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Covid-19 vaccines and vaccinations

Discussion in 'Epidemics (including Covid-19, not Long Covid)' started by hinterland, Dec 3, 2020.

  1. Arnie Pye

    Arnie Pye Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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    Sorry, but my English comprehension seems to be letting me down.

    The risk of Covid-19 increased ... with the number of vaccine doses previously received.

    So people are more at risk the more vaccines they have? Isn't that the opposite of what is supposed to happen?
     
    Ariel, MeSci, Binkie4 and 2 others like this.
  2. SNT Gatchaman

    SNT Gatchaman Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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    Yes, I thought so too, but in paediatrics we not infrequently see Burkitt lymphomas with doubling times of 24 hours, and they can occur in young adults too. My friend described the mass sensation inside their chest that they could feel increasing over a week, and then it became visible/palpable up around the sternal notch and root of neck, at which point treatment arrested/reversed it. I imagine that this might be the opposite of "boiling a frog", that in this instance the changes were so overt that you couldn't fail to recognise their progression in yourself.

    At what point does such a rapid doubling occur? Hard to imagine it's uniform right from the outset without some indolent phase. But could it even start with much more rapid doubling (eg minutes/hours) to reach a "critical mass" of cells forming a very small tumour? Hard to know when we don't diagnose small asymptomatic tumours. However, I haven't had an opportunity to ask an oncology colleague about this.

    If we allowed that it was uniform without an indolent phase, and if my maths is right, then assuming a spherical cow

    3 weeks of 24 hour doublings: 2^21 = 2 million x
    3.5 weeks of 24 hour doublings: 2^24.5 = 24 million x
    4 weeks of 24 hour doublings: 2^28 = 268 million x.

    In that case, you'd only need to start with a tumour of 0.0005 g to reach 1 kg in 3 weeks, or from 0.000004 g at 4 weeks.
     
    Last edited: Dec 22, 2022
    Milo likes this.
  3. Milo

    Milo Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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    2,107
    Indeed Burkitt Lymphoma has a very aggressive doubling time, bulky disease and can be quite devastating. I will leave it to the scientists to decide whether it is due to the vaccination but my understanding is that EBV is usually involved.
     
    SNT Gatchaman likes this.
  4. Mij

    Mij Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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  5. Binkie4

    Binkie4 Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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    There are beginning to be reports of people in the UK who are vaccine injured getting their claims investigated.
    There is a vaccine damage payment applicable for those experiencing 60% injury (to many vaccines including covid) of up to £120,000 but it affects certain benefit entitlements. This is not compensation. For that, Injured people can also pursue a damage claim.

    https://www.gov.uk/vaccine-damage-payment
     
    Ariel, TrixieStix, ukxmrv and 4 others like this.
  6. SNT Gatchaman

    SNT Gatchaman Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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    Class switch towards non-inflammatory, spike-specific IgG4 antibodies after repeated SARS-CoV-2 mRNA vaccination (Science Immunology, 2022) — posted as thread.
     
    Trish likes this.
  7. Mij

    Mij Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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    I forgot to mention that when I received my 4th update jab a month ago, the nurse told me that seniors and some persons with disabilities have already had 8 jabs. Some house bound pts have to have their jabs outside b/c it's not safe inside with care workers.
     
    Ariel, MeSci, Binkie4 and 3 others like this.
  8. TigerLilea

    TigerLilea Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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    That's nuts! If this was any other vaccine they would have pulled them from the market long ago because of the serious adverse reactions. According to John Campbell, when they reanalyzed the mRNA trials results from both Moderna and Pfizer, 1 in 800 people had serious adverse reactions.
     
    Tara Green and Binkie4 like this.
  9. Mij

    Mij Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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    Those who are receiving the 6-8 jabs are house bond and are at very high risk, they also have several different home cares so they have to weigh the benefits vs risk. If they aren't building antibodies then they are at risk of becoming very ill and dying. I would gladly take all the jabs they offer me if I was in their place?

    Some have to take their jabs outside b/c they are so high risk.
     
