BS: 2021 vaccination thread

Subject: BS: 2021 vaccination thread (why not)
From: keberoxu
Date: 31 Dec 20 - 02:44 PM

Well, no, I have yet to be vaccinated.
If you're not interested in my explanation,
you can skip the rest of this opening post.


I have spent most of the year 2020 in a mental health clinic
within driving distance of Albany, New York.
So I am in what is called "congregate housing," living in an on-campus residence,
where strict protocols are being observed to prevent infection.
Up to this moment, NO patient has tested positive for COVID-19,
although clinic staffpersons have done, several times.

Right now we don't have vaccines for us patients.
Our clinic has worked out an account arrangement with a lab.
This is for the screening tests,
which each patient does twice a week.
These tests are different than a diagnostic COVID-19 test.
So we're in the 'sample-collection' stage of testing
and getting back the results from the lab.

I don't know if any of the staffpersons at the clinic
have been vaccinated or not.
You may rest assured there is a lot of TALK about vaccinations here,
it just has yet to start.

Having said all that:

why not a thread
concerning Mudcatters and their loved ones
getting the vaccine this New Year?

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread (why not)
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 31 Dec 20 - 03:31 PM

My daughter, who is in her mid-30s, works for the NHS in what is currently a tier 3 area. She has been supplied with testing kits and has been testing twice a week. She received her first vaccination yesterday and has a date for her follow up jab.

DC

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread (why not)
From: Helen
Date: 31 Dec 20 - 03:48 PM

In Oz, because the rate of infections is very low here the people-in-charge-of-the-country have decided to wait until the clinical trials are completed before starting vaccinations. Enough doses of the vaccines (two brands at least) have been secured so the whole country will be vaccinated - or at least, the people who don't rely on farcebook for their opinions, I guess.

Go science! Go medical expertise! Yay! (that's my opinion, so I'll be standing in line for the vaccinations when they are available, and being an old f@rt, I'll be in one of the earlier prioritised groups.)

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread (why not)
From: Bill D
Date: 31 Dec 20 - 04:39 PM

I am in a major HMO and way above the minimum age. I assume they will contact me in April or so. I will gladly go in when they call.

In the meantime, I am 98% of the time at home and 99.9995% careful when I go out.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread (why not)
From: G-Force
Date: 01 Jan 21 - 07:01 AM

Here in Surrey (UK) our local practice is so hopeless it took us two and a half months to get the flu jab. So with the Covid jab we're not holding our breath (except when we pass a jogger on the street).

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread (why not)
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 01 Jan 21 - 03:24 PM

I'm hoping we'll get given the Oxford Astra-Zeneca vaccination as it seems to confer higher levels of immunity than the Pfizer one after the first dose: also more of a time margin for getting the second dose: 12 weeks as against 3. And less risk of vaccine going off if it's been left out of the deep freeze for too long!
Guess we'll get what we're given and like it! My husband and I are both over 70 so should be called up at least before Easter I'd think.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread (why not)
From: Jos
Date: 01 Jan 21 - 04:38 PM

The accounts of the vaccines I have heard several times say that the Oxford Astra-Zeneca vaccination confers about a 70 to 75% level of immunity after the first dose, and the Pfizer, 90% after the first dose. They also said it gives better immunity with a longer wait between doses.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread (why not)
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Jan 21 - 08:11 PM

As I dare not reveal Mrs Steve's age, all I'll say is that, because she's eight months older than me, she's one step up from me priority-wise. She' ll get done before I get done, which seems a bit daft, but hey ho. However, as we have to endure a "government" that ballses everything up, who knows. They've already screwed up the time interval between doses, from 21 days to three months, something that is completeky untrialled. You really couldn't make it up.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread (why not)
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Jan 21 - 08:42 PM

I have an ad out for a proofreader, preferably one who doesn't lose their reading specs...

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread (why not)
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 02 Jan 21 - 04:07 PM

When a dentist offered to help administer the coronavirus vaccine, he hadn't bargained for the "overload of bureaucracy" he says came his way. Dr Bates, from North Yorkshire, is one of a number of health staff to criticise paperwork needed to gain NHS approval to give the jabs.

Some medics have been asked for proof they are trained in areas such as preventing radicalisation. The NHS said training and checks were needed. What absolute pc bollocks.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread (why not)
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 02 Jan 21 - 06:25 PM

Many of the vaccine whingers have no doubt been happy to stuff their faces with hamburgers all their lives, but they won't have the vaccine because they don't know what's in it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread (why not)
From: mg
Date: 02 Jan 21 - 08:16 PM

i have read UK has given permission to mix the vaccines..one for first dose and perhaps another for second. I think that sounds insane but maybe not. I am hoping they will find a way to prefill syringes..oh they know how to do that..reduce time spent fiddling around and human error. I am starting to wonder if injections could be done by robot. Stick your arm into a sleeve like a blood pressure thing at the pharmacy...robot jabs. I mean, we do incredible eye surgery with robotic assistance..surely we could jab an arm on at least young healthy people...

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread (why not)
From: Big Phil
Date: 02 Jan 21 - 09:14 PM

We could a vaccinate ourselves if supplied with it.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread (why not)
From: Rapparee
Date: 02 Jan 21 - 09:38 PM

I have vaccinated people against smallpox, and I probably could do it for COVID. It ain't, like, developing the vaccine!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread (why not)
From: Mr Red
Date: 03 Jan 21 - 07:32 AM

this guy reckons the Oxford vaccine will prove a better bet - Duc C. Vuong
$3/$4 a shot
efficacy of various vaccines will migrate to a similar level because of the logistics of the various trials, and the logistics of carting around at -70 deg C. There are reports of 500 doses of the Pfizer being left out of the cold store in America - an isolated example but you aren't going to hear all instances. And it doesn't matter how many if it is you that gets those shots.
We have to think world-wide, with airlines crying . Our herd is 7 billion people wide.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread (why not)
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 03 Jan 21 - 07:59 PM

Re what mg said about mixing vaccines in the UK, i.e first and second shots being of different types: this results from article in the New York Times: I spent most of yesterday afternoon arguing about it with a non-medical friend from the Facebook school of medicine. It is a massive distortion of the truth - sensationalist journalism at its worst! So bad that the British Medical Association has demanded that the NYT publish a correction/retraction.
All the advice given by the Medicines Regulatory body is that BOTH vaccinations should be of the SAME type in ALL cases.....except in the rare event that someone has not done proper record-keeping of what was given for the first dose (and recording is a medico-legal requirement!) ONLY if the record of what was given first time cannot be found may a patient be given their second dose which may not match the first, on the grounds that it may be better to have 2 doses if something rather than no second dose.......but this really should not ever have to happen If meticulous documentation is observed.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread (why not)
From: Mrrzy
Date: 04 Jan 21 - 11:46 PM

Americans at least can approximate their place in the vaccine queue here.

I am roughly #268,700,001 in America, or 43,701 in my city.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread (why not)
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 05 Jan 21 - 12:34 PM

There is also some sort of calculator/predictor over here: from that it looks as if it could be Feb/March before I get mine!

And further confirmation from Scotland's First Minister, Nicola Sturgeon, yesterday, as she imposed a further lockdown, that Scottish residents would NOT get different vaccines in the 2 doses, but the same manufacturer's for both.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread (why not)
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 05 Jan 21 - 03:58 PM

I'm on two lists, and whichever one comes through first, I'll cancel the other.

Here is how the leading eight vaccines work.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread (why not)
From: Donuel
Date: 05 Jan 21 - 06:03 PM

As for lockdown precautions this is not the end, not even close.
But we are aclaimated. FIGHT ON PASSIVELY and help each other.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread (why not)
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 07 Jan 21 - 02:30 PM

Our local Health Centre made the national news today by being the first place in Scotland to give the vaccination: there's hope for us yet!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread (why not)
From: JennieG
Date: 07 Jan 21 - 03:16 PM

I saw a headline yesterday but didn't bother reading the story......something to the effect that a member of the IOC wants "all Olympic athletes vaccinated early".

Well, no. Not unless they are a an emergency/care/essential worker in their spare time, which I very much doubt. They can wait their turn the same as the rest of us have to.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread (why not)
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 07 Jan 21 - 03:23 PM

Our local Health Centre made the national news today by being the first place in Scotland to give the vaccination: there's hope for us yet!
Meanwhile Wales made the news by being the slowest of the 4 home nations to get started on vaccination :(

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread (why not)
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 09 Jan 21 - 09:45 AM

The order in which people will be offered the vaccine in the UK is based on advice from the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI). The NHS will let you know when it's your turn to have the vaccine. It's important not to contact the NHS for a vaccination before then.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread (why not)
From: Charmion
Date: 09 Jan 21 - 10:17 PM

Bonzo, that NHS directive reminds me of my Dad’s anecdote about trying to volunteer for the Royal Navy in September 39. « Go away and wait. We’ll come and get you when we’re good and ready. »

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Lurcherman
Date: 10 Jan 21 - 04:06 AM

I’m on a trial for the Novavax vaccine, that’s liable to be the next one licensed for use. Still haven’t grown a third arm...
Disappointing as it could improve my guitar playing..

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 11 Jan 21 - 08:16 PM

I'm finding the slowness of the entire process frustrating, as I hear about friends going out for their vaccinations and I still haven't heard anything. We're all in the same group that is eligible right now.

It looks like there are several vaccines available now and I'll ask which ones are being given once I get an appointment - there is a one-time one that isn't as effective as the two-shot regimen, so I'll hold out for that.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: BobL
Date: 12 Jan 21 - 03:36 AM

Well, it's a huge job, whose logistics are formidable - not only do the vaccines have to be manufactured and distributed, so does ancillary stuff such as syringes and deep freezers. It's unavoidable that the various vax stations, although striving for best efficiency, will vary in how fast they can process their patients.

Some of my own friends in the same age group (70+) have had their jabs - I'm still waiting. Not a problem.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Donuel
Date: 12 Jan 21 - 06:02 AM

News Flush: Florida hackers went after the vaccine scheduling websites so that appointments disappeared and random names appeared.

A war against vaccines just sounds like a Republican thing.













News flush

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mrrzy
Date: 12 Jan 21 - 10:30 AM

Had a poor beleaguered health dept person at our neighborhood meeting last night I skipped out of the Singaround for.

Charlottesville is in a district with 250K residents to jab.

Hospitals are only jabbing their employees and patients, and not the public. We hope that sentence ends in "yet" but that was not said.

No pharmacies or doctors can *store* the vaccines, so nobody but the health dept can do the population.

Our health dept has 15 nurses. They will get a whole 8 more next week. Calls are out for volunteers.

We theoretically have three sub-phases in Phase 1. They are starting Phase 1b before finishing 1a, so people at lower risk are getting jabs before some of those already determined to need them more. Who is being considered at what risk is still in flux, too.

They have jabbed [so much shorter to type, that, than Vacinated] about 9k people in about 2 weeks so far. What they would not say is what % of doses that is, or if they have enough doses for everybody, or will be expectingto get more.

Are we having fun yet?

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Donuel
Date: 12 Jan 21 - 10:54 AM

Inefficiencies have led to disposing of vaccines in some rare cases.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: BobL
Date: 13 Jan 21 - 02:20 AM

I believe they allowed for a certain amount of wastage, when they did their sums.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 13 Jan 21 - 01:09 PM

Medical people are figuring out how to get more mileage out of those containers of vaccine, they're trying to not waste a drop. The excess is part of the packaging process and also takes into account the types of syringes in use, and medical folks are trying to get the syringes that waste the least as far as extending the precious vaccines.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 13 Jan 21 - 08:08 PM

Should have said in my last post on the 7th that our local Health Centre was the first GP premises to be offering Covid vaccinations: they had previously been given in hospitals and care homes. I was in the same centre on Monday for a physiotherapist appointment: had expected it to be full of people in socially distanced queues waiting for more vaccinations, but it was like the Marie Celeste: quite surreal when it used to be such a busy place. One receptionist (busy on the phone), 2 empty waiting rooms, one nurse, one mother + baby, one physiotherapist- and myself.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Donuel
Date: 13 Jan 21 - 08:09 PM

I'm slated to get vaccinated when the C-1 group is called whenever that will be. My wife is in C-3. B is old age homes. A-1 is medical staff of course.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 15 Jan 21 - 02:10 AM

My cousin and his wife in Florida have had their first jab. Both 70+ but no health problems. I think they have good health schemes though. If all goes according to plan my wife and I should get ours in March.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mrrzy
Date: 15 Jan 21 - 09:41 AM

The only person I know who's gotten a first jab is a geriatric psychiatrist.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Donuel
Date: 15 Jan 21 - 09:07 PM

NYC runs out of vaccines next weekend.
HLS said they will relaese the reserves for second shots to be available for first timers.
The problem is that there is no extra supply lying around, theer were no doses held back or no one knows where they are if they exist.

The new varient is like a burr plant that is twice as sticky making it more likely to spread. March is the month the new varient will dominate.

Trump seems more like Nero every day, if he could play an instrument.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: robomatic
Date: 15 Jan 21 - 10:14 PM

Getting the vaccine in Anchorage:

The State of Alaska had a well-defined and tiered list of priorities, the highest being health providers, and then older citizens. But the officials a few days later combined the older citizens into the top tier based on two reasons, that the State didn’t have that many in the age group to constitute its own class or prevent the health workers from getting theirs, and, since a priority would be given to native or ‘bush’ inhabitants and the value of elders was high in those communities. So maybe a week ago the age range of 65 or older went to the high priority area.

Many of us had issues with the website which I found poorly designed and clumsy. I think it is still being developed while it is being used.

There are many vaccine clinic sites in town, but my friends got their shots at the Anchorage School District Education Center. I was told they were taking walk-ins for the rest of the day. So without thinking very much I got in the car and went right over.

Right Decision.

It took about five minutes before I was in a warm indoor line, moving along pretty quickly. I don’t know who did the initial set-up, but the plan was to activate the municipal school administration and especially school nurses, who were on salary but not in the schools, which are about to be re-opened. Who better to give you the vaccine than a school nurse? Some of the waiting around was because the staff defrosted the cold vaccine in lots since it had to be used within a short period of time. This also explained having people wait listed who might not otherwise meet the criteria. For every defrosted dose, a warm and willing arm.

So once there and in line I experienced friendliness, informality matched with efficiency. As always when faced with the possibility of a line I’d brought a sudoku. As it happened, one of my Starbucks friends was in the same line and we got caught up. The nurse who got me was likewise friendly and informative. Again, who better than a school nurse? I was given a couple of sheets printed with FAQs and they went to extra trouble to answer my specific questions. The actual shot was barely noticeable. I was given a stamped paper square with the vacine name and lot number, and then went into a waiting room where they monitored me for 15 minutes for reaction (none), and had me leave my email address and phone number and make an online appointment for my second shot. I was in and out in under two hours. All at no charge.

So far no change in outdoor behavior. Still maintain social distance. Still use a mask. The second shot is in four weeks. Apparently it is possible to have a stronger reaction at the second shot.

The feeling I've got is that it needed to be done, could've taken longer but now I know I've done what I can not to be a problem to others. I have no sense of invulnerability, maybe just a hair less vulnerability.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Donuel
Date: 16 Jan 21 - 07:27 AM

https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2021/01/15/trump-vaccine-reserve-used-up/

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: keberoxu
Date: 16 Jan 21 - 09:06 PM

Here, too, those of us who got our first dose today of the vaccine
were required to wait, after receiving the injection,
in a monitored waiting room for several minutes.
The vaccination clinic was held on a school campus.
The monitored waiting room was the school gym, with chairs socially distanced on the hardwood floor.
I didn't see anybody keel over or pass out or anything.

Along with the shot,
I now have the all-important VACCINATION CARD.
That's going to be increasingly important, I believe, in future.

Of course am due for the second dose in something like four weeks.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mr Red
Date: 17 Jan 21 - 03:54 AM

Has any UK 'Catter, in this parish, had their shot in the arm?

My question:   Do you get a Vaccination Card/Proof of Vaccination/Vax Passport ?

The ceilidh scene has been polled and on a small response the answer was fairly unanimous that they would welcome events that asked for "Proof of Vaccination"

Seems an obvious feature to have going forward. But for a government that is led (did I say led?) by a strawhead, I don't see them looking that far ahead. Brexshit is proving that!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 17 Jan 21 - 05:39 AM

More people have now been vaccinated in the UK then have tested positive in the UK since the pandemic started. That is a wonderful achievement!!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 17 Jan 21 - 05:47 AM

Easy, tiger. There's a bloody long way still to go.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 17 Jan 21 - 05:53 AM

I know, Mrs Bonzo being over 75 is waiting for her letter!!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 18 Jan 21 - 12:16 AM

News came out that the reserve that was supposed to be held for the second dose for people already vaccinated doesn't exist. The Feds lied about it's being available, and they keep telling states one number then reducing it considerably when it comes time to actually ship.

Those who got the shots in my age group were the ones who claimed an underlying condition. I think it will be a couple of weeks before the gears start turning as far as the Defense Production Act to compel companies to make more, and related companies that can do the work to join in. This is four days old but still has a lot of current information.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Donuel
Date: 18 Jan 21 - 11:13 AM

Bonzo brag away. In the US we do not know where the future vaccines are.
As you expect the WHO says the global moral sin is that poor (shithole) countries have been cut out from getting vaccine.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 18 Jan 21 - 06:08 PM

Ordinary human beings with families who are not in control of their own destinies happen to live in those "shitholes." Maybe you should and live in one of those "shitholes" yourself for a while in order to get your perspective fixed.

If developing countries are left behind in this, the pandemic will never go away, new strains will abound and the thing will come back to bite the West on the arse. That's the pragmatic argument, to be put alongside the WHO moral argument, with which I fully agree.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 18 Jan 21 - 06:16 PM

I await my letter!!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 18 Jan 21 - 08:58 PM

Finally! A text from the county with a date and time later this week for my first vaccine. Relief.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 18 Jan 21 - 09:47 PM

Now this is a music link, but I think it fits well into this BS thread.

Click on this for a splendid pro-vaccine version of Hallelujah - Get the New Jab, from the Marsh Family of Faversham in Kent. Great words and beautifully sung.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 18 Jan 21 - 09:57 PM

As for me, I'm lucky enough to have had my second dose of the Bio-tech vaccine over a week ago now. A great feeling. I might have gone down to the pub to celebrate, but the pubs are all closed. (Though actually I wouldn't have, since I'm the only member of my family to achieve immunity.)

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 19 Jan 21 - 04:40 AM


As for me, I'm lucky enough to have had my second dose of the Bio-tech vaccine over a week ago now.

..............................................................
.......since I'm the only member of my family to achieve immunity.

It takes several weeks for immunity to build up and, even then, the jab is only claimed to be 90% effective.

DC

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 19 Jan 21 - 05:36 AM

DC:
As for me, I'm lucky enough to have had my second dose of the Bio-tech vaccine over a week ago now.
..............................................................
.......since I'm the only member of my family to achieve immunity.

It takes several weeks for immunity to build up and, even then, the jab is only claimed to be 90% effective.

If you read what he wrote, he's had his second dose. It takes several weeks after the first jab to achieve immunity.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Jan 21 - 05:46 AM

We don't know whether the vaccines confer full immunity, we don't know how long immunity will last and we don't know whether vaccinated people can't still spread the virus. Feeling relief is one thing, but vaccinated people should remain respectfully cautious and shouldn't swan around feeling invulnerable.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 19 Jan 21 - 06:31 AM

Yes indeed, there is no evidence that being vaccinated in anyway makes us less likely to get infected and spread the disease - we just know that it gives us pretty good protection against actually getting ill ourselves. Potentially we could be Typhoid Marys.

Anybody planning to host or take part in dance activities for the next few months is both crazy and selfish. That's regardless of whether they have been vaccinated or tested.

We need to be conscious that the death rate from Covid 19 is even higher than it is in the USA. Every other island state in the world, rich or poor, great or small, has managed to achieve a death rate that is relatively low. The UK, and especially Great Britain, is the only exception, with one of the highest death rates on the planet.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Senoufou
Date: 19 Jan 21 - 08:33 AM

We (husband and I) should be vaccinated quite soon. He's a 'keyworker' in a secondary school and I'm ancient.
But we have both declared that even after our vaccinations, we shall continue to be very careful, wearing our masks and socially distancing. We only go out to the supermarket once a week, and that's how it will stay.
The virus has come to our village - a paramedic lady four doors down has it, poor soul. She's quite young.
Husband is at risk being from the 'BAME' group. And still working in his school, cleaning toilets etc.
We haven't yet had any communication about getting the vaccination. Hope it will come soon!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 19 Jan 21 - 08:46 AM

So do I!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mr Red
Date: 19 Jan 21 - 10:44 AM

The UK, and especially Great Britain, *

FWIW I have been logging the Gov figures** for each region, and England is running at 16 cf Scotland and NI of 10 with Wales 13 (current running 7 day average expressed as persons per day per million inhabitants). Daily totals would indicate a fall from peak (Monday latest) but weekend figures are usually lower.

* United Kingdom of Great Britain & Northern Ireland.

** such as they are. Do we fully believe them? They don't count anyone who dies just after 28 days. And by all counts, it weakens people, some to the point........

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 19 Jan 21 - 01:47 PM

The latest from Scotland - "supply has been bumpy" (Nicola Sturgeon) but we are now told (promised?)that over-70s will get their first vaccination by mid-February: that should include my husband and myself. But the Army has been called into set up another 80 vaccination sites, so who knows where we shall have to go. Edinburgh Conference Centre has been cited as a possible super-vax hub, but it's not great to get to: if you go by car, parking nearby is expensive, and who knows how long you might be in a queue? Buses pass the door, but have avoided going on a bus since before last March!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Rain Dog
Date: 19 Jan 21 - 02:18 PM

Here in Kent the roll out of the vaccine has been patchy,with some areas still waiting for vaccinations to start.

The local news programme has twice mentioned today that Kent & Medway has the highest number of over 80s in the country.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 19 Jan 21 - 02:23 PM

I suspect that I owe my early access to the jabs to the fact that where I live is in one of the places with especially high infection rates. And the fact that my wife didn't wait for the letter to come, but got on the phone.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: John P
Date: 19 Jan 21 - 07:39 PM

Here in Washington State they just threw out the schedule for vaccinations in order dramatically increase the numbers and the timing. Everyone who is 65 or older is now eligible. I have an appointment in February. My partner is considered a health care worker and has had her first shot already.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mr Red
Date: 20 Jan 21 - 06:48 AM

Well - it looks like the only proof of vaccination is a sticky label. So if it is put on the letter of invitation, that is as official as it gets.

