Coronavirus is one mutation away from infecting millions

[ElNono]

Police sources told The Post roughly 6,500 of those employees put in requests to be exempt from the COVID vaccine on the urging of police unions as they attempt to fight the mandate in court. They are allowed to work as those applications are reviewed.
But sources added the NYPD’s Equal Employment Opportunity Division, which will review the applications, is expected to shoot down any religious exemption requests from cops who have nothing on file previously, such as requesting special accommodations for religious holidays.

Yep, both stories are actually true:

https://nypost.com/2021/11/01/heres-...ccine-mandate/

[ElNono]

The FDNY shut down 26 firehouses across the Big Apple as of 7:30 a.m. Saturday because of staff shortages caused by the vaccination mandate, The Post has learned.
The shuttered companies included Engine 55 in Lower Manhattan, Engine 234 in Crown Heights, Engine 231 in Brownsville, Ladder 128 in Long Island City and Engine 158 and Ladder 78 in Richmond on Staten Island, according to an FDNY alert sent Saturday morning.

The FDNY’s vaccination rate stood at 72 percent for firefighters — and 77 percent agencywide — at the end of Friday, the city’s deadline for workers to get at least one dose of the vaccine, according to data from City Hall. Nearly 4,000 FDNY employees remained unvaccinated.

...

FDNY spokesman Jim Long said the closings are not permanent, describing the companies as “temporarily out of service” and the situation as “fluid” since it was shifting firefighters to units where they were needed.

As of late Saturday afternoon, the FDNY could not provide an exact number of closings that the pols said were in effect as of 7:30 am Saturday.

“The situation remains fluid. We hire manpower to get the company back in service or relocate other units to the area for coverage,” Long said.

In anticipation of a shortage of firefighters, NYPD’s Emergency Service Unit has requested the help of volunteer firefighters from Long Island and upstate to back fill the lost positions, according to an email obtained by The Post.


https://nypost.com/2021/10/30/fdny-f...ing-shortages/

[Cuck Ross]

cool story

You didn't read the methodology and posted a junk study based on the headline. Somewhat embarrassing for you but understandable after such a disgusting move by the CDC to publish.

[Cuck Ross]

Vaccination Offers Better Protection Than Previous COVID-19 Infection

A new study from the [CDC] finds that vaccination provides better protection against hospitalization with COVID-19 than a previous infection with the virus. The analysis found people hospitalized with coronavirus-like symptoms were more than five times more likely to test positive for COVID-19 if they had had recent prior infection than if they were recently vaccinated. The study released Friday examined more than 7,000 people across nine states and 187 hospitals, comparing those who were unvaccinated and had previously had the coronavirus in the last three to six months and those who were vaccinated over the same time frame.

The CDC urged even those who were previously infected to get their shots. [...] Overall, [CDC Director Roc e Walensky] said at a press briefing earlier this week that the hospitalization rate among unvaccinated people is 12 times higher than for vaccinated people. The vaccination rate for those 12 and older has now reached 78 percent with at least one shot, but Walensky noted that still leaves more than 60 million eligible Americans unvaccinated.

A Review and Autopsy of Two COVID Immunity Studies

How effective is immunity after Covid recovery relative to vaccination? An Israeli study by Gazit et al. found that the vaccinated have a 27 times higher risk of symptomatic infection than the Covid recovered. At the same time, the vaccinated were nine times more likely to be hospitalized for Covid. In contrast, a CDC study by Bozio et al. claims that the Covid recovered are five times more likely to be hospitalized for Covid than the vaccinated. Both studies cannot be right.
I have worked on vaccine epidemiology since I joined the Harvard faculty almost two decades ago as a biostatistician. I have never before seen such a large discrepancy between studies that are supposed to answer the same question. In this article, I carefully dissect both studies, describe how the analyses differ, and explain why the Israeli study is more reliable.
The Israeli Study

