Jan
Well-Known Member
I can relate to that, but at least you are not going around saying that you need more long-term studies about flying since it hasn't been around as long as the wheel
Neverending Covid-19 Coronavirus
- Thread starter RenegadeMonster
- Start date
Max Sterling
Well-Known Member
In more bad news, my grandmother, with Alzheimer's got really sick (not related to COVID) and went to Hospital today where was then diagnosed with COVID on top of whatever else is ailing her and is being transferred to Hospice... back to the care home which is currently on lockdown because of a COVID outbreak and my dad can't see her.
Anyone reading this who isn't taking this seriously, please take it seriously, people are literally dying and families are suffering.
Update: Grandma didn't make it through the night. Flying my mom out to Omaha tomorrow to help my dad with everything.
Anyone reading this who isn't taking this seriously, please take it seriously, people are literally dying and families are suffering.
Update: Grandma didn't make it through the night. Flying my mom out to Omaha tomorrow to help my dad with everything.
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I'm so very sorry. We dealt with something similar in August when my Uncle passed. He had dementia and though he didn't die of Covid, he did contract it in the hospital. They were trying to move him to memory hospice care, but because he was Covid positive, they had to quarantine him and he ended up passing waiting to get to hospice. It was a nightmare. Huge, huge, hugs to you and your family. I'm so sorry for your loss.
Breakout linked to a Phish show:
Music fans from Massachusetts to California have been flooding social media with reports on a series of concerts they attended in Las Vegas over Halloween weekend. But instead of raving about the set list and extended jams, many are posting COVID-19 test results and seat numbers in a mass effort at grass-roots contact tracing.
“Covid Positive from Vegas” reads one post on Facebook on Nov. 3 that has drawn more than 500 replies, many saying they or their friends tested positive after attending the shows by Phish, a band with deep Vermont roots and a Grateful Dead-like following. The band played four packed shows at the 16,800-seat MGM Grand Garden from Oct. 28 to Oct. 31.
The reports are sparking fresh concerns about the potential for large indoor venues to trigger mass-spreading events just as COVID infections and hospitalizations climb in many areas of the country.
www.bostonglobe.com
Further down in the article:
In interviews, Phish fans described a crowded venue with poor ventilation and few people wearing masks, despite a Nevada law requiring their use in indoor public settings. MGM said it requires masks indoors, except when eating or drinking.
Fans reported long, packed lines to get into the shows, especially the first night when those who were vaccinated picked up wrist bands that allowed entry for the remaining nights.
”It was pretty chaotic and I could tell the staff were overwhelmed,” said Sean Hathaway, a 31-year-old Somerville fan who attended the shows with his fiancée. He said both were vaccinated, wore their masks the entire time, and did not get sick afterward.
This one is a no brainer. Also @debianlinux, I know you passed on a show earlier in the year because they weren't putting any pandemic controls in place. It looks like you probably made the right decision.
Music fans from Massachusetts to California have been flooding social media with reports on a series of concerts they attended in Las Vegas over Halloween weekend. But instead of raving about the set list and extended jams, many are posting COVID-19 test results and seat numbers in a mass effort at grass-roots contact tracing.
“Covid Positive from Vegas” reads one post on Facebook on Nov. 3 that has drawn more than 500 replies, many saying they or their friends tested positive after attending the shows by Phish, a band with deep Vermont roots and a Grateful Dead-like following. The band played four packed shows at the 16,800-seat MGM Grand Garden from Oct. 28 to Oct. 31.
The reports are sparking fresh concerns about the potential for large indoor venues to trigger mass-spreading events just as COVID infections and hospitalizations climb in many areas of the country.
‘COVID positive from Vegas.’ Phish concerts leave a long trail of infections, fans say - The Boston Globe
Phish fans from across the country who attended a series of concerts in Las Vegas have been flooding social media with COVID-19 test results and seat numbers in a grassroots contact tracing effort, sparking fresh concerns about the potential for large indoor venues to trigger mass-spreading events.
www.bostonglobe.com
Further down in the article:
In interviews, Phish fans described a crowded venue with poor ventilation and few people wearing masks, despite a Nevada law requiring their use in indoor public settings. MGM said it requires masks indoors, except when eating or drinking.
Fans reported long, packed lines to get into the shows, especially the first night when those who were vaccinated picked up wrist bands that allowed entry for the remaining nights.
”It was pretty chaotic and I could tell the staff were overwhelmed,” said Sean Hathaway, a 31-year-old Somerville fan who attended the shows with his fiancée. He said both were vaccinated, wore their masks the entire time, and did not get sick afterward.
