CORONA Main Coronavirus thread

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Covid infections hit 2.7 million in UK
By Smitha Mundasad
Published 2 days ago


Covid infections are continuing to rise across the UK, the latest figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) show.

An estimated 2.7 million people, or one in 25, has the virus. About one in 30 had the virus in the previous week.
The rise is being driven by fast-spreading sub-variants of Omicron - called BA.4 and BA.5.

People are still able to catch the infection even if they have had Covid before.

But the UK Health Security Agency's (UKHSA) latest analysis shows jabs are helping to protect against serious illness.
Health officials are urging anyone who is eligible but has not yet had a vaccine or booster in the past six months, to get one - particularly people over the age of 75, who are more at risk from serious disease.

In the latest report the ONS estimates Covid rates were:

• One in 25 in England - up from one in 30 the week before
• One in 20 in Wales - up from one in 30
• One in 19 in Northern Ireland - up from one in 25
• One in 17 in Scotland - up from one in 18

Image source, BBC News

The stats are collated by testing thousands of people from UK households - whether or not they have symptoms - to estimate how much virus is around.

Sarah Crofts, who works on the ONS's Covid-19 infection survey, said there was a continued rise across all UK countries, English regions and age groups.

She added: "Scotland continues to have the highest infection rate, although it has recently increased at a slower rate compared to other UK countries. We will continue to monitor the data to see if this recent rise is starting to slow in Scotland."

What's happening in hospitals?

Separate data from the UKHSA shows the number of people in hospital with Covid has risen across all age groups, with the largest increases in people aged 75 and older.

Dr Mary Ramsay, from the UKHSA, said about 16% of people in the over-75 age group had not yet had spring booster vaccines to help protect against severe disease.

She warned there was likely to be a "substantial amount of waning immunity" in older people who have not taken up the booster vaccine on schedule.

In England, on 6 July, there were more than 11,000 people in hospital who had tested positive for Covid.

Data from the other UK nations is not as up-to-date but suggests a similar rise over the last month.

The number of Covid patients in hospital is currently still way below the record high of more than 34,000 in January 2021, during the wave of the Alpha variant of coronavirus.

Not all patients testing positive for Covid in hospital are being treated for it - some are there for another reason, but it can make their care more difficult.

This applies to about two-thirds of patients in hospital at the moment.

The number of Covid patients in intensive care has reached 217 in England, which is an increase from 111 at the start of June.

Back in January 2021, more than 3,700 people needed this type of care at a time where intensive care units were in danger of being overwhelmed.

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Top doctor says clueless Aussies are like 'frogs being boiled' in accepting Covid death amid fresh surge - as the ABC ramps up its campaign to bring back the most loathed lockdown rules

• Doctor says Aussies like 'frogs being boiled slowly' in latest wave of Covid
• Dr Chris Moy said health authorities were concerned about new sub-variants
• Dr Moy hit out at health minister Mark Butler for not reimposing mask mandates
• Mr Butler is repeatedly grilled by ABC journalists for failing to bring them back
• Australia's Covid death toll has surpassed 10,000 with over 4,000 hospitalised

By Olivia Day For Daily Mail Australia
Published: 21:19 EDT, 10 July 2022 | Updated: 22:55 EDT, 10 July 2022

The Australian Medical Association has issued a dramatic Covid-19 warning, telling the ABC that Aussies are like 'frogs being boiled slowly' into accepting current death numbers - as the ABC pushes strongly for the return of lockdown restrictions.

AMA vice-president Chris Moy told the ABC's News Breakfast on Monday that health authorities are more worried about Covid now than they have been for many months.

Doctors are worried about the rapid spread of the BA.4 and BA.5 Omicron sub-variants, because they are 'more infectious, cause more reinfections and severe disease' and travel down the lungs.

The doctor blamed the federal election for giving the country a 'false sense of security' as politicians ended mask mandates and Covid restrictions to signal victory over the virus.

'Unfortunately to some degree, we've been like frogs boiled slowly and we're accepting this death rate which is continued on,' Dr Moy said.

He said there has been more than 10,200 deaths of people with Covid in their system over the past two and half years since the virus emerged.

Australia's most recent annual death toll from all causes is 160,000.

The top doctor's warning comes as the ABC appears to be spearheading a campaign for the return of hated Covid rules.
A succession of high-profile hosts have repeatedly questioned why masks are not being mandated across the country.

During his apperaance, Dr Moy urged Aussies to wear masks indoors and in high-risk scenarios for the next few months.

'Masks are very high impact in terms of benefit with low inconvenience compared to things like isolation, which we can encourage at the moment,' he said.

The doctor urged Australians worried about transmission during the third wave to get any vaccines or antiviral treatments they are eligible for.

Pensioners over 70 who test positive to the virus will be able to access antivirals on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme from Monday. Two antivirals are on the PBS - Lagevrio and Paxlovi - with the announcement on Sunday expanding access and lowering cost for millions of Australians.

The pills normally cost more than $1,000, but will be available for $6.80 for concession card holders and around $40 for everyone else.

Dr Moy advised those experiencing symptoms like a runny nose, sore throat or cough to get a PCR test immediately and not rely on a RAT, where detection rates of the virus were only 60 per cent.

'Really consider wearing a mask in high-risk situations,' the doctor urged.

'Because what we need to do over the next 5-10 weeks, it's going to be a really high-risk period for us and we just don't want to overload the hospitals.'

Dr Moy called on Federal Health Minister Mark Butler to see 'what it's really like' for GP's on the frontline and claimed he was 'acting more like an economist'.

'We have been down this line before with the economists running this thing, and particularly New South Wales, and that didn't go very well in two outbreaks,' he said.

ABC hosts have repeatedly grilled the health minister over why he and his state counterparts aren't reintroducing mask mandates, given the rapid spread of Covid and winter viruses.

ABC News Breakfast presenter Michael Rowland on Friday accused Mr Butler of 'accepting' deaths by not re-introducing compulsory face-coverings.

Mr Butler said the advice from the chief health officers is that Australia has 'moved beyond the era of very broad mask mandates and lockdowns', and that you can 'make your own choice' about wearing a mask indoors.

But Mr Rowland refused to accept that answer, claiming that studies showed mask mandates offered close to a 100 per cent success rate - despite case numbers climbing even when previous mandates were enforced during the Delta and Omicron outbreaks.

We do know there are studies reflecting this, that compulsory mask mandates have close to 100% success rate,' Mr Rowland said.

'(That's) as opposed to what you're saying, just asking people to wear them. You're not worried about people not making the right decision here?'

Mr Butler fired back saying Australians, who have unrestricted access to vaccines to protect against serious illness, can 'take control of their own circumstances' in the third year of the pandemic.

Mr Rowland then pointed to the over 10,000 people who have died with the virus.

'By not taking steps to minimise transmissions ... aren't we, Mark Butler, as a society, implicitly accepting that death toll?' he said. 'And are you comfortable with that?'

Mr Butler attempted to answer the question, noting the lives 'tragically' lost before he was cut off by the television host.
'As a society, do we just sit back and accept that?' Rowland interrupted.

'No, we don't sit back and accept it,' the health minister hit back.

The health minister was similarly grilled by journalist David Speers during the ABC's Insiders program on Sunday.

Speers asked: 'You say we've moved to a new phase of the pandemic but you just told us we're in a new wave that's very serious, you're worried about this. Are we really in a new phase of the pandemic where we don't need to consider some of these old measures, like mask mandates, in particular?

'Why don't we look at that for the next six weeks?'

Mr Butler said he had received no advice to mandate masks and said face-coverings were better in 'targeted' areas like hospitals, airports and aged-care settings.

'And if you're in a crowding indoor space with no ability to socially distance you should give strong consideration to wearing a mask,' he added.

Speers said a recommendation that people wear a mask was 'ineffectual' with the proof seen in shopping centres or stadiums where few were worn.

'Wasn't one of the lessons of this pandemic, mask mandates for a fixed period, work?' he asked the health minister.

'But we're deep into the third year. They did work very well for the first couple of years,' Mr Butler replied to which the host hit back: 'We're in a third wave'.

Mr Butler said the government was getting advice that such mandates are best done in a targeted way and focusing on protecting vulnerable members of the population.

Meanwhile, Aussies over 30 have been urged to consider rolling up their sleeve for a fourth vaccine dose.

More than 37,000 new infections and 77 deaths were reported across the country on Saturday with Omicron variants BA.4 and BA.5 now the dominant strains of the virus.

Almost 42,000 cases were also announced nationally on Friday, the third 40,000-plus day in a row while the number of patients hospitalised with the virus tops 4,000, up by more than 1,000 in the past fortnight.

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Israel: New study links COVID vaccines to 25% increase in cardiac arrest for both males & females; Study based on data from emergency services.
Increased cardiac arrest follows the rollout of COVID vaccines, among both males and females. No similar increase was found due to COVID infection alone.
Dr. Paul Alexander
3 hr ago

Israeli reporting indicates ‘An increase of over 25% was detected in both call types during January–May 2021, compared with the years 2019–2020. That is to say, "increased rates of vaccination ... are associated with increased number of CA [cardiac arrest] and ACS [acute coronary syndrome]." By contrast, the trial "did not detect a statistically significant association between the COVID-19 infection rates and the CA and ACS weekly call counts.

"A new study by Israeli researchers and published in Nature has revealed an increase of over 25 percent in cardiovascular-related emergency calls in the young-adult population, following the rollout of COVID vaccines, among both males and females. No similar increase was found due to COVID infection alone.

Israel health authorities and the U.S. Centers of Disease Control (CDC) have acknowledged a link between COVID vaccines and specific cardiovascular complications. The risk of myocarditis after receiving a second vaccine dose is now estimated to be between 1 in 3000 to 1 in 6000 in men aged 16 to 24.’

SOURCE Israel

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A Brief Update On My Spike Protein Progressive Autoimmune Disease Hypothesis
IgG and C3 Deposition
Walter M Chesnut
5 hr ago

I present additional evidence of the Spike Protein’s molecular mimcry inducing systemic autoimmune disease. Here is a cutaneous example.

Please read the referenced paper, and please note the following two quotes:

Bullous pemphigoid after SARS-CoV-2 vaccination: spike-protein-directed immunofluorescence confocal microscopy and T-cell-receptor studies

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/bjd.20890

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Source: Indiana National Guard to boot up to 1,000 troops for refusing Covid vaccine -- no drill, no pay started THIS WEEKEND
Reports of sudden heart attacks among Guardsmen in their 30s as Indiana National Guard enforces vax mandate on troops; Holcomb silent
Margaret Menge
7 hr ago

A longtime officer in the Indiana National Guard says the Guard is about to kick out up to 1,000 Guardsmen in Indiana who have refused to get the Covid-19 vaccine and says the resulting loss of troops will “decimate” the force.

“I was told by people who would know that there’s about 1,000 [refusals],” he said. “They said it’s a little less than that, and it’s gone down a little bit because there were some last-minute takers. But I’m guessing it’s probably still several hundred that have just outright refused.”

