the last 20 years with 3 being COVID, its logical that we would research their origins and how it happened and the mecha
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"Fauci has consistently followed science" ...)? We truly don't know.
Unfortunately, the well done science consists of:
"We have the new Omicron variant which was recently detected in South Africa.
What is the future prospect of this? While we might speculate, we truly don't know.
How well does it evade immunization via current vaccines? We truly don't know.
How dangerous is it (in terms of "people infected that die no matter what, people infected that die without intensive care,
We'll have some answers in maybe t
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You need only see his testimony in congress to know he's not trust worthy, or his position on masks at the start.
The position was that we should save PPE for health care workers because, being repeatedly exposed, they will be passing Covid on to other people if they are not well equipped with it. That position was fundamentally correct.
The pandemic is the single best thing to have ever happened to Fauci
Wat
and the arrogant piece of shit that he is
Fauci has served under presidents from both parties for decades. The whole idea that the pandemic, which has caused toolbags like you to mistrust him, is the best thing that ever happened to him... well, it's frankly dramatically fucking stupid.
And retards like you will continue to enable him.
Brave words from an internet coward lik
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Ah...so your position is that "Ok, he lied, but it was for our own good?"
That's correct. As long as people are drastically undereducated such lies are necessary. And one party has overwhelmingly done the majority of the damage to education in this country, and it's the same as the party that is telling you that Fauci is a POS. Try some critical thinking, you'll like it.
So that's the lens you'll use to justify anything our evil and retarded government does to us.
This is something it is doing for us.
Now run along, you good little brown shirt
One of the basic principles of justice is the right to face your accuser. You're accusing me of being a Nazi while hiding your identity, because you know your ideas are shit an
yabba dabba don't (Score:2)
In society sometimes you have to follow rules you don't personally like. That's civilization. Overall, I like civilization. If you don't, go move to a deserted island or a lawless war-torn nation. You troglodytes are ruining things for everybody with your anti-vax/mask shit, giving the virus extra lunch. If you don't like civilization then get the flying Hell out!!!
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> History, however, shows us where absolute faith in our government leads.
Absolute faith in ANYTHING is a bad idea, be it gov't, corporations, or Hannity. Checks, balances, and verification are always needed for any institution. There is no free lunch under any system nor under no system. regularly Inspect all your tools and make frequent backups. Life is a balancing act.
> I pointed out that the vaccinated represent a higher percentage of cases than the unvaxxed, meaning your statement was false.
You r
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In some places, the big pharma greedy bastards are much more favourably seen than the elected (and named) officials.
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In some places, the big pharma greedy bastards are much more favourably seen than the elected (and named) officials.
In the minds of people who don't know how anything works, specifically. The big pharma greedy bastards work hand in hand with the officials, whether elected or appointed. They simply apply big bags of money to problems until they go away. Only hands can wash hands.
Re:Pharma needs to carefully communicate this info (Score:5, Insightful)
COVID-19 vaccines save money. It's much cheaper (something like $20-30 per dose, plus labor) to vaccinate everyone (even every 6 months) than having to support continuous lockdowns, testings (not free either) and perhaps most importantly hospital care for the few that will get very sick. And hospital costs get even more important if the pandemic is not under control and we need to build more hospitals and hire more staff.
That being said, just because Pfizer says something doesn't mean public health authorities don't make the final call. For example here in Canada, the third dose is still not widely available or recommended. Especially for the under 50, two doses still seem to be good enough, especially if the interval between the doses was 8 weeks or more (which has been shown to provide longer immunity compared to the standard 3-4 weeks).
And this is as it should be.
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Is there a reason why the Pfizer one is so expensive? The AstraZenica vaccine is around $2/dose.
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Is there a reason why the Pfizer one is so expensive? The AstraZenica vaccine is around $2/dose.
Corporatism, obviously, which is running the show in America. But with that said, the AZ vaccine is sold for less in part because it is worth less. So far the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines are the most effective.
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Rich countries paid much more than $2/dose for AstraZeneca.
However, there is still a price difference, which can be explained:
Initially:
1. Was ready and approved before. AZ still not approved in the USA
2. AZ pledged not to make any profit, Pfizer didn't.
3. Better initial numbers (94% vs 62% efficacy on label)
And now:
3. Pfizer-BioNTech appears more effective, especially against Delta.
4. AZ got a bad press because of blot clot issues, and many rich countries stopped using it
5. AZ is still not approved for kid
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The EU is reported to have paid $2.20 for AZ.