    Ariel, RedFox, ahimsa and 1 other person like this.
  10. Wits_End

    Wits_End Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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    Having now recovered from the nasty cold bug I had pre-Christmas, I thought I'd make another attempt to get boosted. Tried clicking on the link my GP surgery had sent me for booking: "No appointments currently available" from the three medical centres on offer. Tried the link to the government website: entered the town name - not recognised. Entered what I knew to be a valid postcode: not recognised. Tried a different town: same thing. My local big town has a vaccination centre which is open Mon-Fri, not including bank holidays - and the only time I can usually get there is weekends :(
     
    Binkie4, MeSci, mango and 2 others like this.
  11. Wits_End

    Wits_End Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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    UK London
    ... And when I took some time out today because I knew I needed a booster, I got to this big NHS facility only to find that it had changed from a walk-in to appointment-only :( I thought the NHS/govt website must be malfunctioning because it was showing so few sites, but apparently there's a significant shortage of vaccine in the London area, and some Boroughs seem to have none at all. I think the website was sending me across two or three Boroughs to find a centre which had vaccine. I'm finally boosted, but it's taken a lot of effort and travel, particularly with the trains being out.
     
    TigerLilea, MeSci, RedFox and 3 others like this.
  12. cassava7

    cassava7 Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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    The situation in London seems to be the opposite of what is happening in France — few people have gotten boosted this fall (though there was an uptick before the end of year festivities) so there is a surplus of vaccine doses. The nurse who vaccinated me at home was able to get a prefilled syringe at the nearest pharmacy just by walking in and asking.
     
    RedFox, TigerLilea and Trish like this.
  13. Wits_End

    Wits_End Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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    Binkie4 likes this.
  14. glennchan

    glennchan Established Member

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    11
    Last edited by a moderator: Jan 12, 2023
    TigerLilea, Hutan and Peter Trewhitt like this.
  15. RedFox

    RedFox Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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    The video asserts that Covid vaccination carries a significant risk of major harm to people with ME or long Covid, but utterly fails to prove it. Its major errors are conflating side effects with serious harm (such as chronic or permanently increased disability), citing evidence of poor quality and relevance, and completely ignoring the benefits of vaccination. It employs many misleading and fallacious tactics, such as describing surveys as studies.

    It's thoroughly established that vaccines vaccines have an incredibly good risk/benefit ratio. There's no reason to think the coronavirus vaccines were any different, as they were tested extremely rigorously. Before I got the Moderna vaccine, I looked it up: their phase 3 trial studied 28,000 people without finding significant safety concerns. (For further discussion: How many of these people had chronic conditions? Or even ME-like conditions?)

    The video cites these 8 pieces of evidence. Only two are studies.
    Surveys have obvious limitations. Respondents may not represent the general population, there are placebo/nocebo effects, and no one can prove cause and effect. Some people may have answered multiple surveys, making the actual number of respondents smaller than it seems. The author describes 4 as negative and 2 as positive. But what are they attempting to measure? Temporary exacerbation of symptoms or long-term harm? Or a muddy mix of both?

    The Tsuchida study is not evidence the Covid vaccines are harmful. In an uncontrolled, unblinded (but prospective) study, they gave 42 people the Covid vaccine. Then they asked them if they felt better, worse, or the same 2-3 weeks after vaccination. Most felt the same. 7 felt better and 9 worse. A difference of two people. And this is long Covid, and illness famous for being variable. Color me unconvinced. And again, this study only looks at having side effects, not significant harms permanent side effects or increased disability. Maybe those 9 people returned to baseline eventually, or if the didn't, it was causally unrelated to vaccination.

    Karina et al. is mostly irrelevant to the question of whether vaccines cause long-term harm. If it's relevant at all, it's reassuring. They gave vaccinations to people who experienced adverse reactions to vaccines in the past. The video claims that in this study, "The injury rate was 25%." This is severely misleading. The study speaks for itself: "Eleven patients (18%) experienced recurrence of their AEFI; none were serious (eg, resulting in hospitalization, permanent disability or death)."

    He doesn't even mention the benefits of getting vaccinated: Protection against infection, severe disease, and post-infectious illness. Vaccination against Covid-19 may have saved over 3 million lives...in the US alone. And vaccines protect against long Covid beyond just preventing infection. It's reasonable to hypothesize that they would similarly prevent people who already have LC or ME from getting worse. Ultimately, people who watch this video without a critical eye will be misled, potentially resulting in hospitalizations, deaths, and new (perhaps worsening) long Covid.
     