The Fourth of July weekend was the first weekend that Guardsmen who refused the vaccine were not allowed to drill and so would not be paid. But troops don’t normally drill on the Fourth of July weekend, so the order took effect this weekend, for all intents and purposes.

In addition to “refusals” — people who have refused the vaccine and not applied for an exemption — there are another 300-400 Guardsmen who have applied for either a religious or medical exemption, according to the source. The great majority of these are religious. All or almost all are pending, with very few having been approved nationwide, according to reports.

“The Army Guard [in Indiana] is about 10,000 soldiers,” says the officer. “If you’re talking about 1,000 people, that’s 10 percent of the force. If we lost 10 percent of our soldiers overnight, we would be seriously hobbled in our effectiveness, especially since it’s not just one unit, it’s going to be across all units. There would be a serious problem for the Guard.”

The National Guard is under state command, but can also be mobilized under federal orders, under Title 10 of the U.S. Code.

The Guard can also be deployed under Title 32 of the U.S. Code, serving under state command but paid with federal money.

Regardless, the source says, the vaccine mandate appears to be an “unlawful order” because none of the vaccines available in the United States have been given full approval by the FDA and CDC, and Army regulations prohibit the Army from mandating that soldiers take an emergency-use vaccine, unless in extraordinary circumstances like a nuclear or biological attack.

Several Republican governors have pressured the Department of Defense to end the vaccine mandate, given that the Guard is mostly under state control.

Last week, Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee wrote a letter to Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin asking for requests for religious exemptions to the vaccine mandate be granted to members of the Guard.

In June, Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin sent a letter to Austin asking him to “indefinitely postpone” the vaccine mandate for the Army National Guard.

Indiana’s Republican Gov. Eric Holcomb, however, has so far been silent on the vaccine mandate for members of the military, including the Indiana National Guard.

Meanwhile, reports have surfaced of sudden deaths, with the officer who has served as an anonymous source for this story saying that another officer in his brigade told him in hushed tones recently of two full-time Guardsmen in their 30s who suddenly “dropped dead” of heart attacks.

“Yeah, soldiers do have heart attack and die sometimes,” he says. “But two in the same brigade? It just seems suspicious.”

Members of the Indiana National Guard live in every county in the state and usually drill in armories located in about one-third of Indiana’s 92 counties.

Last year, many National Guard units were involved with processing about 6,600 Afghans at Camp Atterbury in Southern Indiana.

About 30 members of the Indiana National Guard are now deployed to the Middle East as part of Operation Spartan Shield and Operation Inherent Resolve.

About 120 Guardsmen have been deployed to the U.S.-Mexico border for the last nine months as part of an effort led by Texas and Arizona to secure the border.

The Guard was also deployed in the state in the last year helping rescue people caught in a snowstorm, and in April, was helping test and prep M113 Armored Personnel Carriers to be sent to Ukraine as the United States began to wade into the conflict there.

The Guard was also called up by Holcomb last year to run a drive-thru “vaccine clinic” for kids in the large parking lot across from the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

There has been no Indiana media coverage of the potential loss of 10 percent of the Indiana National Guard and no public discussion about what this may mean for the ability of the Guard to serve the state and serve as part of the U.S. military in defense of the nation.

Guardsmen who have refused the vaccine will be discharged through an administrative process and will not likely get an honorable discharge.

The process is expected to take time, with Guardsmen first appearing on AWOL reports.

After the “refusals,” the people who’ve requested religious exemptions will be next, Guardsmen have been led to believe.

“I think this is all purposeful. I really do,” says the officer. “If you look at the Biden administration and their budget goals, their budget goals include a reduction of military force…I think it’s all purposeful because it’s a twofer for them. They get to easily and quickly reduce troop levels, like Democrats always want to, and — as a bonus — the people they get rid of are the conservative Christians. And so it solves their ‘extremism in the military’ problem and allows them to more easily push PRIDE month and all this other liberal crap that they’re pushing on the soldiers right now.”

The process of separation — an administrative process in which a board of three higher-ranking officers typically hears the evidence and makes a decision — can take several months or up to a year.

But many Guardsmen may leave voluntarily, given the cutoff in pay.

Also, those who have received letters of reprimand for refusing the order to get the vaccine know that these are “career killers,” the source says, so many of them will likely leave on their own.

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Move over, measles: Dominant Omicron subvariants BA.4 and BA.5 could be the most infectious viruses known to man
Erin Prater - FORTUNE
Sat, July 9, 2022, 4:30 PM

COVID was relatively deadly, but not ultra-transmissible when it burst onto the global scene in late 2019 and early 2020.
These days, due a number of factors, the reverse is true: It's considerably less lethal, but more exponentially transmissible.

Globally dominant Omicron subvariants BA.4 and BA.5 are neck and neck with measles in the competition for the title of most infectious disease known to man, according to an Australian professor of biostatistics and epidemiology.

The original Wuhan strain of COVID-19 had a reproductive rate—also known as an R0 or R-naught value—of around 3.3, meaning that each infected person infected another 3.3 people, on average. That put COVID-19 among the least transmissible human diseases.

Slightly less transmissible were the 1918 pandemic strain of flu, which had an estimated R0 of 2, along with Ebola. On the higher end of the spectrum, mumps has an R0 of 12; measles tops the list at 18.

In order to outcompete, successful COVID variants have become more transmissible with time. Delta had a slightly higher reproductive rate of around 5.1. Then came Omicron, with an reproductive rate almost twice as large: 9.5.

So called "stealth Omicron," nicknamed for its ability to evade detection on PCR tests, was about 1.4 times more transmissible than BA.1, so its reproductive rate was around 13.3, Adrian Esterman, a professor at the University of South Australia, recently wrote on academic news website The Conversation.

New studies suggest that BA.4 and BA.5 have a growth advantage over BA.2 similar to the growth advantage BA.2 had over BA.1. Thus, the latest dominant COVID subvariants have a reproductive rate of around 18.6, tying or surpassing measles, the world's most infectious viral disease, according to Esterman.

The next dominant COVID strain should surpass them all. BA.2.75, an ultra-new Omicron subvariant nicknamed "Centaurus" by some on Twitter, made headlines this week after the World Health Organization said it was tracking it. It's already on the heels of dominant BA.5 in India, with "apparent rapid growth and wide geographical spread," according to Tom Peacock, a virologist at the Department of Infectious Diseases at Imperial College in London.

Its reproductive rate is yet unknown.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

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China's Shanghai says new Omicron subvariant found
by David Stanway
Sun, July 10, 2022, 6:41 AM

SHANGHAI (Reuters) - The city of Shanghai has discovered a COVID-19 case involving a new subvariant Omicron BA.5.2.1, an official told a briefing on Sunday, signalling the complications China faces to keep up with new mutations as it pursues its "zero-COVID" policy.

The case, found in the financial district of Pudong on July 8, was linked with a case from overseas, said Zhao Dandan, vice-director of the city's health commission.

Shanghai, in eastern China, emerged from a lockdown lasting around two months at the start of June, but it has continued to impose tough restrictions, locking down buildings and compounds as soon as new potential transmission chains emerge.

"Our city has recently continued to report more locally transmitted positive cases (of COVID-19) and the risk of the epidemic spreading through society remains very high," Zhao of the Shanghai health commission warned.

He said residents in several major Shanghai districts would undergo two rounds of COVID tests, from July 12-14, in a bid to bring potential new outbreaks under control.

The Omicron BA.5 variant, which is driving a new wave of COVID-19 infections overseas, was first discovered in China on May 13 in a 37-year old male patient who had flown to Shanghai from Uganda, according to the China Center for Disease Prevention and Control.

Variant BA.5 has been shown to have an accelerated rate of transmission and an improved immune escape capability, said Yuan Zhengan, a member of the city's expert advisory group on COVID prevention, speaking at the Sunday briefing.

But vaccination is still effective at preventing BA.5 from causing serious illness or death, he added.

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EMPHASIS MINE

New coronavirus mutant raises concerns in India and beyond
LAURA UNGAR and ANIRUDDHA GHOSAL - AP
Mon, July 11, 2022, 12:16 AM

The quickly changing coronavirus has spawned yet another super contagious omicron mutant that’s worrying scientists as it gains ground in India and pops up in numerous other countries, including the United States.

Scientists say the variant – called BA.2.75 – may be able to spread rapidly and get around immunity from vaccines and previous infection. It’s unclear whether it could cause more serious disease than other omicron variants, including the globally prominent BA.5.

“It’s still really early on for us to draw too many conclusions,” said Matthew Binnicker, director of clinical virology at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. “But it does look like, especially in India, the rates of transmission are showing kind of that exponential increase." Whether it will outcompete BA.5, he said, is yet to be determined.

Still, the fact that it has already been detected in many parts of the world even with lower levels of viral surveillance “is an early indication it is spreading,” said Shishi Luo, head of infectious diseases for Helix, a company that supplies viral sequencing information to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The latest mutant has been spotted in several distant states in India, and appears to be spreading faster than other variants there, said Lipi Thukral, a scientist at the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research-Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology in New Delhi. It’s also been detected in about 10 other countries, including Australia, Germany, the United Kingdom and Canada. Two cases were recently identified on the West Coast of the U.S., and Helix identified a third U.S. case last week.

Fueling experts’ concerns are a large number of mutations separating this new variant from omicron predecessors. Some of those mutations are in areas that relate to the spike protein and could allow the virus to bind onto cells more efficiently, Binnicker said.

Another concern is that the genetic tweaks may make it easier for the virus to skirt past antibodies — protective proteins made by the body in response to a vaccine or infection from an earlier variant.

But experts say vaccines and boosters are still the best defense against severe COVID-19. In the fall it’s likely the U.S. will see updated formulations of the vaccine being developed that target more recent omicron strains.

“Some may say, ‘Well, vaccination and boosting hasn’t prevented people from getting infected.’ And, yes, that is true,” he said. “But what we have seen is that the rates of people ending up in the hospital and dying have significantly decreased.
As more people have been vaccinated, boosted or naturally infected, we are starting to see the background levels of immunity worldwide creep up.”

It may take several weeks to get a sense of whether the latest omicron mutant may affect the trajectory of the pandemic.

Meanwhile Dr. Gagandeep Kang, who studies viruses at India’s Christian Medical College in Vellore, said the growing concern over the variant underlines the need for more sustained efforts to track and trace viruses that combine genetic efforts with real world information about who is getting sick and how badly. “It is important that surveillance isn’t a start-stop strategy,” she said.

Luo said BA.2.75 is another reminder that the coronavirus is continually evolving – and spreading.

“We would like to return to pre-pandemic life, but we still need to be careful,” she said. “ We need to accept that we’re now living with a higher level of risk than we used to.”

