COVID-19 treatment and vaccine update thread

[Smoove_B]

I genuinely don't understand it either, but once that narrative hit ("The pandemic is over") back in 2022, pretty much everyone (people, government, corporations) just keep believing it despite evidence suggesting otherwise. I genuinely haven't heard anyone even suggest a situation where we're vaccinating everyone twice a year, specifically to address what has clearly become a comfortable pattern for Summer/Winter surges. In fact, it's been the opposite - that maybe even an annual vaccination is too much and we shouldn't be offering that to everyone, especially not kids.

Are parents not vaccinating kids because they've been told Covid-19 is NBD and it's fine for kids to get (and spread) it? Or is it because no one is dropping dead anymore and everyone just thinks we were all sick 3+ times a year with mysterious illnesses that last weeks on end?

It's so weird because prior to 2009, the narrative on the annual influenza vaccination was largely similar - let's just vaccinate the olds and some high risk people. After the H1N1 pandemic, suddenly the effort (and language) switched to everyone over the age of 6 months should get annual influenza vaccination. I know that most folks don't, but the CDC pivoted really quick and the messaging was unified and quick. Again, is it because it was just "ramping up" what was already done for decades (a once a year vaccination effort)? I really don't know.

[Isgrimnur]

Because money.

[Smoove_B]

Could be. If no one is interested in getting the shot (1 or 2x a year) because everyone is talking about how it's NBD, then the corporations that make them aren't going to invest in producing them. I'm guessing there are better contracts with the government for producing (and then selling) annual influenza to nursing homes, the VA, etc...

[LordMortis]

Yes - the experiment continues.

My parents were called by CVS to schedule their Covid-19 vaccination and I'm not really sure what's going on with that as the new vaccines still aren't available. I went on the CVS site and they're willing to schedule me a Covid-19 vaccine today so I don't know if they're just burning through the current vaccination supply in anticipation of being told to dumpster it when the Fall '24 update is released, but on paper I shouldn't qualify for an interim vaccination so I'm kinda confused.

Their vaccination page says right on it, that the scheduling will be made available when ready for 24-25, which implies you are scheduling for the soon to be old vaccine.

https://www.cvs.com/immunizations/covid-19-vaccine

Updated 2024 to 2025 COVID-19 vaccine recommendation

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends everyone age 6 months and older receive an updated 2024 to 2025 COVID-19 vaccine to protect against COVID-19 this fall and winter, whether they have ever previously been vaccinated with a COVID-19 vaccine or not. Updated vaccines will be available from Moderna, Novavax and Pfizer. As soon as the vaccines are available, we’ll update our systems to provide vaccine scheduling and offer walk-in appointments to eligible patients. Check back soon!

I'm not clicking through to find out when/how you find out you are scheduling for outgoing vaccine.

As I recall, we had this problem of a surge and the new vaccines not being ready for (at least) another month last year as well - it led to me not getting my booster until almost December, when I really wanted it around the beginning of September, but it wasn't ready until almost October.

It seems like they want to treat this like the flu's seasonal patterns, but it needs to be treated as a School Year flux, with Flu-ish patterns...

That was not the case here, I went to CVS on day one first schedule of the day and not one other person was signed up and the pharmacist was unprepared and unhappy.

I'm probably being too harsh, but I genuinely don't understand how we keep choosing to intentionally make vaccinations available 60 days after they would be most useful to a large subset of the population. This is year 3, and at least these last two have been entirely predictable (in kind, if not in exact scope of the current wave)

Or at the very least about six weeks. I mean two weeks before college starts, would be the latest is should go out, right? And that's assuming you could handle all of the traffic on day one. I didn't understand last year or the year before either.


And finally, NBD means either Next Business Day or the long gone National Bank of Detroit. No Big Deal is

[Pyperkub]

I genuinely don't understand it either, but once that narrative hit ("The pandemic is over") back in 2022, pretty much everyone (people, government, corporations) just keep believing it despite evidence suggesting otherwise. I genuinely haven't heard anyone even suggest a situation where we're vaccinating everyone twice a year, specifically to address what has clearly become a comfortable pattern for Summer/Winter surges. In fact, it's been the opposite - that maybe even an annual vaccination is too much and we shouldn't be offering that to everyone, especially not kids.

