COVID-19 - READ THE RULES BEFORE REPLYING

[Mister Woof]

35 minutes ago, dalekphalm said:

While I'm not particularly high risk, as soon as boosters are readily available to all residents in Ontario, I'll probably get it.

I'm over 40, got a few health conditions, and have gotten a little chubby over the last couple years. Definitely not really wanting to catch the 'vid

[Mister Woof]

40 minutes ago, Quackers101 said:

not sure about boosters, if they give more side effects, I guess it depends on the type of vaccine like the stronger ones.

but later shots sure, or if one really needs it.

I think if you got Pfizer (or J&J), I would consider it. 

 

The actual active ingredients in both Pfizer and Moderna shots are pretty similar, and they differ mostly in dosage. Moderna was 100mcg each shot, whereas Pfizer was only 30.

If you get 3 Pfizer shots, it's still less than the amount of a single Moderna shot.

 

This is shown by the efficacy of Pfizer waning much more quickly than Moderna.

 

That said, dosage isn't the only factor, as time delay between shots makes a difference as well. Recent Israel data shows Pfizer boosters recover much of the waned immunity, and T-cell immunity lasts a long time.

 

It's been posited that for Pfizer recipients, the definition of fully vaccinated could change to 3 shots.

 

I haven't followed the other vaccines (AZ, Sinovac, etc) because those aren't available to me.

 

Pfizer, as far as side effects, I had:

 

1st shot: Mild fatigue, injection site pain

2nd shot: Mild fatigue, injection site pain, slight malaise

3rd shot: Same as #2, slightly worse.

 

Wife (also PPP):

 

1st shot: Nothing but injection site pain

2nd shot: 3 days flu-like sx

3rd shot: 1/3 as severe as 2nd shot, but had some armpit lymph node swelling that took a week to go away

 

I can't say how you'll react and it's been shown reaction isn't indicative of immunity potency, so it's totally random I think. No way to know.

[Quackers101]

1 hour ago, Mister Woof said:

I think if you got Pfizer (or J&J), I would consider it. 

 

The actual active ingredients in both Pfizer and Moderna shots are pretty similar, and they differ mostly in dosage. Moderna was 100mcg each shot, whereas Pfizer was only 30.

If you get 3 Pfizer shots, it's still less than the amount of a single Moderna shot.

 

This is shown by the efficacy of Pfizer waning much more quickly than Moderna.

 

That said, dosage isn't the only factor, as time delay between shots makes a difference as well. Recent Israel data shows Pfizer boosters recover much of the waned immunity, and T-cell immunity lasts a long time.

 

It's been posited that for Pfizer recipients, the definition of fully vaccinated could change to 3 shots.

 

...

 

I can't say how you'll react and it's been shown reaction isn't indicative of immunity potency, so it's totally random I think. No way to know.

yeah, so I don't think I would want to recommend to a "normal" person a booster with a third moderna.

As some of what you said for the later side effects or symptoms, has been with the first dose of moderna, so an early 3rd dose of Moderna (M,M,M)?

but like you say, the lower dosage in the J&J vaccine, also hasn't the J&J vaccine been updated to be more effective against mutated versions of the 'vid?

[Mister Woof]

7 minutes ago, Quackers101 said:

yeah, so I don't think I would want to recommend to a "normal" person a booster with a third moderna.

As some of what you said for the later side effects or symptoms, has been with the first dose of moderna, so an early 3rd dose of Moderna (M,M,M)?

but like you say, the lower dosage in the J&J vaccine, also hasn't the J&J vaccine been updated to be more effective against mutated versions of the 'vid?

I haven't looked into J&J very much (don't know anyone personally who took it), but from what I have read, experts recommend an mRNA booster.

 

But beyond dosages, the number of times your immune system is exposed to the vaccine the better the immune response. As I understand it, Moderna booster shots are also half doses.

[tikker]

1 hour ago, Mister Woof said:

This is shown by the efficacy of Pfizer waning much more quickly than Moderna.

   It's worth to noting that that the drop was in the protection against infection and not in the protection against severe consequences which was still like 97% (I think I linked this earlier in the thread, but can dig it up again if people want). You can't immunise yourself 100% and while it would've been nice, it most likely was also never the intent. What matters most is keeping people out of the hospital by reducing severe consequences.

  

10 minutes ago, Quackers101 said:

yeah, so I don't think I would want to recommend to a "normal" person a booster with a third moderna.