In the Israeli study, the researchers tracked 673,676 vaccinated people who they knew not to have had Covid and 62,833 unvaccinated Covid-recovered individuals. A simple comparison of the rates of subsequent Covid in these two groups would be misleading. The vaccinated are likely older and, hence, more prone to have symptomatic disease, giving the Covid recovered group an unfair advantage. At the same time, the typical vaccinated patient received the vaccine long after the typical Covid-recovered patient got sick. Most Covid recovered patients got the infection before the vaccine was even available. Because immunity wanes over time, this fact would give an unfair advantage to the vaccinated group.
To make a fair and unbiased comparison, researchers must match patients from the two groups on age and time since vaccination/disease. That is precisely what the study authors did, matching also on gender and geographical location.
For the primary analysis, the study authors identified a cohort with 16,215 individuals who had recovered from Covid and 16,215 matched individuals who were vaccinated. The authors followed these cohorts over time to determine how many had a subsequent symptomatic Covid disease diagnosis.
Ultimately, 191 patients in the vaccinated group and 8 in the Covid recovered group got symptomatic Covid disease. These numbers mean that the vaccinated were 191/8=23 times more likely to have subsequent symptomatic disease than the Covid recovered. After adjusting the statistical analysis for comorbidities in a logistic regression analysis, the authors measured a relative risk of 27 with a 95% confidence interval between 13 and 57 times more likely for the vaccinated.
The study also looked at Covid hospitalizations; eight were in the vaccinated group, and one among the Covid recovered. These numbers imply a relative risk of 8 (95% CI: 1-65). There were no deaths in either group, showing that both the vaccine and natural immunity provide excellent protection against mortality.
This is a straightforward and well-conducted epidemiological cohort study that is easy to understand and interpret. The authors addressed the major source of bias through matching. One potential bias they did not address (as it is challenging to do) is that those with prior Covid may have been more likely to be exposed in the past through work or other activities. Since they were more likely to be exposed in the past, they may also have been more likely exposed during the follow-up period. That would lead to an underestimate of the relative risks in favor of vaccination. There may also be misclassification if some of the vaccinated unknowingly had Covid. That would also lead to an underestimate.
The CDC Study