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EMPHASIS MINE

New Omicron spawn like ‘Centaurus’ and ‘Bad Ned’ may be the reason you have a weird summer cold (or worse)
Erin Prater
Sat, July 9, 2022, 5:00 AM·6 min read

If there’s one thing we’ve learned from the pandemic, it’s that evolution isn’t necessarily a lengthy process that takes thousands, if not millions, of years.

It can be rapid and ruthless.

On Tuesday the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced that new(ish) Omicron subvariant BA.5, which swept South Africa this spring, had finally become dominant in the U.S. after first being detected there in March.

But there was no chance for the subvariant to celebrate, were it able to. On the same day, the World Health Organization tweeted a video about a new concerning variant surging in India—one giving BA.5, the most highly transmissible, immune-evasive version of COVID yet, a run for its money.

BA.2.75—dubbed “Centaurus” by some on Twitter—has already arrived in the U.S., the CDC told Fortune on Thursday, with the first of two cases identified on June 14.

It’s been located in approximately 10 countries so far, Dr. Soumya Swaminathan, WHO's chief scientist, said this week. It’s not yet been declared a variant of concern or even a variant of interest, and it’s too soon to gauge transmissibility, severity, and the potential for immune evasion, she added.

But some experts are already raising red flags—particularly the additional changes (as many as nine) it has when compared to Omicron.

No one change is individually concerning, “but appearing all together at once is another matter,” Tom Peacock, a virologist at the Department of Infectious Disease at Imperial College in London, said this week in a tweet.

BA.2.75 is “something we should all be concerned about,” Dr. Bruce Walker—director of the Ragon Institute of MGH, MIT, and Harvard, a medical institute focused on eradicating disease, and co-leader of the Massachusetts Consortium on Pathogen Readiness—told Fortune on Friday.

The nascent variant “gives us insight into just what the virus is capable of, in terms of mutation. Here again is a virus that has resemblance to the original Omicron variant, but with minor amino acid changes has become something that is likely to be able to evade immunity.”

“I think what all of these variants are showing us is that the virus has not come anywhere close to exploring all of the evolutionary space available to it.”

A blip on the radar or a new global wave?

Whether BA.2.75 will cause a global wave or quickly fizzle—as did variants Lambda and Mu—remains to be seen, said Dr. Stuart Ray, vice chair of medicine for data integrity and analytics and a professor at Johns Hopkins Medicine.

“There are variants that we see sporadically pop up and have features that make us worry,” he said. “But until we see them out-compete in multiple settings, it’s hard to know what they’re going to mean for us.”

Such variants once flew under the radar but are now gaining attention as a result of “heightened surveillance and increased attention to sequencing,” said Dr. Daniel Kuritzkes, chief of the division of infectious diseases at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School.

“We’ve seen all kinds of variants within the Omicron family,” Kuritzkes said. “We really need to see a substantial number of cases rising in many locations to know that it’s truly a major variant of concern.”

Some of BA.2.75’s mutations are worrisome, and “some we don’t know much about,” Dr. Dan Barouch—a professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and the director of the Center for Virology and Vaccine Research—told Fortune.

“It’s a reason to study it, but not a reason for panic,” he said.

‘Bad Ned’ and relatives emerge

“Centaurus” wasn’t the only COVID subvariant to catch eyeballs this week. The twitterverse—where many doctors, researchers, and data scientists post lengthy threads on COVID-related findings—also saw chatter about BA.5.3.1, aka “Bad Ned.”

The name is symbolic of its mutation on N:E136D, according to Australian data visualist Mike Honey, the author of a popular thread on the topic this week.

View: https://twitter.com/Mike_Honey_/status/1544267714797383680


Bad Ned is a spin-off of the BA.5 subvariant currently sweeping the globe. In Germany, where it’s been on the rise since late May, it’s responsible for nearly 80% of BA.5 cases, according to Honey.

View: https://twitter.com/Mike_Honey_/status/1544267714797383680


BA.5.3.1 has also been identified in the U.S., a CDC spokesperson told Fortune on Thursday. But it represents less than 5% of BA.5 cases in the U.S., he said.

Another BA.5 relative that hit radars this week: BA.5.1, which is increasing in prevalence in the U.K., Barouch said.
“The variants and subvariants are fragmenting quickly,” he said. “There’s not one or two, but hundreds of variants and subvariants.”

Is Omicron COVID’s ‘sweet spot’?

Omicron burst on the scene in early November 2021. Nothing—and everything—has been the same since.

Kuritzkes finds it interesting that every successful variant (or subvariant, rather) since has been an Omicron spinoff: “stealth Omicron” BA.2, BA.2 spinoff BA.2.12.1, BA.4, BA.5.

“We continue to see derivatives of Omicron rather than something completely different emerging,” he said. “Before Omicron, everything that came up was very different from what had been circulating. Delta didn’t come from Beta; Beta didn’t come from Alpha.”

“The virus may have finally found an evolutionary niche where this is the best it can do, and it’s modifying, tinkering around the margins to gain slight advantages.”

Some point to Omicron’s supposedly more mild symptoms and apparent predilection for the upper respiratory tract as compared to the original strain, which often settled in the lower lungs, posing greater risk for pneumonia and death.

Less severe disease and higher transmissibility could actually be a good thing, some contend, if it means Omicron is fizzling to nothing more than a cold, albeit a rampant one.

But it’s too early to come to that conclusion, Kuritzkes said.

Prior COVID infection is common, as is vaccination. Population immunity could be deceiving, making Omicron appear generally milder than it would in its absence.

Kuritzkes points to a BA.2 outbreak in Hong Kong several months ago that ravaged older generations.

“The elderly population was relatively unvaccinated,” he said. “There was very high mortality. That undermines the concept that Omicron is not as virulent as the others.”

Time will tell whether emerging subvariants are viable threats or mere distractions.

But if you come down with a weird summer cold—or worse—COVID could be to blame. If it’s not BA.5 or Centaurus or Bad Ned, it's likely some other new-fangled Omicron spawn.

The possibilities are endless.

Said Walker: “There are an infinite number of combinations of mutations that can arise that can affect transmissibility and immunity.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com

If you're trying to keep track, in the last few articles I just posted, we have the following variants:

BA5.1 - found in the UK

BA5.2.1 - found in Shanghai

BA5.3.1 - found in Germany and the USA

and

BA2.75 - started in India, and now in 10 other countries, including Australia, Germany, the United Kingdom, Canada and the USA

HD

Heliobas Disciple said:

If you're trying to keep track, in the last few articles I just posted, we have the following variants:

BA5.1 - found in the UK

BA5.2.1 - found in Shanghai

BA5.3.1 - found in Germany and the USA

and

BA2.75 - started in India, and now in 10 other countries, including Australia, Germany, the United Kingdom, Canada and the USA

HD

Click to expand...

Thanks HD... I think

...and so once again it looks like we are headed to: Mask mandates. Lockdowns. Severe shortages. Small business collapse. Covid travel restrictions. Vax cards to buy and sell. Martial law. Election rigging. All amidst much hospitalization and death.

Heliobas Disciple said:

If you're trying to keep track, in the last few articles I just posted, we have the following variants:

BA5.1 - found in the UK

BA5.2.1 - found in Shanghai

BA5.3.1 - found in Germany and the USA

and

BA2.75 - started in India, and now in 10 other countries, including Australia, Germany, the United Kingdom, Canada and the USA

HD

Click to expand...

These new variants were talked about on some random news show I saw last night.
We only have antenna tv, lol, so what I see is not the usual mainstream.
But yes. They’re here, and circulating.

My DH is asking, and I’ve not seen anything to help his question.
But has it been said anywhere whether these new variants escape the tests we have for Covid?
We’ve had friends with severe illness in the last month which show up as negative on Covid tests.
The symptoms are extremely similar to Covid.

We all know there are other illnesses out there.
He’s just asking, in light of these new variants and following Dr GVB.

psychgirl said:

My DH is asking, and I’ve not seen anything to help his question.
But has it been said anywhere whether these new variants escape the tests we have for Covid?
We’ve had friends with severe illness in the last month which show up as negative on Covid tests.
The symptoms are extremely similar to Covid.

We all know there are other illnesses out there.
He’s just asking, in light of these new variants and following Dr GVB.

Click to expand...

Great question. I haven't seen it discussed but it does seem like the tests are getting worse at diagnosing some cases... These variants are found using blood samples, but I doubt they'll check everyone's blood. I have posted articles on here about other methods of detecting covid, but don't remember them all now. Saliva, some sort of finger prick (like diabetes)??? I really don't remember but hopefully they are working on something better than the pcr type test.

HD

well... looks like there are a bunch of different variants out there (see the image from the tweet).

Goes to Geert's point that the vaccine isn't creating variants, it's the immune pressure that is selecting the variant that will most efficiently escape that immune pressure. As he described, going into the garage and getting a different vehicle that's better suited for the terrain ahead. (bad paraphrasing on my part).

View: https://twitter.com/RajlabN/status/1546292006418354179


Raj Rajnarayanan @RajlabN
8:35 PM · Jul 10, 2022

#COVID19 #VariantDashboard - #UnitedStates

TOP lineages (15-DAY TRENDS):

26.09% BA.2.12.1,

11.40% unassigned,

11.09% BA.5.2.1,

10.14% BA.5.5,

7.94% BA.4.1,

6.60% BA.5,

5.57% BA.5.1,

5.34% BA.4

4.16% BA.2

Tracker: http://tinyurl.com/mryj4uu7 #OmicronUpdates 07/10/22

psychgirl said:

My DH is asking, and I’ve not seen anything to help his question.
But has it been said anywhere whether these new variants escape the tests we have for Covid?
We’ve had friends with severe illness in the last month which show up as negative on Covid tests.
The symptoms are extremely similar to Covid.

We all know there are other illnesses out there.
He’s just asking, in light of these new variants and following Dr GVB.

Click to expand...

Good question and bears watching for answers.

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Omicron subvariants threaten COVID-19 resurgence across US
BA.5 is estimated to account for more than half of new COVID cases in the U.S.
By Arielle Mitropoulos
July 11, 2022, 7:11 PM

Health officials are once again raising the alarm about the threat of a resurgence of COVID-19 infections across the country, as concerns grow about the new omicron subvariant, BA.5, which is now the dominant viral strain in the U.S.

The BA.5 variant, first detected in South Africa earlier this year, is currently estimated to account for more than half -- 53.6% -- of all new COVID-19 cases in the states, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

BA.5 appears to have a growth advantage over the original omicron variant, according to the World Health Organization, and scientists are closely monitoring the increase in reported cases observed in many countries across the globe.

At this time, BA.5 does not appear to have increased in severity, but officials have previously stressed that research on the new subvariant is still in its "early days," and much remains to be learned about it.

As BA.5 spreads, a growing proportion of U.S. counties are seeing increases in infections and related hospital admissions.

Nearly three-quarters of the U.S. population is now living in a county with a high or medium community risk level for COVID-19, as defined by the CDC, federal data shows. About one-third of those people -- 31.9%-- are living in a high-risk community, while 41.6% are living in a medium-risk county.

