The quest to make a 'contagious' animal vaccine
nationalgeographic.com
nationalgeographic.com
For this it would probably be a good idea to read the article.
* (I posted this because at the time, there were a ton of those in the thread, making the thread bad, and leading to offtopic complaints like https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30758587.)
The government was rounding up people with this disease, jamming them into concentration camps, and incinerating them with FAE bombs.
Turns out, the disease was caused by a (government-created) bioengineered virus that was created to counteract AIDS.
However, a thought about how antibiotics got used in animals and in many respects we have to admit - abused in their usage leading to decrease in how effective they are. So with that history in mind, certainly be prudent to vist that whole aspect cure/exposure. Maybe that early intevention at source may be better and I suspect it may well be as shifting the zoological landscape of fighting a virus's at a stage prior to human exposure. But that may well just see over time, more robust virus's that rise up thru evolutionary exposure to any vacine we put into the wild.
So many aspects to look at. Just the whole leasons from antibiotics into animals and how that went is something we need to be very mindful of in not repeating as the possibility of solving a problem in the short/middle term and creating a larger threat longer term is something that can not be rulled out.
One thing that I hope they do look at is having some kill-switch method, be it anothe virus that attacks the one they release. A fail safe.
Thus, to discusse the original source would be a safer option.
The idea is too close to "lets enhance Coronaviruses to made it more contagious and see what happens" to feel comfortable. We don't ever know how many [1] ebola relatives we have in the west and how that could interact here.
Changing our behavior respect to food safety (i.e learning how to sterilize somehow vine sap palms or banning to market bats to use it as food) could be a safer, less unpredictable solution.
[1] We know about one species native from Spain at least
Since all I really see of National Geographic these days are the 'special issues' at the supermarket checkout going on about the life of Jesus or the latest alternative healing trends, I basically ignore them now. They've had a very sad fall from grace.
I don't want to imply that it would be unethical either, because I haven't thought about it and just don't know; and while it seems like taking the cynical view is prudent at the moment, ultimately I imagine we (humans) will succeed in making these ideas a reality, but it will no doubt be a bumpy road.
This doesn't make a whole lot of sense. You have no (or at least not much) idea which disease is going to spill over from animals into humans. Unless the plan is to eliminate all diseases — which sounds dangerous — this technology might be applied to contain known zoonotic diseases (rabies and Lyme seem particularly notable) but seems unlikely to stop new ones.
>CMVs also infect a host for life, induce strong immune responses yet do not often cause severe disease.
Aren't these... like... uh, lemme check...
>A substantial portion of the immune system is involved in continuously controlling CMV, which drains the resources of the immune system.[41][42] Death rates from infectious disease accelerate with age,[43] and CMV infection correlates with reduced effectiveness of vaccination.[44] Persons with the highest levels of CMV antibodies have a much higher risk of death from all causes compared with persons having few or no antibodies.[45][46]
...bad?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_betaherpesvirus_5#Pathog...
"Nuismer and Redwood both say it is highly unlikely that a CMV-based vaccine could ever jump species given the virus’s biology. Although the evolutionary factors underlying CMV’s species-specificity are not entirely known, there has never been a documented case in the wild or in a laboratory of a successful cross-species CMV infection."
"However, this live vaccine is continued to be used worldwide. And while you're doing that, some of that vaccine has gotten out into the world. And it's mutated. It starts circulating again, just like regular polio. But early on, it's just - it's still a vaccine. It's not dangerous. And then slowly, it sort of regains strength. And they're finding they can actually genetically see this - that scientists can actually trace it back directly to the vaccine. And now these vaccine-linked cases are actually causing more cases of paralysis each year than actual traditional - what scientists call wild polio."
https://www.npr.org/2019/11/16/780068006/how-the-oral-polio-...
SIMON: Now, we should underscore, Jason, this is not the version of the vaccine that's given to youngsters in the United States.
