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Coronavirus: How dangerous a threat?

Page 220 - Get up to date with the latest news, scores & standings from the Cycling News Community.
One simply can’t make this stuff up.

NYC Begs Gov. Cuomo To Let It Start Vaccinating Seniors: 'We've Got To Save Lives'

The Daily Mail reported New York City has dished out only 149,000 of its allotted 487,000 vaccine doses, and that is over a three-week period.

“If you had a world where everyone said ‘I 100 percent want the vaccine’ … then the governor’s theory would make a lot of sense. But on the ground it’s different. We’re at the frontline, here’s what we’re seeing. A lot of people aren’t ready to take the vaccine in category 1A,” he said.

The governor reportedly isn’t budging, though — which means that in this Democrat-on-Democrat dispute, Cuomo has made de Blasio the reasonable one. That’s all the more reason to crown him the worst governor in the country — a field populated by half-wits.



https://www.westernjournal.com/nyc-begs-gov-cuomo-let-start-vaccinating-seniors-got-save-lives/


Meanwhile, U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar said Wednesday that the government will allow more drugstores to start giving vaccinations to speed up the process. If health workers aren’t lining up fast enough, he said, it is OK to expand eligibility to lower-priority groups.

We need to not be overly prescriptive in that, especially as we see governors who are leaving vaccines sitting in freezers rather than getting it out into people’s arms,” he said.


Ya think?
 
We don't have nearly enough vaccine to give to everybody who wants it. Nor do we have the infrastructure to do that if we had enough of the vaccine. Until we do, not much is going to change. Coumo's poor decision has little to do with why most vaccines are sitting in freezers at the moment around the country. I just don't think people like you realize how hard it is to actually get a vaccine for front line health care workers. My partner (who has been involved in COVID testing) has been given the run around for weeks and the latest from the urgent care center employer is that a vaccine might be available at their location in Falls Church..... Virginia. I just updated the situation at my hospital yesterday. In many cases, front line health care workers are not even told where or when to line up, so that SOB Azar can shove it up an orifice IMHO.

“Faster administration could save lives right now, which means we cannot let the perfect be the enemy of the good,” he said.
Do you know what else could've been done to save lives you clueless toady?
 
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We don't have nearly enough vaccine to give to everybody who wants it.

Which is why it is dumb as dirt not to invite subsequent tiers to get vaccinated. This is pure incompetence on display. In the mind of Cuomo and Newsom it’s better to keep the vaccine in the freezer than to break the PC equity protocol.

Until we do, not much is going to change.

As it stands, with the idiots in charge today, we have more vaccine than we can use.

I just don't think people like you realize how hard it is to actually get a vaccine for front line health care workers.

One anecdotal story deserves another. A mid-size community hospital here in Cali was allotted 800 vaccines. They could only get about 600 front-line workers to vaccinate. They had 200 doses they quite literally had to give away before the shelf life limits ruined them. There’s at least two skilled nursing facilities within walking distance of the hospital. But, ya know, rules and stuff.

  • “Right now, every shot in an arm is a win,” the former FDA chief Scott Gottlieb told CNBC on Monday.
Yes it is.
 
Which is why it is dumb as dirt not to invite subsequent tiers to get vaccinated. This is pure incompetence on display. In the mind of Cuomo and Newsom it’s better to keep the vaccine in the freezer than to break the PC equity protocol.
That is not a good idea. You would end up with the Florida situation. Chaos and grift. And how are they doing with their vaccination? Lower than NY. They have administered a little under 30%.


And now we are getting to the point where people are getting ready for dose #2 on schedule. If you want to keep vaccinating new people, you better make sure you have a good reserve to jab the returnees. Otherwise you are counting on just-in-time distribution with nascent supply lines, from people who have consistently under-delivered on their promises.

It is obvious that people should use their common sense to vaccinate instead of flushing vaccine, but I don't think that will be a long term problem now that returnees are imminent. Vaccine scarcity is the long term problem until the J&J vaccine arrives. There is a reason why scientists who would know best have said that open vaccinations will not be a thing until the second quarter. We have only distributed 20m vaccines. That will only vaccinate 10m people. For reference, there are about 50 million people over 65 in this country. Quoting the CDC....

"The goal is for everyone to be able to easily get a COVID-19 vaccine as soon as large quantities are available."

Every person who doesn't get infected is also a win and this strategy was largely ignored by people like Azar.
 
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Yes Slovakia did. We eased restriction after testing and then put restrictions after numbers hit the roof again. So it was pointless after all. In this form we did it.

Theoretically you should be doing better after going through this process - Look at England who've had locldowns/restrictions for 2 months - Normally after a week or two you reach the peak level of infections and then the numbers come down BUT yet the figures are increasing at an astonishing rate - Something doesn't add up.
 
