Covid-19 pandemic

[Fussbudget]

The BBC is reporting that 130,000 people were vaccinated in the first week. Hurrah! Except that at that rate it will take TEN YEARS to vaccinate the entire population of the UK.

And they've only received the first shot of two, haven't they? So no one has been fully vaccinated yet.

[S. aureus]

California continues to lurch from bad to worse, setting a new record yesterday for both new cases and deaths. 61,569 of the former (previous daily record 37,143), 407 of the latter (290).

[Antepli Ejderha]

What would happen if it became a news story in the local press Antepli Ejderha ?

Nothing happened to Dominic Cummings, nothing will happen here, it's not worth the hassle of whistle blowing on this.

[Sporting]

Nothing happened to Dominic Cummings, nothing will happen here, it's not worth the hassle of whistle blowing on this.

Anonymously, at least?

[Nocturnal Submission]

And they've only received the first shot of two, haven't they? So no one has been fully vaccinated yet.

Just out of interest, do we know if after having the first shot the shotee is substantially protected, partially protected or not protected at all until they get the second one?

[ad hoc]

I saw a graph recently that made it clear that just having one shot makes a massive difference. The article was even suggesting that the difference was substantial enough to make it possibly advisable to only give one shot at this stage so as to vaccinate a greater number of people very quickly

[Satchmo Distel]

Guardian:

just over 67% of the population of England will be in tier 3, 31% in tier 2 and 1.6% in tier 1

[S. aureus]

Dealing with those who won't wear a mask:

[Balderdasha]

Both Europe and North America have exceeded 20 million cases of Covid-19.

[San Bernardhinault]

I saw a graph recently that made it clear that just having one shot makes a massive difference. The article was even suggesting that the difference was substantial enough to make it possibly advisable to only give one shot at this stage so as to vaccinate a greater number of people very quickly

I saw that, too. The question - I think - was whether it's worth the risk of immunity wearing off by not having a second booster in order to have a more rapid initial response. I don't think there's a clear-cut answer.

[Patrick Thistle]

Sir Ian McKellen has tweeted a picture of him receiving the vaccine.

[Amor de Cosmos]

I saw a graph recently that made it clear that just having one shot makes a massive difference. The article was even suggesting that the difference was substantial enough to make it possibly advisable to only give one shot at this stage so as to vaccinate a greater number of people very quickly

According to BC's Medical Director, the estimable Dr Bonnie Henry, the second dose prolongs the effect of the the first, it adds virtually nothing beyond that. The first is good for up to two months, possibly longer. This province has an initial 4000 doses and it will be using them on 4,000 people. Rather than two doses on 2,000 people.

[Lurgee]

Sir Ian McKellen has tweeted a picture of him receiving the vaccine.

"Ask yourself - what would Gandalf do?"

[Diable Rouge]

Show us the meaning of haste!

[Diable Rouge]

https://twitter.com/NextIrishGE/status/1339638404938686467

[Diable Rouge]

Furthermore:

https://twitter.com/PTHosford/status/1339639478521106432

[Patrick Thistle]

52 deaths in Wales today. Very likely to top the 3000 deaths total tomorrow. <1% of the population of Merthyr Tydfil has tested positive for Covid.

[Balderdasha]

The official UK death toll of 66,052 is now higher than the populations of Loughborough or Margate.

The latest ONS figures put the excess death toll for 2020 at more than 79,000.

[Balderdasha]

Brazil reported more than 1,000 deaths today, for the first time since September 2nd. Seems to be in the midst of a second wave.

[Incandenza]

Southern California has 0% ICU bed capacity.

[San Bernardhinault]

The Moderna vaccine looks like it will be coming on-stream in the US in the next few days after a positive vote from the FDA advisory committee.

This is great news in this country given what appears to be low supply of the Pfizer vaccine here.

[Incandenza]

The Moderna vaccine looks like it will be coming on-stream in the US in the next few days after a positive vote from the FDA advisory committee.

This is great news in this country given what appears to be low supply of the Pfizer vaccine here.

Was the story about people "finding" more doses of the Pfizer vaccine in vials discussed here?

[San Bernardhinault]

I've not seen it mentioned, and haven't heard anything about it.

[Janik]

According to BC's Medical Director, the estimable Dr Bonnie Henry, the second dose prolongs the effect of the the first, it adds virtually nothing beyond that. The first is good for up to two months, possibly longer. This province has an initial 4000 doses and it will be using them on 4,000 people. Rather than two doses on 2,000 people.

Prolonging the effect is not 'virtually nothing'. It is absolutely vital. Because...

The BBC is reporting that 130,000 people were vaccinated in the first week. Hurrah! Except that at that rate it will take TEN YEARS to vaccinate the entire population of the UK.

As I think I've alluded to before, unless long term protection is provided (and by that I mean years/decades worth of immunity, if not the ideal of permanent, from one course of vaccinations) then the vaccines are peashooters against a herd of charging elephants. It just isn't practical or plausible to be re-inoculating entire populations annually. Doing that would mean health systems effectively only doing that. Or some vast increase in the number of doctors, nurses, clinics, etc., etc. None of which can be quintupled at the drop of a hat.

I won't bother reviving the other thread, but for me the pandemic will only be over once mass vaccination has either been completed (i.e. it gives permanent or semi-permanent immunity) or the programme has been scaled back to the clinically vulnerable only. Vaccination that only confers a year or two of immunity is not an exit strategy really - it is just another, albeit more comprehensive, control measure. The lion is still asleep at the base of the tree.
Pandemics end because either the pathogen is wiped out, which is not going to happen here, or evolution takes it's course and it mutates to be a low enough threat level for humanity to accept it being endemic. Like with 'flu. Until proven otherwise, that is still the end game I completely expect for this. One that will possibly be delayed by years by our attempts to reduce the death toll - all we might achieve in the end is to spread it out over a much longer timeframe.

[Janik]

I saw a graph recently that made it clear that just having one shot makes a massive difference. The article was even suggesting that the difference was substantial enough to make it possibly advisable to only give one shot at this stage so as to vaccinate a greater number of people very quickly

It's about how quickly you can get around the clinically extremely vulnerable. They need a dose as quickly as possible. But making that decision does mean re-dosing the self-same people again, slowing things down for everyone else. It's a real damned if you do...

Course, the really bad move would be to let the virus numbers build up to the point where the situation was critical, just prior to a slow-to-roll-out short-term solution coming online. The thing to do would have been to have a full lockdown when you heard the vaccine was coming, to give you a nice quiet backdrop to work against rather than having to do it whilst trying to firefight conflagrations breaking out everywhere.