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PsychMike

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  1. Before Mongone went on a ventilator, she sent Vereckey a very emotional text. "One of her last texts to me was, 'I was so dumb. I should have gotten vaccinated. It was my belief. I was worried, wanted to do more research. But I was wrong. I should have gotten vaccinated,'" Vereckey said. "It broke my heart because I just knew she was really, really sick." After Mongone got sick, she made sure her 17-year-old daughter got vaccinated, her friend said.
  2. It's in press, I think. We know from past experience, she's going to plagiarize this: Of course, the Editor will change the picture on the cover and make a slight yet apt revision to the title:
  3. Comparative kinetics of SARS-CoV-2 anti-spike protein RBD IgGs and neutralizing antibodies in convalescent and naïve recipients of the BNT162b2 mRNA vaccine versus COVID-19 patients Ioannis P Trougakos # 1, Evangelos Terpos # 2, Christina Zirou 3, Aimilia D Sklirou 4, Filia Apostolakou 5, Sentiljana Gumeni 4, Ioanna Charitaki 6, Eleni-Dimitra Papanagnou 4, Tina Bagratuni 6, Christine-Ivy Liacos 6, Andreas Scorilas 7, Eleni Korompoki 6, Ioannis Papassotiriou 5, Efstathios Kastritis 6, Meletios A Dimopoulos 4 Affiliations collapse Affiliations 1Department of Cell Biology and Biophysics, Faculty of Biology, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Athens, Greece. itrougakos@biol.uoa.gr. 2Department of Clinical Therapeutics, School of Medicine, Alexandra General Hospital, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Athens, Greece. eterpos@med.uoa.gr. 3Thoracic Diseases General Hospital Sotiria, Athens, Greece. 4Department of Cell Biology and Biophysics, Faculty of Biology, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Athens, Greece. 5Department of Clinical Biochemistry, "Aghia Sophia" Children's Hospital, Athens, Greece. 6Department of Clinical Therapeutics, School of Medicine, Alexandra General Hospital, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Athens, Greece. 7Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Faculty of Biology, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Athens, Greece. #Contributed equally. PMID: 34420521 PMCID: PMC8380479 DOI: 10.1186/s12916-021-02090-6 Free PMC article Abstract Background: Coronavirus SARS-CoV-2, the causative agent of COVID-19, has caused a still evolving global pandemic. Given the worldwide vaccination campaign, the understanding of the vaccine-induced versus COVID-19-induced immunity will contribute to adjusting vaccine dosing strategies and speeding-up vaccination efforts. Methods: Anti-spike-RBD IgGs and neutralizing antibodies (NAbs) titers were measured in BNT162b2 mRNA vaccinated participants (n = 250); we also investigated humoral and cellular immune responses in vaccinated individuals (n = 21) of this cohort 5 months post-vaccination and assayed NAbs levels in COVID-19 hospitalized patients (n = 60) with moderate or severe disease, as well as in COVID-19 recovered patients (n = 34). Results: We found that one (boosting) dose of the BNT162b2 vaccine triggers robust immune (i.e., anti-spike-RBD IgGs and NAbs) responses in COVID-19 convalescent healthy recipients, while naïve recipients require both priming and boosting shots to acquire high antibody titers. Severe COVID-19 triggers an earlier and more intense (versus moderate disease) immune response in hospitalized patients; in all cases, however, antibody titers remain at high levels in COVID-19 recovered patients. Although virus infection promotes an earlier and more intense, versus priming vaccination, immune response, boosting vaccination induces antibody titers significantly higher and likely more durable versus COVID-19. In support, high anti-spike-RBD IgGs/NAbs titers along with spike (vaccine encoded antigen) specific T cell clones were found in the serum and peripheral blood mononuclear cells, respectively, of vaccinated individuals 5 months post-vaccination. Conclusions: These findings support vaccination efficacy, also suggesting that vaccination likely offers more protection than natural infection. Keywords: Anti-S-RBD IgGs; BNT162b2 vaccine; COVID-19; Neutralizing antibodies; SARS-CoV-2; Viral infection.
  4. Holy Shit, they have a TE named Jaeger Bull? Doomed!
  5. OMG, the post about Truffles the clown lady was just the chef's kiss of Schadenfreude!
  6. Interesting language...is it like 20% more? Because that'd still be 0. Seriously, I look forward to beating the hawg shit outta Arky, hopefully with Collins playing a role in it.