    Ariel, Mij, merylg and 12 others like this.
  16. Peter Trewhitt

    Peter Trewhitt Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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    I find the video very confusing, if not deliberately misleading.

    When it says people with chronic illness report more harm than benefit, it rather means that a larger minority of Covid vaccine recipients report deterioration in their pre-existing chronic illness than the smaller minority that report improvement in their current chronic symptoms following vaccination. This rather ignores what most people regard as the main benefit from a Covid vaccine, which is not incidental effects on their existing chronic illness but rather vaccination against Covid.

    The finding that one in five of people with a chronic illness experience a worsening in their chronic illness symptoms obviously means for people with chronic illness the cost/benefit analysis of being vaccinated or not is more complex, but this video completely ignores such benefits as not dying from an acute Covid infection or not being obliged to continue self isolation after the statutory Covid restrictions have been dropped.

    On top of the risk of having an adverse reaction to the vaccine, in order to meaningfully make an informed decision on whether or not to have a vaccination the person with chronic illness needs to take into account:
    • Their risk of getting an acute Covid infection
    • Their risk of having a more severe response to an acute Covid infection because of their existing medical condition, including potentially increasing the symptoms of their chronic illness, triggering a major relapse in their pre-existing condition, developing Long Covid or even dying
    The video does make mention of the possibility that previous reaction to other vaccines may give a hint as to how we will react to the Covid vaccination, but makes no mention of the costs of ongoing need to self isolate if remaining unvaccinated. For some people with existing chronic conditions having the vaccination is a bad idea, but for the majority of us, perhaps 80%, it is unambiguously a good idea. However the calculation of potential benefit versus risk is not simple and I worry that this video will not help most people make the best decision for their circumstances.

    [cross posted with @RedFox , corrected typos ]
     
    Last edited: Jan 12, 2023
    Mij, merylg, Lisa108 and 11 others like this.
  17. Peter Trewhitt

    Peter Trewhitt Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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    Does anyone know about who produced this video and how widely it is being circulated? It seems to have been posted by Long Haul Wiki, who presumably also produced this webpage https://www.longhaulwiki.com/index.php/Main_Page , but on first glance it is not obvious who they are.
     
    merylg and Trish like this.
  18. ukxmrv

    ukxmrv Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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    I think that it is misleading to describe patient surveys as studies. We do need proper studies though I think.

    Patient surveys were argued as evidence of patient harm in the absence of proper studies when we talk about things like PACE in the NICE Guideline.

    They are not a substitute for proper studies but the best we have available right now. Obviously I would like that to change and see research carried out on people with ME or LC who had worsening of symptoms or entirely new symptoms after C Vaccination.

    I was one of the ME patient harmed by the Indian AZ Vaccine. Realise that I am in the minority as most people with ME had the vaccine with no long lasting effects. I regret having had that particular vaccine, the lack of informed consent at the time and the way I was treated by the NHS afterwards (appallingly).

    Had to pay to see a private Neurologist and still awaiting proper testing for some of the problems which appear to be permanent and on top of my existing ME. This was serious for me. It may not be life threatening but serious.

    The problems experienced by a minority of people with ME and LC deserves proper research.
     
    Last edited: Jan 12, 2023
    Ariel, Binkie4, TigerLilea and 5 others like this.
  19. Trish

    Trish Moderator Staff Member

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    I have watched the video. I don't recommend it. It's a complete misrepesentaltion of the research data, and doesn't make it clear enough how misleading the patient surveys are, and makes no useful comment on lives saved by vaccines in order to balance the risks. It also muddies the picture by conflating short term reactions to vaccines with long term damage.

    It is undoubtedly true that some people, including some of our members, have got sicker following vaccination, and they have my sympathy and should get appropriate support, but this sort of misinformation video is not a useful contribution, and may cause harm by putting people off vaccination.

    There is also near the end of the video use of the sad case of someone who had long covid before vaccination who took her own life some months after having a negative reaction to a vaccine. I think that use of someone's suffering in that way is inexcusable.

    Edit: Crossposted with ukxmrv. I agree, we need proper research.
     
    Ariel, RedFox, Hutan and 5 others like this.
  20. Mij

    Mij Senior Member (Voting Rights)

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    Experts are now saying that young healthy adults who have had at least 2 jabs no longer need booster shots.

    Do mild cases of Covid develop into LC?
     
    Peter Trewhitt likes this.

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