Are parents not vaccinating kids because they've been told Covid-19 is NBD and it's fine for kids to get (and spread) it? Or is it because no one is dropping dead anymore and everyone just thinks we were all sick 3+ times a year with mysterious illnesses that last weeks on end?

It's so weird because prior to 2009, the narrative on the annual influenza vaccination was largely similar - let's just vaccinate the olds and some high risk people. After the H1N1 pandemic, suddenly the effort (and language) switched to everyone over the age of 6 months should get annual influenza vaccination. I know that most folks don't, but the CDC pivoted really quick and the messaging was unified and quick. Again, is it because it was just "ramping up" what was already done for decades (a once a year vaccination effort)? I really don't know.

I think some of it is fatigue and the thought that it's over, rather than just 'lesser', but also a self-censorship kind of reaction to the the R&P attacks on the Medical Community that it has been completely unprepared for, especially the way misinformation spreads faster than fact, and many politicians would rather spew soundbite misinformation/FUD rather than get it right with nuance, because that's SO much easier and more effective... this isn't the R&P thread, but as we have all seen, it definitely gets impacted by it.

[Smoove_B]

Some actual treatment and vaccine update news!

A team of researchers from the University of Houston have developed a new vaccine to treat and prevent the spread of flu and multiple coronavirus strains.

Through two nasal sprays — an immune activating therapeutic treatment and a new vaccine — the team of UH researchers have not only broken ground on vaccinating against SARS-CoV-2 and the flu virus, but also on creating a universal coronavirus vaccine.

Dr. Navin Varadarajan, who leads the lab behind the nasal sprays, said the new vaccine will be a game-changer to the “major obstacle” of current vaccines, which can prevent people from serious illness, but not stop them from spreading the disease to others.

“They can (current vaccines) keep you out of the hospital, but it doesn’t stop you from spreading it to vulnerable people,” Varadarajan said.

Of note:

While many viral variants have minimal impact, over time viruses become stronger against existing vaccines. SARS-CoV-2 resides in the nose, and since existing vaccines are intramuscular, meaning they are administered through a shot in the arm, the virus is not actually eliminated from the body.

NanoSTING-SN, on the other hand, hits “the last mile” of the nose, which prevents the disease from spreading, Varadarajan said. It’s also a pan-coronavirus nasal vaccine, meaning it works against the infection and disease of all viruses in the coronavirus family.

In animals, the nasal vaccine was 100% effective in stopping transmission of the Omnicron variants of concern to unvaccinated hosts.

Once again, I'm catching up!

What's next?

Before starting the process of approving the nasal vaccine with the FDA, Varadarajan’s startup, AuraVax Therapeutics, is prioritizing the researchers’ second nasal spray, NanoSTING. The spray is a therapeutic treatment for influenza strains more resilient to viral evolution than existing treatments. Through an immune-boosting ingredient called cGAMP, the formula puts cells in an intensified state of alert to fend off respiratory viruses.

Prescription treatment for viruses like the flu often run into the obstacle of resistant or sensitive strains of influenza. UH researchers say NanoSTING has the potential to be a broad-spectrum therapy, as it can override these resistant strains, unlike drugs such as Tamiflu.

[Zaxxon]

Sweet news on the nasal vaccines--seems like those could be a game-changer if they ever make it to market. Though I might advise against naming a vaccine you want people to willingly get 'sting.'

Could be. If no one is interested in getting the shot (1 or 2x a year) because everyone is talking about how it's NBD, then the corporations that make them aren't going to invest in producing them. I'm guessing there are better contracts with the government for producing (and then selling) annual influenza to nursing homes, the VA, etc...

But the corporations are investing in producing them--just a couple months later than they would be most effective. Like, they're not saving money; they're ('they' being the corps and public health officials setting vaccination timetables) just doing a worse job than they could. I don't get it.

[Pyperkub]

It's called "Sting" because it was found (by a Hobbit) for use against (nose) goblins?

