charlie14 wrote: » The level of discussion just seems to be back where we started, but now we appear to have antivaxers joining in. Back then it was those favouring the strategy arguing that Sweden`s antibody modelling was the answer to gaining herd immunity, and it was imminent. Now with that shown to be a myth, we are on to T-cells with no more proof than there was for antibodies and the herd immunity level being lowered to suit. T-cells may be the answer to to overcoming this pandemic, and while it is great to see the levels in Sweden dropping, the speculation that this is due to T-cell immunity because of their strategy, for me just does not stack up. Last week alone, on very patchy reporting, Sweden had 1,740 new confirmed cases and 22 deaths. Their three neighbours, who used lockdown, with over 1.5 times Sweden`s population, combined had 443 confirmed cases and 3 deaths. If this exposure to the virus in Sweden has raised immunity due to T-cells, and thus lowering their numbers, then why are the numbers for the other three Nordic countries, who were not as exposed to the same level, substantially lower. ?
tobefrank321 wrote: » Bizarre comment of the day. Who exactly here is against a safe proven vaccine for covid 19? Do you understand how long it takes to prove a vaccine is safe? Will you be volunteering for trials? Personally I have no issue with long term vaccines proven to be safe, I use them myself. But to call someone anti vaxer because they oppose using a new relatively untested vaccine on children who would have zero side effects from covid 19 is daft, to say the least. As for antibodies, the science doesn't really lie. There is a growing body of evidence that antibodies decline and may not exist after a couple of months if you had a mild infection. 80% of infections are mild. That means up to 80% of people may have no anti bodies after 3 months. Which renders an anti body test useless as a way of determining who was and wasn't infected. So your labouring the point about antibody results doesn't appear to be supported by the science. The evidence now is antibodies are not the reason people are immune from reinfection.
Bit cynical wrote: » It means that the 14% of the overall population that tested positive for antibodies can be translated into about 30% for overall immunity for the country. There has also been research suggesting that the level required for herd immunity may be much lower than previously thought. Although still too early to say for certain, these factors go some way, I think, to explaining Sweden's falling numbers without resorting to believing, as some do, that the numbers are wrong.
bb1234567 wrote: » If half are missed, then it means 100% of people in Bergamo became infected. Which in itself seems implausible, but if it is true it then also suggests that herd immunity is not lower than originally believed, as given the deaths experienced by the region in March and April it would then mean that almost the entirety of the city population became infected in a matter of weeks.
bob mcbob wrote: » Here is an article for you on T-cells. Some interesting points from it -Using bioinformatics tools, a team led by Shane Crotty and Alessandro Sette, immunologists at the La Jolla Institute for Immunology, predicted which viral protein pieces would provoke the most powerful T cell responses. They then exposed immune cells from 10 patients who had recovered from mild cases of COVID-19 to these viral snippets. All of the patients carried helper T cells that recognized the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein, which enables the virus to infiltrate our cells. They also harbored helper T cells that react to other SARS-CoV-2 proteins. And the team detected virus-specific killer T cells in 70% of the subjects, they report today in Cell. “The immune system sees this virus and mounts an effective immune response,” Sette says. and another point about why some people seem to be relatively unaffected by Covid.The teams also asked whether people who haven’t been infected with SARS-CoV-2 also produce cells that combat it. Thiel and colleagues analyzed blood from 68 uninfected people and found that 34% hosted helper T cells that recognized SARS-CoV-2. The La Jolla team detected this crossreactivity in about half of stored blood samples collected between 2015 and 2018, well before the current pandemic began. The researchers think these cells were likely triggered by past infection with one of the four human coronaviruses that cause colds; proteins in these viruses resemble those of SARS-CoV-2. Does any of this constitute "proof" for youhttps://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/05/t-cells-found-covid-19-patients-bode-well-long-term-immunity
charlie14 wrote: » You must be confusing me with someone else. Unlike some here, I never believed in the Swedish strategy based on antibody`s would result in herd immunity and the test results have shown that to be correct. I have always thought it a reckless strategy that cost lives. ?
wadacrack wrote: » https://twitter.com/freddiesayers/status/1286297666570391552
tobefrank321 wrote: » You'd have to agree though that keeping schools open during a pandemic is an impressive approach and if we can't manage that in Ireland, we will have failed in that regard, whereas Sweden will have had some success.
