Vaccine effectiveness and Herd Immunity

[Nimbus]

With anti vaxxers, you need to divide it into two groups: complete anti vaxxers who are against all vaccines and the covid anti vaxxers, those who are just against the covid vaccines.

Complete antivaxxers are a very small minority, in the low single digit percentage. Covid antivaxxers are the majority of the Republican party in USA, close to 30% of the population and approaches 100 million people.

It is astonishing how a politician and a political party purposely let hundreds of thousands of its own members die just to deny the existence of a disease that makes them look bad. Even more astonishing are the members who blindly follow them. They’re more scared of liberals than a deadly disease that has literally killed 3/4 of a million Americans.

 

[gemima]

Are these people writing this article in this journal engaged in shaman rituals and crystal healing?

Stockholm University does sound credible and any possibility of risk that you can develop cancer from mRNA vaccines in years following the vaccination should be taken seriously.

The last important invented vaccine before covid, Dengvaxia, had 5 years of development before approval, and even when approved had side effects for kids, including alleged 600 deaths. After that, Sanofi changed Dengvaxia vaccination guidelines.

I have published an article with this crowd before (not their virus journal - one of the others), It's a joke the level of scrutiny they put into what they will publish. If the research was groundbreaking/ valuable it would be published somewhere better. No scientist dreams of publishing here.
When reviewing scientific literature you need to take this into account. Where it's published matters.

 

[Hawk256]

I have published an article with this crowd before (not their virus journal - one of the others), It's a joke the level of scrutiny they put into what they will publish. If the research was groundbreaking/ valuable it would be published somewhere better. No scientist dreams of publishing here.
When reviewing scientific literature you need to take this into account. Where it's published matters.

Why did you decide to publish with them?

 

[gemima]

Why did you decide to publish with them?

I wasn't the first or last author so it wasn't my choice- they needed to get a publication to hit a KPI in work. This is the type of stuff that ends up in these types of journals.
Nowadays most PhDs need to have 2+ publications to complete their research (you can choose to do your PhD via oldfashioned thesis OR via publications in some unis) thus a lot of crap ends up in these journals to hit KPIs/ to get a publication to your name.

 

[nd_eric_77]

I wasn't the first or last author so it wasn't my choice- they needed to get a publication to hit a KPI in work. This is the type of stuff that ends up in these types of journals.
Nowadays most PhDs need to have 2+ publications to complete their research (you can choose to do your PhD via oldfashioned thesis OR via publications in some unis) thus a lot of crap ends up in these journals to hit KPIs/ to get a publication to your name.

I have heard that many academic institutions are moving from a "number of publications" model to a "number of citations" model because of the difficulty in differentiating between higher and lower quality journals. Have you seen this in your field?

 

[gemima]

I have heard that many academic institutions are moving from a "number of publications" model to a "number of citations" model because of the difficulty in differentiating between higher and lower quality journals. Have you seen this in your field?

No, I haven't. But I really have ended up in a very un-academic area since moving to Indonesia....but my BF is in that world and part of a team with multiple publications in Nature. We are not in the same field but through him, I can appreciate the level of work that goes into a Nature "level" publication.
If they move to the citation approach it could be a bit unfair; in slow-moving fields it can take years to build up citations.
I don't know what the answers are to making the publication model better. IMO there is certainly a place for MDPI type journals - I just wish it was easier for the general public to realize that they are like reading a tabloid newspaper rather than a reference material.

 

[centurion]

I have published an article with this crowd before (not their virus journal - one of the others), It's a joke the level of scrutiny they put into what they will publish. If the research was groundbreaking/ valuable it would be published somewhere better. No scientist dreams of publishing here.
When reviewing scientific literature you need to take this into account. Where it's published matters.

I understand your point, but the source of the publication and authors have also added some weight. The authors are not PhDs from the University of North Sumatra, but a reputable Western University and Institute.

They are however Chinese, maybe they are assets of the CCP and engaged in disinformation campaigns.

The author has publications in the last 25 years

Ya-Fang Mei

www.umu.se

 

[gemima]

I understand your point, but the source of the publication and authors have also added some weight. The authors are not PhDs from the University of North Sumatra, but a reputable Western University and Institute.