[Smoove_B]

Yes, they're making them but only ~23% of the eligible population is taking them. And now you want them to ramp up production for another vaccination effort that only ~23% of the population might take? At exactly the same time you're telling us (the general public) that really, don't worry about Covid-19 anymore, it's a nothing.

I'm guessing unless the government starts floating money to vaccine producers -or- mandating Covid-19 vaccinations for certain fields/professions, once a year is the best you're going to get.

Cynical as fuck, but that's where I am. Once again, as Isg has reminded me, nothing makes sense until you start thinking of things in terms of money - and there's no money in manufacturing a vaccine for a disease people were told not to care about. I'm old enough to remember the Lyme vaccination - I actually had it. And then over a lack of interest, it was yanked. Because 25+ years ago the only people getting Lyme lived in a relatively small area of the North East. Now? Not so much.

[Zaxxon]

Yes, they're making them but only ~23% of the eligible population is taking them. And now you want them to ramp up production for another vaccination effort that only ~23% of the population might take? At exactly the same time you're telling us (the general public) that really, don't worry about Covid-19 anymore, it's a nothing.

I'm guessing unless the government starts floating money to vaccine producers -or- mandating Covid-19 vaccinations for certain fields/professions, once a year is the best you're going to get.

I'm confused now--maybe I'm not reading you correctly. We are having a fall vaccine, and it's new with this year's variant, selected back in the spring. A (at least one) pharmaceutical company is making this vaccine, and it will be distributed starting sometime in September. This year's vaccine recipe will continue to be offered through the summer/early fall of next year, just as we've done this year and last. This all has a cost, and my bewilderment is from the fact that for the same cost, we could merely shift the timetable forward a month or two. This would reduce the start-of-school spread (by some amount, admittedly not by a ton since most kids won't get it).

That's it. That's the pitch. What's the catch? Because from where I'm sitting, it appears to be simply that we suck. I'm not asking for a twice-a-year vaccine, or another recipe to be developed and produced. Nor am I asking for a big marketing effort--just allow those who actually want to have an up-to-date shot for their kids to do so.

It might even improve take rate slightly, as I'm sure there's a small subset of parents that would opt to have their kids get the shot if they could avoid first bathing their children in the COVID breath of their peers for 30-45 days before making the shot available. I saw an estimate that given current numbers, about 50% of classes will have an infectious student at any given time as schools ramp up this month.

[Smoove_B]

Ah yes. I was assuming you were asking for a 2x a year vaccine - one "tuned" to the predicted Summer 202x variant, one tuned to the Winter 202y variant (as I'm thinking). That would be a change that requires an investment (physical and administrative) above and beyond what we're doing now. What you're thinking also has a cost (moving it to a different time of year), though I'm not sure it's one that is significant.

All that said, there still seems to be debate as to the efficacy of offering the Fall 2023 shot (for example) in the Spring and Summer of 2024 (for those that missed it) as a new variant is likely circulating - one that might not be matched to what was circulating 8+ months ago. This would diminish (though likely not entirely negate) the value of receiving it, which of course comes out in the messaging, which then leads to lower uptake. So in order to have a better shot in June for a presumed July/August surge, they'd need to invest more into detection and modeling to have those systems up and running by March (total guess) to have 2+ months of data for production in May (total guess) with distribution in June.

I don't know if the timing is also an issue here - that the winter surge is ending and now they're trying to predict what to do in ~3 months for the next round of vaccinations.

But yes, keeping it simple and just offering the existing previous year's shot as another one could work...until there's a horrible mismatch and it doesn't. But still, I think it would likely be better than what we're' doing now - missing and encouraging the summer/late summer surge each year.

[Unagi]

I've always assumed that they need data collected at 'Time Stamp: 0', and that to make the vacine it takes X days - and that's what we get - and you can't make Time Stamp: 0 happen earlier because it's anchored to the cycle of the virus itself.


No idea if that's the case though.

(that was too Zaxxon's post, hadn't read Smoove's reply)

[Zaxxon]

Yeah, that all makes sense. Seems like a not-insurmountable hurdle since the variant-guessing hasn't worked out the best even as things stand, but maybe it is insurmountable.