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This is cheap but this may also explain why they were not getting it.
AstraZeneca never delivered what was promised to the EU. I hope the EU didn't pay.
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That being said, just because Pfizer says something doesn't mean public health authorities don't make the final call. For example here in Canada, the third dose is still not widely available or recommended. Especially for the under 50, two doses still seem to be good enough, especially if the interval between the doses was 8 weeks or more (which has been shown to provide longer immunity compared to the standard 3-4 weeks). And this is as it should be.
This may actually be because your government simply doesn't want to pay for a 3rd dose and is gambling that "good enough" won't overburden the Canadian health care system and not at all because they think it's not helpful.
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Perhaps you should read some news before doing uneducated accusations towards "big pharma" - it makes you look like an complete idiot.
Some regions in Germany officially started with Triage ... so go figure if you are scared about the booster netting someone some money.
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The thing is, Vaccines are not the best business to be in, Pfizer and Moderna would probably love to get COVID issue off their plate, so they can put their time and resources towards higher margin drugs.
The same thing with Hospitals, people are saying why are you Hospitals so worried about your finances, when there are so many sick people in your beds.
Hospitals get bigger compensations with performing surgeries, and much less for just bed stay and monitoring. So where an average COVID Hospitalization may c
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And they have chosen their caps
Intentional or Freudian slip?
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There is nothing that can be done to reach the hesitant
Of course there is. We can force them. Either to get access to some places (airplanes, restaurants, work, whatever) or by taxing the unvaccinated.
You may not like it, but it does work. And even if it doesn't, at least these people will stay home so it's better for the rest of us.
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This is probably more for RP and goodwill than profit. Because it's way, way more profitable for pharma corporations to have people in ICUs. The deals they have with various countries concerning the vaccine ain't that beneficial for them (you might have heard about various calls to "renegotiate" those deals), because that would have been a public relations disaster if they dared to profit from what is supposed to be life saving vaccines.
They have a lot more leeway with cures, especially the ones that are no
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It's really funny to me hearing this now vs. a year ago. We weren't concerned with the billions of dollars being poured into the vaccine manufacturers pockets then so why now? If you are an optimist you may say this is how science works and isn't it wonderful that we can have something that saves lives? If you're a pessimist you realize that billions of dollars and new Pharma exec billionaires [oxfam.org] have been created for a "cure" that only lasts a few months; it's almost like they wanted it that way.
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The last thing you want is for vaccine-hesitant folks to start thinking "Oh, of course the greedy pharma companies want us to get 3rd, 4th and 5th shots. This is their cash-cow!"
Of course, many, many people (probably even some of the vaccine-hesitant) get a Flu shot every year -- for different strains of the influenza virus that pop up -- so ongoing shots/boosters aren't uncommon and getting them for different strains/variants of COVID shouldn't be that controversial.
Perhaps what confuses people is why some vaccinations last a "lifetime" and others require boosters decades, years or months apart. There are many good articles about this, search: why some vaccines lifetime [google.com]. This
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Yes it's true they spend several billion dollars a year on research, but they spend literally 20 times that on CEO pay and stock BuyBacks
Yeah, well, that's capitalism. What's worse is that they are permitted to advertise drugs directly to consumers, even though they don't know shit on average, and they spend more on THAT than they do on drug development. Even under capitalism there are often restrictions and regulations on advertising, and we need some more if we're not just going to get rid of the drug companies — and I agree that we should, BTW. We should get rid of the health insurance companies first, though. They are providing muc
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This is reporting on initial research. Since it's likely to move markets that affect stock prices it's likely the information is accurate, as they'd be looking at lawsuits if it wasn't.
That said the solution to our problems is to shut down big pharma and replace the research with the university system.
No mass murder, please.
"That said the solution to our problems is to shut down big video game and replace the research with the university system."
"That said the solution to our problems is to shut down big smartphone and replace the research with the university system."
Because government command and control of video games and smart phones will accellerate the innovation, leading to more video games, better units, and better and faster cell phone innovation!
And if it improves fluff like video games and phon
"25-fold less" (Score:2)
Anyone else get really confused when wording like this is used? What does "25-fold less" even mean? 1/25th? 1/25th of what?
If it means 1/25th, then maybe saying "4% the effectiveness of the vaccine, compared to effectiveness against original and Delta variants" would communicate numbers better.
