One or more of those immune cell types (B/T) in conjunction with SARS-CoV-2 Antibodies killing enough of the virus that you don't get noticeably sick.
1,012 karma · joined August 21, 2020
An MD might have a 4-year undergrad in biochemistry or molecular biology or something, an internship at a biotech company or time in a research lab, they might be on one or two wetlab publications, they have another 4 years of medical training with lab experience for the MD, and another 3 or more years in residency training.
I believe most nurses have only an associates (2-year), or a 4-year undergrad degree with zero lab experience, zero biotech industry experience, and zero research-focused biochemistry/molecular biology/immunology training. They're not out there running ELISAs, Western Blots, minipreps and passaging cell cultures.
So they may not understand how the vaccine technology works at a particularly higher level than the general public.
Not a slight against nurses, of course, they do incredibly valuable work. But, upon hearing about a novel mRNA-based vaccine technology, they may be less likely than, say, an MD or a biomedical PhD to go 'that's a pretty cool application of a technology I understand pretty well."
Same thing with cops, fire, paramedics etc. They didn't exactly spend a decade in school to learn all about the magic of B cells and epitopes. So, they might be a little suspicious of something they're not exactly trained to understand, and seemingly not particularly curious about. Not really their fault I guess, it's just way outside of their wheelhouse.
In this particular situation, however, that becomes a bit of a problem since the public isn't necessarily able to contextualize their opinion on something, and may miss the fact that they may have zero clue what they're talking about.
Agreed. Weird time to be alive indeed.
Do you have any sort of a source that ICUs and ERs are on divert more often than not?
And we don't have that.
We have a year of guesswork, and learning, and trying to stop thousands and thousands of loved ones and neighbors from dying.
Perhaps so many lives were saved due to decreases in traffic accidents, that it totally outweighed the lives lost to murder and suicide? Nobody knows right now.
We're just doing the best we can to leg it out until people can get the vaccine. There has been no cohesive federal anything, so the states are hanging in there as best they can.
Be patient. We've made it a year. We're in the home stretch.
Edit: Compare the size of the largest city in California with the largest city in Florida. It's a whole different ballgame. 900k vs 4 million. Florida's playing little-league compared to CA. They're not working with LA sprawl and urban density.
It's killed a LOT of people. Like 360,000 people in the US according to the CDC.
https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#cases_casesper100k...
If you believe the numbers are cooked or something, then consider excess all-cause mortality there are clearly a LOT more dead people this year.
https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/covid19/excess_deaths.htm
I mean, you can just eyeball the weekly deaths graph between 2018 and now, and go 'oh, this isn't good.' There's no end in sight. LA ICUs are now nightmarish.
"At Los Angeles County-USC Medical Center, the breaking point came Sunday night.
There was not one available bed for at least 30 patients who needed intensive or intermediate levels of care, and the hospital had to shut its doors to all ambulance traffic for 12 hours. Some patients, including the very sick who required intensive oxygen, experienced wait times as long as 18 hours to get into the intensive care unit.
The front entrance of Community Hospital of Huntington Park was closed to the public Monday; the back of the building saw a steady stream of ambulances over the weekend, with one security guard saying the vehicles arrived as frequently as every half hour.
And Memorial Hospital of Gardena on Monday was running at 140% capacity, forcing officials to ask for a four-hour suspension of new ambulance calls so it could move patients. The hospital is struggling to keep enough oxygen and supplies on hand amid the crunch of COVID-19 patients who need it."
...
"The crisis at Los Angeles County hospitals hit new levels as patients continued to stream in during the holiday weekend, and the medical system is bracing for a new wave of coronavirus spread arising from Christmas travel and gatherings. L.A. County’s cumulative COVID-19 death toll is expected to climb past 10,000 this week."
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-12-29/l-a-coun...
That's with the biggest state in the country (CA) jumping on the grenade and staying in lockdown. Imagine if CA behaved like North Dakota.
Meanwhile, China is back to normal, with only minimal contact tracing required for the occasional outbreak here and there. They couldn't even run clinical trials for their vaccines in-country because not enough people have the virus anymore. There's a certain freedom in that. Hard to be free if you're dead.
China and Russia didn't engage economically to change the regime. They did it to make money.
> "For that matter, did Cuba change at all after Obama's attempt?"
YES! When Obama engaged Cuba, the entire political calculus of the country changed almost overnight.
"As Obama began softening U.S. policy toward Cuba, the island signaled openness to reform under the new leadership of Fidel’s brother, Raul. Facing an aging population, a heavy foreign debt load, and economic hardship amid the global downturn, Raul Castro began liberalizing Cuba’s state-controlled economy in 2009. Reforms included decentralizing the agricultural sector, relaxing restrictions on small businesses, opening up real estate markets, allowing Cubans to travel abroad more freely, and expanding access to consumer goods. Cuba’s private sector swelled as a result, and the number of self-employed workers nearly tripled between 2009 and 2013.
