Miscellaneous And Off Topic Subjects

[Ghengis Jon]

SCOTUS rules that the Amish cannot be forced to install a modern septic system due to their religious beliefs. What thresh hold, if any, does the SCOTUS use for defining a "legitimate" religion? Would they likewise rule a gov't body could not force a Christian Science member to take a child to the hospital suffering from appendicitis? Gorsuch cites 'sincerity' in the specific religious belief and implies Church establishment longevity as a factor.


https://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2021...7041625257614/


Does Wiz get a pass from the health department because he is a true believer in the 1st Church of Sex With Chickens As Part Of Making Wings?

[Jeff Buchanan]

Last evening's NYT feed (they do an evening COVID overview) was more muted than the FL headline I posted above........but there's plenty of hand wringing as in "experts are concerned we're unfurling the Mission Accomplished flag too soon." This is in reference to a lawn party Chairman Joe is throwing at the WH on July 4th. There are 1000 invited guests, OMG!, mask are not required. However a negative COVID test is.

The balance in the overview comes when the report reveals that any increases in COVID cases are in counties with low Vax rates. They also not that federal PH agencies are sending cash and experts to targeted counties that are hot spots indicating that a shift in approaches to mitigation measures are changing - more surgical and less Machete. That someone at the NYT has recognized COVID is highly regional and it is misleading to associate viral control or lack thereof to nationwide new case numbers is pretty astounding.

As I noted a while back, I write in a cruise blog mostly to counter false information that some moron comes up with to support his particular view on COVID related issues, like getting vaccinated. TBH, I'm a vaccination proponent if you are able and eligible so, I'll admit a bias. The cruise lines have required vaccinations for 12 and over to board on sailings from every cruise port except FL's. The reason for the FL exemption is the Desantis statewide ban on asking for proof of vaccination to enter any venue or business. Cruise lines appear to have elected not to challenge this in court and instead offer this: you can volunteer your vaccination status. If you are unvaccinated or decline to disclose that you are or are not, you will be subject to additional restrictions. The net result is that those who aren't vaccinated and are sailing from FL have said fuck it, I'm not going. Cruisers with families - most of whom simply don't want to have their kids vaxed are pissed off at the cruise lines claiming all sorts of idiotic shit in support of their positions, e.g., "my body, my choice and the constitution guarantees that right." Wrong. Anyway it's fun and when I politely post facts, that shit stops.

I have come around on one issue - parents bring up as rationale for not allowing their kids (under 18) to get vaccinated that the vaccines are EUAuthorized, not fully authorized and the data isn't there to insure they are safe. Then we have myocarditis and a few other documented side effects that parents don't want to take the chance with. The CDC has declared the benefits to kids of vaccination outweighs the risks associated with getting COVID. There are rational pediatricians and physicians who think the CDC is wrong about this and advise against vaccinating kids right now. This is especially applicable in regions where viral prevalence is low, with that shifting the risk benefit analysis enough to make risks of kids catching COVID (already pretty low when it comes to serious illness) less than risk of vaccination serious side effects. It's an interesting argument. The facts in support of opposition, IMO, don't support it but it's complicated and subject to how one interprets the data.

As an aside, if you have risk factors (age or medical conditions) that predispose you to serious COVID related illness if you catch it, I'm in the camp that thinks you should get vaccinated. As others have posted here, the actual risks of serious illness decrease as age decreases making not getting vaccinated a rational and defensible option but this argument does not address the issue that everyone that is unvaccinated contributes to the risk of increased transmission of SARS2 in the communities within whihc they reside. This is especially true wher vax rates are low.

There's a physician who has a rep of bashing the CDC and in some cases, rightfully so. His name is Vinay Prasad. He builds a strong case asking that the CDC revisit it's recommendations on kids and vaccines. He bases this on 5 errors the CDC has made in it's latest ACIP ( Advisory Committee on Vaccination Practices) recommendations. He makes a defensible case. Not everyone agrees with his position though. It's worth pointing out that when it comes to interpreting data and making recommendations based on it, scientists, especially MDs, rarely agree on anything. Worth a read if your interested in ACIPs recommended vaccination practices for your kids.

https://www.medpagetoday.com/opinion/second-opinions/93340?trw=no

[Jeff Buchanan]

Some additional COVID stuff. I'm not an alarmist by any measure but the increased transmissibility of the Deltas is a real factor in prolonging this thing. I still don't think we should or will see major and widespread restrictions to mobility and business activity but there will be inconvenient re-imposition of mitgation measures in places where vax rates are low. It is not too hard to see the potential for SARS2 obtaining greater capacity to evade our immune systems, vaccines and therapies when it is left to percolate globally.

