Author Topic: New South African variant.  (Read 42098 times)

embee

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Re: New South African variant.
« Reply #480 on: February 23, 2022, 07:02:49 PM »
Interesting study from John Hopkins University in USA,  their large study found that lockdowns 'had a minute' effect on covid deaths,  bit of a read - 62 pages ( attached PDF ).

Just as an aside, this report was discussed on the BBC Radio4 programme "More or less" this morning (doesn't appear to be on listen-again yet).
I had looked briefly at the link given above, but didn't spend much time on it. I had picked up on a couple of issues but because I hadn't studied it carefully I thought it best not to comment.

The items mentioned were that it wasn't "by" the John Hopkins Uni but by 3 economists, one of whom worked "at" the JHU. The study was a "meta-analysis", which as we all of course know (?!) means it was an assessment of the results of other studies, but not a study of the original data, and thus was essentially not critical of any previous analysis made.  They excluded many of the studies due to them being carried out by epidemiologists using modelling of epidemics which the authors did not consider to be compatible with their methods. They put a high weighting onto a report from Pretoria which was made by a group of economists rather than epidemiologists. It was not at all clear whether they had included allowance for the delay between infection and eventual deaths and how that delay period related to imposition of any precautionary measures. They also apparently considered "lockdown" measures as any non-medical intervention, which could be anything from wearing masks to full isolation, and thus probably not necessarily quite what we would normally consider "lockdown".

I'm sure the meta-analysis is perfectly reasonable taken in context of the methodology, purpose, assumptions, terms and conditions, but just from a brief scan through it appeared to me that it should not be paraphrased nor presented as anything other than what it was, and certainly not a definitive determination of the effectiveness (however that is defined) of preventive measures applied during the pandemic if for no other reason than it excluded so many of the originally listed studies.

Bazzzer

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Re: New South African variant.
« Reply #481 on: February 23, 2022, 08:10:41 PM »
Just as an aside, this report was discussed on the BBC Radio4 programme "More or less" this morning (doesn't appear to be on listen-again yet).

It seems to be there now https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m0014pc3

embee

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Re: New South African variant.
« Reply #482 on: February 23, 2022, 08:53:19 PM »
Thanks for that. The relevant section is from 8min to 15min.

JimSh

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Re: New South African variant.
« Reply #483 on: February 26, 2022, 05:11:49 PM »
Friday's Indie-Sage update.
Main subject this week was the effects of the epidemic on children.
Effects on education, slow recognition of transmission in children and benefits of vaccination.
 Intro                                                                      0-2m30s
 Latest numbers                                                       2m30s-23m30s
 Schools                                                                  23m30s -32m30s Large class sizes small spaces lack of ventilation
 Comparison with Europe (Esp Sweden and Germany)  32m30s -39m
 Vaccination in 5-11yo                                               39m30s
 Questions                                                               50m  - end


JimSh

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Re: New South African variant.
« Reply #484 on: March 03, 2022, 03:37:36 PM »
Numbers of infections, hospitalisations and deaths have been steadily rising in Scotland again.

JimSh

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Re: New South African variant.
« Reply #485 on: March 05, 2022, 03:14:44 PM »
Indie-Sage update.

Main topic this week is the effect of inequality with regard to covid.
0-3m Introduction.
3m -13m Statistics. Increase in cases in Scotland now due to adults rather than children. Increasing long covid
                             BA.2 variant becoming more prevalent.
13m-43m Main discussion on inequality.
43m -end Questions.

Other slides available from this link (pdf.)
https://www.independentsage.org/weekly-briefing-4th-march-2022/

JimSh

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Re: New South African variant.
« Reply #486 on: March 10, 2022, 02:53:21 PM »
Numbers of infections, hospitalisations and deaths have been steadily rising in Scotland again.

Numbers still rising
                             New Cases                        In Hospital                            Deaths

 Thursday 17/2         7144                                944                                       22
 Thursday 24/2         7195                               1041                                      16
 Thursday   3/3         9491                               1272                                      36
 Thursday  10/3       14387                              1636                                      41
https://www.scotsman.com/health/more-people-in-hospital-with-covid-than-at-peak-of-omicron-wave-3606096

Increase also across UK
Increasing infections amongst older age groups.

https://www.pulsetoday.co.uk/news/clinical-areas/respiratory/rise-in-covid-infections-among-over-55s-concerning-say-experts/

Edit added Scotsman link
« Last Edit: March 10, 2022, 04:46:31 PM by JimSh »

JimSh

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Re: New South African variant.
« Reply #487 on: March 20, 2022, 08:39:55 AM »
Latest Indie-Sage briefing.
Main theme. Lessons to be learned for the future.


0-2min          Intro
2- 22min       Latest numbers.
                                           Numbers of hospitilisations increasing
                                           BA.2 variant
                                           Vaccination almost zero and waning effectiveness.
                                           Ventilation.
                                           Effects on children

22-32min        Local government. Lessons for the future.
32-41min        Devolved governments and situation in Europe
41min-- end    Questions

Edit to edit removed reference to guardian article to use it as a response to Culzean's post

                                     
« Last Edit: March 20, 2022, 02:33:19 PM by JimSh »

culzean

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Re: New South African variant.
« Reply #488 on: March 20, 2022, 11:13:20 AM »
Clip from an article on latest BA.2 variant. 

