Covid-19 Updates & Info

[Suliso]

It's likely even better than that. 65% is for protection against symptomatic illness, for a really severe one resulting in hospitalization about 85% reduction has been reported.

It's fine against the British variant too, South African one possibly eludes it but the latter is a far less common than the former.

[atlpam]

My point was if I can get AZ or J&J now vs. having to wait 3-6 more months for a “preferred” vaccine, what I can get now is better than no protection for another 3-6 months.

[dryrunguy]

Just an observation... This is the first time in my life I have seen people weigh the merits of different types of vaccines. In comparison, take the various vaccines for influenza. There are several of them, and influenza kills a lot of people (though not nearly as many as COVID). But I've never heard or seen people debate the merits of one type of flu vaccine versus another. I've never seen people ask (or heard that people had asked), "Which flu vaccine should I get?" People just get it. And I would bet the lay public doesn't even know there are different types of vaccines for influenza.

Another example... Do parents ask their pediatrician which of the measles/mumps/rubella combination vaccines their child should get? I don't think so.

It's curious.

[ti-amie]

Just an observation... This is the first time in my life I have seen people weigh the merits of different types of vaccines. In comparison, take the various vaccines for influenza. There are several of them, and influenza kills a lot of people (though not nearly as many as COVID). But I've never heard or seen people debate the merits of one type of flu vaccine versus another. I've never seen people ask (or heard that people had asked), "Which flu vaccine should I get?" People just get it. And I would bet the lay public doesn't even know there are different types of vaccines for influenza.

Another example... Do parents ask their pediatrician which of the measles/mumps/rubella combination vaccines their child should get? I don't think so.

It's curious.

You're right. It's never occurred to me to ask who made the vaccine I'm getting. Ever.

[ponchi101]

People don't think about influenza the way we have been thinking about C19. Bet you the vast majority of people don't know how many people influenza kills every year.. Which is not trivial.
But yes, you are right.

[dryrunguy]

Just to be clear, I do not mean to suggest this is a negative development. Perhaps it's an encouraging development--as long as people aren't using these comparisons to make an overarching anti-vax argument.

So now let's ask another question... why? Why are we paying such close attention now? I would bet the answer is pretty simple. For most of us, this is our first pandemic (excluding HIV for those of us who are old enough). This marks the first time we have individually and collectively felt a strong sense of urgency to solve a widespread public health crisis (unlike HIV, which started out as a transmissible disease that in the early days was largely limited to a small population). With COVID, we have had a chance to observe the R&D process and read published data associated with individual vaccine candidates. We've never had that before. We've never needed that before.

I really think it's that simple. For most of us, this is our first pandemic.

::

Now, back to the original discussion. For purely logistical reasons--since I live in a remote, rural area that is a 70-mile round trip to and from medical care--I would greatly prefer a single-dose vaccine. But all of that will depend on whether my primary care provider will have access to single-dose vaccines.

If I get lucky and it turns out that someone in PA's public health structure recognizes how much smarter it would be in the public health interest for them to bring vaccines to Dry Run rather than make people in Dry Run come to them, I'll take whatever they give me. But I won't hold my breath waiting for that scenario to transpire.

[Suliso]

Tanzania leader says prayer will cure Covid, as hospitals overflow

Experts fear policies of John Magufuli could undermine vaccine programme in Africa


Grieving relatives of Covid-19 victims, health experts and opposition politicians in Tanzania have accused President John Magufuli of causing thousands of deaths in the east African country and undermining the fight against the pandemic across the continent.

Magufuli has denied the local spread of Covid-19 in Tanzania, discouraged the mention of the disease by health workers, rejected most conventional measures in favour of prayer and said vaccines are dangerous, without offering any evidence.

Despite repeated requests by the World Health Organization, Tanzania has not published any statistics for Covid-19 cases since May, when it logged 509, and has no testing programme.

Experts fear that Magufuli’s policies will allow Tanzania to act as a source of infections and new variants, which could spread across Africa and beyond.

The WHO last week called on Tanzania to protect not only its own 58 million citizens but also neighbouring countries.

“This situation remains very concerning. Covid-19 is a serious disease that can cause severe illness and even death. National authorities everywhere must do all they can to protect people and save lives,” said Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the WHO’s director general.

Burial workers in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania’s biggest city, and on the semi-autonomous island of Zanzibar told the Observer they face unprecedented demand. Churches said priests are conducting more funeral services than “in living memory”.

