There was something I saw either this morning or yesterday about why this is not good data. Something having to do with the test subjects and who they’re testing and why it’s coming back that way. I am trying to search for it online but can’t find it. If I do, I will post it. But I think this is why Dr’s and others here are saying the Israel data is not scientific.
This article has some useful information for adults and students returning to school in the fall as far as testing and quarantining if required, etc. It may be helpful to share with your children.
https://www.cnn.com/2021/07/14/health/covid-vaccinated-people-guidelines-wellness/
Fully agree.
And I truly do not understand. How did we lose all concern and compassion for others? These “personal choice” decisions are causing others to die. How can anyone do that? I can’t comprehend.
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Part of the problem with vaccine hesitancy is it became political (which it shouldn’t be) Even today politicians are the forefront of all the messaging. Most people do not trust politicians or the media. They should not be the messengers. We need doctors out front on this now.
Trusted medical officials on every level would work better than threats and mandates.
Why? Eventually, like every other variant of flu or coronavirus, a balance will be reached where there’s enough latent immunity and good enough vaccines and treatments that a tolerable level of annual deaths will be achieved.
The only real question is what’s “tolerable”. Different countries (and even US states) may have varying views on that question. But looking forward, I’d rather be where we are today in the US than in the Australian situation of striving for complete elimination and not getting back to normal potentially for years to come.
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Why? Because as the virus mutates and people aren’t vaccinated the vaccine becomes resistant to the variants which is the whole point in in favor for herd immunity. That’s the problem right now. Covid is never going to disappear entirely, but if we had herd immunity, then the vaccines would be able to keep up with the variants as opposed to becoming stronger and resistant.
As far as Australia, the issue there is that they didn’t order enough of the vaccine originally and thus the percent of the country vaccinated has lagged considerably. They’re way below their goals due to inaccessibility of the vaccine. However, once they can get it ramped up and have it available to everyone, they most likely will be one of the sucesses of the process. As will the other countries
Unfortunately, it’s become so politicized in the US that in countries like Canada, it was just found that 86% of citizens 18&older want the vaccine asap, with only 8% not wanting it. UK also shows higher numbers of adults wanting or having received it. There is no reason at all other than political that it had to be this way here. It’s about time people are coming forward and speaking up about getting it, unfortunately, way too many more people have and are going to die because they didn’t say or do something sooner.
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Shouldn’t we be concerned about the “national interest (travel) exemptions” granted to hundreds of thousands of international students traveling to the U.S. from the travel-ban country list experiencing high rates of covid infections & new variants? After August 1, these students will arrive to campus with or without being vaccinated, even if required by uni. Students can receive the covid vaccine once they are here, but won’t ramp up immunity for weeks. Many will not be required to quarantine.
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Each day with the news and the Delta studies is making me more nervous. My S’ college has a vaccine mandate and a solid plan and history for virus management. However, they are allowing domestic students to arrive unvaccinated and make an appointment (with lots of testing). My friends’ daughter’s school is refusing schedule and room assignments to domestic students who didn’t show proof of being vaccinated before arrival (unless medical or religious exception applies). Seems fair to me since both announcements were in May. Plenty of opportunity to get Vaxxed this summer in the US.
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they will have to quarantine once they arrive on campus
Presuming you mean from countries like the UK, France, and Russia, where the COVID-19 case rates are higher than in the US?
NIE covers all the EU countries, China, Russia, Brazil and India. I’m sure a missed a few but all countries that are currently banned from travel to the US. Doesn’t really matter if rates are higher than the US. Vaccinated American students in Israel are testing positive for Covid and being forced to quarantine for 10 days subject to a negative test to return to the US. Pretty sure that’s not happening in all the countries international students are coming from and a negative test 72 hours before you fly is basically useless.
At first I was really perplexed why unvaccinated students from these countries would be allowed to travel and study in the US. But the current administration doesn’t seem worried about Covid coming into the country or keeping track of people who have it.
Certainly those students could go through the vaccine protocol but can they? Many schools aren’t offering remote learning and unvaccinated students can’t attend in person lectures. If they receive Pfizer or moderna that’s a roughly 5-6 week process. Haven’t read much about how schools are dealing with the influx of unvaccinated international students.
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Given how well unvaccinated Americans are doing in spreading COVID-19 within the country, a relatively few international students may not matter too much. Some international students may be able to get vaccinated before arriving.
Apparently, colleges are making up their own policies. Also, those who get the J&J - Janssen vaccine need only two weeks to be considered fully vaccinated.
But that’s atleast 2 weeks out of class without a remote option. And how is J&J doing with Delta? The other variants?
But that won’t be true on college campuses that are heavily vaccinated. And if the breakthrough rate for Delta is as high as it seems to be introducing infectious students into dorms seems like poor planning.
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Some schools are requiring the international students to come early for this very reason, especially if they aren’t vaccinated. Regardless, many schools will likely require masks indoors for the fall, at least to start with.
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Having international students who could not get vaccinated beforehand come two weeks early is more manageable than having them come five or six weeks early.
Unfortunately, there is not as much study on J&J - Janssen, due to it being the least common (by far) vaccine in the US. However, its trials included South Africa (B.1.351 / Beta circulating there at the time) and Brazil (P.1 / Gamma), with results from there included.
B.1.617.2 / Delta does not seem to be as reduced in neutralization by vaccine-derived antibodies (for any vaccine investigated) as B.1.351 / Beta (generally considered the worst common variant in terms of effect on vaccine-derived antibody neutralization). However, it also apparently produces much larger amounts of virus, so an infection dose of B.1.617.2 / Delta may be much larger than for other variants. Perhaps even a robust vaccine-derived antibody response has a greater chance of being overwhelmed by sheer numbers of virus, at least initially.
Canada welcomes international students even though it hasn’t opened up to other international visitors. These students generally have to arrive early because of the two-week quarantine requirement. This is one of the things about dealing with COVID that we should learn from our neighbor to the north.
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Well, here is another article that explains some of the uncertainties surrounding the raw data but also says that this data is concerning because it potentially suggests that Pfizer’s effectiveness could be waning. More analysis is necessary to verify. Anyway:
(sorry - paywall)
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Israel launched an aggressive campaign with the Pfizer vaccine in January, and the country has achieved one of the highest vaccination rates in the world, with 58 percent of the population fully vaccinated.
Just curious, does 58% seem low to be the highest vaccination rate in the world? Is that because Israel has a population that skews younger?
To come into the US you must have a negative covid test within 72 hours. Then once here they’ll need to test again and/or quarantine. Schools that are mandating the vaccine will be giving the students the vaccines at their campuses but until they’re fully vaccinated they will be subjected to testing so if anything they’re going to be watched more closely than many other people coming into the US. They’re not th issue. It’s the citizens who continue to refuse to be vaccinated.
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Could be, countries in the West generally skew towards older populations so have a bigger percentage of their population who are currently eligible to be vaccinated. There are some countries with higher vax rates than Israel but they are generally relatively small countries. While Israel is at 61%, Iceland is at 74%, the UAE is at 68%, and Chile is at 63%.