This is a very long article exploring the possibility that SARS-CoV-2 escaped from a lab in Wuhan. The author cites, but does not really discuss, the seminal Nature Med paper that concluded that the virus was not intentionally designed in a lab. He instead emphasizes the interest of some researchers in designing a virus capable of causing a pandemic, not as an agent of bio-terrorism or warfare, but so that we would be prepared to deal with such a virus if/when it emerged naturally. He finds the existence of a level-4 lab in Wuhan too much of a coincidence, and notes that the bat virus with highest sequence homology to SARS-CoV-2 was brought to Wuhan years earlier from a mine shaft, where it was found after several workers shoveling bat guano died from breathing the dust.

While it's a good account of the research being carried out on infectious viruses, and the conflicts over whether the potential benefits in understanding how to treat a new viral design outweigh the risks of just such a lab accident, this is bound to stoke the conspiracy theorists, which I can already see in the first comments. The author's scenario might be described as a hybrid between the standard intentionally designed virus, and the purely accidental theory. The author believes the virus was intentionally designed, just not for nefarious purposes, and since it's proposed to have been designed from a naturally-occurring virus, one of the arguments made in the Nature Med paper--that intentional design would have made use of a different viral backbone--is avoided. However, another argument vs. intentional design--that the spike protein would have been designed differently--would seem to apply to this scenario, as does the furin cleavage site.

The sad thing is that we may very well never know the origins of the virus, as we have not yet found it, or a very close relative that could have easily mutated to SARS-C0V-2, in any animal species. 8472 may jump in here indignantly, but China really hasn't helped by so far delaying if not refusing admission of an investigative team. If China wants to know the origin of the virus, they're sure hiding their intentions from the rest of us.



Definitely a fun read from a pure speculation point of view that conspiracy theorists would love. Fact of the matter is this: proponents of the lab leak theory depend on the idea of the coronavirus leaping from animals to humans as being improbable – which it’s not. In 2018, the same Shi Zhengli published a paper that reported the results of a serological study conducted of 218 residents in four villages in Yunnan. These villages were located near caves where Shi and her colleagues had sampled bat coronaviruses closely related to SARS-CoV-1. They discovered that six people, or about 2.7 percent of the sample, had antibodies for these coronaviruses, which suggests they had previously been infected.
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12250-018-0012-7
Bat coronaviruses are massively under-sampled. We know about a handful of them, but there are thousands more we haven’t even discovered yet. It is perfectly possible that there are bats that carry an even closer relative of SARS-CoV-2, it’s just that scientists have not stumbled upon them yet. Much more likely that the coronavirus is the result of naturally occurring zoonotic species jump, or that the virus has evolved in humans over time without being noticed and gradually becoming more infectious (which can explain why numerous countries are now finding evidence of COVID-19 existing in numerous frozen serum samples, sewage, etc much earlier than previously thought).

The WIV is a joint collaboration between China and France, and has been certified by officials in both countries, as well as by the International Organization for Standardization. The French government, which has the most knowledge of and experience with the WIV, has stated there is "no factual evidence corroborating the information recently circulating in the United States press that establishes a link between the origins of Covid-19 and the work of the P4 laboratory of Wuhan, China."
 
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A close family member of mine already got vaccinated for the first time on the 30th (she's a nurse) and so far zero side effects.
Same here. I have two nieces who are nurses, and a good friend who is Fire/EMS. Both nieces only had tender shoulders (one niece already got her second), and my friend just got his Wednesday hasn't had anything unexpected happen as of last night.
 
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  • “Right now, every shot in an arm is a win,” the former FDA chief Scott Gottlieb told CNBC on Monday.
Yes it is.
Gottlieb doesn't think the vaccines will be that effective and next fall & winter will look like a bad flu season with Covid. He believes masks, social distancing and other restrictions probably still need to be in place:

View: https://youtu.be/J4PA47aeHDw


I feel sorry for all terrified people who have put so much trust, faith & belief in the Covid vaccines to save the day. The same people who demand that their government give them 100% guarantee protection against this respiratory virus.
 
That is not a good idea. You would end up with the Florida situation.

Sure. Way better to drag out the vaccination process than have people who wish to be vaccinated wait in line.

And now we are getting to the point where people are getting ready for dose #2 on schedule. If you want to keep vaccinating new people, you better make sure you have a good reserve to jab the returnees. Otherwise you are counting on just-in-time distribution with nascent supply lines, from people who have consistently under-delivered on their promises.

So then Gottlieb is wrong in your view. PC run amok.

It is obvious that people should use their common sense to vaccinate instead of flushing vaccine

Common sense in government is more scarce than the vaccine.
 