A high community level suggests there is a "high potential for health care system strain" and a "high level of severe disease," and the CDC recommends that people wear a mask in public indoor settings, including schools. A medium-risk level suggests there is "some impact on [the] health care system," and "more people with severe disease." Under the CDC's official guidance, individuals considered at "increased risk" are advised to speak with their health care provider about whether to wear a mask.

Counties on both coasts -- most notably in California, Montana, New Mexico and Oregon -- are moving up and entering the high-risk level. In Florida, nearly every county is currently considered high risk. Puerto Rico and California currently lead the nation in new cases per capita, followed by New York City, where officials are once again urging residents to wear high-quality masks in indoor public settings and around crowds outside, amid a renewed surge of infections in the city.

"We're currently seeing high levels of COVID-19 in NYC. To help slow the spread, all New Yorkers should wear a high-quality mask, such as an N95, KN95 or KF94 in all public indoor settings and around crowds outside," the New York City Health Department wrote in a tweet on Friday, after the city moved back into the high-risk level.

The average number of new cases across New York City is up by 25% in the last two weeks, according to federal data. City data also shows that an average of 15% of reported tests are now coming back positive, marking the highest seven-day positivity rate in months.

Nationally, the country is currently reporting an average of more than 100,000 new cases each day. However, health officials say that the total is likely significantly undercounted.

As previously reported, dozens of states have moved to shutter public testing sites, with more at-home COVID-19 tests now available in pharmacies and through the federal testing program. Most Americans are not reporting their results to officials, and, thus, experts said infection totals are likely significantly undercounted.

Last week, White House COVID Response Coordinator Dr. Ashish Jha told NBC News that hundreds of thousands of COVID-19 infections are likely going undercounted.

"There's no question in my mind we are missing the vast majority of infections right now," Jha said. "The truth is there are probably several hundred thousand -- 400,000; 500,000 infections a day happening across the country."

The concerns over BA.5 come amid the nation's continued push to get people vaccinated. Although the U.S. is set to roll out new bivalent vaccines in the fall, which will address omicron, millions of eligible Americans are still without their additional shots.

To date, less than half of eligible Americans -- 49.5% or 108.6 million people -- have received their first booster. Similarly, less than one-third -- 29.5% or 42.2 million -- of eligible Americans over the age of 50 have received their second booster.

Overall hospitalization numbers and death rates have yet to see a significant resurgence, though experts say metrics may also be undercounted, due to a lack of reporting from states.

As of July 5, about 34,000 patients are currently receiving care in U.S. hospitals across the country. This still marks one of the highest numbers of patients hospitalized with the virus since March.

On average, more than 5,200 virus-positive Americans are entering the hospital each day -- the highest number of daily admissions since February. Hospital admissions in the Southwest and the South are up by more than 10%, respectively, in the past week.

The average number of daily COVID-19-related deaths remains just below 300 reported each day. Totals are still much lower than during prior COVID-19 surges.

However, thousands of Americans are still losing their lives every week. Over the last seven days, the U.S. has reported nearly 2,000 deaths.

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Emails Confirm Why CDC Changed Definitions of Vaccine, Vaccinated
By Zachary Stieber
July 11, 2022

Newly obtained emails confirm that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) changed its definition for both “vaccine” and “vaccinated” because people were pointing out that definitions didn’t seem to apply to the COVID-19 vaccines.

“The definition of vaccine we have posted is problematic and people are using it to claim the COVID-19 vaccine is not a vaccine based on our own definition,” Alycia Downs, a CDC official, wrote in an email on Aug. 25, 2021, to a colleague.

The definition is located on a page titled Immunization Basics.

“Vaccine” was defined since at least 2011 by the CDC as a product that triggers immunity, while “vaccination” was described as an injection that prevents a disease, according to archived versions of the page. However, a flood of inquiries on the definitions was triggered by the fact that the COVID-19 vaccines have been increasingly ineffective against infection by the virus that causes COVID-19, the emails show.

“Our question is how is the CDC and the rest of the world allowed to call the shot a vaccination when it doesn’t even meet your own definition,” one person wrote to the CDC.

“Right-wing covid-19 pandemic deniers are using your ‘vaccine’ definition to argue that mRNA vaccines are not vaccines,” another said.

The Pfizer and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines are both built on messenger RNA technology. They are two of the three COVID-19 vaccines available in the United States.

Downs and colleagues Allison Michelle Fisher, Cynthia Jorgensen, Valerie Morelli, and Andrew (no last name given) worked on changing the definitions for “vaccine” and “vaccination,” according to the emails.

The changes were pushed through on Aug. 31, 2021, and Sept. 1, 2021, respectively.

Changing Definitions

“Vaccine” is now defined as “a preparation that is used to stimulate the body’s immune response against diseases.
Vaccines are usually administered through needle injections, but some can be administered by mouth or sprayed into the nose.”

The previous definition was “a product that stimulates a person’s immune system to produce immunity to a specific disease, protecting the person from that disease. Vaccines are usually administered through needle injections, but can also be administered by mouth or sprayed into the nose.”

“Vaccination” was changed to “the act of introducing a vaccine into the body to produce protection from a specific disease” from “the act of introducing a vaccine into the body to produce immunity to a specific disease.”

Attorney Travis Miller obtained some of the missives in 2021 and published screenshots of them. At the time, the CDC didn’t dispute their authenticity. The Epoch Times has obtained the emails, and additional messages concerning the changes, and has published all 67 pages of them.

The batch of emails, obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request, also shows that Andrew, a CDC employee on the agency’s Vaccine Task Force, boosted a Washington Post article that downplayed criticism of the change.

“I’ve only seen a couple of inquiries about the change to this page. I think the WaPo article explains the problem well—that people are misinterpreting ‘immunity’ to mean 100% protection,” Andrew wrote.

“Thank you, Andrew! I really appreciate your response,” Downs replied.

A CDC spokesperson has told The Epoch Times that the “slight changes in wording” haven’t altered “the overall definition,” of “vaccine,” adding, “the previous definition at Immunization Basics | CDC could be interpreted to mean that vaccines were 100% effective, which has never been the case for any vaccine, so the current definition is more transparent, and also describes the ways in which vaccines can be administered.”

Some other portions of the CDC website still say COVID-19 vaccines confer immunity. One page, for instance, says that “getting a COVID-19 vaccination is a safer and more dependable way to build immunity to COVID-19 than getting sick with COVID-19.”

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Kerry Chant's big move on BA.5 wave: NSW top doctor slashes official 'reinfection' period down to 28 days
By Jesse Hyland For Daily Mail Australia
Published: 18:52 EDT, 11 July 2022 | Updated: 21:11 EDT, 11 July 2022

• Covid sub-variants BA. 4 and BA. 5 can re-infect Covid patients in 28 days
• Australian Health Protection Principal Committee issued a warning on Friday
• The AHPPC advised reducing the re-infection window from 12 to four weeks
• NSW Health followed through on Tuesday with Dr Chant announcement
• There were 31,406 Covid cases and 13 deaths in Australia in the past 24 hours

NSW's top doctor Kerry Chant has slashed the state's Covid-19 reinfection period from 12 weeks down to 28 days.

The rule change means NSW residents who previously had Covid, will have to test for the virus again, four weeks after their isolations ends, if they are suffering fresh symptoms.

It comes after the Australian Health Protection Principal Committee issued a warning that BA.4 and BA.5 could quickly reinfect Covid patients.

'We’re urging people who have recently had COVID-19, even if they left isolation in the past four weeks, not to be complacent. If you develop symptoms again, make sure to test and isolate,' Dr Chant said.

Rates of re-infection are soaring as many Australians report they've contracted Covid two or even three times.

There were 31,406 Covid cases and 13 deaths recorded across the country in the past 24 hours.

New South Wales had the highest number of infections with 8.670 cases in total, while Victoria followed behind with 7,934 infections.

Out of those case numbers, there are 4,094 patients in hospital battling Covid and 123 in ICU.

It is estimated that around 400,000 Australians are suffering the long-term effects of Covid.

The AHPPC claimed the number of cases across Australia is set to jump even further in the coming weeks as the BA. 4 and BA. 5 strains spread through the community.

'We expect that this wave will lead to a substantial increase in infections, hospitalisations and sadly, deaths, at a time when our communities and health systems are already under strain,' the committee said late last week.

'Without increased community and public health actions, this impact may be similar to that experienced during the BA.1 wave in January this year.'

The AHPPC advised people to stay up to date with their vaccinations, wear a mask when walking in crowds, ensure indoor spaces are well ventilated and practise good respiratory and hand hygiene.

Australians aged 30 and older are now eligible for a fourth dose of the Covid-19 vaccine.

It comes after updated recommendations on vaccines from the Australian Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation (ATAGI)

There will be 4.7million Aussies who can now opt to have a fourth shot from Monday.

The ATAGO recommended Australian adults aged between 50 to 64 years old receive a booster dose for the remainder of winter as Covid continues to spread.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fcaJsygMdfs

Omicron BA.5 is Overtaking The US: Immune Boosting Strategies
27 min 53 sec
Jul 11, 2022
MedCram - Medical Lectures Explained CLEARLY

Roger Seheult, MD of MedCram examines the BA.5 Omicron sub-variant of COVID-19, and immune boosting strategies. See all Dr. Seheult's videos at: https://www.medcram.com (This video was recorded on July 10, 2022) Roger Seheult, MD is the co-founder and lead professor at https://www.medcram.com He is Board Certified in Internal Medicine, Pulmonary Disease, Critical Care, and Sleep Medicine and an Associate Professor at the University of California, Riverside School of Medicine. LINKS / REFERENCES: Outcomes of SARS-CoV-2 Reinfection (Research Square) | https://assets.researchsquare.com/fil... What the BA.5 Subvariant Could Mean for the United States (NYT) | https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2... The BA.5 story (Ground Truths) | https://erictopol.substack.com/p/the-...


Interesting comment:

Sean Graham
16 hours a
Last night 7pm-7am shift I treated 16 Covid positive patients here in Mississippi. Most all have same complaint. Dizziness and either feel like they are going to pass out (near syncope) or actually passing out (syncopal episode). None had fever, none had respiratory symptoms, some had mild nausea. 50 % were vaccinated with at least 1 booster, the other 50% unvaccinated. None hospitalized and all were discharged. No prescriptions given other than symptomatic meds such as zofran for nausea. We are seeing an increase for sure in cases over last week but very low virulence. Over last 2 weeks none have returned with worsening symptoms. 97 test in 3 days and 45positive cases. Also only one admitted with severe copd, pneumonitis from previous infection. Also to note Very poor health appropriate to age. (51 years/old). The rest are really surprised that they are even testing positive. Just my observations in my local ER.

