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On January 11 2021 08:37 LegalLord wrote: At the very least, the plan should be "use all currently available doses as first shots, give second shots out of the newly available inventory three weeks from now." Keeping half the inventory in reserve is definitely problematic in and of itself, and in theory we should be able to get more doses over time.
Agreed. At worst, your supply isn't increasing and you give out only second doses for a while, and very limited numbers of first doses, but provided your supply doesn't decrease, there's no reason to hold any in reserve, beyond 1-2k to handle unexpected shipment losses, errors etc.
At worst your supply decreases and people don't get their 2nd dose. The strategy of 'use all available doses on 1st shots and let replenishment supply the 2nd shots' overlooks the fact that Pfizer/Moderna were anticipating FDA approval and were probably manufacturing/stockpiling like crazy for weeks or months before they got the greenlight to ship. If they had been working on a stockpile for months and all the doses get used on 1st shots they probably can't replenish said stockpile in 3 weeks for the 2nd shots.
Currently still a live press conference so sorry, EDIT:: added timestamped link, but some justifications in here for altered dosing schedules.
Key points. 1. Single dose reaches effectiveness of ~92% after two weeks for both Pfizer/Moderna 2. Second dose increases effectiveness to 95% 3. First dose provides protection that lasts for at least 8 weeks. 4. Second dose schedule was tested at between 3 weeks and 6 weeks in both trials. In both trials, it was found that there is no significant difference in protection after second dose for delayed second doses 5. Pfizer and Moderna have both committed to increasing delivery levels Dec < Jan < Feb <<< Mar as far as vaccine deliveries go.
For both vaccines, WHO has extended second dose recommended interval to 21-42 days (3-6 weeks). Based on what we know about 2 dose vaccines, this is perfectly fine.
Under this basis, BC extended second dose timing to 5 weeks. This allows for 1 week of leeway in getting the second dose.
Edit:: adding timestamped link. Also, added more from conference.
The link provided by firebolt145 on the previous page states that pfizer was only tested at a 3 week interval in the trials and not 6 week? Is that incorrect? Why did they think a 2-shot regimen was needed in the first place, does anyone know?
On a somewhat related note, I just got my 2nd dose of the Pfizer, so any changes to the dose scheduling will be irrelevant to me. Hoping I have mild symptoms.
I agree with your numbers, but disagree with the conclusion. The lower mortality is a a result of the restrictions, and not in spite of them (and the control thing I'm not even going to comment on).
Germany has the lowest total deaths and deaths per capita of all its neighbors by quite some margin. I'd call that a success. If you had Spain, Italy or France per capita numbers instead, you'd still end up with similar restrictions at some point, just with twice as many people dead.
When looking at total stats, you mostly see our good handling of the first wave. Sadly, our handling of the second wave was far worse. Just too many half-measures and lockdown-light actions. If there is one thing that this virus has shown us, it is that the only the thing which really works to bring the numbers down are hard lockdowns. Sadly, our politicians didn't have the balls to actually commit to a hard lockdown in november.
Probably too much fear of the idiots who protest against corona measures.
On January 13 2021 19:51 Simberto wrote: When looking at total stats, you mostly see our good handling of the first wave. Sadly, our handling of the second wave was far worse. Just too many half-measures and lockdown-light actions. If there is one thing that this virus has shown us, it is that the only the thing which really works to bring the numbers down are hard lockdowns. Sadly, our politicians didn't have the balls to actually commit to a hard lockdown in november.
Probably too much fear of the idiots who protest against corona measures.
No, there are many ways to be successful without hard lockdowns. Travel restrictions and mass testing/tracking in the early stages have worked very well in Asia, along with educating the public.
Spain got the numbers of the 2nd wave down using strict domestic travel restrictions and closing bars and restaurants, no hard lockdown needed. Needless to say, reopening the bars/restaurants and allowing some travel for Christmas have made the cases go up again dramatically, but at least they know what to do now, even without closing schools, stores and locking people into their homes.
I agree with your numbers, but disagree with the conclusion. The lower mortality is a a result of the restrictions, and not in spite of them (and the control thing I'm not even going to comment on).
Germany has the lowest total deaths and deaths per capita of all its neighbors by quite some margin. I'd call that a success. If you had Spain, Italy or France per capita numbers instead, you'd still end up with similar restrictions at some point, just with twice as many people dead.
