***NON-POLITICAL COVID-19 Discussion Thread***

[JakeF]

A couple of reminders...

Originally Posted by Bwana

Once again, don't come in this thread with some kind of political agenda, or you will be shown the door. If you want to go that route, there is a thread about this in DC.

Originally Posted by Dartgod

People, there is a lot of good information in this thread, let's try to keep the petty bickering to a minimum.

We all have varying opinions about the impact of this, the numbers, etc. We will all never agree with each other. But we can all keep it civil.

Thanks!

Click here for the original OP:

Spoiler!

Apparently the CoronaVirus can survive on a inanimate objects, such as door knobs, for 9 days.

California coronavirus case could be first spread within U.S. community, CDC says
By SOUMYA KARLAMANGLA, JACLYN COSGROVE
FEB. 26, 2020 8:04 PM

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is investigating what could be the first case of novel coronavirus in the United States involving a patient in California who neither recently traveled out of the country nor was in contact with someone who did.

“At this time, the patient’s exposure is unknown. It’s possible this could be an instance of community spread of COVID-19, which would be the first time this has happened in the United States,” the CDC said in a statement. “Community spread means spread of an illness for which the source of infection is unknown. It’s also possible, however, that the patient may have been exposed to a returned traveler who was infected.”

The individual is a resident of Solano County and is receiving medical care in Sacramento County, according to the state Department of Public Health.

The CDC said the “case was detected through the U.S. public health system — picked up by astute clinicians.”

Officials at UC Davis Medical Center expanded on what the federal agency might have meant by that in an email sent Wednesday, as reported by the Davis Enterprise newspaper.

The patient arrived at UC Davis Medical Center from another hospital Feb. 19 and “had already been intubated, was on a ventilator, and given droplet protection orders because of an undiagnosed and suspected viral condition,” according to an email sent by UC Davis officials that was obtained by the Davis Enterprise.

The staff at UC Davis requested COVID-19 testing by the CDC, but because the patient didn’t fit the CDC’s existing criteria for the virus, a test wasn’t immediately administered, according to the email. The CDC then ordered the test Sunday, and results were announced Wednesday. Hospital administrators reportedly said in the email that despite these issues, there has been minimal exposure at the hospital because of safety protocols they have in place.

A UC Davis Health spokesperson declined Wednesday evening to share the email with The Times.

Since Feb. 2, more than 8,400 returning travelers from China have entered California, according to the state health department. They have been advised to self-quarantine for 14 days and limit interactions with others as much as possible, officials said.

“This is a new virus, and while we are still learning about it, there is a lot we already know,” Dr. Sonia Angell, director of the California Department of Public Health, said in a statement. “We have been anticipating the potential for such a case in the U.S., and given our close familial, social and business relationships with China, it is not unexpected that the first case in the U.S. would be in California.”

It is not clear how the person became infected, but public health workers could not identify any contacts with people who had traveled to China or other areas where the virus is widespread. That raises concern that the virus is spreading in the United States, creating a challenge for public health officials, experts say.

“It’s the first signal that we could be having silent transmission in the community,” said Lawrence Gostin, director of the World Health Organization Collaborating Center on National and Global Health Law. “It probably means there are many more cases out there, and it probably means this individual has infected others, and now it’s a race to try to find out who that person has infected.”

On Tuesday, the CDC offered its most serious warning to date that the United States should expect and prepare for the coronavirus to become a more widespread health issue.

“Ultimately, we expect we will see coronavirus spread in this country,” said Nancy Messonnier, director of the CDC’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases. “It’s not so much a question of if, but a question of when.”

According to the CDC’s latest count Wednesday morning, 59 U.S. residents have tested positive for the new strain of coronavirus — 42 of whom are repatriated citizens from a Diamond Princess cruise. That number has grown by two since Messonnier’s last count Tuesday, although the CDC was not immediately available to offer details on the additional cases.

More than 82,000 cases of coronavirus have been reported globally, and more than 2,700 people have died, with the majority in mainland China, the epicenter of the outbreak.

But public health leaders have repeatedly reminded residents that the health risk from the novel coronavirus to the general public remains low.