Given the way the Gov is handling it, they will run out of labels by the time I get the "call to arm".

Yea, Yea. proof of vaccine isn't proof of immunity or a measure of viral load. But tell that to the Hotel, or the Festival organisers. Not me.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jos
Date: 20 Jan 21 - 08:31 AM

I didn't get a Letter of Invitation, just a phone call.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 20 Jan 21 - 12:39 PM

I should get an invite sometime next month, possibly.
At 65+ I'm not too far down the list, possibly about the same level as my wife who is 60-65, but 'shielding' so gets a raised priority.

Being in Wales I have little confidence in those in charge of the roll-out.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Senoufou
Date: 20 Jan 21 - 01:47 PM

Our very elderly neighbour two doors along (she's 92) has just had her first vaccination. She posted about it on our Village Facebook.
It was at our 'local' doctors' surgery (6 miles away)
Apparently it was fast, no long wait, and she merely had to sit for fifteen minutes before leaving, to check for possible anaphylaxis.
She goes back again in a few weeks for the 'booster' jab.
We're hopeful now that it won't be long until our turn!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 20 Jan 21 - 02:10 PM

My wife’s parents (aged 80 and 79) got theirs last week. My appointment is on Saturday 23/12/21.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Senoufou
Date: 20 Jan 21 - 02:28 PM

23rd December??? That's nearly a year away!!!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: BobL
Date: 21 Jan 21 - 02:16 AM

Forward planning...

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Jan 21 - 06:51 AM

And it's a Thursday anyway. Tsk.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 21 Jan 21 - 07:24 AM

Ha! Good catch, Eliza! Mrs Backwoodsperson says I’m becoming a silly old bugger, I think she might have a point - it’s this coming Saturday, 23/1/21!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Senoufou
Date: 21 Jan 21 - 07:45 AM

Oh phew!! That's great Backwoodsman. Not long to wait. Bum or arm? (tee hee)

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 21 Jan 21 - 08:15 AM

LOL! I really don’t care, Sen. Over the past fifteen years I must have had thousands of injections/blood-tests/cannulas/catheters, plus been almost cut in half twice during major operations, so one more little prick doesn’t faze me! If you know what I mean... ;-) :-)

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Senoufou
Date: 21 Jan 21 - 10:02 AM

Pwaaaaahaaah!! Not long ago I had some teeth out, and the (male) dentist approached with the hypodermic needle to numb-the-gum.
He foolishly set himself up for some banter when he announced, "Just a small prick." I replied, "How very disappointing! But it's the technique that counts."

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Donuel
Date: 21 Jan 21 - 10:19 AM

There was no vaccination plan and vaccines are missing

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 21 Jan 21 - 10:36 AM

Mine was yesterday, and it took navigating a long line, but the County has thought of everything now since this site has been open for a month. There is a long covered walk and you go to the end of the line (it was 46^o and drizzling), wend your way past the extra (portable) toilets, into the building. There are employees who walk up and down the line making sure everyone has the right papers (or gives them a clipboard with a new set if they didn't print them at home). Someone scans your forehead for temperature, and by the time you've been in the indoors part of the line for about 10 minutes you've warmed up enough that taking off the jacket is comfortable. They send you past the folks who register your information (there is no charge, but they let your insurance company know that you've had the shot/s) and the last line is to be sent to the table for the jab. And the nurse I spoke with had a very good touch, I didn't feel it at all. This morning my arm is a little stiff.

She asked what other immunizations I've had, and when I told her last fall I got the two Shingriz (shingles) shots, she told me that one is considered pretty rough (it was, relatively) and that this one isn't so bad. So far, that seems to be the case.

The interesting part of this is that I have the information (a handout) to set up a phone app to keep them apprised of any after effects of the vaccine. The CDC is crowd-sourcing as much as they can information about how well the vaccines are received. Mine was the Pfizer shot and I have a small (precious!) card with the lot number and such.

What I love is that I got this vaccine on inauguration day, after Biden was in office. My statistics now go on his record, for the bean counters to keep track of.

The thing that was so apparent is that everyone was very happy. The sheriff walking along the line to help people with papers, the staff taking temperatures, the sign-in desk people, the folks who monitor the "medical observation" area where you have to wait for 15 minutes to be sure you don't have an allergic response. They are doing life-saving work, one body at a time, and everyone knows it and we were all grateful. I live near the site, and was away from home for about an hour and a quarter, total.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 22 Jan 21 - 10:45 AM

The CDC site is easy to navigate and apparently they will text me every day for the next week to ask how I'm feeling.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 22 Jan 21 - 11:02 AM

It was the talk of the Zoom band practice on Wednesday, with most of us being over 70: one done, one has appointment, the other 4 not yet heard.
And my son-in-law's 94-year-old dad in N Ireland has still not heard anything, but he is housebound at home, not in a care home, so will need a district nurse to come to the house.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 22 Jan 21 - 11:04 AM

Oh, and my daughter, who is a physiotherapist, got hers this morning.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jos
Date: 22 Jan 21 - 12:09 PM

I was done this morning. Very short queue, no temperature check, just a squirt of hand gel.
No forms or clipboards or signing in, just name and address, and brief questions about serious allergies and medications.
Afterwards there was no waiting for 15 minutes in case I was taken ill.
On leaving, I was given a small card with my name on it, the date, and the vaccine type and batch number, and a sheet of paper to read, which includes near the top:

"Read all of this leaflet carefully before the vaccine is given because it contains important information for you."

There is a list of possible side effects, but the bit of information that does worry me is that the vaccine is:

"Produced in genetically modified human embryonic kidney (HEK) 293 cells."

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: robomatic
Date: 22 Jan 21 - 07:20 PM

What a pleasure it is to hear Dr. Fauci unhindered 'liberated' speaking on public radio.

He was talking over his vaccination and the importance of getting as many people vaccinated even though the newer strains of U.K., South Africa, and now Brazil SEEM to throw efficacy in doubt. Dr. Fauci is emphasizing that the main effects of the new strains are increased transmissibility and the vaccine limits that. How resistant the new strains are to the vaccine once transmitted is something we are still learning, but the vaccine is still effective, possibly less effective, but we simply don't know.

GET VACCINATED.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: keberoxu
Date: 22 Jan 21 - 07:23 PM

Hank Aaron got vaccinated this month,
and made it a photo op, talking to the Associated Press.

It is just a little, erm, poorly timed
that he died this morning.
Yes, I know the vaccine didn't do it, but still ...

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: keberoxu
Date: 23 Jan 21 - 09:59 PM

just for the record:
when I went to the nurses' station this week,
and confessed to exhaustion and fatigue,
the nurse assured me that
I was not the only person who received the first dose of vaccine the previous weekend
who complained of that side effect.
I literally did require more sleep and less effort this week.
Not that I regret getting vaccinated.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: robomatic
Date: 24 Jan 21 - 01:38 AM

Dr. Fauci himself mentioned that he experienced fatigue after his vaccination.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Donuel
Date: 25 Jan 21 - 06:17 PM

Bad News.
I don't wish to be the bearer of bad news but the truth is not always what we would want. Denial doesn't help anyone so may the usual suspects, please hold your tongue.
First we do have two vaccines for the early varient of Covid.
Merck has failed entirely and Astra Zenica is only 10% effective for the elderly. Also the two remaining companies in the research pipeline Johnson and Johnson and Novachex won't announce their one dose findings until March.

Moderna and Pfizer are our working vaccines but the race against 4 new varients is not fully understood except that they are worse in being more infectious. Lab studies are not as good as human trials so bottom line we don't know except for the statement that in essence new varients are 30% more deadly.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 25 Jan 21 - 07:08 PM

Drum roll! A letter dropped through our door this morning inviting my husband to attend for vaccination on Feb 2nd. Great - but where’s mine?? My husband is marginally younger than me too, and despite his cardiac history has not been advised to “shield”.
I’ll await our next postal delivery with interest! Since COVID, it has been down to only 2 or 3 times per week.
And he has been given an appointment at Edinburgh International Conference Centre, which is being used as a vaccination hub and is pretty central Edinburgh, a place we have avoided like the plague since last March. To get there could mean 2 buses: again, not been on any of those since last March, or take the car into a highly priced parking area (central zone prices) not knowing how long you might have to wait and risking a parking fine. Oh, what joy! Then if I get my appointment on a different day, just relat or double that!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Noreen
Date: 25 Jan 21 - 07:19 PM

Donuel, where did you get the information that "Astra Zenica is only 10% effective for the elderly"? You sound as if you DO want to be the bearer of bad news- maybe make sure it's true before sharing?

A report in German newspapers claiming similar has been denied, and AZ say good antibody response has been seen in the elderly (very few elderly people were included in the initial trials).

From AstraZeneca denies report vaccine less effective in elderly:
In a written response, AstraZeneca described the German media reports saying its COVID-19 vaccine was shown to have a very low efficacy in the elderly as "completely incorrect".
It said Britain's Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation supported the vaccine's use in the elderly. It also said that a strong immune responses to the vaccine had been shown in blood analysis of elderly trial participants.

Also from The International Journal of the British Geriatrics Society:

Unpublished Phase III analyses suggest high efficacy [in the over 65s]
Many of the Phase III trials have made a conscious effort to recruit older people, and interim analyses of the Pfizer and Moderna vaccine have led to press releases announcing high degrees of efficacy.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 25 Jan 21 - 07:48 PM

In addition, though there is growing evidence that the UK new variant is more transmissible, I'm not aware that there is, as yet, any convincing evidence that the South African and Brazilian variants share that attribute. I think it's quite important that we stick to what we actually know.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Donuel
Date: 26 Jan 21 - 07:51 AM

32,000 doses of vaccine not used in required 7 days in UTAH

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 26 Jan 21 - 08:04 AM

My wife is to have her first vaccine on Friday at our GP Surgery. I still await the call!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: EBarnacle
Date: 26 Jan 21 - 05:55 PM

Sunday, a friend tipped us off that 1B's were going ahead in our area. I got the email about an hour later, offering the shot and scheduled for yesterday. Other than a bit if bureaucratic glitching, it went smoothly. No pain, no side effects as of this afternoon. Lady Hillary is in 1C and expects to get hers next week.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 26 Jan 21 - 06:31 PM

I heard on the news today that Merck abandoned two vaccines it was working on because they couldn't be shown to be very effective.

There is a lot of vaccine information available from Tiberious (a US Dept. of Defense site).

Vaccine makers have plans to adjust the existing formulations or offer a booster if needed to deal with the new varieties turning up if they become prevalent. So far the vaccines are effective against most of them.

Biden found the Trump vaccine program in disarray, he talked about it in a press conference today. They're pushing to get a lot more doses made within the next three weeks to boost the daily vaccine administration numbers.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: robomatic
Date: 26 Jan 21 - 10:00 PM

Tattie Bogle:

In cases where one of you receives an invitation to get a vaccine and another is not, despite obvious criteria for being so vaccinated, it might avail to go together and see what happens. I was vaccinated on a walk-in basis, and there was a wait-listed line of people who would fill in because the vaccine was thawed out on a batch basis and the medical folk were not going to waste any doses.

Just a thought.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mr Red
Date: 27 Jan 21 - 03:13 AM

It looks like my local county health authority have a system of giving out a little card with the date of vaccination and a recall date for the second jab. Physical evidence and a reminder. Good enough for me.

I await the call to arm.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Thompson
Date: 27 Jan 21 - 04:44 AM

Donuel, the supposed low rate of efficacy of the AstraZenica vaccine is a misreading of the figures, which said that only 8% to 10% of the people in the tests of that vaccine were over 70.
I'd love to see a graph of the estimated efficacy of the different vaccines, but haven't found one yet; but I think the Pfizer one is supposed to have a better protective level than the AstraZenica one. Which makes it all the more annoying that (if I'm reading it right) the plan in Ireland appears to be to give the over-70s the AstraZenica vax.
What we're not realising is that the number of vaccines being produced is only what's possible for the factories - equivalent to a ukelele maker suddenly being told to fulfil the worldwide guitar demand.
Fair play to the Indians, who are giving away vaccine to Nepal, Bangladesh, Myanmar, Bhutan, Maldives and Seychelles.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 27 Jan 21 - 04:45 AM

So you will be fined £200 for attending an illegal party - if you catch covid government will pay you £500 - result £200 profit!!!!!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jos
Date: 27 Jan 21 - 05:19 AM

So where does the other £100 go?

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Rain Dog
Date: 27 Jan 21 - 05:20 AM

To the accountant Jos

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jos
Date: 27 Jan 21 - 05:28 AM

You may be right. That might explain why it wasn't mentioned in the post.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 27 Jan 21 - 06:32 AM

No - slipped finger on iphone, profit £300!!!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Allan Conn
Date: 27 Jan 21 - 11:17 AM

I think you can't compare like for like efficacy because how they carried out the tests etc and how they worked out the efficacy differs. Both the main ones currently being distributed in the UK supposedly have high efficacy though which is the main thing.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 27 Jan 21 - 11:55 AM

What is the story of the illegal parties/ paid for catching COVID? It doesn't make sense as presented here?

I wish more municipalities or other entities (counties and states, primarily) would take this more seriously. Portions of those entities are; the ones providing the shots are deadly serious about eliminating the virus, but the rest of their agencies seem unconcerned about enforcement. New York State has done a better job than a lot of places.

It's interesting to read this week that the state that did the best job so far in getting the vaccines into senior centers and assisted living is West Virginia. They declined federal government participation and instead contracted throughout the state with lots of pharmacies to do the job (many states just go with the two biggest pharmacy corporations, Walgreens and CVS, found on every other street corner in urban settings.) Here is the story on CNN.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 27 Jan 21 - 01:43 PM

I had my first shot today - the AZ Oxford one - and have a date for the second jab in April, 12 weeks away. There was a short wait in a queue, seated inside, then I left straight after the jab with no waiting around. All done and dusted in less than 10 minutes.

The system was well set up for social distancing and the plastic chairs in the waiting area were cleaned as each one was vacated.

DC

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Senoufou
Date: 27 Jan 21 - 04:48 PM

Still no word of vaccinations for us, but husband was tested today at his school, along with all the other cleaners. This seems a bit daft to me. One could be tested today, it could come back as negative, then one could contract Covid the very next morning!
Apparently, the High School pupils won't be returning to school until the end of April. But there are several children of key workers attending now. Husband is cleaning pupils' and teachers' toilets and I think he's at risk. Being BAME as well, he's rather vulnerable.
Bring on the vaccinations ASAP!!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Donuel
Date: 27 Jan 21 - 05:22 PM

Noreen My source was Reuters right off the wire. It certainly is a progressing story but a denial is seldom the final word.

As Thompson says https://www.cnbc.com/2021/01/26/astrazeneca-supplies-to-eu-vaccine-efficacy-for-the-elderly-in-focus.html

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: robomatic
Date: 27 Jan 21 - 06:33 PM

In the U.S. you can donate blood after the Pfizer or Moderna jab, but there is a deferral for a time after the Astrazenica jab.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Jan 21 - 06:54 PM

I caught a disease called Q Fever in 1990. I was banned from giving blood for life.

By the way, try to not catch Q Fever....

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Donuel
Date: 27 Jan 21 - 08:32 PM

Especially on a Saturday Night

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: robomatic
Date: 27 Jan 21 - 09:49 PM

I don't know why but that made me LOL.

So WTF is Q Fever? Does it lead to R, S, or T disease?

Vowel disorder?

Inconsonants?

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: robomatic
Date: 27 Jan 21 - 09:58 PM

Holy Crap! I just looked it up!

It is nothing to sneeze at!

I'm afraid that if I even mention it next time I go to the blood bank they'll evict me!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 27 Jan 21 - 11:28 PM

That is quite a fever that few if any have heard of.

Number of available doses are going to go up within the next three weeks here in the US, but it will still be a struggle because making vaccine involves a lot of quality control and materials (a story recently ran on the news about the glass vials the vaccine is shipped in being in short supply - and how a new method of micro-layering a gaseous glass just a few molecules thick onto a special type of plastic to make vials that are air tight.) It's not like they can just double the batch.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 28 Jan 21 - 08:06 AM

I didn't progress to pneumonia but I had a high fever for four days, boy did I sweat, and horrible gastrointestinal issues at both ends. One afternoon I collapsed on the bathroom floor. I had a ferocious headache that took months to fade after I'd recovered from the fever. I didn't know what I'd had until a blood test weeks later showed up Q Fever (Coxiella) antibodies. Just before I'd caught it the farmer next door to us had allowed me to help myself to his dung heap (horses and cows) for my veg garden. I'm pretty sure it was the dust from that that infected me.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Senoufou
Date: 28 Jan 21 - 10:22 AM

I caught Giardiasis in Ghana many years ago. Stupidly brushed my teeth at the cold tap in the hotel in Accra. (Bottled water please, never ever the tap!) My face literally went grey, most odd. Constant loo-visits, terrible abdo pain. Took two courses of antibiotics to get rid of it.
In most West African countries, one needs a current certificate of immunisation against Yellow Fever in order to be permitted entry. I had my injection at our local surgery, and the nurse told me I might have some 'mild flu-like symptoms'.
That night, I woke up flat on my back on the kitchen floor in my nightdress (no idea how or why I'd got there!) surrounded by several bemused and worried-looking cats. Overhead flew rather evil-looking monsters grinning maliciously at me. (hallucinations) I was sweating like a fountain. 'Flu-like'? Hmmm...
Fortunately, the regulations now state that one Yellow Fever jab is for life.
I wonder if there are any adverse reactions to the Covid vaccination?

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Thompson
Date: 28 Jan 21 - 11:25 AM

Oh, don't be annoying me with your Q Fever! I have been looking forever for a short story about a space traveller who comes back to earth after long years and finds the place empty of humans; first thing he sees is a sign saying

WAR Q

on a cliff; he doesn't know that language changed in the centuries he was away, and this meant "Beware Q"; every human on earth has been killed by an epidemic of Q Fever.

Meanwhile the German vaccine advisory group has put out a notice that they don't, for the moment, advise the AstraZeneca vaccine for over-64s, as it's not sufficiently tested for them.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: DMcG
Date: 28 Jan 21 - 02:14 PM

I have just watched this Royal Society discussion on the development of the vaccines. It lasts around an hour, but some of you may find it interesting. I hope it can be seen outside the UK, but I don't know, to be honest.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: DMcG
Date: 28 Jan 21 - 02:18 PM

I have just checked that link and the first six minutes or so were recorded before the talk started. You can skip that!

Subject: RE: 2021 vacation thread
From: Donuel
Date: 28 Jan 21 - 02:45 PM

I will have my vacation injected this March.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 28 Jan 21 - 04:05 PM

They will inject in my arm!!!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 28 Jan 21 - 07:51 PM

@ robomatic: we have been told not to phone our GP’s surgeries to ask about getting vaccinated as it’s “don’t cal us, we’ll call you or send a letter”.
However there is a phone number on my husband’s letter to call if you have any problem with the appointment given, so I might just call that before the day to see if there is any possibility of just turning up and getting done as you suggest. May be different over here though :-(

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: robomatic
Date: 28 Jan 21 - 08:03 PM

I was actually helped by a call to my school district office after a word from some friends who'd just been there and been seen to. A very friendly school official in a very short time gave me enough facts so that I went right to my vehicle and drove over, with the experience I mentioned above.

Not that I understand life on your side of the block, but I've learned that once policies get announced, they may rapidly undergo change, among them for us that vaccines get prepared in lots and batches, and once thawed out, they need to go into arms or be wasted. And people answer phones even when they're supposed to be talking to people right in front of them.

It's a matter of life and health. Good hunting!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: robomatic
Date: 28 Jan 21 - 08:05 PM

Oh, I always bring a Sudoku or puzzle with me so that I have something to occupy my mind with, plus, if folks see that you are busy, they are less likely to leave you idling!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: The Sandman
Date: 29 Jan 21 - 03:41 AM

I am posting this here as it is the closest in subject.
The Government advises us to social distance two meters for safety yet beds in hospitals are only one metre apart, completely illogical, and indicaes that hospitals are unsafe places to be near

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 29 Jan 21 - 04:25 AM

I can't say I've ever seen hospital beds spaced that closely.
According to The BBC the standard gap is 3.6m

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 29 Jan 21 - 05:13 AM

Irish hospitals!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jos
Date: 29 Jan 21 - 09:14 AM

The distance between the patients themselves will be larger than the gap between the beds, as there will be a bit of unoccupied bed-space either side of each patient, varying, of course, with how fat the patients are. This could add the best part of another metre.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: robomatic
Date: 29 Jan 21 - 06:33 PM

Well, as Dr. Fauci said yesterday the 6 feet separation rule is a rule of thumb. The physics of it is simple: The further away you are, the less likely transmission is.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 29 Jan 21 - 06:38 PM

Unfortunately, I have had more experience with hospitals in recent times than I'd have liked. I have never seen beds anything like as close as a metre apart.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: The Sandman
Date: 30 Jan 21 - 03:30 AM

jos so the patients never get out of bed to have a pee? of course they do and that is the time when the bed space needs to be further apart. well steve, you have not been to ireland lately have you

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mr Red
Date: 30 Jan 21 - 04:01 AM

Efficacy?
vaccines in the arm or vaccines made?

There is a difference. I hear stories of 500 vaccines left out of the 'fridge being investigated supposedly deliberately - no room in the 'fridge when the next batch arrived would be my best guess.

And the volunteers students on their way to a vaccine centre in America caught in a snowstorm deciding to offer shots to other stranded motorists. Not all accepted.

Vaccines stored at lower temperatures have less chance of "spoiling".

Real life is messy! It's a jungle out there.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 30 Jan 21 - 04:50 AM

I've got mine tonight.

I think it would be nice - once we've sorted ourselves out to help some other nations - starting with the Irish. They are our closest neighbours, but we've not always enjoyed an easy relationship, and it would be a friendly gesture.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Thompson
Date: 30 Jan 21 - 08:18 AM

Where are these hospitals with the close-spaced beds? I can't see how it would be possible to nurse people with beds spaced close together - nurses and doctors need room to do their work, including proning patients. A metre between beds certainly wouldn't be enough.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 30 Jan 21 - 11:58 AM

Those 500 vaccines left out to spoil were actually intentionally sabotaged by a malignant and now fired and charged with a crime pharmacist.

