Covid vaccine

Quoted from Maringer

I've stated why the AIER article is bunkum. If you think I'm wrong, tell me why and provide evidence. "It hasn't been removed" isn't an argument about truthfulness when you're taking about the Internet.

To reiterate my point.

Interesting read on Sweden's model especially the comments around its unsuitability to the UK


The Sweden experiment: how no lockdowns led to better mental health, a healthier economy and happier schoolchildren

While Sweden's decision to stay open throughout the pandemic generated international debate, the controversy passed most people in Sweden by

Sweden's coronavirus policy seems to have paid off
It's the start of the new school year in Sweden, and the highly infectious delta variant is starting to hit the country hard, with cases having doubled since the end of July.

In a lot of countries that would mean one thing: lockdown. But not in Sweden. Instead, at Sorgenfri school in central Malmö, the only visible anti-Covid measure is a ban on parents entering the school building.

"I'm not worried at all," says Elin Brusewitz, 35, as her son played with his skateboard beside her. "We were fine during the last outbreaks. I guess I'm a typical Swede: not worried unless the authorities tell me to be worried.".

Sweden's decision to eschew lockdown and leave pubs, restaurants, shopping centres and primary schools open throughout the pandemic generated furious discussion internationally.

Millions of people across the world have been confined to their homes, watched businesses go under, and struggled to stay on top of their studies amid wave after wave of restrictions to prevent the spread of coronavirus.

But for some 10 million Swedes, the eighteen months since the first local Covid-19 case was registered last February have been largely unremarkable.

Two-thirds of people are not worried about the consequences of the pandemic for them and their family, according to the most recent opinion survey for the Civil Contingencies Agency, carried out in mid-June.

State epidemiologist Anders Tegnell, Public Health Agency of Sweden, enjoying a beer while working on his laptop at an outdoor restaurant in Stockholm, Sweden
Anders Tegnell was the architect of Sweden's strategy CREDIT: TT News Agency
And there is broad support for the government’s choices. Just a quarter felt the authorities should have given public health greater priority over the economy. Anders Tegnell, the state epidemiologist who was the architect of Sweden's strategy, was last week voted "most important Swede of the year" by the readers of Sweden's leading supermarket magazine.

That is not to say the virus has not taken its toll - nearly 15,000 people have died in total, around 1,450 per million. But that death rate is lower than the average for the European Union as a whole (1,684), and well below those of France, Spain, Italy and the UK.

Some now concede Sweden has not become the cautionary tale many predicted.

"Many times I would have thought that the situation would have gone a different way, but it worked for Sweden," said Samir Bhatt, professor of Public Health at the University of Copenhagen, and one of the team at Imperial College who pushed the UK's lockdown strategy.

“They achieved infection control; they managed to keep infections relatively low and they didn't have any health care collapse.”

The real benefits of Sweden’s radical policy, however, can be seen in the economy, the psychological impact, and in schools.


At the end of the first wave last year, the IMF predicted that Sweden's economy would contract by 7 per cent in 2020. In the end, GDP shrank by just 2.8 per cent, significantly lower than the EU average of 6 per cent and the UK - a staggering 9.8 per cent.

Sweden's economy has also bounced back faster than any other country in Europe. By  June, GDP had overtaken where it was before the pandemic struck and the economy is estimated to grow by 4.6 per cent this year.

The government avoided splashing out on costly financial-support packages, spending just $22bn (£16bn) - 4.2 per cent of its GDP - on wage subsidies and other measures.

As a result, in 2020, the country recorded the second-smallest budget deficit in the European Union after Denmark, and its national debt has come through the crisis almost unscathed.  

"The public finances have been hit relatively lightly compared to most countries, probably due to the fact that we have used less draconian measures," Urban Hansson Brusewitz, Director General of Sweden's National Institute of Economic Research [and no relation to Elin], told the Telegraph.

The psychological toll of the pandemic also appears to have been less dramatic in Sweden.


The National Board of Health and Welfare reported a continuation in the decline in the number of people seeking treatment for anxiety and depression, particularly among children and young adults.


A large part of this is likely down to the decision to keep primary and lower secondary schools open throughout. Even in upper secondary schools, only children who test positive or have been formally contact-traced are asked to stay home.