BEAUBIEN: Yeah.
SIMON: Why are other countries still using it?
BEAUBIEN: Right. So in the United States and in Europe and other countries like that, it - we're using an injectable vaccine, which is a dead vaccine. It is not a live virus, and it cannot cause polio. So that should not at all be a concern. The issue, however, is that it's an injection that has to be given. It's given four times between the ages of 2 months and 7 years. So just administering it is difficult. And just frankly, there is not enough global stockpile of that vaccine to vaccinate all of the children around the world, you know, four times over the course of their childhood.
A few years ago, there were more polio cases caused by vaccine-derived virus than the wild virus.
That said, it is certainly a shame that the entire world doesn't have access to and capability to administer the inactive vaccine.
To draw an analogy to the obvious vaccine-related situation on everyone's minds, no one who knows what they're talking about would say that mRNA covid vaccines are 100% safe. But they are far, far safer than not having a vaccine, so it makes sense to accept that risk. I'm not saying the same is necessarily true of any given 'contagious' animal vaccine, but it could be.
> I'm not saying the same is necessarily true of any given 'contagious' animal vaccine, but it could be.
That's what I think I wanted to say.. there is a huge difference to anything self-spreading / replicating - be it self-reproducing true AI nano robotors, simple things as self replicating plants (and here we have already a dozen examples of promised containment not working with bad consequences involved - oops) or 'contagious' vaccines.. it needs to be magnitudes safer, not?
So if as an individual there is a minimal risk to my health by taking a mRNA vaccine, I can decide for myself vs the risk of infection or consequences, or also let my doctor decide. It is also easy to run "trials" among the population for studies. But if there is a risk to our complete biosphere, that is just very different for the risk calculation?
Like my everyday flying car, that's a nice idea but may have the problem of not existing.
Which could then be added to tap water, soft drinks, added as a fortifying agent in flour and bread.
That would surely be the response from conspiracy theorists, except of course that they would replace could then be with already is.
Imo it must be considered extremely taboo. Moreso than just contagious vaccines.
Humankind has neither the coordination nor the process to reach a consensus on almost anything, and certainly not on the ethics of changes to the natural world. And meanwhile, we continuously make such changes, whether intentionally, unintentionally, or on the boundary between the two that is "we're doing this and we know we're doing it but we lack the coordination to stop".
We should be able to make decisions on a scale of "should we eliminate all mosquitos in the world, would that be a net win or a net loss when taking all side effects into account". I expect that would in fact be a net win, even taking all side effects into account, because disease as a factor will outweigh other considerations. But in practice, I don't think we have the means of making such decisions in any coordinated fashion. And I don't think that means we should refuse to ever make such decisions at all.
I think the proposal in the article is a risky one. The rewards may outweigh the risks. But right now we have no process to evaluate that. Writing articles and provoking public opinion is not a process, it's one small step in an otherwise non-existent process.
"Most researchers agree that self-spreading vaccines could never be applied to human populations, because universal informed consent would never be achieved."
I wonder if these researchers are able to imagine a government mandating that all citizens must receive a vaccine.
even if the vaccine is medically inappropriate, or even contraindicated for millions? the comatose on life support? mandates it for foreign travellers in transit who got stuck in your country? mandates for the foreign diplomatic staff? mandates for military, which has their own medical corps and medical decision-making?
What is all?
We've already crossed the Rubicon on this, and countries will justify infringing the rights of millions if a policy has a potential of saving millions more. Fortunately I can't think of a situation where a contagious human virus would be the only or the best way to save millions, but governments have no trouble making the ethically-questionable decision that some groups of people should die through lockdowns in order that other (generally older) groups of people should survive.
> mandates it for foreign travellers in transit who got stuck in your country? mandates for the foreign diplomatic staff?
A government could announce the policy well in advance, to give people a chance to leave, although the distinction between at home and abroad is moot if the contagion can spread outside the country, which of course it will. Again, sadly, there are plenty of countries that take the view that citizens of other countries have effectively no moral weight and the government has no duty to protect their rights.