As some of what you said for the later side effects or symptoms, has been with the first dose of moderna, so an early 3rd dose of Moderna (M,M,M)?

but like you say, the lower dosage in the J&J vaccine, also hasn't the J&J vaccine been updated to be more effective against mutated versions of the 'vid?

Boosters should be fine for everyone. It's just another shot, treat it like the yearly flu shot.

[Mister Woof]

6 minutes ago, tikker said:

   It's worth to noting that that the drop was in the protection against infection and not in the protection against severe consequences which was still like 97% (I think I linked this earlier in the thread, but can dig it up again if people want). You can't immunise yourself 100% and while it would've been nice, it most likely was also never the intent. What matters most is keeping people out of the hospital by reducing severe consequences.

Right, protection against severe disease remained strong even with just 2 doses over time; however, there was still a measurable reduction in protection in severe disease over time with pfizer specifically.

 

The thinking isn't get boosted every 6 months to bring your antibody levels up and prevent infection at all (these wane over time regardless, doesn't make sense for your body to be pumped full of antibodies for no reason, this is why we have memory B cells and T cells), but that a 2 dose regimen wasn't enough to illicit long lasting immunity.

 

Think of all the other 3+ shot vaccines such as HepB which is 3 shots for lifelong immunity.

 

https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/schedules/hcp/imz/child-adolescent.html

[Quackers101]

7 minutes ago, tikker said:

Boosters should be fine for everyone. It's just another shot, treat it like the yearly flu shot.

not if I heard it could create "more" complications, from the sperm/menstruate cycle to the heart or blood clots. (or whatever else there was or the risks from injection). That it "could" become higher risk with more doses? then again, if I wait 1 year or so for the next shot then fine. But half a year or so, no thanks when I don't need rushing it. Also whatever there is for the long term immunity.

[Mister Woof]

1 minute ago, Quackers101 said:

not if I heard it could create "more" complications, from the sperm/menstruate cycle to the heart or blood clots. (or whatever else there was or the risks from injection).

That it "could" become higher risk with more doses? then again, if I wait 1 year or so for the next shot then fine. But half a year or so, no thanks when I don't need rushing it.

https://www.10news.com/news/in-depth/in-depth-can-a-simple-technique-stop-myocarditis-after-covid-vaccination

 

Knowing all the health care "professionals" that I know.....I think this makes a lot of sense and is more likely to be the cause of myocarditis than the actual contents of the vaccine.

[Quackers101]

7 minutes ago, Mister Woof said:

Knowing all the health care "professionals" that I know.....I think this makes a lot of sense and is more likely to be the cause of myocarditis than the actual contents of the vaccine.

oh I posted about this, that's why they want to "aspirate" vaccines that goes into the muscle and is one of the risks (or could be likely a risk).

[Mister Woof]

2 minutes ago, Quackers101 said:

oh I posted about this, that's why they want to "aspirate" vaccines that goes into the muscle and is one of the risks (or could be likely a risk).

It's still a risk, even if it's because of what's essentially PEBKAC

 

It's pretty small, though.

 

The good news is everyone should be getting informed consent. 

[tikker]

26 minutes ago, Mister Woof said:

Right, protection against severe disease remained strong even with just 2 doses over time; however, there was still a measurable reduction in protection in severe disease over time with pfizer specifically.

 

The thinking isn't get boosted every 6 months to bring your antibody levels up and prevent infection at all (these wane over time regardless, doesn't make sense for your body to be pumped full of antibodies for no reason, this is why we have memory B cells and T cells), but that a 2 dose regimen wasn't enough to illicit long lasting immunity.

 

Think of all the other 3+ shot vaccines such as HepB which is 3 shots for lifelong immunity.

 

https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/schedules/hcp/imz/child-adolescent.html

So these were the studies I was referring to, which show no to insignificant decline in the protection against severe COVID-19:

On 10/7/2021 at 9:47 PM, tikker said:

Israel study: https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2114583?query=featured_home

Qatar study: https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2114114?query=featured_home

Quote

Results

Estimated BNT162b2 effectiveness against any SARS-CoV-2 infection was negligible in the first 2 weeks after the first dose. It increased to 36.8% (95% confidence interval [CI], 33.2 to 40.2) in the third week after the first dose and reached its peak at 77.5% (95% CI, 76.4 to 78.6) in the first month after the second dose. Effectiveness declined gradually thereafter, with the decline accelerating after the fourth month to reach approximately 20% in months 5 through 7 after the second dose. Effectiveness against symptomatic infection was higher than effectiveness against asymptomatic infection but waned similarly. Variant-specific effectiveness waned in the same pattern. Effectiveness against any severe, critical, or fatal case of Covid-19 increased rapidly to 66.1% (95% CI, 56.8 to 73.5) by the third week after the first dose and reached 96% or higher in the first 2 months after the second dose; effectiveness persisted at approximately this level for 6 months.