The CDC study did not create a cohort of people to follow over time. Instead, they identified people hospitalized with Covid-like symptoms, and then they evaluated how many of them tested positive versus negative for Covid. Among the vaccinated, 5% tested positive, while it was 9% among the Covid recovered. What does this mean?
Though the authors do not mention it, they adopt a de facto case-control design. While not as strong as a cohort study, this is a well-established epidemiological design. The first study to show that smoking increases the risk of lung cancer used a case-control design. They compared hospitalized patients with lung cancer and found more smokers in that group compared to non-cancer patients, who served as controls. Note that if they had restricted the control group to people with (say) heart attacks, they would have answered a different question: whether smoking is a larger risk factor for lung cancer than it is for heart attacks. Since smoking is a risk factor for both diseases, such a risk estimate would differ from the one they found.
In the CDC study on Covid immunity, the cases are those patients hospitalized for Covid disease, having both Covid-like symptoms and a positive test. That is appropriate. The controls should cons ute a representative sample from the population from which the Covid patients came. Unfortunately, that is not the case since Covid-negative people with Covid-like symptoms, such as pneumonia, tend to be older and frailer with comorbidities. They are also more likely to be vaccinated.
Suppose we wanted to know whether the vaccine rollout successfully reached not only the old but also frail people with comorbidities. In that case, we could conduct an age-adjusted cohort study to determine if the vaccinated were more likely to be hospitalized for non-Covid respiratory problems such as pneumonia. That would be an interesting study to do.
The problem is that the CDC study answers neither the direct question of whether vaccination or Covid recovery is better at decreasing the risk of subsequent Covid disease, nor whether the vaccine rollout successfully reached the frail. Instead, it asks which of these two has the greater effect size. It answers whether vaccination or Covid recovery is more related to Covid hospitalization or if it is more related to other respiratory type hospitalizations.
Let’s look at the numbers. Of the 413 cases (i.e., Covid positive patients), 324 were vaccinated, while 89 were Covid recovered. That does not mean that the vaccinated are at higher risk since there may be more of them. To put these numbers in context, we need to know how many in the background population were vaccinated versus Covid recovered. The study does not provide or utilize those numbers, although they are available from at least some of the data partners, including HealthPartners and Kaiser Permanente. Instead, they use Covid-negative patients with Covid like symptoms as their control group, of which there were 6004 vaccinated, and 931 Covid recovered. With these numbers in hand, we can calculate an unadjusted odds ratio of 1.77 (not reported in the paper). After covariate adjustments, the odds ratio becomes 5.49 (95% CI: 2.75-10.99).
Ignoring covariates for the moment, we will look at the unadjusted numbers in more detail for illustrative purposes. The paper does not report how many vaccinated and Covid recovered people there are in the population at risk for hospitalization with Covid-like symptoms. If there were 931,000 Covid recovered and 6,004,000 vaccinated (87%), then the proportions are the same as among the controls, and the results are valid. If, instead, there were (say) 931,000 Covid recovered and 3,003,000 vaccinated (76%), then the odds ratio would be 0.89 instead of 1.77. There is no way to know the truth without those baseline population numbers unless one is willing to assume that those hospitalized for Covid-like symptoms without having Covid are representative of the background population, which they are unlikely to be.
With a background population to define a cohort, one must still adjust for age and other covariates as in the Israeli study. Some may argue that the Covid negative hospitalized patients with Covid-like symptoms are a suitable control group because they provide a more representative sample of the population at risk of Covid hospitalization. That may be partially true compared to an unadjusted analysis, but the argument is incorrect as it does not address the key issue of the relevant medical question being asked. There is both a relationship between being vaccinated/recovered and Covid hospitalization and a relationship between being vaccinated/recovered and non-Covid hospitalization. Rather than evaluate the first one, which is of intense interest for health policy, the CDC study evaluates the contrast between the two, which is not particularly interesting.
The CDC study adjusts for covariates such as age, but the procedure does not resolve this fundamental statistical issue and may even exacerbate it. Frail people are more likely to be vaccinated, while active people are more likely to have been Covid recovered, and neither of those are properly adjusted for. With the contrast analysis, there is also more confounding that must be adjusted for: both the confounding related to the exposures and Covid hospitalizations and the confounding related to the exposures and non-Covid hospitalizations. This increases the potential for biased results.
While not the main problem, there is one other curious fact about the paper. Covariate adjustments will typically change the point estimates somewhat, but it is unusual to see a change as large as the one from 1.77 to 5.49 that was observed in the CDC study. How can this be explained? It must be because some covariates are very different between the cases and controls. There are at least two of them. While 78% of the vaccinated are older than 65, 55% of the Covid recovered are younger than 65. Even more concerning is the fact that 96% of the vaccinated were hospitalized during the summer months of June to August, while 69% of the Covid recovered were hospitalized in the winter and spring months from January to May. Such unbalanced covariates are usually best adjusted for using matching as in the Israeli study.
Epidemiologists typically rely on case-control studies when data are unavailable for a whole cohort. For example, in nutritional epidemiology, researchers often compare the eating habits of patients with a disease of interest versus a sample of representative healthy controls. Following the eating habits of a cohort over long periods is too unwieldy and costly, so a questionnaire-based case control study is more efficient. For this immunity study, there is no rationale for a case-control study since cohort data are available from multiple CDC data partners. It is surprising that CDC chose this case-control design rather than the less biased cohort design selected by the Israeli authors. Such an analysis would answer the question of interest and may have given a different result more in line with the Israeli study.

https://brownstone.org/articles/a-re...unity-studies/

[pgardn]

^^^^^^
Brownstone and Jeffery Tucker

Another joke of a source.
TSA can reel these in.
Same guy who is used by all these nuts to falsely criticize Fauci just based on chronological deception.

*crinkle trash*

Now show the studies that say the opposite TSA, man of science.

[DarrinS]

^^^^^^
Brownstone and Jeffery Tucker

Another joke of a source.
TSA can reel these in.
Same guy who is used by all these nuts to falsely criticize Fauci just based on chronological deception.

