I don’t really know or care. I just know that you can an antibody test to see if you actually had Covid even if you were vaccinated.
I had a very mild covid, but I will say it’s not like a cold. I tried to eat properly, but I lost weight. I was very uncomfortable until I wasn’t any more.
My friend who didn’t get her 4th shot is still having headaches. She thinks her symptoms are worse than mine.
Tl;dr previous infection offers little to no neutralization to current dominant strain(s), the current strain is more pathogenic and replicates in the lung
Preprint but from a respected lab
The rebound situation both for COVID and paxlovid is a new wrinkle….hadn’t heard about it before now.
From your linked article:
“ Researchers have pointed to many hypothetical mechanisms. The population Pfizer studied in its clinical trial looked very different from the patients Paxlovid is generally being prescribed to. The former were unvaccinated, met specific high-risk criteria, and were infected with the Delta variant. The latter are generally vaccinated, fit a looser criteria for high-risk, and are infected with Omicron.”
Seems that prescribing this therapeutic right now seems “off label” for most of us. It would be nice if Pfizer conducted another, more timely study. Easier said than done, I know.
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That paper seems to suggest that BA.1 or BA.2 infection alone does not stimulate much of an antibody response, even against BA.2. Vaccination + BA.1 or BA.2 (breakthrough) infection did result in antibody response, but weaker against BA.2 and especially BA.4/5 variants compared to the ancestral B.1.1 variant.
There is also mention of potential pathogenicity:
- Delta > ancestral > Omicron BA.1
- Omicron BA.4/5 > Omicron BA.2 > Omicron BA.1
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Nope, Paxlovid use is on-label for most US adults. I am not sure what the author means by ‘looser definition of high risk’, as around 70% of US adults qualify as being at covid high risk simply because around 70% of US adults have BMI 25+. Here’s the CDC high risk factors:
Pfizer is conducting additional paxlovid studies.
A couple of key passages from that article:
“There’s no question rebound happens — we’ve seen it since the beginning of the pandemic,” he said. “Is the rebound related to infection itself? Is the rebound related to the administration of drugs like Paxlovid, or is a rebound related to neither? That’s the question.”
Despite rebounds, physicians and researchers stress that Paxlovid remains a highly effective method of preventing death and hospitalization. In a call with reporters last week, Health and Human Services officials said they were consulting with the FDA on whether to change any of the prescribing instructions, but in the meantime, continued to recommend people take the drug because of the 88% efficacy it showed in clinical trials.
And on that CDC webpage about people with certain medical conditions, it states: “If you or your family member are at high risk for severe illness, wear a mask or respirator with greater protection in public indoor spaces if you are in an area with a high COVID-19 Community Level.” They should be telling people to mask if in areas of substantial or high Community Transmission.
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Can’t disagree with that, but unfortunately CDC recommendations including mask wearing have become politicized.
The presence or lack of CDC mask wearing recommendations is a separate issue from the list of the (many) factors on that page that have been scientifically shown to put the person at high risk (which means of hospitalization/death) from covid.
Vaccines have changed the risk calculus for many (but not all), and it’s difficult to determine that risk at the individual level. And of course, we have a high proportion of unvaccinated peeps here in the US, many of which have at least one covid high risk condition.
Yes, but I wanted to highlight it because it’s in the first paragraph. The public’s ignorance is greater now than when it was just about masks/social distancing. Now we have people who have been only vaxxed thinking they are invincible re covid, people who have been vaxxed and boosted thinking that now THEY are, the double-boosted thinking they are fully protected, and of course the ones who have had covid thinking THEY are protected. And so few realize the coming subvariants are making ANY protections we have from infection or vaxxing/boosting so much weaker.
It’s certainly a complicated, nuanced message for the CDC to get out, but they are failing in the most basic way by not getting rid of the Community Level metric and at least only using Community Tranmission.
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Agree with all of that. IMO (of course) it’s impossible to overstate how poorly the CDC has performed during this pandemic.
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Is it to be implied that since Covid is here to stay, and one can still get it despite the vaccines, that when its spreading (waves), for the forseeable future we should be a masked society?
YLE did a summary of this. Throughout the pandemic, some people would get the virus, feel better, then rebound. The rebound is what would send them to the hospital, usually around day 10. There were lots of Covid deniers who would post on social media that they had the virus and were already feeling better. Then they would take a turn for the worse and end up hospitalized. I can’t remember all of them but I do remember Phil Valentine because I really hoped he would survive. But with Paxlovid rebound around day 10, I’m not seeing reports of people going to the hospital, so the drug is doing it’s job. It could be that a longer course of treatment is needed. People are in a study of a new drug, taking it for 20 days, and there are no reports of rebound.
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I look forward to a study to help determine if it’s Paxlovid keeping people out of the hospital or the vaccine.
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Re Paxlovid……. I tried to get some this week when I was on day 4. My doctor’s office refused to give it to me because I’m under 60 (just), and did not have a severe case, even though I have a few risk factors. When they read the list of symptoms I’d have to have to qualify, those symptoms were the sort that you should already be in the hospital. My doctor’s office stated that they are seeing some negative consequences (they didn’t specify except did mention rebound), so that’s why they said they are restricting who gets it.
I had COVID about 2 weeks ago, have mild asthma. I had a telemed appt around Wednesday or Thursday (5-6 days after exposure; or 3 days after first symptoms). Dr said they have paxlovid but my symptoms sounded like normal progression and seemed trending better; and I was vaccinated and boosted which he said they see like 99 percent of that population recovers fine especially with this variant; and the antiviral is meant to be taken almost right away and I was several days into it). So he suggested not to do it. I’ve also seen article about a gazillion different drug interactions so that’s complicating factor as well I’m sure (blood pressure, anxiety/depression medication, migraine medication, etc etc etc that you’d have to come off of to take the antiviral).
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If you are looking for an Omicron vaccine, Pfizer is running a trial. You must be 18-55 years old, and your vaccine history must have been PPP (three doses of Pfizer vaccine), with the most recent 5 to 12 months ago, and not been diagnosed with COVID-19.
https://www.covidvaccinestudy.com/high-dose-booster-study
I have a question concerning doing a second booster with Moderna after 3 Pfizer. Initially, two shots of Moderna were needed to build sufficient immunity. If my booster is Moderna, that will be only one dose of that particular vaccine, not the two originally required for sufficient effectiveness.
Are the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines alike enough so that just one Moderna after 3 Pfizer is sufficient to build the mucosal immunity offered by Moderna?
Yes, our experiences are very similar. I posted my experience because I think a lot of non-doctors are reading this thread too, and I wanted to share what is happening on the ground in some areas. It would be a mistake to assume that if you get sick, you can get this anti-viral. In my area, you can only get it if you are very high risk, or you have very severe symptoms that appear very quickly.
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See Eric Topol twitter thread re: mixing MRNA vaccines (with link to paper) here: https://twitter.com/EricTopol/status/1508949980727287809
As always ask your doctor what they think. If it’s a doc that doesn’t stay current on this stuff, then Eric Topol is a reasonable substitute (IMO of course).
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