Vaccines This article reports that Health Canada has approved half-dose Moderna as a booster for people over 18. Mitigation Measures This article says that organized crime stole relief funds in various ways. Recommended Reading In the Before Times, there were a fair number of international medical personnel stationed in Uganda. This article says that when… Continue reading 2021-11-12 General
Category: Mitigation Measures
2021-11-06/7/8 General
Disease As I mentioned back in May 2020, they discovered a new coronavirus in Malaysia in samples from 2017 and 2018 which appears to have jumped directly from dogs to humans. They found this coronavirus because someone decided to go looking for unknown coronaviruses, and whaddayaknow, there one is! There wasn’t a big fuss because… Continue reading 2021-11-06/7/8 General
2021-11-04 General
Genetics This preprint talks about using virus-like particles to study viruses. It looks enough like SARS-CoV-2 that it can get into cells, but then it can’t replicate. Essentially, it’s shooting blanks. This study identified a specific gene variant (which comes from Neanderthals!) which gives a 2x risk of respiratory failure. About 60% of people of… Continue reading 2021-11-04 General
2021-11-02 General
Vaccines This article says that vaccine effectiveness in England was only about 50-60% against infection in the June/July 2021 period. There’s a stat called the number needed to vaccinate (NNV), which is a measure of how many people you would need to vaccinate to prevent some outcome. The NNV for 80 year olds to prevent… Continue reading 2021-11-02 General
2021-10-21 General
Mitigation Measures This article talks about $7.4B in relief spending that the Government of Canada has announced. All three of these programs will go until 7 May 2022. Canada Recovery Benefit (CRB) will be replaced by the Canada Worker Lockdown Benefit and will provide $300 a week to eligible people. The Tourism and Hospitality Recovery… Continue reading 2021-10-21 General
2021-10-16/17/18 General
Vaccines This study in Sweden of mix&match effectiveness against symptomatic infection found that a second dose of mRNA was better after a first of AZ than a second dose of AZ: 1st Dose 2nd Dose Effectiveness AZ AZ 50% AZ Pfizer 67% AZ Moderna 79% Pfizer Pfizer 78% Moderna Moderna 87% This article says that… Continue reading 2021-10-16/17/18 General
2021-10-15 General
A friend kept ragging on me about using the trade names for various vaccines. I held firm because it was more correct and accurate. He complained that nobody knew the names, but I pointed out that people got used to Alpha, Beta, Gamma, and Delta. I now give up. Nobody and I mean nobody but… Continue reading 2021-10-15 General
2021-10-13 General
Diagnosis / Equity This Twitter thread suggests that the reason darker-skinned people have higher fatality rates from COVID-19 is because, well, they have darker skin: pulse oximeters, which are used to judge how serious a case is, don’t work on dark-skinned people. Economic effects This video from January 2021 makes the economic case — not… Continue reading 2021-10-13 General
2021-10-08 General
Risk Factors This preprint says that having a bad mutation on the (X-linked) TLR7 gene is very very bad for your COVID-19 prospects. The authors think this accounts for about 1.8% of severe COVID-19 in male patients under 60. But here’s some good news on genes: this preprint says that a change in one nucleotide… Continue reading 2021-10-08 General
2021-10-06 General
Mitigation Measures This article says that the Government of Canada has come out with new vaccine mandates. All federal employees — including those who work from home or in a different country — have until 29 October to get vaccinated. Everyone over 12 must be vaccinated to take a plane or train inside Canada. Transmission… Continue reading 2021-10-06 General