Pandemic 2020
- Thread starter Jimdamick
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DIY-HP-LED
Well-Known Member
Same rules as before until spring at least, masks and limit contacts, avoid public spaces and crowds. This time folks are on their own, we have vaccines, boosters and antiviral medications, plus previous infections to help us through. Anti viral medications still work on the new strains and there will be improved boosters or a better vaccine eventually. There is a lot of money and research being applied to this issue globally and from my reading there seem to be solutions, or at least very effective vaccines and medications, though they require the usual studies and clinical trials.
printer
Well-Known Member
New coronavirus variants rendered the last remaining monoclonal antibody treatment useless
No more monoclonal antibody treatments for Covid are available in the U.S.: The Food and Drug Administration on Wednesday rescinded its authorization of bebtelovimab, a drug previously given to patients who faced a high risk of severe disease.
Over the last two years, the FDA authorized six monoclonal antibody treatments for Covid, but omicron’s many subvariants rendered the drugs less effective so the FDA gradually revoked each of those authorizations. Bebtelovimab, made by Eli Lilly, was the last one standing.
According to the FDA's announcement, the drug was "not expected to neutralize Omicron subvariants BQ.1 and BQ.1.1.," which together now account for the majority of new infections recorded in the U.S. — around 62%, data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show.
"The big problem is that monoclonal antibodies bind to a very small piece of the virus. As the virus changes, we are now in a position in which we lost them all because they don’t bind to the virus anymore," said Dr. Arturo Casadevall, a professor of medicine at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine....
New coronavirus variants made the last remaining monoclonal antibody drug useless
The FDA rescinded its authorization of bebtelovimab this week, leaving immunocompromised patients with fewer Covid treatment options.
DIY-HP-LED
Well-Known Member
The antiviral medications still work on the latest strains, not the antibodies.New coronavirus variants rendered the last remaining monoclonal antibody treatment useless
No more monoclonal antibody treatments for Covid are available in the U.S.: The Food and Drug Administration on Wednesday rescinded its authorization of bebtelovimab, a drug previously given to patients who faced a high risk of severe disease.
Over the last two years, the FDA authorized six monoclonal antibody treatments for Covid, but omicron’s many subvariants rendered the drugs less effective so the FDA gradually revoked each of those authorizations. Bebtelovimab, made by Eli Lilly, was the last one standing.
According to the FDA's announcement, the drug was "not expected to neutralize Omicron subvariants BQ.1 and BQ.1.1.," which together now account for the majority of new infections recorded in the U.S. — around 62%, data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention show.
"The big problem is that monoclonal antibodies bind to a very small piece of the virus. As the virus changes, we are now in a position in which we lost them all because they don’t bind to the virus anymore," said Dr. Arturo Casadevall, a professor of medicine at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine....
New coronavirus variants made the last remaining monoclonal antibody drug useless
The FDA rescinded its authorization of bebtelovimab this week, leaving immunocompromised patients with fewer Covid treatment options.www.nbcnews.com
DIY-HP-LED
Well-Known Member
cannabineer
Ursus marijanus
Please keep masking, folks. And for those who aren’t, please think hard about doing it. Our healthcare system can’t take the hit.
www.axios.com
Health experts warn of another COVID wave
The spread of the newest Omicron variant has public health experts warning of yet another potential COVID wave in the U.S.
www.axios.com
PJ Diaz
Well-Known Member
Serious question.. If you are sitting in a crowded theater full of 500 people for two hours, is wearing a mask really going to help much? People are still breathing all the while, and potential virus particles are coming through the gaps in the mask perimeter the entire time.Please keep masking, folks. And for those who aren’t, please think hard about doing it. Our healthcare system can’t take the hit.
Health experts warn of another COVID wave
The spread of the newest Omicron variant has public health experts warning of yet another potential COVID wave in the U.S.
DIY-HP-LED
Well-Known Member
Most people who wear masks today would not be in that situation, in the midst of another covid wave tearing through America. Masks work and I wear one inside public spaces like the store, it also protects against and slows down flu and RVS another epidemic affecting children. The idea here being to slow it down so the hospitals can cope over the winter, things are different where the climate is colder. Kids get sick as part of growing up, but not millions all at once overwhelming the hospitals, same for new strains of covid, it slows it down and allows healthcare systems to cope.
cannabineer
Ursus marijanus
I don’t sit in the theater, or visit any other crowd venue. Fortunately, my life does not require such dangerous activities. What drops my jaw are stupid people who do so discretionarily.