Emphasis mine, but as you can see the Qatar study found that despite the significant drop in antibodies the protection against severe effects remained high. Protection can thus be a little bit misleading in the sense that it still protects very well against complications, but not so well against infection anymore.

The boosters do help noticeably and are indeed recommended.

Quote

https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(21)02183-8
Vaccine effectiveness against hospital admissions for infections with the delta variant for all ages was high overall (93% [95% CI 84–96]) up to 6 months.
Although waning effectiveness against hospital admissions was not observed in our study population to date, this possibility should be carefully monitored.

 

https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(21)02249-2

Compared with two doses of the vaccine administered at least 5 months before, adding a third dose was estimated to be 93% effective in preventing COVID-19-related admission to hospital, 92% in preventing severe disease, and 81% in preventing COVID-19-related death, as of 7 or more days after the third dose. Third-dose vaccine effectiveness against admission to hospital and severe disease was estimated to be similar between males and females, and between individuals aged 40–69 years and at least 70 years. In those aged 16–39 years, the rate of these severe outcomes was too small for meaningful estimation of the booster effectiveness. Effectiveness was also similar among groups defined by the number of comorbidities.

I did find a CDC study that finds a possible decline for Pfizer:

Quote

https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/mm7038e1.htm

VE for the Moderna vaccine was 93% at 14–120 days (median = 66 days) after receipt of the second vaccine dose and 92% at >120 days (median = 141 days) (p = 1.000). VE for the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine was 91% at 14–120 days (median = 69 days) after receipt of the second vaccine dose but declined significantly to 77% at >120 days (median = 143 days) (p<0.001).

Moderna seems a better than Pfizer, which honestly doesn't surprise me as the shot is three times the dose. In any case it's not like after 6 months you are no longer protected. The studies corroborate this. 77% is still great, especially for something we had to roll out this quickly.

56 minutes ago, Mister Woof said:

The thinking isn't get boosted every 6 months to bring your antibody levels up and prevent infection at all (these wane over time regardless, doesn't make sense for your body to be pumped full of antibodies for no reason, this is why we have memory B cells and T cells), but that a 2 dose regimen wasn't enough to illicit long lasting immunity.

We don't know that what the length of SARS-CoV2 immunity is yet. From the literature that I've read what we know now is that we see dropping levels of antibodies (expected if you're not infected) and a significant decline against protection against infection for Pfizer, but a lasting high protection against COVID-19. It is still highly effective and  If the B cells remain, so will your bodies ability to fight it. We'll have to wait another 6-12 months to assess the effect of the boosters.

58 minutes ago, Mister Woof said:

Think of all the other 3+ shot vaccines such as HepB which is 3 shots for lifelong immunity.

 

https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/schedules/hcp/imz/child-adolescent.html

Immunity simply means your body knows when something is foreign/harmful and how to deal with it. It varies in effectiveness, as you correctly note, and doesn't mean you'll never get it. You can't compare HepB and SARS-CoV2. SARS-CoV2 is similar to the flu virus, whose vaccine also wanes in effectiveness, also mutates rapidly and needs an updated shot every year. In fact, not nearly everybody develops antibodies for HepB even after being vaccinated.

[Mister Woof]

1 hour ago, tikker said:

So these were the studies I was referring to, which show no to insignificant decline in the protection against severe COVID-19:

The boosters do help noticeably and are indeed recommended.

I did find a CDC study that finds a possible decline for Pfizer:

Moderna seems a better than Pfizer, which honestly doesn't surprise me as the shot is three times the dose. In any case it's not like after 6 months you are no longer protected. The studies corroborate this. 77% is still great, especially for something we had to roll out this quickly.