*crinkle trash*

Now show the studies that say the opposite TSA, man of science.

Not written by Jeffery [sic, lol] Tucker

[Cuck Ross]

^^^^^^
Brownstone and Jeffery Tucker

Another joke of a source.
TSA can reel these in.
Same guy who is used by all these nuts to falsely criticize Fauci just based on chronological deception.

*crinkle trash*

joke of a source

Kulldorff is an internationally well-known biostatistician and epidemiologist. During his career, he has developed new statistical and epidemiological methods for disease surveillance, including the early detection and monitoring of infectious disease outbreaks and the post-market drug and vaccine safety monitoring. His methods are widely used by public health agencies around the world, as are his free disease surveillance software: SaTScan, TreeScan and RSequential. He has served on scientific advisory committees to the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control.

Now show the studies that say the opposite TSA, man of science.

Studies that show the opposite of what?

[pgardn]

Not written by Jeffery [sic, lol] Tucker

Yes.
Jeffrey runs the whole damn thing.
Read about Jeffrey.
Did Jeffrey publish other articles about the vaccine v. the real virus?

Yeah you wont find that in Brownstone.

[pgardn]

joke of a source

Kulldorff is an internationally well-known biostatistician and epidemiologist. During his career, he has developed new statistical and epidemiological methods for disease surveillance, including the early detection and monitoring of infectious disease outbreaks and the post-market drug and vaccine safety monitoring. His methods are widely used by public health agencies around the world, as are his free disease surveillance software: SaTScan, TreeScan and RSequential. He has served on scientific advisory committees to the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control.



Studies that show the opposite of what?

When one has an immune response to a virus the immune system is supposed to form antibodies to ANY proteins in the virus that illicit a response. And thus theoretically produce a wide array of cellular response molecules on cells. When the immune system is given a dose of the most critical protein we know of in Covid, the e protein, it makes ONLY response molecules and associated cells to THAT eprotein. Why do you think the vaccine was made for the e protein instead of all the proteins contained in the virus. Where in the article is this mentioned? I cant find it.

[pgardn]

Just as a starter for you two that looks at the whole ball of wax.

https://www.immunology.org/coronavir...ection-vaccine

[Cuck Ross]

When one has an immune response to a virus the immune system is supposed to form antibodies to ANY proteins in the virus that illicit a response. And thus theoretically produce a wide array of cellular response molecules on cells. When the immune system is given a dose of the most critical protein we know of in Covid, the e protein, it makes ONLY response molecules and associated cells to THAT eprotein. Why do you think the vaccine was made for the e protein instead of all the proteins contained in the virus. Where in the article is this mentioned? I cant find it.

Seriously what the are you rambling about? None of what you posted has anything to do with the poor methodology the CDC used to push this garbage study, which was what the article was about.

[Cuck Ross]

Just as a starter for you two that looks at the whole ball of wax.

https://www.immunology.org/coronavir...ection-vaccine

Countering one of the most robust studies with an infographic

[Cuck Ross]

Just as a starter for you two that looks at the whole ball of wax.

https://www.immunology.org/coronavir...ection-vaccine

Background Reports of waning vaccine-induced immunity against COVID-19 have begun to surface. With that, the comparable long-term protection conferred by previous infection with SARS-CoV-2 remains unclear.


Methods We conducted a retrospective observational study comparing three groups: (1)SARS-CoV-2-naïve individuals who received a two-dose regimen of the BioNTech/Pfizer mRNA BNT162b2 vaccine, (2)previously infected individuals who have not been vaccinated, and (3)previously infected and single dose vaccinated individuals. Three multivariate logistic regression models were applied. In all models we evaluated four outcomes: SARS-CoV-2 infection, symptomatic disease, COVID-19-related hospitalization and death. The follow-up period of June 1 to August 14, 2021, when the Delta variant was dominant in Israel.



