The COVID-19 Science and Medicine Question Thread

Talk about throwing cold water.....:( I may never get back to my favorite Irish Pub.:(

I hope AsraZeneca makes it to the finish line, the other alternatives seem to be logistically challenging to say the least. :(

Never thought that vaccine manufacturers would consider -80°C shipping conditions as an acceptable shipping and storage condition, BUT looks like they have.

From a person who was plagued with receiving materials at said conditions and storing many key reagents at those temps, trust me, this is a HUGE logistical challenge, especially when you're talking about 100s of millions of vaccines for the US, and the billions needed for world-wide inoculations. Trust me, nobody in the Amazon basin has ultrafreezers capable for said storage.

From today's NY Times...

[SIZE=7]How to Ship a Vaccine at –80°C, and Other Obstacles in the Covid Fight[/SIZE]

Developing an effective vaccine is the first step. Then comes the question of how to deliver hundreds of millions of doses that may need to be kept at arctic temperatures.

Many things will have to work out to end the coronavirus pandemic. Drug companies will have to develop a safe and effective vaccine. Billions of people will have to consent to vaccination.

But there are [more prosaic]('https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/01/health/coronavirus-vaccine-supplies.html') challenges, too. Among them: Companies may have to transport tiny glass vials thousands of miles while keeping them as cold as the South Pole in the depths of winter.

A number of the leading Covid-19 [vaccines]('https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/science/coronavirus-vaccine-tracker.html') under development will need to be kept at temperatures as low as minus 80 degrees Celsius (minus 112 degrees Fahrenheit) from the moment they are bottled to the time they are ready to be injected into patients’ arms.

That will not be easy. Vaccines may be manufactured on one continent and shipped to another. They will go from logistics hub to logistics hub before ending up at the hospitals and other facilities that will administer them.

While no vaccine has yet been approved by health officials in the United States, preparations for a mass-vaccination campaign are [gearing up]('https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/02/health/covid-19-vaccine-cdc-plans.html'). The U.S. military and a federal contractor are expected to play a role in coordinating the distribution. But a hodgepodge of companies are scrambling to figure out how to keep hundreds of millions of doses of a vaccine very, very cold.

Planes, trucks and warehouses will need to be outfitted with freezers. Glass vials will need to withstand icy climes. Someone will need to make a lot more dry ice.

“We’re only now beginning to understand the complexities of the delivery side of all of this,” said J. Stephen Morrison, senior vice president at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a research firm. “And there’s no getting around it. These have stark temperature demands that will constrain access and delivery.”

President Trump on Friday asserted that hundreds of millions of doses of an unidentified vaccine will be available to all Americans by April. That timeline is more ambitious than what his own advisers have described. Dr. Robert R. Redfield, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, told a Senate committee on Wednesday that a vaccine would not be widely available until the middle of next year.

Of the three vaccines that have advanced to Phase 3 trials, two — one made by [Moderna]('https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/28/health/coronavirus-moderna-vaccine-monkeys.html') and the National Institutes of Health, the other by [Pfizer]('https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/27/health/moderna-vaccine-covid.html') and BioNTech — need to be kept in a near constant deep freeze. (They are made with genetic materials that fall apart when they thaw.) Another leading vaccine candidate, being developed by [AstraZeneca]('https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/12/health/astrazeneca-coronavirus-vaccine-trial-resumes.html') and Oxford University, must be kept cool but not frozen.

McKesson, a major drug distributor, won a major federal contract last month to help distribute a coronavirus vaccine. Much of the work, however, will fall to companies outside the medical and drug industries. The major U.S. logistics companies, including UPS and FedEx, already have networks of freezers that they use to ship perishable food and medical supplies. The companies have experience shipping vaccines for other illnesses, including the seasonal flu.

But the Covid-19 [vaccination effort]('https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/18/health/coronavirus-anti-vaccine.html') is likely to dwarf all previous campaigns.

UPS said it was constructing a so-called freezer farm in Louisville, Ky., the company’s largest hub, where it can store millions of doses at subzero temperatures.