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Research suggests SARS-CoV-2 could survive for a month on refrigerated or frozen meat products
by American Society for Microbiology
July 11, 2022


Log10 (Nt/N0) reductions and 95% confidence intervals of phi 6, MHV, and TGEV on salmon, beef, pork, and chicken at 4°C over 30 days. Phi 6 is measured in PFU/100 mL, and MHV and TGEV are measured in MPN IU/100 mL. Credit: Emily S. Bailey et al, Applied and Environmental Microbiology (2022). DOI: 10.1128/aem.00504-22


SARS-CoV-2 surrogates can survive on meat products in the refrigerator or the freezer for up to 30 days. Those findings are published in Applied and Environmental Microbiology, a journal of the American Society for Microbiology.

The research was conducted using chicken, beef, pork, and salmon, and surrogate viruses with spikes similar to those on SARS-CoV-2, as surrogates, said first author Emily S. Bailey, Ph.D. The investigators stored the products at both refrigeration (4 degrees C, or 39.2 degrees F) and freezer temperatures (-20 degrees C, or -4 degrees F).

"Although you might not store meat in the fridge for 30 days, you might store it in the freezer for that long," said Bailey. "We even found that the viruses could be cultured after [being frozen for] that length of time." Bailey is assistant professor, Department of Public Health, College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences, Campbell University, Buies Creek, NC.

The investigators undertook this research after learning that COVID-19 outbreaks were occurring in Southeast Asia absent prior community transmission. Reports from those communities "suggested that packaged meat products, produced in areas where SARS-CoV-2 was circulating, could have been the source of the virus," said Bailey. "Our goal was to investigate whether or not similar viruses could survive in this environment."

The research is important because SARS-CoV-2 can replicate within the gut, as well as in the respiratory tract, said Bailey.

In the study, the investigators used one RNA virus with a lipid envelop, and two animal coronaviruses, murine hepatitis virus, and transmissible gastroenteritis virus as surrogates.

All three viruses have previously been used as surrogates for SARS-CoV-2, generally with greater reductions in their numbers observed at refrigeration than at freezing temperatures. The reduction in numbers also varied according to the food item used.

Continued efforts are needed to prevent contamination of foods and food processing surfaces, worker hands, and food processing utensils such as knives," the investigators wrote. Additionally, "the lack of, or inadequate disinfection of these foods prior to packaging needs to be addressed."

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Study reports broadly neutralizing antibody protects hamsters against SARS-CoV-2 omicron variants
by Hong Kong University of Science and Technology
July 11, 2022

Structural biologists at The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) together with researchers at the AIDS Institute, The University of Hong Kong (HKU), Department of Microbiology, School of Clinical Medicine, the LKS Faculty of Medicine of The University of Hong Kong (HKUMed) and the State Key Laboratory of Emerging Infectious Diseases, HKU have demonstrated that ZCB11, a broadly neutralizing antibody derived from a local mRNA-vaccinee against the spreading omicron variants of SARS-CoV-2, displays potent antiviral activities against all variants of concern (VOCs), including the dominantly spreading omicron BA.1, BA1.1 and BA.2. Critically, either prophylactic or therapeutic ZCB11 administration protects lung infection against omicron viral challenge in golden Syrian hamsters. The research paper is now published online in Nature Communications.

The strikingly high transmissibility and antibody evasion of SARS-CoV-2 omicron variants have posed great challenges to the efficacy of current vaccines and antibody immunotherapy. In response to the continuous emergence of SARS-CoV-2 omicron variants with unpredictable pathogenicity, universal masking, quarantine and endless viral testing have to be maintained, resulting in social anxiety and economic disruption. It is therefore important to investigate whether host immune response can generate broadly neutralizing antibodies, which is essential not only for antibody-based immunotherapy but also for vaccine optimization to induce equally broad protection.

Research methods and findings

In this study, the HKUMed team has established an effective platform of cloning technology that natively pairs antibody genes from individual human memory B cells. Using this technique, the research team successfully discovered ZCB11 after screening 34 BNT162b2-vaccinees in Hong Kong, and demonstrated that ZCB11 neutralizes all VOCs including alpha (B.1.1.7), beta (B.1.351), gamma (P1), delta (B.1.617.2) and omicron (B.1.1.529) by testing both pseudoviruses and authentic live viruses. Importantly, ZCB11 administration protects lung infection against both live omicron and delta viral challenges in golden Syrian hamsters respectively, under both prophylactic and therapeutic conditions. Furthermore, the HKUST collaborative team deciphered the complex structure of ZCB11 and spike protein at atomic resolution using single particle cryo-EM, revealing the unique molecular mode of ZCB11 action, which lays a solid foundation for upcoming structure-guided antibody and vaccine optimization.

"The findings suggested that ZCB11 is a promising antibody drug for biomedical interventions against pandemic SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern," remarked Professor Chen Zhiwei, Director of AIDS Institute and Professor of the Department of Microbiology, School of Clinical Medicine, HKUMed, who led the study. "Although our findings implicate that the HKUMed team is at the world's forefront of research and development of human antibody drugs and vaccines against COVID-19, we still urgently need to establish large-scale manufacturing capacity and clinical translational hubs in Hong Kong, in order to meet its aspiration of becoming an international innovation center."

"The high-resolution structural information enabled us to understand the molecular mechanism of ZCB11 responding to a broad SARS-CoV-2 variant of concern," said Professor Dang Shangyu, Assistant Professor of Division of Life Science, HKUST. "This study relies on the state-of-the-art cryo-EM facility at HKUST, which demonstrated its capability to support not only research in structural biology, but also many other research fields, such as antibody development in this study."

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Monoclonal antibody treatment reduces deaths in hospitalized COVID patients
by Alexis Porter, Duke University
July 11, 2022



Pulmonary ordinal scale at days 5, 14, and 28 for the full cohort ECMO=extracorporeal membrane oxygenation. OR=odds ratio. Credit: The Lancet Respiratory Medicine (2022). DOI: 10.1016/S2213-2600(22)00215-6

A monoclonal antibody treatment taken by patients hospitalized with COVID-19 did not improve recovery time but did reduce deaths, according to a study published July 8 in The Lancet Respiratory Medicine.

The therapy, tixagevimab/cilgavimab, was developed and deployed quickly in response to the pandemic. Data was analyzed as part of an international NIH-sponsored clinical trial, including a site at Duke that enrolled about 10% of the study participants.

"In the very early days of COVID, approximately 25% of hospitalized patients died from their illness, and there was a huge imperative to find something that works," said co-lead author Thomas Holland, M.D., an infectious disease specialist and associate professor of medicine at Duke. "Now, with better therapies, in addition to better population immunity from vaccination and prior infections, that number is down. We still have work to do, and trials like this one help point us to additional therapies that may benefit our patients."

Data on another successful approach, using the immune modulator baricitinib in combination with the antiviral remdesivir, were also recently reported in The Lancet Respiratory Medicine. Lead author Cameron Wolfe, M.D. is an infectious disease specialist and associate professor of medicine at Duke.

"The big picture is, monoclonal antibodies are a full-spectrum treatment," Wolfe said. "They have a role from prevention, treatment of early disease, and hospitalized respiratory failure. We are hopeful this could be another class of medications for use in hospitals for COVID patients."

In the study of tixagevimab/cilgavimab, the phase 3 placebo-controlled trial included 1,455 patients and took place at 81 sites on four continents. Duke enrolled 147 patients, making it the highest enrolling site.

Patients were randomized and infused with tixagevimab/cilgavimab or a placebo, in addition to remdesivir and other standard care. By day 90, sustained recovery was achieved by 87% of people who were given tixagevimab/cilgavimab and 84% of placebo group participants. Mortality was lower by nearly 4% in the tixagevimab/cilgavimab group.

"One out of every three patients who would have died without the treatment survived after receiving the monoclonal antibodies," said co-lead author Adit Ginde, MD, MPH, professor of emergency medicine at the University of Colorado School of Medicine and emergency department physician at UCHealth University of Colorado Hospital. "That's a remarkable signal for benefit and suggests that this and other similar treatments may save lives in patients with severe COVID-19."

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BA.5, Chapter 2
Significant updates from the previous BA.5 story
Eric Topol
Jul 11

Two weeks ago I tried to pull together all we knew about the Omicron BA.5 variant (The BA.5 story). I didn’t think another chapter about this variant would be warranted, especially this soon, but there’s been quite a bit of new data worthy of review.

As you may recall, I focused on the genomic and antigenic distance (and the fitness) of BA.5 compared with other Omicron family variants (BA.1, BA1.1, BA.2, BA.2.12.1) which explains the most immune evasion we have yet seen for a version of the virus. A new report from the highly regarded Kirby Institute in Australia takes the understanding of the biology of BA.5 a step further. You may remember the term “Deltacron” prematurely used many months ago in the pandemic, but the ability to infect cells for BA.5 is more akin to Delta than the previous Omicron family of variants. In the Panel F below you can see the shift to the left for copies of the virus, much closer to Delta than BA.1 or BA.2, and the cultures of the different variants in {Panels B, C, and D) that convey the similarity of virus high loads for BA.5 and Delta.

This report is noteworthy because it extends the known immune escape property of BA.5 (shown to be less responsive to Evusheld monoclonal antibodies than prior Omicron variants) to also include enhanced infectivity. There are more copies of the virus because BA.5 has far better ability to get into cells (tropism related to TMPRSS binding efficiency) which may help explain why this version of the virus has caused a lot of trouble, more than other Omicron subvariants. This may align with the anecdotal reports of very long periods to test negative after BA.5 infections, often exceeding 10 days. (Note the CDC still guides us as 5 days as all that is required for isolation without ongoing symptoms and does not recommend the use of rapid antigen tests to screen for persistent infectiousness).



Yes, I called it the worst variant we have seen so far, which The Washington Post editorial board picked up on (and checked with multiple peers before publishing) because of its severity of immune evasion and transmissibility compared with any prior SARS-CoV-2 variant. Not because it causes worse illness, which is still unclear but possible given its Delta-like cell infectivity feature. It’s also hard to interpret that because of our immunity wall with extensive prior infections, vaccination and boosters. But if BA.5 presented without its BA.1 predecessor, it could have been worse than the massive surges we saw around the world with the arrival of Omicron. Our immunity wall makes a big difference for how we perceive the disease induced by each successive variant.



In the United States, the march of exponential growth for BA.5 has progressed to dominance, accounting for ~54% of current infections as of July 2nd, which is really toward the end of June with the known delays in sequencing and reporting.



What we are seeing in many countries in Europe and the United States is a pattern of increased BA.5-induced hospitalizations, still on the rise, but mostly well below what was seen in prior waves. The good news is that generally there is uncoupling from ICU admissions and deaths; that is, they are not going up nearly as much as the increase in hospitalizations. There were marked differences between South Africa and Portugal, the first 2 countries with BA.4/5 case spikes. While that may be attributed to difference in demographics and prior infections, I think it is intriguing that the Beta variant, which hit South Africa very hard and was barely seen in Europe and the US, seems to provide more protection versus Omicron variants than other previous strains, at least as demonstrated with a Beta-specific variant vaccine. While BA.4/5 has already fully descended in those 2 countries, BA.5 hasn’t yet peaked in many countries.