This one is a no brainer. Also @debianlinux, I know you passed on a show earlier in the year because they weren't putting any pandemic controls in place. It looks like you probably made the right decision.
ranbalam
Well-Known Member
I have a friend struggling with Covid right now. At last update (an hour ago) he's in a hospital after an ambulance ride and yet still can't get a room. He says he can barely breath. This is his second bout with it and he didn't get a vaccine because he though he'd have immunity from already having it. I texted him yesterday to check on him and asked how he was doing and he said 'not good, way worse than last time.' Sure enough this morning he called 911. I'm very worried, he's got diabetes and is very overweight.
Max Sterling
Well-Known Member
Man, that really sucks. As a large dude myself, I've been mad worried that even getting the vaccine and taking all the recommended precautions that if I were to catch COVID my chances of having a bad experience would be substantially higher than that of a healthier individual. I've been meaning to get my booster shot... I should schedule that.
ranbalam
Well-Known Member
Not to preach, but you should schedule it.
I'm pretty scared right now, as I'm getting updates from his brother. He says he can't breath but can't get a bed at the ER, stuck in the waiting room. Trying to distract myself by posting here.
Sending love into the universe for him. I'm praying he's okay.
ayayrawn
Well-Known Member
I feel like with the amount of cases being discovered, it has probably already been around for months right? And it's early to tell but signs point toward it being a fast moving, but less lethal version, right? Either way, and this is probably bad, but my capacity for worry during fervor like we're seeing was long ago passed, and all I feel is irritation at this point. I'm tired.
JohnnyCashFan
Well-Known Member
Pfizer says they can have an Omicron booster 90 days from the word go. So current vaccine efficacy studies are critical. Not surprised another variant morphed, especially in Africa. Now we have to deal with travel, holiday, spikes on top of this....sigh
Turbo
Well-Known Member
Oh, yeah. If there's anything to learn here, it's about how important it is to get vaccines out all over the world so we don't get variant incubator pockets.
My personal feeling is we'll be dealing with an Omicron wave here around the new year, fueled by holiday gatherings.
Joe Mac
Well-Known Member
Sadly we’ve prioritised allow pharma companies holding onto patents over vaccines funded by public money, and making mega profits from them, as opposed to public health. It’s not only immortal but staggeringly stupid, it’s been clear for nearly a year now that as well as heartlessly disregarding lives in the developing world we’re also creating areas where the vaccine can mutate at will. It’s going to keep coming back to bite us, and is needlessly extending this damned pandemic.
If I miss a second damn Christmas over this shit I’m not going to be happy!
Now Biden is calling for big pharma to open the patent given the Omicron discovery. The dip in the stock market after Omicron was named probably had a bit to do with it, but if it gets us open patents, that’s fine.
Joe Mac
Well-Known Member
I can’t imagine a call will do anything, they’re brazen enough to have that one up. I’m guessing it will need to be legislated for, let’s see if that happens!
Turbo
Well-Known Member
I could go on about patents for a long time, given I work in the field. But suffice to say that patents themselves are far from the only issue, and removing them can also have bad negative effects. The incentives from patents is what drives invention and it also allows for the invention to be fully disclosed to the public for future exploitation or present improvement. The alternatives are trade secrets, which are way worse.
Manufacturing is also the huge deal. It's not because something is off patent that manufacturers can come along and make it successfully - it can take years to reverse engineer, because not everything in the invention is necessarily inventive and therefore resorts to the choice of persons skilled in the art that are not spelled out in the patent.
The fastest, surest way forward has more to do with forced licensing at reasonable prices so the technical know-how that's not inventive are provided to 3rd parties (i.e. sharing the stuff that's not written in any patent because it could be done different ways that are already known but that are still crucial technical choices required for manufacturing) and/or sharing and distributing the available stocks between countries. Developing countries are not going to be able to all of a sudden make mRNA vaccines if they're patent-free since they don't have the infrastructures and money to do so.
Pharmaceutical companies definitely have a lot of financial wiggle room, which they obtained because of government subsidies. Governments should use their leverage to force them to license their technologies to 3rd parties so manufacturing capacity is increased and accessibility improved. Astra-Zeneca did it themselves with India to increase manufacturing and they shared their techniques and got them running quickly (India did have adequate manufacturing plants in place for that type of vaccine technology though). This is the model to follow and if pharma doesn't want to do it, governments should force it.
Manufacturing is also the huge deal. It's not because something is off patent that manufacturers can come along and make it successfully - it can take years to reverse engineer, because not everything in the invention is necessarily inventive and therefore resorts to the choice of persons skilled in the art that are not spelled out in the patent.
The fastest, surest way forward has more to do with forced licensing at reasonable prices so the technical know-how that's not inventive are provided to 3rd parties (i.e. sharing the stuff that's not written in any patent because it could be done different ways that are already known but that are still crucial technical choices required for manufacturing) and/or sharing and distributing the available stocks between countries. Developing countries are not going to be able to all of a sudden make mRNA vaccines if they're patent-free since they don't have the infrastructures and money to do so.
