Coronavirus

[Sterlk]

Erlich Bachman is a fat pig.

If AstraZeneca really is 80% after both doses, that's great. Almost halves the number of people that would still catch COVID afterwards, and would mean we don't have to vaccinate the impossible 100% of the population to get to herd immunity.

[FuiFui BradBrad]

I heard an argument that the AZ at 70% is fine, considering the Influenza vaccine is 30%. So theoretically the AZ is still double the effectiveness of the Influenza jab.

Would you say that’s a valid point Doc, or fluff to talk up AZ Doc?

[gangrenous]

I can’t talk to whether 70% is sufficient. But double influenza effectiveness is in itself fairly meaningless...

[Dr Zaius]

Who knows. The initial Phase 3 publication is freely available on the internet. Search Astra Zeneca covid vaccine and it comes up.

They ran it in three countries. The UK, Brazil and somewhere else. In the UK group they botched the first production and a bunch of subjects got a half dose. They got a full dose on the second dose.

When they analysed the results they found that the half dose group did better than the full dose group. I think it was about 90 compared to 60% effective. They kind of just averaged the results (which seems a bit dodgy) and said that it's 70% effective. They also reported 50% effectiveness for blocking transmission.

You would think given that, that if the dosing and timing regimen is done right, you could get up around 90%.

They have some pretty clever and trustworthy people working on our strategy. People like singer/songwriter/AFL great/Federal CMO Paul Kelly. They've steered the course well so far, and I'm sure that their will be explanation for the rationale once plans are finalised.

[Northern Raider]

That gives me plenty of confidence knowing Paul Kelly is in charge of the vaccine roll out. He's very talented. As long as he doesn't sing "Darling It Hurts" while giving us the jab.

[Dr Zaius]

Or Dumb Things

[RedRaider]

Or Dumb Things

That would be for the anti-vaxxers Doc.
Lots of ABC radio chatter about the virus mutating and therefore different vaccines for Covid needed in future years. In one of his press conferences Dr Kelly spoke positively about possible future Protein vaccines. I didn't know what they were but see they are used against Hep B and other diseases.
https://www.gavi.org/vaccineswork/what- ... t-covid-19

[-TW-]

I heard an argument that the AZ at 70% is fine, considering the Influenza vaccine is 30%. So theoretically the AZ is still double the effectiveness of the Influenza jab.

Would you say that’s a valid point Doc, or fluff to talk up AZ Doc?

Flu vax is 59%

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[Dr Zaius]

Worldometers.info has surpassed 400,000 deaths in the US. Most news agencies refer to the Johns Hopkins page which is at 391k. Given that they are averaging about 4000 deaths a day at the moment, it will no doubt tick over the 400k by inauguration day. What a legacy for Trump.

[gangrenous]

Yeah, Trump supporters like to go with his strength as he hasn’t started any wars, but he’s overseen an atrocious response to a pandemic which is about to pass the USA’s total deaths for WW2...

[FuiFui BradBrad]

I can’t talk to whether 70% is sufficient. But double influenza effectiveness is in itself fairly meaningless...

That’s what I thought. I couldn’t see why it was used as a comparison. Seems a bit apples/oranges to me

[Dr Zaius]

Australian Academy of Science's statements on Australia's vaccine choices

https://www.science.org.au/news-and-eve ... nformation

[the bone]

Interesting that they say “Australia’s current vaccination strategy is aimed at reducing the severity of the disease”. This strategy, working in conjunction with a non-vaccination strategy of eliminating community transmission, tells me that there are going to be breakouts, and subsequently targeted lockdowns, for many more months ahead. We are a long way from putting this behind us.

[Seiffert82]

While we have international travel, this virus is here to stay, like the cold and flu.

The vaccine will obviously temper the impact of the virus.

What is most interesting is how the politicians respond when it comes. The official strategy is virus suppression, but the premiers are individually aiming for elimination, with the casualties being any poor sucker travelling interstate when a case or two of infection sneaks out into the community.

That approach is unsustainable. I'm keen to find out what the response is after the vaccine is rolled out...and then in 3-4 years time when international travel gets back to normal and we have to deal with this thing as a BAU part of our lives.

We simply can't sustain some sort of 14 day mandatory quarantine system for ever.

[Dr Zaius]

Exactly Seiffert, which is why what NSW is doing makes sense.

It will be interesting to see what the other states do when out breaks happen. I'd judge Queensland more on their prison outbreak last year rather than their recent hotel fiasco. Melbourne held their nerve recently.
SA would have gone with track and trace rather than lockdown if not for the pizza shop fiasco.

Mostly the border closures have been sensible this time around, locking out hotspots. Obvious exemptions being WA, and Melbourne who got spooked.

If this goes on for years, and it very well may. I don't think that people are going to tolerate the border shenanigans. Even just the daily act of going to border is a massive pain in the ass for people living in Tweed, working on the GC or vice versa.

[the bone]

Interesting that the Australian government has not entered into an agreement with J&J for their coronavirus vaccine. Nor is the J&J vaccine included on the list of vaccines potentially available to Australians through the COVAX facility with Gavi, despite J&J agreeing to provide 500 million doses to Gavi. My interpretation of that is J&J must’ve only pledged their doses in COVAX for lower income countries. Which again raises the question why the Australian government hasn’t made an agreement with J&J considering the benefits of their vaccine (can be stored in a fridge as it only needs to be b/w 2-8 degrees Celsius, and only one dose required).
This is the website I was looking at:
https://www.health.gov.au/initiatives- ... agreements

[RedRaider]

With US hospitals filled with Covid cases I shudder to think what the numbers will be for the USA biggest pre-pandemic annual killer - heart disease.

https://www.cdc.gov/heartdisease/facts.htm

Thank you for your Australian Academy of Science post of Jan 16 Doctor Z. It explains clearly what the first of the vaccines are trying to accomplish.