Same here. I have two nieces who are nurses, and a good friend who is Fire/EMS. Both nieces only had tender shoulders (one niece already got her second), and my friend just got his Wednesday hasn't had anything adverse as of last night.
Just to be forewarned. People should expect to see a bigger response to the booster shot when you re-activate the memory cells from the first dose. I hesitate to call it an adverse response because it is the correct immune cells becoming activated. The process might feel like you are a little sick. I am really worried about how these effects get reported and circulated on such bastions of reason as...facebook/ twitter/ youtube. Alex Berenson's is pinning a tweet that 11 people have been killed by the vaccine. But, don't you dare call him an anti-vaxxer. He is just 'asking questions about vaccine safety'. Smooth sailing from here no doubt....

View: https://twitter.com/thehowie/status/1347291889612038150

It seems as though the USA doesn't have a national plan for the roll out of the vaccine to be administered by the states - It appears to be done on an ad-hoc basis.

The national plan is to leave it up to the states. Each state devises its own tiering and allocation. They can prioritize anybody they want. They can micromanage it or be laissez faire.

The latest announcement from our Gov is that Maryland will be getting ~10,000 doses a day from the Feds 'for the foreseeable future'. They also announced that 11,000 were vaccinated yesterday, leaving an administration rate around 30%. Not a whole lot more that we can do about the burn rate without more vaccine. The total population for the state is about 6m. At 5k people fully vaccinated a day.... the math does not look great. Eating into the slack will help a bit on the margins, but like arguing over tiers, you're not targeting the root of the problem, which is vaccine availability.
Gottlieb doesn't think the vaccines will be that effective and next fall & winter will look like a bad flu season with Covid. He believes masks, social distancing and other restrictions probably still need to be in place:

I feel sorry for all terrified people who have put so much trust, faith & belief in the Covid vaccines to save the day. The same people who demand that their government give them 100% guarantee protection against this respiratory virus.
Why do you always assume that we are terrified? Caution does not equate to terror. Am I terrified of biking if I wear a helmet? Nor do I demand a 100% protection guarantee. I do expect people in charge to implement common sense mitigation strategies that align with scientific consensus.

The key bit about Gottlieb is that he is assuming that only 90-100m get vaccinated. With that level, next winter probably will be that bad for the unvaccinated.
 
The EU is buying up half of the vaccines Pfizer is producing in 2021...

Also, EMA has approved getting 6 doses from the 5 dose Pfizer/BioNTech containers. Apparently, you can get 7 doses out if you are able to dose very precisely. This is only possible with 'the best' needles/syringes, which Belgium for instance seems to have acquired. However, there is global competition for this type of needles, so they don't think our stocks will last very long. Also, the 2500 employees at the Pfizer plant in Belgium will also receive the vaccine now, to make sure production is guarenteed. Finally, several Belgian labs processing covid tests have been victim of hacking, which in some cases put all of their computers 'out of business'. They fear that cyber-criminals may later also target the vaccine distribution centres, which would of course seriously f**k things up.
 
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The EU is buying up half of the vaccines Pfizer is producing in 2021...

Also, EMA has approved getting 6 doses from the 5 dose Pfizer/BioNTech containers. Apparently, you can get 7 doses out if you are able to dose very precisely. This is only possible with 'the best' needles/syringes, which Belgium for instance seems to have acquired. However, there is global competition for this type of needles, so they don't think our stocks will last very long. Also, the 2500 employees at the Pfizer plant in Belgium will also receive the vaccine now, to make sure production is guarenteed. Finally, several Belgian labs processing covid tests have been victim of hacking, which in some cases put all of their computers 'out of business'. They fear that cyber-criminals may later also target the vaccine distribution centres, which would of course seriously f**k things up.

I can definitely understand Pfizer making the decision now to vaccinate all their employees at the plant. I would definitely categorize them as critical personnel.
 
On another note, the UAE cycling team has received the first dose of the 2 dose Chinese vaccine. From what I can gather it appears the Chinese vaccine is available to anyone who requests it in UAE and other middle eastern countries. So they aren't jumping any line to get vaccinated.
 
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The thing is of course, the rich nations are buying up all of the good stuff, so where does that leave the rest? The solidarity talk is all good and well, but solidarity seems to be on the table only after 'we' have what we need.

That said, since the Pfizer vaccine, and to an extent also the Moderna one is very difficult to transport, store and correctly administer, poorer nations would probably struggle with those anyway. They would depend on the Chinese ones, the Oxford one and perhaps the J&J one anyway.
 
The thing is of course, the rich nations are buying up all of the good stuff, so where does that leave the rest? The solidarity talk is all good and well, but solidarity seems to be on the table only after 'we' have what we need.

That said, since the Pfizer vaccine, and to an extent also the Moderna one is very difficult to transport, store and correctly administer, poorer nations would probably struggle with those anyway. They would depend on the Chinese ones, the Oxford one and perhaps the J&J one anyway.

