Moderna vaccine protects against British and South African variants (Kind Of), company CLAIMS

[LovingA2andMI]

"The finding was largely encouraging but contained a clear warning sign: Even though the vaccine generated disease-fighting antibodies that worked against the South African variant, that efficacy was diminished. Moderna said there was a reduction in response, prompting the company to design a new potential vaccine that could be added on to the current two-dose regimen.

As a precaution, Moderna announced it will launch two new studies. The company will test adding a third shot of its current vaccine to boost its two-dose regimen. The biotechnology company also plans early human tests of the all-new vaccine specific to the South African variant, using it as a booster to prime the immune system to the new strain.

“The virus is changing its stripes, and we will change to make sure we can beat the virus where it’s going,” Stephen Hoge, president of Moderna, said in an interview. “The unknown is would we feel it’s necessary to do that, would public health officials want this at that point or would they still be comfortable? What we’re trying to do is create an option.”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2021/01/25/covid-vaccine-virus-variant/

What's missing from the headline - Moderna is 6 times LESS effective against the South African Variant

In other words, COVID mutates - often. In this scenario, the thought would be a person would have to subject themselves to possibly multiple "booster shots" a year for whatever is the dominant mutation at that time. To be frank and completely honest, that is a non-starter for many as to force individuals to take multiple shots yearly or even maybe bi or tri yearly will not work in the long halt.

Which means it time to get real about the future. mRNA vaccines are not going to be a quick fix (or maybe any fix) back to reality pre-February 2020.

Maybe, the focus should be placed is on TREATMENTS to increase IMMUNITY against the COVID virus. This way individuals would have a fighting opportunity to combat COVID and its mutations with hopefully little to no adverse reactions to COVID. It is likely, INCREASING immunity with OTC supplements like Vitamin D3 might be one of the immediate longer term ways to combat COVID and is as easy as taking a Vitamin D3 pill or gummy each morning with breakfast.

[BGBD]

1. I'll stick

with the vaccine, you take your flintstones.

Taking vitamins isn't going to slow the spread of the virus, which isn't going to slow the mutations in the virus. There's really not even any evidence that supplemental vitamins have an effect on COVID.

[LovingA2andMI]

10. Flintstones???

That is an interesting response as Flintstones is for kids. No one is a kid here, right?

Vitamin D3 has been proven in study after study to be a defense against the comorobilites of COVID 19. So, no, not Flintstones however, Natural Adult Vitamins -- you bet I will keep taking them as they have a HOST of benefits including the ones described below (with 5.7 Million views and counting):

[BGBD]

11. Flintstones

would be as effective at treating COVID as any other vitamin....none.

If there were studies to support what you're saying you would cite them here, not post a youtube video.

[LovingA2andMI]

13. Maybe you need to....

Look at the many citations in the video. That is why it was posted. Meanwhile, trying (so trying) so come oneists back with comments is not making the attempt point you are trying to make any better. Worse, yes - better, no.

Have a lovely day!

[anamnua]

24. I respectfully disagree

Speaking as a medical doctor, based in Ireland:
https://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/please-take-vitamin-d-to-protect-against-covid-19-say-irish-experts-1069537.html
https://imj.ie/vitamin-d-and-inflammation-potential-implications-for-severity-of-covid-19

[Blue_true]

17. I disagree with you on NFL penalties. But I am with you on this one.

I will stick with the vaccine when my time comes to get a shot.

[BGBD]

22. It was still

A bad call lol

[Blue_true]

23. You get the last word.

[anamnua]

25. Go for both NT

[lapucelle]

2. Are you a medical doctor or an epidemiologist?

[Baclava]

3. So this is why they can't cure the common cold, viruses are way smarter than we are

[Blue_true]

18. SARS-COV-2 is a cousin of one version of the Common Cold.

When I heard that, my tiny little doubting gremlin went into over-drive on whether there would be an effective vaccine in the short term (like 1,000 years). My uneducated belief is that the strains of Common Colds were all deadly during early human evolution, and the human body ultimately developed a coexistence arrangement with the Common Cold. Now we have the modern Common Cold’s nasty cousin peeing in the punchbowl.

A successful solution maybe something that attacks SARS-COV-2 directly instead of boosting the body’s immune system like a vaccine does. Such a solution would say cause SARS-COV-2’s spikes to break off on contact with a chemical from that solution, while a second chemical lance the capsid of SARS-COV-2, while a third chemical helps regulate the body’s immune response to broken off spikes and chopped up SARS-COV-2 pieces of capsid floating around the body-the chemical would regulate the immune roundup of the pieces and the body would dispose of them as waste, either through the urine or feces. Does something like that exist or is possible? I don’t know, I am not an expert, but it doesn’t hurt to wonder.