Creating an entire warehouse that could maintain that deep freeze would have been too complex and costly. So instead, rows of upright industrial Stirling Ultracold freezers, each capable of holding 48,000 vials, are being arranged inside a warehouse. There are 70 freezers so far, but the warehouse could fit a few hundred. A similar UPS center is in the works in the Netherlands.

“I haven’t seen anything like this before,” said Wes Wheeler, UPS’s head of health care. “Nothing has been quite this global in scale.”
R 7 under this scenario how does this vaccine reach my local Walgreens Pharmacy where I get my ‘normal’ Flu Shot or is there another distribution scenario that needs to be in play? Thanks.

R 7 under this scenario how does this vaccine reach my local Walgreens Pharmacy where I get my ‘normal’ Flu Shot or is there another distribution scenario that needs to be in play? Thanks.

Great question that the author, nor I considered! I doubt that most Walgreens, CVS, Rite Aid nor your Primary Care Physician have substantial ultrafreezer storage space. Therefore we're probably talking about large-scale clinic vaccinations scenarios, like some of us may remember for the oral Polio Vaccine.

Aye, but there's the rub, who wants to go to a crowd place to get vaccinated for a highly-contagious disease??? I'm guessing state CDCs will organize drive-thru vaccination situations. The Admiral and I are getting our flu shot on Tuesday at our doc, and they organized it as a drive-thru clinic. Maybe they're "practicing" for the Main(e) event???

Interesting and sort of scientific

[[SIZE=7][COLOR=rgb(184, 49, 47)]Horseshoe crabs have a vital role in the development of a coronavirus vaccine[/COLOR][/SIZE]]('https://www.yahoo.com/news/horseshoe-crabs-vital-role-development-090024849.html')

Interesting and sort of scientific

[[SIZE=7][COLOR=rgb(184, 49, 47)]Horseshoe crabs have a vital role in the development of a coronavirus vaccine[/COLOR][/SIZE]]('https://www.yahoo.com/news/horseshoe-crabs-vital-role-development-090024849.html')

I'll leave it because I LOVE Limulus polyphemus, our beloved horseshoe crab, and never hesitate to pimp its utility to medical science. A day doesn't go by that most of us don't use something that has been tested with the LAL test developed from its "blue blood."

As an undergraduate BIO major, my favorite invertebrate physiology lab was using horseshoe crab blood to demonstrate its oxygenation properties, and the horseshoe crabs used were provided to my college by myself, making a quick early May stop in PJ Harbor to grab a few to bring back to PA, my destination that day.

Well it's about time CDC got this out. Keep your distance and stay upwind while wearing your masks and avoid closed environments...

[SIZE=7]Airborne transmission can spread coronavirus, CDC says in long-awaited update[/SIZE]

[pressherald.com/2020/10/05/airborne-transmission-can-spread-coronavirus-cdc-says-in-long-awaited-update-after-website-error/]('https://www.pressherald.com/2020/10/05/airborne-transmission-can-spread-coronavirus-cdc-says-in-long-awaited-update-after-website-error/')

By Lena H. Sun and Ben GuarinoThe Washington PostOctober 5, 2020

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention acknowledged Monday that people can sometimes be infected with the coronavirus through airborne transmission, especially in enclosed spaces with inadequate ventilation.

The long-awaited update to the agency Web page explaining how the virus spreads represents an official acknowledgment of growing evidence that under certain conditions, people farther than six feet apart can become infected by tiny droplets and particles that float in the air for minutes and hours, and that they play a role in the pandemic.

The update follows an embarrassing incident last month when the agency removed a draft that had not gone through proper review and was posted in error. The draft’s wording included a reference to aerosols – tiny droplets that can stay in the air, potentially traveling a significant distance. Officials said the draft was removed because they feared the language could be misinterpreted as suggesting that airborne transmission is the main way the virus spreads.
[[IMG alt="Virus_Outbreak_-_Inflammatory_Condition_79958"]https://multifiles.pressherald.com/uploads/sites/10/2020/07/Virus_Outbreak_-_Inflammatory_Condition_79958.jpg[/IMG]]('')
This 2020 electron microscope made available by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention image shows the spherical coronavirus particles from the first U.S. case of COVID-19. The CDC acknowledged Monday that people can sometimes be infected with the coronavirus through airborne transmission, especially in enclosed spaces with inadequate ventilation. C.S. Goldsmith, A. Tamin/CDC via Associated Press

That is not the case. The CDC says the main way the virus spreads is through close contact with virus-containing droplets – large and small – that are emitted when someone coughs, sneezes, sings, talks, or breathes. When people are in proximity, within six feet, they are exposed to the whole spectrum of spray that can cause infection. “It’s not just big goobers, but everything that’s exhaled, big and tiny,” said one CDC scientist who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak on the record.