Yes, people were "nudged" to get vaccinated to by restricting travel and ability to work, aka denial of food and shelter, but not quite physical force yet.
However, I don't recall any civilized government using physical force to pin down their subjects and force-vaccinate them.
Austria may have backed down on their plan to mandate vaccination, but Indonesia went ahead with it[0]. Hopefully you don't view that country as uncivilized. It's true that they "only" went as far as fining people who refused, but I'm sure if you refused to pay the fine there would eventually be some arm of the government willing to use force against you.
[0] https://www.straitstimes.com/asia/se-asia/indonesia-makes-co...
1) they will of course mutate and jump to humans at some point.
2) we will be told it’s a matter of public health to release ones for humans.
Insofar as legal mandates we've been mandating that school children be vaccinated for various things for a very long time. I don't see any problem with not allowing a single person to opt to subject the entire rest of society to sickness and death. That seems like a morally dubious sort of freedom.
There are millions of people with primary (1 in 1000), some more acquired, and hundreds of millions of immunosuppressed globally. "not a single person" just sounds laughable in this context.
500,000,000 vs 1.
Is that science? or is it hysteria?
> I don't see any problem with not allowing a single person to opt to subject the entire rest of society to sickness and death.
That is I don't think its OK to allow individuals to opt out of vaccination because that ignorant minority can not only spread their contagion to vulnerable individuals but also potentially act as a lab for the creation of entirely new variant that bypass existing immunity. Every unnecessary infection is a dice roll with the rest of the human race.
Nobody said anything at all about immunosuppressed individuals. Few of them are incidentally entirely without an immune system else they would soon be dead outside of a clean room. This is to say that their decreased immune systems results in them being at a vastly increased risk compared to the general population and it is more critical not less to vaccinate them even though it doesn't wholly ameliorate their greater risk. I am well aware of this due to my own research my wife's doctors advice.
Lastly 500M would be 1 in 16 not 1 in 1000. In further communication please review the post you are replying to so that it at least makes contextual sense and double check math so as to ensure you aren't wasting the other readers time with trivial errors instead of substantial discussion.
Fluoride is naturally occurring in water, some places add more, some places remove some to get to the desired level.
The earth should distill all water for my consumption.
Iodine in table salt is probably a better example.
Here is one: the difference between medicine and poison is dosage.
Each individual requires its own dosage. This idea is talking about a forced universal. But nobody has the right to poison an individual, not to mention a minority, in the name of the good for everybody. It would be a false good forced with an illegitimate right. In other words, necessary fraud. And we didn't even started about the side effects.
Few have serious adverse reactions unless she is describing feeling ill for a day as a severe reaction. If she is unable to take needed preventative measures wouldn't it be more reasonable if they hired someone who can?
This was after the second shot. Regardless of previous infection, shouldn't the reaction to a previous dosage be enough to determine that maybe increasing the dosage is not a good idea?
And is natural immunity not enough of a preventative measure? Natural immunity has been proven to be more robust than vaccine acquired immunity, with natural immunity plus one shot being touted as superior to simply being double or even triple jabbed. Of course many of the more controversial doctors have been saying that risk of adverse effects increase 4-fold if you have previously been exposed to the virus. But that's not acceptable to discuss.
> If she is unable to take needed preventative measures wouldn't it be more reasonable if they hired someone who can?
When staffing shortages regularly kill people, I hate to even dignify this with a response.
> Previous infection should have had some bearing on the dosage one was compelled to take.
But then backed it up with no evidence that this was actually so. Basically nobody cares about your intuitive reasoning about how the human body works because that's worth in an area as complex as your body less than nothing. The correct answer would have been a study that showed people with prior infection responded better to a different dosage.