We don't know that what the length of SARS-CoV2 immunity is yet. From the literature that I've read what we know now is that we see dropping levels of antibodies (expected if you're not infected) and a significant decline against protection against infection for Pfizer, but a lasting high protection against COVID-19. It is still highly effective and  If the B cells remain, so will your bodies ability to fight it. We'll have to wait another 6-12 months to assess the effect of the boosters.

Immunity simply means your body knows when something is foreign/harmful and how to deal with it. It varies in effectiveness, as you correctly note, and doesn't mean you'll never get it. You can't compare HepB and SARS-CoV2. SARS-CoV2 is similar to the flu virus, whose vaccine also wanes in effectiveness, also mutates rapidly and needs an updated shot every year. In fact, not nearly everybody develops antibodies for HepB even after being vaccinated.

There's still a lot we don't know - but given everyone I know has been boosted (including me), I'm already past the part of wondering if it's worth it.

[Guest willies leg]

One of my friends told me that she already had covid, so she identifies as triple vaccinated + boosters.

 

I guess reading about how the disease infects us and your body recovers, she might not be that far off. Having it produces strong antibodies. There's studies all over the place depending on who funded it, but common sense science makes me lean towards it being highly effective.

 

Of course, I just laughed at her when she told me that, though.

[tikker]

27 minutes ago, Mister Woof said:

There's still a lot we don't know - but given everyone I know has been boosted (including me), I'm already past the part of wondering if it's worth it.

I've never doubted the booster's effectiveness. If you are eligible then by all means get it (especially older folks).

15 minutes ago, willies leg said:

so she identifies as triple vaccinated + boosters.

You can't identify with a vaccine lol. People who have had COVID-19 do show increased immune response to the vaccine, however, so it's a good combination.

[DrJankenstein]

11 minutes ago, willies leg said:

. There's studies all over the place depending on who funded it

 

I would say it's mostly the media that have caused the mixed and sometimes even sensationalist views on this. At the start, here in the UK, they made it seem like it was the end of days  

 

I probably wouldn't get the vaccine again (or the booster I guess), I don't think it's a particularly special virus but on the same token I also don't think it's just "a bad cold".

[tikker]

15 minutes ago, DrJankenstein said:

 

I would say it's mostly the media that have caused the mixed and sometimes even sensationalist views on this. At the start, here in the UK, they made it seem like it was the end of days  

 

I probably wouldn't get the vaccine again (or the booster I guess), I don't think it's a particularly special virus but on the same token I also don't think it's just "a bad cold".

It's not a special virus in the sense that it's a coronavirus and that we had previous knowledge to build on. We've had the unfortunate pleasure of a front row seat  seeing what an unknown disease can do, so I would still advocate vaccines. The problem isn't protecting yourself here, it's the other consequences of having unvaccinated people in combination with such a highly infectious and severe disease, even immediate lethality aside.

[tkitch]

23 minutes ago, DrJankenstein said:

I would say it's mostly the media that have caused the mixed and sometimes even sensationalist views on this. At the start, here in the UK, they made it seem like it was the end of days  

 

I probably wouldn't get the vaccine again (or the booster I guess), I don't think it's a particularly special virus but on the same token I also don't think it's just "a bad cold".

Something like 5 million deaths in 2 years worldwide says that "This was really a very bad thing."

And that's with some countries intentionally under-reporting deaths.  

 

End of days?  Not really.  But imagine what would have happened without all the "crazy" precautions we were taking, and then the hospital system just absolutely crashed?  (It never did, although it was close in areas.)

The US would have been looking at millions of deaths, and worldwide would have been a hell of a lot more than that.  

[rikitikitavi]

14 minutes ago, tkitch said:

And that's with some countries intentionally under-reporting deaths.

Like when a hospital has to under report number of cases and deaths, because of funding reasons. Increased death stats - coincidence. Sad realities.

[Guest willies leg]

52 minutes ago, tikker said:

I've never doubted the booster's effectiveness. If you are eligible then by all means get it (especially older folks).

You can't identify with a vaccine lol. People who have had COVID-19 do show increased immune response to the vaccine, however, so it's a good combination.

 

I don't think she identifies as a vaccine, but as vaccinated. I think it's valid. I'll have to ask her what her pronouns are.

 

[tikker]

11 minutes ago, willies leg said:

I don't think she identifies as a vaccine

Well I sure hope not

11 minutes ago, willies leg said:

, but as vaccinated. I think it's valid. I'll have to ask her what her pronouns are.