I just know that what we're doing right now makes no sense for the school/college-age population. And while the olds are more at-risk for acute COVID, it's these kids that are going to be infected potentially dozens of times in their remaining lives. That's a not-great long COVID forecast. I'd really like to cut that down as much as possible.

[LordMortis]

I just know that what we're doing right now makes no sense for the school/college-age population.

And the people around them. And the people around those people... Which is to say what we're doing makes no sense to mitigate against the demonstrable huge upswing in transmission when colleges and schools let back in and mix together large populaces that had been previously been isolated and there is high pressure to keep mixing them even when ill.

[Smoove_B]

It's totally possible - but would require financial investments from both the private and public sector. It really could be that for generations we've been lulled into the influenza model where we watch what's happening in China each Winter/Spring to tune our vaccinations for the Fall - because that's when it's most likely to reach us at epidemic levels. But with SARS-CoV-2 sloshing around the planet like water in a tub, we don't have systems in place to address changing variants every ~6 months and rapidly deploying vaccines.

Coupled with the short-term impact it's having (SEE: Minimal) on younger, healthier folks there really just isn't an urgency to do anything else. Yeah, kids are going to get it every August and September, but we'll just accept that because it's not killing them.

Meanwhile we've hit a steady ~500+ deaths a week for Covid-19 for the last 5+ weeks and we'll just settle into that until the numbers jump again into December. It's not kids - mainly elders - so we just accept it. Never mind where the elders are getting it from...

EDIT: Hope you all enjoyed your quiet week while I was on vacation.

[Zaxxon]

I repeat:

[LordMortis]

[Isgrimnur]

variant-guessing hasn't worked out the best even as things stand, but maybe it is insurmountable.

variant-guessing will get better. It always does.

[Zaxxon]

variant-guessing hasn't worked out the best even as things stand, but maybe it is insurmountable.

variant-guessing will get better. It always does.

[Smoove_B]

Checks calendar. Checks watch. Right on time:

MONTGOMERY, Ala. (WSFA) - JAG High School will be holding school virtually Wednesday and Thursday due to a COVID outbreak, the school announced in a release.

According to the school, they made the decision to transition to “asynchronous learning” due to a high number of the school’s staff currently being absent with COVID.

The school is currently planning to be virtual for two days, with plans to asses Thursday if the school can safely reopen on Friday.

And here:

HUMBOLDT, Tenn. - Just days into the new school year, one Mid-South elementary school has already had to shut down due to an uptick in COVID cases.

Students at Stigall Primary School in Humboldt, Tenn., about 90 miles northeast of Memphis, started school on August 1. Parents told FOX13 that they got a letter on Monday night from the district telling them that students needed to stay home Tuesday as the district works to sanitize the building.

"Everyone's like, 'COVID is back, COVID is back,'" Jessica Williamson, a parent of a first grader at Stigall Primary, said. "I just feel like it didn't really go anywhere."

It's the second full week of school for Stigall Primary School students, but instead of math class and recess, Williamson's daughter and her classmates are at home.

I'm not going to post every time a school closes, but this is the first I'm seeing for the 24/25 school year. I wish I had some advice for y'all, but we're still in the "you do you" portion of the pandemic, so focus on you and yours.

Sad to see "Sanitize the building" is still a thing. That money would be better spent elsewhere.

[Zaxxon]

Sad to see "Sanitize the building" is still a thing. That money would be better spent elsewhere.

Before I even saw your response I was thinking 'oh, we still haven't figured out what actually matters, 4 years in, eh?'

[Zaxxon]

Thankfully all these kids have had the opportunity to obtain a current vaccine, at least. /s

[Smoove_B]

Oh boy, FLiRTing with danger:

As the Paris Olympics draws to a close, the event has been a triumph for sporting achievements but has been marred by dozens of athletes testing positive for SARS-CoV-2. This has prompted concerns among the Olympic community about containing further viral transmission ahead of the Paralympics. The numbers infected are likely an underestimate and COVID-19 cases have also been steadily rising in communities in several countries as a result of circulating new omicron-derived variants, the so-called FLiRT variants.