And many countries it is. Besides Europe and the United States, there are BA.5 new case spikes now in Israel, Japan, Singapore, New Zealand, Australia, Indonesia, China, and Brazil. Many of these case surges are also accompanied by an increase in hospitalizations.



In the United States, while the confirmed cases, representing only a small fraction of the actual new infections, has hovered around 100,000 for weeks, there has been a significant rise in hospitalizations and ICU admissions, although well below the initial Omicron wave (now pushing 40,000 instead of 160,000 hospitalizations at peak BA.1)



That 18-19% is less than the 40% increase in hospitalizations seen in France and 34% in England, and may in part be attributed to the descent of BA.2 concurrent with BA.5’s rise. As the FT coverage suggested: “The rate of increased hospital admissions in the US is currently slower than in Europe …This reflects the decline of the BA.2 variant in the US, the FT’s data analysis suggests. But as the BA.5 variant becomes dominant, the overall rate of growth is likely to accelerate.” It remains unclear whether the decoupling from ICU admissions will continue in the US which is now ranked 67th in the world for boosters, below Iran, Rwanda, Sri Lanka, Azerbaijan, and Tajikistan, to name a few. Not a good immunity wall here, to say the least.

For now there has clearly been a rise in reinfections in the United States, where tracking of reinfections is largely absent. In San Diego County where I live, the 2nd largest county in California, there has been a recent doubling of reinfections, and that may well be a gross underestimate due to lack of reporting of PCR confirmed cases. The reinfection rise is not at all surprising given the immune escape features that have been established for BA.5. Our best protection from BA.5 infections and reinfections now consists of high-quality, well-fitted masks, physical distancing, air filtration, ventilation and vaccination + boosters (as previously reviewed).

That gets me to the lede in the Washington Post’s BA.5 report today: “America has decided the pandemic is over. The coronavirus has other ideas.” The virus is still evolving and there are concerns about a BA.2.75 variant in India with different mutations than BA.5 that might be important, but it’s too early to know since this is occurring without the backdrop of competing with BA.5



There’s clearly more room for the virus to evolve, get more fit, gain advantages as an immune escape artist and more efficiently infect cells. Yet we are watching its accelerated evolution akin to the behavior of a Formula One race car lapping around the track with humans in the stands. At best, there will not be a BA-5 specific booster until November or December and that represents a failed strategy of variant-chasing, knowing full well that BA.5 will not be the dominant circulating virus in 5 to 6 months. We need to get ahead of the virus, stop acting as bystanders with “hope and prayers’ that it will not get worse than what we are dealing with now. No, BA.5 has taught us once again, the virus doesn’t just get milder and fade away. While the virus revs up its mutations under selection pressure, we’ve ironically become immutable, more resistant to taking an aggressive stance with second-generation and nasal vaccines that are clearly in our reach.
.

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'UK Gov. quietly published a report confirming the Vaccinated account for 94% of all COVID-19 Deaths since April, 90% of which were Triple/Quadruple Jabbed'
Government of Canada figures show that there were 521 Covid-19 deaths between 6th -12th June, and the vaccinated population accounted for 485 of them (93%), 242 deaths among quadruple vaccinated
Dr. Paul Alexander
4 hr ago



SOURCE
“A report that was quietly published by the UK Government, just hours before Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced his resignation, reveals that Covid-19 deaths have risen dramatically among the triple vaccinated population in England over the past couple of months whilst declining drastically among the unvaccinated population.

With the most recent figures showing the vaccinated population in England accounted for a shocking 94% of all Covid-19 Deaths in April and May, and 90% of those deaths were among the triple/quadruple vaccinated population.”

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i see we have entered the "ninja level fear porn" stage of the pandemic
apparently, "omicron" is no longer scary enough
el gato malo
19 hr ago



this whole daily beast article is hilarious both for what it says and does not say.

apparently, BA.5 is just not a scary enough name.

this is the fear-porn industrial complex jumping the shark and imploding on itself. the whole “ninja” notion is so hilarious it’s hard to take seriously, but what i do think we need to take a serious look at are some of the claims being made here. because they are disastrously wrong.


i’m not seeing evidence that this is terribly true outside of the vaccinated. it’s not at all clear that BA.5 is inherently more contagious, more “ninja,” or more dangerous than early omi, itself a very mild variant vs delta or alpha.

it’s just increasingly vaccine advantaged because we antigenically fixated the herd with a leaky vaccine that trained intensely for narrow, non-sterilizing immunity. of course the virus did this. it’s the evolutionary gradient such a vaccine creates. no other outcomes was possible or plausible.


so yes, of course people are getting infected again and again. that’s what antigenic fixation does. it turns your immune system into a one trick pony unable to adapt to changing pathogens.

antigenic fixation/hoskins effect/OAS is a simple evolutionary process driven by strong immune imprinting such as that from narrow vector leaky vaccines.

you learn one response and use it preferentially to learning others.

we’ve never seen this at herd level/society scale like this before where so many all got the same non-sterilizing fixation. (sterilizing refers to prevention of contracting, carrying, and spreading virus)

this has created an unprecedented viral lab and evo-pressure and it’s going to work like this:



and once you are fixated, new adaptive responses are not learned. that means that this is 100% wrong:


we already know it doesn’t work. if live virus cannot overcome the antigenic fixation, neither can a vaccine, especially as it’s going to be based on variant strains that are well out of date by the time it’s released and just fixate patients further and drive further viral evo to take advantage of it.

we already know that variant specific boosters don’t work. they tried them. it did not elicit novel response. (mRNA vaxx also inhibits learning to produce n-antibodies, a key source of sterilizing immunity.)


these new “variant boosters” are just marketing hype. they’re going to be approved without clinical trials based on being “known to be safe” and “eliciting biomarker response.” the FDA has already said so. they’re just going to see if the boosters generate some predetermined antibody response. of course they will. but what we do no know is:

1. do those antibodies have any effect on current covid strains?
2. do they provide any sort of sterilizing immunity? (doubtful as others have not)
3. and if not, are they just going to drive more and deeper OAS/ADE? (likely because that’s what leaky vaccines do)

adding to this mess is the issue that boosters seem to be eliciting greater adverse event response than the original 2 dose course. (and this is not going to be assessed before these are approved. it’s been removed from the trial protocols.)

this is indeed precisely the case, but it’s vaccines and boosters causing it. it was becoming incredibly obvious in the UK data that the boosted were getting covid at several multiples the rate of the unvaxxed.

and the extent of that greater susceptibility was accelerating when they stopped publishing this data. we had not even seen BA.5 yet. just based on simple evolutionary pressure from OAS one would expect this ratio to move even higher.



this is leading to some really dire math.

i suspect vaccines, at least at one point, provided some reduction in death risk perhaps on the order of 50% (at least before counting side effects). but if you quadruple cases, that’s still twice the deaths overall (and we have no idea if VE(death) has been sustained.

fortunately, omi is MUCH milder than prior strains. this idea that it’s “the most dangerous yet” appears a complete fabrication, at least for those not antigenically fixated. how this will play out in terms of virulence in immunity compromised folks is anyone’s guess.

but this is stunningly disingenuous:


this variant was selected for and preys upon the vaxxed and boosted. they are the ones getting it, spreading it, and suffering from it. it has become highly clear in nearly every sound data series.

US over 70’s are near 100% vaxxed and highly boosted. yet their hospital rate is more than double (+130%) year on year despite an objectively milder variant. we’re already approaching the summer highs from last year despite being 6-7 weeks away from a likely peak. my money is on “we exceed it significantly.”



it looks more and more like any protection from severe outcomes that vaccines may have provided has either attenuated or is being swamped by the rise in prevalence. per JH, testing is flat in the US vs this period a year ago. but cases are 5.6X what they were this time last year, a number that starts to looks an awful lot like the sort of over expression figures one could extrapolate from the risk ratio graph above if BA.5 etc continues the trend to be more OAS optimized vs prior strains.



it also finds unfortunate alignment with this “swamping” prediction based on county level UK data.


so, sorry beast, but it’s not the “unvaxxed” doing this. this is the predictable and inevitable outcome of generating herd level antigenic fixation with narrow, leaky vaccines. this is WHY we do not use them.

and there is no obvious climb down that i see. once you have created this “freight train” you have to ride it to the end. variant boosters look unlikely to have any extra positive effect. that’s how fixation works. it’s great marketing, but it seems to be bad science. this is not so much a super sneaky variant as it is a “concussed watchman with his shoelaces tied together that you could walk a brass band in front of.”

one need not be “ninja” to take advantage of such…

Major, major piece here. Please read, all, even if you've really kept up on the Chinavirus fauxine subject.
==================================================================

First place I read about the original source:


48 Facts Against the Vaxx

The list of the damning facts that comprehensively destroy the Covid vaccine narrative established by the government-media-science complex is growing. Read the whole list there.

Here is my list of over 40 indicators that the “safe and effective” narrative is falling apart.
It is a devastating list.
And for some reason, nobody wants to fact check me on it.

Click to expand...

1. The vaccine deaths are now simply too massive to keep hiding/explaining them away:
Non-Covid excess deaths: why are they rising? Experts call for probe as mortality rates in England and Wales climb despite drop in coronavirus deaths
Excess deaths are on the rise – but not because of Covid

Click to expand...

Office for National Statistics data leads health experts to call for urgent investigation into what is causing the excess mortality

Click to expand...

England: Excess Deaths on the Rise But NOT because of COVID – Experts Call for Investigation
There is a 163% rise in life insurance claims at Lincoln National. They are the fifth largest insurance company in the US. The increase is huge. That’s not a 63% increase. It’s 163% increase, almost a tripling of the death rate. That isn’t COVID. COVID doesn’t kill anywhere close to that number of people. We are looking at the biggest killer in history and nobody can figure out what it is! Watch this video. You will never see a story on this on mainstream media; they ignore it. Note, part of the claims increase is due to premium increases (adding new clients).

Click to expand...

Life insurance companies in countries all over the world are reporting record numbers of excess deaths. These are not “statistical fluctuations.” The deaths are all caused by a huge intervention that is affecting the health of millions of people. And it’s all new. Nothing like this ever happened before 2021. Nothing of this magnitude has EVER happened in their history (which goes back over 100 years).

Click to expand...

2. Even John Campbell, who is pro-vaccine, admits that a troubling number of unexplained excess deaths are not just happening in the UK:

Click to expand...

They are happening worldwide. Just listen to the first 30 seconds of this video. Of course, the CDC isn’t investigating anything even though American life insurance companies are reporting deaths that are off-the-charts. The CDC is NEVER going to investigate this. It’s bigger than COVID and they know full well what it is. That’s why they are NOT going to investigate and The NY Times is NEVER going to fault them for this. After all, it’s only the biggest medical cause of death in our history.

Click to expand...

3. The overall shift in the cause of death from respiratory to cardiac is impossible to ignore and can’t be explained if the vaccines are “safe and effective.”