“While COVID-19 has a high transmission rate, it has a low mortality rate,” the state Department of Public Health said in a statement Wednesday. “From the international data we have, of those who have tested positive for COVID-19, approximately 80% do not exhibit symptoms that would require hospitalization. There have been no confirmed deaths related to COVID-19 in the United States to date.”

CDC officials have also warned that although the virus is likely to spread in U.S. communities, the flu still poses a greater risk.

Gostin said the news of potential silent transmission does not eliminate the possibility of containing the virus in the U.S. and preventing an outbreak.

“There are few enough cases that we should at least try,” he said. “Most of us are not optimistic that that will be successful, but we’re still in the position to try.”

[O.city]

It’s just not smart.

They’ve got a big study going on in our area that the infectious disease guys are running at the hospital with vaccination spread and such. Last I heard it was damn near negligible the amount, even with some breakthrough infections occurring . And we’re the “delta epicenter”.

Just stupid.

Everyone should talk to their doctor about vaccination. Most should get it. It’s sad when people get sick and die, especially from something preventable.

But at this point it’s just not attainable to keep back and forth

[MahomesMagic]

ONE. DAY. APART. pic.twitter.com/VjeZJTunEk

— Marina Medvin ���� (@MarinaMedvin) July 27, 2021

[WhawhaWhat]

Originally Posted by MahomesMagic

ONE. DAY. APART. pic.twitter.com/VjeZJTunEk

— Marina Medvin ���� (@MarinaMedvin) July 27, 2021

Unvaccinated people ruining it for everyone else.

[BigBeauford]

Christ, it was a nice month without a mask at work. Back on again. Thanks ****face anti-vaccers.

[O.city]

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-021-03841-4

Strong T cell (both 4 and 8 CD cells) with mRNA vaccination. There's your long term protection.

[dirk digler]

I have long thought that our genes are playing a big role in who gets sick and who doesn't so this confirms quite a bit in regards to that. Interesting that blood type might play a role as well which many have suspected to be the case.

https://directorsblog.nih.gov/2021/0...-and-severity/

More Genetic Clues to COVID-19 Susceptibility and Severity

Many factors influence our risk of illness from SARS-CoV-2, the coronavirus responsible for COVID-19. That includes being careful to limit our possible exposures to the virus, as well as whether we have acquired immunity from a vaccine or an earlier infection. But once a person is infected, a host of other biological factors, including age and pre-existing medical conditions, will influence one’s risk of becoming severely ill.

While earlier studies have tied COVID-19 severity to genetic variations in a person’s antiviral defenses and blood type, we still have a lot to learn about how a person’s genetic makeup influences COVID-19 susceptibility and severity. So, I was pleased to see the recent findings of an impressive global effort to map the genetic underpinnings of SARS-CoV-2 infection and COVID-19 severity, which involved analyzing the genomes of many thousands of people with COVID-19 around the globe.

This comprehensive search led to the identification of 13 regions of the human genome that appear to play a role in COVID-19 infection or severity. Though more research is needed to sort out these leads, they represent potentially high-quality clues to the pathways that this virus uses to cause illness, and help to explain why some people are more likely to become infected with SARS-CoV-2 or to develop severe disease.

The international effort, known as The COVID-19 Host Genetics Initiative, is led by Andrea Ganna, Institute for Molecular Medicine Finland, Helsinki, and colleagues in the United States and around the world. Teasing out those important genetic influences is no easy task. It requires vast amounts of data, so Ganna reached out to the scientific community via Twitter to announce a new COVID-19 gene-hunting effort and ask for help. Thousands of researchers around the world answered his call. The new study, published in the journal Nature, includes data collected through the initiative as of January 2021, and represents nearly 50,000 COVID-19 patients and another 2 million uninfected controls [1].

In search of common gene variants that may influence who becomes infected with SARS-CoV-2 and how sick they will become, Ganna’s international team turned to genome-wide association studies (GWAS). As part of this, the team analyzed patient genome data for millions of so-called single-nucleotide polymorphisms, or SNPs. While these single “letter” nucleotide substitutions found all across the genome are generally of no health significance, they can point the way to the locations of gene variants that turn up more often in association with particular traits or conditions—in this case, COVID-19 susceptibility or severity. To find them, the researchers compared SNPs in people with COVID-19 to those in about 2 million healthy blood donors from the same population groups. They also looked for variants that turned up significantly more often in people who became severely ill.