Beds in an open hospital ward? That's so 1950s. The closest I've seen to that is the large recovery room for after surgery, where there are curtained off areas that each hold a bed; I imagine it lets the nursing staff tend easily to several people. Those spaces are probably 12 feet wide per space, and you never see the other people in the area. I say this being fully aware that it is my hospital experience because I have insurance, and in the US, if you don't have insurance, things are probably different at hospitals.

The Pfizer vaccine made my upper arm ache slightly, much as one would get after a flu or other type of shot. I was kind of tired for several days, possibly related to that. My daughter got the Moderna and she said that one packed more of a punch as far as the aching arm. I participated in the V-Safe CDC follow-up, and for a couple of days I didn't report the fatigue because I thought it was just me, but it lingered, so I reported it. The CDC sent a daily text for a week to see what I had to report, and if I'd reported something particularly unusual, the message said someone from the CDC might call to follow up.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Donuel
Date: 30 Jan 21 - 12:29 PM

jeeze louise I'm still in registration limbo.
I assumed Maryland would be quicker than Texas.
I also assume I developed one single shingles painful itchy spot from the shingles vaccine. I'm just glad it wasn't full blown.

I read a story about Utah having 32,000 doses of vaccine expire.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Thompson
Date: 30 Jan 21 - 01:45 PM

Which vaccine, Donuel?

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 30 Jan 21 - 03:07 PM

Not being able to plan has made the vaccine distribution difficult. In my county in Texas they set up in a couple of convention centers and in large facilities owned by the county, but without the people to do the work of directing traffic, taking personal information, and generally monitoring all of the traffic through the space, that would be meaningless. And getting those worker-bee people in time to give the shots, it's such an interwoven process that all depends on advance notice.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: The Sandman
Date: 30 Jan 21 - 03:16 PM

Thompson in ireland as reported on rte radio one about week to ten dqys ago

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Rain Dog
Date: 30 Jan 21 - 03:23 PM

Hospitals have always been unsafe. A lot of people have died in them.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: The Sandman
Date: 30 Jan 21 - 03:32 PM

Thompson if people are catching covid in hospital in ireland 2 meters is not far enough apart . would you agree, or alternatively improve ventilation in hospital.
Finally what is the percentage of people who have died of covid but had weakened immune systems, but would have died of their terminal condition anyway
and what is the percentage of people who have covid who have recovered, and what are the stats for people who had weakened immuune systems but did not die
there is very little well informed data being presented to the public, by governments in the uk and in ireland
these are questions that do not appear to be answered
meanwhile certain sections [newspapers] are sensationalising and behaving irresponsibly.
it is important to take care,
but not necessary, to become a hermit, the situation is clearly unhingeing a minority and causing mental problems, i know of at least 4 people who are refusing to go out of their house

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Thompson
Date: 30 Jan 21 - 06:31 PM

Ah, I see, didn't see the report; but the hospitals here are very crowded.
What's the proportion of people who would have died anyway? Tiny, comparatively. The virus is reaping human lives.
The worst figures are for illness and hospitalisation, but the intensive care units are packed. There are graphs on the Wikipedia page about Covid-19 in Ireland that give an idea. Everyone knows people who've died; everyone knows people who've been very ill. Vaccination is happening, but it's at the early stage where medics and people in care home are being vaccinated; all of those I know who've been vaccinated fall into one of those groups (as is right, of course). Plans for faster vaccination of others are being made difficult by companies overpromising what they could provide, then saying, oh, sorry, ooops.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: The Sandman
Date: 31 Jan 21 - 05:18 AM

Thompson, I do not know anyone in ireland who has died, obviously people have died, but were they people with weakened immune systems, you have not answered my question about the stats and the reporting.
I am keeping an open mind, I am not saying it is a conspiracy, but i am critical of newspaper reporting, and i have to say that the conspiracy theorists have one thing right, people are being controlled.
   I am also critical of governments handling of this, too much emphasis on masks and not enough on ventilation and space inside buildings., including hospitals and schools
not enough emphasis on how to build up immune system to fight the virus.
what has been sown is being reaped, lack of investment in suitable hospital equipment and suitable hospitals equipped to deal with viruS, years of underfunding in the HSE
cock ups over supply of vaccine plus reports that one of the vaccines is not effective or has limited effect for over 65s
if one of the vaccines is not effective what is the point of taking it?
you say quote"What's the proportion of people who would have died anyway? Tiny, comparatively."
well provide some stats to back that up.
I want the truth, i do not want misinformation from either side.. the government or the conspiracy theorists

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 31 Jan 21 - 05:40 AM

Fresh air ventilation is very important. I work in a single story building. No clients are allowed inside, main door is always open and windows in my room. So we dress very warmly indeed.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Thompson
Date: 31 Jan 21 - 09:03 AM

The Sandman: Of course, as in any outbreak of illness, it's the weakest who die most. That's not to say that they would have died anyway.
I'm not following the statistics with any great dedication; if you're interested, feel free… but if you look at this page and go to "Epidemiology of COVID-19 in Ireland" you'll have an enjoyable browse.
If you want to build up your immune system, of course that's a good idea - don't drive but instead ride a bicycle (slashes instance of heart disease, cancer, diabetes, obesity), eat plenty of fibre and greens, be happy…
But while it's obviously going to help your chances, it didn't necessarily save people in other epidemics like the Spanish Flu, Aids, etc.
Vaccines, however, do have an excellent record - the one closest to home for me is the vaccination drive run by women, both suffragettes and nationalists, from the 1920s on, against the furious opposition of a particularly conservative Church and State, which succeeded in ending an endemic of tuberculosis that made Ireland the sickest country in Europe.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Thompson
Date: 31 Jan 21 - 09:14 AM

Of course, more familiar to others would be the polio vaccines that spread across the world after the polio pandemic of the 1950s - Salk's and Sabin's vaccines saved millions of people from a hideous disease.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 31 Jan 21 - 11:07 AM

Vaccine Tourism to Florida.

Until this opens up to allow more people in their own localities to get vaccines, there will be those who hunt for and go to other community's vaccine programs.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 31 Jan 21 - 07:45 PM

Further snow and ice forecast for the day my husband has to go for his vaccination: an 8-mile journey - if he can get out of our own road. The neighbours all mucked in to dig it out a couple of weeks back!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Thompson
Date: 01 Feb 21 - 05:36 AM

Roald Dahl's little girl got measles in 1962, shortly before the vaccine was developed. He wrote about it:
(the link also leads to Dahl's children's charity)
==
Olivia, my eldest daughter, caught measles when she was seven years old. As the illness took its usual course I can remember reading to her often in bed and not feeling particularly alarmed about it. Then one morning, when she was well on the road to recovery, I was sitting on her bed showing her how to fashion little animals out of coloured pipe-cleaners, and when it came to her turn to make one herself, I noticed that her fingers and her mind were not working together and she couldn't do anything.

"Are you feeling all right?" I asked her.

"I feel all sleepy," she said.

In an hour, she was unconscious. In twelve hours she was dead.

The measles had turned into a terrible thing called measles encephalitis and there was nothing the doctors could do to save her. That was twenty-four years ago in 1962, but even now, if a child with measles happens to develop the same deadly reaction from measles as Olivia did, there would still be nothing the doctors could do to help her.

On the other hand, there is today something that parents can do to make sure that this sort of tragedy does not happen to a child of theirs. They can insist that their child is immunised against measles. I was unable to do that for Olivia in 1962 because in those days a reliable measles vaccine had not been discovered. Today a good and safe vaccine is available to every family and all you have to do is to ask your doctor to administer it.

It is not yet generally accepted that measles can be a dangerous illness. Believe me, it is. In my opinion parents who now refuse to have their children immunised are putting the lives of those children at risk. In America, where measles immunisation is compulsory, measles like smallpox, has been virtually wiped out.

Here in Britain, because so many parents refuse, either out of obstinacy or ignorance or fear, to allow their children to be immunised, we still have a hundred thousand cases of measles every year. Out of those, more than 10,000 will suffer side effects of one kind or another. At least 10,000 will develop ear or chest infections. About 20 will die.

LET THAT SINK IN.

Every year around 20 children will die in Britain from measles.

So what about the risks that your children will run from being immunised?

They are almost non-existent. Listen to this. In a district of around 300,000 people, there will be only one child every 250 years who will develop serious side effects from measles immunisation! That is about a million to one chance. I should think there would be more chance of your child choking to death on a chocolate bar than of becoming seriously ill from a measles immunisation.

So what on earth are you worrying about? It really is almost a crime to allow your child to go unimmunised.

The ideal time to have it done is at 13 months, but it is never too late. All school-children who have not yet had a measles immunisation should beg their parents to arrange for them to have one as soon as possible.

Incidentally, I dedicated two of my books to Olivia, the first was 'James and the Giant Peach'. That was when she was still alive. The second was 'The BFG', dedicated to her memory after she had died from measles. You will see her name at the beginning of each of these books. And I know how happy she would be if only she could know that her death had helped to save a good deal of illness and death among other children.

==

Dahl's letter remains eerily appropriate today, in light of the ongoing and expanding measles outbreak centered in California. More than 100 cases have now been confirmed in 14 states across the U.S., including Arizona, Colorado, Illinois, Minnesota, Michigan, Nebraska, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, South Dakota, Texas, Utah and Washington state. According to the latest figures from the California Department of Public Health, at least 91 of the cases are in California, 58 of which have been linked to the outbreak that began in Disneyland last month. The degree and scale of this outbreak (in the past thirty days, California has seen more confirmed measles cases than it typically sees in a year) has been pinned to the obstinacy, ignorance, and fear of those who would refuse their children, and anyone else unable to vaccinate for legitimate medical reasons, the protection immunization affords.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mr Red
Date: 01 Feb 21 - 09:01 AM

What's the proportion of people who would have died anyway? - can be deduced from "excess deaths" - for the UK worst since WW2 see BBC story

In Ireland that would appear to be 2 to 3000

The people who would have died anyway would have died over a longer period, because we keep them alive longer these days. So the excess deaths reflect the surge.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 01 Feb 21 - 11:05 AM

Excellent post, Thompson, and Dahl would absolutely be the first to make this case if he were still around.

I was listening to a discussion on NPR (National Public Radio) this weekend and the conclusion of the guest being interviewed (I can't remember which program to post a link) is that the best way to reverse the views of those who are vaccine averse is to have a one-on-one conversation with them. Especially if that person talking to them has experience with the disease or the vaccine.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mrrzy
Date: 01 Feb 21 - 12:01 PM

I have been helping route traffic at a vax site, and they offered us jabs, but I said I'd wait till it was my actual turn. No comorbidity, under 60, I can wait.

Meanwhile our big hospital has apparently been jabbing *all* their staff, even the computer coders working from home, and not jabbing the public, even old people or those with risk factors. Shame, I say.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 01 Feb 21 - 07:24 PM

The big hospital system based in my home town in Washington did an email promotion to their donors who are eligible age-wise, but it didn't go over well that this group in an entitled demographic were offered this as a perk for being donors. I suspect the simple act of dividing resources and addressing both those over 65 AND hard-hit zip codes (something Dallas tried to do last month) is too simple for the Texas state executives who seem to have no idea and don't leave it to the medical professionals.

What is happening in New York State, where they waged such a successful battle after being inundated last spring but have since stumbled all over themselves, is an example. A politician decided to ask hospitals to do something that public health officials already had a hand on and were planning to do. And now many of those top health officials are quitting or going to other jobs within the state. It's such a waste of talent.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: robomatic
Date: 01 Feb 21 - 08:38 PM

Mrrzy:

I understand your laudable desire for your 'proper' turn. Practically speaking, when you get offered it by a legitimate authority, it IS your turn. Once done, you can continue your job all the better for it. As much as an ordered progression of recipients getting dosed in their time is admirable, things do not necessarily happen that way. The very fact that you got offered a jab is evidence of that.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: robomatic
Date: 05 Feb 21 - 07:38 PM

Just went hiking with my dog walking buddy. Three of her friends, various ages, just had their second jabs. All had stronger reactions than they had after their first jabs. Feeling sick and flu-like.

We're getting ours next week.

All are mRNA vaccines (Moderna or Pfizer).

Most people I see or observe are maintaining mask wearing and distancing. And for now Alaska State numbers are going down.

Ebbie if you're reading this your mileage may vary. I hope you are not unduly affected by yesterday's news out of Canada: Canada extends cruise ship ban through Feb 2022

Right now that is bad news for Alaska State tourism, and it's not clear that American legislation can or will alleviate it.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: BobL
Date: 06 Feb 21 - 03:08 AM

Last night's Zoom meeting with members of one of the local country dance clubs, the conversation turned to vaccinations (mine's booked BTW). And I thought: what does this tell us about the age of country dancers these days? That's the trouble with a hobby you enjoy for 40 years or more, you're in danger of finding it's no longer a young person's thing.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 06 Feb 21 - 05:19 AM

Of course it's your turn if offered by a legitimate authority, how can anyone think otherwise???????

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Allan Conn
Date: 06 Feb 21 - 06:23 AM

Re the queue thing. I suppose it depends on folk's principles too. There was some criticism here in the UK, in Wales to be more specific, that council workers who were not front line in the fight against the pandemic were on some occassions able to get vaccines before the aged, before the more vulnerable and before the front line workers. Don't know the specifics and if it was exaggerated by the press but I suspect that might have stopped now with the negative press. So if someone feels it may not be their turn then you can only admire their principles.

Saying that to ensure the roll out is smooth and numbers keep up they do start vaccinating people in the next group down the priority list before everyone in the higher group has had it. Otherwise time would be wasted finishing off the dribs and drabs before the next vaccination list.

Also there is the issue of potential wastage. If at the end of the day there is some left over (which may for instance be Pfizer which may be nearing its got to use it now limit) then it would be a crime to waste it rather than get it in the nearest suitable arm.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 06 Feb 21 - 06:36 AM

That's the trouble with a hobby you enjoy for 40 years or more, you're in danger of finding it's no longer a young person's thing.

When I had my vaccination, I was sitting in the medical centre, waiting my turn. I was looking at the others either side of me when I suddenly realised - this was a queue of old people .... and me!


DC

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: robomatic
Date: 06 Feb 21 - 11:44 AM

Not ten minutes ago on the radio I heard a story of a younger man who was in a pharmacy when he was offered a jab. He was in DC the day of the 'insurrection' (JAN06) and stopped in for supplies, and the cashier told him the doses were defrosted and available with no scheduled takers. He and an older man who was on the scene got the shots.

Apparently this included a scheduled second shot and it gave him a noticeable reaction as well.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Thompson
Date: 06 Feb 21 - 01:47 PM

The World Health Organisation have warned against the first world hoarding vaccines when the third world is in desperate need.
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, WHO director-general, warned of "catastrophic moral failure" and that this could destroy our economy, while Mike Ryan, WHO's chief of emergencies, said the rich were “fighting over the cake” when when frontline health workers in poor countries “don’t even have access to the crumbs”.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Senoufou
Date: 06 Feb 21 - 01:53 PM

The weather forecast for Norfolk warns of up to a foot of snow tomorrow and very high winds. Husband should be driving me over to a village six miles away for my vaccination in the early evening. Our funny neighbour has offered to lend us his tractor (it has a cabin)! I'm really tempted to take him up on his offer, but I reckon the vaccinations will be cancelled.
Talk about arriving in style!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Lurcherman
Date: 06 Feb 21 - 03:13 PM

I volunteered for the Novovax trial, from reports on the BBC the preliminary results look to be good. First jab gave me the symptoms of flu but they soon went, second jab no symptoms at all.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: keberoxu
Date: 06 Feb 21 - 03:15 PM

Robomatic, thanks for the warning about
the effects of the second dose of coronavirus vaccine.
My appointment for my second vaccination
is two weeks from today.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: robomatic
Date: 06 Feb 21 - 04:51 PM

keb:

I was actually a little hesitant about writing what I wrote. In fact, when I was getting the news from my friend first I said:

"If it's a bad reaction I don't want to know because my mind will make my body react that way!"
then I said:
"Well, I DO want to know if it's been everybody you know (it was three persons)!"
and now I say: "It's worth knowing but don't believe it's a given thing. Half the time it's a way people have to convince themselves that it's the real vaccine and it will really work."

The mind is a terrible thing sometimes.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Thompson
Date: 06 Feb 21 - 11:43 PM

The vaccine(s) seem to be pretty good at stamping on the virus's toes; in Israel, where they've vaccinated virtually all of the population, the numbers of sick are dropping fast. (I just wish one of the Arab states would set up a vaccination programme for Palestine, for the safety of both the Palestinians and the Israelis.)

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 07 Feb 21 - 04:46 AM

Well my husband (same age as me in years) got his on Tuesday at one of those mass vax centres in a conference hall, but I’m still waiting...........no letter, no phone appointment, and no, you can’t just turn up without an appointment letter: my husband saw several uninvited people who had come along with invited partners being turned away. This in spite of Nicola Sturgeon’s promise that all those in age bracket 70-74 would have at least had notification of a first appointment by Friday 5th. There seems to be a problem with those who are 74 but nearly 75, such as myself: several people I know also not been called by either channel yet. It is very confusing, frustrating and anxiety-generating.
However....we had reason to contact our GP on another matter, and I mentioned that I hadn’t heard yet about a vaccination: he has confirmed that I would be done at the GP surgery and should be contacted some time during this coming week. I won’t really believe it until the needle is in my arm!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Feb 21 - 05:31 AM

"I just wish one of the Arab states would set up a vaccination programme for Palestine, for the safety of both the Palestinians and the Israelis."

Well, as Israel controls those occupied territories I should think that, morally speaking, that's their job.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jeri
Date: 07 Feb 21 - 10:23 AM

The USA is all over the place with vaccinations, as each state is different. New Hampshire actually seems to have its shit together, and our Republican governor has been excellent throughout this whole thing. The appointment-making website is confusing a lot of people, who can't get their second-dose appointment, so now, when you get the first, they give you an appointment for the second. So having a date for the first shot in March has allowed them time to work that particular bug out. I can last.

I don't know how hard I tried to get this across when I was still working in public health, but basically, your health depends on your brother/sister's health. One lunchtime debate I remember was when someone took a Libertarian point of view*. People should pay to be considered part of society, and eligible for benefits such as health care.
The problem with that was/is, when the have-nots get communicable diseases, you get them, too. Diseases don't care about how much money or power people have.
The virus will continue replicating and mutating in countries that don't get vaccines, and those mutations will end up on our doorstep. Some of them may involve vaccine-resistant strains.

We ARE our brother's keeper.

* He was a doctor, my boss's boss's boss, and one of his specialties was public health. He just liked to debate.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 07 Feb 21 - 10:37 AM

Yes, and at one time there was a program in the US that had to do with making sure that doses of vaccines were delivered to poorer countries (you have to look back to SARS or Ebola or Bird Flu, etc.). I hope the Biden folks have built that back into the International outreach (or are working on it as I type).

The State Department has a lot to do with this, as do other federal agencies, so there are any number of places to start looking for the answer to this distribution problem. If all of the vaccine is hogged by rich countries the virus in the wild will go through a lot of mutations and come back to bite everyone in the ass.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Feb 21 - 10:52 AM

There was no SARS vaccine, Maggie.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Allan Conn
Date: 07 Feb 21 - 11:14 AM

Aye Steve the UN has stated that the Israel has the moral duty to vaccinate everyone in the occupied territories whether Jewish settlers or Palestinians.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 07 Feb 21 - 11:30 AM

I'm listing various events simply to place a date prior to COVID. I didn't look it up, but I imagine you knew that.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Senoufou
Date: 07 Feb 21 - 01:02 PM

Just got back from our Doctor's Surgery. So well-organised. In and out in minutes. Was given the Astra Zeneca vaccine. Didn't hurt at all.
Back in 4-12 weeks for the second one.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mrrzy
Date: 07 Feb 21 - 09:28 PM

Bien bon, Senoufou.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: fat B****rd
Date: 08 Feb 21 - 11:55 AM

I'm due mine at Dunfermline Athletic football ground on Friday at 12.32. Just thought I'd mention that.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 08 Feb 21 - 03:32 PM

I've heard on the news that a popular way people are introducing themselves on some of the online dating sites is to announce their status as far as receiving the vaccine - and those who are through the process are in a better position to start meeting people again.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Senoufou
Date: 08 Feb 21 - 04:20 PM

Merci Mrrzy!
Felt rather tired today, and have stayed in bed dozing. Injected arm isn't sore, but what is strange is that the other arm is!
This evening I'm feeling much better, and have no other side-effects to report.
Please don't have any worries about the Vaccine - It's as easy as pie!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Bill D
Date: 08 Feb 21 - 08:34 PM

Had mine last Friday.Moderna.
Sore arm for a couple days. I feel fine. It was well run, with 25 or more volunteers directing traffic and lines.... and over 15 stations giving the shots. I'd guess there were over 150 in line at any one time, but lines moved quickly.
(Montgomery County, MD)

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 09 Feb 21 - 01:38 AM

In hindsight I'd say that the following week I felt rather lethargic (more than usual). The call from the county came this evening, my appointment is later this week and has been accepted. This is for shot number two of the Pfizer.