Obama and Raul Castro surprised the world in late 2014 by announcing that their governments would restore full diplomatic ties and begin to ease more than fifty years of bilateral tensions. The historic moment marked the culmination of eighteen months of secret diplomacy brokered by Pope Francis in which the parties agreed to an exchange of prisoners, including Cuban intelligence officers and an American development contractor, among other concessions."
U.S. policy towards Cuba was turned 180 degrees in 2016 in a unilateral move by the U.S., so that ended any hopes of progress.
"As a candidate, Trump was fiercely critical of the Obama administration’s thaw with Cuba and he pledged to reverse course once in office. Despite maintaining diplomatic relations, Trump has largely delivered on his promise through policies that curtail trade and tourism, and target Havana’s purse strings."
https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/us-cuba-relations
> "Engagement fails when it is not reciprocal"
Iran was very open to cooperation with the United States following 9/11, right up until they were included in the 'Axis of Evil.'
"In the aftermath of the attacks, the Iranian public responded with sympathy and their government with something resembling prudence. Tehran was the scene of spontaneous candlelight vigils by ordinary Iranians and a temporary suspension of the weekly chants of “death to America” by its official clergy. An array of Iranian officials, many with reformist political leanings, offered seemingly heartfelt condolences to the American people, and even the hardest-line elements of Iran’s leadership briefly summoned the moral decency to denounce Al Qaeda and the use of terrorism against Americans."
...
"The initial willingness to cooperate with the U.S. military campaign against the Taliban eventually bloomed into a wide-ranging, historic cooperation between the two old adversaries that included the only sustained, officially sanctioned dialogue since the negotiations of the hostage release in 1981. Logistical cooperation from Tehran facilitated use of Iranian airspace as well as tactical assistance in establishing supply lines. Equally vital was Tehran’s political collaboration, as the Iranians had close and long-standing relations with the Taliban’s primary domestic opponent, the Northern Alliance."
...
"The “Axis of Evil” speech produced a furious response from Iranian leaders across the political spectrum, and incited a similarly fierce debate in Washington. It did not, however, result in the termination of the bilateral dialogue over Afghanistan, as Tehran demonstrated its capacity to prioritize interests over outrage or ideology. But it marked an across-the board American repudiation of Iran’s ruling elites, one that would become more pronounced over the course of the subsequent year, and a deliberate U.S. embrace of the idea of galvanizing popular opposition against the Iranian regime. In the months that followed the speech, the Bush White House strove to align themselves with regime opponents through public statements and other efforts to expedite political change inside the country."
https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/11_iran...
(It's from a Brookings whitepaper, but it jives with the gist of The Twilight War by David Crist)
The U.S. keeps turning its back on both countries when progress begins to be made, based on old animosities left over from the Cold War. It's ridiculous. Why does the wealthiest country on the planet need to be in a pissing contest with a small Caribbean island nation over something that happened under the Kennedy administration? Or a theocracy on the other side of the planet over something that happened under Jimmy Carter? My god, what's the point?
I'm arguing that when you weigh Iran's activities in the Middle East alongside U.S. activities in the region over the last 30 years or-so, Iran really doesn't look like the boogeyman it's made out to be.
As a result, when viewing each other as perhaps within the same order of magnitude on the morally outrageous activities scale, the two countries could maybe leave behind the tired old mutual hatred routine that has played itself out since 1979.
A big part of that could be the United States extending an olive branch, apologizing for a few things, letting a few things go, and not simply pointing fingers and rattling sabers at them for cheap political points. The U.S. should be able to look around, realize that they have more important stuff to worry about, and embrace Iran as an economic partner like Europe and China have done.
It's ok for the U.S. to take the first step and extend an open hand. Go to the Wikipedia page on the 'Reactions to the September 11 attacks.' The Iranians deserve it on the basis of their behavior in the early days after 9/11, and the help they gave the U.S. in the early days of the Afghan War. They're not bad people, and have expressed a great deal of kindness to the United States in times of vulnerability.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reactions_to_the_September_11_...
Push soft power aggressively, offer a more prosperous alternative, and you'll pull the damn rug right out from under the hard-liner's justification for their hold on power.
If the U.S. has learned anything from Cuba, it should be that the stupid 60-year embargo didn't do anything but keep the Cuban people poor and bitter, and the Castro brothers in power.
Our current policy is something dragged up from the Carter administration. It's not the seventies anymore.
More GitHub. Less John Bolton.
My country has done a lot of stupid stuff in the Middle East. I get why they're upset. They should be. Fair enough.