'So what's going on? Firstly, both the BA.1 and BA.2 variants do not have an intrinsically much higher growth rate than any previous variant. Instead, they have spread globally for two main reasons. First, both can infect people who were protected from earlier viral strains by vaccines and/or previous infection because their spike proteins (the region which neutralising antibodies, which protects people from infection by the virus, bind to) are drastically different to any previous Covid strain.

This means that in terms of protection against infection, even populations with high rates of vaccination or prior infection were essentially encountering it as an almost novel virus.

The second reason behind the explosive growth of Omicron is that its incubation time (the time interval between one infection and the next) is much shorter than for any previous Covid lineage. BA.2 has an even shorter incubation time than BA.1.

Shorter incubation can lead to explosive growth in daily case numbers over a short period of time even if each infected person passes on the virus to a similar number of other hosts.

Despite the ability of BA.1 and BA.2 to readily infect and re-infect people, vaccines and prior infections still protect from severe disease and death, thanks to T-cells that cannot be bypassed by the virus as they target hundreds of different sites across the viral genome.

Moreover, contrary to antibodies which are largely identical in different people, each person mounts a unique T-cell response that targets different sites in the viral genome. As such, a virus simply cannot evolve to escape T-cell recognition at the level of the host population.
'
Some people will only consider you an expert if they agree with your point of view or advice,  when you give them advice they don't like they consider you an idiot

JimSh

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Re: New South African variant.
« Reply #489 on: March 20, 2022, 11:25:54 AM »
Omicron is unlikely to be the last variant.
On a similar theme to the Indie Sage report above.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/mar/20/public-health-measures-are-key-to-curbing-covid-in-uk-say-scientists

Edit changed "Omicron may not be the last variant." to " is unlikely to be"

We need to be prepared to respond more quickly and on a more local level as discussed in Indy-Sage briefing.
Nobody wants another lockdown.


« Last Edit: March 20, 2022, 02:44:35 PM by JimSh »

Jocko

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Re: New South African variant.
« Reply #490 on: March 20, 2022, 10:34:59 PM »
My grandson is currently infected. His previous infection was in November (both confirmed by PCR tests). So it looks like anyone is fair game now.

John Ratsey

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Re: New South African variant.
« Reply #491 on: March 22, 2022, 12:59:33 PM »
My grandson is currently infected. His previous infection was in November (both confirmed by PCR tests). So it looks like anyone is fair game now.
I'm wondering when I'll next get infected and want it to be at a convenient time so it boosts my immune system before the holiday season. I had what was probably Delta in October and a booster jab on 1st December. They were sufficient to stop me getting infected in late January when my wife was infectious about 2 months after her booster but I'm assuming that any protection I currently have is diminishing. The official line is that the current vaccine only protects against serious illness.
2022 HR-V Elegance, previously 2020 Jazz Crosstar

JimSh

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Re: New South African variant.
« Reply #492 on: March 24, 2022, 02:36:50 PM »
Numbers of infections, hospitalisations and deaths have been steadily rising in Scotland again.

Numbers still rising
                             New Cases                        In Hospital                                 Deaths

 Thursday 17/2         7144                                944                                            22
 Thursday 24/2         7195                               1041                                           16
 Thursday   3/3         9491                               1272                                           36
 Thursday  10/3       14387                              1636                                            41
https://www.scotsman.com/health/more-people-in-hospital-with-covid-than-at-peak-of-omicron-wave-3606096

Increase also across UK
Increasing infections amongst older age groups.

https://www.pulsetoday.co.uk/news/clinical-areas/respiratory/rise-in-covid-infections-among-over-55s-concerning-say-experts/

Edit added Scotsman link
                          New Cases                       In Hospital                          Deaths

Thursday 17/3        9721 *                           2038                                  28*
Thursday 24/3      13564                              2322                                  50
                 
* Computer glitch

Also happening in England
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/health/covid-patients-hospitals-increase-b2043010.html

Kremmen

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Re: New South African variant.
« Reply #493 on: March 24, 2022, 04:46:29 PM »
London R value a couple of weeks ago was 0.7 to 0.9

Now 1.1 to 1.4

Hardly surprising now 'things' are almost back to normal. Very few wearing masks and close contact gatherings, etc.

I wonder why some vaccines protect you for life whilst these Covid vaccines needs topping up like nothing before
« Last Edit: March 24, 2022, 04:48:18 PM by Kremmen »
Let's be careful out there !

culzean

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Re: New South African variant.
« Reply #494 on: March 24, 2022, 06:08:29 PM »
London R value a couple of weeks ago was 0.7 to 0.9

Now 1.1 to 1.4

Hardly surprising now 'things' are almost back to normal. Very few wearing masks and close contact gatherings, etc.

I wonder why some vaccines protect you for life whilst these Covid vaccines needs topping up like nothing before

Some virus do not mutate, so the vaccine for smallpox, measles etc will protect for life.  Problem with MRNA vaccines is that they only carry the spike protein, not the whole virus and it is the spike protein that changes the most, then the very specific antibodies produced by MRNA ( as opposed to wider T cell immunity from the whole virus by normal vaccines ) cannot recognise the new virus ... so boosters needed 4 or 5 times a year, great news if you are a shareholder...  I only had the original AZ vaccine in Feb and April 2021, had covid twice. Omicron just after new year 2022 and about a month ago BA.2 variant, neither worse than a common cold...
Some people will only consider you an expert if they agree with your point of view or advice,  when you give them advice they don't like they consider you an idiot

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