Coronavirus prep
Replies
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T1DCarnivoreRunner wrote: »kshama2001 wrote: »SuzySunshine99 wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »No need for a vaccine or masks, the virus will go a way when " it reaches certain numbers and we get herd mentality."
All is good, isn't it?
I said two or three weeks ago I think we'd hit Herd Immunity before we get a vaccine that works, unfortunately. But, here's the good news. Many of us might already have immunity and not know it. Because if this new information is true (and it makes logical sense), many of us mask wearers might already have immunity. We might have been exposed to enough small doses of the virus that the numbers of people that have been exposed now could be much higher than we thought.
The problem is...for true herd immunity, you'd need around 70 percent of the population to be immune, and I don't believe we are anywhere near that infection rate. Given what we assume to be the death rate, if we hit a 70 percent infection rate, it would conservatively cost several million lives in the U.S. alone.
Secondly, we have no idea how long immunity lasts after exposure to this virus. If you had symptoms, do you have better immunity than those that were asymptomatic? If you have antibodies to the virus, does that mean you are immune to future infection? No one knows. This is the problem with a novel virus. Exposure does not necessarily mean immunity.
Yes, assuming Johns Hopkins was correct in the below article saying a 70% immunity rate would be necessary to achieve herd immunity, 70% of 330 million is 231 million infected people. Assuming a conservative 1% mortality rate, that's 2.31 million dead.
https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/from-our-experts/early-herd-immunity-against-covid-19-a-dangerous-misconception
It's not that simple. We know there are some people who have actually gotten re-infected because the immunity lasts only about 3-4 months. So it's actually that 70% of us need to get infected within the same 3 month time frame. This idea that we will reach herd immunity naturally by 2021 or 2022 or something completely ignores that the antibodies don't seem to last. You think hospitals were over-run and not prepared in late Mar. (NYC in particular)? Just wait until 70% of the population is infected simultaneously. Let's not do that.
Agreed to not let's do that
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MikePfirrman wrote: »No need for a vaccine or masks, the virus will go a way when " it reaches certain numbers and we get herd mentality." All is good, isn't it?
I said two or three weeks ago I think we'd hit Herd Immunity before we get a vaccine that works, unfortunately. But, here's the good news. Many of us might already have immunity and not know it. Because if this new information is true (and it makes logical sense), many of us mask wearers might already have immunity. We might have been exposed to enough small doses of the virus that the numbers of people that have been exposed now could be much higher than we thought.
Don’t modern vaccines use adjuvants to enhance immune response ? Wouldn’t that be more protective than casual exposure?4 -
Hey folks - just a reminder for users who may be new to the thread or community, please review community guidelines (link below). One of those guidelines prohibits divisive topics in the main community (if you'd like to discuss something like politics here at MFP, please create or find a group).
https://www.myfitnesspal.com/community-guidelines
Stay healthy,
Em3 -
T1DCarnivoreRunner wrote: »kshama2001 wrote: »SuzySunshine99 wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »No need for a vaccine or masks, the virus will go a way when " it reaches certain numbers and we get herd mentality." All is good, isn't it?
I said two or three weeks ago I think we'd hit Herd Immunity before we get a vaccine that works, unfortunately. But, here's the good news. Many of us might already have immunity and not know it. Because if this new information is true (and it makes logical sense), many of us mask wearers might already have immunity. We might have been exposed to enough small doses of the virus that the numbers of people that have been exposed now could be much higher than we thought.
The problem is...for true herd immunity, you'd need around 70 percent of the population to be immune, and I don't believe we are anywhere near that infection rate. Given what we assume to be the death rate, if we hit a 70 percent infection rate, it would conservatively cost several million lives in the U.S. alone.
Secondly, we have no idea how long immunity lasts after exposure to this virus. If you had symptoms, do you have better immunity than those that were asymptomatic? If you have antibodies to the virus, does that mean you are immune to future infection? No one knows. This is the problem with a novel virus. Exposure does not necessarily mean immunity.
Yes, assuming Johns Hopkins was correct in the below article saying a 70% immunity rate would be necessary to achieve herd immunity, 70% of 330 million is 231 million infected people. Assuming a conservative 1% mortality rate, that's 2.31 million dead.
https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/from-our-experts/early-herd-immunity-against-covid-19-a-dangerous-misconception
It's not that simple. We know there are some people who have actually gotten re-infected because the immunity lasts only about 3-4 months. So it's actually that 70% of us need to get infected within the same 3 month time frame. This idea that we will reach herd immunity naturally by 2021 or 2022 or something completely ignores that the antibodies don't seem to last. You think hospitals were over-run and not prepared in late Mar. (NYC in particular)? Just wait until 70% of the population is infected simultaneously. Let's not do that.
Don't misinterpret my comments. I've never said, "let's go for herd immunity". What I'm pointing out is that it's happening in front of our eyes because utter incompetence and mixed messaging. And the scientists have already said that, quite frankly, antibodies only matter for stop gap vaccine purposes. They are finding the T Cells have long term memories and now they believe if you've ever had a Coronavirus within the last decade or so, your T Cells will fight it and it shouldn't be that severe.
And the latest models on Herd Immunity have said that (likely) 43% or less need to be infected and we might have herd immunity. I'm just pointing out the obvious. People aren't doing what they are supposed to be doing. The mask deniers and the college students are spreading it rapidly. The CDC talking about comorbidities was the last straw of control that was lost. These are just facts. I still pray, against all odds, that we'll have a vaccine, but I'm not counting on it. I think we'll reach herd immunity first, to be completely honest. But I don't think 2 million will die. At least I hope not. I think Fall, Winter and early Spring will have horrific numbers of dead and, like the Spanish Flu, will taper out late Spring and it will be mostly in our rear view mirror by Summer.
If you add in the fact that many might potentially have immunity from exposure with masks (and low viral loads building immunity) to the fact that many, many more could have had it than official numbers indicate, we could be at 20% to 25% now. That wouldn't entirely shock me. Antibodies don't last, so antibody tests might not show if someone has T Cells that will protect them, so the antibody testing as a litmus test for how much of the population has had isn't an accurate measure. Not at all.
Let me have my dark optimism. Because we're not all of a sudden going to all start listening, have 100% mask compliance and mature up 20 somethings. It's not happening. Even if we had consistency of messaging from the top, local authorities would not enforce a national mask mandate because of politics.
Here's a decent article on the Antibodies versus T Cells on fighting Covid-19.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/health/coronavirus/122807223/coronavirus-us-research-suggests-bigger-role-for-t-cells-than-antibodies-in-fighting-off-covid19
As this article points out, as you age, your T Cells dwindle. That's why this is such an efficient killer of the elderly.
Here's a good article on the 43% versus 70% for herd immunity. A few scientists think it might be 20%.
https://www.boston.com/news/coronavirus/2020/08/17/herd-immunity4 -
MikePfirrman wrote: »T1DCarnivoreRunner wrote: »kshama2001 wrote: »SuzySunshine99 wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »No need for a vaccine or masks, the virus will go a way when " it reaches certain numbers and we get herd mentality." All is good, isn't it?
I said two or three weeks ago I think we'd hit Herd Immunity before we get a vaccine that works, unfortunately. But, here's the good news. Many of us might already have immunity and not know it. Because if this new information is true (and it makes logical sense), many of us mask wearers might already have immunity. We might have been exposed to enough small doses of the virus that the numbers of people that have been exposed now could be much higher than we thought.
The problem is...for true herd immunity, you'd need around 70 percent of the population to be immune, and I don't believe we are anywhere near that infection rate. Given what we assume to be the death rate, if we hit a 70 percent infection rate, it would conservatively cost several million lives in the U.S. alone.
Secondly, we have no idea how long immunity lasts after exposure to this virus. If you had symptoms, do you have better immunity than those that were asymptomatic? If you have antibodies to the virus, does that mean you are immune to future infection? No one knows. This is the problem with a novel virus. Exposure does not necessarily mean immunity.
Yes, assuming Johns Hopkins was correct in the below article saying a 70% immunity rate would be necessary to achieve herd immunity, 70% of 330 million is 231 million infected people. Assuming a conservative 1% mortality rate, that's 2.31 million dead.
https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/from-our-experts/early-herd-immunity-against-covid-19-a-dangerous-misconception
It's not that simple. We know there are some people who have actually gotten re-infected because the immunity lasts only about 3-4 months. So it's actually that 70% of us need to get infected within the same 3 month time frame. This idea that we will reach herd immunity naturally by 2021 or 2022 or something completely ignores that the antibodies don't seem to last. You think hospitals were over-run and not prepared in late Mar. (NYC in particular)? Just wait until 70% of the population is infected simultaneously. Let's not do that.
Don't misinterpret my comments. I've never said, "let's go for herd immunity". What I'm pointing out is that it's happening in front of our eyes because utter incompetence and mixed messaging. And the scientists have already said that, quite frankly, antibodies only matter for stop gap vaccine purposes. They are finding the T Cells have long term memories and now they believe if you've ever had a Coronavirus within the last decade or so, your T Cells will fight it and it shouldn't be that severe.
And the latest models on Herd Immunity have said that (likely) 43% or less need to be infected and we might have herd immunity. I'm just pointing out the obvious. People aren't doing what they are supposed to be doing. The mask deniers and the college students are spreading it rapidly. The CDC talking about comorbidities was the last straw of control that was lost. These are just facts. I still pray, against all odds, that we'll have a vaccine, but I'm not counting on it. I think we'll reach herd immunity first, to be completely honest. But I don't think 2 million will die. At least I hope not. I think Fall, Winter and early Spring will have horrific numbers of dead and, like the Spanish Flu, will taper out late Spring and it will be mostly in our rear view mirror by Summer.
If you add in the fact that many might potentially have immunity from exposure with masks (and low viral loads building immunity) to the fact that many, many more could have had it than official numbers indicate, we could be at 20% to 25% now. That wouldn't entirely shock me. Antibodies don't last, so antibody tests might not show if someone has T Cells that will protect them, so the antibody testing as a litmus test for how much of the population has had isn't an accurate measure. Not at all.
Let me have my dark optimism. Because we're not all of a sudden going to all start listening, have 100% mask compliance and mature up 20 somethings. It's not happening. Even if we had consistency of messaging from the top, local authorities would not enforce a national mask mandate because of politics.
