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  • Welcome to the new site. Here's a thread about the update where you can post your feedback, ask questions or spot those nasty bugs!

Coronavirus

James Lemon

Well-known member

3741


What do you think is the rational approach to fight this virus? Herd immunity or are we overreacting to the current situation?
The SARS epidemic in 2003 reported 8098 cases with 774 deaths, and was eventually brought under control by July, 2003, in a matter of 8 months. Although 26 countries reported cases, the vast majority of cases were concentrated in five countries or regions: China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore, and Toronto, Canada. SARS was eventually contained by means of syndromic surveillance, prompt isolation of patients, strict enforcement of quarantine of all contacts, and in some areas community-level quarantine. By interrupting all human-to-human transmission, SARS was effectively eradicated. By contrast, by Feb 28, 2020, within a matter of 2 months since the beginning of the outbreak, more than 82 000 confirmed cases of COVID-19 have been reported with more than 2800 deaths, mostly in China. Outside of China, 46 countries are reporting more than 3600 cases including at least 700 on several cruise ships.
 

Jerome Marot

Well-known member
I was waiting for the first post on the subject as I have been facing work restrictions for a week. But sorry, I don't have a picture as it is not easy to photograph closed schools.

Herd immunity means that 60% of the people would be infected. For the USA only (320 millions inhabitants), that means 192 millions infected. Let us be optimistic and say only 10% would develop symptoms necessitating hospitalisation, that is 19 millions people exceeding by far available capacity. So we would have people in dire needs of care and no available capacity, but let just assume that mortality is a very optimistic 1%, that is again 1,9 million dead. Still optimistic but more reasonable assumptions would be around 5 to 10 millions.

China, with 4 times the US population, would have faced 20 to 40 millions deaths. Unsurprisingly, they decided that "herd immunity" was not such a great idea.

Obviously, I am not the only person capable of such an easy calculation, so the real question becomes: "with herd immunity being such an obviously bad idea, why is it even suggested in the first place?". The obvious answer is that the authorities need a bit of distraction to buy them time.
 
Last edited:

Doug Kerr

Well-known member
Hi, Jèrôme,

In the past, we have been accustomed to the term "herd immunity" referring to the impact of immunity conferred by vaccination. But of course it applies equally well to the situation where the only immunity is conferred by recovering from the disease.

The fraction of immunity required for this situation to come into effect of course varies with the disease. (As I understand it, it runs from perhaps 30% to perhaps 95% over a range of common diseases.) I have not been following the reports closely enough to realize that perhaps the epidemiologists have concluded that for the novel coronavirus of interest the herd immunity threshold is perhaps 60%.

Best regards,

Doug
 

Jerome Marot

Well-known member
In the past, we have been accustomed to the term "herd immunity" referring to the impact of immunity conferred by vaccination. But of course it applies equally well to the situation where the only immunity is conferred by recovering from the disease.

You may not be aware of recent news from the UK: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/13/herd-immunity-will-the-uks-coronavirus-strategy-work

Obviously, vaccines have the advantage that they are designed not to kill too many people. That is not trivial and takes at least over a year.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Within 6 months there will be drugs. Vaccines by 18 months!

No more than 1 million deaths in the USA.

Asher
 

James Lemon

Well-known member
Despite our efforts I believe that our governments could be doing much better. So far we here about social distancing,washing hands and not touching our faces. Yet I have not heard about any strategies that would require other measures to help upset the spread of this virus. The strategy that underpinned this containment effort in China was initially a national approach that promoted universal temperature monitoring, masking, and hand washing.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
The only method that is efficient involves privacy invasion and has been successfully used by China, Singapore, South Korea, (with drive through instant virus testing) and just today, Israel too all with:

1. Tracking your phone: if you are found positive and then matching all your schedule and locations retrospectively with your oral account and GPS record.

2. Search GPS database of all other persons who crisscrossed their schedules and locations with the person of interest. Basic Mossad software.

3. All Potential contacts interviewed and tested repeatedly and quarantined

4. Arrest for anyone breaking quarantine
Asher
 

James Lemon

Well-known member
The only method that is efficient involves privacy invasion and has been successfully used by China, Singapore, South Korea, (with drive through instant virus testing) and just today, Israel too all with:

1. Tracking your phone: if you are found positive and then matching all your schedule and locations retrospectively with your oral account and GPS record.