In the town of Skellefteå, a teacher died and 18 of 76 staff tested positive at a school with about 500 students in preschool through ninth grade. The school closed for 2 weeks because so many staff were sick, but students were not tested for the virus. In Uppsala, staff protested when school officials, citing patient privacy rules, declined to notify families or staff that a teacher had tested positive. No contact tracing was done at the school. At least two staff members at other schools have died, but those schools remained open and no one attempted to trace the spread of the disease there. When asked about these cases, Ludvigsson said he was unaware of them. He did not respond to a query about whether he would amend the review article to include them.
Boggles wrote: » Not really, they threatened parents if they didn't send their kids to school they would notify social services. They didn't bother testing school children to get gauge what level of infection their was or what level of spread, vital science that could have helped the rest of the world. There is also widespread information suppression going on in Sweden at the moment. An investigation has been launched into their approach, sounds like the cover up is running in tandem.
tobefrank321 wrote: » Pretty normal practice I'd imagine in most countries. Its their right to determine if an infectious disease poses a serious threat to kids or if its overhyped when it comes to children.
tobefrank321 wrote: » The evidence so far is the risk to kids is nominal in most cases and therefore there is no good reason to keep them from getting a proper education.
tobefrank321 wrote: » The risk is if those kids went into a nursing home and hugged their 90 year old very ill granny.
Boggles wrote: » No, it's not pretty normal practice in most countries to threaten to take kids off their parents who do not want their kids to return to school during a deadly once a generation global pandemic. Not normal at all. The evidence is scant, bits of studies. My point was that Sweden had an opportunity to give the world a live comprehensive study, they didn't bother. Well no. That's not how this virus works. It's not as simple as A to B.The risk is the kid goes home and hugs their father, there father works with Tony, Tony lives with his ageing mother, that mother ends up in ICU and dies because of that kid hugging their father.
tobefrank321 wrote: » If that is the case, Sweden should be seeing tens of thousands dead, instead of 5,600, just over 3 times ours with 2 times our population.
tobefrank321 wrote: » As you point out this virus works through a number of linkages from A to B to C to D and disrupting those linkages is the key. Mask wearing is one way of doing that.
tobefrank321 wrote: » Ireland is keeping numbers under control because we aren't opening up schools and pubs, which are open in Sweden. If schools and pubs open, we may see a different outcome, I hope we don't. You'd have to agree though that keeping schools open during a pandemic is an impressive approach and if we can't manage that in Ireland, we will have failed in that regard, whereas Sweden will have had some success.
charlie14 wrote: » I would also hope that with the reopening of schools we do not see a significant rise in new cases, but from looking at England, I would not be that confident. From the British Health Minister Matt Hancock telling BBC 4`s Today programme that Leicester schools were closed "to slow the spread of the virus" there has been a lot of speculation that school outbreaks played a significant part in Leicester going back into lockdown. What I would find particularly worrying is that of the 13 schools in Leicester that had outbreaks, 11 were primary schools. What has added to this speculation on school is Public Health England week 26 report "An increase in the number of suspected or confirmed school outbreaks" "School outbreaks have increased over the past 2 weeks from 15 in week 23, to 24 in week 24,to 44 in week 25. This coincides with wider school reopening since week 23, but also an expansion of testing and contact tracing".