Entire schools and classes were quarantined very rarely and only in exceptional circumstances if advised by a local infectious disease doctor. That’s a marked contrast to the UK, where as many as a million children were sent home from school during the "pingdemic".

"We are very happy that we kept our schools open. I think that that is very important," explained Sara Byfors, unit chief at the Public Health Agency.

An analysis of national grades published by the Swedish National Agency for Education last month found no evidence that the pandemic had negatively affected children's educational attainment.

"The fact that grades have stayed stable suggests that both teachers and pupils have handled this tough pandemic year well," said the agency's general director Peter Fredriksson in a statement. "No group of pupils seems to have been affected more negatively than any other."

Students run out of their school celebrating their high school graduation at Nacka Gymnasium in Stockholm, Sweden

Ms Byfors said the worst impact of the pandemic appeared to have been on the few people who did have to quarantine.

"We know that it had a big effect on the elderly that were isolated, and we also know that a lot of children were affected if they were in the higher grades that had to have distance learning," she said. "How big it is and what the long-term effects will be [is] still to be determined."

However, Dr Bhatt, the University of Copenhagen professor, is keen to point out that for all of its successes, Sweden saw more Covid fatalities than its Nordic neighbours who took a more interventionist approach.

The death rate was between three and four times that of Denmark, and nearly 10 times those of Finland and Norway - suggesting Swedes died that didn’t need to.

And Dr Bhatt does not think another, non-Nordic country such as Britain could have copied Sweden’s policies and got the same results.

With about 23 people per square kilometre, Sweden has about a tenth of the population density of the UK, while about half of Swedish households comprise just one person - a major factor in local transmission.


In a paper published last week in science journal Nature, Dr Bhatt, together with the UK's former government advisor Neil Ferguson and other researchers, estimated that if the UK had adopted Sweden’s policies, its death rate would have been between two and four times higher.

"What Sweden did was a pandemic response that involved large numbers of interventions, a considerable amount of reliance on population behaviour and population adherence, and a reliance on the intricacies of what makes Swedish culture Swedish culture,” Dr Bhatt said.

"If the UK had adopted what Sweden did, I have no doubt in my mind that it would have had an absolute disaster.

For residents of Malmö, the gamble has paid off.

Zaina Vujcics is a podiatrist who runs a small business close to Sorgenfri school that was able to stay open throughout the pandemic. She is adamant: "Sweden has had the best coronavirus policy.”

"In Denmark, in Norway, in France, Belgium, everywhere else, I would have had to close," she said. "I am so happy to be living in Sweden."

Sweden was an interesting case because their approach was so different to that of other countries, including their direct neighbours. Neighbours who had much, much better outcomes in terms of numbers of infections and deaths. Norway and Finland had about a tenth of the number. The Swedes cocked up with care homes in the same way that we did and suffered lots of deaths because of it, so that made things worse in that regard. Don't know about Norway and Finland

Very much a different situation to countries such as ourselves or other similarly highly-populous countries. The population density is very low in Sweden - amongst the lowest in the EU which obviously means less chance of transmission. Perhaps of more note is the fact that more than half of Swedish households contain just 1 person living in them and roughly a third of older folk live alone:

https://www.businessinsider.co.....2020-9?r=US&IR=T

UK equivalent, less than 30% of households are single person. Pretty remarkable situation over there in comparison. Their weaker restrictions, allied with the Swedish propensity to follow the advice of the authorities meant that the virus didn't take off there last year in the way it did in many countries.

The Swedish approach might not have been too disastrous for them (except for those who died or have suffered long-term illness, of course), but almost certainly would have been in countries with higher population density and fewer single-person households.

Still not looking to clever in Highly vaccinated Israel!
Interesting also to see a BBC report asking the question over the weekend - Is it better for the vaccinated to get the virus now rather than the booster?

From the report-

"We could be digging ourselves into a hole, for a very long time, where we think we can only keep Covid away by boosting every year," Prof Eleanor Riley, an immunologist from the University of Edinburgh,

Prof Adam Finn, a government vaccine adviser, said over-vaccinating people, when other parts of the world had none, was "a bit insane, it's not just inequitable, it's stupid".

Quoted from Humbercod

Still not looking to clever in Highly vaccinated Israel!
Interesting also to see a BBC report asking the question over the weekend - Is it better for the vaccinated to get the virus now rather than the booster?

