COVID-19 Research, Drug trials and Pathophysiology

Discussion in 'Coronavirus (COVID-19) News' started by Bowerbird, Apr 13, 2020.

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  1. LangleyMan

    LangleyMan Well-Known Member

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    If this is the new normal (UK ... 30,000 new cases, 150 deaths per day) we're only at the beginning of the economic pain. Service sector businesses and their employees kept alive by government subsidies will feel the full impact of the consumption shift from services to goods unless we get the new case count and death from covid way down and people go back to regularly frequenting "places with faces."
    They likely need to get much lower than this...

    D0442D21-73D6-445F-B97D-C88E0DBF3C09.jpeg
    I trust you noticed Merck and Pfizer came up with covid treatments. If treatments and vaccinations can get the case counts down, we might get our old lives back.
     
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  2. Tigger2

    Tigger2 Well-Known Member

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    I am unaware of any strain of the virus that is resists the vaccine? I am talking post vaccine.
    In your opinion should we behave as if the virus will mutate in a way the vaccine cannot be adapted to?
     
  3. Tigger2

    Tigger2 Well-Known Member

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    New cases are now dropping, hospitalisations plateaued, deaths will follow. The promised surge didn't happen. Most scientists don't think it will. With 90% of the population vaccinated the virus only has a small audience left. And don't forget the 150 deaths per day are winter numbers.

    What number is acceptable and when do you think we will achieve it?
    [​IMG]
     
  4. LangleyMan

    LangleyMan Well-Known Member

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    No doubt for the same reason you prefer them. :)
    I wonder how many of the immunocompromised are actually wearing PAPR.

    I know all sorts of people my age with obvious covid risk factors who should at least be taking reasonable precautions. One long-time friend is in his 70s--overweight, has high blood pressure, etc. His bathroom looks like a pill factory, but I don't nose into his business and wouldn't know what else he has. He's convinced his cloth mask is good protection even though he has a full beard.

    His 50-year-old daughter was operated on recently for colon cancer and he takes her for chemo. Her husband is unvaccinated, obese, works for Home Depot, and they two elementary school children.

    At least he and his daughter are fully vaccinated.
     
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  5. CenterField

    CenterField Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Well, Delta has infected a lot of fully vaccinated people. And yes, of course it is possible that a mutation will further escape the vaccines.
    What are the odds of this happening, is hard to say. Maybe it won't happen. But it will be very reassuring to have antivirals that zap every variant, present and future.
     
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  6. CenterField

    CenterField Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    These people are playing with fire.
     
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  7. Tigger2

    Tigger2 Well-Known Member

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    -Yes, but we both know it doesn't make them seriously ill.
    Are you suggesting we pause everything on the premise that we might see a variant that resists the vaccine?
    Perhaps we should prepare for that meteor strike while we're at it.
     
  8. CenterField

    CenterField Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    A fair number of fully vaccinated people have died of breakthrough infections.

    No, I just said, we should stay prudent and vigilant. Rules about what to do will vary according to each country and even each region within a county (and with individual health status and vaccination status). If you're in a country or region that is having high community transmission, then you should be vigilant. If your country or region is doing well, then you can relax more. If you got full vaccination AND a booster, you're probably in good shape, provided that you're not immunocompromised or you don't have a large number of co-morbidities.

    All that I'm saying is, let's not yell victory yet, because the pandemic is not over, and this has happened five times already, that people prematurely declared it about to be over, just to see another surge.

    I'm also saying that if we have widely available antivirals that act against all present and future variants, cutting hospitalizations by about 90% and death by practically 100% (nobody died in the Pfizer trial of their antiviral among the active drug group (while 17 died in the placebo group), and they only tested it in high risk, unvaccinated patients) then we can relax even more, knowing that if we do catch the virus, it will be sufficient to get a prescription for a medication that one takes at home over five days, then, problem solved. Nothing made me more optimistic than the Pfizer antiviral's preliminary results because this has the potential to really make of this terrible disease, a pretty mild and non-dangerous one, because it hits ALL variants present and future, because all variants depend on the viral protease it inhibits, in order to replicate.

    If we have five points of attack against the virus - the three antivirals being studied all three have different mechanisms of action so they can be synergistic and given simultaneously, so they count as 3 - plus monoclonal antibodies, plus the vaccine, we may see this virus dropping to a round zero of fatality rate and organ damage, at least for the lucky citizens of countries with a proficient health system that will be able to diagnose new cases rapidly and give to the infected, fast access to these therapeutics.

    Life would go 100% back to normal. We'd get vaccines, yearly boosters like we do for flu shots, and would go about our lives, knowing that if we still caught a breakthrough infection we'd rapidly be given a course of an antiviral combination (and if high risk, we'd also receive a monoclonal antibody infusion) and in five days we'd be as good as new, with no consequences. This would be a thorough victory against this virus. Until this is in place, I'm not yelling victory yet.
     
    Last edited: Nov 7, 2021
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  9. LangleyMan

    LangleyMan Well-Known Member

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    Are we on the same page? I'm suggesting we have to get the new covid case count down if we want to save many of our service industries. Even states like Texas and Florida running wide open have problems when the virus is circulating.