Now, the CDC is saying infection can also spread through exposure to smaller virus-containing droplets and particles that can remain suspended in the air over long distances and time.

“There is evidence that under certain conditions, people with COVID-19 seem to have infected others who were more than six feet away,” the updated Web page states. “These transmissions occurred within enclosed spaces that had inadequate ventilation. Sometimes the infected person was breathing heavily, for example while singing or exercising.”

“Under these circumstances,” the Web page says, “scientists believe that the amount of infectious smaller droplet and particles produced by the people with COVID-19 became concentrated enough to spread the virus to other people. The people who were infected were in the same space during the same time or shortly after the person with COVID-19 had left.”

In a statement, the agency said it “continues to believe, based on current science, that people are more likely to become infected the longer and closer they are to a person with COVID-19.”

The CDC added: “Today’s update acknowledges the existence of some published reports showing limited, uncommon circumstances where people with COVID-19 infected others who were more than 6 feet away or shortly after the COVID-19-positive person left an area.” The agency said transmission took place in “poorly ventilated and enclosed spaces that often involved activities that caused heavier breathing, like singing or exercise. Such environments and activities may contribute to the buildup of virus-carrying particles.”

The agency said its recommendations for avoiding the virus remain the same.

People can protect themselves by staying at least six feet away from others, wearing a mask that covers their nose and mouth, washing their hands frequently, cleaning touched surfaces often and staying home when sick, the CDC said. People should also avoid crowded indoor spaces and ensure indoor spaces are properly ventilated by bringing in outdoor air as much as possible, the agency said.

Although many experts have already pointed to mounting evidence that airborne transmission plays a role in spreading the virus, the official acknowledgment from the CDC is certain to add to public health concerns about risks of infection from crowded indoor spaces with poor ventilation.

Both presidential campaigns and the Commission on Presidential Debates say they plan to move ahead with in-person events less than a week after President Trump tested positive for the novel coronavirus. As more White House personnel announce they have tested positive for the coronavirus, it is not clear what protocols have been put in place to reduce the risk of infection for staff, many of whom don’t wear masks and work in cramped conditions.

When there is adequate ventilation, respiratory droplets are diluted by outdoor air or pushed out by air exchanges, according to experts. To improve indoor airflow in public buildings, experts at the Yale School of Public Health recommend switching off sensor-based ventilation to more constantly flush air. Open windows for fresh breezes, they said. And reverse ceiling fan blades, which can draw air up, away from a room’s occupants.

Experts have pointed to the spread of the virus in choirs, buses, fitness classes and other poorly ventilated spaces. In July, more than 200 aerosol biologists and other experts sent a letter expressing concerns about airborne transmission to the World Health Organization, which responded by acknowledging the “emerging evidence” the pathogen can spread through the air.

A group of infectious-disease physicians and aerosol experts, in a letter published Monday in the journal Science, more strongly emphasized the airborne potential of the virus than the CDC did in its update.
“The balance of attention must be shifted to protecting against airborne transmission,” they said, because people are “far more likely” to breathe in floating virus than be sprayed by quickly falling droplets of contaminated body fluid.

Aerosols and airborne transmission “are the only way to explain super-spreader events we are seeing,” letter author Kimberly Prather, an atmospheric chemist at the University of California at San Diego, said in an interview. Once the airborne route is acknowledged, she said, this becomes a “fixable” problem through proper ventilation.

“Wear masks at all times indoors when others are present,” Prather said. Separation is important – but, inside, no such thing as a completely “safe social distance” exists.

Experts welcomed CDC’s new guidance on airborne transmission.

