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Coronamonomania Thrives in Darkness, Part 11

By February 21, 2021Commentary

For Minnesota readers, just want to point out again that there are very few active cases, i.e., infectious people, in the state.  Your odds of running into one are pretty small.  I also again will remind you that in a low prevalence population, high levels of testing, even with supposedly accurate tests, crank out lots of false positives.  And an increasing number of positive tests are antigen tests, which may have greater accuracy problems.  These issues are almost certainly happening in Minnesota.  But has the state even one time done a study to check up on this?  No, because it is more important to keep terrifying people and keep schools closed to continue teacher contributions flowing to the IB.

The dynamics and circumstances of transmission are still poorly understood.  This study examined clusters of cases in Switzerland.  (Medrxiv Paper)  The researchers studied clusters of cases.  They found that some of the most significant clusters had a member with an extremely high viral load (a billion virions or more).  Clusters with the lowest average age tended to have the highest viral loads, suggesting either it took more to infect those younger people or they can tolerate higher doses.  And the clusters with the highest average ages had low to middle viral loads, which again would suggest that older persons may be more easily infected.

This paper attempted to explore cycle threshold values in regard to epidemic dynamics.  (Medrxiv Paper)   Daily median cycle numbers were compared with epidemic measures in El Paso from the middle of September to the middle of January.  Remember that higher cycle numbers mean less viral load, and vice versa.  As cycle number medians rose during this time period, test positivity rates dropped, as did rates of transmission.  Hospitalization also dropped but with a lag, as you would expect.  Just one more reason to publish cycle numbers and the distribution of cycle numbers.  It gives you relevant information about the likely infectiousness of cases and seriousness of disease.

Another piece of research looked at viral shedding across disease severity and age.  (Medrxiv Paper)   This was a meta-review and analysis.  Near symptom onset, the viral load in the upper respiratory tract was substantially higher for severe as opposed to mild illness.  Duration and amount of shedding was highly variable.  Adults with severe illness tended to have more lower respiratory tract shedding, and therefore were more likely to be infectious.

The testing nuts think that every person should have test kits in their home and test themselves several times a day.  Sounds crazy to me and it is.  This paper also finds that there can be issues with relying on people to properly test themselves.  (Medrxiv Paper)   The study compared self-collected swabs and saliva to professional nasal swabbing.  The patient collected specimens were less accurate, particularly in asymptomatic persons.

Okay, can we now assume that being infected causes a lasting adaptive immune response, with study after study finding at least 6 months of antibody/T cell protection.  The latest is from Austria and covered over 150 people with varying disease severity.  Almost every person, around 99%, had some persistent immune response.  There was some correlation of response with disease severity.  (Medrxiv Paper)

Another study that examined frequency of patients actually getting CV-19 in a health care setting, this study again from England.  (Medrxiv Paper)   Somewhere between 15% and 20% of all cases in a hospital appeared to be infections acquired in the hospital.

 

Join the discussion 2 Comments

  • Ellen says:

    While everyone is obsessed with “covid” our Constitution is being dismantled. That seems to be the plan. The virus is STILL less in magnitude than the 1958 Asian flu pandemic or the 1968 Hong Kong flu pandemic. When will people wake up? —– Vaccines are harming people. I used to believe in vaccines, but it seems every serious virus has diminished of its own accord. Vaccines may have caused/be causing more harm than good. Excuse my incredulity, but in the 1950s and 1960s, most of us got mumps, rubella, measles, and chickenpox as kids and did not die from them. My husband got the pertussis vaccine and got the whooping cough anyway; his older sister did not get the vaccine and did not get the whooping cough. Some say getting those childhood illnesses helped build our immune systems and genuine herd immunity. We didn’t have gluten intolerance, and kids with allergies were rare, unlike today; I know people who are praying to outlive their vaccine injured children. And you probably remember the 1976 Swine Flu vaccine for which about $3.4 billion were paid out in vaccine injury reparations. —– Dr. Judy Mikovits recommended the1993 movie AND THE BAND PLAYED ON; it’s about the aids epidemic. She seems to be saying that Dr. Fauci blocked available treatment which could have diminished HIV deaths. HIV is certainly worse than covid. And now we’re hearing that HIV was a deliberate assault on homosexual men; that someone actually started it through a vaccine. Who knows what the whole truth is? 2020-2021 mask-wearing maybe saved as many lives as vaccines have saved, which may be none; testing has saved zero lives: for sure it exposes something of the character of the American people.

  • LeeS says:

    wondering – lower age group had higher viral load. Does that mean they needed a higher load b4 they had symptoms? And did they have higher Vit D levels that worked on the virus so that higher load than older folks contributed to this. https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/03/100307215534.htm

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