The news this evening said that the vaccinations are picking up the pace, that in the US now 10% of the people have had at least 1 dose of the vaccine.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Thompson
Date: 09 Feb 21 - 08:54 AM

Those dating site people are being foolish. Having the vaccine stops you getting (very) sick; it's not known whether it stops you giving others the virus if you're carrying it.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 09 Feb 21 - 09:05 AM

Glad you're OK Senoufou, I'm off to doctor's surgery for my first jab in 10 minutes. I was going to walk because of icy roads, but our side road is clear so I'll drive and drop into Sainsbury's on the way back for a cake as my prize!!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Allan Conn
Date: 09 Feb 21 - 09:53 AM

There were huge numbers vaccinated in Scotland last week and it ramped up even more yesterday when the figure was over 61,000. That equates to about 750,000 for the day on a UK population basis. The snow won't help today though I imagine.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Senoufou
Date: 09 Feb 21 - 12:22 PM

You're right Allan. My sister lives in Tayside and had a phone call yesterday afternoon summoning her for her vaccination in Dundee today. But she woke this morning and her car was buried under loads of snow and the roads were impassable. She spent two hours trying to contact the organisers to say she couldn't make it.
Luckily she eventually got through and the lady has rescheduled it for Friday (snow permitting)

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Senoufou
Date: 09 Feb 21 - 12:26 PM

Oh, and enjoy your cake Bonzo! I had a Morrisons little coffee cake as my 'prize'. Gorgeous!
In the Daily Mail letters page, a grandmother told her small granddaughter that she was going to be vaccinated. The child asked her if she would be having the Asda Vinegar one! Since reading that, I've been calling it the Asda Vinegar in my head.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 09 Feb 21 - 12:41 PM

Another mondegreen created! Very nice!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: mg
Date: 09 Feb 21 - 11:52 PM

i found out yesterday i was number 1,006 for my area. was in no haste to get it but now i have a family situation in seattle that will require me to take public transportation etc. anyway, got a call from local pharmacy saying to come tomorrow. i am carless. will get a dial a ride down there but got to thinking what if i am one of the sick ones after..i said don't worry i'll walk the four miles home...bus not available. but that would be hard if i was to faint etc. but i am hardy and probably will not be bothered at all. and there is a taxi.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 10 Feb 21 - 09:29 AM

I had no side effects from my vaccination yesterday, it was done so well that I never felt a thing!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: DMcG
Date: 10 Feb 21 - 10:07 AM

Just booked mine for Friday - my wife's birthday. She is turning 65, so has probably just missed being in the 65-70 bracket !

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 10 Feb 21 - 12:42 PM

Finally got a phone call from our GP’s surgery on Monday, and was given an appointment for tomorrow, as well as a second appointment for May. Just hoping the heavy snow we have had won’t stop me going tomorrow! The neighbours have dug the road out again, in the absence of any snow ploughs or gritters down side roads.
I gather the appointments for the mass vaccination centres in Edinburgh are being sent out by some agency based in Glasgow, who have absolutely no idea of the geography of our city: lots of folk I know being sent miles across town, while there’s a much nearer centre almost on their doorstep! Some people have been able to change their appointments to nearer home; others not.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 10 Feb 21 - 01:20 PM

It was interesting this morning on my trip for the second shot. On Jan. 20 they were giving first and second vaccines, sorting people into two groups once they were inside, and the window of arrival was larger.

This time they had an hour in which everyone was getting just Pfizer, and we were all there for our second shot, and though the line was long, once inside it went fast. And the county had called FEMA to help. I quizzed people as they went past - we had workers here from Houston, from nearby in North Texas, from Arizona and from Louisiana. There were others I didn't have time to ask - but I thanked every one of them. While in line I spoke with the fellow behind me, a public works supervisor in a town on the north side of the county. I handed him one of my masks, a large size, because I could see that he was at least six inches taller than me and probably needed the extra coverage. He was pleased with the offering.

My shot was given by a Fort Worth fire fighter, fast, efficient, and painless, assisted by the FEMA worked from Houston. I handed masks to the firefighter and the FEMA worker at my table, and they were also happy to receive the offering. It's my version of a non-cash "tip" for this day and age.

It was effing cold out there and they set up LP gas heaters, but due to the parking lot on one side of the path, weren't able to set them efficiently so the hot air would be carried by the breeze. Safety prohibited that placement, but they were doing what they could to keep people a little bit warmer. Through various means, this county has managed to set up an efficient system for the vaccines, while next door Dallas County seems to be falling all over itself with bickering from the state protesting their attempts to serve underserved communities. There was a good racial mix in my line at the event today, though I have no way of knowing if any of us were from underserved communities. I think the attitude is "if we make it available they will come," and they're giving the shots to all comers in the eligible groups. They're using the vaccine as fast as they can get it.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: robomatic
Date: 10 Feb 21 - 02:58 PM

Just got home after receiving my second jab. Like my first (see above, 15 January, I received mine via the Anchorage School District which some brilliant member of the local Deep State put together. Again, school nurses, some of 'em coaxed out of retirement, very well organized with many people in vests making sure that everyone got their paperwork, knew where to go, and stayed afterwords for a 15 minute reaction check. I think I was in and out within about 40 minutes, including the final wait. No immediate reaction, I'm giving myself 48 hours from now to judge after effects.

The only preparation I made was to drink at least a pint of water before, and again after. I've found it works well for blood donating, and I didn't think it would do any harm today.

My friends who have a couple years on me got theirs yesterday afternoon. No immediate reaction, no problems sleeping, but one of 'em is experiencing 'brain fog' today.

Mo Layta!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Thompson
Date: 10 Feb 21 - 06:22 PM

That's a nice thought for a tip, Stilly. And the water suggestion is great, robomatic.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 10 Feb 21 - 08:47 PM

This county is easily doing hundreds of people a day, depending on how many other locations they have around the county. I'm guessing there were 100 to 200 of us at today's cattle call from 10-11, and they probably have several hours scheduled during the day (with time for cleaning built in?).

The state has FEMA setting up three large vaccination sites set up at various stadiums to vaccinate underserved communities (getting to the stadium will be one part of this - have they thought about that?)

https://www.texastribune.org/2021/02/10/texas-coronavirus-vaccines-fema/

Three federally-run mass vaccination sites aimed at underserved communities are expected to open before the end of the month in Houston and Dallas-Fort Worth, Gov. Greg Abbott said Wednesday.

The sites will be run by the Federal Emergency Management Agency and state emergency management officials, and are described as "pilot sites" in the national effort to speed up the nation's COVID-19 vaccine distribution effort.

The sites, which are currently being adapted for the effort, are NRG Stadium in Houston, AT&T Stadium in Arlington and Fair Park [the state fair fairgrounds] in Dallas. All three are expected to open on Feb. 24, with more details to be released later about how eligible Texans can register for the vaccine in those locations, Abbott said.

More sites in Texas could be added if the pilots are successful, FEMA officials said.

Combined, the three sites are expected to administer more than 10,000 shots per day, said Seth Christensen, spokesperson for the Texas Division of Emergency Management.

“These mass community sites will allow us to expand access to COVID-19 vaccinations in underserved communities and help us mitigate the spread of the virus," Abbott said in a statement. "Thank you to our partners at FEMA for working with the state of Texas to establish these vaccination sites and help us protect our most vulnerable."

Communities of color are not only being disproportionately affected by the virus, but also receiving the vaccine in lower numbers than their white counterparts.

The sites are part of a national effort to achieve President Biden’s goal of administering 1.5 million shots per day and make the vaccine widely available by spring.

The rest of the story is at the link.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 11 Feb 21 - 08:47 AM

It's a very achy morning, a flashback to the polymyalgia rheumatica I finally got rid of back in 2018. I won't hop on the steroids, though, I'll stick with alternating Motrin and Tylenol for the next day or two.

I'm very glad to have it out of the way, but I will have more to report to the CDC when they send their daily text asking how I'm feeling.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: robomatic
Date: 11 Feb 21 - 03:55 PM

Second Jab: Wednesday (yesterday) about 0830.
No immediate effect. Over the day walked the dog as usual and felt very much as usual, a bit achy but not out of the ordinary. Towards evening I felt I was running a slight temperature. Checked it with my magic VICKS want from Costco, and it was as high as 99 deg F (or about 37.5 C if my calcs are correct). But I felt otherwise okay. Temp. did not go any higher.

Normal sleep.

24 hours later, feel fine, temp. normal (98F 36.7C). So I'd say I had little reaction, but perceptible. It would not have caused me to miss work if I was currently working. And no induced cough, which I felt I did have after first jab.

So my basic advice is: Drink some water before and again after. Stay cheerful. Bring a sudoku or crossword puzzle in case you have a wait. As the Brits (used to) say: "Keep your pecker up!"

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: mg
Date: 11 Feb 21 - 04:51 PM

i had first moderna yesterday. no problems. sore arm if i raise it or sleep on it but dormant no discomfort. i tend to have the i survived the potato famine genes so i am probably somewhat hardy.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 11 Feb 21 - 09:12 PM

On MSNBC just now they have reported that over the last week they've had at least one million vaccinations a day, and today they reached 2 million.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Thompson
Date: 12 Feb 21 - 04:36 AM

Who's they, Stilly?

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 12 Feb 21 - 10:43 AM

Spectator data hub shows vaccination target of 14.6m will be hit *tomorrow*, two days early. At this rate, all vulnerable groups (1-9) will be vaccinated by 25 March. data.spectator.co.uk/city/vaccines

Thanks to the great job being done, despite continuing dithering by johnson/hancock!!!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 12 Feb 21 - 12:10 PM

All very straightforward yesterday: about 12 people in the usual surgery waiting room, with only 1 in every 3 chairs in use to maintain social distancing. And the roads were passable, tho husband nearly got stuck on the back road behind the surgery (car being full!)
Not much in the way of side effects, apart from being achy across the shoulders and neck and slightly sore arm. Astra Zeneca used: second dose not until May.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 12 Feb 21 - 01:16 PM

Government health folks, probably the CDC.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Senoufou
Date: 12 Feb 21 - 03:33 PM

My sister got her vaccination today. She had to drive to Dundee (about 10 miles) in the bitter cold, many degrees below zero, and through deep snow. The designated parking was a third of a mile away from the huge vaccination centre. Everyone had to wait outside, and many old people were near collapse with hypothermia. She did her best to help them.
Once inside it was stuffy and badly organised. Forty vaccinators in booths, more waiting and too close to eachother. Afterwards she faced the third of a mile walk back to the car park. Bearing in mind she still suffers from long Covid, none of this was acceptable.
I just hope she doesn't get a relapse (or pneumonia!)

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: BobL
Date: 13 Feb 21 - 04:01 AM

I pity too the poor organisers, who I'm sure were aware of the difficulties but had to work with what they were given.

Got my jab in Aylesbury yesterday - went like clockwork. Except that I had to wait 2 hours for my bus home. Fortunately the exit from the vaccination centre was convenient for my favourite supermarket. It wasn't desperately cold in this part of the world either, although the canal basin was frozen just enough to take the weight of some gulls, and the occasional duck.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 13 Feb 21 - 04:27 AM

I remember preparing accounts in the late 70s for a dairy farm in Aston Clinton just outside Aylesbury. The owner spent far too much on feed which after questioning, he admitted it was also for his racehorses!!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Thompson
Date: 14 Feb 21 - 05:28 AM

Senofou, that's crazy. Was it possible to be dropped off if you had a designated driver at least, who could then go off and park till phoned to come and collect?

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Feb 21 - 06:38 AM

Well I got my letter yesterday (not quite being 70 yet). I went on the NHS website to see what was on offer. The nearest centre offered to me is in Westward Ho! (the exclamation mark is part of its name! That one wasn't! Nor that one!), a very nice seaside town with echoes of Kipling and possessing a submerged fossil forest which you can walk out to at the lowest spring tides. But it's 26 miles and a 50-minute drive away. Other lovely Cornish and Devon locations were available. I could have gone to Truro and met my daughter (outdoors only) for the first time in months. 55 miles, 75 minutes. Or Plymouth, another 75-minute drive, where I could have taken my permitted exercise on the Hoe or in Mount Edgcumbe country park. Nice.

Or I can wait another day or two until my GP fixes me up no more than a 15-minute drive away...

Huh?

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Senoufou
Date: 14 Feb 21 - 07:29 AM

It was indeed crazy Thompson. I know my sister well and she's a stubborn old thing! She'd have gritted her teeth and driven through the snow in a very determined fashion. But I don't know if any alternatives were possible. Like Steve, one is left wondering how on earth one is going to get there, especially in these very wintry conditions.
Also, if one has had an adverse reaction (at the worst, anaphylaxis) one is hardly in a fit state to drive home.
Apparently the arrangements for vaccination in Scotland are woeful according to sis.
I feel ever more blessed to have had such an easy experience, driven by my husband who is a superbly capable driver, such a short distance and with nobody else around in the doctor's surgery. And no ill-effects afterwards either (except drowsiness for one day)
What a lucky thing I am eh?

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jos
Date: 14 Feb 21 - 08:03 AM

Drowsiness for one day? I'm just beginning to shake off the weariness after more than three weeks.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 14 Feb 21 - 10:37 AM

The government have got a lot wrong during the pandemic but the vaccine roll out has been brilliant, in part due to the British public being confident about having the jab, although I did read - maybe here or maybe on twitter, various chortling by stupid disbelievers who think they know better.

Over 15 million have now received their first jab!!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Senoufou
Date: 14 Feb 21 - 12:43 PM

Sorry to hear that Jos. Hope you soon feel 'back to normal'.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Pamber
Date: 14 Feb 21 - 02:21 PM

Speak as you find! I had mine today at the grand old age of 68 with my wife. Hotel abot 6 miles from home painless in every sense of the word and brilliantly organised by the NHS staff. Now to sit back and listen to the politicos taken credit!!!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 14 Feb 21 - 08:24 PM

Now that FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Administration) is involved in the US things will go a lot faster. Especially since their funds hopefully aren't still siphoned off. Trump moved money around between agencies to find the cash to build that effing wall of his. Tore up a lot of beautiful desert for nothing.

Anyway, new high-capacity centers are going in soon, and Fauci predicts that by April the pharmacies and these centers will be vaccinating all comers.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Allan Conn
Date: 16 Feb 21 - 12:10 PM

My wife, who had been one of the shielding group, got her vaccine jag today. Two days after the whole group supposedly were vaccinated. She had to phone the local surgery for it though - and was there with another friend who was shielding too because he is a cancer patient. Likewise he had chased it. Went well though and easy - she was only in for minute. Later this afternoon we had the call from the vaccination line itself to book the appointment for something that was supposedly completed on Monday ;-) They have done great with the numbers being vaccinated but I do wish politicians and health boards and the media wouldn't say everyone in a certain group has now been vaccinated - when they patently haven't been. Much better to say right we have hit the target numbers by the date - and we are now just finishing off this group.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jos
Date: 16 Feb 21 - 12:25 PM

Rather than saying that everyone in a group has been vaccinated, they say that everyone in the group has been offered a vaccination (though it seems even that isn't completely true).

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Allan Conn
Date: 16 Feb 21 - 12:43 PM

Well yes but I am not including those who don't want to be - which as yet is a tiny amount in Scotland. They were saying everyone in the shielding group who wanted a vaccination had been vaccinated. Which isn't true. Yesterday the claim was that the only ones who have slipped through the net had moved house or had rearranged their appointments. Not true! Today it was changed to perhaps some letters are lost in the post. Again not the case! The health board is still actively working through the group and are expecting it to be finished within a week. Like I say the numbers vaccinated are incredibly impressive but by saying a group is finished it does put stress on folk who are still waiting.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: DMcG
Date: 16 Feb 21 - 12:56 PM

There are also edge cases that are a bit unclear. I am 66 so got called up as 65-and-over to my local surgery on 11th Feb. My wife turned 65 on 12th. We are not clear if she will be called up shortly or if she will be picked up much later.

(She can book direct with the NHS but the nearest centre is in a shopping centre a few miles away, so she would rather wait for the local GP if it is not too long.)

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Allan Conn
Date: 17 Feb 21 - 09:45 AM

Scottish gvt covid site showing today that 80% of people shielding have now had the vaccine. 20% not yet done is a huge difference from a few have slipped through the net.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Thompson
Date: 17 Feb 21 - 11:43 AM

Piece in the Guardian about all this makes you shiver a bit.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 17 Feb 21 - 04:58 PM

That's the guardian for you. To vaccinate 15 million plus is a tremendous achievement.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 17 Feb 21 - 07:50 PM

Entirely agree with you Allan about over-stating the case, as I experienced that myself, as I outlined in my post of 7th Feb: very frustrating being told that everyone in your age-group has either been vaccinated or received an appointment when I knew that to be untrue! Yes, I did get done eventually, but nearly 2 weeks after my husband who is same age and health criteria!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 18 Feb 21 - 06:40 AM

Why are you all criticising the wonderful achievement of vaccinating so many people in such a short space of time???????????

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 18 Feb 21 - 07:25 AM

We're not all. I'm not.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Allan Conn
Date: 18 Feb 21 - 12:12 PM

I am not criticising the vaccine programme itself. That has been an achievement. I criticised thee fact that it was reported on the 15th by both the gvt and media that all the people clinically shielding had been vaccinated or had been offered a vaccination - when that was far from the truth! They would have been better with the truth. That we hit the figures we'd hoped for by the 15th; that we were starting on the next group which is 65 to 69 year olds, while the previous group is completed.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Senoufou
Date: 18 Feb 21 - 12:48 PM

I am very interested (and concerned) about the situation for BAME people in UK. It has been suggested that these ethnic groups are more vulnerable in their bodies' poor resistance to Covid 19, and infection/death rates are noticeably higher.
There have been several possible reasons mooted in the BMJ :-
- BAME households often have several generations of families, and the vectors are therefore increased.
- The culture of BAME people promotes suspicion of the motives behind mass vaccination, and a reluctance to take up offers of a vaccine.
- BAME people often live in deprived areas, and their general health is poorer than that of other ethnicities
- Due to much darker skin, BAME people in UK climate have low vitamin D levels, and there is a school of thought that vitamin D protects to some extent from Covid 19.
Now I find quite a bit of this objectionably racist to say the least. Lumping all BAME people together is absurd. UK has so many different types of environment and climate, so it isn't very scientific.
To consider Black, Asian and Middle-Eastern origin folk as one group is not workable. And there are poor, unhealthy people of all races (including whites) to be found in various places around the UK.
Now my husband is extremely black (W African) but has taken vitamin D supplements ever since his arrival here. He is not 'poor' or suspicious of the governments motives. He will gladly have the vaccine just as soon as it is offered to him. And I think it should be soon, as his risk is in cleaning a high school where pupils are still attending. He has to wear a mask, but cleans toilets of staff and pupils.
His union ('Unison') is starting to agitate for cleaning staff to cease working as the conditions are not safe.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: fat B****rd
Date: 19 Feb 21 - 06:37 AM

Just back from my first "jag", as they say in Scotland, at the local football ground. Without fail everybody involved was friendly and helpful.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 19 Feb 21 - 10:25 AM

Yes, it is a great achievement, Bonzo: no complaints on that score. But like Allan C I also experienced misinformation and confusion on the road to getting vaccinated. Our First Minister had to backtrack somewhat on some of her inflated claims re how “everyone“ in certain groups had definitely been contacted when they patently hadn’t.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 19 Feb 21 - 10:37 AM

??????????

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: keberoxu
Date: 19 Feb 21 - 10:45 AM

Tomorrow is my second dose.
Everybody's reports where I live --
many of them got their second doses LAST weekend --
are anxiety-provoking.
I hate feeling ill ...
and of course I'll get the dose anyhow.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 19 Feb 21 - 12:33 PM

My first is booked for next Wednesday at Cardiff City FC.
My second is also booked for 12 weeks later.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Thompson
Date: 20 Feb 21 - 06:22 AM

Keboroxu, just think how much iller you risk getting if you don't have the jab, and you'll feel much better!
Incidentally, here's Dr Mike Ryan of the WHO talking about pandemics and climate change and our hopes for the survival of humanity. Frightening stuff. (The video's down the page a bit.)

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mrrzy
Date: 20 Feb 21 - 02:25 PM

Allan Conn, oh, ok. I thought for a sec than AllanC was back.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 20 Feb 21 - 04:16 PM

Keyboard stuck, Bonzo????????????????????????????????????????

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: keberoxu
Date: 20 Feb 21 - 07:24 PM

About time that the original poster to the thread
got vaccination dose number 2.

It's eight hours later.
Apart from a burning sensation in the shoulder
of the arm that got the vaccine
(started out as an itch, after the shot),
no complaints.
But there's still time for some of the other side effects.

Anyway, THAT'S done and I have got the
all-important vaccination card to prove it.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 21 Feb 21 - 11:13 AM

Boris Johnson confirms that every UK adult will be offered a jab by the end of July -which means that within 17 months of the first recorded Covid-19 cases everybody could be jabbed. Incredible achievement! Thanks to all involved.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mrrzy
Date: 21 Feb 21 - 01:09 PM

I am appalled at the degree of whinging going on here in Charlottesville by people trying, and failing, to jump the line.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Helen
Date: 21 Feb 21 - 03:51 PM

Yesterday a few lucky people got the vaccination in Australia.

One guy jumped the queue. Scotty from Marketing, i.e. our PM. I guess he did it as a marketing strategy to convince all Aussies to get it.

So, we are at the beginning of the long path to herd immunity.

The list is prioritised. My appointment won't be until maybe late April to late May.

Bring it on!! :-D

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 Feb 21 - 05:21 AM

Chap aged 32 here in Britain was mysteriously offered the vaccine way out of turn. When it was looked into they found that "the system" had recorded his height as 6.2cm instead of his real height, 6'2". That made his BMI 28000, so "the system" concluded that he was a super-urgent case. :-)

He admitted that he was a bit podgy but nothing special. When he told his mum about it, she looked at him sternly and said, Let that be a wake-up call." :-) :-)

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Allan Conn
Date: 22 Feb 21 - 12:00 PM

Initial results from the data in Scotland appears to show a massive decrease in hospitalisation among people who have had just one jab of either Pfizer (85% reduction in hospitalisation) or Astrazenca (90% reduction in hospitalisation). Overall results not known yet as they still need to compare data for deaths in care homes - but never the less they are describing the effect of the vaccinations as spectacular!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 Feb 21 - 04:17 PM

Call me Mr Unlucky, Allan. I had a high fever on Saturday night and spent all day yesterday in bed, aching all over, sweating like a bull, heart going like the clappers and with the mother and father of a headache. Mrs Steve and I slept in separate beds for the first time in this house in 34 years (because I was stinking). Mrs Steve suspected coronavirus so she promptly ordered me a test kit. The upshot of that ordering is we both have to self-isolate. I thought I had flu, even though I've had the jab. Wrong again. I woke up this morning with a severe case of cellulitis, my second in a year. The fever's gone but I'm as weak as a kitten. Hoping the the antibiotics are beginning to kick in... I can hardly walk, as the infection started in my foot. A right pickle...

And I STILL haven't had me first jab! If (when) the test comes back negative (Wednesday, I hope) at least we'll be released from prison. Last year I ended up in A&E. Better luck this time!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 22 Feb 21 - 04:22 PM

Steve:
Hope it passes off soon.
Cheers!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 Feb 21 - 04:51 PM

Much appreciated, Nigel. I always try to stay cheerful...