“There is overwhelming evidence that this is an important route of transmission for COVID-19, and we have desperately needed federal guidance on this route,” said Linsey Marr, who studies aerosols at Virginia Tech and was an author of the Science letter. “I would like to emphasize that short-range airborne transmission when people are in close contact, meaning inhalation of aerosols, probably is more important than transmission by large droplets that are sprayed onto mucous membranes.”

Some of the debate around airborne transmission may stem not from substance but from terms used differently in the fields of aerosol chemistry and infectious disease. The Science letter clarifies that fluid blobs up to 100 microns wide (the thickness of a sheet of paper) can behave as aerosols, unlike some definitions focused on smaller particles.

“Aerosol biologists speak a slightly different language than, say, clinicians like myself do, where we’re looking more at the pragmatic application of transmission for infection control, especially in a health-care environment,” Jay Butler, CDC’s deputy director for infectious diseases, said last month. He summed up a National Academies of Sciences workshop, convened in late August to discuss the growing evidence of airborne transmission, as having “much more agreement than disagreement” around its possibility.
COVID-19 is not as contagious as measles or tuberculosis, which are primarily spread through airborne transmission and require hospitals and health-care settings to care for patients in special negative-pressure infection isolation rooms to prevent spread.

There have been several well-documented cases in which the coronavirus spread rapidly and widely in an enclosed or indoor environment – a restaurant in Guangzhou, China; a bus traveling in China’s Zhejiang province; a call center in Seoul; and a church choir in Washington state. In that instance, a singer spread the virus up to 45 feet away and infected more than 50 people.

Those reports prompted CDC to update its guidance about coronavirus transmission, officials have said. Adding to that urgency is the arrival of fall and colder weather, when people will be indoors.

Decent article 'splaing things in today's NYTimes with nice graphics, but I can't transpose the graphics directly, so please read the attached file...

[SIZE=7]Charting a Covid-19 Immune Response[/SIZE]
By [Katherine J. Wu]('https://www.nytimes.com/by/katherine-j--wu') and [Jonathan Corum]('https://www.nytimes.com/by/jonathan-corum')Oct. 5, 2020

Amid a flurry of press conferences delivering upbeat news, President Trump’s doctors have administered an array of experimental therapies that are [typically reserved for the most severe cases of Covid-19]('https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/04/health/trump-covid-treatment.html'). Outside observers were left to puzzle through conflicting messages to determine the seriousness of his condition and how it might inform his [treatment plan]('https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/science/coronavirus-drugs-treatments.html').

Though Mr. Trump [left Walter Reed medical center]('https://www.nytimes.com/live/2020/10/05/world/covid-trump#trump-has-returned-to-the-white-house-his-doctor-says-he-isnt-out-of-the-woods') on Monday night to continue his recovery in the White House, the future of his health status is unclear. Physicians have warned that the president [remains at a precarious point in his disease course]('https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/04/health/trump-covid-treatment.html'). The coronavirus can be a tricky adversary — and for many people whose cases of Covid-19 are severe, the greatest threat to survival might not be the pathogen itself, but the deadly forces that the body marshals to fight it.

To quash the virus, the immune system unleashes an arsenal of powerful weapons. Sometimes these turn inward and destroy healthy tissues. Combatting this friendly fire has become as crucial a part of the Covid-19 treatment strategy as subduing the virus itself.

R7, you’re killing me with this info. It seems that there is no practical solution until there is an effective vaccine; mitigation in the short term.:cry:

R7, you’re killing me with this info. It seems that there is no practical solution until there is an effective vaccine; mitigation in the short term.:cry:

Sadly, you're exactly correct. No amount of downplaying, equivocating nor rationalization can change the fact until there is an effective vaccine with widespread acceptance, mitigation through testing, social distancing, wearing masks, and avoiding crowded interior spaces, is the only effective tool we have.

The consensus amongst the professionals I talk with suggests a late 2021/early 2022 as a reasonable expectation for a return to 2019 norms...

A good article regarding COVID-19 testing from the NY Times. It provides insight into what used to be the demons I faced at work...

