Vaccines Apparently there’s some people being concerned about mRNA vaccine ending up in the ovaries. This Twitter thread takes that idea down. Tl;dr: the lipid envelopes which contain the mRNA migrate around, and a small amount ends up in the ovaries (as it does to lots of organs, most notably the liver), but such a… Continue reading 2021-06-25 General
Category: Variants
2021-06-22 General
Mitigation Measures This paper looks at the strategy of eliminating vs. mitigating and concludes that eliminating is better. It says that the countries which went for elimination (Australia, Iceland, Japan, New Zealand, and South Korea) have done much better than the ones which went for mitigation. Um, notice anything about those countries? None of them… Continue reading 2021-06-22 General
2021-06-20 General
Variants I have been scaremongering about Delta, saying it is more transmissible, causes more severe cases, and is transmitted more in schools. I apparently need to back off a little bit. Delta is more transmissible, that’s uncontestable. This very interesting tweet thread says that the data does not support there being more transmission in schools.… Continue reading 2021-06-20 General
2021-06-17 General
Vaccines The US just donated 1M Moderna doses to Canada. Canada received 330K Johnson & Johnson doses, but it’s going to sit on them right now because of concerns about contamination. Canada will also refuse any more J&J shipments. Today NACI advised Team AZ to get mRNA for the second dose. While I think this… Continue reading 2021-06-17 General
2021-06-10 General
Vaccines AstraZeneca is in the process of developing a booster, AZD2816 (their original one was AZD1222), to do better against new strains. (As you might recall, AZD1222 is shit against Beta.) This paper says that it does well against all the strains in mice and test tubes. This article says there is a different AZ… Continue reading 2021-06-10 General
2021-06-09 General
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… Continue reading 2021-06-09 General
2021-06-08 General
Vaccines There are a fair number of studies about how many antibodies a given vaccine induces the patient to make, but this study seems to say that a lot of the antibodies which a patient produces in response to a vaccine aren’t actually useful at killing the virus. The antibodies you produce after getting a… Continue reading 2021-06-08 General
2021-06-03 General
Vaccines In general, I try not to post about things that people SAY are going to happen, preferring to wait until it actually happens. However, I am and have been quite excited about Novavax for a long time, so I am really pleased to hear that they are finally going to announce the results of… Continue reading 2021-06-03 General
2021-06-02 General
Vaccines This preprint says that in a very small study (26 participants) in Germany, a Pfizer boost after an AZ prime gave fewer side effects than the first dose (AZ). Based on in vitro measurements, AZ+Pf appeared to be at least as good as AZ+AZ. Antibodies were three times higher in AZ+Pf than AZ+AZ, and… Continue reading 2021-06-02 General
2021-06-01 General
Vaccines Canada’s National Advisory Committee on Immunizations has decreed that it’s okay to get an mRNA shot after an AstraZeneca shot. They had been waiting for the efficacy results from a big UK study, but the study has been delayed another month, and they (along with many other immunology boards) finally said “screw it, we’re… Continue reading 2021-06-01 General