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 22 Feb 21 - 05:08 PM

That's terrible Steve, hope you get back to form soon.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Donuel
Date: 22 Feb 21 - 05:22 PM

I don't know about the cheerful part but your immune system has faced an extraordinary number of infections, perhaps from your penchant for travel. If you do get infected the good news is that there is a surplus of monoclonal antibody treatments for people in a risk group.

There are over 4,000 varients but a strain is a predominate highly successful varient that exceeds the others in infection, spread and severity.

I am still too young for the current vaccine jab over here.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 Feb 21 - 05:42 PM

Thanks, Bonzo. Don't worry, as long as I remain sentient and retain at least one typing finger, I'll be up 'n' at yer in no time!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 Feb 21 - 05:48 PM

I have a feeling that you're on the wrong wavelength, Donuel. My immune system is in good nick, thanks. Anyone who gets severe cellulitis needs a bit of a boost in order to avoid sepsis (which nearly carried me off last May). It's bacterial, by the way. I doubt whether anyone's ever counted the "strains".

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: fat B****rd
Date: 22 Feb 21 - 06:05 PM

Whatever, I hope you are better soon, Steve.
Sending good thoughts from Dunfermline
Charlie

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 Feb 21 - 06:31 PM

That's very kind, Charlie. Thank you. Hope it's not too grim up north!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Allan Conn
Date: 23 Feb 21 - 02:40 AM

Cellutitis! Wishing you a speedy recovery Steve.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jack Campin
Date: 23 Feb 21 - 04:44 AM

Brilliant idea from a friend of mine: if the algorithm wants to send you to a nearby centre which is exclusively drive-through but you aren't a destructive shitbag with a car, take them up on it anyway and get a taxi to drive you through.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: fat B****rd
Date: 23 Feb 21 - 04:48 AM

P***ing down just now ! who cares. Had my first jag last Friday and side effects for a couple of days. Much better now apart from terminal sloth. My 57 year old stepson-in-law had a heart attack a couple of years ago so he's due his jag on Sunday, Vacwise things seem to be moving along in Fife. Take care

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Feb 21 - 05:01 AM

Er, a taxi would be even more destructive on that particular trip, Jack. Not only would it be carting you to and from the centre, it would be coming from the taxi rank to your house to pick you up then doing the reverse journey after taking you home. Have you got a pushbike?

The way the world is, many rural areas would be devoid of people but for cars. I live four miles out of town with no usable pathway, the A39 round here is notoriously dangerous and public transport is next to non-existent. So how would you like it to be, and who do you think the real shitbags are?

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Feb 21 - 05:05 AM

Got my invite for the first jab five minutes ago, Charlie! Can't act on it until I know whether we've got to keep self-isolating, so I await the test result with baited breath...

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 23 Feb 21 - 05:38 AM

Previously a positive test result meant you couldn't have the jab for 28 days. I have been told (uncorroborated) that this time lag has now been reduced to 10 days.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Feb 21 - 06:09 AM

Well I'm convinced the result will be negative. We ordered the test as a kneejerk when I got the fever, which then turned out to be the cellulitis. As the cheerful doc told me, you can get both, you know! Anyway, I'll either leave it until I get the result or make a speculative booking today...

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Feb 21 - 07:03 AM

Well I've booked for Sunday afternoon. As it's in Holsworthy, ten miles away, and with Holsworthy having a Waitrose, I might take the opportunity to nip in and buy a few bottles of the superb Stemmari Nero d'Avola, currently on offer. Otherwise, under lockdown, I should think that driving ten miles to a supermarket when there are several in Bude would be somewhat stretching the bounds of morality. I'll not be gainsaid on this. I wish to support the Sicilian economy (and I've been to Avola...)

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 23 Feb 21 - 08:35 AM

Nice to see that you can still get your European wines, despite earlier fears ;)

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Feb 21 - 08:38 AM

Mutual interest rules OK...

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jack Campin
Date: 23 Feb 21 - 08:58 AM

at particular trip, Jack. Not only would it be carting you to and from the centre, it would be coming from the taxi rank to your house to pick you up then doing the reverse journey after taking you home.

She didn't get one specially made for the trip. Most of the resource footprint of a car is in getting it made, shipped and disposed of. Fuel is probably a bit higher for taxis because they run such high mileages; the balance is much worse for electric cars because their materials require such enormous energy inputs and destructive mining.

The place I had mine done was within walking distance.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Thompson
Date: 23 Feb 21 - 06:11 PM

The way the world is, many rural areas would be devoid of people but for cars. I live four miles out of town with no usable pathway, the A39 round here is notoriously dangerous and public transport is next to non-existent. So how would you like it to be, and who do you think the real shitbags are?

By "the A39 round here is notoriously dangerous" do you mean the drivers on that road are notoriously dangerous, Steve?

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Feb 21 - 06:12 PM

Well the nearest I can ever get mine done is ten miles away. I've long advocated universal free public transport, including a massive uplift for it in rural areas. If you didn't have to pay to go anywhere, most people would put up with the inconveniences of longer journey times and stations not quite being in the right place for them. And if anyone knows where there's a statue of Beeching, the Cornish Army would soon know what to do with it. The Tamar is deep...

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Feb 21 - 06:31 PM

Whilst I agree with your sentiment that it's not the roads that are dangerous, it's some of the particular drivers who are idiots who use them (an argument I make meself all the time), Thompson, I was specifically thinking of pedestrians who might want to walk to Bude from where I live. From here, the first mile of the single-carriageway A39 is bendy and narrow in places and has no footway or refuges. The speed limit is 60. If every driver in that stretch was a saint, the road would still not be safe for pedestrians. Further on there's a short stretch of footway, then one. It's possible to get off the road after a mile and a half and walk into town along the canal, a completely unlit stretch in remote country. It's hardly an attractive proposition and, for that mile and a half, you are sort of taking your life in your hands (I've done it a few times). That's just the way it is.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Feb 21 - 06:32 PM

Then none

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 24 Feb 21 - 10:24 AM

FDA review confirms safety and efficacy of single-shot Johnson & Johnson coronavirus vaccine, especially against severe cases

Washington Post, February 24, 2021

A Food and Drug Administration review released Wednesday of the single-shot coronavirus vaccine made by pharmaceutical giant Johnson & Johnson found it was safe and effective and completely prevented hospitalizations and deaths in a large clinical trial.

The review sets the stage for a third coronavirus vaccine to be authorized as soon as this weekend, a point of hope in the middle of a pandemic that has killed more than a half-million people in the United States.

The review, although positive, was more nuanced than regulators’ assessments of the first two coronavirus vaccines, reflecting a pandemic that has entered a more complicated phase as variants capable of slipping by some aspects of immunity have emerged. The Johnson & Johnson vaccine was more than 85 percent effective at preventing severe illness, including in a region dominated by a concerning variant, but only 66 percent protective overall when moderate cases were included.

The FDA scientists found that the “known benefits” of the vaccine included reducing the risk of symptomatic and severe cases of its disease, covid-19, at least two weeks after vaccination. The review found vaccine efficacy against severe covid-19 “was similarly high across the United States, South Africa, and Brazil.”

“We know this vaccine prevents 85 percent of the severe disease. . . . It was 100 percent effective in preventing hospitalization and deaths, and that’s really what’s important,” said Nancy M. Bennett, a professor of medicine and public health sciences at the University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry. “Those facts are the most important thing to recognize.”

The vaccine was less effective in a subgroup of adults older than 60 who also had risk factors for severe illness, but regulators noted there were no deaths or cases requiring medical intervention a month after those older adults received vaccines. Overall, there were seven deaths in the trial, all in the group that received a placebo.

An external committee of scientific experts is scheduled to meet Friday to recommend whether the FDA should authorize the shot. If the regulatory deliberations follow the path of the previous two authorized coronavirus vaccines — a joint vaccine from U.S. pharmaceutical giant Pfizer and German biotech firm BioNTech, and one from U.S. biotech company Moderna — a decision could come this weekend.

Public health officials have eagerly awaited the arrival of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine because it is expected to streamline the logistics of a complicated mass vaccination campaign. The vaccine can be stored in a refrigerator for several months, which should ease the challenges of distributing frozen products, and it doesn’t require a follow-up visit for a booster shot.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: keberoxu
Date: 24 Feb 21 - 09:16 PM

Four days later,
the muscle/arm where the injection went in
is pretty much back to normal,
but whoa!
Was it ever swollen and touchy with pain for a few days.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Helen
Date: 24 Feb 21 - 09:45 PM

keberoxu, did you get out of doing housework for four days? :-D

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jos
Date: 25 Feb 21 - 04:06 AM

Newsreaders on the radio this morning are expressing surprise and delight at the high levels of antibodies among people who had the Pfizer vaccine - PARTICULARLY among those who had also HAD THE VIRUS.
Well, what did they expect.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Thompson
Date: 25 Feb 21 - 12:30 PM

There's a new French vaccine made by Valneva which is made from the whole virus, and so works against all variants. It's likely that this will be used not only as a two-shot vaccine, but also as a booster shot for those who've had all other vaccines. The UK has optioned 40 million doses.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 25 Feb 21 - 01:46 PM

Why can't our scruffy clumsy PM, Boris Johnson, just say "hello" instead of going within a metre of so many people to touch elbows?

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 26 Feb 21 - 05:06 AM

Those who refuse the covid vaccine are selfish (except for medical reasons of course) and we all know the "doubting Thomas" types who do!!!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 26 Feb 21 - 06:38 AM

There's hardly a "medical reason" on earth why anyone shouldn't have the vaccine. The percentage of people needed to be immune (via vaccine or catching the virus) needs to be in the high eighties or low nineties in order for us to get to herd immunity. Antivaxxers and namby-pamby vaccine-refusers (who love to proclaim their ignorance from the rooftops: we've had at least one on here who sarcastically thanked the rest of us for being his guinea-pigs before he decides whether, down the line, he should take the vaccine) will seriously hamper efforts to get the virus under control, and more people will suffer and die. The side effects are either slight and transient or non-existent and all the vaccines are safe and effective. Even the Queen was rolled out to tell us that (and good for her, say I). I'm having mine on Sunday and bloody wild horses wouldn't stop me.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 26 Feb 21 - 06:45 AM

Well I have a left leg like a blotchy balloon and I'm so stuffed with antibiotics that there's no room left for me dinner. My coronavirus test, ordered because the cellulitis gave me a fever, came back negative. I've checked, and being on huge doses of antibiotics is not a "medical reason" for not having the jab. I'll wear long pants and not mention it when I go.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 26 Feb 21 - 08:56 AM

I think there may be certain medications are thought to clash adversly with contents of the vaccine.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 26 Feb 21 - 09:50 AM

Well I can't find references to any. The main contraindication is for anyone allergic to any of the contents of the vaccine. That would be very rare, and in any case the staff at UK vaccination centres have the training and wherewithal to treat anyone who has a rapid adverse reaction. Common allergens have not been used in the vaccines. If you know you have such an allergy you can ask and find out, and should. Allergies to peanuts, eggs, dust mites, cat hair and suchlike don't count. If you hear anyone giving you an excuse for not having the jab they're almost certainly bullshitting.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: robomatic
Date: 26 Feb 21 - 09:56 AM

Thompson, I'm not sure that your description of a vaccine made from 'whole virus' defends against variants. By definition, the variants are not part of the original virus from which that vaccine was derived. There is of course a time element. After the vaccine is made from a particular virus at a particular date, the variants occur. No way can a vaccine anticipate the variant. To do that it would have to 'anticipate' what would happen, or attack a portion of the virus that remains invariant. By contrast, there are flu virus medications which attack all flu viruses such as Tamiflu, but you'll note it is a palliative, not a definitive 'cure' and flu vaccines come out every year and are not necessarily very effective.

We are all hoping that Covid-19 does not turn out to be a ready mutator such as flu. But we are learning it does mutate to some extent.

Please provide a source/ link for a statement such as yours.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 26 Feb 21 - 10:08 AM

Well I've heard news of research on variant-proof vaccines too. As ever, they have to made, then tested for safety and efficacy. We're ok for now with what we've got, so let's wait and see.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: keberoxu
Date: 26 Feb 21 - 12:45 PM

Steve, I'm really sorry to hear about
the cellulitis and your leg,
it sounds truly horrible.
I hope those antibiotics do what they're supposed to do
and that you feel more like yourself very soon.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 26 Feb 21 - 01:32 PM

Cheers for that kind thought. I had it more severely last May, when I delayed getting help as I didn't know what was up (I hadn't even heard the word "cellulitis"). As the infection (by common bugs that live on everyone's skin) is in deep skin layers, the antibiotics don't get there very quickly. Yesterday the doc doubled my dose. I tolerate such things very well so the antibiotic doesn't upset me at all, and my leg feels much better today (though it isn't a pretty sight!). I actually feel fairly normal today, for the first time this week. Onward and upward!


Cellulitis is a common and serious disease that not enough people know much about. The infection starts via a break in the skin, very likely something insignificant. Once the germs are in, they can spread rapidly if they get into the bloodstream (as happened with me last year) and there is the danger of sepsis, which is often fatal. It's crucial to recognise the symptoms of cellulitis early and get help, even if it means going to the hospital emergency department.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 27 Feb 21 - 03:43 PM

Just heard from a friend who is recovering from a nasty attack of shingles (herpes zoster): she should have had a vaccination for that earlier last year, but this was delayed because of Covid! In the UK, this is offered to anyone over 70: it doesn't promise total protection from the disease, but does offer the hope of reduced symptoms if unluckily affected.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Joe Offer
Date: 28 Feb 21 - 01:05 AM

Sometimes in threads like this, I can't figure out who's talking to whom. So, I'll just leave that part alone.

I'm living with two anti-vaxxers. My 31-year-old stepson is more vehement. He thinks this whole COVID thing is a government plot, so he takes no precautions and certainly won't get a vaccination. He's taken several cross-country flights in the last year, so he has had the opportunity to import germs from all over. I really was worried about catching something from him, so I've made an effort to stay away from him. He's kind of a recluse and stays in his room much of the time, so it's not that hard to stay away. He went after me with that anti-vaxxer propaganda when he was about 12. He had one of those author-published books that is full of factoids about the horrors of vaccines, and he had almost memorized that damn book - at the age of 12. I firmly stated that I listened only to medical doctors on medical issues, and I had no desire to argue with him.

Now he's 31 and has two-year degrees in computer science and statistics, and a bachelor's in Physics....and he still thinks he knows everything about medical science. Back in about March, he went on a long tirade about how Dr. Fauci and the epidemiologists were all wrong and he had developed a spreadsheet to prove it. I had no interest in his spreadsheet, and told him I wouldn't talk with him about epidemiology unless he's an epidemiologist with a medical degree. He got kinda scary, and yelled and slammed his door so hard I thought it would fall down. Since then, I have mostly avoided him except for making occasional remarks in his hearing about our "asshole President Trump." He has settled down a bit since the inauguration, but not much.

My wife is a chiropractor, now retired. She's very good at healing orthopedic issues, but I can't agree with her on medical stuff. She spent $2500 on a homemade machine connected to crystals in test tubes that the patient was supposed to hold in his/her hands. Then she hooked up with a guy who took blood samples from people who came to gatherings at our house that were like Tupperware parties, and then he'd give flaky analyses of their entire medical condition after a quick look at their blood through a microscope. He had no credentials of his own, so he was taking advantage of my wife's chiropractic license to add an illusion of credibility. I called him the "blood jerk." During one session, I blew up and told him before the group how full of shit he was. Then I demanded that my wife have nothing to do with him. She was making less than $900 a month, less than I was paying in taxes, and she had no liability insurance. I told her that she and the blood jerk had no assets, and I didn't want to expose my assets to that sort of quackery. So, she agreed not to host the guy anymore, but it was a difficult moment. I felt bad being a husband bossing his wife around like that, but I just couldn't expose myself to that sort of liability unless she could find a legal way to insulate me from that.

She has been relatively cautious about COVID, and I'm grateful for that. She takes more chances than I would, but she generally adheres to the guidelines for masks and distancing. I thought she was going to get the vaccine when it became available, but she told me last month, that she thought she'd pass it up and leave it to more deserving people.

This week, I had a conference about COVID with a group of Latinas and the county health officer, who is an acquaintance of mine. He's well-qualified as a public health physician, and he knows his stuff. He answered all the questions the ladies had, and it was a very good session. So, I was talking about this with my wife today, and she started asking all sorts of technical questions from her pseudo-scientific point of reckoning. I finally said I didn't want to talk about the matter and I didn't want to spend time researching it. I said I believe a lot of information because of the credibility of the sources, and I think Dr. Fauci and most of the professional epidemiologists have established themselves as more credible than self-anointed "experts" who can't even find a conventional publisher for their books.

So, it stands there. At least I have my COCID shots. It's difficult to live peacefully with people who are convinced of theories that are outside the conventional realm of truth. My wife and I simply don't talk about certain things.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: BobL
Date: 28 Feb 21 - 03:01 AM

We've had at least one on here who sarcastically thanked the rest of us for being his guinea-pigs

He's just as much a guinea-pig. He's the control.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Allan Conn
Date: 28 Feb 21 - 03:28 AM

Re the anti-vaxxers! Round about where I am there obviously are anti-vaxxers but I think they are a lot less numerous on the ground than they are loud on the internet. The vast bulk of folks seem to be really keen to get their jags! The take up among the older age group has been very high indeed - far higher than the authorities expected. Among some of the age groups it is approaching virtually nearly everyone having the vaccination. In the high 90%s. It will be interesting to see how that continues down the generations. I suppose the more vulnerable you feel then the more likely you are to want a vaccination!

When the 65s and overs were done I was expecting to be in the next 60 to 64 group - but unless there is some other underlying condition we seem to have been pushed down the list a bit. Kind of frustrating when I pass the vaccination centre on my daily walk!!! ;-)

I know how Joe feels about just not touching on subjects with people you live with though! My wife and I are more or less in agreement with most things but we just need to avoid the Scottish independence subject as that causes real friction in this household and both parties are pretty set in their opinions.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Manitas_at_home
Date: 28 Feb 21 - 04:25 AM

I wasn't expecting my vaccination until after my 65th birthday but I got my invitation and had it on Friday. Now I see they seem to have changed the age groups and the next group will be the 60-63 year olds. There were quite a few young people (early 20s) in the queue on Friday. I expect they were health care workers. This in England,BTW.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 28 Feb 21 - 04:50 AM

Anti-vaxxers are very selfish.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 28 Feb 21 - 06:26 AM

We have anti-vaxxers round here who think that coronavirus doesn't exist and that the vaccine is a ploy to get microchips into us all. Then there are those who don't share those views but who won't have the vaccine because they've taken on board bullshit about how vaccines are unsafe, give us the actual disease, no-one's pumping viruses into me, etc. Unfortunately, gullibility appears to be bred into the human race (or is it that we don't put enough emphasis in schools on critical thinking and being automatically sceptical when off-beam ideas come along...?) As for people who refuse to take the vaccine, they'll be fine as long as enough of the rest of us do the right thing. They won't have helped and, in fact, may be prolonging the period until we get herd immunity. So no thanks to them. We'll do it for them. Bonzo won't like the analogy, but it's reminiscent of those people who wouldn't join a trade union "on principle," but who weren't "principled" enough to refuse the pay rises that the unions won.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 28 Feb 21 - 01:37 PM

Sorry to hear about your cellulitis, Steve and hope it is responding well to treatment.
Not quite sure why you shouted at Donuel for his last post, though, as Augmentin IS an antibiotic (anti-bacterial) - known as co-amoxyclav over here - amoxycillin + clavulanic acid - and IS commonly used for treating cellulitis. However the drug(s) of choice will be those that are shown by to be most appropriate, by swab and sensitivity testing, for whichever bacterium is causing your particular attack of cellulitis. Signed Tattie Bogle, M.B., B.S. and a whole load more letters.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 28 Feb 21 - 02:30 PM

That's as maybe, but I've had two serious attacks of this and amoxicillin has been ineffective and withdrawn from my treatment. What I don't need is a non-doctor making 'helpful" medicine suggestions when I'm hurting, thanks. That's something that too many people are a bit too willing to indulge in on internet forums.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 28 Feb 21 - 02:34 PM

On a brighter note, I got Pfizer-jabbed this affy. Didn't feel a thing!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 28 Feb 21 - 02:49 PM

On an even brighter note, Mrs Steve was winding me up on the drive home from the vaccination centre. Looking in the mirror, she exclaimed "Hey, there's a car behind us with a tracking device on the roof...Oh my God, it's Bill Gates!!"

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mrrzy
Date: 28 Feb 21 - 05:49 PM

Oh, Steve Shaw, you crack me up. Considering all the based-on-your-opinion advice you dish out to others!

I am not getting vaccinated if I can help it, not for any of the silly reasons above, but for my own, silly to some, reasons. First, I have no comorbidities, second, I am still (for another 12 days) in my fifties, so for both of those reasons I am content to wait my actual turn, which I hope won't be for years.

And that is because of reason 3, which is untested technologies. I would like to see the vaccine tested for at least 3 and preferably 5 years, as all vaccines should be. In 3-5 years, we should know more about mRNA vaccines with nanoparticles, and about coronovirus variants.

But I am *not* recommending anybody *else* either have the jab OR not have the jab. Rely on your own intelligence, make your own decision. Jab or no jab, the data are fairly clear, by now, on masks and distance and clean hands minimizing viral spread.

The vaccines do not, apparently, prevent your catching the virus. The vaccines do not, therefore, prevent you spreading the virus. The vaccines are, apparently, really good at preventing you from getting seriously ill if you do catch the virus.

So do keep on with the masks and the distance and the clean hands.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 28 Feb 21 - 06:47 PM

No, but you are going big and loud about any negative you can rustle up. From what you have posted here there is not a single reason on earth why you shouldn't have the jab. Your choice, of course, as it always should be. But if there were tens of millions of refusers like you, a lot more people would die. Carry on relying on the fact that there aren't too many of you. So go figure, huh.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 28 Feb 21 - 06:56 PM

Incidentally, this is blatant misinformation and you really shouldn't be propagating it:

"The vaccines do not, therefore, prevent you spreading the virus."

This is not known. Maybe yes, maybe no, maybe to a larger or lesser extent. The science is not there. So please refrain from nonsense such as this. It is completely irresponsible.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: robomatic
Date: 28 Feb 21 - 10:10 PM

Mrrzy:

If you think about your last post, it makes you come off as an anti-vaxxer. After participating in a thread where you earlier mentioned turning down a jab because you didn't think "it was your turn", you now give non-scientific reasons for why you don't want it.