2. Search GPS database of all other persons who crisscrossed their schedules and locations with the person of interest. Basic Mossad software.

3. All Potential contacts interviewed and tested repeatedly and quarantined

4. Arrest for anyone breaking quarantine
Asher

Asher

Do you think that the consequences of the current reaction of this resulting pandemic will be worse than the virus itself. In terms of broken supply chains,economic,lost jobs, and social behavior, etc.? It's not just another cold or flu.

Best, regards
James
 

Peter Dexter

Well-known member
30 some cases in my neck of the woods and cranking up daily. No deaths yet. Shot to Hell my plans for a US trip next month.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Asher

Do you think that the consequences of the current reaction of this resulting pandemic will be worse than the virus itself. In terms of broken supply chains,economic,lost jobs, and social behavior, etc.? It's not just another cold or flu.

Best, regards
James
The virus is working against a naive world population and is at least 20 times more lethal than influenza (which at its worse, killed 20 million “naive”people during World War One).

Normally, when one region has a disaster, the other unaffected areas can lend resources of supplies and first responders.

Now that’s hardly possible.

Even today, China using its 10 fold increased mask manufacture internally. They are preparing for the second wave!

We no longer can have all vaccine mass production carried out from US, Australian and Israeli research then actually ramped up in only India China!

India lacks Donald Trump and Donald Duck, But the leadership of the Hindu ruling party is recommending holy cow urine as the preventative and cure for cancer and now the novel coronavirus!

American and European big pharmaceutical companies do t make profits from vaccines so they offshore production.

NATO should have its own supply chain starting from the raw materials.

Each continent should have redundant supply chains like petroleum and grain reserves!

I needed to call. Doctor at a hospital today and we waited 26 minutes to get through and get transferred and re transferred back to the beginning of the same queue!

Imagine if the crest of the epidemic was here already!

Asher
 

James Lemon

Well-known member
The virus is working against a naive world population and is at least 20 times more lethal than influenza (which at its worse, killed 20 million “naive”people during World War One).

Normally, when one region has a disaster, the other unaffected areas can lend resources of supplies and first responders.

Now that’s hardly possible.

Even today, China using its 10 fold increased mask manufacture internally. They are preparing for the second wave!

We no longer can have all vaccine mass production carried out from US, Australian and Israeli research then actually ramped up in only India China!

India lacks Donald Trump and Donald Duck, But the leadership of the Hindu ruling party is recommending holy cow urine as the preventative and cure for cancer and now the novel coronavirus!

American and European big pharmaceutical companies do t make profits from vaccines so they offshore production.

NATO should have its own supply chain starting from the raw materials.

Each continent should have redundant supply chains like petroleum and grain reserves!

I needed to call. Doctor at a hospital today and we waited 26 minutes to get through and get transferred and re transferred back to the beginning of the same queue!

Imagine if the crest of the epidemic was here already!

Asher

Here in Canada it would be difficult to get a bed in a hospital at the best of times. Never mind even a minor crisis.
 

Tom dinning

Registrant*
I’m sitting in my comfy chair waiting for Christine to get ready to go see a doctor. She has a cough, sore throat, normal temp, unwell generally, tired.
There’s no panic here. Anxiety does nothing to diagnose, contain, prevent, cure.
Her chances of having COVID-19 are less than slim. Nevertheless, any illness has it discomfort levels and risk factors.
We are following procedure. That’s all we have. We trust the experts to know what they are doing. Any input from me or any person not across the virus is just hot air as far as I’m concerned.
Changing queues has more risks than being patient when you’re listening to the sooth-sayers and conspiracy mongers.

Here’s Dinning’s Rules:
  1. Don’t make up stuff.
  2. Find someone you trust and listen carefully.
  3. Don’t take any notice of numbers.
  4. concentrate on looking after yourself.
  5. Wait for the outcome.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Well that might work for you in your outback home!

You do not know the chances of getting infected are close to zilch unless testing everyone in your city or at least a scientific sampling predicted that!

With this disease, being concerned about others too is essential. If you have symptoms, stay home or some pregnant woman, person with heart failure or elderly might die.

But I expect no different from you, Tom!

Why should you change?