Their analyses uncovered a number of gene variants associated with SARS-CoV-2 infection or severe COVID-19 in 13 regions of the human genome, six of which were new. Four of the 13 affect a person’s risk for becoming infected with SARS-CoV-2. The other nine influence a person’s risk for developing severe illness following the infection.

Interestingly, some of these gene variants already were known to have associations with other types of lung or autoimmune diseases. The new findings also help to confirm previous studies suggesting that the gene that determines a person’s blood type may influence a person’s susceptibility to SARS-CoV-2 infection, along with other genes that play a role in immunity. For example, the findings show overlap with variants within a gene called TYK2, which was earlier shown to protect against autoimmune-related diseases. Some of the variants also point to the need for further work to study previously unexplored biological processes that may play potentially important roles in COVID-19.

Two of the new variants associated with disease severity were discovered only by including individuals with East Asian ancestry, highlighting the value of diversity in such analyses to gain a more comprehensive understanding of the biology. One of these newfound variants is close to a gene known as FOXP4, which is especially intriguing because this gene is known to play a role in the airways of the lung.

The researchers continue to look for more underlying clues into the biology of COVID-19. In fact, their latest unpublished analysis has increased the number of COVID-19 patients from about 50,000 to 125,000, making it possible to add another 10 gene variants to the list.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34237774/

[O.city]

Originally Posted by O.city

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-021-03841-4

Strong T cell (both 4 and 8 CD cells) with mRNA vaccination. There's your long term protection.

This is also whats maddening about the whole "antibodies are waning" hysteria.

No shit. They always do. It's what happens.

Immunological responses are very layered.

[O.city]

The Singapore study showed that while vaccinated people can have some transmission, it's extremely small and the window for it is tiny.

This is all stupid.

[wazu]

Originally Posted by O.city

The Singapore study showed that while vaccinated people can have some transmission, it's extremely small and the window for it is tiny.

This is all stupid.

Government response: Take measures to de-motivate people from even bothering with the vaccine.

[DaFace]

Originally Posted by wazu

Government response: Take measures to de-motivate people from even bothering with the vaccine.

I get that take, but I see it more as "Well, people still aren't following our recommendations. Our job is to try and save lives through preventing disease, so there's not much more we can do but recommend people at least wear masks in high-risk areas."

In short, the CDC wouldn't be doing their jobs if they just said, "**** it, let the dumbasses die."

[wazu]

Originally Posted by DaFace

I get that take, but I see it more as "Well, people still aren't following our recommendations. Our job is to try and save lives through preventing disease, so there's not much more we can do but recommend people at least wear masks in high-risk areas."

In short, the CDC wouldn't be doing their jobs if they just said, "**** it, let the dumbasses die."

I’m fine with recommending masks for the unvaccinated. As it is, my 15 year old son is about to start his 2nd year of high school in which seeing faces of other students at school will not be possible. And he’s vaccinated, like many other students. It’s ridiculous.

[DaFace]

Originally Posted by wazu

I’m fine with recommending masks for the unvaccinated. As it is, my 15 year old son is about to start his 2nd year of high school in which seeing faces of other students at school will not be possible. And he’s vaccinated, like many other students. It’s ridiculous.

That's fair to be irritated about.

[TLO]

Originally Posted by O.city

The Singapore study showed that while vaccinated people can have some transmission, it's extremely small and the window for it is tiny.

This is all stupid.

There's more stuff coming out of Israel this morning. I don't know what to believe anymore

[O.city]

Originally Posted by TLO

There's more stuff coming out of Israel this morning. I don't know what to believe anymore

About what?

[Sure-Oz]

@CNN: JUST IN: Pfizer has shared new data that suggests a third dose of its Covid-19 vaccine "strongly" boosts protection against the Delta variant https://cnn.it/3f1tlaE