The vaccines have been tested. Numbers of the sick are coming down where the vaccines are being put into living bodies.

All new vaccines are, by definition, new. Think of how many lives would have been saved had a 'new' flue vaccine been available in 1918-1919 (The technology didn't exist at the time).

I know you are a very intelligent, expressive poster. All I ask is that you think in the very terms those folks you ae working with do.

Remember the story of the guy in the flood who turned down a pickup truck to get him out of his house, as the water rose, a boat came by. As he was clinging to the roof of his house, a helicopter offered him a line...each time he said "No, save someone else, the Lord will look after me!"

He drowned.

As he stood before the Lord, he said: "I don't understand why you didn't save me!"

"I SENT YOU A PICKUP, A BOAT, AND A HELICOPTER!"

You are being sent a vaccine.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: BobL
Date: 01 Mar 21 - 03:17 AM

Think of it this way: the vaccine isn't a magic bullet, it's another weapon in the armoury.

BTW if it were technically possible to implant a microchip with the vaccine, it would save a lot of bothering with vax passports.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mrrzy
Date: 01 Mar 21 - 09:06 AM

The CDC has made it very clear that the vaccine was not tested for ability to prevent catching or spreading the virus, but only for prevention of illness if you do catch it.

It is much more responsible to assume that it doesn't prevent catching or spreading, than that it does.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jeri
Date: 01 Mar 21 - 09:44 AM

Mrrzy's right. The vaccines haven't been tested for ability to stop the spread. I probably don't have up-to-date information, but I know the most recent J&J one wasn't.

They still advise wearing masks, washing hands, and social distancing, even if you've had the vaccine.

BUT if you can reduce the severity of this virus to that of a bad cold, and know you won't die from it, it's worth getting the shot.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jeri
Date: 01 Mar 21 - 09:49 AM

Oh, and they ARE supposed to induce immunity in the person vaccinated, so prevent you from getting it.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jeri
Date: 01 Mar 21 - 10:46 AM

From the CDC website:

COVID-19 vaccination will help keep you from getting COVID-19

All COVID-19 vaccines currently available in the United States have been shown to be highly effective at preventing COVID-19. Learn more about the different COVID-19 vaccines.
All COVID-19 vaccines that are in development are being carefully evaluated in clinical trials and will be authorized or approved only if they make it substantially less likely you’ll get COVID-19. Learn more about how federal partners are ensuring COVID-19 vaccines work.
Based on what we know about vaccines for other diseases and early data from clinical trials, experts believe that getting a COVID-19 vaccine may also help keep you from getting seriously ill even if you do get COVID-19.
Getting vaccinated yourself may also protect people around you, particularly people at increased risk for severe illness from COVID-19.
Experts continue to conduct more studies about the effect of COVID-19 vaccination on severity of illness from COVID-19, as well as its ability to keep people from spreading the virus that causes COVID-19.

COVID-19 vaccination is a safer way to help build protection

COVID-19 can have serious, life-threatening complications, and there is no way to know how COVID-19 will affect you. And if you get sick, you could spread the disease to friends, family, and others around you.
Clinical trials of all vaccines must first show they are safe and effective before any vaccine can be authorized or approved for use, including COVID-19 vaccines. The known and potential benefits of a COVID-19 vaccine must outweigh the known and potential risks of the vaccine for use under what is known as an Emergency Use Authorization (EUA). Watch a video on what an EUA is.
Getting COVID-19 may offer some natural protection, known as immunity. Current evidence suggests that reinfection with the virus that causes COVID-19 is uncommon in the 90 days after initial infection. However, experts don’t know for sure how long this protection lasts, and the risk of severe illness and death from COVID-19 far outweighs any benefits of natural immunity. COVID-19 vaccination will help protect you by creating an antibody (immune system) response without having to experience sickness.
Both natural immunity and immunity produced by a vaccine are important parts of COVID-19 disease that experts are trying to learn more about, and CDC will keep the public informed as new evidence becomes available.

COVID-19 vaccination will be an important tool to help stop the pandemic

Wearing masks and social distancing help reduce your chance of being exposed to the virus or spreading it to others, but these measures are not enough. Vaccines will work with your immune system so it will be ready to fight the virus if you are exposed.
The combination of getting vaccinated and following CDC’s recommendations to protect yourself and others will offer the best protection from COVID-19.
Stopping a pandemic requires using all the tools we have available. As experts learn more about how COVID-19 vaccination may help reduce spread of the disease in communities, CDC will continue to update the recommendations to protect communities using the latest science.

---

The unimpressive HTML is mine.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 01 Mar 21 - 10:58 AM

From: Mrrzy
Date: 28 Feb 21 - 05:49 PM
. . .

I am not getting vaccinated if I can help it, not for any of the silly reasons above, but for my own, silly to some, reasons. First, I have no comorbidities, second, I am still (for another 12 days) in my fifties, so for both of those reasons I am content to wait my actual turn, which I hope won't be for years.

And that is because of reason 3, which is untested technologies. I would like to see the vaccine tested for at least 3 and preferably 5 years, as all vaccines should be. In 3-5 years, we should know more about mRNA vaccines with nanoparticles, and about coronovirus variants.

I assume that you mean that you are happy to see it tested on other people before you accept the security it gives based on others taking any (miniscule) risk.
If everyone took that attitude the drugs would never be tested and we would still see people dying in much greater numbers than they currently are as we would never see the emergence of a tested vaccine. And there would be many, many more carriers who could possibly infect you (and others).

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Mar 21 - 11:58 AM

Mrrzy: "The vaccines do not, therefore, prevent you spreading the virus."

Jeri: "Mrrzy's right. The vaccines haven't been tested for ability to stop the spread."

Mrrzy is NOT right. He said that the vaccines don't stop the spread. As you rightly say, the vaccines haven't been tested for that. "Not tested for it" does NOT mean the same thing as "they don't do it."

I hate to keep saying it, but spreading negative misinformation about vaccines plays straight into the hands of anti-vaxxers. Let's try to not do that in this thread at least.

Your link says "Experts continue to conduct more studies about the effect of COVID-19 vaccination on severity of illness from COVID-19, as well as its ability to keep people from spreading the virus that causes COVID-19.

When the vaccines were developed, the priority was to establish their efficacy and their safety. The urgency of getting the vaccines out precluded at that stage testing for the ability to prevent spread. That matters, but not as urgently as efficacy and safety. The data will continue to roll in. That's how it is.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 01 Mar 21 - 12:18 PM

There are many things that weren't tested for because it took too long; there will be results as the vaccines are distributed and recipients respond to CDC queries. I joined a study by phone and over the next six weeks have answered questions about symptoms following the inoculations. Those may be less scientific because not everyone joins, but any information helps.

Scientists working on treating COVID-19 eventually hope to be able to say that the vaccines not only stop recipients from catching COVID-19, but vaccinated people won't catch or spread it. Like polio or smallpox. But the claims must await the test of time. In the meantime, their qualified remarks give the anti-vaxxers a target to shoot at, as willfully-uninformed as they are about the whole thing.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Mar 21 - 12:25 PM

That's a downside all right. But it's important that new data is interpreted, as carefully as possible, to the public, as it rolls out. It's equally important that we remain vigilant about misinformation being disseminated. The best way to counter it is with accurate and clear statements about the way things really are.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 01 Mar 21 - 12:26 PM

300!

We had ours 3 weeks ago to make this more relevent

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 01 Mar 21 - 12:26 PM

Damn you Shaw! :-D

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Mar 21 - 12:37 PM

Har har! You've gotta get up early, Dave!

I had mine yesterday, the Pfizer, didn't feel a thing and, so far, have had no after-effects whatsoever. Mrs Steve had hers three weeks ago, Astra-Zeneca, ditto.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 01 Mar 21 - 01:09 PM

I'm not sure if ours were the Vauxhall Astra or the Michelle Pfeiffer ones.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jeri
Date: 01 Mar 21 - 01:58 PM

As to vaccines "stopping the spread", check this.

Stopping the spread means the person hadn't already been infected when they were vaccinate. It means they weren't among the very small number of people who were infected despite being vaccinated, which is a higher number if one received the J&J shot. If you were correct, there would be no need to wear masks or social distance.

A vaccine can HELP stop the spread, but doesn't guarantee anything.

And an anti-vaxxer is an anti-vaxxer. They all have some non-scientific, fearful (or downright paranoid) reasons. Unfortunately, I've had a great deal of training in pathogens and immunity, including supervising an immunization clinic at a US Air Force base hospital. Thinking that a few years will show some weird, unpredictable side effects is nuts, IMO. You're entitled to believe what you want. I'm sure there are still people who believe the MMR causes autism. Fundamentally, for me, it's not worth an argument which would be based on facts.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Senoufou
Date: 01 Mar 21 - 02:50 PM

Mine was the Asda Vinegar one.
I don't think one can compel people to be vaccinated, but I think what will happen is that airline travel, entry into public places such as shops, hotels etc and using public transport will be limited to The Vaccinated, proven by special vaccination 'passports'.
There's talk at the moment about introducing some form of verification for people to show.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jos
Date: 01 Mar 21 - 03:16 PM

Perhaps it should be either a certificate saying the person has been vaccinated, OR a certificate saying they have antibodies to the virus (through having had the virus itself).

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Mar 21 - 03:27 PM

"If you were correct, there would be no need to wear masks or social distance."

If who was correct about what?

You can't force anyone to stand still while someone stabs a needle into you. But, I must admit, I haven't got any time for refusers. There may come a time when shops and airlines ask you to prove that you've been done, but I doubt it. In the not-too-distant future, numbers will be very low, all being well, and the perceived need for that will have receded (though international travel may take longer). New variants, plus the refusers, will probably ensure that we'll have to live with the virus but just stay vigilant. All those people who have taken the vaccine will have done their bit. Dunno what twisted nonsense the anti-vaxxers will be coming out with then. They won't be my friends, that's for sure.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 01 Mar 21 - 04:27 PM

And they won't be my friends either.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Donuel
Date: 01 Mar 21 - 09:37 PM

It turns out that Trump was secretly vaccinated January of this year.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Senoufou
Date: 02 Mar 21 - 07:35 AM

Husband just told me that they're starting vaccinations in Abidjan (Ivory Coast) Using the Astra-Zeneca one. However, he was shocked to hear from his sister that nobody is wearing a mask, keeping a distance or even acknowledging that the virus is about! One of his nieces is organising a Muslim baptism in a few days' time for her little son, and over a hundred people will be there, including most of the local mosque congregation.
He's so worried, and I don't blame him. I heard him on his mobile phone bellowing at his family for even considering attending.
There must be cases in Abidjan if they're starting vaccination.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 02 Mar 21 - 01:44 PM

"Why is Covid Killing People of Colour?" (BBC documentary, 21:00 2/3/2021) As with rickets, EVOLUTION - darker skin DOES require more sunlight for enough vitamin D to be healthy & the UK is too far north of the equator for many BAME; my WalkaboutsVerse poem on "Repatriating"

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Rain Dog
Date: 02 Mar 21 - 01:57 PM

Had a letter yesterday from the NHS about booking the vaccination. Went online this afternoon and booked in for first jab this Friday. Have to travel to Folkestone for it so will be getting the bus.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mrrzy
Date: 02 Mar 21 - 02:39 PM

Have you heard Catholics in some places are being told the J&J vaccine is immoral, even tho the pope said it's ok? Stem cells are involved.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 02 Mar 21 - 02:57 PM

Do tell us more about those stem cells.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jos
Date: 02 Mar 21 - 04:22 PM

Regarding the stem cells, this is from my post on 22 January after I had the Oxford vaccine:

'On leaving, I was given a small card with my name on it, the date, and the vaccine type and batch number, and a sheet of paper to read, which includes near the top:

"Read all of this leaflet carefully before the vaccine is given because it contains important information for you."

There is a list of possible side effects, but the bit of information that does worry me is that the vaccine is:

"Produced in genetically modified human embryonic kidney (HEK) 293 cells."'

I investigated this on line and discovered that the HEK cells originated from an abortion in the Netherlands in the 1970s.

It is likely that the J&J vaccine also uses those cells. But perhaps the Catholics who were "told the J&J vaccine is immoral" [who by?] have checked the facts themselves and made up their own minds about the morality of the vaccine, rather than waiting to be told by the Pope. The Pope has decreed that use of these cells is acceptable in the absence of an alternative.

I looked for a vaccine that doesn't use them but all I found was one that is undergoing tests, which uses African Green Monkey cells - which strikes me as more immoral as there must be far fewer African green monkeys than there are people..

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 02 Mar 21 - 05:14 PM

It is highly possible but not certain that the embryonic kidney cells came from an electively-aborted foetus. It's worth pointing out, though it won't mollify everyone, that the cell line from that culture is immortal and that the process by which those cells were originally obtained will never have to be repeated. There is no recipe for future abortions. I suppose it's possible to argue, as I will, that, whatever your stance on abortion, the abortion did happen, it didn't happen specifically to get those cells, and that, by using the descendants of those cells to produce a vaccine, at least some good came out of bad. I can respect the unhappiness that many people will feel about this, but the vaccine is now out there and is going to save countless thousands of lives. As I said, good coming out of bad. I can live with myself on that, and it has nothing to do with what I think about abortion in general.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jeri
Date: 02 Mar 21 - 05:24 PM

The Pope says the vaccine is kosher. Well, maybe my terminology is a little off, but the vaccine is ok.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 02 Mar 21 - 05:36 PM

He did, and I hope that does enough. I can well understand people with views on abortion different to mine having a bigger tussle with their conscience than I have. I just hope that there's not going to be conflation with the issues that vaccine-doubters with other reasons harbour.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 02 Mar 21 - 05:42 PM

I've just read carefully the Vatican statement you posted. Within the context of the Church's anti-abortion position, I think the judgement is measured and wise.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jeri
Date: 02 Mar 21 - 06:19 PM

From Nebraska Medicine:

To make their virus vector vaccine, Johnson & Johnson infects PER.C6 fetal cell line cells with adenovirus. All PER.C6 cells used to manufacture the Johnson & Johnson vaccine are descended from tissue taken from a 1985 elective abortion that also took place in the Netherlands.?They use this cell line because it is a well-studied industry standard for safe and reliable production of viral vector vaccines.

None of the COVID-19 vaccines in development use fetal cells taken from recent abortions.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mrrzy
Date: 02 Mar 21 - 06:46 PM

The stem cells were cloned from a 1970's fetus. All used them in development / research but J&J also use them in production.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 02 Mar 21 - 07:34 PM

Let's just be really clear here. No "stem cells" were used either in the production or testing of our current vaccines. The cells that WERE used are thousands of generations down the line from the original stem cells and were not obtained from aborted foetuses. Now we know how they originated, and it's down to each one of us to make a moral judgement for ourselves. But we should take into account the fact that the vaccines are going to save hundreds of thousands of lives. To coin a cliche, we are where we are, and even the Vatican, reluctantly I'm sure, recognises that.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mrrzy
Date: 03 Mar 21 - 04:41 PM

Hmm... better info is appearing on blood group stuff. Group A is, like they said a while back and then weren't so sure, more at risk. Well, there goes my "I have no risk factors" thought...

Not putting my link here.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 03 Mar 21 - 05:43 PM

Well, again, let's be clear and not propagate misinformation. Risk factors regarding susceptibility to infection or to severe disease apropos of your blood group/blood type may well vary according to what you've got. That is to be expected and is normal, in that our genetics are all different, including blood groups. But this is not a susceptibility-to-coronavirus thread. It's a vaccination thread. The risk factors you refer to have nothing to do with the vaccines. I haven't seen any evidence that any vaccine is any more dangerous to any specific blood type. Please correct me if I'm wrong. Otherwise, it looks like you're clutching at straws.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: robomatic
Date: 03 Mar 21 - 07:42 PM

Mrzzy:

You've been participating in this thread since early days -of the thread' and making comments as to bits you've heard and conclusions you've drawn. You even had a snipped about apparently working where vaccines were being given and somehow you imply without thought for yourself you turned down the opporunity of a jab. After this, you supplemented these messages with the information that you had no intention of getting the jab for your own reasons, which, assuming you've shared everything, which I now doubt, are not really good or well thought out reasons.

You are still contributing to the thread, but for what purpose?

Meanwhile, since this is a brand new pandemic, it turns out that some of the folks who get sick don't really get well. They are being called "long haulers".

You can consider the administration of the vaccines in their millions, as they are now, as a massive uncontrolled experiment. But we are learning and will continue to learn, the fallout of seocndary effects from the vaccine.

While this thread is vastly beyond the minor messaging available through Twitter, the back-and-forth via forum threads is no comparison to the massively complex subject that is vaccine design and administration. These are extremely complex things. If you ask an actual researcher or someone with experience (such as Dr. Fauci), you often get a long, conditional response that may not strike you as confirmatory. That is what real response sounds like. The pithy responses that you hear from those with political axes to grind, or those who only want the easy yes-or-no answer, are just that.

We have had a world-wide disease that is new, but is related to SARS. It has a known kill rate, but much about it is unknown even now, and will remain so until data have been tabulated and reviewed, and more minds have spent time on it. It is known to mutate, but the significance of how much and how bad is unknown as of this date. Like the rest of life, uncertainties exist.

But there is a history of vaccines and how they are developed, what they can and can't do, and this vaccine is taking place in that tradition. I think it is safe to say that most reports are that where the vaccine is administered, the sickness and death counts get significantly better. So these vaccines have been tested to be safe and effective, and that seems to be borne out by numbers from around the world.

The idea of herd immunity is that once a high percentage of the population is vaccinated, incidence and transmission fall. At some point, transmission falls to zero. There are people who never get vaccinated for legitimate medical reasons, but they obtain their safety by the majority of their fellows being vaccinated.

Maybe you do not believe in this stuff. At least you should say so. Your objections or relegation to quibbling on details do not sound like that of someone who is endangered by the vaccine; Rather,they sound like someone who doesn't believe that it applies to themself.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 04 Mar 21 - 01:59 AM

People who refuse the vaccine are stupidly selfish.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Thompson
Date: 04 Mar 21 - 04:39 AM

Anyone who doesn't want vaccines: would they like smallpox back? And polio?

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Senoufou
Date: 04 Mar 21 - 07:21 AM

Anyone entering most West African countries must have proof of a Yellow Fever vaccination. One used to have to have a booster, but now a single jab lasts for life.
One cannot enter the countries there without this proof (It's like a small passport)
Also, one needs proof of being free from TB, and a fairly recent X-ray document is required.
I think the time will come when one will need similar proof of a Covid vaccination to be allowed to fly, book into a hotel, even enter a restaurant or bar etc. Abroad and probably here at home too.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Donuel
Date: 04 Mar 21 - 08:29 AM

ibid robo
same as robo post

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Senoufou
Date: 04 Mar 21 - 08:34 AM

Sorry, to clarify my last post, the proof of being free from TB is for people coming INTO UK FROM several countries, including from most of West Africa. No entry is permitted without this, and the aim is to prevent tuberculosis infecting residents here.
I think countries/public places/anywhere that people mix have the right to insist on vaccination proof in order to protect everybody. Covid is deadly, and even if one survives, one can be terribly weakened for a very long time (eg my poor sister)
My husband has been tested a third time for Covid at the school where he works. He is eagerly awaiting a call for his jab.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Donuel
Date: 04 Mar 21 - 08:55 AM

https://www.cbsnews.com/video/great-apes-at-san-diego-zoo-get-animal-version-of-covid-19-vaccine/#x

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mrrzy
Date: 04 Mar 21 - 09:20 AM

Wups yes the risk factor should have gone into the new news thread. *But* I was referring to my waiting for the jab till people with risk factors got'm first, even though I was offered one because of helping out at the vax site. Yes I *also* want to wait for the effects to be known. But now I have a risk factor, so, hmmm.

I repeat that I am not antivax in general nor recommending anybody else not get the jab. I just wanted to wait because I was a) unsure about untested effects and b) in a group that could wait, anyway. And I was glad to be in the waiting to be last group. Now a) is still true but b) apparently isn't. So I put something in this thread, which is what it is about.

My purpose in posting to *any* thread us the same,.. To add my tuppenny'orth to the ongoing conversation. Just like all y'all.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 Mar 21 - 09:58 AM

Well you haven't made it clear, to me at least, what "risk factor" you think you harbour. Yes you come here to give your tuppence-worth, as do we all. But you've peppered this thread with a fair few implied or explicit negatives which you don't support particularly convincingly. There's a pandemic on that's killing people in droves, and there's been an amazing response from science in a miraculously short time with no corners cut (whatever you may think). The vaccines are safe for virtually everyone and they are effective enough to bring this pandemic crashing down in short order. We all know that nothing's perfect, and nothing would have been perfect had we waited ten years for the vaccines. Reasonable people want an end to the misery and what we don't need is unreasonable doubts being scattered all over the place. Don't have the jab. The rest of us will have to protect you, that's all.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: robomatic
Date: 04 Mar 21 - 10:04 AM

Mrrzy:

You have synopsized your concerns and I guess they are consistent with your previous posts. BUT:

You are now fast approaching if not past decision time and others are part of the process, particularly if you intend to rejoin close association with the human race as it hopefully approaches this thing called herd immunity.

It still seems to me to be a little hinky on your part to have been helping out at a vax site, presumably with access to all the information you could wish, and still be reluctant on your own part to get the jab. And some of your posts in between have been less than fully aware of actual covid and vaccine realities.

We are ALL facing 'untested effects' by definition. I can't promise you that the jab is 100% safe. No one can.

A time comes to 'fish or cut bait'. Are you afraid of a 'children of the damned' situation? "one of us! one of us! one of us!"

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jeri
Date: 04 Mar 21 - 11:00 AM

For someone with a decent amount of training in pathogens and immune responses, it still comes off as paranoid. We can't all have had education in vaccinations, and some of us won't believe anything people tell us. I figure mind-changing is probably not a possibility.

I'd love to know what it would look like to be sure about untested effects. Nobody's testing the effects, other than for immune response, which they've already done, so I think you meant something else (?), but I still wonder what it would take for you to be satisfied.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 04 Mar 21 - 11:11 AM

Robomatic:
It still seems to me to be a little hinky on your part to have been helping out at a vax site

"Hinky, what does that mean?"