Here's a decent article on the Antibodies versus T Cells on fighting Covid-19.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/health/coronavirus/122807223/coronavirus-us-research-suggests-bigger-role-for-t-cells-than-antibodies-in-fighting-off-covid19
As this article points out, as you age, your T Cells dwindle. That's why this is such an efficient killer of the elderly.
Here's a good article on the 43% versus 70% for herd immunity. A few scientists think it might be 20%.
https://www.boston.com/news/coronavirus/2020/08/17/herd-immunity
All fair points. Personally, I don't see sufficient herd immunity happening until we have that artificial immunity from a vaccine. Even then, I don't see this ever going away, but rather just becoming less commonly spread. Unlike SARS, which was contained and killed, this is already too widespread to contain to elimination.6 -
@T1DCarnivoreRunner -- yeah, there were several early scenarios with the worst one being that this would be around forever, like the seasonal flu, with no true long term vaccine ever found. It's shaping up like that. When I say "herd immunity", I'm talking not loss of massive life -- 100's or 1000's a day. I think we're going to have to keep protections in place for the elderly for years. With their lack of T Cells, it's going to be hard. But with time, the virus has mutated to be more contagious but much less deadly. The strain that hit NYC on was much more deadly than the one that hit CA and the West Coast, though those were more contagious. I'm hoping it continues that way. SARS wasn't nearly as contagious.
Where the antibodies could come into play (if they never find a long term vaccine) is for added protection for the elderly. I could see that as a game plan. I'm not convinced they have any vaccine that has lasting effects.3 -
This is a great article on the overview of where we're at. It's a long one but a good one on the challenges and the stark reality that we may never find the "silver bullet" vaccine.
https://www.newyorker.com/science/medical-dispatch/the-state-of-the-fight-against-covid-191 -
Meanwhile, I see there is a confirmed human case of EEE (Eastern equine encephalitis) in Barry County, MI. This is in addition to 22 horses in 10 counties in the same area.
The fatality rate in humans is somewhere around 33% with many survivors having permanent disabilities. It's spread by mosquitoes, so hopefully in MI, it will be turning cold enough soon enough.9 -
MikePfirrman wrote: »T1DCarnivoreRunner wrote: »kshama2001 wrote: »SuzySunshine99 wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »No need for a vaccine or masks, the virus will go a way when " it reaches certain numbers and we get herd mentality." All is good, isn't it?
I said two or three weeks ago I think we'd hit Herd Immunity before we get a vaccine that works, unfortunately. But, here's the good news. Many of us might already have immunity and not know it. Because if this new information is true (and it makes logical sense), many of us mask wearers might already have immunity. We might have been exposed to enough small doses of the virus that the numbers of people that have been exposed now could be much higher than we thought.
The problem is...for true herd immunity, you'd need around 70 percent of the population to be immune, and I don't believe we are anywhere near that infection rate. Given what we assume to be the death rate, if we hit a 70 percent infection rate, it would conservatively cost several million lives in the U.S. alone.
Secondly, we have no idea how long immunity lasts after exposure to this virus. If you had symptoms, do you have better immunity than those that were asymptomatic? If you have antibodies to the virus, does that mean you are immune to future infection? No one knows. This is the problem with a novel virus. Exposure does not necessarily mean immunity.
Yes, assuming Johns Hopkins was correct in the below article saying a 70% immunity rate would be necessary to achieve herd immunity, 70% of 330 million is 231 million infected people. Assuming a conservative 1% mortality rate, that's 2.31 million dead.
https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/from-our-experts/early-herd-immunity-against-covid-19-a-dangerous-misconception
It's not that simple. We know there are some people who have actually gotten re-infected because the immunity lasts only about 3-4 months. So it's actually that 70% of us need to get infected within the same 3 month time frame. This idea that we will reach herd immunity naturally by 2021 or 2022 or something completely ignores that the antibodies don't seem to last. You think hospitals were over-run and not prepared in late Mar. (NYC in particular)? Just wait until 70% of the population is infected simultaneously. Let's not do that.
Don't misinterpret my comments. I've never said, "let's go for herd immunity". What I'm pointing out is that it's happening in front of our eyes because utter incompetence and mixed messaging. And the scientists have already said that, quite frankly, antibodies only matter for stop gap vaccine purposes. They are finding the T Cells have long term memories and now they believe if you've ever had a Coronavirus within the last decade or so, your T Cells will fight it and it shouldn't be that severe.
I'm feeling cranky I guess, but after reading things like this that you have posted several times, I have to say: This is not news. You keep saying this like it's some new discovery, but the "memory" function of T-cells with respect to previously encountered viruses has been known for a long time. The news with respect to covid, as I understand it, is that they have found T-cell responses to covid in significant percentages (20% to 50%) of subjects who are not believed to have previous exposure to covid, and even in stored blood from several years before the first known cases of covid, so either covid has been circulating in the human population for a lot longer than we've known, or previous exposure to some other coronaviruses makes it possible for the T-cell system to recognize covid and respond.
8 -
Just saw a set of "man-on-the-street" interviews about covid deaths in the U.S. on NBC News. Obviously, not a scientific survey, and you don't know how many people they asked to find the uninformed ones they broadcast, but people were saying they thought "thousands," "1900" and "tens of thousands" of people have died in the U.S. so far from covid (it's actually just shy of 200,000 as of today). How can we expect people to take it seriously if they don't know that it's on target to be one of the top three causes of death this year, behind heart disease and cancer?12
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lynn_glenmont wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »T1DCarnivoreRunner wrote: »kshama2001 wrote: »SuzySunshine99 wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »No need for a vaccine or masks, the virus will go a way when " it reaches certain numbers and we get herd mentality." All is good, isn't it?
I said two or three weeks ago I think we'd hit Herd Immunity before we get a vaccine that works, unfortunately. But, here's the good news. Many of us might already have immunity and not know it. Because if this new information is true (and it makes logical sense), many of us mask wearers might already have immunity. We might have been exposed to enough small doses of the virus that the numbers of people that have been exposed now could be much higher than we thought.
The problem is...for true herd immunity, you'd need around 70 percent of the population to be immune, and I don't believe we are anywhere near that infection rate. Given what we assume to be the death rate, if we hit a 70 percent infection rate, it would conservatively cost several million lives in the U.S. alone.
Secondly, we have no idea how long immunity lasts after exposure to this virus. If you had symptoms, do you have better immunity than those that were asymptomatic? If you have antibodies to the virus, does that mean you are immune to future infection? No one knows. This is the problem with a novel virus. Exposure does not necessarily mean immunity.
Yes, assuming Johns Hopkins was correct in the below article saying a 70% immunity rate would be necessary to achieve herd immunity, 70% of 330 million is 231 million infected people. Assuming a conservative 1% mortality rate, that's 2.31 million dead.
https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/from-our-experts/early-herd-immunity-against-covid-19-a-dangerous-misconception
It's not that simple. We know there are some people who have actually gotten re-infected because the immunity lasts only about 3-4 months. So it's actually that 70% of us need to get infected within the same 3 month time frame. This idea that we will reach herd immunity naturally by 2021 or 2022 or something completely ignores that the antibodies don't seem to last. You think hospitals were over-run and not prepared in late Mar. (NYC in particular)? Just wait until 70% of the population is infected simultaneously. Let's not do that.
Don't misinterpret my comments. I've never said, "let's go for herd immunity". What I'm pointing out is that it's happening in front of our eyes because utter incompetence and mixed messaging. And the scientists have already said that, quite frankly, antibodies only matter for stop gap vaccine purposes. They are finding the T Cells have long term memories and now they believe if you've ever had a Coronavirus within the last decade or so, your T Cells will fight it and it shouldn't be that severe.
I'm feeling cranky I guess, but after reading things like this that you have posted several times, I have to say: This is not news. You keep saying this like it's some new discovery, but the "memory" function of T-cells with respect to previously encountered viruses has been known for a long time. The news with respect to covid, as I understand it, is that they have found T-cell responses to covid in significant percentages (20% to 50%) of subjects who are not believed to have previous exposure to covid, and even in stored blood from several years before the first known cases of covid, so either covid has been circulating in the human population for a lot longer than we've known, or previous exposure to some other coronaviruses makes it possible for the T-cell system to recognize covid and respond.
You're right. It's not news. It's not news to you. It's not news to me as I have studied immunology due to teaching an intensive Health class for the homeschool co-op which included a lot of human physiology. It should have been a college class. The teaching prep for that class consumed my life for a semester.
Most people are NOT taught this in public education. I wasn't. I didn't take Anatomy/Physiology in high school or college. My high school health class in my public school was a joke and talked most about drugs, alcohol, tobacco, and sex and not to do any of it.
Most people haven't heard of T-cells either! I had heard of T-cells, but I never really knew how they work. I only know b/c I am such a neurotic nerd that I have to know EVERYTHING I'm going to teach in a class and must be able to answer any possible question I might be asked. So I take a deep dive. I'm a terribly curious person. So if I feel like I'm ignorant about something, then I do something about that. The sad fact is that it seems like 90% of people on the street have no idea how the body fights disease whatsoever. They either never knew, only got a smattering that wasn't in depth (me in school), or have forgotten it. And I couldn't possibly tell you the percentage of curious people accurately, but I tell you from experience, and I'm certain many would concur, that in general people are 99% uncurious most of the time these days and allow cognitive dissonance to silence that leftover 1%. All many read are the headlines. And they do not read the science. And even if the science is revised to be easier to understand, they still won't read it if that goes against their chosen belief system. Many don't trust experts and prefer what their chosen news source tells them. Some news sources don't even post/report science. And as I have posited above, if they did, it would go unread by some. The way this is right now, and being continually reminded that people are like this, makes me cranky so I completely understand cranky. 
I don't think reiterating it so that the people with unenlightened yet thirsty brains reading this can be exposed is unreasonable even if the repetition is annoying.15 -
JustSomeEm wrote: »
Hey folks - just a reminder for users who may be new to the thread or community, please review community guidelines (link below). One of those guidelines prohibits divisive topics in the main community (if you'd like to discuss something like politics here at MFP, please create or find a group).
https://www.myfitnesspal.com/community-guidelines
Stay healthy,
Em
I think we've done a remarkable job keeping this thread going for 6 months without getting (too) political, as discussing the coronavirus without politics is like talking about the Titanic while leaving out the iceberg, but I am of course willing to abide by the guidelines.