    Service businesses (restaurants, pubs, clubs, theaters, etc.) should press government for financial support while the government then makes a strong effort to cut the number of new covid cases with vaccines and the impact those infected with therapies.
     
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  10. LangleyMan

    LangleyMan Well-Known Member

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    There may be light at the end of the tunnel.
     
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  11. LangleyMan

    LangleyMan Well-Known Member

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    Probably lower than anything on this chart without an effective treatment.

    upload_2021-11-7_19-30-8.jpeg
     
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  12. LangleyMan

    LangleyMan Well-Known Member

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    Yes, I thought you might think so.
     
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  13. Tigger2

    Tigger2 Well-Known Member

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    As will always be the case.
    Apologies. I think I put to much emphasis on your use of the phrase "Middle of the pandemic". Your words here seem more in line with my own thoughts. Another thing is that your perspective is driven by the situation in the U.S while mine the UK. Especially as you still have over 40% unvaccinated.
    This sounds like the Viral equivalent to Penicillin. :thumbsup:
    Until the one that resists the new drug comes along. That's why we have to live with death, it keeps finding ways to catch us.
     
    Last edited: Nov 8, 2021
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  14. Bowerbird

    Bowerbird Well-Known Member

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    As you know Australia has been aggressive with contact tracing and the data is now in

    https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-11...s-protection-covid-19-vaccine-gives/100603470

    I think that blows the ant-vaxxer argument that “the vaccine does not stop the spread” pretty much out of the water
     
  15. LangleyMan

    LangleyMan Well-Known Member

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    The problem with removing mitigation measures is that people pull back spending at service sector businesses as the number of new civid cases rise.
     
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  16. gnoib

    gnoib Well-Known Member

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    As much as I understand the Pfizer-Pill disables a Enzyme, which allows the virus to replicate.
    Is that correct CF ?

    I remember a article in the FAZ about a research project from a German and polish university, they had found a enzyme, which is common in all Sars-Covid and important for replication of the virus ( group ). Is the Pfizer-Pill eliminating/disabling that enzyme ?
     
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  17. CenterField

    CenterField Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Agreed. No apology necessary. We do seem to be on the same page.
     
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  18. CenterField

    CenterField Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    This is correct, gnoib. The enzyme that the Pfizer drug inhibits is called a protease, and it is essential for all variants to replicate. The virus can't replicate if this enzyme is disabled. As for the one detected by the German and Polish groups, I don't know if it is the same. There are other essential enzymes, so, it could be a protease, or something different, but the goal would be the same. The advantage of researching and developing drugs that target different enzymes essential to the replication process is that we can then combine drugs and hit different points of the virus' reproduction system, simultaneously. So the fact that Pfizer came up with this one doesn't mean that other groups shouldn't keep trying to make more drugs that hits other points of the replication process.
     
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  19. gnoib

    gnoib Well-Known Member

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    Thanks @Center Field. since that is not my line of work, I always try to get the gist of things.
    The research I read about, last years, was called the Achilles Tendon/ Heal of the Sars-Covid family of virus. They all have that enzyme.
    I remember that 3 University research teams were collaborating in that research, 1 in Germany and 1 in Poland and a other East European Country and that the enzyme was part of the replication process of that group/family of Virus.
    Interesting stuff.
    My thought was, that is like castrating the virus.
     
    Last edited: Nov 8, 2021
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  20. Jack Hays

    Jack Hays Well-Known Member Donor

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  21. Tigger2

    Tigger2 Well-Known Member

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    Interesting article Jack. Did you read it?
    Sweden comes out in the OK region of Covid casualties. But there are too many other factors for such straight comparisons.
    Population density, has played a large part in the spread of the disease, but then so has temperature (colder is Sweden which the virus prefers)
    Average age is another major factor.
    Tourism and travel another.
    ..and then a host of cultural differences (Such as Italies extended family gatherings, the UK's crowded pubs)
     
  22. Tigger2

    Tigger2 Well-Known Member

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    an interesting reposte, comparing Sweden to similar countries.
    Sweden has recorded more COVID-19 cases per capita than most countries so far: Since the start of the pandemic, roughly 11 out of every 100 people in Sweden have been diagnosed with COVID-19, compared with 9.4 out of every 100 in the UK and 7.4 per 100 in Italy. Sweden has also recorded around 145 COVID-19 deaths for every 100,000 people — around three times more than Denmark, eight times more than Finland, and nearly 10 times more than Norway.
    https://www.businessinsider.com/sweden-covid-no-lockdown-strategy-failed-higher-death-rate-2021-8
     
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  23. WillReadmore

    WillReadmore Well-Known Member

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    Well, it appears that we're going to have to keep wading through the correlation=causation garbage of those who have NO qualifications of ANY kind in any field of science.
     
  24. Jack Hays

    Jack Hays Well-Known Member Donor

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    The outcome is the outcome.
     
  25. CenterField

    CenterField Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Yes, the outcome is, Sweden did worse than comparable countries, as per post #1072
     

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