Yes, having had COVID + being vaccinated once is for bureaucratic purposes (corona passes etc.) often considered equivalent to being doubly vaccinated, because people that have had it show strong immune responses.

  

39 minutes ago, tkitch said:

End of days?  Not really.  But imagine what would have happened without all the "crazy" precautions we were taking, and then the hospital system just absolutely crashed?  (It never did, although it was close in areas.)

Don't really have to imagine. This was Italy in the beginning.

[DrJankenstein]

7 hours ago, tikker said:

It's not a special virus in the sense that it's a coronavirus and that we had previous knowledge to build on. We've had the unfortunate pleasure of a front row seat  seeing what an unknown disease can do, so I would still advocate vaccines. The problem isn't protecting yourself here, it's the other consequences of having unvaccinated people in combination with such a highly infectious and severe disease, even immediate lethality aside.

 

I advocate for voluntary vaccination too, I don't believe that in constant ongoing vaccination though. 

 

7 hours ago, tkitch said:

Something like 5 million deaths in 2 years worldwide says that "This was really a very bad thing."

And that's with some countries intentionally under-reporting deaths.  

 

End of days?  Not really.  But imagine what would have happened without all the "crazy" precautions we were taking, and then the hospital system just absolutely crashed?  (It never did, although it was close in areas.)

The US would have been looking at millions of deaths, and worldwide would have been a hell of a lot more than that.  

Good morning!

 

It's hard to get "solid" mortality data specific to Covid worldwide for many reasons ranging from "there's no covid here" to "we just never seen him again".

 

Here's the UKs Mortality for the past 20 years: https://www.ons.gov.uk/aboutus/transparencyandgovernance/freedomofinformationfoi/deathsintheukfrom1990to2020 

 

We've got a pretty solid handle on that here. Anyway, 2020s mortality rate is only exceptional within a decade. You can see how the media has sensationalised that because, in the news, I've seen such outlandish claims as:

 

Worse than WW2

Worse than smallpox

Absolute failure 

Health Service almost collapsed

 

Furthermore, we have an elephant in the room specifically here in Scotland:

 

 

Between those two arrows that some brute has crudely affixed to the graph the entire country was in lockdown. It appears that the measures taken has no effect on the case rates since the spike started and ended during the lockdown (approximately). So (it seems that) the measures were either not at all effective or at least not potent. 

 

Anyway, the point is, I think if there were fewer or no measures taken that the situation would be *somewhat* worse but probably not by much, at least in Scotland. Less measures would have blunted the sharp increase in child and adult suicide, which I *believe* would have been a better choice in hindsight. It's always easy to see things in hindsight though. 

[tikker]

3 hours ago, DrJankenstein said:

Between those two arrows that some brute has crudely affixed to the graph the entire country was in lockdown. It appears that the measures taken has no effect on the case rates since the spike started and ended during the lockdown (approximately). So (it seems that) the measures were either not at all effective or at least not potent.

Not sure what the situation in Scotland is, but here for example it's been identified that schools are the major spreading points. As long as those stay open infections will rise rapidly. People also just don't really follow the rules. The combination of those will give a large rise. In the Netherlands we have seen the measures help moderately against ICU pressure, but we are often riding the line with some concern for a code black and the fact that no normal care can be given.

 

Regarding the peaks, remember it is about flattening the curve. Rising infections does not mean the measures have not been effective. At this stage infections also don't really matter anymore. It's the hospitalisation that matters, so while "Health Service almost collapsed " might be a small exaggeration for some countries, there is a large truth in it. Normal care for example here is still extremely little due to COVID.

3 hours ago, DrJankenstein said:

Anyway, the point is, I think if there were fewer or no measures taken that the situation would be *somewhat* worse but probably not by much, at least in Scotland. Less measures would have blunted the sharp increase in child and adult suicide, which I *believe* would have been a better choice in hindsight. It's always easy to see things in hindsight though. 

Yeah hindsight is always 20/20. Suicides are always a shame, but if a new infectious deadly virus that we know nothing about pops up you're not going to let it loose either. We have to play with the cards we were dealt.

[WkdPaul]

The issue is always finding the appropriate balance, some think the measures were going too far, some think they weren't going far enough.