I've looked for political groups here in the past and didn't find any. If anyone has one here or wants to start one, please link. Current events are much on my mind these days.8 -
lynn_glenmont wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »T1DCarnivoreRunner wrote: »kshama2001 wrote: »SuzySunshine99 wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »No need for a vaccine or masks, the virus will go a way when " it reaches certain numbers and we get herd mentality." All is good, isn't it?
I said two or three weeks ago I think we'd hit Herd Immunity before we get a vaccine that works, unfortunately. But, here's the good news. Many of us might already have immunity and not know it. Because if this new information is true (and it makes logical sense), many of us mask wearers might already have immunity. We might have been exposed to enough small doses of the virus that the numbers of people that have been exposed now could be much higher than we thought.
The problem is...for true herd immunity, you'd need around 70 percent of the population to be immune, and I don't believe we are anywhere near that infection rate. Given what we assume to be the death rate, if we hit a 70 percent infection rate, it would conservatively cost several million lives in the U.S. alone.
Secondly, we have no idea how long immunity lasts after exposure to this virus. If you had symptoms, do you have better immunity than those that were asymptomatic? If you have antibodies to the virus, does that mean you are immune to future infection? No one knows. This is the problem with a novel virus. Exposure does not necessarily mean immunity.
Yes, assuming Johns Hopkins was correct in the below article saying a 70% immunity rate would be necessary to achieve herd immunity, 70% of 330 million is 231 million infected people. Assuming a conservative 1% mortality rate, that's 2.31 million dead.
https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/from-our-experts/early-herd-immunity-against-covid-19-a-dangerous-misconception
It's not that simple. We know there are some people who have actually gotten re-infected because the immunity lasts only about 3-4 months. So it's actually that 70% of us need to get infected within the same 3 month time frame. This idea that we will reach herd immunity naturally by 2021 or 2022 or something completely ignores that the antibodies don't seem to last. You think hospitals were over-run and not prepared in late Mar. (NYC in particular)? Just wait until 70% of the population is infected simultaneously. Let's not do that.
Don't misinterpret my comments. I've never said, "let's go for herd immunity". What I'm pointing out is that it's happening in front of our eyes because utter incompetence and mixed messaging. And the scientists have already said that, quite frankly, antibodies only matter for stop gap vaccine purposes. They are finding the T Cells have long term memories and now they believe if you've ever had a Coronavirus within the last decade or so, your T Cells will fight it and it shouldn't be that severe.
I'm feeling cranky I guess, but after reading things like this that you have posted several times, I have to say: This is not news. You keep saying this like it's some new discovery, but the "memory" function of T-cells with respect to previously encountered viruses has been known for a long time. The news with respect to covid, as I understand it, is that they have found T-cell responses to covid in significant percentages (20% to 50%) of subjects who are not believed to have previous exposure to covid, and even in stored blood from several years before the first known cases of covid, so either covid has been circulating in the human population for a lot longer than we've known, or previous exposure to some other coronaviruses makes it possible for the T-cell system to recognize covid and respond.
I agree completely. The only reason I kept bringing it up is all people were talking about is antibodies and saying things like, "the antibodies are short lived, so immunity won't last". I had to keep pointing out that antibodies are great, but the T-Cells is where the long lasting immunity comes from.
And related to Herd Immunity, if what you're saying about some not even exposed to Covid-19 have T-Cells that are protecting them (and again I agree 100% with you and the science on it), then that's precisely why we might not have to get to 70% of the population having Covid-19 to get to herd immunity.
So I think we're in total agreement except you're assuming that these are well known facts. Obviously, they aren't or we wouldn't still be hearing about antibodies as the only defense and 70% of the population needs to get Covid-19 to get to Herd immunity. Neither of which I believe is true and it sounds like you support that?
You likely know science more than the rest of us, which is great. It's helpful to the rest of us.6 -
MikePfirrman wrote: »lynn_glenmont wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »T1DCarnivoreRunner wrote: »kshama2001 wrote: »SuzySunshine99 wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »No need for a vaccine or masks, the virus will go a way when " it reaches certain numbers and we get herd mentality." All is good, isn't it?
I said two or three weeks ago I think we'd hit Herd Immunity before we get a vaccine that works, unfortunately. But, here's the good news. Many of us might already have immunity and not know it. Because if this new information is true (and it makes logical sense), many of us mask wearers might already have immunity. We might have been exposed to enough small doses of the virus that the numbers of people that have been exposed now could be much higher than we thought.
The problem is...for true herd immunity, you'd need around 70 percent of the population to be immune, and I don't believe we are anywhere near that infection rate. Given what we assume to be the death rate, if we hit a 70 percent infection rate, it would conservatively cost several million lives in the U.S. alone.
Secondly, we have no idea how long immunity lasts after exposure to this virus. If you had symptoms, do you have better immunity than those that were asymptomatic? If you have antibodies to the virus, does that mean you are immune to future infection? No one knows. This is the problem with a novel virus. Exposure does not necessarily mean immunity.
Yes, assuming Johns Hopkins was correct in the below article saying a 70% immunity rate would be necessary to achieve herd immunity, 70% of 330 million is 231 million infected people. Assuming a conservative 1% mortality rate, that's 2.31 million dead.
https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/from-our-experts/early-herd-immunity-against-covid-19-a-dangerous-misconception
It's not that simple. We know there are some people who have actually gotten re-infected because the immunity lasts only about 3-4 months. So it's actually that 70% of us need to get infected within the same 3 month time frame. This idea that we will reach herd immunity naturally by 2021 or 2022 or something completely ignores that the antibodies don't seem to last. You think hospitals were over-run and not prepared in late Mar. (NYC in particular)? Just wait until 70% of the population is infected simultaneously. Let's not do that.
Don't misinterpret my comments. I've never said, "let's go for herd immunity". What I'm pointing out is that it's happening in front of our eyes because utter incompetence and mixed messaging. And the scientists have already said that, quite frankly, antibodies only matter for stop gap vaccine purposes. They are finding the T Cells have long term memories and now they believe if you've ever had a Coronavirus within the last decade or so, your T Cells will fight it and it shouldn't be that severe.
I'm feeling cranky I guess, but after reading things like this that you have posted several times, I have to say: This is not news. You keep saying this like it's some new discovery, but the "memory" function of T-cells with respect to previously encountered viruses has been known for a long time. The news with respect to covid, as I understand it, is that they have found T-cell responses to covid in significant percentages (20% to 50%) of subjects who are not believed to have previous exposure to covid, and even in stored blood from several years before the first known cases of covid, so either covid has been circulating in the human population for a lot longer than we've known, or previous exposure to some other coronaviruses makes it possible for the T-cell system to recognize covid and respond.
I agree completely. The only reason I kept bringing it up is all people were talking about is antibodies and saying things like, "the antibodies are short lived, so immunity won't last". I had to keep pointing out that antibodies are great, but the T-Cells is where the long lasting immunity comes from.
And related to Herd Immunity, if what you're saying about some not even exposed to Covid-19 have T-Cells that are protecting them (and again I agree 100% with you and the science on it), then that's precisely why we might not have to get to 70% of the population having Covid-19 to get to herd immunity.
So I think we're in total agreement except you're assuming that these are well known facts. Obviously, they aren't or we wouldn't still be hearing about antibodies as the only defense and 70% of the population needs to get Covid-19 to get to Herd immunity. Neither of which I believe is true and it sounds like you support that?
You likely know science more than the rest of us, which is great. It's helpful to the rest of us.
None of that explains the re-infections, though. If T-Cells were good enough after anti-bodies are gone, we wouldn't see re-infections... and that is something that indicates herd immunity cannot be achieved over several years.4 -
T1DCarnivoreRunner wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »lynn_glenmont wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »T1DCarnivoreRunner wrote: »kshama2001 wrote: »SuzySunshine99 wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »No need for a vaccine or masks, the virus will go a way when " it reaches certain numbers and we get herd mentality." All is good, isn't it?
I said two or three weeks ago I think we'd hit Herd Immunity before we get a vaccine that works, unfortunately. But, here's the good news. Many of us might already have immunity and not know it. Because if this new information is true (and it makes logical sense), many of us mask wearers might already have immunity. We might have been exposed to enough small doses of the virus that the numbers of people that have been exposed now could be much higher than we thought.
The problem is...for true herd immunity, you'd need around 70 percent of the population to be immune, and I don't believe we are anywhere near that infection rate. Given what we assume to be the death rate, if we hit a 70 percent infection rate, it would conservatively cost several million lives in the U.S. alone.
Secondly, we have no idea how long immunity lasts after exposure to this virus. If you had symptoms, do you have better immunity than those that were asymptomatic? If you have antibodies to the virus, does that mean you are immune to future infection? No one knows. This is the problem with a novel virus. Exposure does not necessarily mean immunity.
Yes, assuming Johns Hopkins was correct in the below article saying a 70% immunity rate would be necessary to achieve herd immunity, 70% of 330 million is 231 million infected people. Assuming a conservative 1% mortality rate, that's 2.31 million dead.
https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/from-our-experts/early-herd-immunity-against-covid-19-a-dangerous-misconception
It's not that simple. We know there are some people who have actually gotten re-infected because the immunity lasts only about 3-4 months. So it's actually that 70% of us need to get infected within the same 3 month time frame. This idea that we will reach herd immunity naturally by 2021 or 2022 or something completely ignores that the antibodies don't seem to last. You think hospitals were over-run and not prepared in late Mar. (NYC in particular)? Just wait until 70% of the population is infected simultaneously. Let's not do that.
Don't misinterpret my comments. I've never said, "let's go for herd immunity". What I'm pointing out is that it's happening in front of our eyes because utter incompetence and mixed messaging. And the scientists have already said that, quite frankly, antibodies only matter for stop gap vaccine purposes. They are finding the T Cells have long term memories and now they believe if you've ever had a Coronavirus within the last decade or so, your T Cells will fight it and it shouldn't be that severe.
I'm feeling cranky I guess, but after reading things like this that you have posted several times, I have to say: This is not news. You keep saying this like it's some new discovery, but the "memory" function of T-cells with respect to previously encountered viruses has been known for a long time. The news with respect to covid, as I understand it, is that they have found T-cell responses to covid in significant percentages (20% to 50%) of subjects who are not believed to have previous exposure to covid, and even in stored blood from several years before the first known cases of covid, so either covid has been circulating in the human population for a lot longer than we've known, or previous exposure to some other coronaviruses makes it possible for the T-cell system to recognize covid and respond.