Doctors said hospitals are overwhelmed, with an acute shortage of beds and oxygen.

“We have elderly patients coming in, showing every symptom that we’ve seen around the world but we cannot test … we are not allowed to even mention Covid-19. We have to call it pneumonia,” said one doctor, who requested anonymity for fear of punishment by employers and authorities.

Farida Saidi’s 82-year-old father died this month in a hospital in Dar es Salaam. His relatives were unable to find a bed in an intensive care unit because all were full.

“They said we could only keep him where he was and hope for the best. They called it pneumonia but said, ‘your father has the same condition that everybody is facing everywhere’,” Saidi said.

“Since January we have lost six family members. On my WhatsApp there are just messages and messages about people dying. They are all showing the same symptoms: struggling to breathe, fever, loss of sense of taste. It is desperate.”

Saidi said Magufuli’s policies had cost lives.

“I wouldn’t want anyone to watch their father die the way I did. It’s so wrong.”

Zitto Kabwe, leader of the opposition ACT-Wazalendo party, said that his party had called on its members to document and report all deaths due to suspected Covid-19 so that it could hold the government to account.

“We don’t have data. There is no testing, so it’s very difficult to cut transmission. Local media have been afraid even to mention Covid-19. We just see hospitals being full,” he said.

A second wave, fuelled by a more transmissible variant of the virus originating in South Africa, has pushed infections across the continent to 3.8 million, with more than 100,000 deaths. The total is thought to be a significant underestimate.

The extent of any outbreak in Tanzania is unclear, but South Africa, which has roughly the same population, has suffered almost 50,000 deaths from Covid-19, according to official statistics, and many more according to excess mortality figures.

Last month, Tanzania’s chief government spokesman, Hassan Abbasi, told Reuters that, while the country was not entirely coronavirus-free, it had “controlled” the disease.

“There are people intermingling with the global world. But we don’t have local transmissions. That is why you are seeing everything is open, universities, sports, arts, markets, and you have not heard someone has fallen down publicly,” Abbasi said.

A doctor at the coronavirus testing centre in Zanzibar said that more than 80 cases had been recorded on the island from mid-December to early January. “But we are not allowed to release the data,” said the doctor. “We keep it for future use.”

The rise in cases has led to mixed messaging from the government.

The Zanzibar health ministry last week issued a public announcement asking people to avoid gatherings and “rush to a nearby hospital for testing if you feel you have difficulties in breathing”.

But officials denied this was because of Covid-19, saying they wanted to encourage people to take precautions because the number of people suffering breathing difficulties is increasing.

A health ministry official, Mabula Mchembe, visited hospitals in Dar es Salaam and stressed that there were no coronavirus patients, just “rumours which may cause unnecessary panic”.

Vaccination programmes are now under way or planned in most African countries, but not Tanzania.

In late January, Magufuli, who won a second term in October in an election marred by violence and allegations of fraud, said prayers, steam inhalation or herbal remedies were better than “dangerous” foreign vaccines.

Faced with international pressure and after the deaths of a series of senior officials, there has been a change over the past two weeks.

Magufuli recently attributed the death of the head of the civil service to the “respiratory disease”, and official media have begun calling on Tanzanians to wear face masks and wash their hands.

“I can’t say there is any hope,” said Kabwe, the opposition leader. “It’s too late now, the spread at the community level is so widespread. “How many people need to die before the government accepts the obvious?”

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/ ... s-overflow

With leaders like this what kind of help can one hope to provide?

[Deuce]

Of course it has killed teenagers, and people in their 20's and 30´s. In a population of millions of dead, you will find deaths in all cohorts.
It has killed 45 children under the age of 1, 648 kids in the 15-24 age group, 2,922 in the 25-34 group. 0.009%, 0.13% and 0.59%. (USA Data). Assuming that the AZ vaccine gives you a 65% protection, you can slash those numbers in half and safely assume new mortalities for those groups.
Get the AZ. Then, in September, get any other you want. They are not exclusive. And you are in the (I guess) 45-54 age group (21.251 deaths, 4.5%). Dropping that 4.5% to 2.76% is not trivial. Adding your medical history (any underlying conditions) gives you a better stat yet.

