Quote:
Originally Posted by 1andrew1
To be honest, jfman's views on Coronavirus are pretty mainstream and in line with WHO, HMG etc.
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In other threads I may have made the odd contrary post. I'll hold my hands up.
---------- Post added at 23:18 ---------- Previous post was at 22:49 ----------
Quote:
Originally Posted by Damien
At this point, I think it's worth looking at the vaccine as a head start of getting COVID to reach endemic status as opposed to pandemic status. It's not going away and it's likely we'll all get it at some point.
When we do get it however we'll all be in a better position to cope with it. Fewer people will get symptoms, of those that do fewer will have it badly or get long COVID, of those that do fewer will be hospitalised and of those who are fewer still will die. Once you've had a natural infection and the vaccine the immunity levels will be even higher. COVID will be endemic.
We can't get rid of it so the question around any further restrictions will have to be what does this gain us? If it's just a delay then what's the point? The only justification is to act as a brake on hospitalisations if the numbers spike at the same time as flu season. Even then the Government will need a good argument as to why this would be 'one last push' and why they'll be better prepared for Winter 2022.
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It's always been my stance that lockdown represents the emergency brake because things have got out of control. While the vaccine is having positive outcomes, there's still 1000 (and rising) people on ventilators as we sit here today. That doesn't just have an impact on Covid - that has wider healthcare implications.
Buying time isn't solely a delay for the sake of it - better treatments emerge, booster vaccines emerge. We've got 35 million Pfizer vaccines ordered for next Autumn, however it's clear that longer term vaccines have to match the variants out there in reality. Vaccination against the variant we had two variants ago is never going to adequately resolve the issue.
Some of those who subscribe to the idea that Covid leaked from a lab draw parallels between the "partially vaccinated" and gain-of-function research.