I agree completely. The only reason I kept bringing it up is all people were talking about is antibodies and saying things like, "the antibodies are short lived, so immunity won't last". I had to keep pointing out that antibodies are great, but the T-Cells is where the long lasting immunity comes from.
And related to Herd Immunity, if what you're saying about some not even exposed to Covid-19 have T-Cells that are protecting them (and again I agree 100% with you and the science on it), then that's precisely why we might not have to get to 70% of the population having Covid-19 to get to herd immunity.
So I think we're in total agreement except you're assuming that these are well known facts. Obviously, they aren't or we wouldn't still be hearing about antibodies as the only defense and 70% of the population needs to get Covid-19 to get to Herd immunity. Neither of which I believe is true and it sounds like you support that?
You likely know science more than the rest of us, which is great. It's helpful to the rest of us.
None of that explains the re-infections, though. If T-Cells were good enough after anti-bodies are gone, we wouldn't see re-infections... and that is something that indicates herd immunity cannot be achieved over several years.
So far, I've only read about one documented reinfection, at least in the US. There haven't been a ton to my knowledge.
There have been some, but not a lot.
https://science.slashdot.org/story/20/08/24/1933220/first-covid-19-reinfection-has-been-documented
If I'm not mistaken, what I think they are saying in this article is that most that have been reinfected are asymptomatic, which is potentially dangerous to those that haven't been exposed yet. And I also believe they are saying the T Cells won't keep you from getting it, they just keep you from getting as seriously ill if you get it.
Now, as you age and your T Cells naturally dwindle, that's the concern.
https://www.statnews.com/2020/08/28/covid-19-reinfection-implications/
If I'm off base with anything I'm saying, I'm not a scientist. That's the way I'm understanding it.4 -
MikePfirrman wrote: »T1DCarnivoreRunner wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »lynn_glenmont wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »T1DCarnivoreRunner wrote: »kshama2001 wrote: »SuzySunshine99 wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »No need for a vaccine or masks, the virus will go a way when " it reaches certain numbers and we get herd mentality." All is good, isn't it?
I said two or three weeks ago I think we'd hit Herd Immunity before we get a vaccine that works, unfortunately. But, here's the good news. Many of us might already have immunity and not know it. Because if this new information is true (and it makes logical sense), many of us mask wearers might already have immunity. We might have been exposed to enough small doses of the virus that the numbers of people that have been exposed now could be much higher than we thought.
The problem is...for true herd immunity, you'd need around 70 percent of the population to be immune, and I don't believe we are anywhere near that infection rate. Given what we assume to be the death rate, if we hit a 70 percent infection rate, it would conservatively cost several million lives in the U.S. alone.
Secondly, we have no idea how long immunity lasts after exposure to this virus. If you had symptoms, do you have better immunity than those that were asymptomatic? If you have antibodies to the virus, does that mean you are immune to future infection? No one knows. This is the problem with a novel virus. Exposure does not necessarily mean immunity.
Yes, assuming Johns Hopkins was correct in the below article saying a 70% immunity rate would be necessary to achieve herd immunity, 70% of 330 million is 231 million infected people. Assuming a conservative 1% mortality rate, that's 2.31 million dead.
https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/from-our-experts/early-herd-immunity-against-covid-19-a-dangerous-misconception
It's not that simple. We know there are some people who have actually gotten re-infected because the immunity lasts only about 3-4 months. So it's actually that 70% of us need to get infected within the same 3 month time frame. This idea that we will reach herd immunity naturally by 2021 or 2022 or something completely ignores that the antibodies don't seem to last. You think hospitals were over-run and not prepared in late Mar. (NYC in particular)? Just wait until 70% of the population is infected simultaneously. Let's not do that.
Don't misinterpret my comments. I've never said, "let's go for herd immunity". What I'm pointing out is that it's happening in front of our eyes because utter incompetence and mixed messaging. And the scientists have already said that, quite frankly, antibodies only matter for stop gap vaccine purposes. They are finding the T Cells have long term memories and now they believe if you've ever had a Coronavirus within the last decade or so, your T Cells will fight it and it shouldn't be that severe.
I'm feeling cranky I guess, but after reading things like this that you have posted several times, I have to say: This is not news. You keep saying this like it's some new discovery, but the "memory" function of T-cells with respect to previously encountered viruses has been known for a long time. The news with respect to covid, as I understand it, is that they have found T-cell responses to covid in significant percentages (20% to 50%) of subjects who are not believed to have previous exposure to covid, and even in stored blood from several years before the first known cases of covid, so either covid has been circulating in the human population for a lot longer than we've known, or previous exposure to some other coronaviruses makes it possible for the T-cell system to recognize covid and respond.
I agree completely. The only reason I kept bringing it up is all people were talking about is antibodies and saying things like, "the antibodies are short lived, so immunity won't last". I had to keep pointing out that antibodies are great, but the T-Cells is where the long lasting immunity comes from.
And related to Herd Immunity, if what you're saying about some not even exposed to Covid-19 have T-Cells that are protecting them (and again I agree 100% with you and the science on it), then that's precisely why we might not have to get to 70% of the population having Covid-19 to get to herd immunity.
So I think we're in total agreement except you're assuming that these are well known facts. Obviously, they aren't or we wouldn't still be hearing about antibodies as the only defense and 70% of the population needs to get Covid-19 to get to Herd immunity. Neither of which I believe is true and it sounds like you support that?
You likely know science more than the rest of us, which is great. It's helpful to the rest of us.
None of that explains the re-infections, though. If T-Cells were good enough after anti-bodies are gone, we wouldn't see re-infections... and that is something that indicates herd immunity cannot be achieved over several years.
So far, I've only read about one documented reinfection, at least in the US. There haven't been a ton to my knowledge.
There have been some, but not a lot.
https://science.slashdot.org/story/20/08/24/1933220/first-covid-19-reinfection-has-been-documented
If I'm not mistaken, what I think they are saying in this article is that most that have been reinfected are asymptomatic, which is potentially dangerous to those that haven't been exposed yet. And I also believe they are saying the T Cells won't keep you from getting it, they just keep you from getting as seriously ill if you get it.
Now, as you age and your T Cells naturally dwindle, that's the concern.
https://www.statnews.com/2020/08/28/covid-19-reinfection-implications/
If I'm off base with anything I'm saying, I'm not a scientist. That's the way I'm understanding it.
I'll admit there aren't a lot of cases to review, but 1 of the 4 in this article was significantly worse the 2nd time. That's not re-assuring: https://news.yahoo.com/coronavirus-twice-experts-discuss-cases-154834889.html1 -
T1DCarnivoreRunner wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »T1DCarnivoreRunner wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »lynn_glenmont wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »T1DCarnivoreRunner wrote: »kshama2001 wrote: »SuzySunshine99 wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »No need for a vaccine or masks, the virus will go a way when " it reaches certain numbers and we get herd mentality." All is good, isn't it?
I said two or three weeks ago I think we'd hit Herd Immunity before we get a vaccine that works, unfortunately. But, here's the good news. Many of us might already have immunity and not know it. Because if this new information is true (and it makes logical sense), many of us mask wearers might already have immunity. We might have been exposed to enough small doses of the virus that the numbers of people that have been exposed now could be much higher than we thought.
The problem is...for true herd immunity, you'd need around 70 percent of the population to be immune, and I don't believe we are anywhere near that infection rate. Given what we assume to be the death rate, if we hit a 70 percent infection rate, it would conservatively cost several million lives in the U.S. alone.
Secondly, we have no idea how long immunity lasts after exposure to this virus. If you had symptoms, do you have better immunity than those that were asymptomatic? If you have antibodies to the virus, does that mean you are immune to future infection? No one knows. This is the problem with a novel virus. Exposure does not necessarily mean immunity.
Yes, assuming Johns Hopkins was correct in the below article saying a 70% immunity rate would be necessary to achieve herd immunity, 70% of 330 million is 231 million infected people. Assuming a conservative 1% mortality rate, that's 2.31 million dead.
https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/from-our-experts/early-herd-immunity-against-covid-19-a-dangerous-misconception
It's not that simple. We know there are some people who have actually gotten re-infected because the immunity lasts only about 3-4 months. So it's actually that 70% of us need to get infected within the same 3 month time frame. This idea that we will reach herd immunity naturally by 2021 or 2022 or something completely ignores that the antibodies don't seem to last. You think hospitals were over-run and not prepared in late Mar. (NYC in particular)? Just wait until 70% of the population is infected simultaneously. Let's not do that.
Don't misinterpret my comments. I've never said, "let's go for herd immunity". What I'm pointing out is that it's happening in front of our eyes because utter incompetence and mixed messaging. And the scientists have already said that, quite frankly, antibodies only matter for stop gap vaccine purposes. They are finding the T Cells have long term memories and now they believe if you've ever had a Coronavirus within the last decade or so, your T Cells will fight it and it shouldn't be that severe.
I'm feeling cranky I guess, but after reading things like this that you have posted several times, I have to say: This is not news. You keep saying this like it's some new discovery, but the "memory" function of T-cells with respect to previously encountered viruses has been known for a long time. The news with respect to covid, as I understand it, is that they have found T-cell responses to covid in significant percentages (20% to 50%) of subjects who are not believed to have previous exposure to covid, and even in stored blood from several years before the first known cases of covid, so either covid has been circulating in the human population for a lot longer than we've known, or previous exposure to some other coronaviruses makes it possible for the T-cell system to recognize covid and respond.
I agree completely. The only reason I kept bringing it up is all people were talking about is antibodies and saying things like, "the antibodies are short lived, so immunity won't last". I had to keep pointing out that antibodies are great, but the T-Cells is where the long lasting immunity comes from.
And related to Herd Immunity, if what you're saying about some not even exposed to Covid-19 have T-Cells that are protecting them (and again I agree 100% with you and the science on it), then that's precisely why we might not have to get to 70% of the population having Covid-19 to get to herd immunity.
So I think we're in total agreement except you're assuming that these are well known facts. Obviously, they aren't or we wouldn't still be hearing about antibodies as the only defense and 70% of the population needs to get Covid-19 to get to Herd immunity. Neither of which I believe is true and it sounds like you support that?
You likely know science more than the rest of us, which is great. It's helpful to the rest of us.