FintanMcluskey wrote: » Sweden have exactly 3 times more vulnerable citizen's ie those over 65 than Ireland. 2m vs 650k. A countries death rate in the 1st world looks to be directly linked to the population of citizen's over 65, not restrictions on citizens, schools shut etc
bb1234567 wrote: » USA has a higher number of deaths per capita than most of Europe, with a smaller population of over 65's. Sure, the theory has some validity as that group make up almost all deaths. But of course an older country that puts enough in restrictions in place that the virus won't spread will have far fewer deaths than a country with a slightly younger population that allows it to spread uncontrolled. Don't know how you could possibly argue against that. Other examples UK - 19% of population over 65 far higher number of deaths per capita than Netherlands where 20% of population is over 65. Switzerland where 19% of population over 65 has considerably higher number of deaths per capita than Portugal where 22% of the population is over 65. There are dozens of other examples. The theory is simply incorrect, or at least is very often not correct, the most you could say is that there is a strong correlation between population over 65 and deaths per capita.
tobefrank321 wrote: » So keep the schools closed indefinitely? There may be a case for closures in infection spike towns. Currently we are showing a complete inability to contain the virus without going for the nuclear option of closing all schools, an option Sweden has made a point of avoiding. An indefinite closure of schools is a clear failure to live with the virus. All this depends on a vaccine in the next 12 months by the way, which is not guaranteed. So far a vaccine has worked in a limited way for a number of otherwise healthy volunteers and even they haven't been challenged by the virus. We can learn from Sweden still. They didn't close schools, shops, pubs, restaurants, hair salons or any kind of salons, non essential workplaces, building sites, and so on, and so far they have per capita a couple thousand more deaths than us. And of those perhaps a few hundred are linked directly or indirectly to schools. We don't shut down the roads because of a few hundred deaths on them.
cnocbui wrote: » Fewer deaths if you cocoon the vulnerable indefinitely or a vaccine safe for the vulnerable becomes available, otherwise, you are only delaying the point at which the vulnerable become infected and die, because lock downs can not be indefinite.
bb1234567 wrote: » Well yeh I agree. Fintan's point didn't take that into account though, he said explicitely fewer deaths would occur in one country with a large population over 65 than one with fewer, regardless of restrictions, which is patently false. There are many other factors to take into accounr, healthcare quality , population density, preparedness, rates of chronic illness, that would of course massively impact the rate of death per capita. While old age is the greatest risk factor, it is clearlynot nearly as simple as that.
FintanMcluskey wrote: » My point is Sweden has preformed just as well as Ireland at protecting the vulnerable.
bb1234567 wrote: » It was true in the case of comparing Sweden and Ireland, but not across the board, clearly.
FintanMcluskey wrote: » We agree Sweden have protected its citizen's as well as Ireland?
99nsr125 wrote: » You are completely deluded if you think the test results which are painfully unreliable can be used as the basis for anything. All evidence from past illnesses's is that the only quarantine that has any chance of being effective is the quarantine of the sick and that only works temporarily for the illness remains with us forever. Smallpox is the only virus we have eradicated *everything* else is still with us.
charlie14 wrote: » You should fire off a missive to Sweden on that. Their strategy was based on antibody modelling figures. You are aware are you not that smallpox was only declared eradicated in 1980 due to a worldwide vaccination campaign ?
Ginger n Lemon wrote: » Very good, as posted earlierhttps://unherd.com/2020/07/swedens-anders-tegnell-judge-me-in-a-year/ Charlie I thought you'd be all over this? Rejecting all of his claims? Sweden have been a disaster and had a large chunk of population wiped out etc? "I ask again: is he claiming that lockdowns make no difference? “We don’t know. It would have made maybe some difference, we don’t know. But on the other hand we know that lockdowns also have big other effects on public health. We know that closing schools has a great effect on children’s health in the short and the long term. We know that people being out of work also produces a lot of problems in the public health area. So we also have to look at what are the negative effect of lockdowns, and that has not been done very much so far.” Charles what do you think are negative effects of lockdowns, and more importantly whether those effects cause deaths through suicide, lack of cancer screening etc?