Results SARS-CoV-2-naïve vaccinees had a 13.06-fold (95% CI, 8.08 to 21.11) increased risk for breakthrough infection with the Delta variant compared to those previously infected, when the first event (infection or vaccination) occurred during January and February of 2021. The increased risk was significant (P<0.001) for symptomatic disease as well. When allowing the infection to occur at any time before vaccination (from March 2020 to February 2021), evidence of waning natural immunity was demonstrated, though SARS-CoV-2 naïve vaccinees had a 5.96-fold (95% CI, 4.85 to 7.33) increased risk for breakthrough infection and a 7.13-fold (95% CI, 5.51 to 9.21) increased risk for symptomatic disease. SARS-CoV-2-naïve vaccinees were also at a greater risk for COVID-19-related-hospitalizations compared to those that were previously infected.



Conclusions This study demonstrated that natural immunity confers longer lasting and stronger protection against infection, symptomatic disease and hospitalization caused by the Delta variant of SARS-CoV-2, compared to the BNT162b2 two-dose vaccine-induced immunity. Individuals who were both previously infected with SARS-CoV-2 and given a single dose of the vaccine gained additional protection against the Delta variant.

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1....24.21262415v1

[boutons_deux]

700K+ covid deaths,

40K dead per month still, heading for 300K more dead to hit 1M dead, nearly ALL 300K unvaxxed.

and anti-vaxxers are still pushing bull

G F Y

[Thread]

700K+ covid deaths,

40K dead per month still, heading for 300K more dead to hit 1M dead, nearly ALL 300K unvaxxed.

and anti-vaxxers are still pushing bull

G F Y

Boiled down:::

President Trump: 400k dead AmericansPERIOD
MF Biden: 356k dead Americans. & counting, son.

[pgardn]

Countering one of the most robust studies with an infographic

You need a graphic starter because you have no idea what you are posting dumb copypasta.

So its word. Its over.
End of argument.
You dont even understand wtf it means.

You dont understand the counter to why this robust study does not fit the model of why the vaccine was made the way it was and why we DID NOT USE whole attenuated viral proteins from the whole virus (would be much more like the active virus). Dont give me this about all the best studies coming from Israel. Thats ONE place with ONE group of people and as shown in the other article does not fit what others have found.

Quit pretending like you actually understand any of this with your wall of copy post. Just use your own words. So explain why the vaccine was made for one protein instead of all the proteins which would be more likely to mimic the active virus. Why?

[pgardn]

Background Reports of waning vaccine-induced immunity against COVID-19 have begun to surface. With that, the comparable long-term protection conferred by previous infection with SARS-CoV-2 remains unclear.


Methods We conducted a retrospective observational study comparing three groups: (1)SARS-CoV-2-naïve individuals who received a two-dose regimen of the BioNTech/Pfizer mRNA BNT162b2 vaccine, (2)previously infected individuals who have not been vaccinated, and (3)previously infected and single dose vaccinated individuals. Three multivariate logistic regression models were applied. In all models we evaluated four outcomes: SARS-CoV-2 infection, symptomatic disease, COVID-19-related hospitalization and death. The follow-up period of June 1 to August 14, 2021, when the Delta variant was dominant in Israel.



Results SARS-CoV-2-naïve vaccinees had a 13.06-fold (95% CI, 8.08 to 21.11) increased risk for breakthrough infection with the Delta variant compared to those previously infected, when the first event (infection or vaccination) occurred during January and February of 2021. The increased risk was significant (P<0.001) for symptomatic disease as well. When allowing the infection to occur at any time before vaccination (from March 2020 to February 2021), evidence of waning natural immunity was demonstrated, though SARS-CoV-2 naïve vaccinees had a 5.96-fold (95% CI, 4.85 to 7.33) increased risk for breakthrough infection and a 7.13-fold (95% CI, 5.51 to 9.21) increased risk for symptomatic disease. SARS-CoV-2-naïve vaccinees were also at a greater risk for COVID-19-related-hospitalizations compared to those that were previously infected.



Conclusions This study demonstrated that natural immunity confers longer lasting and stronger protection against infection, symptomatic disease and hospitalization caused by the Delta variant of SARS-CoV-2, compared to the BNT162b2 two-dose vaccine-induced immunity. Individuals who were both previously infected with SARS-CoV-2 and given a single dose of the vaccine gained additional protection against the Delta variant.