None of that explains the re-infections, though. If T-Cells were good enough after anti-bodies are gone, we wouldn't see re-infections... and that is something that indicates herd immunity cannot be achieved over several years.
So far, I've only read about one documented reinfection, at least in the US. There haven't been a ton to my knowledge.
There have been some, but not a lot.
https://science.slashdot.org/story/20/08/24/1933220/first-covid-19-reinfection-has-been-documented
If I'm not mistaken, what I think they are saying in this article is that most that have been reinfected are asymptomatic, which is potentially dangerous to those that haven't been exposed yet. And I also believe they are saying the T Cells won't keep you from getting it, they just keep you from getting as seriously ill if you get it.
Now, as you age and your T Cells naturally dwindle, that's the concern.
https://www.statnews.com/2020/08/28/covid-19-reinfection-implications/
If I'm off base with anything I'm saying, I'm not a scientist. That's the way I'm understanding it.
I'll admit there aren't a lot of cases to review, but 1 of the 4 in this article was significantly worse the 2nd time. That's not re-assuring: https://news.yahoo.com/coronavirus-twice-experts-discuss-cases-154834889.html
It's absolutely concerning. But as the doctor in that article said, we aren't seeing a lot of folks get sicker the second time and that's very encouraging. He also later says, he's certainly not going to stop wearing a mask.
There's not going to be a clean herd immunity or a clean vaccine. Masks are going to be a key part of this for a long, long time. Likewise, we'll likely have to protect the elderly for years. That's not being pessimistic at all, I just think it will be a long battle and what we're hearing from the CDC just confirms that to me.
I'm going to continue eating outside and avoiding crowds inside indefinitely and I think most of us on here will do that. But I think by the time they prove they have a safe vaccine that's, for instance, 70% effective, most of the new cases will be so rare that I'll likely debate if I should get it. I likely will, but it won't be an easy decision.
Of the vaccines, I'd feel safest taking the Moderna one. Maybe that's just because I've read more about it than the others and they've said they won't involve themselves in a horserace. They want to do it right.5 -
lynn_glenmont wrote: »Just saw a set of "man-on-the-street" interviews about covid deaths in the U.S. on NBC News. Obviously, not a scientific survey, and you don't know how many people they asked to find the uninformed ones they broadcast, but people were saying they thought "thousands," "1900" and "tens of thousands" of people have died in the U.S. so far from covid (it's actually just shy of 200,000 as of today). How can we expect people to take it seriously if they don't know that it's on target to be one of the top three causes of death this year, behind heart disease and cancer?
How do we deal with the fact that people don't apparently know the facts about a lot of things? We probably can't. It just is, upsetting as that may be.4 -
T1DCarnivoreRunner wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »lynn_glenmont wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »T1DCarnivoreRunner wrote: »kshama2001 wrote: »SuzySunshine99 wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »No need for a vaccine or masks, the virus will go a way when " it reaches certain numbers and we get herd mentality." All is good, isn't it?
I said two or three weeks ago I think we'd hit Herd Immunity before we get a vaccine that works, unfortunately. But, here's the good news. Many of us might already have immunity and not know it. Because if this new information is true (and it makes logical sense), many of us mask wearers might already have immunity. We might have been exposed to enough small doses of the virus that the numbers of people that have been exposed now could be much higher than we thought.
The problem is...for true herd immunity, you'd need around 70 percent of the population to be immune, and I don't believe we are anywhere near that infection rate. Given what we assume to be the death rate, if we hit a 70 percent infection rate, it would conservatively cost several million lives in the U.S. alone.
Secondly, we have no idea how long immunity lasts after exposure to this virus. If you had symptoms, do you have better immunity than those that were asymptomatic? If you have antibodies to the virus, does that mean you are immune to future infection? No one knows. This is the problem with a novel virus. Exposure does not necessarily mean immunity.
Yes, assuming Johns Hopkins was correct in the below article saying a 70% immunity rate would be necessary to achieve herd immunity, 70% of 330 million is 231 million infected people. Assuming a conservative 1% mortality rate, that's 2.31 million dead.
https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/from-our-experts/early-herd-immunity-against-covid-19-a-dangerous-misconception
It's not that simple. We know there are some people who have actually gotten re-infected because the immunity lasts only about 3-4 months. So it's actually that 70% of us need to get infected within the same 3 month time frame. This idea that we will reach herd immunity naturally by 2021 or 2022 or something completely ignores that the antibodies don't seem to last. You think hospitals were over-run and not prepared in late Mar. (NYC in particular)? Just wait until 70% of the population is infected simultaneously. Let's not do that.
Don't misinterpret my comments. I've never said, "let's go for herd immunity". What I'm pointing out is that it's happening in front of our eyes because utter incompetence and mixed messaging. And the scientists have already said that, quite frankly, antibodies only matter for stop gap vaccine purposes. They are finding the T Cells have long term memories and now they believe if you've ever had a Coronavirus within the last decade or so, your T Cells will fight it and it shouldn't be that severe.
I'm feeling cranky I guess, but after reading things like this that you have posted several times, I have to say: This is not news. You keep saying this like it's some new discovery, but the "memory" function of T-cells with respect to previously encountered viruses has been known for a long time. The news with respect to covid, as I understand it, is that they have found T-cell responses to covid in significant percentages (20% to 50%) of subjects who are not believed to have previous exposure to covid, and even in stored blood from several years before the first known cases of covid, so either covid has been circulating in the human population for a lot longer than we've known, or previous exposure to some other coronaviruses makes it possible for the T-cell system to recognize covid and respond.
I agree completely. The only reason I kept bringing it up is all people were talking about is antibodies and saying things like, "the antibodies are short lived, so immunity won't last". I had to keep pointing out that antibodies are great, but the T-Cells is where the long lasting immunity comes from.
And related to Herd Immunity, if what you're saying about some not even exposed to Covid-19 have T-Cells that are protecting them (and again I agree 100% with you and the science on it), then that's precisely why we might not have to get to 70% of the population having Covid-19 to get to herd immunity.
So I think we're in total agreement except you're assuming that these are well known facts. Obviously, they aren't or we wouldn't still be hearing about antibodies as the only defense and 70% of the population needs to get Covid-19 to get to Herd immunity. Neither of which I believe is true and it sounds like you support that?
You likely know science more than the rest of us, which is great. It's helpful to the rest of us.
None of that explains the re-infections, though. If T-Cells were good enough after anti-bodies are gone, we wouldn't see re-infections... and that is something that indicates herd immunity cannot be achieved over several years.
It so far doesn't seem like there are a lot of reinfections, though, and the one big example that was confirmed as a reinfection was someone who had it badly before and asymptomatically later, which is not bad news.
I'm on the "we don't know enough to claim to know anything" train, but I do wonder about examples like NYC and Sweden, where I think there may be some form of herd immunity. Current upticks in Italy and Spain (I think the same regions that were hit before, but would love correction), suggest otherwise. I'd heard London was doing well, but am interested in what's going on there.
1 -
baconslave wrote: »lynn_glenmont wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »T1DCarnivoreRunner wrote: »kshama2001 wrote: »SuzySunshine99 wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »No need for a vaccine or masks, the virus will go a way when " it reaches certain numbers and we get herd mentality." All is good, isn't it?
I said two or three weeks ago I think we'd hit Herd Immunity before we get a vaccine that works, unfortunately. But, here's the good news. Many of us might already have immunity and not know it. Because if this new information is true (and it makes logical sense), many of us mask wearers might already have immunity. We might have been exposed to enough small doses of the virus that the numbers of people that have been exposed now could be much higher than we thought.
The problem is...for true herd immunity, you'd need around 70 percent of the population to be immune, and I don't believe we are anywhere near that infection rate. Given what we assume to be the death rate, if we hit a 70 percent infection rate, it would conservatively cost several million lives in the U.S. alone.
Secondly, we have no idea how long immunity lasts after exposure to this virus. If you had symptoms, do you have better immunity than those that were asymptomatic? If you have antibodies to the virus, does that mean you are immune to future infection? No one knows. This is the problem with a novel virus. Exposure does not necessarily mean immunity.
Yes, assuming Johns Hopkins was correct in the below article saying a 70% immunity rate would be necessary to achieve herd immunity, 70% of 330 million is 231 million infected people. Assuming a conservative 1% mortality rate, that's 2.31 million dead.
https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/from-our-experts/early-herd-immunity-against-covid-19-a-dangerous-misconception
It's not that simple. We know there are some people who have actually gotten re-infected because the immunity lasts only about 3-4 months. So it's actually that 70% of us need to get infected within the same 3 month time frame. This idea that we will reach herd immunity naturally by 2021 or 2022 or something completely ignores that the antibodies don't seem to last. You think hospitals were over-run and not prepared in late Mar. (NYC in particular)? Just wait until 70% of the population is infected simultaneously. Let's not do that.
Don't misinterpret my comments. I've never said, "let's go for herd immunity". What I'm pointing out is that it's happening in front of our eyes because utter incompetence and mixed messaging. And the scientists have already said that, quite frankly, antibodies only matter for stop gap vaccine purposes. They are finding the T Cells have long term memories and now they believe if you've ever had a Coronavirus within the last decade or so, your T Cells will fight it and it shouldn't be that severe.
I'm feeling cranky I guess, but after reading things like this that you have posted several times, I have to say: This is not news. You keep saying this like it's some new discovery, but the "memory" function of T-cells with respect to previously encountered viruses has been known for a long time. The news with respect to covid, as I understand it, is that they have found T-cell responses to covid in significant percentages (20% to 50%) of subjects who are not believed to have previous exposure to covid, and even in stored blood from several years before the first known cases of covid, so either covid has been circulating in the human population for a lot longer than we've known, or previous exposure to some other coronaviruses makes it possible for the T-cell system to recognize covid and respond.
You're right. It's not news. It's not news to you. It's not news to me as I have studied immunology due to teaching an intensive Health class for the homeschool co-op which included a lot of human physiology. It should have been a college class. The teaching prep for that class consumed my life for a semester.
