Mega-Thread: Coronavirus Pandemic

[Egomaniac]

56,544 today.

Is this real or just some fake news to make Trump look bad?
Is the hospital full or still empty?

Those are just the number of new cases that are known about. The real number is likely much higher. There are people walking around every day that don't even know they have it.

That's why everyone should wear a mask...because you could be carrying it and not be aware of it. You don't wear a mask to protect yourself...you wear a mask to protect others...and they wear the mask to protect you. And the sooner everyone starts to understand that...the sooner you will start seeing new cases go down instead of up.

[tehealadin]

I see in Scotland starting next week we need to wear face coverings in shops. There has been a bit of a reactive response here at times, waiting for the horse to bolt first. People having been going to shops without them for months. Not sure if they know something we don't that means it is ok today, but not next week. Don't get me wrong, I will still wear one.

[Thepersona]

So, in other words, there are lots of people who are exposed to COVID enough to develop T-cells, yet remain asymptomatic or lightly symptomatic.

There's absolutely nothing new about that.

The thing is (as i remember talking about this with you 2 months ago) that we dont know how many asymptomatic/very light symptomatic people are there. Is 10% of the total? 50% 200%? We still dont know.

[Zan15]

LOL positive rates are nearing 20% for Florida….

meanwhile in states where people are not being ignorant assholes, like in the northeast the rates are under 1%.


https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/testing/...states/florida

[Forogil]

It's hardly new. It was expected. Now there's at least one study done confirming what everyone already knew.

Did they?

The idea is that the people who are exposed create the antibodies and T-cells, but the antibodies fade to undetectable levels much faster. Nothing in this study implies that IFR value estimates are necessarily wrong. Indeed, antibody tests back in late April for Stockholm were around 25%. Now, in one small test, a month later, T-cell prevalence is 30%. And with a supposed 1:2 rate, they only saw 15% with active antibodies.

Except that the report from late April for Stockholm had about 7.3% antibody-positive not 25%, and similar for blood donors in late April it was about 8% with antibodies, and in mid-May it rose to 10% (and medical professionals have raised more concerns about antibodies not having developed than having disappeared).

Here's what you wrote back then about that 7.3% figure:

Coming as no great surprise to any person capable of critical thinking:

CNN: Sweden is still nowhere near 'herd immunity,' even though it didn't go into lockdown
"Sweden has revealed that despite adopting more relaxed measures to control coronavirus, only 7.3% of people in Stockholm had developed the antibodies needed to fight the disease by late April.

The figure, which Sweden's Public Health Authority confirmed to CNN, is roughly similar to other countries that have data and well below the 70-90% needed to create "herd immunity" in a population."

[PhaelixWW]

Except that the report from late April for Stockholm had about 7.3% antibody-positive not 25%

Sorry, I should have specifically said that I was comparing it to the earlier, non-standardized study, which I took to be more similar to the new one. Shoddy comparison on my part, sure.

But after reading through the current study a bit, it calls into question the veracity of the quote in the article. First, I'd point out that the sample is not necessarily well-stratified (limited to blood donors; not the worst, but not the best method), nor is the sample size (55 donors) sufficient for very meaningful population-wide extrapolation.

More important, I can't find any support for the 30% figure quoted in the article. The study showed that only 7% (4 of the 55) donors tested positive for antibodies. Earlier in the article, one of the main authors states that T-cell prevalence was twice that of antibody prevalence. That would place T-cell prevalence among the blood donors at only 14%. Of course, again, the risk of translating an n=4 finding to population-wide extrapolation is utterly massive, considering that a shift of just one more/less positive finding could shift that to 10% or 18%.

medical professionals have raised more concerns about antibodies not having developed than having disappeared.

Sources?

[Zantos]

convenience store near me removed their store limit sign. even though wisconsin's cases are trending upwards again.

The walmart near me had that up but never really seemed to enforce it. The entire reasoning they went to limited hours is stupid since being open 24hours would help to further limit exposure by far than cramming everyone in at the same time.

[Forogil]

Sorry, I should have specifically said that I was comparing it to the earlier, non-standardized study, which I took to be more similar to the new one. Shoddy comparison on my part, sure.

But after reading through the current study a bit, it calls into question the veracity of the quote in the article. First, I'd point out that the sample is not necessarily well-stratified (limited to blood donors; not the worst, but not the best method), nor is the sample size (55 donors) sufficient for very meaningful population-wide extrapolation.

That's why I stated it was only preliminary, and since it's only a pre-print I hope they clear up the actual article.
As I understand the basic problem is that T-cell testing requires more advanced manual work than other methods.