[HEADING=2]What Does ‘Negative’ on a Coronavirus Test Really Mean?[/HEADING]
President Trump’s recent tests are a reminder that although many products exist, none test for infectiousness.

President Trump boarded Air Force One after attending a campaign rally in Pennsylvania on Tuesday. Credit...Doug Mills/The New York Times

By [Katherine J. Wu]('https://www.nytimes.com/by/katherine-j--wu')
Oct. 15, 2020

In a flurry of memos released this week and last, the White House physician, Dr. Sean Conley, [stated]('') that President Trump [no longer posed a transmission risk]('') to others — an assessment, he noted, that was largely precipitated by the results of a bevy of “[advanced diagnostics]('').” The declarations have helped clear Mr. Trump to return to the campaign trail, including a town-hall-style event hosted by NBC News on Thursday evening.

Outside experts have also said that Mr. Trump, who reportedly began feeling sick about two weeks ago, is probably no longer infectious. But most have based such assessments on the trajectory of the president’s symptoms — not the results of his tests.

There exists no test that can definitively determine whether someone who caught the coronavirus is still contagious. “We do not have a test for cure, and we do not have a test for infectiousness,” said Omai Garner, a clinical microbiologist at the University of California, Los Angeles.

Experts have [criticized the administration’s overreliance on tests]('https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/06/health/covid-white-house-testing.html') to keep the coronavirus out of Mr. Trump’s inner circle. Now, they said, the White House appears to be leaning too heavily on tests to break the president out of isolation.

Not all coronavirus tests are designed to detect the same parts of the virus. And a negative on one test does not necessarily guarantee a negative on another.

“We don’t just look at these tests in the context of ‘Coronavirus, yes or no,’” said Karissa Culbreath, a clinical microbiologist at TriCore Reference Laboratories in New Mexico. “Each test looks for a different aspect of the virus.”

[As recently as Tuesday]('https://www.nytimes.com/live/2020/10/14/world/covid-coronavirus#fauci-reviews-trumps-virus-test-results-and-says-he-is-past-the-point-of-infectiousness'), for instance, a rapid test called the BinaxNOW was [unable to detect the coronavirus in Mr. Trump](''). But results yielded from a laboratory test, which used a slower but more accurate technique called polymerase chain reaction, or P.C.R., showed he still carried genetic material from the virus at low levels in his body.

The White House also reported using two experimental approaches on Mr. Trump: a viral culture, in which researchers in a laboratory tried to grow the coronavirus from a sample taken from the president, and a test for subgenomic RNA, a proxy for the presence of actively replicating virus.

Many types of P.C.R. and antigen tests for the coronavirus have received a green light from the Food and Drug Administration. But viral culture and probes for subgenomic RNA are not currently part of the standard testing tool kit, Dr. Culbreath said.

[IMG alt="Abbott Laboratory’s BinaxNOW coronavirus test kit."]
Abbott Laboratory’s BinaxNOW coronavirus test kit. Credit...Abbott, via Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

P.C.R.-based tests are some of many among a suite of so-called molecular tests, which hunt for genetic material exclusive to the coronavirus. These tests include an amplification step, wherein the genetic material is copied over and over until it reaches detectable levels, revealing even very small amounts of the virus.

Some P.C.R.-based tests can also give an indication of how much virus is lingering in the body — a number called the cycle threshold, or C.T., which increases as the virus becomes more scarce.

A recent P.C.R. test taken by Mr. Trump yielded a C.T. of 34.3, after steadily increasing for several days. Researchers have had [trouble growing the virus]('https://www.cdc.gov/library/covid19/090420_covidupdate.html') [out of samples]('https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7185831/') taken from people whose P.C.R. tests [crest above the low 30s]('https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.08.04.20167932v4.full.pdf'). But exceptions to this trend do exist, and cycle-threshold readings are often inconsistent among different types of P.C.R.-based tests, and even among laboratories using the same test.

“We cannot say, ‘A C.T. value of 34 does not make someone infectious’ across the board,” Dr. Culbreath said. “It’s not a universal answer.”

