MuchoMaas

A viral infection doesn't last forever either. There may be no reproduction with mRNA, but an infection is limited by the control exerted by the immune response. To use an absurd example to demonstrate the point, if you used a dose 100x or 1000x higher than the actual shots, might that result in higher levels of spike exposure than a mild asymptomatic SARS-CoV-2 infection? If so, then we've established that this is an empirical question, not something that can be reasoned about with a priori assumptions.

> Such studies should compare the risk to the covid-19 infection itself vs. the risk to vaccination and infection to the risk of vaccination.

I'm not sure why that comparison would be relevant, since vaccination does not zero out the risk of infection or developing myocarditis from that infection. The risks are cumulative, not mutually exclusive.

It also doesn't seem clear to me that spike protein exposure is necessarily higher from infection than vaccination, as you assert. Do you have any studies that show this? The only comparisons I've seen have been between the levels of anti-spike antibodies, which are much higher following vaccination.

Age stratification is also an important consideration here. A large Israeli study found no increase in incidence of myocarditis among ~200,000 unvaccinated individuals who contracted SARS-CoV-2: https://euroweeklynews.com/2022/07/08/no-increase-myocarditi...

> Under the current rules — marked orange for the second most restrictive setting under the nation’s traffic light system — Kiwis are told they can do everyday activities, but that they “need to protect our vulnerable communities”.

This means they are ordered by the government to wear a face mask in many indoor locations, but that there are no limits on gatherings or distancing requirements.

Around about a year ago there was a lot of crowing about how New Zealand hadn't had to do any of this stuff and "life is completely normal" because of the genius of their COVID response. Now they have the highest case rate in the world and the article is hinting at the next "red" tier of restrictions.

That's nice. My kids' preschool in a blue state which mandated masks until spring of this year had constantly recurring COVID cases and exposures, including a Delta infection my kids brought home in October last year and passed to me.

Setting aside for a moment the fact that chronic, day-in-day-out long term use of N95s has never been studied for potential ill effects, why is it so difficult to discern any reduction in community transmission from Germany's N95 mandates?

Michael Parenti points out in one of his lectures on YouTube that it was unfortunate that the Soviet Union bought into the idea that high meat consumption constitutes a "better" diet and began diverting large amounts of its agricultural output to feeding livestock.

The alternative is simply to keep schools open.

I find all these mandates silly, but in a way this makes more sense than the places here in the US which have a vaccination requirement but still accept proof of shots from early/mid 2021, which are known to have worn off long ago at this point.

What if I told you that people who don't get the flu vaccine don't necessarily get the flu every year? And that clinical trials have shown little or no benefit to the updated COVID vaccines? And that being vaccinated has never been shown in 2022 to make any difference to whether you infect the very old or very young?

But masking and social distancing had entirely eliminated the flu in 2020, everyone was celebrating the victory! Anyway, now that the emergency situation has passed, the mandates can be ended and this decision returned to the parents. Especially since flu shots have caused significant harm to children in the past [0] and the lifelong effects of serial childhood influenza shots are poorly understood at best.

Anyone who wants to mandate shots which were studied in a grand total of 4500 kids, for less than a year, for a disease that does not pose a significant hazard to them in the absence of significant risk factors and comorbidities, is a fanatic, yes.

[0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pandemrix

Do they usually get added more than five decades after they were approved in kids, or was there some political sea change in 2020 which probably has more explanatory power?

Starting only in 2020 I guess: https://www.wxxinews.org/health/2020-09-10/new-york-consider...

Why?

Do they require flu shots?

Well, what's the worst that could happen? ADE/OAS or other unpredictable immune problems from constant tinkering and perturbation? Driving the virus to evolve yet another immune escape variant which might be much more virulent? These risks seem insignificant compared to not boosting against a virus with a CFR that's now about 1.5x the flu.

Actually, from what I have seen of the initial Omicron booster trials, it's probably the case that they're simply unable to stimulate much production of updated/modified antibodies, which is making it impossible to demonstrate any clinically significant effectiveness against the disease. But now they won't have to!

Also quite remarkable that the flu vaccine seems to have a larger impact on the prevalence of Alzheimer's disease than it does on, well, influenza.

Mandated to keep your job if you worked at a company that implemented Biden's rule for firms with >100 employees. Mandated to go to public places including museums and schools in many large cities. Mandated for many workers in healthcare and police forces. Mandated (including boosters!) for students to continue attending colleges where they had been enrolled for years.

Many people lost their jobs to oppose and help end these mandates (which, incidentally, did essentially zero to combat the spread of Covid), and now a lot of people want to pretend the whole thing never happened because they just don't want to take the L, and admit that they supported some pretty heinous stuff in a moment of media-driven panic and scapegoating.

> Robinhood was only saved from defaulting on its daily collateral deposit requirement by a discretionary and unexplained waiver issued by the NSCC over which Robinhood had no control. In other words, Robinhood's risk management processes did not work well to predict and avert the risk of default that materialized. Rather, Robinhood's risk management processes failed and wider risk to Robinhood's customers was only averted due to the NSCC's exercise of discretion.

Any mildly critical comments re COVID vaccines are now instantly flagged, it's really pathetic the need some people have to do the "see no evil" routine on this.

So we're already down to serious injuries to over 1 in 1,000 people who get vaccinated as "not a big deal"? What rates of subclinical harm might that imply?

"Taking (and even mandating) it was still the right thing to do given the information we had available at the time. After all, 'it was a GLOBAL PANDEMIC'."

Yes, there was. There were early studies in rats showing that the lipid nanoparticles which the mRNA vaccines use concentrate in the ovaries and testes. There should have been biodistribution studies in humans before the vaccine rollout, but naturally those were skipped entirely. It was one of the biggest early red flags for me.