Moved this from Mask rant
I wear a mask to protect you from me. I work around COVID every day. I personally could not care if you wear a mask, but stay 6 feet away from me. That I will enforce.
I remember (gad it seems like a loooooong time ago) you correcting me, telling me vaccines don’t necessarily prevent infections, they prevent or reduce SYMPTOMATIC infections.
that said, has there been any reliable documentation of a vaccinated previously UNINFECTED person contracting an ASYMPTOMATIC infection and transmitting it to an UNVACCINATED person producing a SYMPTOMATIC infection? (Just typing that starts to sound like
@JAL3 ‘s Rube Goldberg sadly incomplete lander build thread!)
I understand the mRNA vaccines specifically target the spike protein and ONLY the spike protein. Is there a specific component of Covid that J and J targets? And could it be that the spike protein is so critical to the Covid virus that the mutations that significantly change the spike protein (to the point it isn’t recognized by the antibodies produced in mRNA vaccinated people) are less successful than their fellow virions and don’t propagate?
I guess I am selfish. I am vaccinated Pfizerx2 and still wear a mask in stores (usually two), I am doing it to protect myself (even if minimal added protection) from what (by the above stats) is a significant U.S. population that has DECLINED a free vaccination, is wandering around WITHOUT a mask potentially both contracting and SPREADING the latest and greatest Covid variants, as I fear eventually one of these variants will be completely resistant to my two Pfizer shots. I neither want to chance getting this nor taking the gift that keeps on giving to my wife at home, also vaccinated.
Chuck, if you can talk about it, do you think the next generation vaccine, particularly if mRNA, will have a SINGLE protein target or MULTIPLE protein targets?
any estimate on what percentage of U.S. population is left that has NEITHER had Covid NOR been vaccinated?
any U.S. reports of documented Covid survivors (had documented virus and recovered.) who have not been vaccinated contracting the new variants?
there is all this panic about the vaccine causing possible myocarditis. But wait a minute. Covid infection ITSELF can cause myocarditis
source
https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/covid-19-and-the-heart-what-have-we-learned-2021010621603Inflammation of the heart muscle, called myocarditis, typically occurs only in patients with advanced COVID-19 disease. Myocarditis can result from direct heart invasion by the virus itself, or more commonly by inflammation caused by cytokine storm. When this occurs, the heart may become enlarged and weakened, leading to low blood pressure and fluid in the lungs. While this severe form of myocarditis is rare, recent studies have suggested that a milder form of heart muscle inflammation may be much more common than previously recognized. A
recent study showed that asymptomatic heart inflammation was seen on magnetic resonance imaging in up to three-quarters of patients who had recovered from severe COVID-19.
It seems entirely possible that the small fraction of vaccine recipients who got myocarditis from the vaccine (almost certainly an autoimmune reaction) would have been just as likely (possibly more) to get it from actual Covid infection (in addition to all the wonderful other things Covid offers the human body.). I think I remember you (a long time ago but thankfully in the same galaxy) discussing Covid 19 myocarditis in the younger active duty population well before the vaccines were out.
if mRNA vaccine generates cells to make spike proteins that provoke antibodies to spike proteins which in susceptible individuals rarely provokes autoimmune myocarditis, it seems highly likely the same cascade would occur with ACTUAL spike proteins created by active Covid infection as well.