From the report-

"We could be digging ourselves into a hole, for a very long time, where we think we can only keep Covid away by boosting every year," Prof Eleanor Riley, an immunologist from the University of Edinburgh,

Prof Adam Finn, a government vaccine adviser, said over-vaccinating people, when other parts of the world had none, was "a bit insane, it's not just inequitable, it's stupid".

Anecdotes tell us what the data can’t: Vaccinated people appear to be getting the coronavirus at a surprisingly high rate. But exactly how often isn’t clear, nor is it certain how likely they are to spread the virus to others.

Though it is evident vaccination still provides powerful protection against the virus, there’s growing concern that vaccinated people may be more vulnerable to serious illness than previously thought.

There’s a dearth of scientific studies with concrete answers, leaving public policy makers and corporate executives to formulate plans based on fragmented information. While some are renewing mask mandates or delaying office reopenings, others cite the lack of clarity to justify staying the course. It can all feel like a mess.


“We have to be humble about what we do know and what we don’t know,” said Tom Frieden, a former director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the head of the nonprofit Resolve to Save Lives. “There are a few things we can say definitively. One is that this is a hard question to address.”


Absent clear public health messaging, vaccinated people are left confused about how to protect themselves. Just how vulnerable they are is a key variable not just for public health officials trying to figure out, say, when booster shots might be needed, but also to inform decisions about whether to roll back reopenings amid a new wave of the virus. On a smaller scale, the unknowns have left music lovers unsure if it’s OK to see a concert and prompted a fresh round of hang-wringing among parents pondering what school is going to look like.

In lieu of answers, what has emerged is a host of case studies providing somewhat different pictures of breakthrough infections. Variables including when the surveys were conducted, whether the delta variant was present, how much of the population was vaccinated and even what the weather was like at the time make it hard to compare results and suss out patterns. It’s difficult to know which data might ultimately carry more heft.

“It’s quite clear that we have more breakthroughs now,” said Monica Gandhi, an infectious disease expert at the University of California, San Francisco. “We all know someone who has had one. But we don’t have great clinical data.”


One of the best known outbreaks among vaccinated people occurred in the small beach town of Provincetown, Massachusetts, as thousands of vaccinated and unvaccinated alike gathered on dance floors and at house parties over the Fourth of July weekend to celebrate the holiday -- and what seemed like a turning point in the pandemic. About three-fourths of the 469 infections were among vaccinated people.


Authors of a CDC case study said this might mean that they were just as likely to transmit Covid-19 as the unvaccinated. Even so, they cautioned, as more people are vaccinated, it’s natural that they would also account for a larger share of Covid-19 infections and this one study was not sufficient to draw any conclusions. The incident prompted the CDC to reverse a recommendation it had issued just a few weeks earlier and once again urge the vaccinated to mask up in certain settings.

Still, the particular details of that cluster of cases may have made that outbreak especially bad, according to Gandhi.

“The rate of mild symptomatic outbreaks in this population was higher because of a lot of indoor activity (including intimacy), rain that weekend, not much outside time and mixture of people with different vaccination status,” she said in an email.

A newly released, far larger CDC case study of infections in New York state, meanwhile, found that the number of breakthrough infections has steadily ticked up since May, accounting for almost 4% of cases by mid-July. Those researchers cautioned that factors such as easing public health restrictions and the rise of the highly contagious delta variant might impact the results.

Yet another CDC case study, in Colorado, found that the breakthrough infection rate in one county, Mesa, was significantly higher than the rest of the state, at 7% versus about 5%. The report suggested it was perhaps because the delta variant was circulating more widely there, but also noted the ages of patients in Mesa and the lower vaccination rate may have played a role.

Research out of Israel seems to back the idea that protection from severe disease wanes in the months after inoculation, and more recently, that breakthrough cases may eventually lead to an uptick in hospitalizations. The information is preliminary and severe breakthrough cases are still rare, but it bolsters the case that some people will need booster shots in coming months.

Case studies and data from some states in the U.S. have similarly shown an increase in breakthrough cases over time. But with the delta variant also on the rise, it’s difficult to tell whether waning immunity to any type of coronavirus infection is to blame, or if the vaccinations are particularly ineffective against the delta variant. It could be both, of course. Changing behavior among vaccinated people could be a factor, too, as they return to social gatherings and travel and dining indoors.