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It means 1/25th the number of neutralizing antibodies, after 2 shots, compared to the number of antibodies to the original strains. That is NOT the same as 4% of the effectiveness of the vaccine, as the effectiveness of the vaccine is not measured by antibodies, it is measured by comparing disease rates in vaccinated vs unvaccinated people. A booster shot increases the number of antibodies to omicron 25x.
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"Should mean"? According to who? For instance, the use of the word 'threefold' to mean 'three times as many' goes back at least 1000 years. Pretty sure 'threefold' NEVER meant 'eight times as many'.
This just in... (Score:4, Informative)
Saw a story on the local NBC news in Chicago [nbcchicago.com] that the first omicron case in Illinois has been isolated. The patient is fully vaccinated plus booster.
The buffer has run out (Score:3)
If omicron does reduce neutralization by 40x, then the peak post-2nd-shot antibody level would have barely reached the threshold of protecting against infection by it. The large buffer provided by the high effectiveness of the shots, because they provoked far more than enough antibodies to defeat the ancestral strain, has run out.
The 3rd round of affinity maturation from the booster shot improves neutralization efficiency across the board (it improves neutralization of alpha by ~1.8, closing the gap to almost nil, of beta by ~4 improving the reduction in neutralization to a factor of 2, and of delta by ~2, closing the gap to a factor of 2) and yields peak antibody levels that are about 50% higher than post 2nd dose. But even if it does improve by the largest factor - 4 - that means all together you'll be starting with a titer in the mid hundreds. Which will decay to under 100 within a few months.
The fact that we've gone from the original trials - which reported >99% protection against hospitalization, 96% protection against symptomatic disease and later 94% protection against infection - to "a booster shot will probably keep you from getting seriously ill" - tells you that an updated vaccine is needed.
FTA: "Whether omicron-targeted boosters are needed now still isn’t clear." I'd say the fact that a single person with omicron at a party in Norway where every single attendee was vaccinated managed to infect literally 90 out of 120 people makes it pretty damn clear.
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
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Much depends on the nuance, and there's not a lot of nuance in discussion.
If the long term effect of vaccine is your immune system will protect you from serious illness, but you still can be infected/mildly symptomatic, then I may deem that adequate. It sucks for spreading toward unvaccinated, however at this point they have made their choice and I can't dance around their choice forever.
If instead stale vaccination results in risk of serious illness/hosiptialization/death, then I guess I'm taking the vacci
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It sucks for spreading toward unvaccinated, however at this point they have made their choice and I can't dance around their choice forever.
I wish this was the case, but it seems that very few people are willing to accept that choice. As an example, watch this post get modded troll in no time.
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They are totally different things. Its their choice to not get vaccinated. There is no problem here. We aren't putting them in jail over it like we would a murderer. However, the rest of us don't have to accept it. This is a separate topic from "choice". We don't have to do business with them just like they don't have to do business with us. Believe it or not, this is also one of the few places that even the government has the option; precedent set by our lead founding father: George Washington. Cho
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Actually, vaccines are not very profitable. Just consider that you need one or two shots and that is it (even if it gets repeated each year) and they are cheap. In comparison to some other things pharma companies make, vaccines are peanuts.
As to the more durable solution, I have reasonable expectations that mRNA tech will finally make for a good flu vaccine. The one we currently have is still a lot better than nothing, but there is quite some room for improvement. We may see some very nice other things from
Re:Small print (Score:5, Insightful)
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Rational people will keep their antibody levels up period. Therapeutics aren't cures their treatments. They're not 100%. It would be like not wearing your seatbelt because you have airbags.
Nothing is 100%. And we are all going to die. But are we all going to live before we die?
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Dunno about you, but I am having the time of my life. 2020 was the best year I ever had.
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There is nothing healthy about what you are doing. You are mentally swimming in conspiracy theories and constantly filtering out everything contrary to your personal beliefs and clinging onto every morsel that aligns with you. Going so far as to build entire fantasy worlds far from the reality the rest of us actually partake in.
One would think having people in India, China, Japan, eastern Asia, etc wearing masks for over 2 decades would give you pause to question your beliefs. One would think having half
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Are you really quoting the bible while advocating for being short-sighted and selfish? Ever heard the biblical quote "love thy neighbor as thyself" (Matthew 22:36-40) ? That means not being a selfish git, and helping those around you. Wearing a mask helps those around you. Getting vaccinated helps you, and those around you.
I am so sick and tired of the fucking religious hypocrisy. Even Jesus Christ disagrees with you.