They are however Chinese, maybe they are assets of the CCP and engaged in disinformation campaigns.

The author has publications in the last 25 years

Ya-Fang Mei

www.umu.se

There is always value to be had from any good research. I'm not a virologist so I can't really comment on her publication portfolio - BUT you have listed the last author - this is not the person doing this research, they are the head of the lab and as a result, usually have lots of experience and lots of publications. The first author is the one doing the actual research in this paper, this researcher is not so experienced and could be a PhD student or possibly a post-doc.
I read the paper and it is certainly topical - but it's very fundamental stuff. As I said in a previous comment, it's in vitro research (so in test tubes and cell lines). None of it is near anything clinical (in-vivo - in bodies - first step rats/ mice/ monkeys etc. and finally into actual humans). There is usually a lot of changes on the path from in vitro --- through to final research in actual humans so making judgments from a piece of in vitro research in a low-class journal is not something I recommend.

If their proposed model of damage to the immune system is real there are billions of healthy people in the world right this moment they could check the model in (anyone with the Pfizer/ AZ/ Moderna vaccines which had full-length spike protein in them).

 

[centurion]

There is always value to be had from any good research. I'm not a virologist so I can't really comment on her publication portfolio - BUT you have listed the last author - this is not the person doing this research, they are the head of the lab and as a result, usually have lots of experience and lots of publications. The first author is the one doing the actual research in this paper, this researcher is not so experienced and could be a PhD student or possibly a post-doc.
I read the paper and it is certainly topical - but it's very fundamental stuff. As I said in a previous comment, it's in vitro research (so in test tubes and cell lines). None of it is near anything clinical (in-vivo - in bodies - first step rats/ mice/ monkeys etc. and finally into actual humans). There is usually a lot of changes on the path from in vitro --- through to final research in actual humans so making judgments from a piece of in vitro research in a low-class journal is not something I recommend.

If their proposed model of damage to the immune system is real there are billions of healthy people in the world right this moment they could check the model in (anyone with the Pfizer/ AZ/ Moderna vaccines which had full-length spike protein in them).

Correct me if I am wrong but AZ does not belong to this group (Moderna, Pfizer)?

 

[gemima]

Correct me if I am wrong but AZ does not belong to this group (Moderna, Pfizer)?

She refers to vaccines with the full length spike protein in them.

From: https://www.news-medical.net/amp/ne...tein-antigen-COVID-19-vaccine-candidates.aspx
(which I know is just a science news site - so it could be wrong):
"Full-length spike vaccines
Several vaccines that incorporate the full-length spike include the Oxford/Astra-Zeneca adenovirus vector vaccine (ChAdOx1 nCoV‐19), Ad5 vector, the LNP- encapsulated mRNA vaccines from Pfizer/BioNTech (BNT162b2) and Moderna (mRNA‐1273), and the Novavax vaccine that uses the recombinant spike protein (NVX‐CoV2373)."

 

[centurion]

She refers to vaccines with the full length spike protein in them.

From: https://www.news-medical.net/amp/ne...tein-antigen-COVID-19-vaccine-candidates.aspx
(which I know is just a science news site - so it could be wrong):
"Full-length spike vaccines
Several vaccines that incorporate the full-length spike include the Oxford/Astra-Zeneca adenovirus vector vaccine (ChAdOx1 nCoV‐19), Ad5 vector, the LNP- encapsulated mRNA vaccines from Pfizer/BioNTech (BNT162b2) and Moderna (mRNA‐1273), and the Novavax vaccine that uses the recombinant spike protein (NVX‐CoV2373)."

Actually all on the market except the Chinese vaccines?

 

[gemima]

Actually all on the market except the Chinese vaccines?

To be honest I think the Chinese ones probably have the full-length spike too.
The virus itself is like this:

The spike part (the bit that sticks out - S in the diagram) is basically what AZ/ and the mRNA vaccines work on exclusively whereas Sinovac uses the whole of the virus. Maybe the denaturing process they use when making the vaccine also denatures the spike part - but I wouldn't assume that because I think the denaturing process affects the genes rather than the spike protein.