It would be nice for us to move past the petty hatred over things that happened 50 years ago.
They signed in 1968. In your words, "something that happened 60 years ago when both countries had very different governments" But, perhaps after watching the US performance in Iraq, maybe Iran wanted a credible deterrent to prevent the same thing from happening to them.
If the issue with the nuclear program was really about proliferation, the US would have active sanctions against Pakistan. AQ Khan wasn't an Iranian!
> "How many of those are the result of Iranian involvement?"
They didn't invade the country, overthrow the government, and disband the army. If Iran invaded Mexico, overthrew the government, and disbanded the army plunging the country into chaos, do you think the US would stand by and do nothing? No way!
Do you feel that the ISI is any more odious of an institution that Iranian military intelligence in that respect? Why does the US treat them so differently?
> "agreement and compensation"
That's blood money, not an apology. The US screwed up big time in shooting down that plane, and the best they could muster was that it was a "...proper defensive action by the U.S.S. Vincennes." (rolls eyes) When Iran shot down the Ukrainian airliner, at least they had the decency to label it a "disastrous mistake."
> "Who had been involved in attacking American soldiers."
Why were the American soldiers there halfway across the planet in a country where they aren't welcome and don't speak the language? Maybe they wanted the Americans out so that the region could achieve some stability?
My point with the Saudi-Yemen thing is that KSA doesn't need nukes as an insurance policy because the US has their back. No nuclear-armed superpower has Iran's back, so they're probably looking for the security of a nuclear deterrent.
The US-Irainian conflict, like the US conflict with Cuba, is something that should have ended decades ago. It's a legacy of old political hostilities that happened when my parents were teenagers. It's 2021, we have better things to worry about. It's all so petty.
Objectively, why can't Iran have a nuclear program while Israel, India, and Pakistan can?
> Iran killing hundreds of American soldiers
They are a regional superpower and the United States invaded and destabilized their neighbor causing widespread chaos throughout the region. Civilian casualties from violence in Iraq following the destabilization of the '03 war have been estimated at around 200,000.
> would you support bombing a different country over something that happened 60 years ago
The US did shoot down an Irainian civilian airliner in 1988 and refuse to apologize about it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_Air_Flight_655
And then assassinated one of their generals earlier this year.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_Qasem_Soleima...
> SA has nothing remotely comparable
They don't need them. They can do whatever they want in the region while the U.S. looks away and sells them the weapons to do it.
"The bomb dropped on a school bus in Yemen by a Saudi-led coalition warplane was sold to Riyadh by the US, according to reports based on analysis of the debris.
The 9 August attack killed 40 boys aged from six to 11 who were being taken on a school trip. Eleven adults also died. Local authorities said that 79 people were wounded, 56 of them children. CNN reported that the weapon used was a 227kg laser-guided bomb made by Lockheed Martin, one of many thousands sold to Saudi Arabia as part of billions of dollars of weapons exports.
Saudi Arabia is the biggest single customer for both the US and UK arms industries. The US also supports the coalition with refuelling and intelligence."
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/aug/19/us-supplied-bo...
From the Wikipedia article:
"...the company traded with Indianised Southeast Asian countries when the Dutch government granted it a 21-year monopoly on the Dutch spice trade."
It's a dumb comparison, I know, but it strikes me as similar to how Amazon wound up with a pseudo-monopoly on many goods during the pandemic as brick-and-mortars were shuttered.
And a quote in a quote from the article:
"The Dutch, it seems, more than anyone in the West since the palmy days of ancient Rome, had more money than they knew what to do with. They discovered, unlike the Romans, that the best use of money was to make more money."
Weirdly apropos.
"As the site Jewish Journal noted, the list Rehm may be referring to seems to be one that has circulated on the Internet for several years concerning U.S. government officials and members of Congress who allegedly hold dual citizenship with Israel.
"That's some of the nonsense that goes on in the Internet. But that is absolutely not true," Sanders said."
https://www.politico.com/blogs/media/2015/06/nprs-diane-rehm...
Politifact has debunked the particular Facebook post in question that may have originally led Diane astray:
https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2019/feb/25/blog-posti...
That being said, backing Israel is obviously incredibly smart politics in heavily-evangelical Christian parts of the US:
"Some Christian Zionists believe that the gathering of the Jews in Israel is a prerequisite for the Second Coming of Jesus. The idea has been common in Protestant circles since the Reformation that Christians should actively support a Jewish return to the Land of Israel, along with the parallel idea that the Jews ought to be encouraged to become Christians as a means of fulfilling biblical prophecy."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_Zionism
"Notably, LifeWay found that 80% of the surveyed evangelicals believe that the modern rebirth of Israel and the return of millions of Jews to that land are a fulfillment of Bible prophecy and show "we are getting closer to the return of Jesus Christ." Some evangelicals say that prophecy includes a belief in a final battle of Armageddon that concludes with Jews accepting Jesus Christ as their savior."
https://www.npr.org/2019/08/25/753720351/as-u-s-jews-cool-to...