Sorry, Robo, gratuitous quote from Tommy Lee Jones in the film "The Fugitive"

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Charmion
Date: 04 Mar 21 - 03:33 PM

We are all participants in the great uncontrolled experiment of Life, which includes many smaller experiments that may or may not be meaningfully controlled.

For most of us, the vaccination campaign is like those scratch-and-win discount coupons they sometimes hand out at big department stores and supermarkets -- scratch the panel to find out if you get 10, 15, 25, 50 percent off, or the big bonanza of Everything Is Free. We know that the vaccine will help, just not precisely how much. We also don't know how likely we are to experience an "adverse reaction" (love that phrase), but so far most of us believe that it won't be much worse than a sore arm and maybe feeling crappy for a day or two.

Since doing nothing seems likely to leave me more vulnerable than I would be with the jab, I'll go with the jab. There is no perfect information. That's my best guess.

Incidentally, Nigel, "hinky" means "strange verging on suspicious".

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jeri
Date: 04 Mar 21 - 04:36 PM

80.5 million vaccine doses given in the USA. Side effects seem to be a sore arm and flu-like symptoms. I haven't read anything recently on people with anaphylaxis, but there's that, too.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Donuel
Date: 04 Mar 21 - 07:33 PM

I hate anaphylaxis, but immunity or something near immunity is great.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 Mar 21 - 07:59 PM

The rate of anaphylaxis for the Pfizer vaccine is around 11 people in a million. Anaphylaxis is an extreme allergic reaction. The vast majority, if not all, of those cases involve people who are allergic to one of the ingredients in the vaccine. It's possible for anyone worried about allergy to have a pre-vaccination discussion with a health professional who specialises in allergy. To give this context, you need to consider the adverse reactions to any medical procedure. Could be to an anaesthetic at the dentist or before an operation, or to having a CT scan or an MRI scan, or a chest X-ray, or donating blood, or having a blood test, or taking paracetamol. I had an operation on my lumbar vertebrae a few years ago. Before I "went under," the surgeon leaned over me, said that there was a one in 300 chance of my dying on the operating table, and did I still want to go ahead. Too bloody right I did: I'd suffered excruciating pain for years.

Can't speak for the US, but here every vaccination centre has someone there at all times who is trained to deal with the emergency of anaphylaxis. Unless you know of an allergy to a vaccine ingredient, using the extremely remote risk of anaphylaxis as an excuse to not have the jab is unacceptable.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jeri
Date: 04 Mar 21 - 08:07 PM

I think it's really rare, and from what I read, it wasn't really a surprise to people who had that reaction. The ones I heard about it had epi pens. I figure if people have severe allergies, it might be predictable. Anaphylaxis is a response to an allergen - something that provokes an immune response. A vaccine provokes an immune response. Last I heard, they were advising people with severe allergies to avoid the shot. They have to have paramedics available at the vaccination sites.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 Mar 21 - 08:13 PM

Common allergies to various foodstuffs or cat hair, etc., don't count. It's an allergy to a vaccine ingredient that matters. Anyone worried can seek advice. I suppose that anyone with a whole array of allergies might have concerns that need checking out. It's easy enough to find out what's in each vaccine. Nothing's perfect, of course.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jeri
Date: 04 Mar 21 - 08:37 PM

When they recommended people with SEVERE allergies not get the vaccine, I think it was because a person's immune system may be prone to freaking out. I don't know what the status of it is now. I think it should be manageable if a person knows they might have a severe reaction, has an epi pen, and consults with the medics at the vaccine site.

I'm only allergic to penicillin, and something unidentifiable in buildings in the UK that caused me to have asthma. I'm pretty sure the penicillin thing isn't a current thing.although I'll try not to get gonorrhea, I have friends who aren't so lucky (allergies, not gonorrhea).

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mrrzy
Date: 06 Mar 21 - 07:49 AM

In all the shifts I have worked at the vax center, there has been 1 reaction requiring an ambulance, and 1 person who drove back 3 days after the jab to say she was still having a reaction and wanted advice. Don't know what either reaction was.

Of all the folks I know personally who have had their second jab, only one had any not-just-sore-or-tired reaction, and it was a fit of shivering and feeling like they were freezing, which happened about 15 hours later and lasted about 20 mn.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 06 Mar 21 - 08:08 AM

Not a problem then, no more than forgetting a coat when the temperature suddenly drops in April.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Mar 21 - 09:14 AM

Well my jaw aches and I dribble down one side after a filling anaesthetic. I often got a big bruise after giving blood or after a blood test. I've had lots of risky X-rays. I've just spent four days with a headache and bellyache taking an antibiotic that is hopefully making me get better.

All these things are just like having any jab. They are medical interventions. They are not exactly what our physiology expects. A reaction is not unlikely. But the science has gone to great lengths to demonstrate that the jabs are safe. You're far more likely to die in the dentist's chair. We don't need this constant emphasis on the negatives.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jeri
Date: 06 Mar 21 - 09:30 AM

I figure it's the second of a two-shot regimen that mostly affects people, so I just won't plan anything for after. (As if I might have plans.) As someone who had a bit of a nasty reaction (flu-like symptoms for 3-ish days. Yay, immune response!) to a flu shot a couple times in the past few years, I won't worry about it.
I quit giving blood because the last few times, I got a nasty migraine afterwards. But shots? Having been in the military, I managed to avoid the plague vaccine, and anthrax. HepA & B, rabies, yellow fever, typhoid, I've had. Plus, the old peoples' vaccines for pneumonia and shingles. Probably more that I can't remember. Mostly, I get a sore arm. I'm happy to say I've had none of those diseases.
The Covid-19 shot seems like a walk in the park.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 06 Mar 21 - 09:36 AM

You probably also haven't had polio or smallpox—those vaccines are so far back you don't even think of them.

When I went to graduate school in the 1990s the paperwork asked when were my measles, mumps, rubella, and chicken pox vaccines. Sorry, I had to report, I had those diseases and formed my own immunity (hence making sure to get the Shingrix shots now).

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Mar 21 - 09:45 AM

Whenever I've got anything medical coming up, I never think about it in advance. Not even if it's having a tooth out. Gotta be done, can't be helped, nobody'll die. I didn't give my jab a thought beforehand. I drove to the jab centre, had the jab and ten minutes later was arguing in the supermarket with Mrs Steve about how many bottles of my favourite wine, on offer with 33% off, to put in the wagon...

It's only a little prick, for God's sake, as the bishop said to the duchess...

And no reactions!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jeri
Date: 06 Mar 21 - 10:34 AM

Me? I've had polio and smallpox. Never had the MMR, because I got all those diseases. Measles almost killed me, and I didn't get chicken pox until I was 13, and I got it BAD. Most people these days are of an age where they never had to deal with these things. For all they know, the shot is worse than the illness, plus, people think they can live forever. So we're having a re-surgence of these things. “Those who don't know history are destined to repeat it.”

I don't think it's "knowing". I think it's ignoring.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Senoufou
Date: 06 Mar 21 - 10:41 AM

My much-loved neighbour-across-the-road had her jab on the same day as me. I asked her the next day if she felt alright? Did she feel any side-effects? Headache? Sore arm?
She's broad Norfolk and a real old-fashioned villager. She looked at me in bewilderment, thought for a moment, then answered, "Woi?" That's all she said. I had to laugh. People here don't believe in making a mountain out of a molehill, and like Steve they just get on with it.
Very good philosophy of life in my opinion.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jeri
Date: 06 Mar 21 - 10:42 AM

Addendum: I haven't had polio or smallpox. I've known people who have, but I've only had the immunizations. But I think SRS was talking to else-folks.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Mar 21 - 02:03 PM

I don't remember the smallpox jab being routinely on offer, though I saw a few people who'd had one. I had the polio one on sugar lumps as I recall. I suffered mumps and measles. When we were pregnant with child numero uno we had a huge scare apropos of rubella. It turned out that Mrs Steve had never had it, so was signed off work for six weeks in the school she taught at as a child there had caught rubella. My mum couldn't remember whether I'd ever had it, so I had to take time off until I was tested. Turned out that I'd had it. It got me two weeks off work though! :-)

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 06 Mar 21 - 02:22 PM

I had the polio vaccination as a child as a course of three injections. This was followed by a booster on a sugar lump as an adult. I received the smallpox vaccination as an adult which was given by a scratch with a scalpel rather than by injection with a needle.

DC

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 06 Mar 21 - 02:29 PM

In fact, the smallpox vaccination as an adult was a booster. The one I received as a child left a scar. This was expected and my sister was given hers in her hip so that the scar would not show when she wore short sleeved blouses.

DC

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jeri
Date: 06 Mar 21 - 03:01 PM

The smallpox wasn't a jab. There was this little round thing with blade to cut the skin, and the "vaccination" was in the tiny cuts. I was told that initially, the skin was cut with razor blades. I don't know how true that is, but the large round scar is because ot the way the vaccine was administered.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Charmion
Date: 06 Mar 21 - 07:36 PM

Scalpel, Jeri. I had two smallpox vaccinations: one in 1960, so I could start school, and the next in 1974, when I joined the regular force.

I never had MMR because I had all those diseases, plus chicken pox, before the inoculations were invented. Polio was the injectable — Salk, I think — version, not droplets on a sugar cube, and we got boosters every year at school. Typhus, typhoid types A & B, tetanus and diphtheria was a single big fat (probably 10-cc) syringe with pink stuff in it, and we got boosters of that, too.

The tuberculosis test was also done at school every year, with a machine that made a noise like a stapler as the technician pressed its business end on our wrists so it could inject a tiny dose of reagent under the outermost layer of skin. In the forces, for some strange reason, we did the TB test the old-fashioned way, with a small syringe and a fine needle slipped between the layers of skin. I never saw a kid faint at a school needle parade, but one or two went down every week during basic — always at either the blood sample station or the TB test. It was seeing the needle pierce the skin that did it.

In the service, I was inoculated against several tropical diseases, too. The yellow fever shot stung something wicked and the cholera shot made me a little feverish, but nothing more.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Joe Offer
Date: 06 Mar 21 - 08:23 PM

Gee, I always thought the scar from smallpox vaccinations was caused by a "pox" at the injection site. I thought it was injected with a regular needle, and then the reaction caused a scab and a scar.
https://www.healthline.com/health/smallpox-vaccine-scar

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jeri
Date: 06 Mar 21 - 09:15 PM

Joe and Charmion, I think when I was small, I was told the smallpox vaccine was administered via tiny cuts in the skin, so I imagined razor blades. When I was older, and got a booster, I remember seeing the single use multi-pronged poky things.

I could still find my smallpox scar, right up to when it got tattooed over.

And TB tests come in a couple different varieties. The simple one, the screening test, is another sort of poky thing. If it comes up positive, you have to get a PPD (purified protein derivative, if it matters), which is given with a needle. The screening test has occasional false positives. The PPD doesn't. The Air Force only gives the IPPD.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 06 Mar 21 - 11:56 PM

Jeri, I meant that you hadn't actually caught smallpox or polio BECAUSE you most likely had the vaccines instead. I wasn't clear enough.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Charmion's brother Andrew
Date: 07 Mar 21 - 09:05 AM

The last time I got a smallpox vaccination was in the mid-1970s (I cannot remember if it was in recruit or officer training, but it was more likely the former). The instrument used was a flat implement of steel like that of a safety razor blade, about 30 mm long and 5 mm wide, with a equilateral triangular "tooth" with sides of about 2.5 mm on one end. The medical assistant (MA) swabbed the vaccination site and applied a droplet of the vaccine to the "target area." The MA then stabbed the droplet and pierced the skin repeatedly with the tooth, maybe a dozen times. She then applied a bandage to the site, and I was off, in the finest traditions of the service, to physical training where all of us with recent perforations to our deltoids did push-ups.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 07 Mar 21 - 06:47 PM

Yes, that's how smallpox vaccine was given, using a "scarifier" to scratch the skin repeatedly. Most people of my generation had it as babies and developed a small scar. I decided to go to Morocco on holiday at age 21 and had to be vaccinated against smallpox again so that I could produce a valid vaccination certificate before travelling there: no new scar from that. Then 3 months later, as part of our medical training in immunology, we medical students had to vaccinate each other! So I got done twice in 3 months - no ill- effects and no new scars!
BCG vaccination for TB also gave most people a scar, but that was after a sort of indolent ulcer developed at the injection site, and took weeks to heal.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Donuel
Date: 08 Mar 21 - 11:39 AM

https://www.businessinsider.com/cdc-guidance-what-can-covid-19-vaccinated-people-do-2021-3

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: The Sandman
Date: 08 Mar 21 - 12:22 PM

So what is the story with pregnant women and vaccines are there problems for them with all the differentvaccines

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Donuel
Date: 08 Mar 21 - 12:28 PM

I get the covid shot next week. None of the State websites worked for months but an academic link got me an appointment. After several hundred tries its been a long process so far in Md.


I had measels and chicken pox at the same time as a kid so I got the shingles vaccine. 2 weeks later I got a painful itchy blister inside my elbow on the same arm as the shot. Its almost gone now but it makes me think I could have gotten shingles for sure.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: fat B****rd
Date: 08 Mar 21 - 03:01 PM

I'm immune to Yellow Fever until November 2023, so there :-}

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Rain Dog
Date: 08 Mar 21 - 03:23 PM

I had my first vaccine on Friday and am due to get the second one on 21st May.

Easy to book and just took 20 minutes from arrival to leaving.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 08 Mar 21 - 03:24 PM

We used to call the TB test we had when I was in school six needles. It sounded a bit nasty but wasn't bad.

I had measles and German measles (rubella) as we called it then as a kid but am not sure about mumps. I seemed to escape (at least no symptoms) chicken pox when all three of my brothers had it.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 08 Mar 21 - 07:00 PM

That was the Heaf test, the one with 6 needles: not a vaccination. If the test was negative you then got the BCG vaccination. Mine was positive so I had to go for a chest X-ray, but it was all clear.
There were no vaccines for measles, mumps or rubella when I was a kid. Polio vaccination ( by injection then) came in during my early teens.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Donuel
Date: 09 Mar 21 - 08:26 AM

One will not test positive from the vaccine unless they already were infected pre jab.
The antibody tests will also show no positives except for one type that looks for nucleotides.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: robomatic
Date: 10 Mar 21 - 12:21 PM

"60 Minutes" US had an interesting story about a repurposed drug that was successfully used to reduce the danger of the Covid-19 virus. This drug was NOT promoted by anyone in the Trmp government, which was diversionary in so many of its activities.

Meanwhile, our Governor has opened vaccination to all appropriate ages. Sort of like the airline announcement that "the rest of us may board."

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: The Sandman
Date: 11 Mar 21 - 08:39 AM

so does anyone here know anything about the different vaccines, why one vaccine only needs one jab, do they all work in the same way?

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: The Sandman
Date: 12 Mar 21 - 10:47 AM

it seems the uk are moving faster than ireland, i do not know whose fault that is europe or ireland

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 12 Mar 21 - 11:03 AM

If you can get this US radio program, on Monday's Fresh Air: CRISPR Scientist's Biography Explores Ethics Of Rewriting The Code Of Life Terry Gross interviewed Walter Isaacson about his new book Code Breaker that describes the process of developing these vaccines. He follows Jennifer Doudna who was instrumental in the process.

Jennifer Doudna and Emmanuelle Charpentier won the 2020 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for their role in developing this technology. (And what is so incredibly remarkable about this? Not only is it two women who won this prize, they're both still in the prime of their lives and not dusted off to receive recognition for work performed decades ago!)

The Pfizer and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines are the first vaccines to be activated by mRNA — and would not have been possible without the invention of the gene editing technology known as CRISPR.

In his new book, The Code Breaker, author Walter Isaacson chronicles the development of CRISPR and profiles Jennifer Doudna, who, along with Emmanuelle Charpentier, won the 2020 Nobel prize in chemistry for their roles in developing the technology.

CRISPR has already led to experimental treatments for Huntington's disease and sickle cell anemia, as well as certain cancers. Isaacson likens its technological capabilities to "Prometheus snatching fire from the gods — or maybe Adam and Eve biting into the apple."

There is a lot more text on the site even if you can't hear or download the podcast.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Allan Conn
Date: 12 Mar 21 - 12:15 PM

I take it the Irish roll out is much slower than the UK is because they agreed to go along with the EU idea of all doing it together! They have then been slower to order and slower to approve the vaccines. Which means the UK is on a head to head basis well ahead of the curve compared to the EU. We have been lucky in a way. We approved Astra-Zeneca for the over 60s before the data proved the efficacy in the over 60s. We took the word of the scientists at face value when they said there was no reason to doubt it's effectiveness in the elderly! And that gamble seems to have paid off as initial results both in Scotland and England seem to suggest that its effectiveness is even higher than Pfizer's high effectiveness. Could have gone the other way I suppose.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 12 Mar 21 - 12:35 PM

The US has millions of the AstraZeneca in surplus because it has been produced here but hasn't been approved here. Other countries that have approved it need those vaccines and it would behoove the US to give those vaccines to the places that can use them now.

The U.S. Is Sitting on Tens of Millions of Vaccine Doses the World Needs

Those tens of millions of doses from AstraZeneca are waiting for trial results, while countries that authorized the vaccine beg to have them.

WASHINGTON — Tens of millions of doses of the coronavirus vaccine made by the British-Swedish company AstraZeneca are sitting idly in American manufacturing facilities, awaiting results from its U.S. clinical trial while countries that have authorized its use beg for access.

The fate of those doses of AstraZeneca’s vaccine is the subject of an intense debate among White House and federal health officials, with some arguing the administration should let them go abroad where they are desperately needed while others are not ready to relinquish them, according to senior administration officials.

AstraZeneca is involved in those conversations.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: keberoxu
Date: 13 Mar 21 - 03:24 PM

The local radio channel just broadcast a news "soundbite"
quoting ... hmm ... who were they quoting? ...
that 10% of the United States population is vaccinated now.

We in the US really ought to do better than 10% -- ...

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 13 Mar 21 - 03:31 PM

Over 50, in England, I'm due to get my first jab within a month, I think; and vaccinations are at least one thing we've done well at.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mr Red
Date: 14 Mar 21 - 03:52 AM

An interesting video from November says that the trials of Moderna & Pfizer differed from the Astra Zenica/Oxford vaccine by one detail that surprised me. (6:30 mins in)

The A-Z vaccine trials checked for infection constantly, while the Pfizer/Moderna looked for people showing symptoms of COVID. Which explains the early result differing, which even Dr Fauci reckoned long-term statistics would show a migration to a similar efficacy.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Donuel
Date: 16 Mar 21 - 04:02 PM

In the future I expect to get booster varient vaccines as common as a flu shot.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 16 Mar 21 - 05:53 PM

The A-Z vaccine trials checked for infection constantly, while the Pfizer/Moderna looked for people showing symptoms of COVID.
Seriously? In trials Pfizer/Moderna were looking for symptoms for something which we already knew could be carried asymptomatically?

Looks like another bonus for Astra-Zeneca.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Senoufou
Date: 17 Mar 21 - 02:31 PM

My husband's extremely elderly mother has been vaccinated in Adjame (district of Abdijan) Apparently it was the Oxford Astra-Zeneca vaccine. We're very pleased. But the family is now planning a huge baptism celebration and there will be dozens attending, unmasked and undistanced. Husband is furious, but they seem oblivious to the dangers.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Donuel
Date: 17 Mar 21 - 03:40 PM

CVS is now vaccinating with Pfizer in the store after a 5 day registraation for an appointment. No age requirment except no children.
I saw it with my own eyes, not yours.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jos
Date: 17 Mar 21 - 04:42 PM

Today I heard a new word (new to me, anyway):

Vaccinee.

(Or at least, I don't think it was 'vaccine-knee'.)

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Donuel
Date: 18 Mar 21 - 04:45 PM

We are now half vaccinated but have another 5 weeks to an all clear of sorts.
We have all been careful as the saying goes but mostly we've been lucky.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 20 Mar 21 - 08:02 AM

Overmorrow is the word that comes to mind!!!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mrrzy
Date: 20 Mar 21 - 03:38 PM

If you have to take vaccine
Take it orallyyyyy
For you know the other way
Can most painful beeeee

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: robomatic
Date: 20 Mar 21 - 06:09 PM

Allan Sherman

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Donuel
Date: 27 Mar 21 - 09:15 AM

Of its 30,000 employees the NIH has documented its first of a fully vaccinated person contracting Covid. The person has not yet been sequenced so the variant possibility id dtill an open question. This ongoing and new incident here may be small odds of vaccine failure or something else.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Donuel
Date: 27 Mar 21 - 09:50 AM

Of its 30,000 employees the NIH has documented its first case of a fully vaccinated person contracting Covid. The person's virus has not yet been sequenced so the variant possibility is still an open question. This ongoing and new incident may be small odds of a vaccine failure or something else.

Mrrzy the technology in the production of micro fine thin needles makes shots painless today compared to the 'spikes' of the past.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mrrzy
Date: 29 Mar 21 - 04:31 PM

Data are a -cummin in that the 2-shot vaxes do prevent infection, not just illness, yay!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: robomatic
Date: 29 Mar 21 - 07:41 PM

Mrrzy, I haven't read here that you've actually got the shot(s), or did I miss it? Are you walking round and round the pool, or have you taken a dive?

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Donuel
Date: 31 Mar 21 - 10:51 AM

Our shots are good for about year but 3 to 5 varient vaccines should be developed. Currently a 4th wave is growing in the US. We don't know the full impact of varient spread . Dr. Brilliant who cured smallpox says the globe will never reach herd immunity and will chase varients ad infinitum. The UK varient is now found to be more severe. All in all bad news but even a small feeling of reprieve is being enjoyed with the return of the sun.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mrrzy
Date: 01 Apr 21 - 07:45 AM

Still just directing traffic [more foot than vehicle now] at that pool *but* the data are looking better and better. I am likely to take the jab when my turn rolls around. I would prefer 3 to 5 years of data, but am predicting June.

Meanwhile, my vax site has started jabbing anybody in 1b. Finally. You can walk in if you are over 65, or claim an underlying health issue, or work with people.

We count a lot of things as underlying health issues, too. One super-ethical dude hung out looking through the list of co-morbidities, then didn't claim any, though I bet his bmi was higher than 25.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Rain Dog
Date: 03 Apr 21 - 03:19 AM

Re travel restrictions within the US

Following an item on BBC radio this morning, I had a look at the CDC recommendations for travel with the USA.It says that if you are fully vaccinated you can travel within the US and do not have to self quarantine on arrival. It does also state you should follow local recommendations too.