Delta.PNG

[lineygoblue]

Does Wiz get a pass from the health department because he is a true believer in the 1st Church of Sex With Chickens As Part Of Making Wings?

Wiz would never do anything with chickens other than fry them to a crispy and delicious tastiness.

However he has been placed on a national watch list for those who can't control themselves around tractors.

[Jeff Buchanan]

Sorry I have more ..........I have a subscription to the Economist. I just finished reading an incredibly interesting article that detailed exactly how mutations form and why the currently known mutations seem to grow in their capacity to be more transmissible. The article is pay-walled so I'll provide some takeaways:

SARS2 has demonstrated some unique properties in the way viruses mutate. These include multiple substitutions and deletions in a specific protein - the "spike proteins" that bind to ACE2 cells in bats and humans. That bats have many more ACE2 cells make them a perfect reservoir for viral evolution to occur. The article doesn't say this but the apparent "better" environment for viral evolution of the SARS2 virus in bats strengthens the theory that it evolved and was transmitted to humans via bats sold in wet markets than it was engineered in the Wuhan lab. Not by any means a slam dunk though. All of this research is very early and very recent. I'm still in the fuck the Chinese crowd.

The good news is that SARS2 may have run out of places on the spike proteins to evolve. The point is made that the behavior of all viruses become limited by this fact. While SARS2 has demonstrated its capacity to evolve into more transmissible and potentially more lethal forms, like all viruses, they run out of room to evolve and eventually recede.

In humans, the immune system also evolves when it encounters a new threat like SARS2. So, it's a battle that involves SARS2 becoming limited in it's ability to evolve and the human immune system continuing to get better at fighting it and surviving. In the end, humans win. That is a historical perspective that goes way back to when this sort of thing was first recorded and studied, the Bubonic Plague in the mid 1300s.

What the above implies is that it is unlikely that recurring "boosters" will be required and this is particularly true for the mRNA vaccines, less true in degree for traditionally developed vaccines that deliver protection through viral vectors. There is already concern about the effectiveness of the the Chinese and Russian vaccine in conferring as high a level of protection as mRNA vaccines are delivering. What is being considered is administering a "booster" of an mRNA vaccine to individuals who have been vaxed by traditionally developed vaccines. As an aside, the AZ and J&J vaccines are not traditionally developed vaccines and are delivering a comparable level of effectiveness as the Pfizer and Moderna mRNA vaccines. Don't go running out to get a third dose of a Pfizer or Moderna vaccine if you got the J&J .... and to that point don't defer getting vaxed, if you chose to do so, and wait for an mRNA vaccine. It is more important to get vaccinated with something rather than deferring a jab waiting for something else.

[CGVT]

I’ll save you all some time

Buchanan’s posts summed up:

Get the fucking shot

Carry on

[Jeff Buchanan]

I’ll save you all some time

Buchanan’s posts summed up:

Get the fucking shot

Carry on

Well, not really a good summation, CGVT. Like I said, I'm a vaccination proponent but on balance, under the right circumstances, the benefit of the vaccine and associated risks attendant to it, have to be balanced against the risks - sometimes exceedingly low - of getting infected by SARS2 and developing a serious illness with COVID.

IMO, most people should get vaccinated but there are specific circumstances where it my not be beneficial to get vaccinated. The risks of the vaccine, although small and considered within the realm of normal for vaccines in general, they are not zero. Pediatricians and other scientists, for example, argue that the risks associated with children, specifically males, receiving the vaccine are greater than the benefit when local seroprevalence is low. That's a pretty specific subset. I think arguments advanced that attempt to excuse the choice of not getting vaccinated by the over 40 cohort, are hard to defend. 19-39? It's not as clear from the standpoint of the risk of COVID related serious illness; it's very clear that vaccination is a good thing in this age cohort as a means of reducing transmissibility, especially with regard to the Delta variants.

So, yeah, in general, get vaccinated.

[lineygoblue]

An article from the NYT that says the J&J turns out to be pretty doggone effective, even against the dreaded "delta variant". That's what we got.

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/01/h...ine-delta.html

From the article: Antibodies stimulated by the vaccine grow in strength over time, researchers also reported.