But it does turn out the The University of Melbourne’s is one of THE Respected top Works Centers for Epidemiology in this disease. Also they have taken a leadership role in original vaccine research.

As long as you listen to THEM, you need look no further on the planet for advice!

Asher
 

Jerome Marot

Well-known member
Despite our efforts I believe that our governments could be doing much better. So far we here about social distancing,washing hands and not touching our faces. Yet I have not heard about any strategies that would require other measures to help upset the spread of this virus. The strategy that underpinned this containment effort in China was initially a national approach that promoted universal temperature monitoring, masking, and hand washing.

Germany has closed all schools and public places from Friday onwards. France as well and up the ante yesterday by closing all but essential shops. Italy is closed down and has travel restrictions, keeping everyone not essential on house arrest. International trains and planes are cancelled. This is only the beginning, the situation is evolving rapidly.
 

Jerome Marot

Well-known member
We no longer can have all vaccine mass production carried out from US, Australian and Israeli research then actually ramped up in only India China!

India lacks Donald Trump and Donald Duck, But the leadership of the Hindu ruling party is recommending holy cow urine as the preventative and cure for cancer and now the novel coronavirus!

American and European big pharmaceutical companies do t make profits from vaccines so they offshore production.

NATO should have its own supply chain starting from the raw materials.

Each continent should have redundant supply chains like petroleum and grain reserves!

You keep talking about vaccines, yet we don't have one against this particular virus and it is not sure we will ever have one. From https://www.wired.com/story/everything-you-need-to-know-about-coronavirus-vaccines/

There’s another factor that makes developing a vaccine against coronavirus a particularly tricky endeavor, says Peter Hotez, a vaccine researcher and dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine. That’s something called “immune enhancement.” In the 1960s, scientists at the National Institutes of Health were working on a vaccine against respiratory syncytial virus, or RSV, a common, very contagious virus responsible for most of the colds that infants and toddlers get. During clinical trials, some children who received the vaccine later went on to get terribly sick when they caught RSV in the wild. The vaccine produced an exaggerated immune response, causing extensive damage in their bodies. Two kids died.
Decades later, when SARS hit, researchers including Hotez began working on a vaccine. But in early tests with lab animals, they saw something that raised a red flag. The animals’ immune cells were attacking their lungs, causing damage like what had been described in the RSV trials. “That alerted everyone in the coronavirus research community that there was potential for immune enhancement,” says Hotez.
 

Jerome Marot

Well-known member
Here’s Dinning’s Rules:
  1. Don’t make up stuff.
  2. Find someone you trust and listen carefully.
  3. Don’t take any notice of numbers.
  4. concentrate on looking after yourself.
  5. Wait for the outcome.

And most of all: exercise common sense. We live in the times of social networks which aggravate rumours and panics.
 

Tom dinning

Registrant*
Well that might work for you in your outback home!

You do not know the chances of getting infected are close to zilch unless testing everyone in your city or at least a scientific sampling predicted that!

With this disease, being concerned about others too is essential. If you have symptoms, stay home or some pregnant woman, person with heart failure or elderly might die.

But I expect no different from you, Tom!

Why should you change?

But it does turn out the The University of Melbourne’s is one of THE Respected top Works Centers for Epidemiology in this disease. Also they have taken a leadership role in original vaccine research.

As long as you listen to THEM, you need look no further on the planet for advice!

Asher
Hang on!
I’m the bloke with heart disease. So I’m looking after myself.
That’s where it starts. So the right thing and everyone benefits.
I keep away from suspects before they have a chance to contaminate me.
I took Christine to the docs today. I looked after myself all the way.
fuck, Ash! What good is anyone if they don’t look after themselves.
I expect my doctor to be healthy. I’ll ask him. That’s looking after me.
Christine is sick. I look after myself so I can then look after her.
I keep away from crowds. I don’t travel.
what’s wrong with any of that.
I don’t take a bullet for or from anyone.
good community health starts with me. I’m the one person I can be fully responsible to and for.
Don’t be such a patronising martyr.
You can really annoy me sometimes with your “outback” prejudice.
What do you mean “it just turns out”? Like it’s some sort of surprise that someone other than Israel had some good ideas?
It just turns out we don’t skite about what we do. We just get on with it.
As for advice. I trust our medical advisors. It’s all we have.
so back of just a bit. I’m not in for a fight. Just to be heard and not scorned by your bigotry.
 