[JT45242]

4. Let's let science work -- Covid 19 is more likely to be like AIDS than smallpox

It is unsurprising that a coronavirus would mutate faster than vaccines can be produced. That is what they do. That is why there has never been a successful coronavirus vaccine before Covid-19. It is why these vaccines likely won't work in the long term -- but they may help us to get things under better control. Covid-19 will probably not be eliminated with a vaccine like smallpox and polio were

Scientists have not found any of the vitamin treatments to work in experimental studies with controls so let's hold off on that as well. Once the scientists have replicated controlled studies, then we can go down that path.

I think the better answer is to focus attention on treatments and prevention of the disease getting worse like we did for AIDS. At one point, getting AIDS was a death sentence. Now with better treatment drugs -- people with AIDS are living full and productive lives. Hopefully, something similar can happen with Covid.

Rather than play whack a mole with mutations, let's find ways to deal with the many ways Covid attacks the body -- clots, immune reaction storms, damage to liver, kidneys, and lungs. Better treatments are probably the long term answer.

[BGBD]

6. The biggest reason there's never been a coronavirus vaccine

is because there's never been a need for one. Each of the 4 endemic human coronavirus's are only severe in very, very rare cases. They also don't typically cause public health emergencies like the flu can. The two previously known dangerous coronaviruses are SARS, which vanished before a vaccine could be completed, and MERS, which is rare and doesn't appear contagious enough to warrant development of a vaccine. Unless you are living in proximity to camels on a regular basis, your odds of getting MERS are pretty low.

Viruses mutate when they move from one host to another. They can't just mutate by their own will, it happens naturally as they transmit. So, the key to slowing or stopping mutations is to stop or slot transmission, which is why the vaccine is so important. Nothing else will do it other than complete China-style lockdowns. We can and are developing anti-virals, but those will improve outcomes, not lower cases or slow mutations. Mutations can also impact the effectiveness of therapeutics. We see flus trains that are resistant to things like tamiflu. So, unless we get transmissions under control we are going to be dealing with mutations on a regular basis.

[LovingA2andMI]

9. Totally Agree...

Rather than play whack a mole with mutations, let's find ways to deal with the many ways Covid attacks the body -- clots, immune reaction storms, damage to liver, kidneys, and lungs. Better treatments are probably the long term answer.

[Blue_true]

20. I agree with you.

If we get into a game of whack a mole with SARS-COV-2, given that we have never beaten it’s cousin, we are going to lose. The best strategy may be therapies that allow us to live with the virus while our bodies adapt to it and over centuries, make it less lethal to anyone not getting a therapy.

[anamnua]

26. I disagree

Big difference: AIDS DNA gets into the human genome where it is vaccinologically unassailable -- not so with Covid-19.

[Blue_true]

21. Your strategy is sound given where we are.

But because the SARS-COV-2 has been largely uncontrolled (large numbers of anti-mask and social distancing idiots), there are likely to be several more mutants that even new vaccines won’t cover, so we will need a booster for that. Ultimately, I see the SARS-COV-2 vaccine becoming like the Flu vaccine, designed to deal with many mutants in one shot and limit the death toll.

[anamnua]

27. Big difference

The influenza bug does not have an Achille's heel like Covid's spike protein that vaccines can target.

[Blue_true]

28. True. But the South African strain developed a way to neutralize the vaccine

somewhat. Who are we to say that once people are vaccinated and there are still lots of anti-vaxxers running around, that the next batch of mutants won’t take advantage of that situation. I read that the South African mutant could make some people that had been vaccinated sick, that is really bad news, because if it can do that, it can go through a process of spurning off a mutant that is totally insensitive to any vaccine that is thrown at it.

[anamnua]

30. ''True. But the South African strain developed a way to neutralize the vaccine''

I'd question that.

[Blue_true]

31. There has been, I believe, at least two cases where vaccinated people got

sick after contracting that variant.

I am confident that we will have a better picture in a few weeks. It is possible that people that got sick didn’t follow post vaccination procedures. A vaccine doesn’t instantly build immunity, there is a delay time of a number of days before a person is fully protected. Also, the people that got infected could have been among the 5% that vaccines didn’t show effectiveness for.

[Massacure]

7. Let's give an analogy to calm fears

Pretend the U.S. capitol is a cell in your body and that each January 6 rioter is a COVID virus. Now pretend that the National Guard dispatches 120,000 troops when the rioters try to invade. The riot would obviously be crushed. Now pretend the National Guard is 1/6 as effective. With 20,000 troops, the riot would still be put down, even though they are only six times less effective.