How can you prove restrictions had such effect on the number of deaths? Restrictions had no effect on containing spread in Germany. Not in the first, not in the second wave. Neither wave showed any signs of healthcare collapse.
Each and every death Germany had can be compared to any other country in terms of medical treatment procedures. No country had any medical treatment which has been proved to be better, so that other countries thought worth using.
Germany has between 20k and 30k positives a day since at least a month, number of deaths have in Germany nothing to do with number of positives. There is no correlation between number of positives and number of deaths. The first wave had 10k deaths with around 250k positives. The second wave has till now 30k deaths with 1.700k positives. Again, neither wave was near healthcare collapse.
In my opinion, numbers show that the number of deaths have more to do with the age of your population and the state of your healthcare system, than with any other variable I can think of. Aside from the bunch of opinions in that analysis, the numbers speak for themselves.
If restrictions have an impact, I have not yet found any scientific articles proving it. Most excess deaths I see in other countries seem to be related to healthcare system's condition, population characteristics and collateral damage produced by restrictive measures.
Hospitals in Brandenburg sent patients to Berlin. They were full.
That isn't collapse, but not coping fine either.
How can you say restrictions have had no impact? Lockdown started Dec 17. Measures show up roughly 14 days later in infection numbers. We've had the Christmas break which complicates the data. Last week, the midweek high was ~28k, which is 3k less than the week before and 6k less than another fortnight ago.
What makes you sure this would have happened anyhow?
On January 13 2021 21:15 Artisreal wrote: Hospitals in Brandenburg sent patients to Berlin. They were full.
That isn't collapse, but not coping fine either.
How can you say restrictions have had no impact? Lockdown started Dec 17. Measures show up roughly 14 days later in infection numbers. We've had the Christmas break which complicates the data. Last week, the midweek high was ~28k, which is 3k less than the week before and 6k less than another fortnight ago.
What makes you sure this would have happened anyhow?
It cannot be analyzed that way. Numbers are not normalized. The number of weekly tests is not stable and 3k more or less could simply have to do with less or more testing. Christmas makes it even more difficult, yes. I have another analysis, 30 pages long. You can look at it, it is in the same blog and it is called "[EN] Information politic", I give my take on that too.
Also there are more variables that come into play, like the virus' behavior (which I also analyse in my post "[EN] Cold or influenza". I am sorry but it is a lot to just briefly post here. If the virus were to behave like a cold, numbers will drop in the coming weeks and will rise again around march-april.
Edit: Sorry, I also forgot to say. I did this mortality analysis because the test is kind of in shambles, you can check the Corman-Drosten review to read some more about that. Decisions based on a test which might not be working properly could not be the best either. Death numbers are nothing one could argue about, cause of death is another topic.
I think the statement "restrictions had no effect on containing spread in Germany" is a very strong statement which requires some pretty strong evidence to support it, because it doesn't seem to make sense on the surface, and also doesn't seem to fit the data on a surface level.
"Number of deaths have nothing to do with number of positives" is another very strong statement requiring a lot of evidence to support it, for the same reasons as above. If you simply overlay the "new cases" data with the "deaths" data for germany, you see a very clear correlation between the two.
You make very strong and counterintuitive claims, but you don't deliver very strong evidence to support them. Also, i have no clue where that blog you reference is supposed to be.
On January 13 2021 21:15 Artisreal wrote: Hospitals in Brandenburg sent patients to Berlin. They were full.
That isn't collapse, but not coping fine either.
How can you say restrictions have had no impact? Lockdown started Dec 17. Measures show up roughly 14 days later in infection numbers. We've had the Christmas break which complicates the data. Last week, the midweek high was ~28k, which is 3k less than the week before and 6k less than another fortnight ago.
What makes you sure this would have happened anyhow?
It cannot be analyzed that way. Numbers are not normalized. The number of weekly tests is not stable and 3k more or less could simply have to do with less or more testing. Christmas makes it even more difficult, yes. I have another analysis, 30 pages long. You can look at it, it is in the same blog and it is called "[EN] Information politic", I give my take on that too. [...]
Yes I agree to that. Data is all fucked (still) and it's rather complicated to draw a comparable picture.