 

[Dave70]

Pfizer have had to enforce the vaccine mandate on their own employees. Why? For some reason, refusing to take the vaccine their own company produced?

Pfizer employees face COVID-19 vaccine mandate deadline of Nov. 15

The reality for Pfizer workers Monday morning is to vaccinate or vacate as the company hits its Nov. 15 deadline for all employees to be vaccinated against COVID-19. Pfizer's mandate, along with other companies in West Michigan, came after a federal mandate forced employees to make a decision...

wwmt.com

Finally, the OSHA has to suspend the enforcement for businesses.

OSHA is suspending enforcement of the government's new employer vaccine rule

The federal agency said it is complying with a court ruling that temporarily halts the regulation for big employers.

www.cbsnews.com

Even the CDC Director is "refusing to answer" how many CDC employees are vaccinated. That's strange indeed, there must be large number of unvaccinated CDC employees. Why?


Is mRNA vaccine the cause of hesitancy? Maybe Pfizer should start producing inactivated vaccine for COVID-19.

 

[Helpful Herbert]

There are nutters and conspiracy theorists everywhere, even in CDC and Pfizer. A better metric would be what % have voluntarily been vaccinated at those organisations. I bet it's 90%+, which is pretty conclusive on how they view it.

 

[Nimbus]

Pfizer have had to enforce the vaccine mandate on their own employees. Why? For some reason, refusing to take the vaccine their own company produced?

Pfizer employees face COVID-19 vaccine mandate deadline of Nov. 15

The reality for Pfizer workers Monday morning is to vaccinate or vacate as the company hits its Nov. 15 deadline for all employees to be vaccinated against COVID-19. Pfizer's mandate, along with other companies in West Michigan, came after a federal mandate forced employees to make a decision...

wwmt.com

Finally, the OSHA has to suspend the enforcement for businesses.

OSHA is suspending enforcement of the government's new employer vaccine rule

The federal agency said it is complying with a court ruling that temporarily halts the regulation for big employers.

www.cbsnews.com

Even the CDC Director is "refusing to answer" how many CDC employees are vaccinated. That's strange indeed, there must be large number of unvaccinated CDC employees. Why?


Is mRNA vaccine the cause of hesitancy? Maybe Pfizer should start producing inactivated vaccine for COVID-19.

There are trumpers in any US organization. Refusal is mostly political, not clinical.

 

[Nimbus]

There are nutters and conspiracy theorists everywhere, even in CDC and Pfizer. A better metric would be what % have voluntarily been vaccinated at those organisations. I bet it's 90%+, which is pretty conclusive on how they view it.

It depends on the state too. In Pfizer’s New York HQ the percentage of trumpers would be low, but in Missouri office it would be considerably higher.

Virtually all questions about vaccination policy in my company comes from the Missouri office, with few issues in New Jersey.

 

[R Cameron]

In addition to points from @Helpful Herbert and @Nimbus , a company as large as Pfizer certainly employs thousands of people as janitors, drivers, and other positions with absolutely no medical expertise required.

It would be more telling to know the percentage of those medical experts who actually worked on the vaccine who also took it. Didn't the inventor of the "bullet proof vest" personally test it?

 

[gemima]

There are nutters and conspiracy theorists everywhere, even in CDC and Pfizer. A better metric would be what % have voluntarily been vaccinated at those organisations. I bet it's 90%+, which is pretty conclusive on how they view it.

At the Pfizer labs/ plants in Ireland they were even vaxxing the family members of the staff - there are 4000 people working for them in Ireland and they vaxxed 16,000 people in total. It was really appreciated at the time - vaccines were in short supply in Europe at the time.

 

[Balifrog]

No need to add any comment I guess....

Redirect Notice

The Ottawa Senators Have a 100% Vaccination Rate—and 40% of the Team Has Tested Positive for Covid​

 

[ChrisTex]

Something similar happened in the ECHL(Double A minor league) recently: Kansas City played Allen(my local team) and Allen played Witchita. All 3 teams were making roster moves due to positive tests.