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death rates of fully vaccinated do not differ that substantially from population vaccination rates
Wat
it is hard to make the case that vaccines are a cure either.
Nice straw man there, it'd be a shame if you were to fuck off with it. No wait, it wouldn't.
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Considering that death rates of fully vaccinated do not differ that substantially from population vaccination rates, it is hard to make the case that vaccines are a cure either.
Who exactly is making that case?
https://www.pfizer.com/news/pr... [pfizer.com]
That's the results. What do you have to contradict the results of the tests?
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Erh... for that I'd like to see a source.
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The incidents putting vaccine recipient life at risk are (very roughly) 10 in a million. Even with all those affected dead, three doses for a population of 20 millions means 600 deaths. Just a bit higher than the worst COVID-19 day in Romania, and this fourth wave alone cost us some 23,000 deaths in the last three months (https://datelazi.ro/, official website in Romanian, google translation: https://datelazi-ro.translate.... [translate.goog])
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The incidents putting vaccine recipient life at risk are (very roughly) 10 in a million. Even with all those affected dead, three doses for a population of 20 millions means 600 deaths.
And people who don't have a severe reaction to the first vaccination are unlikely to react negatively to additional vaccinations, so all affected will not die, so the number is definitely even lower.
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You can't ignore that while vaccines are relatively safe, there are rare cases of adverse side effects like myocarditis [hopkinsmedicine.org]. This means that perpetual boosters for endemic COVID are not feasible and boosters should not become routine.
There are side effects to absolutely everything. Water and oxygen are toxic, yet people drown and die from free radical related diseases every day.
But if you refuse to get a vaccine or any medical treatment because of the small number of adverse effects that exactly means you accept and prefer things like Polio, smallpox whooping cough. mumps, and believe you would rather prefer death from Covid-19.
Now of course, those fools don't actually want to die, they are just practicing a stupid form of solipsi
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I can definitely ignore that, since those rare side effects also result from infection with COVID-19 - which is a far more likely scenario than vaccine side effects.
This means that perpetual boosters for endemic COVID are not feasible and boosters should not become routine.
Why not if they are optional? We do this for flu.
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Erh... It's nice to know that there is a cure in case I still get sick, but I'd rather take every precaution I can to not get sick in the first place.
Re:Small print (Score:5, Informative)
Note that I recently had a relative get hit with covid and had all those treatments at his disposal. He lived, but it was about as sick as he could remember getting, and involved several hospital visits before he pulled through. However, he was unvaccinated, and vacinnated family members tested positive, but suffered no or slight significant symptoms. This was recent but before booster shots. Technically before omicron was announced, but at least showed that the vaccine protected well enough 6 months out, even if they were 'infected', they weren't bothered by it.
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Re:Small print (Score:5, Informative)
The problem with all of this is these are all anecdotes. We can find as many as we need to support any position.
For example, I know a guy who had covid in 2020 with almost no symptoms besides as he put it 'a mild cold'. He was reinfected 4 weeks ago and passed out at work and spent time in the ER. He said it was the hardest hitting thing he has ever experienced.
This is why the best we can do is to protect ourselves and society from this thing with every tool we can prove works. I got 3 shots of Moderna, and honestly I'll keep getting them if that is what the science recommends.
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I'll keep doing it so long as the science recommends, but I do want a nuanced picture of what skipping the vaccine booster looks like at any given time.
In my case, both the second and third shot left me with a significant fever, soreness all over, and a massive headache. If the 'get sick without a booster' is 'you might have a mild cough for a few days' then I might take my chances, but if it is absolutely going to be at least as bad as a bad flu, then I'll suck it up and keep getting painfully knocked out
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Re:Small print (Score:5, Interesting)
The funny part is the vaccines are 100% approved while Regeneron is still listed under emergency use (experimental). So everyone complaining about these "untested" vaccines better shut up if they need Regeneron. https://www.fda.gov/media/1456... [fda.gov]
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Not to mention that the vaccine is free but Regeneron is $2100 per dose, along with the bill for the ICU bed, which can be over $10,000 per day if you need a ventilator.
Re:Small print (Score:5, Informative)
To be pedantic, the vaccine isn't free; it costs $20–40 per dose, give or take, depending on which vaccine we're talking about. The government just pays for it. But either way, it's two to three orders of magnitude cheaper to save someone with a vaccine than with monoclonal antibody treatment.
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Why would DeSantis enact such a socialist policy?
