I am not sure the report @T28 posted is the one that triggered the article in the Zurcher Unterländer I quoted, as they refer to Swedish and Israeli studies. The US Study basically sais the same thing,but with different vaccines, so AZ is not included.
Also it never said that Peter wrote:
It does not support the wild claims of vaccines being useless after x months;
Depends on the definition of “useless”. What it sais is that the effectiveness of the vaccination against certain scenarios is decreasing with different rates depending on the vaccine. According to some people I know who have a better understanding for the data than I do, say that while those who are sick from Corona despite dual vaccinatioon is still small, it is growing. So the claim that certain vaccinations loose the protection after a certain time, is only logical.
The main focus appears to be on “symptomatic illness”,where almost all vaccines loose effectiveness after between 4 (AZ) and 8 Months (Moderna).
Protection from severe illness with or without hospitalisation appears to take longer, yet the effectiveness also reduces.
Consequently, 3rd shots will be needed p.d.q. to stop this trend.
I see nothing very surprising in this, apart from the rather short times. It is only normal that now we get more experience on how effective the vaccines are, that results will be published and also countermeasures need to be taken.
To be fair, I believe the source posted by @T28 (presumably to support the journalistic claims linked to by @Mooney_Driver) talked of infection, not illness.
It does seem that vaccine protection against infection is waning fast, and perhaps was never particularly great in the first place. Most of the clinical trials used symptomatic infection as a primary endpoint. Only AZ’s phase III trial routinely tested participants for Covid-19, and even then not particularly often – every 8-12 weeks – plenty of time to contract and then shrug off an asymptomatic infection between tests.
The protection against serious illness is quite evidently considerable. The UK government stats on vaccinated vs non-vaccinated that I posted a page or two ago make this quite clear, and also support the idea that protection against infection is quite limited.
To be fair, I believe the source posted by @T28 (presumably to support the journalistic claims linked to by @Mooney_Driver) talked of infection, not illness.
The study looks both at infection and illness effectiveness.
Finally, we did not examine VE against hospitalization but used death as a surrogate for clinical significance of infection. Our finding that VE-D remained high during the Delta surge is consistent with U.S. studies showing sustained protection against hospitalization (15, 30, 45).
The Dutch are going to lock down again, it seems:
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/11/12/world/europe/covid-netherlands-lockdown.html
By Christopher F. Schuetze
Nov. 12, 2021, 6:04 a.m. ET
The Netherlands’ government plans to introduce a three-week partial lockdown to quell a fourth wave of Covid infections amid a spike in case numbers, the public broadcaster NOS reported on Friday.
It is the first recent lockdown affecting all people — whether vaccinated or not — in Western Europe, and it comes as the Netherlands registered 16,364 new cases on Thursday. That figure, a level not seen since early in the pandemic, was a 33 percent rise over the new cases registered a week earlier.
Starting on Saturday, restaurants, bars and cafes in the country will have to close at 7 p.m. Sporting events will be held without spectators. Residents will not be allowed to invite more than four guests into their homes. And social distancing rules will be reinstated, though stores that sell essentials will remain open.
Prime Minister Mark Rutte and Hugo de Jonge, the health minister, are expected to announce the measures on Friday evening.
Mr. Rutte’s cabinet will also discuss on Friday whether to introduce longer-term measures that would require people to provide proof of vaccination or past infection to get access to certain services or to participate in certain events.
About 76 percent of the country’s population is fully vaccinated against the coronavirus, according to Our World in Data.
Malibuflyer wrote:
Comparing Covid deaths to deaths from Cardiac insufficiency is like comparing 9/11 deaths to deaths from road traffic. So why should we bother about terrorism?
[…]
So we are talking about less than 1/3 of the yearly US military budget. How many lives did the US military safe in that year compared to let’s say those 600.000 Americans that died of cancer that year? So why bother about military at all as long as we have cancer?
These are both very good questions! (Bur perhaps not in the way you intended?)
The fact that almost 20 percent of critical Intensive care capacity in 2020 were taken by COVID patients makes it clear that suppression was necessary.
The deaths in France were concentrated in 4-5 months – April/May and Oct-Dec, so during that period there were probably more than half of these beds required for COVID. And that was WiTH lockdown measures, I can’t but help roll my eyes at people seriously falling for the “I didn’t get sunburn, why did I bother with the sunscreen?” fallacy.
But now that the lethality is reduced to around 1/10th of the initial value or less, indeed the handwringing about cases and new lockdowns appear well over the top.
Cobalt wrote:
But now that the lethality is reduced to around 1/10th of the initial value or less, indeed the handwringing about cases and new lockdowns appear well over the top.
Depends where you are looking. Some countries are far worse than before.
Austria, Netherlands, e.t.c. are going to lock down again, that much appears sure.The others will follow. no choice. 1/3rd or more non vaccinated plus a growing share of the vaccinated who are ill and need hospitals as well will be well capable of getting hospitals over limit yet again.
Cobalt wrote:
The deaths in France were concentrated in 4-5 months – April/May and Oct-Dec, so during that period there were probably more than half of these beds required for COVID. And that was WiTH lockdown measures, I can’t but help roll my eyes at people seriously falling for the “I didn’t get sunburn, why did I bother with the sunscreen?” fallacy.
sure, there was a huge peak in April, rapidly going down towards beginning of May with a MUCH smaller peak towards the end of the year. having 4000/5000 of the 19000 beds(which was the number at the peak) occupied by COVID patients makes it seem slightly more manageable in a country of 60Mio people.
Whether lockdowns help or not, we will likely never agree on. I am very firmly in the camp of those that the cure is worse than the disease with 35% of youth in France stating they have experienced suicidal impulses because of the lockdowns my argument is simply not just economic, though from that perspective the measures can only be described as insane.
Again, I try to ‘educate’ myself and be less black and white about the matter (to this date I fail to as the idiocy of it all just pisses me off ;-)) but this is a more balanced read on it. https://theconversation.com/why-nobody-will-ever-agree-on-whether-covid-lockdowns-were-worth-it-161154
LFHNflightstudent wrote:
Whether lockdowns help or not, we will likely never agree on. I am very firmly in the camp of those that the cure is worse than the disease
Those are two very very different questions.
Looking at the numbers of by now three waves there is no reasonable doubt that lockdowns are actually helping to reduce hospitalizations and ICU cases. I would really like to see a fact based argument against it.
It is a very different question if the effect of lockdowns on hospital utilization has been and is actually worth the “collateral damage” on economy, mental health, …
This one is a much more difficult question and beyond the facts it is also based on personal opinions, values, mindest, etc.
I would also make a distinction between the first lockdown (or two) and ongoing lockdowns.
In those early months there was no testing (in the UK at least) so nobody knew how many actual cases there were. Nobody knew how the disease was transmitted. But with those “cases” doubling twice a week, and a “guesstimated” 1% of those dying about 5 weeks later, you could not sit back and do nothing. You risked a WW1 death toll packed into a few months, and a burned-out health service .
But now with vaccines, and better knowledge and treatments, the decision can be less panicky.
Also, ongoing lockdowns are worse than simple multiples of that first one. Among other things we still need to educate children properly, and use the full workforce to provide goods and services and invest in the future. We can’t stop those things indefinitely.