 

While the excess death numbers proves we needed measures, it's clear that there was no health system ready for such a pandemic. Even if we don't agree with the death rate numbers, the amount of people needing ICU care isn't in question, hospitals (mostly in urban area, less so in rural areas) were swamped. Even here in Canada, in Alberta, a province with leaders that were (and still are) openly dismissive about the pandemic, did backtrack and apologized about opening and switching to and "endemic" response because of how much more of an impact the Delta variant has on the healthcare system.

 

Here in Canada, to cover the large numbers of cases, nurses and doctors were pulled from other departments to help with emergency and ICU care, we now know that this has lead to thousands of fewer cancer diagnostics, meaning, there are thousands of people out there that have cancers, but still don't know. They'll eventually be detected, but it's very possible that it'll be too late. On top of that, you have people that are in need of surgery and can't get it.

 

If we want to see what "no or very little measures" looks like, a quick look at the US and Brazil numbers will show that COVID isn't something to brush off, and the death rate isn't the only thing to consider. Having people sick (but not on the verge of death) is still a big strain on the healthcare system and minimizing that strain to make sure people other than COVID victims can get care is a big part of why measures were taken.

[HM-2]

9 hours ago, DrJankenstein said:

Between those two arrows that some brute has crudely affixed to the graph the entire country was in lockdown. It appears that the measures taken has no effect on the case rates since the spike started and ended during the lockdown (approximately). So (it seems that) the measures were either not at all effective or at least not potent. 

Just to pick this up quickly- the issue with trying to look at positive test rates and number and trying to extrapolate the success or failure of particular policies is that there's a couple of factors and pieces of missing information which disambiguate the two from each other. In this instance:

 

The number of positive tests could be a strong indicator of the effectiveness of a policy, but only if testing rates remained static or declined. If we had a significant uptick in testing rates during the early days of lockdown (which we did more broadly across the UK) then we would expect a higher level of positive returns. What would actually be a very interesting statistic here would be the percentage of tests returning a positive result. That would remove the need to account for the overall testing rates. I don't have access to the testing testing data from december when the country went into lockdown initially, but I do have it from January onwards:

 

 

As you can see, rates of positive infections remained relatively steady until late January early February when they declined rapidly- so despite the spike in positive test results between early January and early February shown on your chart, the actual rate of positive test results was declining during that period. 

 

A second consideration is the lag time between infection and testing. Typically, it will take 3-5 days from initial infection to returning a positive test. Most people don't test until they're symptomatic, which can be a week or longer after initial infection. So when you see a spike in positive test results, a significant proportion of those positive tests will actually be people who were infected at least a week before. 

[DrJankenstein]

10 minutes ago, HM-2 said:

Just to pick this up quickly- the issue with trying to look at positive test rates and number and trying to extrapolate the success or failure of particular policies is that there's a couple of factors and pieces of missing information which disambiguate the two from each other. In this instance:

 

The number of positive tests could be a strong indicator of the effectiveness of a policy, but only if testing rates remained static or declined. If we had a significant uptick in testing rates during the early days of lockdown (which we did more broadly across the UK) then we would expect a higher level of positive returns. What would actually be a very interesting statistic here would be the percentage of tests returning a positive result. That would remove the need to account for the overall testing rates. I don't have access to the testing testing data from december when the country went into lockdown initially, but I do have it from January onwards:

 

As you can see, rates of positive infections remained relatively steady until late January early February when they declined rapidly- so despite the spike in positive test results between early January and early February shown on your chart, the actual rate of positive test results was declining during that period. 

 

A second consideration is the lag time between infection and testing. Typically, it will take 3-5 days from initial infection to returning a positive test. Most people don't test until they're symptomatic, which can be a week or longer after initial infection. So when you see a spike in positive test results, a significant proportion of those positive tests will actually be people who were infected at least a week before. 

I've been mulling this over for a while (with there not being much else to do )

 

I've explored these points in depth and, bear in mind this is just my opinion, I think the lockdown blunted it by a very small %. 

 

I seen a stat recently something along the lines of "the average age of death for covid victims was 79 with 4 underlying health conditions unvaccinated and 84 with 5 underlying health conditions for vaccinated". Take that with a pinch of salt, but naturally older people are more vulnerable. I then think of child suicide increasing (I didn't even know children did that), and that's why I come to the conclusion that it wasn't worth it.

 

Hindsight though. Plus as  @tikker said: "if a new infectious deadly virus that we know nothing about pops up you're not going to let it loose either"