...

Recent FLiRT variants are named with a JN or KP prefix and have developed the same set of mutations in the spike protein through convergent evolution. They have demonstrated their viral fitness by becoming the dominant circulating variants. The relaxation of quarantine measures, lack of testing, and fewer vaccinations has provided the space for these variants to continue to circulate and evolve. The lack of community and home-based testing, waning immunity post-vaccination, and the generally milder disease experienced by the majority of those infected, means tracking case numbers is also challenging; viral levels are primarily being measured via wastewater and health-care case notifications. SARS-CoV-2 has previously shown seasonal variations in transmission and infection levels, and with autumn fast approaching in the Northern hemisphere, the FDA has called for the development of new monoclonal vaccines to target these FLiRT variants, and WHO also released similar recommendations earlier this year. Pfizer, Moderna, and Novavax are therefore developing vaccines targeting JN-1 or KP-2 variants, with the earliest vaccine expected within weeks in the USA. However, the costs of these vaccines will not be covered by the government, except for the poorest and most vulnerable groups.

...

Long COVID affects multiple organs, and there are differing definitions, although symptoms persisting for more than 3 months after acute COVID-19 has gained the most traction in the community. A Review by Trisha Greenhalgh and colleagues in The Lancet noted the proportion of people with long COVID after acute infection is controversially reported as between 45% and 57%, with millions now affected globally. The quality of available data, lack of baseline information, differing definitions, and variable recognition of the condition has hampered such estimates. The Lancet authors call for increased research into the pathophysiological mechanisms of long COVID to enable the development of targeted treatments; better health-care services and infrastructure to support this growing group of people; continuity of care and appropriate specialist referral to multidisciplinary care; and engagement of societies, partnering with patients and advocates, and formal education programmes for health-care providers.

At least future generations will be clear we knew and opted to just keep on trucking.

[Victoria Raverna]

I just genuinely don't understand how we're here in 2024. This isn't politicians fucking it up now, it's the infectious disease prevention community collectively deciding to just let er rip through another back-to-school season (or failing to decide to do better). We're past the part where the general public cares to try to do better, so now those in charge of determining vaccination plans also are past trying to do better?

I'm probably being too harsh, but I genuinely don't understand how we keep choosing to intentionally make vaccinations available 60 days after they would be most useful to a large subset of the population. This is year 3, and at least these last two have been entirely predictable (in kind, if not in exact scope of the current wave).

The problem is that you are a democratic capitalist country. If it is an authoritarian/dictatorship socialist country, it'll probably much easier to deal with something like COVID-19. Cost of Freedom.

[Skinypupy]

My 85 year old uncle fell and broke his pelvis in two places on Monday. Found out today that both he and my 80 year old aunt both have Covid.

One or the other of those would be bad by itself, but that’s a brutal double-whammy. Worried as hell for them.

[LordMortis]

I forgot my mask when I did my infusion today. My first stint in a medical environment with no mask. We'll see how that goes. Maybe it's the sign that I'll finally start getting on with life.

[Jeff V]

The other day, my daughter asked when they (her and her brother) will get vaccinated again. It's cool that they actually want to do this, but it's been awhile since I heard a news story about a new must-have vaccine. Their PR machine seems to be ramping down.

[MHS]

I am anxiously awaiting the announcement of when the new boosters will be out. Our clinic says "August or September." So many of our circle have Covid right now, and a lot of them have it for the first time, having successfully dodged it for 3.5 years. We've stopped doing even our small poker games with friends, which is pretty much our only social interaction anymore, so I'm really looking forward to getting boosted, soon.

[Isgrimnur]

Mom said Dad has come down with it.

[Smoove_B]

What the fuck are we even doing.

Data up to August 15th 2024

I feel like they're going to need a blacker-blue to continue the trending.

[LordMortis]

Are we low because we are low or because we don't report. I've literally never seen a Michigan Waste Water notice and I used to monitor our states status on like six different sites.

Edit: How about that years later they put up something and say we've been doing it all along

https://www.michigan.gov/coronavirus/st ... r-covid-19


.... And it's all voluntary and most sites read as "inactive" so....