There was just a report from a hospital in Northern California in which a freezer stopped working and they basically had 2 hours once they found out what happened to administer 800 doses before they went bad. (I don't remember if it was Pfizer or Moderna). They first offered it to any one in the hospital, then first responders (EMTs and fire dept) and the workers at the prison (something about not enough time to get consent of the prisoners) and then set up 2 or 3 locations and put word out to the general public and were able to administer all 800 doses and give cards for apts for the second dose. They just proved you CAN do mass vaccinations more quickly than what is currently happening.
 
One simply can’t make this stuff up.

NYC Begs Gov. Cuomo To Let It Start Vaccinating Seniors: 'We've Got To Save Lives'

The Daily Mail reported New York City has dished out only 149,000 of its allotted 487,000 vaccine doses, and that is over a three-week period.

“If you had a world where everyone said ‘I 100 percent want the vaccine’ … then the governor’s theory would make a lot of sense. But on the ground it’s different. We’re at the frontline, here’s what we’re seeing. A lot of people aren’t ready to take the vaccine in category 1A,” he said.

The governor reportedly isn’t budging, though — which means that in this Democrat-on-Democrat dispute, Cuomo has made de Blasio the reasonable one. That’s all the more reason to crown him the worst governor in the country — a field populated by half-wits.



https://www.westernjournal.com/nyc-begs-gov-cuomo-let-start-vaccinating-seniors-got-save-lives/


Meanwhile, U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar said Wednesday that the government will allow more drugstores to start giving vaccinations to speed up the process. If health workers aren’t lining up fast enough, he said, it is OK to expand eligibility to lower-priority groups.

We need to not be overly prescriptive in that, especially as we see governors who are leaving vaccines sitting in freezers rather than getting it out into people’s arms,” he said.


Ya think?
The Daily Mail? Really...seems like opinion piece more than reporting. And Alex Azar? That whole Ship of Tools will be moved out of the picture very quickly.
 
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It seems as though the USA doesn't have a national plan for the roll out of the vaccine to be administered by the states - It appears to be done on an ad-hoc basis.
all of the states are doing the best that they can. The 2 current vaccines are semi complicated. Because of tort actions, before you get the vaccine you need to fill out a couple of forms saying basically that the vaccine is being given under emergency circumstances and that you accept that.
The vaccine needs to be thawed out, and administrators try to get people scheduled, so that all vaccine is used and will not have to be discarded if it expires.
because of a possible allergic reaction,you need to hang around for @15 or 20 minutes..
And the biggest issue is money and staff..in California if the keep opening up the criteria of who can administer the shots it's got to help..Dentist,Pharmacy staff and other non traditional settings..
but most people agree that the Army Corps of engineers and national guard should have already had super centers set up months ago to accommodate the easily anticipated demand, that just was not done.
there is no physical reason that vaccines cannot be given 24\7 ..money and staffing are preventing that.
A national form should be available online and be filled out in advance,in hand..there is no logical reason that old people in Florida and Arizona,Nevada are holding pieces of paper, sleeping in their cars because the scheduling process is insanity..should have been a wartime,all hands on deck,military controlled effort to a large degree. Many states don't have a clue about a mass vaccination program..and they really should not have been expected to know what to do..far,far,far above the paygrade and expertise of most governors
 
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The Daily Mail? Really...seems like opinion piece more than reporting. And Alex Azar? That whole Ship of Tools will be moved out of the picture very quickly.

Don’t be lazy. Go look at the numbers for yourself. Cuomo is a complete disaster. But then we already knew that.

Google...

Cuomo refuses to expand COVID-19 vaccine eligibility faster amid mounting pressure
 
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all of the states are doing the best that they can.

What in the actual F? “The best they can?” That’s the standard now? That just suddenly came to you out of left field, did it?

”Ya dude, gonna be 3 or 4 years ‘till a vaccine is ready... it’s the best we can do.”

Weren’t you just crushing the current admin for missing the 20 million vaccinated by the end of the year... then you come up with this??


there is no physical reason that vaccines cannot be given 24\7 ..money and staffing are preventing that.

This is 100% absolutely untrue.
 
Cuomo has made mistakes, but his state is still mid-pack in terms of vaccination.

Maybe you missed my post yesterday, but the hospital I work at is asking for volunteers to work 5 hr shifts to cover the 10 hrs from 7a-5p. I guess it is possible that they could ask for volunteers to do overnight shifts, but likely you would need to pay people to do this. Once we have a lot of vaccine. the way to do this is to train and pay people like they do during the census to run the vaccination clinics. And, like it or not, there are certainly financial constraints involved in some of the last mile problems that places are experiencing. I heard one county had to stop COVID testing because the public health people were required for COVID vaccination. Then there is the big issue with freezers. That speaks to a lack of resources especially in a year where local revenue streams are so much less than usual. Solvable if people had a desire to fix it. And it sounds like it will be a priority moving forward.
 

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