  7. He also jumped out a window with his dick in his hand I thought that was John Henry.
  8. "Well, I mean I don't really have to believe in this stuff, do I?" "No, no! Just...fucking tell everybody you believe in this shit. When they say 'the sun sucks,' go, 'Yeah, fuck the sun! I fuckin' hate it too! Long live the fuckin' beast!'"
  9. Don't remember seeing this on this thread...
  10. I found this article to be helpful to assist in understanding where we are today and how to decide upon the necessity for boosters. Is it Delta or waning immunity? The summer Covid-19 breakthrough surge explained. Jeremy Faust (ER Physician, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medicine) Is the surge in breakthrough coronavirus cases in the United States a result of the Delta variant or is it due to waning immunity as vaccine recipients get further in time from their initial doses? The conventional wisdom says that it is a lot of both. I now believe that's wrong. I have spent weeks obsessed with this question. I did not want to speak out on it until I had a better sense of the answer. I finally feel confident enough to put my chips down. It is now clear to me that the surge in breakthrough Covid-19 cases in the United States is almost entirely a result of the Delta variant, and not an indication of waning immunity. Yes, measured antibody levels in vaccine recipients are now lower than they were right after vaccination. But that does not necessarily have clinical meaning, nor is it unexpected. By analogy, someone standing in three feet of water is not “nearly drowning” just because that person was previously standing in two feet of water; nor are they necessarily destined to soon be standing in eight feet of water. The fact that the breakthrough surge is driven by Delta has important implications on whether to boost, whom to boost, when to boost, and with what vaccine formulation. ••• Why do I feel confident that the surge in breakthrough cases is due primarily (though not completely) to the Delta variant? The data are buried in a handful of scientific papers recently circulated in the peer-review and preprint literature. Once excavated, the body of evidence is compelling. First, we can use the fact that we implemented a phased vaccine rollout to gain a key insight. Remember the phased rollout? Though perhaps a distant memory, back in January, only seniors and healthcare workers were eligible for vaccines. Then, as the winter progressed and spring arrived, ever-younger groups of people became eligible. That means if waning immunity were the problem, we would see breakthrough cases, breakthrough hospitalizations, and breakthrough deaths grow in a specific and predictable sequence: the order in which the phased vaccine rollout occurred. We would expect to see breakthrough cases in the oldest people (who mounted lower antibody levels to begin with) and in healthcare workers first. Next, we’d see more breakthrough cases in middle-aged adults. Finally, we would see increases among the last group to become eligible for vaccination this spring, younger adults and teens. That’s not what happened. Instead, the data from New York show that breakthrough cases rose in all age groups at the same time and right as Delta took over in the region. The absence of an age-specific sequence—in which older people succumbed first—virtually eliminates the waning immunity theory as the driver of the breakthrough surge. If anything, it appears that breakthrough infections increased among the younger population somewhat before older adults. Another very recent study that includes data from 13 states reports that breakthrough hospitalizations rose in all age groups simultaneously, both this spring and this summer. That makes no sense if this is all just waning immunity. ••• Another important observation is that the rise in breakthrough Covid-19 cases in the United States tracked tightly with the rise of Delta’s dominance over other SARS-CoV-2 variants. That’s highly suspicious, but only circumstantial evidence; that alone would not be enough to close the case. After all, what if Delta sprang onto the scene just as our antibody levels happened to be waning, giving that variant a plentiful and ever-growing supply of newly at-risk targets to infect? The argument against that possibility is that breakthrough infections started to occur in regions where Delta showed up first, rather than in areas that had earlier vaccine rollouts, whose populations would certainly be expected to show the first signs of waning immunity (first immune, first to have immunity fade). If breakthrough infections were mainly driven by waning immunity, we would have initially noticed more breakthrough infections in areas that vaccinated the most people early, such as in the northeast. That is simply not what happened between January and April, when breakthrough cases were first noted. By July, the first month in which Delta represented a majority of infections in every major region in the United States, it was clear that more breakthrough cases were occurring in places that combined two undesirable ingredients: low rates of vaccination and towering Delta dominance. Places like Utah and Missouri—both of which had vaccination rates under 50% among adults and where Delta represented 85% and 93% of all cases respectively