The problem with your scenario is that vaccines are not something you can walk into a Walmart anytime to purchase. I'm assuming that if I am assigned the AstraZeneca vaccine, and I accept it, I will not be able to dictate when I will get the Moderna or Pfizer/Biontech (or J&J if it is approved here) vaccine. I assume that determination and decision will be out of my hands. It may well be that once I get the AZ shots, I won't be permitted to get another vaccine for a year. This is yet to be determined - but I'm assuming it will be something along those lines.

Will the vaccine be available privately at some point on a per demand basis? I don't know when or if that will happen. Right now, it's being distributed only as part of our publicly funded universal healthcare.

Statistics, or 'odds', or percentages, mean nothing to me - for the simple reason that I have absolutely no idea how COVID-19 would affect ME. Therefore, I am assuming the worst, and not taking any unnecessary chances.
Everyone is in exactly the same situation of having no idea how the virus will affect them. So whether one is in in a 90 percentile group, or in a 2 percentile group is really irrelevant.
Each person can decide for him/her self how he/she deals with the circumstance. I've decided that I want the best protection available. To me, this is completely logical.

As for why people are being more selective about COVID-19 vaccines than about other vaccines... well, I think it's rather obvious that it's because A) COVID-19 kills 10 times more people than influenza, and we've all likely had influenza several times without any serious consequences, B) COVID-19 is very easily transmissible - and so protection from it is extremely important, and C) we have much more information about the efficacy, etc. of the COVID-19 vaccines than we have about other vaccines - the details of the COVID-19 vaccines are unavoidable - they're in our face every day.

I'm simply trying to make the best and most informed choice I can - if I am permitted to make that choice, which I feel everyone should be permitted to do.

[Togtdyalttai]

I am getting my first dose of the vaccine tomorrow. I feel slightly guilty because I'm not sure I agree with the policy that allows me to get it, but I'm happy to be getting it nonetheless.

The relevant part of the policy is that both formal and informal caregivers can qualify as health care workers for vaccine purposes. Given my mom's poor health of late and that I do more for her than I once did, I qualify as an informal caregiver. Her doctor wrote a letter to affirm this. The link to the policy is below.

https://www.sandiegocounty.gov/content/ ... _FINAL.pdf

[Deuce]

I am getting my first dose of the vaccine tomorrow. I feel slightly guilty because I'm not sure I agree with the policy that allows me to get it, but I'm happy to be getting it nonetheless.

The relevant part of the policy is that both formal and informal caregivers can qualify as health care workers for vaccine purposes. Given my mom's poor health of late and that I do more for her than I once did, I qualify as an informal caregiver. Her doctor wrote a letter to affirm this. The link to the policy is below.

https://www.sandiegocounty.gov/content/ ... _FINAL.pdf

^
There's no reason to feel even slightly guilty about that, Tog. Not at all - it makes perfect sense.

.

[ponchi101]

...

The relevant part of the policy is that both formal and informal caregivers can qualify as health care workers for vaccine purposes. Given my mom's poor health of late and that I do more for her than I once did, I qualify as an informal caregiver. Her doctor wrote a letter to affirm this. The link to the policy is below.

https://www.sandiegocounty.gov/content/ ... _FINAL.pdf

It seems reasonable to me, given what you state about your mom's health.

[Suliso]

I guess it's based on our personalities. Risks to me personally are unknown so I assume I'll be asymptomatic.

Mind you that doesn't mean I'm not taking all the basic precautions.

[atlpam]

My son received his first dose yesterday (phase 1B in his state - essential workforce). He has had several symptomatic friends that he did not have contact with (healthy 30 year olds), so he has not been taking precautions lightly. He has primarily only socialized with a co-worker for outdoor activities. I still think it will be at least May timeframe before I am eligible.

[ponchi101]

Risk for the individual is different than risk for the society. The individual doesn't know what will happen to her, within the range of the disease. It will range from not catching the disease through all the stages of possible infection, including death.
Society does know what will happen. A percentage of people will not catch the disease, another will. The second group then is split into finer and finer groups: asymptomatic, symptomatic, mild, grave, etc. Society starts using Bayesian Stats then to fine tune its model. The leaders of such a society then have to use these figures to gauge their response, and cannot use anecdotal data to see how to handle it (or shouldn't).
That is the crux of any and all personal decisions. The guy that starts smoking at 17 does not know what will happen to him 50 years later. The insurance company knows very well what will happen to the 100,000 kids that started to smoke at the same age.

[ti-amie]