On January 13 2021 21:35 Simberto wrote: I think the statement "restrictions had no effect on containing spread in Germany" is a very strong statement which requires some pretty strong evidence to support it, because it doesn't seem to make sense on the surface, and also doesn't seem to fit the data on a surface level.
"Number of deaths have nothing to do with number of positives" is another very strong statement requiring a lot of evidence to support it, for the same reasons as above. If you simply overlay the "new cases" data with the "deaths" data for germany, you see a very clear correlation between the two.
You make very strong and counterintuitive claims, but you don't deliver very strong evidence to support them. Also, i have no clue where that blog you reference is supposed to be.
Yes, I agree. There are thousands of ways to limit the spread of this virus, and you simply can't dismiss them all and say we would have been just as well doing nothing. There is quite a difference of a R number of 5+ and 1,5-.
The measures vary from pointless to super effective, and telling which ones matter more or less is very complicated and might be different between counties.
On January 13 2021 21:35 Simberto wrote: I think the statement "restrictions had no effect on containing spread in Germany" is a very strong statement which requires some pretty strong evidence to support it, because it doesn't seem to make sense on the surface, and also doesn't seem to fit the data on a surface level.
"Number of deaths have nothing to do with number of positives" is another very strong statement requiring a lot of evidence to support it, for the same reasons as above. If you simply overlay the "new cases" data with the "deaths" data for germany, you see a very clear correlation between the two.
You make very strong and counterintuitive claims, but you don't deliver very strong evidence to support them. Also, i have no clue where that blog you reference is supposed to be.
Those statements are objectively bollocks.
If the restrictions do not have an effect on the spread, how come the number of cases and deaths dropped significantly in every single country/region that imposed a hard lockdown, such as Italy, Spain, Wuhan, New York etc.? How come Central European countries which locked down hard back in March pretty much avoided the first wave altogether? If the excess deaths were a result of lockdowns, how come the numbers were negative in countries that avoided the first wave through lockdowns and dropped massively in places like Italy or New York?
On January 13 2021 21:35 Simberto wrote: I think the statement "restrictions had no effect on containing spread in Germany" is a very strong statement which requires some pretty strong evidence to support it, because it doesn't seem to make sense on the surface, and also doesn't seem to fit the data on a surface level.
"Number of deaths have nothing to do with number of positives" is another very strong statement requiring a lot of evidence to support it, for the same reasons as above. If you simply overlay the "new cases" data with the "deaths" data for germany, you see a very clear correlation between the two.
You make very strong and counterintuitive claims, but you don't deliver very strong evidence to support them. Also, i have no clue where that blog you reference is supposed to be.
This is a graph of the reproduction value and number of tests, together with the restrictive measures "https://bit.ly/3dRvbt0". In my post "https://ferraronga.wixsite.com/gimmesometruth/post/en-information-politic" I talk about it, amongst other things. You can see how neither restrictive measures had any impact nor demonstrations. It had mostly to do with testing strategy changes.
In my other post, that I already linked is the data supporting my claim, number of positives does not correlate to number of deaths. Check my blog, has more information about my claims.
On January 13 2021 21:39 Artisreal wrote: I think it's this one he linked earlier. *klick*
On January 13 2021 21:15 Artisreal wrote: Hospitals in Brandenburg sent patients to Berlin. They were full.
That isn't collapse, but not coping fine either.
How can you say restrictions have had no impact? Lockdown started Dec 17. Measures show up roughly 14 days later in infection numbers. We've had the Christmas break which complicates the data. Last week, the midweek high was ~28k, which is 3k less than the week before and 6k less than another fortnight ago.
What makes you sure this would have happened anyhow?
It cannot be analyzed that way. Numbers are not normalized. The number of weekly tests is not stable and 3k more or less could simply have to do with less or more testing. Christmas makes it even more difficult, yes. I have another analysis, 30 pages long. You can look at it, it is in the same blog and it is called "[EN] Information politic", I give my take on that too. [...]
Yes I agree to that. Data is all fucked (still) and it's rather complicated to draw a comparable picture.
Thanks for the "klick". And yes, data had better days. Gathering and analyzing all this was a nightmare, which lasted months, many.
On January 13 2021 21:35 Simberto wrote: I think the statement "restrictions had no effect on containing spread in Germany" is a very strong statement which requires some pretty strong evidence to support it, because it doesn't seem to make sense on the surface, and also doesn't seem to fit the data on a surface level.