Pharmaceutical companies definitely have a lot of financial wiggle room, which they obtained because of government subsidies. Governments should use their leverage to force them to license their technologies to 3rd parties so manufacturing capacity is increased and accessibility improved. Astra-Zeneca did it themselves with India to increase manufacturing and they shared their techniques and got them running quickly (India did have adequate manufacturing plants in place for that type of vaccine technology though). This is the model to follow and if pharma doesn't want to do it, governments should force it.
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The other, and I think bigger issue, is who owns these patents given that a large amount of the work was done with public funding.
This is what I consider drama, y'all:
Moderna is offering to share ownership of its COVID-19 vaccine patent with the U.S. government to resolve the dispute, the vaccine maker said, and would allow the Biden administration to "license the patents as they see fit."
An NIH spokesperson declined Monday to comment directly on Moderna's offer, citing "ongoing discussions."
The company claims it had no choice under the "strict rules" of American patent law to list only its own scientists "as the inventors on these claims."
But the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases disagrees.
A spokesperson for the government research arm - housed within the NIH - said that "its own thorough review" had determined that scientists Kizzmekia Corbett, Barney Graham, and John Mascola also deserved to be named as inventors.
"Moderna has made a serious mistake here in not providing the kind of co-inventorship credit to people who played a major role in the development of the vaccine that they are now making a fair amount of money off of," NIH Director Dr. Francis Collins told Reuters last week.
"Omitting NIH inventors from the principal patent application deprives NIH of a co-ownership interest in that application and the patent that will eventually issue from it," said an NIAID spokesperson.
Public Citizen, a government watchdog group, penned a letter this month to the NIH urging the agency "to publicly reclaim the foundational role" it played in developing the shots, criticizing a July patent filing by Moderna claiming it had "reached the good-faith determination" that the NIH's scientists "did not co-invent the mRNAs" in their application.
Moderna offers NIH co-ownership of COVID vaccine patent amid dispute with government
Activists have been pushing the Biden administration to "reclaim" ownership over the vaccine, in hopes of increasing global access.
www.cbsnews.com
I really like that there is finally some push back against big pharma over this. We, as tax payers funded the NIH research. We should get something for that. This would be great to help us fund Medicare.
Turbo
Well-Known Member
The other, and I think bigger issue, is who owns these patents given that a large amount of the work was done with public funding.
This is what I consider drama, y'all:
Moderna is offering to share ownership of its COVID-19 vaccine patent with the U.S. government to resolve the dispute, the vaccine maker said, and would allow the Biden administration to "license the patents as they see fit."
An NIH spokesperson declined Monday to comment directly on Moderna's offer, citing "ongoing discussions."
The company claims it had no choice under the "strict rules" of American patent law to list only its own scientists "as the inventors on these claims."
But the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases disagrees.
A spokesperson for the government research arm - housed within the NIH - said that "its own thorough review" had determined that scientists Kizzmekia Corbett, Barney Graham, and John Mascola also deserved to be named as inventors.
"Moderna has made a serious mistake here in not providing the kind of co-inventorship credit to people who played a major role in the development of the vaccine that they are now making a fair amount of money off of," NIH Director Dr. Francis Collins told Reuters last week.
"Omitting NIH inventors from the principal patent application deprives NIH of a co-ownership interest in that application and the patent that will eventually issue from it," said an NIAID spokesperson.
Public Citizen, a government watchdog group, penned a letter this month to the NIH urging the agency "to publicly reclaim the foundational role" it played in developing the shots, criticizing a July patent filing by Moderna claiming it had "reached the good-faith determination" that the NIH's scientists "did not co-invent the mRNAs" in their application.
Moderna offers NIH co-ownership of COVID vaccine patent amid dispute with government
Activists have been pushing the Biden administration to "reclaim" ownership over the vaccine, in hopes of increasing global access.
I really like that there is finally some push back against big pharma over this. We, as tax payers funded the NIH research. We should get something for that. This would be great to help us fund Medicare.
Are western countries going to provide the funds to developing countries so they can set-up their own manufacturing? Opening patents in the US, also only affects the US, as US patents only apply in the US. So is the goal to get US generic companies to supply the developing world? Who's going to fund that? Who's going to make sure Moderna helps the generics, either in the US or abroad, to set-up their manufacturing using their best practices? Or is this going to go the usual way where the generics have to reverse engineer the processes, which could take years?
I still contend that the best way forward is to force cheap/free licensing agreements between Moderna and Pfizer and third party manufacturers around the world and force them to be involved in setting up manufacturing, either in the US for export or in countries that can handle it. The Astra-Zeneca - India model at a cheap price.
The patent debate is being made for political points and Moderna will be perfectly happy to open them up to score good will points, because no other companies will be able to quickly manufacture their vaccines any time soon without their help.