Basically there's a lot about covid-19 we still don't understand.
How much immunity does T-cells and/or anti-bodies give, for how long time?

How many are/were infected when nothing is fully reliable:
Some are mildly symptomatic or asymptomatic (perhaps 20% fully asymptomatic - perhaps a different number), some are anti-body negative both during "acute phase" and after afterwards, some may even be PCR-negative even though they are infected (detected since they later develop anti-bodies - but are there other mild cases that we don't detect at all?); see https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-020-0965-6

Sources?

Many earlier comments - including comments on article itself.

And the Nature-article above indicated that they test for IgG 3-4 weeks after exposure as "acute phase" test; which suggest that people don't expect specific antibodies to appear right away for a new infection. Obviously that may depend on which subclass of IgG.

[Zantos]

https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/02/polit...eck/index.html

Child of a world leader and notable figure within said leaders party shares social media memes that attempt to discredit the effectiveness of masks.

This is why so many Americans are getting sick and dying. Because they pay attention to this monumental fucking retards of the highest calibur.

Good info though in that video. Basically, if you're not social distancing, you're mask is useless. Shows that most masks are still going to allow you to spread it to about a foot. Others being 3 feet.

Really highlights these are supposed to be in addition to social distancing. Not a replacement.

[Forogil]

The walmart near me had that up but never really seemed to enforce it. The entire reasoning they went to limited hours is stupid since being open 24hours would help to further limit exposure by far than cramming everyone in at the same time.

I agree - but I assume they get a bit less business and thus cannot afford to be open more. (And there is additional work with disinfecting etc.)

And support for companies (in countries that hands them) are often designed such that companies have to partially lay off the work-force - which naturally leads to a reduction in the opening time.

[Zantos]

I agree - but I assume they get a bit less business and thus cannot afford to be open more. (And there is additional work with disinfecting etc.)

And support for companies (in countries that hands them) are often designed such that companies have to partially lay off the work-force - which naturally leads to a reduction in the opening time.

Having worked at walmart, I can tell you exactly why they did it. They make a lot of money, enough to stay open that late. They did it because they needed an excuse to do so before now. They lose a Lot of money to theft at night. They have no one there to stop thieves aside from 2, maybe 3 managers on duty. This virus ensured they could lower hours and not get yelled at.

I went to walmart twice, right at 7 am. It didn't look more clean. It wasn't more stocked. It looked as though nothing had been done. I don't think there is any real reason they reduced hours when anyone with a brain realizes that 24hours was a better choice for this environment.

[AeneasBK]

...when anyone with a brain realizes that 24hours was a better choice for this environment.

Certainly one thing that wasn't well explained to me was how forcing everyone to get their shopping done in a smaller window of time was going to somehow help people stay socially distant from each other to reduce the spread, when it would logically seem that having shops open longer, with fewer staff on at a time and much fewer people allowed in, would lead to far reduced human to human contact. But I'm prepared ot accept that I just haven't given it enough thought.

[Forogil]

Having worked at walmart, I can tell you exactly why they did it. They make a lot of money, enough to stay open that late. They did it because they needed an excuse to do so before now. They lose a Lot of money to theft at night. They have no one there to stop thieves aside from 2, maybe 3 managers on duty. This virus ensured they could lower hours and not get yelled at.

I agree, companies also use the virus as an excuse to do what they liked to do anyway.

[Poopymonster]

Certainly one thing that wasn't well explained to me was how forcing everyone to get their shopping done in a smaller window of time was going to somehow help people stay socially distant from each other to reduce the spread, when it would logically seem that having shops open longer, with fewer staff on at a time and much fewer people allowed in, would lead to far reduced human to human contact. But I'm prepared ot accept that I just haven't given it enough thought.

Local 24 hour supermarket closed from 12-6. Claimed it was to do better cleaning in an empty store instead of working around customer. Also claimed it allowed them to restock shelves without being mobbed for TP or paper towels.

[AeneasBK]

Local 24 hour supermarket closed from 12-6. Claimed it was to do better cleaning in an empty store instead of working around customer. Also claimed it allowed them to restock shelves without being mobbed for TP or paper towels.

The first part, okay fair enough (if they were already open 24 hours they can hardly open for longer and they'll have a very clear idea of when they are least busy). I can totally get behind a 24 hour business reducing it's hours.

The second part must be a regional thing, because the TP issues do seem to be kinda area based (parts of UK had it apparently, Australia, parts of USA, but elsewhere no troubles).