Most people are NOT taught this in public education. I wasn't. I didn't take Anatomy/Physiology in high school or college. My high school health class in my public school was a joke and talked most about drugs, alcohol, tobacco, and sex and not to do any of it. Most people haven't heard of T-cells either! I had heard of T-cells, but I never really knew how they work. I only know b/c I am such a neurotic nerd that I have to know EVERYTHING I'm going to teach in a class and must be able to answer any possible question I might be asked. So I take a deep dive. I'm a terribly curious person. So if I feel like I'm ignorant about something, then I do something about that. The sad fact is that it seems like 90% of people on the street have no idea how the body fights disease whatsoever. They either never knew, only got a smattering that wasn't in depth (me in school), or have forgotten it. And I couldn't possibly tell you the percentage of curious people accurately, but I tell you from experience, and I'm certain many would concur, that in general people are 99% uncurious most of the time these days and allow cognitive dissonance to silence that leftover 1%. All many read are the headlines. And they do not read the science. And even if the science is revised to be easier to understand, they still won't read it if that goes against their chosen belief system. Many don't trust experts and prefer what their chosen news source tells them. Some news sources don't even post/report science. And as I have posited above, if they did, it would go unread by some. The way this is right now, and being continually reminded that people are like this, makes me cranky so I completely understand cranky.
I don't think reiterating it so that the people with unenlightened yet thirsty brains reading this can be exposed is unreasonable even if the repetition is annoying.
But it's not being "reiterated" here as a fact. It's being presented as some brand new, game-changing discovery that is the solution to our COVID problems when it would be pretty incomprehensible if this fact about T-cells had not been part of the framework researchers, public health officials, and epidemiologists working on covid have taken into consideration from the beginning.
I'm not objecting to someone not knowing this prior to reading an article recently. I'm objecting to it being repeatedly presented as game-changing information in our present crisis -- something that has just been discovered.
And even in that context I'm not "objecting" to someone reporting something that either they misunderstood or that was misleading and they didn't have prior knowledge to prevent them from accepting the misleading presentation.
I let it go at least twice, but I finally decided that if there were other people on the thread who don't know that the "memory" function of T-cells is not a new discovery and hence not in and of itself likely to change the course of the public health crisis, they might be misled also about how long they need to prep for (which is the topic of the thread, after all).5 -
MikePfirrman wrote: »lynn_glenmont wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »T1DCarnivoreRunner wrote: »kshama2001 wrote: »SuzySunshine99 wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »No need for a vaccine or masks, the virus will go a way when " it reaches certain numbers and we get herd mentality." All is good, isn't it?
I said two or three weeks ago I think we'd hit Herd Immunity before we get a vaccine that works, unfortunately. But, here's the good news. Many of us might already have immunity and not know it. Because if this new information is true (and it makes logical sense), many of us mask wearers might already have immunity. We might have been exposed to enough small doses of the virus that the numbers of people that have been exposed now could be much higher than we thought.
The problem is...for true herd immunity, you'd need around 70 percent of the population to be immune, and I don't believe we are anywhere near that infection rate. Given what we assume to be the death rate, if we hit a 70 percent infection rate, it would conservatively cost several million lives in the U.S. alone.
Secondly, we have no idea how long immunity lasts after exposure to this virus. If you had symptoms, do you have better immunity than those that were asymptomatic? If you have antibodies to the virus, does that mean you are immune to future infection? No one knows. This is the problem with a novel virus. Exposure does not necessarily mean immunity.
Yes, assuming Johns Hopkins was correct in the below article saying a 70% immunity rate would be necessary to achieve herd immunity, 70% of 330 million is 231 million infected people. Assuming a conservative 1% mortality rate, that's 2.31 million dead.
https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/from-our-experts/early-herd-immunity-against-covid-19-a-dangerous-misconception
It's not that simple. We know there are some people who have actually gotten re-infected because the immunity lasts only about 3-4 months. So it's actually that 70% of us need to get infected within the same 3 month time frame. This idea that we will reach herd immunity naturally by 2021 or 2022 or something completely ignores that the antibodies don't seem to last. You think hospitals were over-run and not prepared in late Mar. (NYC in particular)? Just wait until 70% of the population is infected simultaneously. Let's not do that.
Don't misinterpret my comments. I've never said, "let's go for herd immunity". What I'm pointing out is that it's happening in front of our eyes because utter incompetence and mixed messaging. And the scientists have already said that, quite frankly, antibodies only matter for stop gap vaccine purposes. They are finding the T Cells have long term memories and now they believe if you've ever had a Coronavirus within the last decade or so, your T Cells will fight it and it shouldn't be that severe.
I'm feeling cranky I guess, but after reading things like this that you have posted several times, I have to say: This is not news. You keep saying this like it's some new discovery, but the "memory" function of T-cells with respect to previously encountered viruses has been known for a long time. The news with respect to covid, as I understand it, is that they have found T-cell responses to covid in significant percentages (20% to 50%) of subjects who are not believed to have previous exposure to covid, and even in stored blood from several years before the first known cases of covid, so either covid has been circulating in the human population for a lot longer than we've known, or previous exposure to some other coronaviruses makes it possible for the T-cell system to recognize covid and respond.
I agree completely. The only reason I kept bringing it up is all people were talking about is antibodies and saying things like, "the antibodies are short lived, so immunity won't last". I had to keep pointing out that antibodies are great, but the T-Cells is where the long lasting immunity comes from.
And related to Herd Immunity, if what you're saying about some not even exposed to Covid-19 have T-Cells that are protecting them (and again I agree 100% with you and the science on it), then that's precisely why we might not have to get to 70% of the population having Covid-19 to get to herd immunity.
So I think we're in total agreement except you're assuming that these are well known facts. Obviously, they aren't or we wouldn't still be hearing about antibodies as the only defense and 70% of the population needs to get Covid-19 to get to Herd immunity. Neither of which I believe is true and it sounds like you support that?
You likely know science more than the rest of us, which is great. It's helpful to the rest of us.
No, what bothered me is that you phrased it as though it's a new discovery that could change the outlook for the pandemic's path ("they're finding the T-cells have long memories"), when they've known this for a long time. I think people who don't know that could be misled into thinking "Yay, our bodies have this heretofore undiscovered super power and we're saved. Off with the masks! Let's stop for a cold one at the bar on our way to visit Grandma!"4 -
MikePfirrman wrote: »lynn_glenmont wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »T1DCarnivoreRunner wrote: »kshama2001 wrote: »SuzySunshine99 wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »No need for a vaccine or masks, the virus will go a way when " it reaches certain numbers and we get herd mentality." All is good, isn't it?
I said two or three weeks ago I think we'd hit Herd Immunity before we get a vaccine that works, unfortunately. But, here's the good news. Many of us might already have immunity and not know it. Because if this new information is true (and it makes logical sense), many of us mask wearers might already have immunity. We might have been exposed to enough small doses of the virus that the numbers of people that have been exposed now could be much higher than we thought.
The problem is...for true herd immunity, you'd need around 70 percent of the population to be immune, and I don't believe we are anywhere near that infection rate. Given what we assume to be the death rate, if we hit a 70 percent infection rate, it would conservatively cost several million lives in the U.S. alone.
Secondly, we have no idea how long immunity lasts after exposure to this virus. If you had symptoms, do you have better immunity than those that were asymptomatic? If you have antibodies to the virus, does that mean you are immune to future infection? No one knows. This is the problem with a novel virus. Exposure does not necessarily mean immunity.
Yes, assuming Johns Hopkins was correct in the below article saying a 70% immunity rate would be necessary to achieve herd immunity, 70% of 330 million is 231 million infected people. Assuming a conservative 1% mortality rate, that's 2.31 million dead.
https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/from-our-experts/early-herd-immunity-against-covid-19-a-dangerous-misconception
It's not that simple. We know there are some people who have actually gotten re-infected because the immunity lasts only about 3-4 months. So it's actually that 70% of us need to get infected within the same 3 month time frame. This idea that we will reach herd immunity naturally by 2021 or 2022 or something completely ignores that the antibodies don't seem to last. You think hospitals were over-run and not prepared in late Mar. (NYC in particular)? Just wait until 70% of the population is infected simultaneously. Let's not do that.
Don't misinterpret my comments. I've never said, "let's go for herd immunity". What I'm pointing out is that it's happening in front of our eyes because utter incompetence and mixed messaging. And the scientists have already said that, quite frankly, antibodies only matter for stop gap vaccine purposes. They are finding the T Cells have long term memories and now they believe if you've ever had a Coronavirus within the last decade or so, your T Cells will fight it and it shouldn't be that severe.
I'm feeling cranky I guess, but after reading things like this that you have posted several times, I have to say: This is not news. You keep saying this like it's some new discovery, but the "memory" function of T-cells with respect to previously encountered viruses has been known for a long time. The news with respect to covid, as I understand it, is that they have found T-cell responses to covid in significant percentages (20% to 50%) of subjects who are not believed to have previous exposure to covid, and even in stored blood from several years before the first known cases of covid, so either covid has been circulating in the human population for a lot longer than we've known, or previous exposure to some other coronaviruses makes it possible for the T-cell system to recognize covid and respond.
I agree completely. The only reason I kept bringing it up is all people were talking about is antibodies and saying things like, "the antibodies are short lived, so immunity won't last". I had to keep pointing out that antibodies are great, but the T-Cells is where the long lasting immunity comes from.
And related to Herd Immunity, if what you're saying about some not even exposed to Covid-19 have T-Cells that are protecting them (and again I agree 100% with you and the science on it), then that's precisely why we might not have to get to 70% of the population having Covid-19 to get to herd immunity.
So I think we're in total agreement except you're assuming that these are well known facts. Obviously, they aren't or we wouldn't still be hearing about antibodies as the only defense and 70% of the population needs to get Covid-19 to get to Herd immunity. Neither of which I believe is true and it sounds like you support that?
You likely know science more than the rest of us, which is great. It's helpful to the rest of us.
I doubt I know more science than the rest of "us" at least on average. More than some maybe, probably less than many.
I definitely find the discovery of T-cells responsive to COVID in people not known to be exposed and even blood samples taken before COVID was known to be transmitting in human populations to be very hopeful data.
I appreciate the spirit in which you took my post. Just trying to clarify something I found potentially misleading that is germane to the thread topic.2 -
T1DCarnivoreRunner wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »lynn_glenmont wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »T1DCarnivoreRunner wrote: »kshama2001 wrote: »SuzySunshine99 wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »No need for a vaccine or masks, the virus will go a way when " it reaches certain numbers and we get herd mentality." All is good, isn't it?
I said two or three weeks ago I think we'd hit Herd Immunity before we get a vaccine that works, unfortunately. But, here's the good news. Many of us might already have immunity and not know it. Because if this new information is true (and it makes logical sense), many of us mask wearers might already have immunity. We might have been exposed to enough small doses of the virus that the numbers of people that have been exposed now could be much higher than we thought.