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"That's all part of the conspiracy man!" -- some guy, every day it seems
The hypocrisy is funny. But also a little sad because it doesn't seem to embarrass people as it should.
I'm exhausted dealing with the mental gymnastics that insane people have been using to justify their fringe anti-vax beliefs. I like a healthy dose of skepticism and transparency in the process of public health. But when confronted with facts and reason, some people double down on stupid to fight back.
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Using federal funds no less. Regeneron isn't cheap.
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Good thing everyone in the US is otherwise healthy [slashdot.org].
Re:Small print (Score:5, Informative)
Effective therapeutics are widely available. There are monoclonal antibodies
It always confuses me when antivaxers talk about monoclonal antibodies as a effective therapeutic so they don't need to be vaccinated. How do they think monoclonal antibodies are created? They are created by giving a person or an animal the vaccine and collecting the resulting antibodies. Seems simpler and safer to just get the vaccine directly and skip the middleman.
Also, monoclonal antibodies are much more expensive and much more limited than the vaccine and only works during the early stages so they generally won't give it to a younger person who is statistically less likely to die or to someone who is already sick enough to be in the hospital.
Re: Small print (Score:2)
Why buy a vaccine when you can rent one instead?
Re: Small print (Score:5, Insightful)
Why buy a vaccine when you can rent one instead?
Why buy a $10 vaccine when you can have a $10,000 hospital stay instead?
You may even die if you're really unlucky. $10 is money well spend. It's why sensible countries give it for free.
Re: Small print (Score:2)
You obviously don't get my point.
I've had my $10,000 hospital visit and then my share of $10 vaccines. My parent had their $10 vaccines THEN their $10,000 hospital visit.
Re: Small print (Score:4, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3)
Moving the goalpost.. from literal death. That's not much of a goalpost move to most people. Move that goalpost all you like as far as I'm concerned.
Re: Small print (Score:5, Informative)
I counter your anecdote with my own: I know nobody that has been vaccinated that required a visit to a hospital for covid.
We can play the anecdote game all day long, so how about we talk about the probability of severe infection response with regard to vaccination status? Every point of data available shows that the probability is vastly lower that you will have to be admitted to a hospital if you are vaccinated.
Yes, there will be edge cases. No, you should not be making decisions based on the rare edge cases.
Re: (Score:2)
Honestly, the booster for high antibody count doesn't sit well with me. The point for any vaccine isn't to maintain high antibody counts nor to make you completely immune to the virus. Its to train your immune system to provide a good response and to have the response reduce or eliminate the severity of the disease caused by the infection. And to limit the window of transmission so others don't suffer. Obviously this doesn't apply to the immune impaired.
Organizations and funding are so focused on the va
Re: (Score:2)
Honestly, the booster for high antibody count doesn't sit well with me. The point for any vaccine isn't to maintain high antibody counts nor to make you completely immune to the virus.
You're right- but omicron is not a good fit for the vaccine. It's either "take action right now" or wait for an entirely new vaccine to go through the whole pipeline. Pragmatically, higher antibody count is fairly reasonable.
That said, omicron is potentially a good variant to become the dominant endemic strain, but it remains to be seen whether it causes the inflammation risks like blood clotting, myocarditis, and lung issues. So far what I've seen shows that it's mostly just severe cold symptoms like a
Re: (Score:2)
You're worried about "damage" from shots but not from covid? Might want to read up a little bit more on those two things because you might have mixed them up
Re: Small print (Score:2)
The dude hears spike protein and assumes it's like injecting microscopic razor blades... Reading won't help him.. If I was a computer, he would be dispatched to the bit bucket.
Re: (Score:2)
So why on Earth would you want to contract COVID multiple times and get a huge number of spike proteins in your system instead of getting the the vaccine? Natural immunity also wears off, so you're much better off getting the vaccine
Re: Small print (Score:3)
This very interesting and I agree more research needs to be done. Thank you informing me.
I think the problem is there are a lot of factors such as comorbidity relating to risk. I don't think this is enough of a basis to argue for natural immunity.
However, it does make me wonder if an RNA vaccine may have more risk than an inactivated vaccine. I think the RNA is directly used to produce spike proteins and in this, the dose is static without further production of spike proteins. My understanding is limited bu
Re: (Score:3)
So you are advocating for massive unmitigated replication of the spike protein attached to actual viral payloads in vital organs instead of measured doses at an injection site with plenty of time between exposure for the body to recover?
Did you think about that even a little bit before reaching for the submit button?
Re: (Score:3)