I meant more the places (mostly talking supermarkets) that are already only open 8-8 or w/e deciding "We're gonna close at 4pm every day now for safety" forcing the 12 hours of custom into 8 hours (because people still need groceries). Maybe that's just how a few ones near me handled it and it's not as widespread a practice but it was both bloody inconvenient (working till 5? - SOL) and also seemed to me to be counter intuitive.

[PhaelixWW]

That's why I stated it was only preliminary, and since it's only a pre-print I hope they clear up the actual article. As I understand the basic problem is that T-cell testing requires more advanced manual work than other methods.

Basically there's a lot about covid-19 we still don't understand.
How much immunity does T-cells and/or anti-bodies give, for how long time?

The pre-print states:

Virus-specific memory T-cells have been shown to persist for many years after infection with SARS-CoV-1. In line with these observations, we found that SARS-CoV-2-specific T cells acquired a nearly differentiated memory phenotype in the convalescent phase, as reported previously in the context of other viral infections and successful vaccines. This phenotype has been associated with stem-like properties. Accordingly, we found that SARS-CoV-2-specific T-cells generated anamnestic responses to cognate antigens in the convalescent phase, characterized by extensive proliferation and polyfunctionality. Of particular note, we detected similar memory T-cell responses directed against the internal (nucleocapsid) and surface proteins (membrane and/or spike) in some individuals lacking detectable circulating antibodies specific for SARS-CoV-2. Indeed, almost twice as many exposed family members and healthy individuals who donated blood during the pandemic generated memory T-cell responses versus antibody responses, implying that seroprevalence as an indicator has underestimated the extent of population-level immunity against SARS-CoV-2.

It remains to be determined if a robust memory T-cell response in the absence of detectable circulating antibodies can protect against SARS-CoV-2. This scenario has nonetheless been inferred from previous studies of MERS and SARS-CoV-1, both of which have been shown to induce potent memory T-cell responses that persist while antibody responses wane. Moreover, vaccine-induced T-cell responses, even in the absence of detectable antibodies, can protect mice against lethal challenge with SARS-CoV-1. In line with these observations, none of the convalescent individuals in this study, including those with previous asymptomatic/mild disease, have experienced further episodes of COVID-19.

A few things:

Clearly, the expectation, at least, is that T-cells alone should provide protection against reinfection, for as long as they last. What's more the question is whether or not those T-cells alone will prevent someone from being a carrier of the virus, however.

Also, the study's statement of "twice as many" was in reference to the combined groups of exposed family members (n=30) and May blood donors (n=55). The study indicates that 19/30 (64%) of the exposed family members had antibodies, and 4/55 (7%) of blood donors did as well. That means that 23/85 (27%) of the combined group had antibodies. Perhaps the assistant meant "antibodies" instead of "T-cells" in her quote, in reference to this larger group?

Also, the "twice as many" statement would mean that ~46/85 in that larger group would have had T-cells. In order for her statement of "30% of the blood donors having T-cells" to be accurate, that would mean that 16/55 had T-cells, which would mean that, per the "twice as many" comment, that 30/30 exposed family members would had to have had T-cells in order to get to the 46 total in both groups.

This seems off for a few reasons. First, because it would mean that such a larger ratio of blood donors had T-cells only instead of both T-cells and antibodies than the exposed family member group. It also implies that basically every single person in their exposed family members group had T-cells. I feel that were this true, then both of those things (the latter in particular) would have easily warranted their own direct statement in the study, if not in the article.

Regardless of any of this, the study was still done with a small enough sample as to make the results interesting, but hardly definitive.

Also regardless, there are plenty of unknowns still, so further research can only help.

Many earlier comments - including comments on article itself.

I'm not debating that said concern exists. What I'm questioning is your claim that those concerns collectively rise to the level of "more than".

[breadisfunny]

The walmart near me had that up but never really seemed to enforce it. The entire reasoning they went to limited hours is stupid since being open 24hours would help to further limit exposure by far than cramming everyone in at the same time.

our walmart still has limited hours.

[Masark]

Florida hits 200,000 cases.

https://experience.arcgis.com/experi...1c643c195314e/

[breadisfunny]

Florida hits 200,000 cases.

https://experience.arcgis.com/experi...1c643c195314e/

i see the number 190,052 not 200,000. why would there be a 10,000 person discrepency between the positives and cases?

[Pwnyride]

i see the number 190,052 not 200,000. why would there be a 10,000 person discrepency between the positives and cases?

Total Cases also include those whom are not currently positive with COVID but have active antibodies showing that they had it at some point