That is why scientists are not concerned yet, even though they are closely watching it. What they don't want to see is a COVID variant that triggers what is analogous to only a few hundred guard members.

[BGBD]

12. And in this analogy

vitamins are the capitol police. They help out on a normal day but when there's an invasion they are mostly going to stand around and watch.

[LovingA2andMI]

14. Says who?

You?

Again, maybe try a peer review study on for size:

"To conclude, there is a strong rationale to study whether vitamin D may prevent COVID‐19, given previous publications in the field. Future studies should involve experimental models to assess whether vitamin D can impair viral replication, block proinflammatory cytokines or have other effects related to SARS‐CoV‐2 pathogenesis. Here, it is crucial to select the best model system where vitamin D‐responsive host factors are active. For example, the virus grows well in VeroE6 cells, but these cells are of primate origin and may not represent the best model. The virus is significantly more difficult to grow in human cells, but it is possible [12]. Further, large epidemiological studies can be employed to assess whether vitamin D levels correlate with the risk to get infected by the virus and also whether vitamin D levels are associated with the severity of disease. Importantly, blood levels should not be too old, but rather obtained within a 6‐month period prior to disease onset to give a meaningful estimate of the impact of disease by vitamin D levels. Finally, and most important, is to perform randomized and placebo‐controlled trials to test the hypothesis whether vitamin D can prevent COVID‐19. Special consideration should be given to the inclusion criteria, where only those deficient in vitamin D should be included, to maximize the potential effect. Also, a daily dosing schedule may be superior to weekly or monthly dosing, as judged by previous data [6, 13].."

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7405052/

As in a daily dose of Vitamin D would quantify what has been hypothesis here:

"Finally, the field of vitamin D and COVID‐19 is very active and several trials are underway. Thus, new data will come, which may change these conclusions. However, in the meantime the conclusions above can be followed and we have massive data to say that vitamin D at low doses (1000–2000 IU per day) is safe and not harmful, which is in line with the historical proverb: primum non nocere (first, do no harm) – but potentially we may prevent a number of ARIs and perhaps also COVID‐19."

So with that, many people should take their Adult Natural Vitamin D3 (Flintstones are again, for kids). Have a lovely day!

[Chakaconcarne]

15. People can take their Daily Vit D, but it hasn't yet been proven efficacious against Covid.

Which is essentially what this review article (not a study) is eluding. Vitamin D is good for balanced immune health and to aid in calcium absorption. The RDA (assuming minimal sun exposure) is 600-800 IU Daily, max is 4000 IU Daily.

Research into whether Vit D aids in general disease prevention has been inconclusive. If people run with this without proper evidentiary guidance, thinking Vit D is a clear prevention or cure, the next thing you know we have runs on Vit D and the people that do need it can't get it or people overdo it and take too much.

[LovingA2andMI]

16. Where again was it said anywhere...

That Vitamin D3 is a cure? Nowhere. Also, the mRNA vaccines are not a cure either. There is no cure at the moment.

***Note -- it is a PEER REVIEW article of Scientific STUDIES from the NIH (the same place Dr. Fauci works for by the way ).***

Runs on Vitamin D3? Umm, no IF what you said is true in the 1st paragraph, WHY would folks make a run for it in the second paragraph?

(Even Though there is plenty supply of the Vitamin however some folks will confuse it with Flintstones vitamins for kids so no runs on D3 are happening anytime soon.)

There is no cure at the moment.

Take care.

[anamnua]

29. Excellent point. And what's more

There are two types of immunity: humoral (antibodies) and cellular (T cell). The former wears off; the latter tend not to. Vaccines stimulate both: we have a two-pronged attack.
This is why there is still immunity to SARS-COV-1 (Covid-19's first cousin) 17 years later; this will probably be lifelong. And I believe that SARS-COV-1 affords the best clue as as to what's likely to happen with SARS-COV-" (Covid 19). Of all the pieces of information circulating around since the saga began I have always found this the most reassuring.

[nolabear]

8. E All of the Above

Take the freakin’ vaccine. And take the reasonable supplements. Vitamin D, elderberry, a healthy diet, masks, social distancing, hand sanitizer, do it all. None of it is as hard as dying or killing your loved ones.

[Blue_true]

19. Are you sure about the 6 times less effective?

That would put the vaccine at only around 16% effective against the South African strain. Maybe that is right, just hard to swallow.