Gonna talk about those MRNA vaccines real quick.

So, many of us (possibly not all, because other vaccines in the pipeline) are going to be getting either the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine.

What vaccine you end up getting is likely to depend on your age, health, and where you live. Pfizer’s vaccine is harder to store and transport, so if you live in a big city you’re more likely to get that one.

For what I’m going to say, though, it doesn’t make a difference.

You’re going to be getting two shots, a few weeks apart. For Moderna, it’s 28 days (4 weeks). For Pfizer, it’s 21 days (3 weeks). Yes, this sucks. No, this is not ideal for mass vaccination. You’ll get a card that will remind you to come back for the second dose. The person administering the shot, most likely a pharmacist, will also ask for your cell phone number so they can text you. Because if you don’t come back that first shot is a waste of time.

We don’t know for sure if the single shot gives any protection at all, but the reasonable assumption is that it doesn’t.

This means you need to get your ass back in there for that second shot. And while you are waiting for that shot, you are not protected.

This means you should continue to wear a mask, etc. In fact, if possible, you should be even more careful, because if you get sick and can’t come in for that second shot? They’ll most likely have to start over. The trial included longer periods between the two, so you might be fine, but there is a risk here.

And once you have had that second shot?

It’s going to take two to four weeks to build antibodies, during which time you will have lower, but increasing, protection. They’ll tell you what it is…that data hasn’t been released yet, but will be.

So you should still continue to be careful for those weeks.

Finally!

We don’t know if these vaccines provide what is called sterilizing immunity, meaning you can’t be infected and can’t pass it on.

They may only provide functional immunity, meaning you get infected but don’t get sick. You could still transmit COVID-19 to others, although the risk is lower.

Which means?

Yeah, the masks have to stay on until the case numbers and other metrics are looking good.

Please don’t be those people who get that first shot and go throw a wild party. Have a bit of patience.

I will reblog this every month until we get the all clear from Fauci.

our enrollment numbers “are down” so our principal wants to talk to the director about having hybrid classes and i... am so scared. so, so scared.

he just said he wants kids to come back on the 21st and i feel like i can’t breathe.

Been going in this week.  Schools are NOT remotely prepared.  I’ve seen grocery stores with more partitions and protections than school buildings.  Everyone should be on remote learning.  Especially as we now know the federal government is outright lying to us about this virus.

Why covid cases are spiking but deaths aren't

The number of covid cases in the US is spiking but the death count isn’t. This mystery has spawned many explanations, most of them optimistic (“it’s young people who are recovering,” “our therapies are better,” etc). But the real explanation is simpler, and it’s sad.

As epidemiologist Ellie Murray explains, it’s almost certainly just “lead time bias.”

That’s when you test more people, including presymptomatic people, and thus discover the disease earlier than before.

https://twitter.com/EpiEllie/status/1280305393516904448

That means we learn people are sick earlier, which means that the time between detection and death gets longer - not because people are surviving longer from the onset of symptoms, but because we’re detecting sick people before they exhibit symptoms.

Lead-time bias emerges whenever we ramp up testing: routine mammograms and colonoscopies appeared to change the course of related cancers, but what was really going on was earlier, presymptomatic identification of cancers.

And while it’s true that we measured earlier cases from the first symptoms, we didn’t know what some symptoms were (loss of smell, for example) and we relied on self-reporting by gravely ill people, which isn’t as good as actual tests.

That’s called “recall bias.” Sometimes we’d ask family members, who only knew about the symptoms that were severe enough to warrant mentioning (“proxy respondent bias”).

Bottom line: “When you start identifying people at earlier stages of a disease, it looks like they survive longer (or have the disease longer) compared to when you identify based on severe symptoms.” -Ellie Murray

THIS

THIS THIS THIS

“U.S. deaths near 100,000, an incalculable loss,” the headline read above six columns of names.

“They were not simply names on a list. They were us,” reads the subhead.

I thought the screenshot/photo of the A1 of the NYT was from the Spanish flu outbreak of the 1920s. It’s tomorrow’s front-page. Our president is golfing right now.