[Kraken]

It doesn't worry me because they used shades of blue.

[Smoove_B]

Vaccine approval might be coming as "soon" as next week:

The US Food and Drug Administration is poised to sign off as soon as next week on updated Covid-19 vaccines targeting more recently circulating strains of the virus, according to two sources familiar with the matter, as the country experiences its largest summer wave in two years.

The agency is expected to greenlight updated mRNA vaccines from Moderna and Pfizer/BioNTech that target a strain of the virus called KP.2, said the sources, who declined to be named because the timing information isn’t public. It was unclear whether the agency simultaneously would authorize Novavax’s updated shot, which targets the JN.1 strain.

The move would be several weeks ahead of last year’s version of the vaccine, which got FDA signoff on September 11.

Also:

“Now is the time to get a dose with this surge,” Dr. Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, told CNN.

While I'm not a doctor and I respect Dr. Osterholm professionally, I will respectfully disagree; we are well beyond when people should have been getting an updated dose.

More:

Representatives for Pfizer and Moderna told CNN that the companies had ample supply of their updated Covid vaccines and would be ready to ship doses upon approval. Moderna’s spokesman said it expects the vaccine to be available in stores within days of FDA signoff.

Novavax’s vaccine is based on protein technology, which takes longer to manufacture than mRNA vaccines. The company’s executives told investors on a conference call last week that it anticipated that its updated vaccine would be arriving in warehouses this month and that it’s expected to be ready for distribution when authorized. A spokesperson for Novavax didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment Friday.

A spokesperson for the FDA said the agency can’t comment on timing of product applications but noted that it “anticipates taking timely action to authorize or approve updated COVID-19 vaccines in order to make vaccines available this fall.”

[Isgrimnur]

What the fuck are we even doing.

Not a god damned thing.

[Zaxxon]

1) It’s good that this approval is coming weeks ahead of last year.
2) It’s cool that the updated vaccines are already manufactured.
3) Could we maybe act like #1 and #2 should have coordinated such that they’re in stores now since they could have been in goddamned stores now? FFS. Maybe in year 5 we'll apply a more modern logistical approach to something impacting so many lives.

[LordMortis]

1) It’s good that this approval is coming weeks ahead of last year.
2) It’s cool that the updated vaccines are already manufactured.
3) Could we maybe act like #1 and #2 should have coordinated such that they’re in stores now since they could have been in goddamned stores now? FFS. Maybe in year 5 we'll apply a more modern logistical approach to something impacting so many lives.

Isn't this year 5? 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024? Maybe the second half of the decade?

[Zaxxon]

1) It’s good that this approval is coming weeks ahead of last year.
2) It’s cool that the updated vaccines are already manufactured.
3) Could we maybe act like #1 and #2 should have coordinated such that they’re in stores now since they could have been in goddamned stores now? FFS. Maybe in year 5 we'll apply a more modern logistical approach to something impacting so many lives.

Isn't this year 5? 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024? Maybe the second half of the decade?

No, there was no vaccine rollout in 2020.

[Smoove_B]

All I can do is observe that the FDA is seemingly acting in alignment with the CDC. Specifically, that Covid-19 isn't a serious issue anymore so there's no need to "rush" anything or expedite approvals.

What's also strange is apparently Novavax applied for their Fall 2024 approvals before Moderna and Pfizer and yet there isn't any official word on Novavax approval (as indicated in this article). Maybe there will be simultaneous approvals provided "soon" for all of them, but it's another oddity.

[Smoove_B]

Still watching for FDA approval. Probably too much to hope it'll happen on a Monday, but maybe by business end to kick off the week.

I also just saw that the UK's plan for Fall 2024 is to simply re-use the Fall 2023 vaccinations, which haven't been "tuned" to a more recent variant. It will save money, but the modeling they've done suggests it's going to be about 1/3rd as effective as whatever we're going to get (when it's eventually released).

I guess it'll provide us with some data - for the small percentage of people in the UK that opt to take it.

Off to drink more coffee and ponder my place in the universe.

[Isgrimnur]