[Dr Zaius]

It was an interesting Coronacaat today. They were discussing that the data from NSW Health indicates that only average a cluster takes about 3 weeks to snuff out.

That sounds about right for the Northern Beaches, which died out about two weeks ago. All the recent cases have been linked to the Berala cluster which is coming up to three weeks. It should die out very soon. Fingers crossed no further clusters.

https://www.abc.net.au/radio/programs/c ... r/13070458

[bonehead]

I think reality says we'll have rolling clusters, the management is the key

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[-TW-]

I think the hotspots declarations are working relatively well, except for states like WA who **** the bed every time there's one case and locks a whole state out

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[Northern Raider]

I think the hotspots declarations are working relatively well, except for states like WA who **** the bed every time there's one case and locks a whole state out

It's all a precursor to secession. The People's Republic of Westralia will the next new country on the world atlas. Part of the master plan to get Cameron Bancroft back into a Test Cricket team.

[The Nickman]

I think the hotspots declarations are working relatively well, except for states like WA who **** the bed every time there's one case and locks a whole state out

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Queensland has been pretty **** stupid too.

100% agree that hotspots are the way to move forward, rather than shutting whole borders... but that's always been the case.

[Dr Zaius]

I think the hotspots declarations are working relatively well, except for states like WA who **** the bed every time there's one case and locks a whole state out

It's all a precursor to secession. The People's Republic of Westralia will the next new country on the world atlas. Part of the master plan to get Cameron Bancroft back into a Test Cricket team.

It will all change once the election is won. It's amazing how the health advice in Queensland has changed from locking out a state to locking out a hotspot.

[Northern Raider]

I think the hotspots declarations are working relatively well, except for states like WA who **** the bed every time there's one case and locks a whole state out

It's all a precursor to secession. The People's Republic of Westralia will the next new country on the world atlas. Part of the master plan to get Cameron Bancroft back into a Test Cricket team.

It will all change once the election is won. It's amazing how the health advice in Queensland has changed from locking out a state to locking out a hotspot.

Happens when health advice is based on opinion polls.

[Northern Raider]

Restrictions being lifted in Brisbane region tomorrow. Masks no longer mandatory except at airports and on planes. Not sure how state governments can mandate use of masks while on the plane.

[-TW-]

Restrictions being lifted in Brisbane region tomorrow. Masks no longer mandatory except at airports and on planes. Not sure how state governments can mandate use of masks while on the plane.

Planes are a federal mandate, airports are state mandate. It was brought in after the last national cabinet, about 2 weeks ago

Glad they lifted it the day after I left, but to be honest venues weren't really enforcing it that strictly

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[Dr Zaius]

A bit concerned seeing Biden sitting in the Oval Office. I hope that the Whitehouse got a deep clean first.

[Azza]

NSW looks to be doing a great job handling the outbreak last month.

Of course WA will keep its borders closed because a mouse farted somewhere near the NSW border.

[greeneyed]

The other States and Territories did a good job containing coronavirus too... by constraining the movement of NSW people from outbreak affected regions into their jurisdictions, and requiring them to quarantine if they’ve been in a hot spot.

[Azza]

Yawn...

[Northern Raider]

One thing that looks to have slipped notice around the recent community transmission case in QLD. The CHO often referred to the "incident" in hotel quarantine on January 2nd. All we were told was that the cleaner who contracted the virus was working that day but did not enter the room of the infected person in quarantine. Nobody seems to have asked what the "incident" was. A cleaner going to work for the day is not an incident.

[greeneyed]

The reason for the breach in Queensland hotel quarantine really should be explained... the public deserves answers on what went wrong. At least one of the outbreaks in Sydney has also been unexplained... perhaps it’s impossible to find out. But the leaks into the community are all believed to have come from hotel quarantine there too. We should be given some assurance that procedures for hotel quarantine in NSW and Queensland are as safe as they should be.

[Northern Raider]

The reason for the breach in Queensland hotel quarantine really should be explained... the public deserves answers on what went wrong. At least one of the outbreaks in Sydney has also been unexplained... perhaps it’s impossible to find out. But the leaks into the community are all believed to have come from hotel quarantine there too. We should be given some assurance that procedures for hotel quarantine in NSW and Queensland are as safe as they should be.

That's the key. It's been referred to as an incident which implies that something specific occurred that wasn't meant to. Refusing further comment, saying police are investigating and there's no CCTV footage all gives the impression of cover up. Erodes confidence in the process.

[Dr Zaius]

The other States and Territories did a good job containing coronavirus too... by constraining the movement of NSW people from outbreak affected regions into their jurisdictions, and requiring them to quarantine if they’ve been in a hot spot.

How many of the people coming from NSW quarantined by those states have subsequently tested positive?

[Dr Zaius]

The reason for the breach in Queensland hotel quarantine really should be explained... the public deserves answers on what went wrong. At least one of the outbreaks in Sydney has also been unexplained... perhaps it’s impossible to find out. But the leaks into the community are all believed to have come from hotel quarantine there too. We should be given some assurance that procedures for hotel quarantine in NSW and Queensland are as safe as they should be.

That's the key. It's been referred to as an incident which implies that something specific occurred that wasn't meant to. Refusing further comment, saying police are investigating and there's no CCTV footage all gives the impression of cover up. Erodes confidence in the process.

There's no cover up, they genuinely don't know. They were split system aircon, so not that. There was no CCTV in the hotel, so can't say for certain people didn't leave their room. They believe that the people in quarantine contracted it on the 2nd but don't know how.