Covid 19 Part XXXV-956,720 ROI (5,952 deaths) 452,946 NI (3,002 deaths) (08/01) Read OP

One very strong possibility is that vaccinated and natural immunity might be effective at corralling the virus into an evolutionary path where it at least stops attacking our lungs.

Our lungs have very strong immune responses (for obvious reasons being a core organ). However, our noses and upper airways are less well defended.

If it is spreading efficiently as an upper respiratory infection, it may eventually start to find its sweet spot and inadvertently do us less damage.

It simply wants to keep reproducing. It will find the paths of least resistance and that may ultimately turn it into a rather less problematic virus that aims to make us sneeze and spray it into the air. It doesn't necessarily need to beat our immune systems, just avoid being killed by them.

The vaccines preventing serious disease and ensuring we aren't facing a novel virus with a naive immune system can only really be a very positive thing.

We end up with a virus that's evolved and been tamed by bouncing off our vaccinated immunity.

We've likely short cutted what might have been a very much more protracted, costly and deadly process.

Polar101

Even if the vaccines don't magically stop the pandemic, they do offer some form of protection against the disease. And in Ireland getting the vaccine is free, so it seems like a fairly obvious choice that most people should get vaccinated / boosted.

Disinformation sites on the internet (like LifeSiteNews) will disagree, of course.

WoollyRedHat

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118384883#Comment_118384883

Not going to argue with that, hopefully this will be something better regulated in future.

marno21

The vaccine stopped transmission for the B.1.1.7 variant and its ancestors. Then along came Delta which was the viruses natural evolution into a form which was able to infect people but the boosters and previous immunity stopped serious disease in most cases. But the virus was able to infect and replicate. At least the serious consequences were still averted.

Now we have omicron which takes that to hold my beer levels of infectivity. Luckily it seems milder and protection against serious illness is still in the large holding up n

Literally none of the vaccine producers ever promised that. I remember the discussions online, on science podcasts, read journals, read material from Pfizer and BioNTech, Moderna and the Oxford research group and AstraZeneca.

Various candidate vaccines also never even got beyond early trials as they were under performing.

The only claim any of them were making was that it would reduce very negative outcomes. Sterilising immunity (ability to totally stop all transmission) wasn't what they're claiming. Their whole mission was to reduce deaths and stop the scenes of refrigerated trucks being used as morgues ourside hospitals, which happened in quite a few major western countries.

Various commentators and certain populist politicians, notably in the UK, sold it as a magic bullet and also did things like have "freedom day" and made promises of never having to have any future restrictions.

Those people are pathological liars and manipulators. They wanted an instant Hollywood ending, not a slow and imperfect slog, which is reality unfortunately.

The line from science, from regulators, vaccine makers and also from most in Irish politics and officialdom was never like that. It was very cautious. A lot of people were comparing to England claiming it was far too cautious.

There's a lot of rewriting history going on here and claims of claims that were simply never made by anyone with any kind of sense.

Steveimitation

Regardless of who promised it, a lot of people took the vaccine thinking that it was something of a magic bullet and are now understandably pissed off that it wasn't. And there most certainly were times that Irish politicians said vaccines were out way out.

JP Liz V1

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118384862#Comment_118384862

3 hospitalised, 2 had underlying issues that I know off, a few though had to contact their Doctor twice

I don't think the majority of people thought that to be quite honest.

Talking to anyone I know, they were all very much aware that it might last, it might not last and that updated vaccines might ultimately be needed too.

The majority of Irish general public aren't naive fools led by tabloid headlines and Facebook. That's been very clearly demonstrated. We are very cynical and have built in b/s detection from birth.

They're fairly science literate and rational and haven't ridiculous expectations.

Given the fact that Ireland has a much, much lower covid fatality rate than countries with low uptakes, you can conclude it's turned it from a very dangerous pandemic to just a manageable pandemic. I think most people realise that, although the horror story reporting focusing on only case numbers isn't particularly helpful right now, especially when the cases so far do not see to be translating into bad outcomes.

We should be celebrating a world leading, and very successful vaccine programme. Instead, we've the nightly case count. Caution but not self flagellation is required.

At least place the numbers into the context of how we are doing in terms of hospitalisations and fatalities Vs other jurisdictions.

Steveimitation

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118384913#Comment_118384913

That's fair enough and sorry to hear that. Unfortunately in some instances it really can be so random as to who gets sick and to what severity. I tested positive on Christmas Eve and the only thing I noticed before or after the test is a slightly metallic taste in my mouth. I was full sure that it was a side effect from the booster I had a week earlier. As it was a symptom I've not had before though and because it's listed as one of the main ones, I decided to get a PCR. Positive.

Both my siblings had covid recently and got a much worse dose than I did (not life threatening or anything but they were definitely sick for a bit). I'm by far the most medically vulnerable of the three of us (asthmatic, very heavy weight these days, on blood pressure meds) yet I wouldn't even have known I had it but for that little taste. I may have had it a few weeks ago and recovered without being any the wiser. It does put me in the annoying scenario of knowing that if I do get symptoms in the next few months, I will likely come up positive even if that is not the case. Anyway sorry bit of a ramble there and I'm grateful I didn't get sick but the randomness of it all can be bewildering.