Tests like the BinaxNOW, on the other hand, are antigen tests, which search for bits of proteins, or antigens, made by the coronavirus. Unlike P.C.R.-based tests, antigen tests do not include a step in which they amplify their targets, making them faster and more convenient but less reliable at finding the virus when it is in low abundance. Some P.C.R.-based tests are thought to be [many thousands times more sensitive]('https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7302192/') than antigen tests.

It’s thus very possible to be antigen negative but P.C.R. positive, while still harboring the virus in the body, Dr. Culbreath said.

The BinaxNOW has emergency clearance from the F.D.A., but only when administered [within seven days after the onset of symptoms]('https://www.fda.gov/media/141570/download'). Researchers do not yet know how the test will perform in people outside this window. Mr. Trump received several of these tests during his second week of illness, all of which returned negative results.

“The tests have to be used when they’re supposed to be used,” said Andrea Prinzi, a clinical microbiologist at the University of Colorado, Anschutz. “That’s when they’re going to help you the most.”

Both P.C.R. and antigen tests have another limitation: They look for hunks of the virus’s anatomy — debris from the pathogen — and cannot determine whether the virus is still active. Some people who have been infected by the coronavirus may register as P.C.R. positive [for weeks, even months, after they are no longer contagious or ill]('https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/22/health/coronavirus-isolation-testing.html'), simply because tests are picking up on harmless souvenirs of an infection long past.

“Neither is a measure of actual, live virus,” Dr. Garner said, of P.C.R. and antigen tests.

That’s where viral culture comes in. Scientists can take a sample from a person’s airway and then try to coax the coronavirus into infecting cells in a lab. But these procedures are not widely available to the public, because they have to be performed in a high-containment facility by people specifically trained to work with deadly pathogens.

These restrictions have led several scientists to experiment with P.C.R.-based tests that search specifically for subgenomic RNA as [a possible proxy for active virus]('https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/26/11/20-3219_article'). Subgenomic RNA is a type of genetic material that is produced only after the coronavirus has infected a human cell. The compound can thus act as a sort of molecular beacon that can alert researchers to a virus that has started to reproduce itself, without the need to grow the dangerous pathogen.

Dr. Conley’s memos about Mr. Trump [appear]('') to [indicate]('') that the president is no longer producing samples with detectable subgenomic RNA. Researchers have also tried to culture the coronavirus outside of his body, although few details on this have been shared. Virus that can be cultured is not necessarily transmittable, or vice versa.

Neither viral culture nor subgenomic RNA tests are approved for widespread use, Dr. Garner noted. Researchers doing these studies might not perform their experiments in the same way, making any results difficult to interpret without more information how, and by whom, they were obtained.

[Guidelines]('https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/hcp/duration-isolation.html') published by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention stipulate that symptoms — not test results — should be the primary motivator for ending a person’s isolation. People with mild or moderate Covid-19 should isolate for least 10 days after their symptoms start. That timeline could extend up to 20 days if their symptoms are severe.

Before advising someone to end their isolation for Covid-19, “I would want to know about their symptoms,” said Dr. Krutika Kuppalli, an infectious disease physician in South Carolina. While information on tests wouldn’t hurt, that data should be considered secondary to how the patient is feeling. Otherwise, the tests might be not just unhelpful, but also a “waste of resources,” Dr. Kuppalli said.

“If the president meets C.D.C. guidelines, he can come out of isolation,” said Dr. Alexander McAdam, director of the infectious diseases diagnostic laboratory at Boston Children’s Hospital. “But I don’t see testing as a get-out-of-jail-free card.”

Everything comes at a cost

[URL unfurl="true"]https://www.sciencealert.com/some-vaccine-candidates-could-make-people-more-susceptible-to-hiv-warn-immunologists[/URL]

Everything comes at a cost

[URL unfurl="true"]https://www.sciencealert.com/some-vaccine-candidates-could-make-people-more-susceptible-to-hiv-warn-immunologists[/URL]

Really interesting, trials and tribulations of genetic engineering, and a sad reminder why a HIV vaccine is such a stretch target. I've always used a First Gulf War analogy regarding HIV. The virus, which DOES NOT KILL, knocks out the immune system by attacking the first line defenses, the body's "Radar". During that war, the first thing the Coalition targeted was Iraq's air defense warning systems. After the immune system is shot, other diseases get in and kill the person, just like the launching of the ground assault.