And, as part of the ongoing discourse about this weird relationship, rep Ilhan Omar got absolutely raked over the coals for this comment, which should give you some idea of how politically important public, unconditional support for Israel can be in the US:
"First, when questioning long-standing congressional support for Israel, she blamed the campaign money provided by pro-Israel supporters. “It’s all about the Benjamins, baby,” she tweeted."
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/03/ilhan-omar...
The article (granted, it's an opinion piece) goes on to condemn her for being a horrible anti-Semitic such and such for uttering those six words. Important lesson, never even think the word AIPAC while you're tweeting if you're an American politician. Nothing good can come of it.
Although, there are voices from the inside condemning this, as in this opinion piece in Haaretz by a former AIPAC lobbyist:
'Deploying very stark language, naming the Democratic Party, picturing three Democratic congresswomen (two of whom are freshmen) and throwing around accusations of anti-Semitism and of being "more sinister" than international terrorist groups is jarring at best. And although AIPAC subsequently pulled the Facebook ad and issued an apology via Twitter, labeling their own ad "imprecise, poorly worded, inflammatory…that distorted our message" a spokesperson still explained the ad was "popular with our target audience."'
https://www.haaretz.com/us-news/.premium-aipac-s-fall-i-work...
It's a weird, weird relationship between two countries linking geopolitics, religion, history, blah, blah, blah.
"Stepped-up NSA eavesdropping revealed to the White House how Mr. Netanyahu and his advisers had leaked details of the U.S.-Iran negotiations—learned through Israeli spying operations—to undermine the talks; coordinated talking points with Jewish-American groups against the deal; and asked undecided lawmakers what it would take to win their votes, according to current and former officials familiar with the intercepts."
https://www.wsj.com/articles/u-s-spy-net-on-israel-snares-co...
I think Israel just uses more HUMINT than SIGINT to do it, so we're occasionally able to snag one of their spies.
Adding an 'Animal May Have Consumed Insect Protein' label seems pretty reasonable and low-key.
It might wind up being added as a marketing thing anyway since insect protein is so much more sustainable than other feed sources. It takes like 1,500 gallons of water to make a pound of cow with traditional feedstock. Be nice to move away from that.
I personally think it's cool and would go out of my way to purchase animal products labeled as derived from insect protein.
You'd have to have a USDA-maintained database that tracks each feeding instance of each animal in the country, as well as for all imported animals.
That could get kind of unwieldy.
Is there any country that does this currently? What's their system for doing it?
https://library.osu.edu/site/40stories/2020/01/05/we-have-me...
Bad government may be worse than no government at all.
The OP article is about raising insects for animal feed, not for people feed.
There may be instances of individuals with allergies to certain foodstock materials having reactions to eating meat from animals fed that foodstock, but I can't find anything about it in the literature, so I'm going to guess it's extremely rare if it actually exists?
That being said, rage is probably not the least appropriate emotional response to the learned helplessness of being a cog in the belly of a great political, social, and economic machine. At least it means they're kind of paying attention.
Everyone has been pretty clear that if you have a history of the latter you should have a talk with your physician about risks and benefits.
https://www.merckmanuals.com/home/immune-disorders/allergic-...
Akakakakakakakakakak
Ok, so from what I understand, much of the fallout from a coronavirus infection in severe cases is resulting from an overreaction by the immune system. What I saw in the original paper you shared is that the most plausible mechanism would be increased propensity for isolation and mask wearing, but the IL-6 knockdown would be through CF deactivating elements of the immune system (immune signaling molecules).
The Nature paper suggests upregulation of inflammation, which seems implausible to me: "Activation of furin, which is increased in CF, together with the cellular damage induced by viroporins, might be expected to upregulate NLRP3 and cause inflammation"
The proposed mechanism in the Physio paper is as follows: "Our analysis revealed that ACE2 mRNA is elevated and TMPRSS2 mRNA is decreased in CF airway epithelial cells compared with non-CF cells. Increased ACE2 is predicted to enhance SARS-CoV-2 binding to epithelial cells but would increase conversion of ANG II, which is proinflammatory, to angiotensin-1–7, which is anti-inflammatory. Thus, increased ACE2 would reduce inflammation and lung damage due to SARS-CoV-2. Moreover, decreased TMPRSS2 would reduce SARS-CoV-2 entry into airway epithelial cells"
So, again, there isn't hard evidence that this is happening at all, but here are a couple of proposed mechanisms that could potentially explain it if it is happening.
Also I skimmed these things, so grain of salt.