[Jeff Buchanan]

So everyone understands this when you see shit like the J&J vaccines aren't as effective as the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines, the first thing to do is understand this:

There is a difference between efficacy and effectiveness, the former being derived from trial data, the later from actual and evolving longitudinal data collected in the real world. These terms are conflated all the time and are the source of a ton of misinformation.

The J&J vaccine is in the neighborhood of 88-92% efficacious in preventing serious illness and death in trials. Both mRNA vaccines have upwards of 95-98% efficacy. Of course this leads to the nonsense that you see on social media platforms that you have a 12% risk of dying from COVID taking the J&J vaccine and only a 2% chance taking the Pfizer shot. Wait for the Pfizer shot. Nutz.

Here are the facts: in real world studies of vaccinated people, the AZ, J&J, Pfizer and Moderna vaccines are upwards of 95% effective - all of them with only variances of tenths between them. All of them have also demonstrated the same level of protection of reinfection v. the Deltas - not to mention that if you do get re-infected you probably won't know it. Just recently studies have demonstrated that the viral load of SARS2 in the nostrils and oropharynx of vaccinated people who got re-infected with the original version of SARS2 or any of the mutants had substantially less circulating virus in the samples than were found in early samples going back to March of 2020. What this means is that if someone that is unknowingly infected sneezes or coughs and spreads snot, if you walk through that cloud of snot, you won't get much exposure to the virus compared to that same situation a year or more ago.

That's the current thinking anyway slightly overcome by the fact that the mutants, especially the deltas, have more ways to latch on to your cells even though there may be less of them in your nose and throat following an exposure.

[lineygoblue]

The position I'm taking is that I'm going to consider myself fairly well protected against the virus. If my doctor tells me its time to get a booster, I'll get it, just like I would if he told me it was time to update any other shot that I get. Recently, I had to have a booster for a shot that I need every 10 years. Doc asked me to roll up my sleeve, and I got the shot. Because he told me that it was necessary. My doctor is a well studied doctor. I trust his opinion. I won't be led by the nose by the media or any politician when it comes to my personal health care. My doctor knows me personally, he has access to all my private medical records, and because I know him to be a very good doctor, I trust his recommendations.

Back in 2016, my doctor asked me if I'd ever had a colonoscopy. (I was 62 at the time) I told him "no". He told me that I should have had one at 55 years old, at the very latest. He said he strongly recommended that I have tests (gross, I won't describe) to see if I could possibly have colon cancer. The tests came back positive, that CC was a real possibility. He said I needed to have the colonoscopy immediately. The colonoscopy revealed I had several polyps, one that was very large and appeared cancerous. He told me I needed a 'resection' immediately, and that it was possible that I'd need cancer treatment afterward. The next month or so was agonizing for me and my family. It took nearly 2 months before the surgeon could get to me. Fortunately for me, even though cancer was found within the polyp, it had not spread outward. It had just started.

The moral to all that is that I now get all tests and immunizations recommended by my physician, without delay. If Doc tells me I need a Covid booster, I'll get it. If Fox News or pMSNBC tells me I need a booster, I'll ignore them.

[CGVT]

Glad you had good results with the CC, Liney. One of the "good" things about CC is that it usually grows slowly, but if you don't know that you have it...

I have a family history so I have been on a 5 year schedule since I turned 50. I've had some polyps removed but none were cancerous. I'll continue my 5 year schedule, because as unpleasant as the colonoscopy may be, I am sure it isn't near as unpleasant as cancer. BTW, if it has been a while since you have had one, the prep is a bit easier than it used to be when you had to drink a gallon of that damn laxative the day before . (now it is only about a cup. Ha!)

[lineygoblue]

I'm still on a yearly basis because my last one in December had a couple very small polyps. I'll be back in there this coming December or January.

If I can avoid drinking the GLOP, I'm completely in favor of that...

My GI doctor is a MSU grad. I think she knows I'm a M fan. I've wondered many a time if she somehow enjoys her job a bit too much when she works on me.

[CGVT]

You should ask her about the newer stuff. I think it is more expensive. I think I had to pay about 60 bucks out of pocket for it, but it was worth every penny.

[Dr. Strangelove]

Dopey's defense team must love love love the rallies

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-rally-sarasota/2021/07/03/6965b6b2-dc71-11eb-ae62-2d07d7df83bd_story.html

[Dr. Strangelove]

Happy 4th of July!