Natural immunity alone is a worst case situation because covid without vaccination is far more likely to kill you and far more likely to cause permanent damage to heart and lungs. It's less meaningful to talk about the benefits without also talking about the costs. You also have worse immunity than if you had also got vaccinated and worse costs than if you had got vaccinated prior to infection.
Covid infection -> Vaccination. All of the costs above then even greater immunity.
Vaccination -> Covid infection Lesser costs same immunity as above.
Vaccination alone. Best possible scenario none of the costs above in exchange for slightly worse immunity.
Remember the whole point of immunity is to avoid paying some or all costs of the infection. Getting it by paying full costs defeats the purpose its like going to a war zone and saying screw it I'll just get shot right away and get it over with and shooting yourself in the chest.
Regarding one shot being better two than people with prior covid infections. I have seen exactly one pre print study to that effect. I do not believe that this is the scientific consensus.
The recommendations from actual doctors and scientists is to get your two shots regardless of whether you have had covid or not. I would stick with that.
A better solution would be to tightly regulate this sort of thing so that random research teams aren't allowed to just do this, but there are checks and balances, e.g. a plan coordinated by the UN/WHO or something.
[0]: https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/71/wr/mm7104e4.htm?s_cid=mm...
What seems more important is how conveniently it can prove a point that the person already is trying to push forward.
The reason is because diagnosis is almost never done randomly, but instead relies on different avenues like hospitalization data. So you tend to already be biasing yourself to severe outcomes because milder cases are not going to end up getting diagnosed. In omicron's case this effect has been extreme as things like sewage samples showed dramatically higher rates of of the disease than were being officially reported. In the study you mentioned it determined diagnosis using:
"CDC used data from three surveillance systems to assess U.S. disease related to COVID-19 during December 1, 2020–January 15, 2022. COVID-19 aggregate cases and deaths reported to CDC by state and territorial health departments¶ were tabulated by report date.* ED visits with COVID-19 diagnosis codes were obtained from the National Syndromic Surveillance Program (NSSP).†† Hospital admissions and inpatient and ICU bed use among patients with laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 were obtained from the Unified Hospital Data Surveillance System."
So your numbers are biased to heavily rely on things like hospitalization data, which is going to make the numbers borderline useless for trying to evaluate the overall mortality rate. To be fair I'm not really attacking the study either. Like I said this is a problem that really can't be solved in any way other than an involuntary lottery with mandatory testing + reporting + profiling/classification, which is something I'd expect to see in China, but not the US - for better and for worse.
https://www.imperial.ac.uk/news/234736/people-with-omicron-v...
It says the risk of death with Omicron is 69% lower than with Delta. Among the unvaccinated, the risk is 80% lower than with Delta.
These numbers jibe with the statistics on case rates and mortality that we've seen over the last three months, when Omicron has been dominant.
I suspect the difference would be much more pronounced if we were to account for asymptomatic cases. Looking at wastewater measurements, which have been a good proxy for (and predictor of) case rates, we see far fewer confirmed cases, relative to virus levels, during the Omicron phase than we saw during prior variants. The ratio of deaths to wastewater virus levels is about 1/10th of what it was with Delta.
Maybe a coincidence, maybe not.
https://twitter.com/stevensalzberg1/status/14792575379208355...
"Although the evolutionary factors underlying CMV’s [cytomegalovirus] species-specificity are not entirely known, there has never been a documented case in the wild or in a laboratory of a successful cross-species CMV infection."
A technology cannot be fairly represented by the intent of its inventors. It's equivalent to describing the Manhattan project as "New technology aims to end WWII and provide cheap, clean power".
What could possibly go wrong?
No, it isn't large, but it sure as all hell isn't 0.
Allergic reactions to vaccine are not 1 in a hundred, they're generally closer to 1 in a million.
(Of course the problem is that cures are antithetical to Capitalism.)
The problem with preventatives is that they can proliferate on marginal effectiveness. In fact they are more lucrative that way.