PJ Diaz
Well-Known Member
I'm interpreting your answer as "it doesn't really matter if you wear a mask in that situation or not". Is that a fair assessment of your position? You seem to be saying that people who wear masks don't go out to enjoy things like the theater anymore.
PJ Diaz
Well-Known Member
That doesn't really answer my question, which was an honest one. I have to work at crowded venues from time to time, and wondering if the mask requirement is really preventing anything in such situations.
cannabineer
Ursus marijanus
The question started with a bad premise. The situation you describe is one on which I do not participate. It would degrade my one duty, which is not to transmit the pathogen.
I am very sorry that your work requires it. In your instance, I would recommend a cartridge respirator. If your employer balks, change jobs. It’s a seller’s market.
PJ Diaz
Well-Known Member
Naw, I've worked a couple of hundred shows since the start of the pandemic. If I was worried about being around people that much, I would change careers. We've had a mask mandate for years now, but most concert-goers don't want to wear masks these days.
cannabineer
Ursus marijanus
The sad part about that, for both you and your clients, is the displayed indifference to a proven life-saving measure.
DIY-HP-LED
Well-Known Member
I would say your odds of exposure are greatly increased! It depends on the mask too, something better than a surgical mask. Masks seemed to do a pretty good job of protecting healthcare workers during the worst of it when they were working in a sea of infection with no other protection. There is nothing wrong with people wearing masks, its a personal choice to spread disease, the same as with vaccines. There will be better vaccines too in a couple of years that it won't slip away from as easily or at all, in the meantime the antiviral meds still work, but the antibodies don't and the latest strains are good at evading not just the latest vaccines, but previous natural infections too.
It is smart to wear a mask inside public places and to get boosted, since there are several strains circulating most of which it helps with a lot.
PJ Diaz
Well-Known Member
I've always worn a mask for events during the pandemic. I only posed the question, and you refused to answer, but did imply that you feel that it's an unsafe environment regardless of mask usage.
DIY-HP-LED
Well-Known Member
Most are younger people, there is a demographic divide with covid that is more apparent in other places than America where it got mixed up with politics. The young and horny want their freedom, time passes slower for them than older folks and the attitudes of the young are different from the old and vulnerable.
PJ Diaz
Well-Known Member
That's not really true. It depends on the event. I do all kinds of concerts/events. My original question was about theater (perhaps I should have used the French spelling, Theatre), which in fact is largely attended by older folks. The Nutcracker performances generally attract an audience of a very wide age range. We've required masks, but policing their use serves to be problematic.
cannabineer
Ursus marijanus
I answered fully. The hypothetical situation is one that I avoid on principle. For reasons of your own, you falsely assert that I did not fully engage the question.
I more than feel it. I know it. It is established fact. I mimimize the one thing I dread: to be part of any virus casualty’s transmission genealogy.
Especially that it is now 2020 all over again with a pathogen for which we have neither immune treatment nor effective vaccine.
you complain that I’m not playing by your rules. Fine; posit more realistic and less self-absolving rules.
The hard truth remains: our one civic duty in this is not to transmit the virus.
Assuming personal inconveniences is part of that duty, as is not posting a barrage of self-absolving untruths and logic fails about masking, vaccination or the severity of the disease.
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DIY-HP-LED
Well-Known Member
Live events attract younger people and the kinds of shows you describe appeal to an older audience and families for the most part. There are plenty of older people around in public who don't wear masks these days, not many do. It is winter where I live and that makes things worse for covid and flu spread inside public places and covid lasts longer outside in the cold. Each successive wave of covid has been more contagious than the last, it is contagion that wins Darwin's race and covid now is the most infectious disease known. Lockdowns are not practical, but work as we see in China, but they never used the time they bought wisely and are not prepared for what is happening as the older generation dies off.
Covid is still a threat and there is a lot of money and medical brains focused on it with much promising research and stuff under trials now. Safety and clinical trials take awhile, even with telescoped clinical trials underway. Covid is a moving target, but there are weaknesses common to all coronaviruses, fundamental weaknesses it can't mutate away from or around.
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