Click to expand...

A friend of mine who lives in Massachusetts noticed this after he made a FOIA request for the death records in Massachusetts. He looked at the ICD-10 coded causes of deaths and noticed that the causes of deaths shifted from primarily “J codes” (respiratory due to COVID) to “I codes” (circulatory due to the vaccine). Now we learn that the exact same thing happened in the UK in 2021 according to official UK government numbers. This is a huge effect and there must be a cause, but the health authorities are simply baffled and cannot explain it (because they are not permitted to blame the vaccine since that would make everyone look bad). It’s safe to say that such a shift has never happened before in history. Clearly, something new happened starting in 2021 that affected massive numbers of people worldwide. I wonder what that might have been? Health authorities simply cannot come up with a single thing that was new in 2021.

Click to expand...

In sum: STOP GETTING VAXED, YOU RETARDS! DO NOT EVEN THINK ABOUT GETTING BOOSTED!
Seriously, if you got vaxxed, you’re retarded.

Look, I’m sorry that you did it, I’m even sorry if that offends you, but the increasingly obvious fact is that you permanently damaged your health because you were stupid enough to take the word of a) a bunch of confirmed liars (aka the media), b) a profession whose track record is literally worse than a coin flip (aka the scientists), and c) elite global depopulationists who want to reduce the human population by 93.75 percent (aka Bill Gates and the Society of People You REALLY Don’t Want Babysitting Your Children.)

And if you encouraged your children to get vaxxed, you’re retarded squared. Cubed if they were pre-pubescent and under absolutely zero risk from Covid in the first place. Furthermore, you’ve probably pretty much guaranteed that they’re going to hate you for the rest of your reduced lifespan once they realize what you did to them in your retardery.

Maybe there is a way to reduce or undo the circulatory damage done by the vaxx. I certainly hope there is, for everyone’s sake. But in the meantime, for the love of everything that is good and beautiful and true in your life, STOP MAKING IT WORSE!

Looks like BA2.75 has made it to the medical journal aggregator page I post from. I posted this article from the AP source yesterday, but I am reposting it because medicalexpress picked up the story, which seemed significant to me.


(fair use applies)

New coronavirus mutant raises concerns in India and beyond
By LAURA UNGAR and ANIRUDDHA GHOSAL
July 11, 2022

The quickly changing coronavirus has spawned yet another super contagious omicron mutant that's worrying scientists as it gains ground in India and pops up in numerous other countries, including the United States.

Scientists say the variant—called BA.2.75—may be able to spread rapidly and get around immunity from vaccines and previous infection. It's unclear whether it could cause more serious disease than other omicron variants, including the globally prominent BA.5.

"It's still really early on for us to draw too many conclusions," said Matthew Binnicker, director of clinical virology at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. "But it does look like, especially in India, the rates of transmission are showing kind of that exponential increase." Whether it will outcompete BA.5, he said, is yet to be determined.

Still, the fact that it has already been detected in many parts of the world even with lower levels of viral surveillance "is an early indication it is spreading," said Shishi Luo, head of infectious diseases for Helix, a company that supplies viral sequencing information to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The latest mutant has been spotted in several distant states in India, and appears to be spreading faster than other variants there, said Lipi Thukral, a scientist at the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research-Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology in New Delhi. It's also been detected in about 10 other countries, including Australia, Germany, the United Kingdom and Canada. Two cases were recently identified on the West Coast of the U.S., and Helix identified a third U.S. case last week.

Fueling experts' concerns are a large number of mutations separating this new variant from omicron predecessors. Some of those mutations are in areas that relate to the spike protein and could allow the virus to bind onto cells more efficiently, Binnicker said.

Another concern is that the genetic tweaks may make it easier for the virus to skirt past antibodies—protective proteins made by the body in response to a vaccine or infection from an earlier variant.

But experts say vaccines and boosters are still the best defense against severe COVID-19. In the fall it's likely the U.S. will see updated formulations of the vaccine being developed that target more recent omicron strains.

"Some may say, 'Well, vaccination and boosting hasn't prevented people from getting infected.' And, yes, that is true," he said. "But what we have seen is that the rates of people ending up in the hospital and dying have significantly decreased. As more people have been vaccinated, boosted or naturally infected, we are starting to see the background levels of immunity worldwide creep up."

It may take several weeks to get a sense of whether the latest omicron mutant may affect the trajectory of the pandemic. Meanwhile Dr. Gagandeep Kang, who studies viruses at India's Christian Medical College in Vellore, said the growing concern over the variant underlines the need for more sustained efforts to track and trace viruses that combine genetic efforts with real world information about who is getting sick and how badly. "It is important that surveillance isn't a start-stop strategy," she said.

Luo said BA.2.75 is another reminder that the coronavirus is continually evolving—and spreading.

"We would like to return to pre-pandemic life, but we still need to be careful," she said. " We need to accept that we're now living with a higher level of risk than we used to."
.

The full original source:


The "safe and effective" narrative is falling apart
Here is my list of over 40 leading indicators that the momentum is moving in our favor. I'd be surprised if the narrative doesn't fall apart soon. It's now unravelling quickly in the UK.

Steve Kirsch
Jul 7
1,162
1,050

Here is my list of over 40 indicators that the “safe and effective” narrative is falling apart.
It is a devastating list.
And for some reason, nobody wants to fact check me on it.

1. The vaccine deaths are now simply too massive to keep hiding/explaining them away:
   1. Non-Covid excess deaths: why are they rising? Experts call for probe as mortality rates in England and Wales climb despite drop in coronavirus deaths
   2. Excess deaths are on the rise – but not because of Covid
      Office for National Statistics data leads health experts to call for urgent investigation into what is causing the excess mortality
   3. England: Excess Deaths on the Rise But NOT because of COVID – Experts Call for Investigation
   4. It’s happening in Ireland too! How can heart disease explode in kids only after they roll out the vaccines for kids? Experts are baffled as to what might be causing a sudden increase in heart disease for kids that is happening only in places that have rolled out the COVID vaccines for kids. It’s not happening to kids anymore in Uruguay for some reason (perhaps the judge stopping the vaccine program might have something to do with it).
      
   5. Unknown causes is now the leading cause of death in Alberta, Canada. It wasn’t that way before the vaccines rolled out. The experts dismiss that as “oh, that’s because people who have had COVID are more susceptible of dying.” But why would they be more susceptible of dying of UNKNOWN causes? And why is it only the vaccinated who are dying of the the unknown causes? And if this is due to the COVID infection, how come it isn’t happening in any country with a low COVID vaccination rate? And how do the experts explain the strange blood clots only found in vaccinated people? The press still forgets to ask these critical questions. But at least mainstream media is covering the mystery cause of deaths. It’s a start. But they are allowing “hand-waving” explanations when the “experts” are just making this stuff up with no data to back it up. Any “expert” who actually talks to patients knows the side effects of the vaccine are far greater than those from COVID. So how is our “expert” not even considering the vaccine as a possibility?
      
   6. Embalmers are seeing blood clots in over 50% of patients that they’ve never seen in their careers. It isn’t caused by COVID because it only started after the vaccine rollout and the clots are only found in vaccinated patients. So how do the experts explain that?
   7. There is a 163% rise in life insurance claims at Lincoln National. They are the fifth largest insurance company in the US. The increase is huge. That’s not a 63% increase. It’s 163% increase, almost a tripling of the death rate. That isn’t COVID. COVID doesn’t kill anywhere close to that number of people. We are looking at the biggest killer in history and nobody can figure out what it is! Watch this video. You will never see a story on this on mainstream media; they ignore it. Note, part of the claims increase is due to premium increases (adding new clients).
   8. Life insurance companies in countries all over the world are reporting record numbers of excess deaths. These are not “statistical fluctuations.” The deaths are all caused by a huge intervention that is affecting the health of millions of people. And it’s all new. Nothing like this ever happened before 2021. Nothing of this magnitude has EVER happened in their history (which goes back over 100 years).
2. Even John Campbell, who is pro-vaccine, admits that a troubling number of unexplained excess deaths are not just happening in the UK: they are happening worldwide. Just listen to the first 30 seconds of this video. Of course, the CDC isn’t investigating anything even though American life insurance companies are reporting deaths that are off-the-charts. The CDC is NEVER going to investigate this. It’s bigger than COVID and they know full well what it is. That’s why they are NOT going to investigate and The NY Times is NEVER going to fault them for this. After all, it’s only the biggest medical cause of death in our history.
3. The overall shift in the cause of death from respiratory to cardiac is impossible to ignore and can’t be explained if the vaccines are “safe and effective.” A friend of mine who lives in Massachusetts noticed this after he made a FOIA request for the death records in Massachusetts. He looked at the ICD-10 coded causes of deaths and noticed that the causes of deaths shifted from primarily “J codes” (respiratory due to COVID) to “I codes” (circulatory due to the vaccine). Now we learn that the exact same thing happened in the UK in 2021 according to official UK government numbers. This is a huge effect and there must be a cause, but the health authorities are simply baffled and cannot explain it (because they are not permitted to blame the vaccine since that would make everyone look bad). It’s safe to say that such a shift has never happened before in history. Clearly, something new happened starting in 2021 that affected massive numbers of people worldwide. I wonder what that might have been? Health authorities simply cannot come up with a single thing that was new in 2021.
   