All that said, some facts are well established at this point. Vaccinated people infected with the virus are much less likely to need to go to the hospital, much less likely to need intubation and much less likely to die from the illness. There’s no doubt that vaccines provide significant protection. But a large proportion of the nation -- almost 30% of U.S. adults -- have not been vaccinated, a fact that has conspired with the highly contagious delta variant to push the country into a new wave of outbreaks.

“The big picture here is that the vaccines are working and the reason for the spike in the U.S. is we have too little vaccine uptake,” Frieden said.

To a certain extent, breakthrough cases of any virus are expected. In clinical trials, no Covid vaccine was 100% effective -- even the best vaccines never are. The more the virus is in circulation, the greater the risk of breakthrough cases. It’s also common for some aspects of viral immunity to naturally wane over time.

  
For the time being, there are simply more questions than answers. Are breakthrough infections ticking up because of the delta variant, waning immunity or a return to normal life? Are vaccinated people more vulnerable to severe illness than previously thought? Just how common are breakthrough infections? It’s anyone’s guess.

“It is generally the case that we have to make public health decisions based on imperfect data,” Frieden said. “But there is just a lot we don’t know.”

Quoted from lew chaterleys lover

That Ferguson fella! Did he get the job by mistake, a bit like the chap Guy Goma who was interviewed on Newsnight that time when he attended a job interview but was interviewed live on TV  as a "technology expert?"  

"We won't have any more lockdowns..." Unless things get worse!!"

Well, go to the bottom of our stairs for that most far-reaching analysis known to man.

I am not walking the dogs tonight because it's raining. Unless it stops, obviously.

He's appeared again.


The UK will see a “significant surge” in Covid-19 cases following the return of schools, but it is too early to say whether certain restrictions will need to be reintroduced, a leading scientist has said.


Professor Neil Ferguson, who was a leading figure in the Government’s original Covid response in early 2020, said if daily cases start going above 100,000 to 150,000 there will be “significant demands on the health system”.


Prof Ferguson, from Imperial College London and a member of the Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage), said it will be for the Government to decide on potential measures.


He said: “We expect to see quite a significant surge in cases, to some extent in hospitalisations, but whether that's going to require any rolling back of the relaxation of restrictions is too early to say. It really depends on the level of healthcare demand.”


He added that vaccination has changed the relationship between case numbers and hospitalisations - but surpassing 100,000 cases could lead to increased demand on the NHS and push the Government to decide “what the implications are for policy”.

Exactly the same as a resident poster stated,are they one ??

Of course there will be a huge surge in infections now the kids are back at school! Why wouldn't there be?

The mitigations in place in schools last September have been all but removed now - no bubbles, no masking, isolation requirements removed or greatly reduced etc etc. All this with Delta now utterly dominant which is more than twice as infectious as the virus in circulation a year ago. The vaccine programme has been a success at reducing the number of deaths and serious illness, but only among those who are vaccinated. Which is not children. A tiny proportion of children have been vaccinated and therefore have no protection against infection. Prior infection with Covid provides a reasonable amount of protection against Delta, but a lot of children haven't been infected and have no protection. That is a lot of people just waiting to be infected. Not to mention their parents and grandparents who are still vulnerable to infection even if vaccinated (though not for severe illness as was the case last September).

If you can think of a single piece of evidence which shows why you don't think cases are going to rocket now the schools are back, then please post it. It will be interesting to see, that's for sure. Note, the studies released claiming Covid doesn't spread in schools were pretty terrible, not least because one was carried out before Alpha even emerged (~50% more infectious than previous variants), but also because the second was carried out during the earliest part of the Delta surge where no end of kids were off school isolating and therefore couldn't spread the virus, if they had it. Pretty much gaslighting the way that 'evidence' was pushed.