The problem is...for true herd immunity, you'd need around 70 percent of the population to be immune, and I don't believe we are anywhere near that infection rate. Given what we assume to be the death rate, if we hit a 70 percent infection rate, it would conservatively cost several million lives in the U.S. alone.
Secondly, we have no idea how long immunity lasts after exposure to this virus. If you had symptoms, do you have better immunity than those that were asymptomatic? If you have antibodies to the virus, does that mean you are immune to future infection? No one knows. This is the problem with a novel virus. Exposure does not necessarily mean immunity.
Yes, assuming Johns Hopkins was correct in the below article saying a 70% immunity rate would be necessary to achieve herd immunity, 70% of 330 million is 231 million infected people. Assuming a conservative 1% mortality rate, that's 2.31 million dead.
https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/from-our-experts/early-herd-immunity-against-covid-19-a-dangerous-misconception
It's not that simple. We know there are some people who have actually gotten re-infected because the immunity lasts only about 3-4 months. So it's actually that 70% of us need to get infected within the same 3 month time frame. This idea that we will reach herd immunity naturally by 2021 or 2022 or something completely ignores that the antibodies don't seem to last. You think hospitals were over-run and not prepared in late Mar. (NYC in particular)? Just wait until 70% of the population is infected simultaneously. Let's not do that.
Don't misinterpret my comments. I've never said, "let's go for herd immunity". What I'm pointing out is that it's happening in front of our eyes because utter incompetence and mixed messaging. And the scientists have already said that, quite frankly, antibodies only matter for stop gap vaccine purposes. They are finding the T Cells have long term memories and now they believe if you've ever had a Coronavirus within the last decade or so, your T Cells will fight it and it shouldn't be that severe.
I'm feeling cranky I guess, but after reading things like this that you have posted several times, I have to say: This is not news. You keep saying this like it's some new discovery, but the "memory" function of T-cells with respect to previously encountered viruses has been known for a long time. The news with respect to covid, as I understand it, is that they have found T-cell responses to covid in significant percentages (20% to 50%) of subjects who are not believed to have previous exposure to covid, and even in stored blood from several years before the first known cases of covid, so either covid has been circulating in the human population for a lot longer than we've known, or previous exposure to some other coronaviruses makes it possible for the T-cell system to recognize covid and respond.
I agree completely. The only reason I kept bringing it up is all people were talking about is antibodies and saying things like, "the antibodies are short lived, so immunity won't last". I had to keep pointing out that antibodies are great, but the T-Cells is where the long lasting immunity comes from.
And related to Herd Immunity, if what you're saying about some not even exposed to Covid-19 have T-Cells that are protecting them (and again I agree 100% with you and the science on it), then that's precisely why we might not have to get to 70% of the population having Covid-19 to get to herd immunity.
So I think we're in total agreement except you're assuming that these are well known facts. Obviously, they aren't or we wouldn't still be hearing about antibodies as the only defense and 70% of the population needs to get Covid-19 to get to Herd immunity. Neither of which I believe is true and it sounds like you support that?
You likely know science more than the rest of us, which is great. It's helpful to the rest of us.
None of that explains the re-infections, though. If T-Cells were good enough after anti-bodies are gone, we wouldn't see re-infections... and that is something that indicates herd immunity cannot be achieved over several years.
I'm worried about the reinfections, too, but my sense is that there have been a very limited number of documented cases (of course, we're, relatively speaking, in early days yet, and I suspect most people who have been diagnosed with COVID once are on average more cautious than those who haven't about avoiding non-distanced contacts, etc.). I think we need more data on reinfections rates.0 -
This is a second-hand account from a poster on another forum. He claims that two patients at his clinic tested positive twice over a three month time span. When he reported them to the CDC as reinfections, both were reclassified as re-emerging.3
-
kshama2001 wrote: »JustSomeEm wrote: »
Hey folks - just a reminder for users who may be new to the thread or community, please review community guidelines (link below). One of those guidelines prohibits divisive topics in the main community (if you'd like to discuss something like politics here at MFP, please create or find a group).
https://www.myfitnesspal.com/community-guidelines
Stay healthy,
Em
I think we've done a remarkable job keeping this thread going for 6 months without getting (too) political, as discussing the coronavirus without politics is like talking about the Titanic while leaving out the iceberg, but I am of course willing to abide by the guidelines.
I've looked for political groups here in the past and didn't find any. If anyone has one here or wants to start one, please link. Current events are much on my mind these days.
Totally agree. I've been super impressed with everyone's ability to keep politics to a minimum. You guys are absolutely amazing.This is a second-hand account from a poster on another forum. He claims that two patients at his clinic tested positive twice over a three month time span. When he reported them to the CDC as reinfections, both were reclassified as re-emerging.
I'm not beating you up, but I've been amazed at all the 'second-hand' information floating around out there. Much of the narrative seems to be that our organizations are reclassifying things to fit some alternate story. Last week at work I overheard a conversation about people dying from heart disease or other 'normal' causes of death who were tested after death and discovered to have had COVID - so that's what went on their death certificate. My own mother-in-law is a driver for the Amish and has stories like that from their community. All second- or third- (or more) hand. I hate all the mis-information floating around out there.10 -
lynn_glenmont wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »lynn_glenmont wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »T1DCarnivoreRunner wrote: »kshama2001 wrote: »SuzySunshine99 wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »No need for a vaccine or masks, the virus will go a way when " it reaches certain numbers and we get herd mentality." All is good, isn't it?
I said two or three weeks ago I think we'd hit Herd Immunity before we get a vaccine that works, unfortunately. But, here's the good news. Many of us might already have immunity and not know it. Because if this new information is true (and it makes logical sense), many of us mask wearers might already have immunity. We might have been exposed to enough small doses of the virus that the numbers of people that have been exposed now could be much higher than we thought.
The problem is...for true herd immunity, you'd need around 70 percent of the population to be immune, and I don't believe we are anywhere near that infection rate. Given what we assume to be the death rate, if we hit a 70 percent infection rate, it would conservatively cost several million lives in the U.S. alone.
Secondly, we have no idea how long immunity lasts after exposure to this virus. If you had symptoms, do you have better immunity than those that were asymptomatic? If you have antibodies to the virus, does that mean you are immune to future infection? No one knows. This is the problem with a novel virus. Exposure does not necessarily mean immunity.
Yes, assuming Johns Hopkins was correct in the below article saying a 70% immunity rate would be necessary to achieve herd immunity, 70% of 330 million is 231 million infected people. Assuming a conservative 1% mortality rate, that's 2.31 million dead.
https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/from-our-experts/early-herd-immunity-against-covid-19-a-dangerous-misconception
It's not that simple. We know there are some people who have actually gotten re-infected because the immunity lasts only about 3-4 months. So it's actually that 70% of us need to get infected within the same 3 month time frame. This idea that we will reach herd immunity naturally by 2021 or 2022 or something completely ignores that the antibodies don't seem to last. You think hospitals were over-run and not prepared in late Mar. (NYC in particular)? Just wait until 70% of the population is infected simultaneously. Let's not do that.
Don't misinterpret my comments. I've never said, "let's go for herd immunity". What I'm pointing out is that it's happening in front of our eyes because utter incompetence and mixed messaging. And the scientists have already said that, quite frankly, antibodies only matter for stop gap vaccine purposes. They are finding the T Cells have long term memories and now they believe if you've ever had a Coronavirus within the last decade or so, your T Cells will fight it and it shouldn't be that severe.
I'm feeling cranky I guess, but after reading things like this that you have posted several times, I have to say: This is not news. You keep saying this like it's some new discovery, but the "memory" function of T-cells with respect to previously encountered viruses has been known for a long time. The news with respect to covid, as I understand it, is that they have found T-cell responses to covid in significant percentages (20% to 50%) of subjects who are not believed to have previous exposure to covid, and even in stored blood from several years before the first known cases of covid, so either covid has been circulating in the human population for a lot longer than we've known, or previous exposure to some other coronaviruses makes it possible for the T-cell system to recognize covid and respond.
I agree completely. The only reason I kept bringing it up is all people were talking about is antibodies and saying things like, "the antibodies are short lived, so immunity won't last". I had to keep pointing out that antibodies are great, but the T-Cells is where the long lasting immunity comes from.
And related to Herd Immunity, if what you're saying about some not even exposed to Covid-19 have T-Cells that are protecting them (and again I agree 100% with you and the science on it), then that's precisely why we might not have to get to 70% of the population having Covid-19 to get to herd immunity.
So I think we're in total agreement except you're assuming that these are well known facts. Obviously, they aren't or we wouldn't still be hearing about antibodies as the only defense and 70% of the population needs to get Covid-19 to get to Herd immunity. Neither of which I believe is true and it sounds like you support that?
You likely know science more than the rest of us, which is great. It's helpful to the rest of us.
No, what bothered me is that you phrased it as though it's a new discovery that could change the outlook for the pandemic's path ("they're finding the T-cells have long memories"), when they've known this for a long time. I think people who don't know that could be misled into thinking "Yay, our bodies have this heretofore undiscovered super power and we're saved. Off with the masks! Let's stop for a cold one at the bar on our way to visit Grandma!"
Sorry, Lynn, don't mean to imply take off your masks. Not at all. One of my friends is an epidemiologist (but for cancer, not for contagious diseases). Yes, the T Cell memory isn't anything new at all. You're right. But, when they found out that T Cells worked against Covid-19, like if you've had any Coronavirus in the past, was new news about a month ago. Also, scientists were somewhat pleasantly surprised that T Cells were so efficient against it. When they figured this out (not discovered it, bad phrasing on my part), he seemed downright giddy and his best friends are at high-levels fighting this thing. Perhaps I'm relying too much on what he's telling me.
Edit -- I looked it up. It was in May this information came out, so it is older.
https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/05/t-cells-found-covid-19-patients-bode-well-long-term-immunity
From the article:
"Before these studies, researchers didn’t know whether T cells played a role in eliminating SARS-CoV-2, or even whether they could provoke a dangerous immune system overreaction. “These papers are really helpful because they start to define the T cell component of the immune response,” Rasmussen says. But she and other scientists caution that the results do not mean that people who have recovered from COVID-19 are protected from reinfection.