Jimi H

I think we’re going to need a better vaccine.

https://www.medpagetoday.com/special-reports/exclusives/96412

https://twitter.com/drericding/status/1473769670863949825?s=21

Deeper Blue

Any post that contains a Feigl-Ding tweet instantly loses all credibility

Jimi H

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118384960#Comment_118384960

Fair enough. The point is new research seems to suggest that Covid may be more than a respiratory virus. Regardless of who reports it.

https://twitter.com/pandemicaid_net/status/1473748730780258311?s=21

The Oort Cloud

I find it absolutely amazing that in certain E.U countries, their governments are using a tactic to force the vaccinated to attack the unvaccinated citizens, something akin to an episode of the 'twilight zone' below...

https://youtu.be/d-Bamw4mmQw

Lumen

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118384968#Comment_118384968

The finding that COVID is a multi organ disease is very much not new. This pre-print has a number of obvious issues, some of which are mentioned in the comments.

Most obviously, there is the sampling bias that 100% of the participants were dead. 😀

Vaccinated30

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118384855#Comment_118384855

When Delta started in India the weather temp was average mid to high 20s, nobody said the same thing about India as they do about SA. Doom Porn.

CruelSummer

Why don’t Government allow antigen testing at test centres for symptomatic people? The whole situation is a joke. Most people are just looking for pcrs to prove to Government they’ve had Covid and won’t be hounded by them for boosters. All the news is focused on are boosters and registration - which are probably empty as so many people have Covid and could be used for testing.

Coupled with this they open vaccinations for children, using a vaccine that isn’t designed against Omicron. Half of the children in the place have Omicron and will have antibodies to it shortly. Why would they allow said children to be injected with Pfizer only 4 weeks after that infection? Where is the trial data on that?

The Covid Pass is next to useless and is only there to coerce, exclude and divide. It hasn’t failed to stop any spread and should be abolished and any government party who stands against it, I will vote for. Coupled with that, am I right in saying there is currently no medical exemption given to the cert in Ireland? Despite some people having adverse reactions to the vaccine?

Are the Government suggesting that people recovering from Omicron is not what they want to see? There is no scientific reason anyone who’s had Omicron would need a booster now at this stage.

The vaccines do work.

The problem is that COVID was very mild anyways and most people didn't really need a vaccine.

And the vaccine can't save people from advanced cancers, heart issues and old age.

Now people are getting frustrated because the vaccine can't prevent all deaths and protect our pathetic health service.

Jimi H

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118384977#Comment_118384977

That’s true. I suppose there’s been a narrative recently that omicron is similar to a mild cold and I hope it is. At the same time there’s a lot we still have to learn and caution may still be needed while these studies are being carried out.

The vaccines do work so it’s time to let omnicron rip like **** tru society to get the whole thing over and done with.

Dr Fred

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118384889#Comment_118384889

Why would you take any notice of Tubridy in relation to the pandemic?

Deep0527

Travelled to a nice lake side walk across the county.

Hey boy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118385045#Comment_118385045

Good for you. Don’t let the fear take hold. The number of decent folk walking outside including the beach etc with masks on is concerning. I now worry about what it will take for said folks to go back to normal living.

brickster69

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118384883#Comment_118384883

This guy said they were 100%

jackboy

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118385087#Comment_118385087

Hardly surprising when not too long ago people were accused of being granny murderers for walking on the beach. It will take a long time for that to wear off.

Rosita

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118384659#Comment_118384659

It's a sad state of affairs when we've been desensitised to this point.

Multipass

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118385107#Comment_118385107

Do you concern yourself with the numbers of children who die every year from all causes? Read about how many children were killed by lockdowns in Asia, that’s an eye opener. There certainly seems to be some desensitisation around this topic.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/covid-19-restrictions-may-have-led-to-rise-in-child-deaths-in-south-asia-11615987388

‘The same Covid-19 lockdowns that may have saved lives in South Asia last year may have contributed to a jump in deaths of young children by cutting off essential services, a new report said.

In 2019, South Asia recorded the deaths of 1.4 million children under the age of five, according to a report released Wednesday by Unicef. Last year, such deaths may have climbed by an additional 228,000 as the pandemic made access to medical care and food difficult. 

Also, an additional 11,000 pregnant women may have died due to limited access to medical care in India, Nepal, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, according to the report, which was supported by the World Health Organization and the United Nations Population Fund.

“The generally restrictive measures taken to mitigate the Covid-19 outbreak have contributed to more deaths,” said Dr. Atnafu Getachew Asfaw, who led development of the report, which pulled national health data comparing people accessing essential services before and during the pandemic.’

PowerToWait

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118383744#Comment_118383744

Ah now, Buckety has it all worked out. Been on here all day every day giving out about the morons in charge won’t do it his way. We’d be long out if the situation if only we listened.

Rosita

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118385127#Comment_118385127

Can't believe you came back with such a rigmarole to counter a harmless enough remark. People are so angry.

Leftwaffe

Any word on the farcical covid certs being scrapped? Absolute buffoonery at this stage.

Rosita

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118384875#Comment_118384875

That's a funny one about the South Africans being right to be concerned only about their own data considering the tiresome posting here of data from Canada, South Africa, or anywhere about which a vaguely positive narrative can be constructed.