Tom dinning

Registrant*
And most of all: exercise common sense. We live in the times of social networks which aggravate rumours and panics.
Most of all, Jerome.
I did have that conversation with Christine this very day. Unfortunately there are enough people without good common sense about to cause a problem. And you can’t always tell by just looking at them.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
.......You can really annoy me sometimes with your “outback” prejudice.


What do you mean “it just turns out”?

Like it’s some sort of surprise that someone other than Israel had some good ideas?
It just turns out we don’t skite about what we do. We just get on with it.


As for advice. I trust our medical advisors. It’s all we have. so back of just a bit. I’m not in for a fight. Just to be heard and not scorned by your bigotry.


Well Tom,

First, to Christine, we wish her a speedy recovery!

To your above rebuke: Yes! It was indeed a surprise as the work in Melbourne was not generally known and certainly not in the USA.

In fact when I discovered the scholarship from the Aussie University I used it as my core report for my recommendation to City managers planning response here in Southern California.

I had first looked to the UK for guidance, but they are stuck in a fight between ministers who feel that the British will get exhausted with early strict distances and scientists who simply want to get on with it.

It turns out the South Korea and Singapore, together with the ideas from Melbourne’s are the best the planet has produced outside of China.

Israel has simply followed suit with the distancing practices and draconian losses of privacy used by China, South Korea and Singapore.

I mentioned Israel since they are a major source of pharmaceuticals and protective gear outside of China.

The key role of Melbourne is known to vaccine researchers who share data.

I would have thought France and the U.K. would have ranked far higher in leadership, so I was, indeed, very surprised.

My view of the “Outback” is limited to your independant voice. Of course I know you are not the governor of the region, but Darwin is not Melbourne nor Perth!

If I am prejudiced, which likely I am, it’s only in admiration of the guys who fought and sacrificed with us in every war and have produced some of the best artists and movies of the 20th Century!

Here in the USA, a lot of the local world class advances in Australia simply don’t reach us as we invent and then bulk-produce it in China, the Philippines, Taiwan and India if it isn’t cheaper from South Korea or Japan!

Australian wine reaches here but not a lot else that is generally known! The frozen lamb and beef that come to us are not necessarily marked as such! Your ores go mostly to China, South Korea and Japan.

Only about 6% of your exports are to the USA. Australia is more known for resilience, honest talk and hard humor than from products we use!

But we all know do little about the actual internal structure of your industries.

So to discover the leading role of Melbourne academics in tackling this novel coronavirus, (over so many other countries), is really news!

Asher
 

Jerome Marot

Well-known member
Please calm down and realise that we will probably all have to go through some form of isolation in the next weeks. A forum like this one will be one of our few left sources of social contacts and help us all not going insane from confinement.

Take care of yourself and of loved ones. It is all we can do.
 

Tom dinning

Registrant*
Please calm down and realise that we will probably all have to go through some form of isolation in the next weeks. A forum like this one will be one of our few left sources of social contacts and help us all not going insane from confinement.

Take care of yourself and of loved ones. It is all we can do.
I'm calm, Jerome. Truly.
I just get a little annoyed with Asher from time to time.
Surely you can understand that.
The safest place for me is right here.
 

nicolas claris

OPF Co-founder/Administrator
Please calm down and realise that we will probably all have to go through some form of isolation in the next weeks. A forum like this one will be one of our few left sources of social contacts and help us all not going insane from confinement.

Take care of yourself and of loved ones. It is all we can do.
Hi Jerome
you may delete the word "probably"…
 

James Lemon

Well-known member
Viruses are infectious agents with both living and nonliving characteristics.
1. Living characteristics of viruses
a. They reproduce at a fantastic rate, but only in living host cells.
b. They can mutate.
2. Nonliving characteristics of viruses
a. They are acellular, that is, they contain no cytoplasm or cellular organelles.
b. They carry out no metabolism on their own and must replicate using the host cell's metabolic machinery. In other words, viruses don't grow and divide. Instead, new viral components are synthesized and assembled within the infected host cell.
c. The vast majority of viruses possess either DNA or RNA but not both.