The key take aways are things like "may" and "endemic areas". If there are effective Adenovirus-free COVID vaccines, then they should be used in HIV prevalent areas. It's all a balance and there's nothing better than using a virus to inject nuclei acids into cells, it's what they evolved to do with great efficiency.

As a former boss would say, "That scares me to death... And I'm fearless!!"

Here are Maine's COVID infection data. The consistent upward trends of both the 7 and 14 day averages are extremely disconcerting. Maine has one of the lowest infection rate in the country, so the data suggest that all states are looking at a bleak winter 20/21 forecast...

this entire thing started with exactly 1 infected person back in 2019 , correct ?

stop me when I’m not scientific enough

so as long as there is still 1 case out there without 100 percent quarantine or a 100 percent effective method to stop 100 percent of transmission We will have spikes
until such time as its eradicated, no ?

have we ever managed to eradicate a corona virus ?

this entire thing started with exactly 1 infected person back in 2019 , correct ?

stop me when I’m not scientific enough

so as long as there is still 1 case out there without 100 percent quarantine or a 100 percent effective method to stop 100 percent of transmission We will have spikes
until such time as its eradicated, no ?

have we ever managed to eradicate a corona virus ?

Yes, spikes will occur, but by definition an epidemic's spike is a quick uptick, followed by a quick dropoff. What the current worldwide data show is a consistent upward trend, not a spike.

Yes, 100% stops everything, but with only 1 exception, there is never a 100% in a virologist's vocabulary. When things get into the high 90%s the term "effectively eradicated" get used.

Smallpox is the sole exception to the above, in that it was declared "eradiated" back in the 1980, the only infectious disease officially eradicated. I seem to remember huge debates about whether or not stored scientific samples should be destroyed or kept and can't remember what the official decision was. Even if they were supposed to be destroyed, I'd bet some unscrupulous folks/groups/governments have some stashed away in their freezers. Whether or not they have the actual virus stored, with modern molecular biology techniques and the nucleic acid sequence, any graduate student could reassemble the virus.

So no, no corona virus has been eradicated, nor is their an effective vaccine for a corona virus. SARS is also caused by a corona virus and there are vaccine programs for that bug which have yet to produce anything. Due to it's similarity to COVID-19, the work and experience from the SARS vaccine helped jump start the COVID-19 effort.

So in short
We’re spinning our wheels
And will continue to do so out of either an over abundance of caution or fear whichever you prefer

and you see no correlation between nys very very big infection rate in the beginning and the fact that it’s simply spiking at this time

and say a place like Maine that held it at bay early and is now seeing what your calling more than simply a spike

No, we are not spinning our wheels when you consider the importance of keeping the rate of infection as low as possible. Measures that slow the rate of infection are imperative because they buy time and time is critical; they are far from an exercise of spinning our wheels.

Time to:
[LIST]
[*]Keeps hospitals below 100% capacity so the healthcare workers are not totally swamped
[*]To increase hospital capacity, equipment and personnel to be able to react to possible future overloads
[*]Accumulate data and understanding for more effective treatments
[*]Continue to work on effective vaccines
[/LIST]

Didn’t we have hospital capacity increased
With many places like the javits center that went unused, then abruptly and possibly prematurely removed ?

Didn’t we have hospital capacity increased
With many places like the javits center that went unused, then abruptly and possibly prematurely removed ?

NY Yes, other states like WI setting up field hospitals now because their hospitals are exceeding capacity.

The only proven techniques to flatten the curve are the combinations of masks, limited gatherings, social distancing and good hygiene. Recent events at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue bear this out and demonstrate the failure of testing only, as the President of Notre Dame University can attest to. He ignored his own instructions to his students, after being told that everyone at a gathering had tested negative and he could remove his mask. He, along with others, ended up contracting COVID at this event. His students and faculty called for his resignation because he failed to comply with his own University's COVID precautions. So instead of a mask, he ended up with egg on his face...

Flattening the curve buys time, allowing better treatment in terms of options, therapeutics and hospital resources. INCREASED TIME = INCREASED SAVED LIVES!!