in July—had a small but noticeable fraction of breakthrough cases (that is, among new Covid-19 cases, the percent that occurred among vaccinated people remained small, but was notably greater than in other states for which we had data). On the other hand, states including Connecticut, Massachusetts, Delaware, and Virginia had far fewer breakthrough cases. These are precisely the states with the highest vaccination rates, over 60% among adults by July, and where Delta was comparatively less dominant at the time, at 54% (Massachusetts and Connecticut) and 57% (Delaware and Virginia). Two interesting states to notice during July were Nebraska and New Jersey. Nebraska had relatively few breakthrough cases despite Delta dominance in the region (93%; The CDC bundles Nebraska into the same subregion of the country as Missouri). But Nebraska had a rather high vaccination rate, with over 60% of its adults fully vaccinated by then. New Jersey also had a relatively small number of breakthrough infections in July, despite a relative Delta takeover in the region (then accounting for approximately 70% of all cases). But New Jersey’s vaccination rate among adults had surpassed 70% by late July, among the highest in the nation. The message is clear. If your goal was to avoid breakthrough hospitalization this summer, you wanted to be in a region with high rates of vaccination and lower Delta prevalence. It did not matter whether antibody levels in your community were waning or not. ••• What does this mean for boosters? Taken together, these data suggest that the effectiveness of the vaccines should no longer be compared to how they performed in the clinical trials or during the first few weeks of a rollout. We just need to know more about their sustained performance during the Delta era. Because hospitals are not being overrun by breakthrough infections, we genuinely have the time to study whether a Delta-specific booster might perform better than either the original two-dose series, or better than a 3rd dose of the original vaccine. We have time to learn whether half or full doses of these boosters would provide all the protection we need but with fewer adverse events that could convert vaccine-hesitant people who have received zero doses into firm “No’s.” With these vaccines, we have built a mighty wall against Covid-19. That wall is a bit leakier in the face of Delta. How best to fix the problem is an important question that urgently requires answers. But we are not being flooded by vaccinated breakthrough cases. We have enough time to gather the information we need to act smartly and achieve the best systemic outcomes that take all of these considerations into account. We don’t need to scramble and throw up another wall without the right safety checks in place. That’s how people get hurt. ••• References and further reading: Breakthrough cases reflected the rates of vaccination by age. They did not happen among the oldest people first (i.e. those who were vaccinated first): https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/mm7021e3.htm Antibody levels were higher in younger people and a bit lower in older people early after vaccination: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41564-021-00947-3 Data from New York following breakthrough hospitalizations and infections during the pre-Delta and early Delta periods: https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/mm7034e1.htm Data from 13 states on breakthrough infections during 2021. Rates of breakthrough infection hospitalization changed in all age groups simultaneously both in the spring and summer (Green line, figure 3A and 3B): https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.08.27.21262356v1.full.pdf The CDC’s variant tracker, by region: https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#variant-proportions. Recent breakthrough Covid-19 data by state: https://www.kff.org/policy-watch/covid-19-vaccine-breakthrough-cases-data-from-the-states/ Special thanks to Dr. Jonathan Graf and Dr. Angela Rasmussen for helpful conversations about this topic. https://insidemedicine.bulletin.com/537599687311876/
  11. The First Lady of Texas Football showed out...(not sure if this is in Game Thread).
  12. What kind of dewormer do Arabian horses use?
  13. Seems like this belongs here: Maj. Gen. Hassan Firouzabadi saluting during an annual military parade in Tehran in 2010. His death from Covid-19 was reported by Iranian news outlets on Friday.Credit...Atta Kenare/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images A close military aide to Iran’s supreme leader who led the armed forces for 27 years and once accused Western enemies of deploying lizards to spy on Iranian nuclear activities has died from Covid-19. The death of Maj. Gen. Hassan Firouzabadi, 70, was reported Friday by Iranian news outlets as the country grapples with its fifth wave of coronavirus infections — and as Iranians have grown increasingly irate at the government’s response.
  14. I was pretty young then, but here's what left the biggest impression on me from that game: That passage was written by Stephen Ross after Jeff Leiding passed away just over 7 years ago. I tried to find video of it but couldn't. It was the birth of a Longhorn Legend. RIP Jeff!
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