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1....24.21262415v1

Great.
This DOES NOT AGREE with other studies.
Especially considering it comes from one small population very likely to have similar immune systems than compared to the US.
This is continually left out of the conversation.

[pgardn]

TSA goes to another user name to toss of all the wrong he has already posted.

[Cuck Ross]

So its word. Its over.
End of arguement.
You dont even understand wtf it means.

You dont even understand the counter to why this robust study does not fit the model of why the vaccine was made the way it was and why we DID NOT USE whole attenuated viral proteins from the whole virus (would be much more like the active virus). Dont give me this about all the best studies coming from Israel. Thats ONE place with ONE group of people and as shown in the other article does not fit what others have found.

Quit pretending like you actually understand any of this with you wall of post. Just use your own words. So explain why the vaccine was made for one protein instead of all the proteins which would be more likely to mimic the active virus. Why?

"and as shown in the other article does not fit what others have found" The only other study I've seen that agreed with the recent CDC study was the article out of Kentucky released by.....the CDC. And it was properly on and torn apart for cherry picking data as well.

Do you even understand what is being discussed here? Natural immunity vs vaccine induced immunity? I doesn't look like you do.

[Cuck Ross]

Great.
This DOES NOT AGREE with other studies.
Especially considering it comes from one small population very likely to have similar immune systems than compared to the US.
This is continually left out of the conversation.

Post the studies you keep referring to. Bonus points if you include both flawed CDC studies

[Cuck Ross]

Vaccination Offers Better Protection Than Previous COVID-19 Infection

A new study from the [CDC] finds that vaccination provides better protection against hospitalization with COVID-19 than a previous infection with the virus. The analysis found people hospitalized with coronavirus-like symptoms were more than five times more likely to test positive for COVID-19 if they had had recent prior infection than if they were recently vaccinated. The study released Friday examined more than 7,000 people across nine states and 187 hospitals, comparing those who were unvaccinated and had previously had the coronavirus in the last three to six months and those who were vaccinated over the same time frame.

The CDC urged even those who were previously infected to get their shots. [...] Overall, [CDC Director Roc e Walensky] said at a press briefing earlier this week that the hospitalization rate among unvaccinated people is 12 times higher than for vaccinated people. The vaccination rate for those 12 and older has now reached 78 percent with at least one shot, but Walensky noted that still leaves more than 60 million eligible Americans unvaccinated.

CDC went from 5X greater to protection to releasing this later the same day

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019..._1635540569644

[Cuck Ross]

Great.
This DOES NOT AGREE with other studies.
Especially considering it comes from one small population very likely to have similar immune systems than compared to the US.
This is continually left out of the conversation.

https://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2...rotection.html

https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/mm7044e1.htm?s_cid=mm7044e1_w

[SnakeBoy]

I guess the necessity of acknowledging COVID is real and still a threat is too much for some.

Who are you talking about?

[ElNono]

You didn't read the methodology and posted a junk study based on the headline. Somewhat embarrassing for you but understandable after such a disgusting move by the CDC to publish.

I shared a story from a trusted source. I made no commentary about it.

Has the study been retracted yet? You shared two tweets from rando on the internet.

[pgardn]

"and as shown in the other article does not fit what others have found" The only other study I've seen that agreed with the recent CDC study was the article out of Kentucky released by.....the CDC. And it was properly on and torn apart for cherry picking data as well.

Do you even understand what is being discussed here? Natural immunity vs vaccine induced immunity? I doesn't look like you do.

You have no fkn clue what the actual difference is and why the vaccine likely works much better.
Do you want it explained again? You are putting your money on a study from crowded population in major cities with mostly the same genetic makeup (yes this could indeed be a problem in that people have different immune systems and it CAN BE GENETIC) that is the most current and extending it to the world. And you worry about cherry picking? And the rest of the world does not show the same thing. And there is a good reason why. (which I already briefly explained) This headline popped up in the last week or so... there will be no more studies from any other part of the world.