Regardless, even if the absolute risk to most children is low, we've still been seeing around 300 hospitalisations of children per week over the summer when they weren't mixing so the numbers of infections will rise in children, as will the numbers of hospitalisations and the paediatric ICU capacity is at full-stretch already. Breakthrough cases into older relatives who are still more likely to become seriously ill, even if vaccinated are going to be a major problem as well. The difference in absolute numbers between now and this point last year is ludicrous, somewhere over 25 times as many daily cases:



Covid hospitalisations are currently about 8 times the level they were at this time last year and rising slowly, even before the impact of school reopening is felt. Ah, you say, but the number of deaths is lower. No, the daily number of deaths is 10 times higher than it was a year ago and also still rising. The politicians might claim that the link between infections and deaths has been broken, but it hasn't. What has occurred is that the vaccines and available treatments have reduced the ratio of deaths to infections. A good thing, but we're not exactly out of the woods yet. The current daily rate of deaths equates to about 40,000 deaths a year and that's before we enter the colder winter months - that's not much under twice the level of typical flu deaths each year. Those flu deaths mostly occur in the winter and we will see another flu season this winter, possibly worse than the last real one a couple of years ago. That will be addition to most Covid deaths.

It is pretty obvious to me that government policy is to actively get the virus spreading through schools as quickly as possible before the winter kicks in and the NHS is too busy to treat the children who require hospitalisation. This will lead to more immediate cases over the next couple of months than would have been the case if masking and other mitigations had continued. Let's hope it doesn't lead to too many deaths and not too many tens of thousands of children suffering from 'Long Covid' by the end of the year.

I've resigned myself to my kids getting Covid, probably some time before Christmas. Can't keep them out of school/nursery and my wife will be surrounded by unvaccinated teenagers at school as well so I'm left hoping they don't get too poorly, don't suffer longer-term symptoms and don't pass on infections to their grandparents. All the adults in the family are vaccinated, but we know protection wanes so the risk isn't negligible.

Hope is not a good way to deal with a respiratory pandemic when we know what needs to be done to stop the spread of the virus. We're not even trying any longer so I can only hope it doesn't get too bad over the winter.

I guess if kids keep refusing tests then in theory there won’t be a surge…I appreciate that doesn’t mean it isn’t there but nothing will be registered.

None of ours tested yesterday, a friend in another school said only 5 were bothered at his, a handful at another.

Just crack on, I’m sure there’s fill still worries, that’s their choice and right but equally, in the last month I’ve been many a place where people are clearly just wanting to get on with life and don’t seem unduly worried…people from all walks of life and ages etc…

It’s always gonna be a personal thing, in the last 18 months I haven’t been worried in the slightest about catching it nor worried about it at work. Professionally there are things which need my concerns much greater than Covid. People might argue against that but even this week, 2 days in and believe me, Covid is the least of my worries given some of the things that my kids have had to go through this summer…

The whole thing can talk itself round; some folk will find evidence to suggest its on its way out, others will find masses to say its still a big issue. Public opinion, certainly the places I’ve been and folk I’ve spoken to suggests people are just flipping fed up and the constant drivel and negativity in the media is just pushing folk away I guess.

For lots of people Covid is no longer a concern with work and the likes becoming the focus again. It’s there, they know that but it’s not…

And yet, the number of deaths continues to increase along with the number of hospital admissions. A jump in cases today but unlikely to be school related at this point in time. We'll have to wait a week or two to see what happens.

Looks like the government intend to press ahead with vaccinating our kids against medical advice!  Any surprise? Not really when you check out the school immunisation nurse vacancies! Many of these nurses are already on the payroll now with the death jab ready to go, and not one death under 20 due to Covid this year…. Not one😔

Once the older kids are out the way they will come for the under 10s then eventually babies! this may sound like BS but if you look into it then you will find that they’ve already started carrying out trials on babies. Another concern for me is the dosage, I didn’t realise but children would get the same dose as an adult just think for a minute an  18st 40 year old gets the same shot as a 6st 12 year old and even as we go down to the little ones the dosage rate does not change.

A number of people on social media have been raising concerns and questions to the amount of sudden deaths in young people, every day I seem to read about a young person who as died suddenly of heart attack, only yesterday closer to home I heard on Lincs FM a young footballer collapsed in an FA you match at Boston with a heart attack! I’m not saying there is any relation to the jab but these are question that need to be answered.

And yet now doctors are now advising against physical fitness after the jab-

https://www.brusselstimes.com/.....r-covid-vaccination/

Oh well I’m sure we will be reassured that these cyclists where just a coincidence 🤔