absolutely zero chance of eradication with our open skies and open borders. Too many millions of people visiting the US every year from every place on the globe. Hawaii could possibly maintain strict protocols – at the expense of tourism dollars – and keep COVID at bay, but that is the only state.
New Zealand and Australia could come close by continuing to prohibit visitors, but how long could their economies last?
Seychelles has been finding a high number of COVID-19 infections among vaccinated people.
The vaccines used there are Sinopharm (a more traditional-technology inactivated virus vaccine) and Covishield (same as the AstraZeneca vaccine, an adenovirus vector vaccine).
There does not seem to be much information on what variants of COVID-19 are there, nor whether the breakthrough infections occurred mostly against one of the vaccines. Of note, the AstraZeneca vaccine was rejected by South Africa due to low effectiveness against the B.1.351 variant circulating there; South Africa is currently using the J&J - Janssen vaccine. The B.1.351 variant has been detected in Seychelles, but it is not stated whether it is the cause of the breakthrough infections.
The following says this about COVID-19: “in general, past infection confers 80·5% protection against reinfection, which decreases to 47·1% in those aged 65 years and older”. I.e. natural infection with COVID-19 does not produce strong immunity in many people.
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(21)00662-0/fulltext
Medical speech language pathologist here. We weren’t slammed per se but we had our share of patients. Much more recovered than the news cared to share and we are bound by HIPPA to not discuss particulars of cases. I’d say take the fear-media with a grain of salt and know that people are treating in person and working with a lot of stressors and politicized red tape.
I definitely think many people’s Covid thoughts are based upon their experience. My lad’s GF works with people in recovery at the hospital (not discharged yet, but supposedly recovering). Many stories are quite sad and some of them still end up dying - including (two days ago) a 70 year old they thought would make it.
Needless to say, she got her vax as soon as she was eligible even though she deals with an autoimmune disorder (Lupus).
Fortunately, things are better now than before, but we all feel for those who draw the short straw now, esp if they got sick prior to being able to be vaxed. She hasn’t seen a post vax case (yet).
Interesting article about how some cancer patients don’t appear to get immunity from Covid vaccinations - Uncertain protection from Covid vaccines leaves cancer patients in limbo
I took 4 mg prednisone (I have this for lupus and some other conditions) for four days, two weeks after my first Pfizer dose and one week before my second Pfizer dose. I am worried about the effect on my vaccine effectiveness. I did the math on biological half life (as opposed to plasma half life) and probably had under 0.5mg drug activity at the time of my second shot. It was totally gone from my system days before, but from what I understand the biological half life is 24-36 hours. Clearly not immune-suppressing but worried about effect on the inflammation needed for the vaccine to work. Hoping I am overthinking.
In Qatar, the Pfizer - BioNTech vaccine was checked against two COVID-19 variants there.
B.1.1.7: 89.5% effective after two doses + 14 days; 29.5% effective after one dose
B.1.351: 75.0% effective after two doses + 14 days; 16.9% effective after one dose
Versus severe, critical, or fatal disease (however, the 95% CIs were wide for specific variants):
B.1.1.7: 100.0% effective after two doses + 14 days; 54.1% effective after one dose
B.1.351: 100.0% effective after two doses + 14 days; 0.0% effective after one dose
Any COVID-19: 97.5% effective after two doses + 14 days; 39.4% effective after one dose
Among 2,195 vaccinated Mayo Clinic patients (79.6% in Minnesota, 19.7% in Wisconsin, 93.2% White, 49.4% age >= 65), the J&J - Janssen vaccine was found to be 76.7% effective compared to demographically matched unvaccinated cohorts. However, the 95% CI was wide. B.1.1.7 was the largest share among variants in Minnesota during the study period.
Study of various dosing strategies using the J&J - Janssen vaccine. Dosing strategies considered one and two shots of low and high dose versions (current use is one shot of low dose). Also, the 18-55 and 65+ age groups were considered separately.
Among age 18-55, 100% had an immune response, but the two shot or high dose strategies did result in higher immune response. Immune response was weaker in the 65+ group (although still a very high percentage had some immune response).
Report on the trial of Pfizer - BioNTech vaccine for age 12-15:
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2107456
This is interesting (and sad and scary). Our local school district just lost a 43 year old teacher. She was vaccinated but had an underlying auto-immune disorder (lupus) and ended up contracting covid. I had assumed maybe her timing of receiving the vax and exposure to covid was the issue, but perhaps not.
I’m curious about patients treated with immunotherapy (my H). Considering having him get tested for antibodies.
I would do that. My neighbor’s elderly uncle is undergoing chemo, and was vaccinated. At some point post-vaccination they tested him for antibodies, and there weren’t any…meaning the vaccine didn’t take, at all 
Trial on use of a Moderna vaccine dose as a booster in people who have already completed vaccination with any of the three COVID-19 vaccines available in the US:
If you are interested in joining the trial, go to the following link:
https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04889209
Locations are in GA, NY, OH, PA, TX, WA.
One of the reasons that we discuss herd immunity is because of people like your neighbor’s uncle who can’t maintain any immunity because of chemo. There will always be people in the can’t get vaccinated or vaccines don’t “stick” category. As we get close enough to that threshold, there will not be a lot of the virus around (in the air, infecting people, etc.) and those immunocompromised will get their life back. It is sad for them, but hopefully the rest of us do our part for them.
I take azathioprine for an autoimmune problem and had the J&J vaccine early March. I had serum antibodies checked before flying in April and did test positive for antibodies.
The case report paper is here: https://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/pediatrics/early/2021/06/02/peds.2021-052478.full.pdf
There’s hope that there could be some good news from Covid:
Time will tell, but any positive from such a negative would be welcome IMO.