Variants
The Delta strain is spreading fast. This could be because it easier to catch (because infected people cough more often, infected people breath out more particles, or fewer virus particles are needed to get you sick, etc.) or because infected people become contagious more quickly. This study says that infected people don’t become contagious more quickly, therefore Delta is easier to catch.
Mitigation Measures
The Government of Canada says that Canadian businesses, non-profit organizations, or charities who have seen a drop in revenue during the COVID-19 pandemic may be eligible for a subsidy to cover part of their commercial rent or property expenses. This covers rents from September 27, 2020 until June 2021.
The Canadian government will loosen border entry requirements for Canadian residents and citizens. Starting in July, entering residents and citizens who have been fully vaxxed get to skip the in-hotel quarantine. They will still need to take a COVID-19 test and isolate until the test results come back.
Supply
Moderna is teasing Canada again, saying that they will ship 7M doses in June. They have broken many promises, so I will believe it when I see it.
However, for the first time, some of the Moderna doses will be coming from the US. Moderna has delivered at least 41M doses to the US, so maybe their US plants are more competent than their Swiss ones.
Interestingly, the feds’ vaccine supply page has not been updated since slightly after General Fortin was yanked from his position as the vax rollout head.
Disease
This study looked at markers of immune responses and damage in COVID-19 patient autopsies, compared with non-respiratory deaths, respiratory but non-COVID-19 deaths, and multiple sclerosis. They found a distinct and different signature, which (aside from confirming that there can be a shitton of COVID-19 infection of the central nervous system) might lead to better treatment.
Vaccination
In this study, Qatar, which was thinking about lifting the testing requirement on fully-vaxxed inbound air travellers, looked at test-positive rates for fully vaxxed/not fully vaxxed passengers. They found that 0.82% fully vaxxed passengers were positive, while 3.74% of the unvaxxed passengers were positive. (1.01% of the passengers who weren’t vaxxed but who had been sick with COVID-19 were positive.)
This shows that unvaxxed people are significantly more likely to test positive, but also shows that fully vaxxed people are not immune.
(I kind of wonder how many of the proof-of-vax records were forgeries.)
This case study talks about three of the first Canadian patients who developed blood clots from AZ. All three were given immunoglobulin gamma and blood thinners as treatment.
The first thing that’s interesting is that they were between the ages of 63 and 72, two men and one woman. I realize that “anecdote” is not the singular of “data”, but this sample population is really different from the “young women” population that they thought was more susceptible.
The second thing to note is that blood clots are not to be messed with. By the end of the paper’s time period, one patient went home, one was awaiting amputation, and I think the last one was better but still in the hospital. Note that these were some of the first blood clot patients, so they probably didn’t know what they were doing yet.
The third interesting thing is that IV gamma globulin seemed to be a real win for these three cases. (Yay!)
Recommended Reading
This article talks about how the US’ individualism is hurting its pandemic response. In particular, it shows how the “go ahead and lose the mask if you are double-vaccinated” ties into individualism and was a bad idea.
This article talks about how COVID-19 is not going to go away, and what the US should do about it.
This article talks about Long COVID.