To spark production of antibodies, vaccines against the virus need to stimulate helper T cells, Crotty notes. “It is encouraging that we are seeing good helper T cell responses against SARS-CoV-2 in COVID-19 cases,” he says. The results have other significant implications for vaccine design, says molecular virologist Rachel Graham of the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill."
I gathered there was some question whether our natural immune system could even fight something so foreign to humans.
Promise, it's the last time I'll bring it up!
Not anything controversial at all related to politics, but I don't envy either candidate who wins this next election. We have a very large part of the population that is done with this virus. And it's not done. Not by a long way. My hope is we just have more consistency of message and learn how to better cope with it.1 -
https://apnews.com/a01ddfa2e8ef839b2ee05e2cbcd63169
Sweden spared surge of virus cases but many questions remain
I have been wondering about Sweden of the past 6 months so I find this article interesting.1 -
JustSomeEm wrote: »This is a second-hand account from a poster on another forum. He claims that two patients at his clinic tested positive twice over a three month time span. When he reported them to the CDC as reinfections, both were reclassified as re-emerging.
I'm not beating you up, but I've been amazed at all the 'second-hand' information floating around out there. Much of the narrative seems to be that our organizations are reclassifying things to fit some alternate story. Last week at work I overheard a conversation about people dying from heart disease or other 'normal' causes of death who were tested after death and discovered to have had COVID - so that's what went on their death certificate. My own mother-in-law is a driver for the Amish and has stories like that from their community. All second- or third- (or more) hand. I hate all the mis-information floating around out there.
Agreed. I keep hearing this and all I can think is that it must be just conspiracy theories. Every time I hear this, I ask for them to name someone who has died and their cause of death was incorrectly classified as Covid. I would like a list of names, but even 3 would be useful. But then I can't even get 1 single name. It's all "I heard someone in this city at some point died from X reason and Covid was put on the death certificate instead." (Not trying to be political, I know this because it was a really big news story from MN) - George Floyd was positive for the virus and died for an unrelated reason. Under the common story I hear, people argue that everybody who dies and tests positive for the virus will have Covid listed as the cause of death no matter the true cause of death. But that isn't true for George Floyd, whose official cause of death was correctly reported as homicide. So if there are really mis-classified deaths, why can nobody name someone - anyone - as an example? I can name at least the one case with the same similarities except the death was classified properly.10 -
MikePfirrman wrote: »lynn_glenmont wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »lynn_glenmont wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »T1DCarnivoreRunner wrote: »kshama2001 wrote: »SuzySunshine99 wrote: »MikePfirrman wrote: »No need for a vaccine or masks, the virus will go a way when " it reaches certain numbers and we get herd mentality." All is good, isn't it?
I said two or three weeks ago I think we'd hit Herd Immunity before we get a vaccine that works, unfortunately. But, here's the good news. Many of us might already have immunity and not know it. Because if this new information is true (and it makes logical sense), many of us mask wearers might already have immunity. We might have been exposed to enough small doses of the virus that the numbers of people that have been exposed now could be much higher than we thought.
The problem is...for true herd immunity, you'd need around 70 percent of the population to be immune, and I don't believe we are anywhere near that infection rate. Given what we assume to be the death rate, if we hit a 70 percent infection rate, it would conservatively cost several million lives in the U.S. alone.
Secondly, we have no idea how long immunity lasts after exposure to this virus. If you had symptoms, do you have better immunity than those that were asymptomatic? If you have antibodies to the virus, does that mean you are immune to future infection? No one knows. This is the problem with a novel virus. Exposure does not necessarily mean immunity.
Yes, assuming Johns Hopkins was correct in the below article saying a 70% immunity rate would be necessary to achieve herd immunity, 70% of 330 million is 231 million infected people. Assuming a conservative 1% mortality rate, that's 2.31 million dead.
https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/from-our-experts/early-herd-immunity-against-covid-19-a-dangerous-misconception
It's not that simple. We know there are some people who have actually gotten re-infected because the immunity lasts only about 3-4 months. So it's actually that 70% of us need to get infected within the same 3 month time frame. This idea that we will reach herd immunity naturally by 2021 or 2022 or something completely ignores that the antibodies don't seem to last. You think hospitals were over-run and not prepared in late Mar. (NYC in particular)? Just wait until 70% of the population is infected simultaneously. Let's not do that.
Don't misinterpret my comments. I've never said, "let's go for herd immunity". What I'm pointing out is that it's happening in front of our eyes because utter incompetence and mixed messaging. And the scientists have already said that, quite frankly, antibodies only matter for stop gap vaccine purposes. They are finding the T Cells have long term memories and now they believe if you've ever had a Coronavirus within the last decade or so, your T Cells will fight it and it shouldn't be that severe.
I'm feeling cranky I guess, but after reading things like this that you have posted several times, I have to say: This is not news. You keep saying this like it's some new discovery, but the "memory" function of T-cells with respect to previously encountered viruses has been known for a long time. The news with respect to covid, as I understand it, is that they have found T-cell responses to covid in significant percentages (20% to 50%) of subjects who are not believed to have previous exposure to covid, and even in stored blood from several years before the first known cases of covid, so either covid has been circulating in the human population for a lot longer than we've known, or previous exposure to some other coronaviruses makes it possible for the T-cell system to recognize covid and respond.
I agree completely. The only reason I kept bringing it up is all people were talking about is antibodies and saying things like, "the antibodies are short lived, so immunity won't last". I had to keep pointing out that antibodies are great, but the T-Cells is where the long lasting immunity comes from.
And related to Herd Immunity, if what you're saying about some not even exposed to Covid-19 have T-Cells that are protecting them (and again I agree 100% with you and the science on it), then that's precisely why we might not have to get to 70% of the population having Covid-19 to get to herd immunity.
So I think we're in total agreement except you're assuming that these are well known facts. Obviously, they aren't or we wouldn't still be hearing about antibodies as the only defense and 70% of the population needs to get Covid-19 to get to Herd immunity. Neither of which I believe is true and it sounds like you support that?
You likely know science more than the rest of us, which is great. It's helpful to the rest of us.
No, what bothered me is that you phrased it as though it's a new discovery that could change the outlook for the pandemic's path ("they're finding the T-cells have long memories"), when they've known this for a long time. I think people who don't know that could be misled into thinking "Yay, our bodies have this heretofore undiscovered super power and we're saved. Off with the masks! Let's stop for a cold one at the bar on our way to visit Grandma!"
Sorry, Lynn, don't mean to imply take off your masks. Not at all. One of my friends is an epidemiologist (but for cancer, not for contagious diseases). Yes, the T Cell memory isn't anything new at all. You're right. But, when they found out that T Cells worked against Covid-19, like if you've had any Coronavirus in the past, was new news about a month ago. Also, scientists were somewhat pleasantly surprised that T Cells were so efficient against it. When they figured this out (not discovered it, bad phrasing on my part), he seemed downright giddy and his best friends are at high-levels fighting this thing. Perhaps I'm relying too much on what he's telling me.
Edit -- I looked it up. It was in May this information came out, so it is older.
https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/05/t-cells-found-covid-19-patients-bode-well-long-term-immunity
From the article:
"Before these studies, researchers didn’t know whether T cells played a role in eliminating SARS-CoV-2, or even whether they could provoke a dangerous immune system overreaction. “These papers are really helpful because they start to define the T cell component of the immune response,” Rasmussen says. But she and other scientists caution that the results do not mean that people who have recovered from COVID-19 are protected from reinfection.
To spark production of antibodies, vaccines against the virus need to stimulate helper T cells, Crotty notes. “It is encouraging that we are seeing good helper T cell responses against SARS-CoV-2 in COVID-19 cases,” he says. The results have other significant implications for vaccine design, says molecular virologist Rachel Graham of the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill."
I gathered there was some question whether our natural immune system could even fight something so foreign to humans.
Promise, it's the last time I'll bring it up!
Not anything controversial at all related to politics, but I don't envy either candidate who wins this next election. We have a very large part of the population that is done with this virus. And it's not done. Not by a long way. My hope is we just have more consistency of message and learn how to better cope with it.
Yeah. I'm sure there were folks who were 'done with' WWII by late 1942, but it's hard not to feel as a nation we've lost a lot of the capacity to sacrifice for the greater good, pull together, etc., etc.
I think the article you quoted from here offers some interesting perspective, although I'd note the researchers seem more interested in the implications for vaccine development than for the possibility of natural herd immunity.3 -
T1DCarnivoreRunner wrote: »JustSomeEm wrote: »This is a second-hand account from a poster on another forum. He claims that two patients at his clinic tested positive twice over a three month time span. When he reported them to the CDC as reinfections, both were reclassified as re-emerging.
I'm not beating you up, but I've been amazed at all the 'second-hand' information floating around out there. Much of the narrative seems to be that our organizations are reclassifying things to fit some alternate story. Last week at work I overheard a conversation about people dying from heart disease or other 'normal' causes of death who were tested after death and discovered to have had COVID - so that's what went on their death certificate. My own mother-in-law is a driver for the Amish and has stories like that from their community. All second- or third- (or more) hand. I hate all the mis-information floating around out there.
Agreed. I keep hearing this and all I can think is that it must be just conspiracy theories. Every time I hear this, I ask for them to name someone who has died and their cause of death was incorrectly classified as Covid. I would like a list of names, but even 3 would be useful. But then I can't even get 1 single name. It's all "I heard someone in this city at some point wrongdied from X reason and Covid was put on the death certificate instead." (Not trying to be political, I know this because it was a really big news story from MN) - George Floyd was positive for the virus and died for an unrelated reason. Under the common story I hear, people argue that everybody who dies and tests positive for the virus will have Covid listed as the cause of death no matter the true cause of death. But that isn't true for George Floyd, whose official cause of death was correctly reported as homicide. So if there are really mis-classified deaths, why can nobody name someone - anyone - as an example? I can name at least the one case with the same similarities except the death was classified properly.
I can actually name one, but it’s the exception that proves the rule, in that it was wrongly reported as a Covid death initially but the news quickly retracted the story and clarified after the hospital issued a statement. A small child died at LeBonheur and was reported as the first pediatric Covid death in Tennessee, but actually died of the serious illness for which the child was being treated at LeBonheur in the first place.
Note also that in this case, there was never any question of the death certificate wrongly stating that the child died of Covid, it was just a case of the news report being wrong, and it was quickly corrected.
Anyone who says this doesn’t understand how death certificates work.7
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