"Number of deaths have nothing to do with number of positives" is another very strong statement requiring a lot of evidence to support it, for the same reasons as above. If you simply overlay the "new cases" data with the "deaths" data for germany, you see a very clear correlation between the two.
You make very strong and counterintuitive claims, but you don't deliver very strong evidence to support them. Also, i have no clue where that blog you reference is supposed to be.
Yes, I agree. There are thousands of ways to limit the spread of this virus, and you simply can't dismiss them all and say we would have been just as well doing nothing. There is quite a difference of a R number of 5+ and 1,5-.
The measures vary from pointless to super effective, and telling which ones matter more or less is very complicated and might be different between counties.
The graph linked above shows how the R number behave and how measures and gatherings impacted it. The text is in German, but in the PDF in my blog you can check the translations for everything. In short "Maßnahme" translates to "measure".
On January 13 2021 21:35 Simberto wrote: I think the statement "restrictions had no effect on containing spread in Germany" is a very strong statement which requires some pretty strong evidence to support it, because it doesn't seem to make sense on the surface, and also doesn't seem to fit the data on a surface level.
"Number of deaths have nothing to do with number of positives" is another very strong statement requiring a lot of evidence to support it, for the same reasons as above. If you simply overlay the "new cases" data with the "deaths" data for germany, you see a very clear correlation between the two.
You make very strong and counterintuitive claims, but you don't deliver very strong evidence to support them. Also, i have no clue where that blog you reference is supposed to be.
Those statements are objectively bollocks.
If the restrictions do not have an effect on the spread, how come the number of cases and deaths dropped significantly in every single country/region that imposed a hard lockdown, such as Italy, Spain, Wuhan, New York etc.? How come Central European countries which locked down hard back in March pretty much avoided the first wave altogether? If the excess deaths were a result of lockdowns, how come the numbers were negative in countries that avoided the first wave through lockdowns and dropped massively in places like Italy or New York?
If you read my mortality analysis, you will get the idea. But for the first wave, many countries show no improvement thanks to measures, in most the number of cases drop because of the end of the wave of influenza period. Regarding deaths, strongly worded, as more people die, the people more likely to die are not there anymore, thus, death numbers drop. Please read the analysis, we will save a lot of time. One can easily ignore my opinions at the beginning and end of the analysis. The data is there with graphics and all to be interpreted by everyone.
If you read my mortality analysis, you will get the idea. But for the first wave, many countries show no improvement thanks to measures, in most the number of cases drop because of the end of the wave of influenza period.
No. I have studied the initial curve of Spain, and the connection between the hard lockdown and cases is perfect. You should do the same, it shows the difference between "nothing" and "everything" very clearly, in a very vulnerable country.
You must note the delay, though. It takes a few weeks from being infected, then having symptoms, then being tested and the results being reported. Taking that into account, it is very obvious that the peak of new infections was the week before the lockdown.
What is really interesting is that the first hard lockdown lasted so long, and that the numbers remained low until travel between regions were reopened in July, despite other relaxations from May on.
On January 13 2021 22:51 maybenexttime wrote: I guess the countries that experienced massive death peaks in both waves imported people more likely to die for that to happen?
You would have to look into that. If I need evidence to support my claims, so do you. Raw numbers in mortality are not everything.
Just one example: - Week 38 = 7,2% excess deaths (COVID deaths = 40, total deaths = 17.400) - Week 48 = 9% excess deaths (COVID deaths = 1500, total deaths = 19.800)
Another example: - Weeks 1 to 20 of 2018 = 405.427 deaths - Weeks 1 to 20 of 2020 = 383.802 deaths - Weeks 1 to 48 of 2018 = 879.066 deaths - Weeks 1 to 48 of 2020 = 876.688 deaths
We all have to analyze the data, seeing raw numbers rise and fall and attributing them to the preferred cause, does not necessarily mean we are doing it right.
Another variable impacting peaks is healthcare system, everything counts and matters. I say in my analysis, every country has to do their own reseach, populations' characteristics are different, healthcare systems are different, and so on. We could have said Germany was an exception, until November and December came. Now Germany is on par with other countries, my analysis shows or rather the data shows, we have to think over this a bit more and more deeply.
EPT