How does this work in practice. Do airlines, hotels etc ask for proof?

I ask the question because here in the UK there is talk of maybe people having 'vaccine passports' in the near future.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 03 Apr 21 - 11:48 AM

Just saw that a plane-load of people flew from Gatwick (UK) to Alicante (Spain): the majority of them were sent back straight away. Only Spanish nationals returning home were allowed in. Don't think vaccinated or not came into it!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mrrzy
Date: 03 Apr 21 - 06:01 PM

All through my embassy brat days we had health cards to show with passports while traveling, that said if we had the vaccines needed to go places. Nothing strange there.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 03 Apr 21 - 07:28 PM

The difference is, Mrrzy, that those other vaccinations gave you long-lasting or even lifetime immunity to said diseases. The jury is still out on how long immunity lasts after COVID vaccination, and therefore what faith or validity you could place on COVID vaccination certificates.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mrrzy
Date: 04 Apr 21 - 09:14 AM

Not so, Tattie Bogle. We had to get cholera and typhoid shots every other year, for exampke. Gamma globulin was every two years in the 60s but up to every 6 months by the late 70s. And there were lots more.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mrrzy
Date: 04 Apr 21 - 09:15 AM

And kids in Virginia have to show they've had their shots for school, I just remembered. So not new at all.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 06 Apr 21 - 01:40 PM

Ah yes, Mrrzy, you’re right about the older typhoid and cholera shots and the gamma globulin. But most of these have been replaced by longer-lasting vaccines. e.g. the current typhoid vaccination offered in the UK for overseas travel needs a booster every 3 years. Boosters for polio recommended after 10 years if fully vaccinated before and travelling to affected areas.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 06 Apr 21 - 05:35 PM

I posted this on the new news about the pandemic thread and was requested to post it here as well.

---

This is HUGE news!

Researchers Are Hatching a Low-Cost Coronavirus Vaccine

A new formulation entering clinical trials in Brazil, Mexico, Thailand and Vietnam could change how the world fights the pandemic.

From the article (a big middle chunk of it, in case it can't be read outside the US):

But simply injecting coronavirus spike proteins into people is not the best way to vaccinate them. That’s because spike proteins sometimes assume the wrong shape, and prompt the immune system to make the wrong antibodies.

This insight emerged long before the Covid-19 pandemic. In 2015, another coronavirus appeared, causing a deadly form of pneumonia called MERS. Jason McLellan, a structural biologist then at the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth, and his colleagues set out to make a vaccine against it.

They wanted to use the spike protein as a target. But they had to reckon with the fact that the spike protein is a shape-shifter. As the protein prepares to fuse to a cell, it contorts from a tulip-like shape into something more akin to a javelin.

Scientists call these two shapes the prefusion and postfusion forms of the spike. Antibodies against the prefusion shape work powerfully against the coronavirus, but postfusion antibodies don’t stop it.

Dr. McLellan and his colleagues used standard techniques to make a MERS vaccine but ended up with a lot of postfusion spikes, useless for their purposes. Then they discovered a way to keep the protein locked in a tulip-like prefusion shape. All they had to do was change two of more than 1,000 building blocks in the protein into a compound called proline.

The resulting spike — called 2P, for the two new proline molecules it contained — was far more likely to assume the desired tulip shape. The researchers injected the 2P spikes into mice and found that the animals could easily fight off infections of the MERS coronavirus.

The team filed a patent for its modified spike, but the world took little notice of the invention. MERS, although deadly, is not very contagious and proved to be a relatively minor threat; fewer than 1,000 people have died of MERS since it first emerged in humans.

But in late 2019 a new coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2, emerged and began ravaging the world. Dr. McLellan and his colleagues swung into action, designing a 2P spike unique to SARS-CoV-2. In a matter of days, Moderna used that information to design a vaccine for Covid-19; it contained a genetic molecule called RNA with the instructions for making the 2P spike.

Other companies soon followed suit, adopting 2P spikes for their own vaccine designs and starting clinical trials. All three of the vaccines that have been authorized so far in the United States — from Johnson & Johnson, Moderna and Pfizer-BioNTech — use the 2P spike.

Other vaccine makers are using it as well. Novavax has had strong results with the 2P spike in clinical trials and is expected to apply to the Food and Drug Administration for emergency use authorization in the next few weeks. Sanofi is also testing a 2P spike vaccine and expects to finish clinical trials later this year.

Two prolines are good; six are better

Dr. McLellan’s ability to find lifesaving clues in the structure of proteins has earned him deep admiration in the vaccine world. “This guy is a genius,” said Harry Kleanthous, a senior program officer at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. “He should be proud of this huge thing he’s done for humanity.”

But once Dr. McLellan and his colleagues handed off the 2P spike to vaccine makers, he turned back to the protein for a closer look. If swapping just two prolines improved a vaccine, surely additional tweaks could improve it even more.

“It made sense to try to have a better vaccine,” said Dr. McLellan, who is now an associate professor at the University of Texas at Austin.

In March, he joined forces with two fellow University of Texas biologists, Ilya Finkelstein and Jennifer Maynard. Their three labs created 100 new spikes, each with an altered building block. With funding from the Gates Foundation, they tested each one and then combined the promising changes in new spikes. Eventually, they created a single protein that met their aspirations.

The winner contained the two prolines in the 2P spike, plus four additional prolines found elsewhere in the protein. Dr. McLellan called the new spike HexaPro, in honor of its total of six prolines.

The structure of HexaPro was even more stable than 2P, the team found. It was also resilient, better able to withstand heat and damaging chemicals. Dr. McLellan hoped that its rugged design would make it potent in a vaccine.

Dr. McLellan also hoped that HexaPro-based vaccines would reach more of the world — especially low- and middle-income countries, which so far have received only a fraction of the total distribution of first-wave vaccines.

“The share of the vaccines they’ve received so far is terrible,” Dr. McLellan said.

To that end, the University of Texas set up a licensing arrangement for HexaPro that allows companies and labs in 80 low- and middle-income countries to use the protein in their vaccines without paying royalties.

Meanwhile, Dr. Innis and his colleagues at PATH were looking for a way to increase the production of Covid-19 vaccines. They wanted a vaccine that less wealthy nations could make on their own.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mrrzy
Date: 06 Apr 21 - 05:59 PM

Ok so my site had one single dose that was going to go to waste so I said I'd take it but when I got up front someone else who worked there had called a friend in and given it to them.
So whew!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 06 Apr 21 - 07:54 PM

Oh Mrrzy, you should get yours, of all people! Hope you are quicker on the draw next time there’s a spare one going!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 07 Apr 21 - 12:42 AM

How Wisconsin turned around its lagging vaccination program — and buoyed a Biden health pick

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: robomatic
Date: 07 Apr 21 - 07:22 PM

Alaska is the most vaccinated of U.S. States.

Our death numbers are down to nothing. Our infection counts are going up somewhat. There are many people living north of Anchorage who are politically opposed to the vaccine, even though former Governor Sarah Palin came down with the disease and advised people to get vaccinated. I believe we are experiencing younger people who are getting themselves exposed by flouting the exposure guidelines.

I had a conversation with a health care worker who is in their 20s. They got their two shots of Moderna and were sick for three days after each jab. That is the toughest reaction I've learned about. They were told it was a tribute to their immune system. They are fully back to normal now.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mrrzy
Date: 08 Apr 21 - 06:28 PM

I walked in for my shift today and they pulled me out and jabbed me. Pfizer. Well, 6 months of data are better than none...

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: keberoxu
Date: 08 Apr 21 - 08:21 PM

Hooray, Mrrzy, and welcome to the, er, stadium.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: robomatic
Date: 08 Apr 21 - 09:10 PM

Congratulations Mrrzy. "One of us, one of us, one of us....."


Seriously, hope you have no side effects and the vaccine protects you as it seems to be protecting most people.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 08 Apr 21 - 11:39 PM

I got the Pfizer shots in January and February. I felt a bit lethargic for a few days after, but no other symptoms. I felt ecstatic that I had the vaccine and now could start a bit more activity around town. I'm still careful, wear a mask, keep my distance, but am glad that chances are excellent if I came into contact, I wouldn't end up in the hospital. That's what is important.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 08 Apr 21 - 11:55 PM

Kati Kariko Helped Shield the World From the Coronavirus. I've read about her before.

Collaborating with devoted colleagues, Dr. Kariko laid the groundwork for the mRNA vaccines turning the tide of the pandemic.

She grew up in Hungary, daughter of a butcher. She decided she wanted to be a scientist, although she had never met one. She moved to the United States in her 20s, but for decades never found a permanent position, instead clinging to the fringes of academia.

Now Katalin Kariko, 66, known to colleagues as Kati, has emerged as one of the heroes of Covid-19 vaccine development. Her work, with her close collaborator, Dr. Drew Weissman of the University of Pennsylvania, laid the foundation for the stunningly successful vaccines made by Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna.

For her entire career, Dr. Kariko has focused on messenger RNA, or mRNA — the genetic script that carries DNA instructions to each cell’s protein-making machinery. She was convinced mRNA could be used to instruct cells to make their own medicines, including vaccines.

But for many years her career at the University of Pennsylvania was fragile. She migrated from lab to lab, relying on one senior scientist after another to take her in. She never made more than $60,000 a year.

By all accounts intense and single-minded, Dr. Kariko lives for “the bench” — the spot in the lab where she works. She cares little for fame. “The bench is there, the science is good,” she shrugged in a recent interview. “Who cares?”

Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institutes of Allergy and infectious Diseases, knows Dr. Kariko’s work. “She was, in a positive sense, kind of obsessed with the concept of messenger RNA,” he said.

Dr. Kariko’s struggles to stay afloat in academia have a familiar ring to scientists. She needed grants to pursue ideas that seemed wild and fanciful. She did not get them, even as more mundane research was rewarded.

“When your idea is against the conventional wisdom that makes sense to the star chamber, it is very hard to break out,” said Dr. David Langer, a neurosurgeon who has worked with Dr. Kariko.

Dr. Kariko’s ideas about mRNA were definitely unorthodox. Increasingly, they also seem to have been prescient.

“It’s going to be transforming,” Dr. Fauci said of mRNA research. “It is already transforming for Covid-19, but also for other vaccines. H.I.V. — people in the field are already excited. Influenza, malaria.”

The rest is found following the link.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Rain Dog
Date: 13 Apr 21 - 04:32 AM

From The Guardian website reporting on an interview on BBC radio 4 this morning.

++
Fauci says that US may not 'need' to use Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine
US infectious disease official Dr Anthony Fauci has been on the media in the UK this morning, and said if safety concerns about AstraZeneca’s Covid-19 vaccine were straightened out it had good efficacy, but it might not be needed for Americans because of supplies of other shots.

“I think that the AstraZeneca vaccine from a standpoint of efficacy is a good vaccine, and if the safety issue gets straightened out in the European Union … the efficacy of that vaccine is really quite good,” he told BBC radio.

“The way the United States has made contractual relationships with a number of companies, we clearly have enough vaccine – or will get enough vaccine – that does not include AstraZeneca, which would be enough quantitatively to vaccinate everybody in the United States.”

Reuters reports that he added: “Whether or not we ever use AZ is unclear but it looks right now at this point in time that we will not need it. It’s not a negative indictment of AZ, it is just possible that given the supply that we have from other companies that we may not need to use an AZ vaccine.”

So far, 120.8 million people have received one or both doses of a vaccine in the US, and the Joe Biden administration has been keen to emphasise the speed at which it is being administered.
++

I don't know how many AstraZeneca vaccines the US has in store rather than on order. Perhaps they might think about offering some of them to other countries now rather than later.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Rain Dog
Date: 13 Apr 21 - 10:28 AM

From the BBC site in the Last hour

++
Johnson & Johnson says it's going to delay the rollout of its vaccine in Europe, and is reviewing cases of extremely rare blood clots in a small number of people who've received the jab.

US health officials earlier called for a pause on Johnson & Johnson's single-dose vaccinations, after six people there developed a rare disorder involving blood clots.
++

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Donuel
Date: 13 Apr 21 - 10:36 AM

The recommondation in the US for the J&J vaccine is to pause its use because in rare cases platletes drop and open people to a cerebral blood clot. Care givers may decide to use it depending on risk factors.
6 rare cases of blood clot have been seen.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Rain Dog
Date: 13 Apr 21 - 01:16 PM

As I understand it the AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson (Janssen as it is known in Europe) are similar types of vaccine.

Here in the UK there was some debate as to how rare that type of blood clot was in the pre-covid population. I don't recall seeing any further information on that.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 13 Apr 21 - 01:20 PM

This was posted in a Facebook political group:

Feel free to do the math...

Over 7 million people in the US have received the Johnson & Johnson COVID vaccine - 6 developed a rare blood clot side effect and sadly, one person died from it.

The response has been to pause the distribution and use of the vaccine. 1-in-7 million...

The US currently averages 3.96 deaths per 100,000 due to gun violence. Nearly 20,000 deaths last year. The response has been higher gun sales... and no meaningful control efforts on the horizon.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 13 Apr 21 - 01:36 PM

I couldn't possibly comment!!!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jeri
Date: 13 Apr 21 - 01:56 PM

I remember them saying the incidence of blood clots in patients who received the Astrazeneca vaccine wasn't higher than that of the general population. (Maybe something's changed?) I don't know what's going on with the J&J. It SHOULD be investigated. None of these vaccines are approved by the FDA (or whatever the British equivalent would be) so they need to be extra watchful. I'm still answering CDC questionnaires regarding side effect of the Moderna one.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Rain Dog
Date: 13 Apr 21 - 02:36 PM

They are keeping watch for unusual/dangerous side effects both here in the UK and Europe. The usual process for any new drug/vaccine.

Here in the UK, Alison Astles, the sister of Neil Astles who died from a blood clot, spoke very eloquently urging people not to be put off from having the jab. She is a pharmacist and felt she had a responsibility to speak out "because, overall, we will save more lives by people having the vaccine than not".

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: robomatic
Date: 14 Apr 21 - 10:38 AM

By comparison, consider the incidence of Reye's syndrome, which is associated by the use of aspirin in young people who have other issues going on. It affects less than one in a million among young people. It is associated with aspirin, and when it occurs it can be deadly serious. There is usually a warning on an aspirin box if you look for it.

There is no causal relation between Reye's syndrome and the incidence of blood clots for a very small, very very small, proportion of vaccinnees. In the case of AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson we are still on a learning curve, and the phenomenon of vaccine resistance is substantial, including some in this thread.

At this point in time, I think there are valid doubts as to whether or not we're going to obtain herd immunity anywhere. This is serious because it will lead to more people getting sick with Covid variants, and we could get into a 'chasing-our-tail' situation.

The lesson is: Get those vaccines into people, but do the research because the nay-sayers are gonna neigh their lungs out without doing any research.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Apr 21 - 11:21 AM

"Vaccinnee..." Bwahahaha!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 14 Apr 21 - 11:55 AM

With the entire population slated to hopefully receive the vaccine, and with people suffering from various ailments at any given time, the coincidence of someone receiving a vaccine near the time some other health event happens is probably higher than 1 in a million. Determining if these clots are coincidence or an extremely rare yet treatable side effect is going to slow a lot of people from getting the much-needed vaccine. Being aware of the clotting issue and the treatments (and if someone begins to have a problem get a blood test and find out about the platelets) seems a prudent warning label, but please, go ahead and give the vaccines. Far more people will die of COVID if they don't receive it. The odds are working against those who might get clots, so be vigilant, but get the vaccine.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mrrzy
Date: 15 Apr 21 - 09:46 AM

We have "paused" J&J. Most folks being rescheduled for Pfizer, here.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 15 Apr 21 - 02:32 PM

My husband and I both have our 2nd vaccinations next week: both survived Astra Zeneca unscathed for our first one, but maybe "Wish me luck as you wave me goodbye"............

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: robomatic
Date: 15 Apr 21 - 03:33 PM

Congrats Tattie, I think that even the reported problems indicate such a low incidence of secondary effects that the overall situation is outstandingly good as far as vaccine quality and efficacy is concerned.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Ebbie
Date: 17 Apr 21 - 11:05 PM

I'm biting my tongue here. Let me point out that I cannot be the only one who has serious issues with the vaccine. I am 85 years old and don't scare easily but others may be that lucky.

I am NOT an anti-vaccer. I AM at high risk. I don't mind needles or shots. Being treated for lupus years ago cured me of any fear of those.

Every time I have gone to hospital they have discovered another medication (last time it was oxy codone!) I am either sensitive to or outright allergic to. As one seemingly miffed doctor said: Well, she is certainly not used to narcotics.... Twice I have had to stay in the hospital an extra two days.

I have had anaphylactic shock; let me tell you that I have never ever felt such pain as in that incident. It felt as though every cell in my body had risen up and was fighting the one next to it. That was before I lost consciousness and was gone for almost three hours. It is easy to say that there are medical people there to intervene in the event. Fine. They can keep me alive, but I am the one with the experience.

One more thing: If allergic reactions were all that rare, why would they bother to ask?

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mrrzy
Date: 18 Apr 21 - 08:00 AM

The people at risk for the weird rare blood clots after vaccination with non-mRNA vaccines appear to be white women in their thirties maybe forties, who are the people most likely to get that weird rare clotting thing without the jab. Not posting my link.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 18 Apr 21 - 11:39 PM

They also seem to have some issue to do with low platelets.

The Atlantic: The Blood-Clot Problem Is Multiplying
So are theories to explain it.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mr Red
Date: 20 Apr 21 - 10:49 AM

It may be rare but Johnson & Johnson (et al) producing clots ?

Tell us in the UK about it! Stanley Johnson & his missus did it 60 years ago.

One of the great unknowns is the rate of problems in the general public is masked by the great messy thing that is life. In a time of mass vaccinations there is far more visibility on the health of those vaccinated. Whereas, in life without mass vaccinations some cases will go unnoticed. Or described as TIAs or alcoholism black-outs. Etc.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: robomatic
Date: 21 Apr 21 - 12:08 AM

Ebbie:

I hear you. You need to make sure you're heard by the relevant medical folks. You need to think it out for yourself. I don't think you'd be here and opening up about your history if you were close minded.

Allergic reactions are not common. They are not rare. They exist and there are at least hundreds of kinds of them.

So listen to the professionals. Make sure they lisen to you and understand your concerns.

These vaccines, I believe, are better than those of the past, precisely because of the novel technology that enabled their creation. But they are not for every single body.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 24 Apr 21 - 11:29 AM

I'm still here - 2 days after AZ 2. My daughter has a naturally low platelet count, so was relieved that she got the Pfizer jab: she is younger, but had it earlier for occupational reasons.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: JHW
Date: 26 Apr 21 - 06:15 AM

Had headache and shivers after my first AZ jab, I don't usually react to jabs. Second last week no reaction.
We await expert research or opinion on how long protection may last. Being here at all is only chance.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Rain Dog
Date: 26 Apr 21 - 11:07 AM

From The Guardian newspaper

AstraZeneca said it would “strongly defend itself in court” and highlighted its supply of 50m Covid vaccine doses to European countries as Brussels launched legal action against the pharmaceutical company over delivery shortfalls.

The Anglo-Swedish firm said it regretted the decision by the European commission to start a legal case over alleged breaches of an advance purchase agreement.

And

In response, AstraZeneca said it was on course to fulfil its commitments to the EU for the end of this month and noted that its vaccine made up 97% of the doses provided to the world’s poorest countries though the Covax initiative.

Full article here

EU Commission sue AstraZeneca

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Ebbie
Date: 27 Apr 21 - 04:12 AM

Thanks, robomatic. I'm hoping that the powers will address the issue.

As for vaccines being better than they used to be, I'm quite sure that is true. However, when I told the surgeon that I'd had bad reactions to various medications 30 years before the currently scheduled hernia surgery, she reassured me. "Oh, medications are so much better now," she said.

And of course, I spent an extra two days in hospital....

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Rain Dog
Date: 27 Apr 21 - 06:31 AM

When they ask me if I am allergic to anything, I always reply "not that I know of". You never know when these things will change.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: robomatic
Date: 27 Apr 21 - 02:34 PM

I'm a regular blood donor. They always ask me if I'm allergic to iodine before they wipe you down for the jab. I always say: "Not yet!"
Good times!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: JHW
Date: 29 Apr 21 - 06:09 AM

Had my second jab this week. No reaction but then I didn't actually see it go in!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mrrzy
Date: 29 Apr 21 - 01:20 PM

2d jab in arm! My superpowers kick in in 2 weeks...

Then in 5 years we'll get data. Looking forward to them. Wish I coulda waited but oh, well.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Rain Dog
Date: 29 Apr 21 - 01:45 PM

5 years would be quite a wait.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 29 Apr 21 - 06:31 PM

My husband and I have both done the UK Biobank Covid antibody test, having both had 2 vaccinations, and we have both had positive results: good news, but hope the antibodies last!

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Jack Campin
Date: 29 Apr 21 - 08:10 PM

How do you get that antibody test?

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: keberoxu
Date: 30 Apr 21 - 10:53 AM

Good question, Jack. I'm not sure what all's going on there.

The website for the CDC in the United States offers what they call
"INTERIM" guidelines for COVID-19 Antibody Testing,
which makes me question the word "interim."
I get kind of lost at this point.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 01 May 21 - 12:12 PM

Here in North Texas there are now announcements of "no appointment/walk in" locations in addition to all of the drug stores and doctors' offices with the vaccines. And the public service ads are ramping up with popular actors and other celebrities promoting vaccinations.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Mrrzy
Date: 03 May 21 - 09:40 AM

We are starting to do walkins and also doing fewer vaccinations. I am not happy.

Subject: RE: BS: 2021 vaccination thread
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 04 May 21 - 02:08 PM

Jack, we have been enrolled in the UK Biobank for a good few years now: apart from one face-to-face interview and a few health checks some years back, it has mainly been based on online questionnaires re our state of health, weight, height, diet, lifestyle, etc. The Covid antibody test was offered as the latest intervention, so we both signed up for it: a kit was sent in the post, with full instructions how to do your own test, which involved a finger stab with provided lancet and a device into which we had to put a drop of blood and supplied reagent, and read the result 20 minutes later: then just send the result back via the website.
See: UK Biobank