General Categories of Viral Infections of Humans
Most viruses that infect humans, such as those that cause routine respiratory infections (e.g., cold viruses, influenza viruses) and gastrointestinal infections (e.g., Rotaviruses, Noroviruses), cause acute infections. Acute (def) infections are of relatively short duration with rapid recovery.
In persistent infections, the viruses are continually present in the body. Some persistent infections are late complications following an acute infection and include subacute sclerosing panencephalitis (SSPE) that can follow an acute measles infection and progressive encephalitis that can follow rubella. Other persistent infections are known as latent (def) viral infection. In a latent viral infection the virus remains in equilibrium with the host for long periods of time before symptoms again appear, but the actual viruses cannot be detected until reactivation of the disease occurs. Examples include infections caused by HSV-1 (fever blisters), HSV-2 (genital herpes), and VZV (chickenpox-shingles). In the case of chronic virus infections, the virus can be demonstrated in the body at all times and the disease may be present or absent for an extended period of time. Examples include hepatitis B (caused by HBV) and hepatitis C (caused by HCV). Slow infections are ones in which the infectious agents gradually increase in number over a very long period of time during which no significant symptoms are seen. Examples include AIDS (caused by HIV-1 and HIV-2) and certain lentiviruses that cause tumors in animals. Although not viruses, prions also cause slow infections.
 

James Lemon

Well-known member
You keep talking about vaccines, yet we don't have one against this particular virus and it is not sure we will ever have one. From https://www.wired.com/story/everything-you-need-to-know-about-coronavirus-vaccines/

There’s another factor that makes developing a vaccine against coronavirus a particularly tricky endeavor, says Peter Hotez, a vaccine researcher and dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine. That’s something called “immune enhancement.” In the 1960s, scientists at the National Institutes of Health were working on a vaccine against respiratory syncytial virus, or RSV, a common, very contagious virus responsible for most of the colds that infants and toddlers get. During clinical trials, some children who received the vaccine later went on to get terribly sick when they caught RSV in the wild. The vaccine produced an exaggerated immune response, causing extensive damage in their bodies. Two kids died.
Decades later, when SARS hit, researchers including Hotez began working on a vaccine. But in early tests with lab animals, they saw something that raised a red flag. The animals’ immune cells were attacking their lungs, causing damage like what had been described in the RSV trials. “That alerted everyone in the coronavirus research community that there was potential for immune enhancement,” says Hotez.

Hotez and other vaccine scientists, who argue that SARS, and the Middle East respiratory syndrome, or MERS, of 2012, should have triggered major federal and global investments to develop vaccines in anticipation of future epidemics.
Instead, the SARS vaccine that Hotez's team created in collaboration with scientists at the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston is sitting in a freezer, no closer to commercial production than it was four years ago.

We could have had this ready to go and been testing the vaccine's efficacy at the start of this new outbreak in China," said Hotez, who believes the vaccine could provide cross-protection against the new coronavirus, which causes a respiratory disease known as COVID-19. "There is a problem with the ecosystem in vaccine development, and we've got to fix this

https://www.nbcnews.com/health/heal...s-vaccine-years-ago-then-money-dried-n1150091
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
It’s an odd fact about our society that we accept highway and influenza deaths and folk influenza shunning vaccination as normal aspects of our civilization.

Everyone thinks it will happen to someone else!

Truth is that when 30,000 men march off to war, 100 are most certainly not coming back. Often it’s a hell of a lot more. Still most feel they will make it!

Asher
 

Jerome Marot

Well-known member
major federal and global investments to develop vaccines in anticipation of future epidemics.

Building vaccines in for yet unknown pathogens or, strictly speaking, yet non-existing pathogens as COVID-19 appears to be a mutation of an animal virus, would require no less feast than predicting the future.
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Building vaccines in for yet unknown pathogens or, strictly speaking, yet non-existing pathogens as COVID-19 appears to be a mutation of an animal virus, would require no less feast than predicting the future.
Well not exactly. We already have several different skeleton frameworks prebuilt and proven as platforms to attach the novel antigens too. Just simple molecular biology and trial and error!

But the good news:


Coronavirus slowing down http://bit.ly/2Uasidc Turns our that after several weeks, you can no longer infect over two new people every few days as these are mostly the same folk you bump into every day.

Also, on the cruise ships with common air and dining rooms, 80% didn’t get infected!

Asher
 
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