4. The vaccine injuries of toddlers who are now having seizures cannot be explained. This is now a regular occurrence for 2 and 3-year-old kids to have seizures. It’s only happening in vaccinated kids and most often between 2 and 5 days of vaccination from the COVID vaccine. Doctors are not allowed to report these events publicly (they are not allowed to share on social media or talk to the press) so each doctor thinks it is simply a “one-off” event that is ONLY happening to them. If doctors would be allowed to speak publicly, they would realize the massive pattern. This is why hospitals muzzle the doctors: so nobody finds out. We have multiple reports of these from nurses directly from nurses who are scared that their social media accounts are being monitored. The parents are told that it is just “bad luck” and the parents believe what they are told. So the parents don’t speak out about it either.
5. Countries are starting to realize birth rates are dropping and there are more stillbirths. Sweden, the UK, Germany, etc. See my article about birth rates.
6. The deaths and injuries are happening in plain view of everyone with no plausible explanation for all the coincidences. All of the events are only happening to vaccinated people, but because the press never mentions the vaccination status of the people who “die unexpectedly,” the public never realizes the pattern:
   1. Think about all the rock concerts that have been terminated or canceled due to medical reasons. Justin Bieber, Santana, … Brett Michaels. They never give the cause as the vaccine so they have to make something up (Santana) or simply refuse to disclose it (Michaels). Someone sent me a list of four other concerts that were canceled within the past few months. This isn’t normal folks. But most people never attend rock concerts in different parts of the country so they never figure it out. Also, Santana cancelled six upcoming concerts to recover from dehydration. All the doctors I talked to said that makes no sense. Worst case he’d get IV fluids and be back to normal in less than a day. So the explanation doesn’t fit. But other celebrities are speaking out on their vaccine injuries such as Eric Clapton, but they aren’t well publicized (Clapton’s video has just 66,000 views as of July 11, 2022).
   2. Think about all the celebrity deaths in 2021 and 2022. These are never covered up; they can’t be. What they never mention is the sheer number of unexpected deaths and they never mention the vaccination status of the deceased.
   3. Young people virtually never die in their sleep. When you see this happening over and over, it’s no accident. When you see it happening to celebrities, it’s even more noticeable and impossible to cover up such as the death of Dani Hampson who died in her sleep on her wedding day. Not only was it a celebrity death but a “young person died in her sleep” death as well, a black swan. Many Americans realize what is going on. You can see this by looking at the Twitter comments.
   4. Athletes are dying in plain sight at 22X the normal rate. Today, former NHL defenseman Bryan Marchment died “unexpectedly.” But few people are tracking this so they have no idea the rates are so much higher. It just seems a bit odd.
   5. Even young UPS drivers, like 24-year-old Estegan Chavez, Jr. are dying while delivering packages which are not nearly as physically demanding. These are just the deaths you hear about though.
   6. Pilots are having events at unprecedented rates, but the airlines are refusing to screen the pilots for cardiac issues. When American Airlines Captain Bob Snow had a cardiac event right after he landed, he didn’t even get a call from the CEO of American Airlines. The FAA won’t require pilot screening. They know exactly what they would find. So they look the other way and say nothing and pretend these events never happened. The pilots know. Any member of the public with a working brain can figure this out. But we assume that the FAA is honest and will do the right thing. Big mistake. The FAA was officially put on notice and they have done absolutely nothing about it. They just ignored it like it never happened. Congress is doing the same: they aren’t holding the FAA accountable since they know it would make them look bad. Everyone is banking on nobody ever finding out. After all, they covered up the fact that the US government created the virus in the first place so the reasoning is that they can cover up all the cardiac events and pilot deaths.

Continuing:

6.

1. Surveys (such as this one) consistently show that fewer than 50% of Americans are willing to get more shots of the vaccine. Most of America is clued in, even though none of the media people are. As a result, the government is throwing away tens of millions of vaccine doses due to insufficient demand (which is why Peter Marks of the FDA said he’d do anything except debate the opposition to reduce vaccine hesitancy. So basically we are literally throwing away billions of dollars of taxpayer money to produce a product nobody wants. Is anyone in Congress complaining about the government waste: No. Not a single person. Is anyone in the mainstream media pointing out this is stupid to order a product nobody wants? Nope. Nobody in mainstream media is going to publish an op-ed like that. They all just go along as if nothing is wrong.
2. People’s young healthy friends are having medical problems at unprecedented rates (though not everyone is realizing this). For example, today I learned that one of our country club employees (forced to vaccinate) that I knew died from a stroke at age 52. A young candidate for US Senate, John Fetterman, had a stroke following his vaccination. He may never recover.
3. Whenever we do audience surveys, every audience always reports a comparable or excess rate of death from the vaccine vs. COVID. So even if you don’t see it yourself, the live audience surveys are very convincing since there is no “bias” in these live surveys. Nobody but “misinformation spreaders” like myself are willing to do the surveys for some reason.
4. User surveys done by professional third party polling firms consistently show the vaccines have killed more people than COVID has. The NY Times, 60 Minutes, etc. all refuse to do the surveys themselves. They don’t want anyone to know. Our next step is to use a big name polling organization to promote this result so it is not coming from “anti-vaxxers.” That poll should be impossible for anyone to ignore. We have never run a single poll that shows everything is fine and the vaccines are perfectly safe. That is why the mainstream media will never do these polls. But most people don’t realize that the are deliberately not doing these polls. However, it may be hard for us to get this done. There have been far less devastating polls that have been done by the big polling firms and they refuse to allow the results to be used when they found out the result were against the narrative. The reason is simple: it would be bad for business to release such a poll because everyone would stop using them because they are “evil.” This is why the public never sees any polls on vaccine safety: the media won’t commission them and the pollsters won’t do them. We welcome being proved wrong on this!
5. Mandates are vanishing even though COVID rates are increasing. For example, see this story about what is happening in parts of Australia where they are backing off their former recommendations with no apologies whatsoever:
   1. Vanishing vaccine mandates: No apology from our once-so-zealous public health officials
6. The evidence shows that COVID was created in a US government funded biolab. That’s the direct assessment of the chairman of the independent commission tasked with looking into the cause. Professor Jeffrey Sachs was responsible for the independent Lancet investigation. He said, “I chaired the commission for the Lancet for 2 years on Covid. I'm pretty convinced it came out of a US lab of biotechnology.” You will never find that statement anywhere on US mainstream media. How could that not be covered? But in this video, he also said that there is absolutely no interest in learning more, not from any country in the entire world. That tells you everything you need to know. How can there be no interest in learning more? The only way there can be no interest in learning more is if the US government did it. Check out this article in Science which tries to make Sachs look like the villain: “Fights over confidentiality pledge and conflicts of interest tore apart COVID-19 origin probe: Former members of The Lancet task force challenge why economist Jeffrey Sachs disbanded effort.” Sachs figures out Daszak is conflicted and Daszak won’t produce documents showing a conflict. So the panel sides with Daszak!!! It is completely stunning that nearly the whole panel is conflicted and corrupt. Sachs emerges as the hero here. He calls for further investigation by an unbiased commission due to the smoking gun evidence of a contract that was “supposedly” never funded. Nobody takes him up on it because he’s right; what they want is a corrupt investigation only. The contract fits the origin of COVID like a glove and Daszak’s defense is that the work “was not funded. Therefore, the work was not done. Simple.” But it’s not as simple as that (as the article points out). It seems very clear that Daszak is lying. I double-checked with a former EcoHealth Alliance employee who was in a position to know. He was unequivocal. You have to have data to get funding on these proposals. The bottom line is Peter Daszak shouldn’t be trusted since he’s in on it. There’s more, but we’ll leave it at that for now.
7. Vaccine injuries are now being compensated in other countries with large payouts, but not in America. We haven’t paid out a dime to anyone, despite thousands of applicants (most others know it is fruitless to apply and don’t bother). So how can the vaccines injure people outside of America, but not injure anyone who was given a shot inside America? That’s simply impossible if there isn’t a government cover-up. There is no third party oversight of the vaccine compensation program in America and nobody in Congress (except for Senator Ron Johnson) thinks that zero payouts to the millions of Americans who were killed, disabled, or injured is a problem.
8. Our surveys consistently show well over 1M Americans have been injured or disabled so severely by the vaccines that they are unable to work, but Congress thinks $0 compensation is appropriate. See this analysis, this story, and this story and the poll data in this article.
9. The most extensive investigations ever done on a death, 14 months of intensive investigation, have proven that the vaccines kill people. 27-year-old Jack Last of Stowmarket was vaccinated on March 30, 2021 and died days later. It took 14 months of investigation to determine he was killed by the vaccine.
10. Ed Dowd was interviewed by the Defender and the CHD Roundtable and made the following points:
    1. The group life claims come from a younger, employed demographic dying neither from COVID nor suicide
    2. This group of largely millennials fed “a silent Vietnam War” body-count-wise (61,000 in 2021, how many insurance companies counted not stated)
    3. The connection to the shots is demonstrated by the “hockey stick” plots of deaths versus time clearly marked by mandates and boosters: the smoking gun
    4. CEOs who mandated the shots are reluctant to publicize their responsibility for killing their employees
    5. The financial catastrophe will push these data into mainstream news sooner or later
    6. Ed was working directly with actuaries and insurance executives specifically counting group life claims, not just deaths among the general population. The exponential rates of change marked by dates of vaccine roll out, mandate implementations and boosters nails the vaccine inference for these fatalities reported this way. The argument is hard to contest. “Smoking gun,” as he says. This is insurance industry hard data: money paid out. This is why this is so impressive and to-the-point.
    7. There is no response from any fact checkers on this.

More:

1. Former highly respected blue-pilled doctors like Dr. Naureen Shaikh in Sausalito have seen enough and are now willing to come out of the closet and speak about vaccine injuries even though it means the end of her career in medicine.
2. Articles written by respected scientists like Peter Doshi are slammed by people who refuse to be held publicly accountable for their remarks. Read this article by Professor Norman Fenton which summarizes the bogus arguments made to smear these scientists who are speaking the truth, “Response to Susan Oliver video “Antivaxxers fooled by p-hacking and apples to oranges comparison.” Almost definitely, the “Doshi paper” will not be published for reasons explained in this article by Phil Harper. Susan Oliver, who is remarkably inept, will not have a discussion with Fenton and it’s pretty obvious who is spreading the misinformation for anyone spending any time on this. Instead of challenging Fenton, Susan produces a second video. Susan summarized her view of the paper in this tweet (which included the link to the video) that was retweeted by people like Prof Sir David Spiegelhalter (a world renowned expert on probability and risk) and Prof Peter Hansen (Econometrician, Data Scientist, and Latene Distinguished Professor of Economics at UNC, Chapel Hill). Hansen and Spiegelhalter refuse to speak with Fenton as well. Fenton would LOVE to chat with any of these people in a recorded conversation so he can ask them key questions, but all of them are afraid to be challenged: they just throw stones and then go into hiding. That is how “science” works nowadays.
3. Even though key studies that destroy the government narrative will not be published (as noted in the previous point), scientists still managed to publish over 1,250 papers in medical journals on serious adverse events caused by the COVID vaccines.
4. Two teenage boys die in their sleep in different states days after vaccination and the paper concludes that the deaths were caused by the vaccine. It’s published in a peer-reviewed medical journal. There is no coverage of this in the US mainstream media. The best we could find is this report on NTD News. Read the comments on that tweet including, “My friend's mom woke up terrified, unable to breathe. Her husband was by her side and called 911 but she was gone via cardiac arrest. She took a booster the morning before this transpired. It hits especially hard to think a child, alone, went through this. Rips my heart out.” The US mainstream media will continue to ignore all these deaths so that when it happens to them people will just think it is just their “bad luck,” but these stories are leaking on alternate media.
5. The world’s most respected vaccine expert, Dr. Paul Offit, publicly admitted on a YouTube video that the whole FDA outside review process is a complete sham. The FDA doesn’t review the data, they hand the committee hundreds of pages right before the meeting (knowing that way they committee cannot review it), and then badger them to approve the vaccines without any efficacy data. Offit admitted that if there was a “hell no” option for his vote, that’s what he would have done. He basically said the others on the committee are brain-dead because there was no efficacy data to justify approval: they basically vote “yes” because that’s what they are expected to do and they want to stay on the committee. The government orders the drug even before they ask the FDA panel to review the data, proving the whole “review process” is a complete sham. Offit himself still hasn’t figured out the vaccines aren’t safe. He won’t have that discussion with anyone on our side. However, Paul Offit is completely oblivious to the fact that if there are no deaths, you can’t save any lives. For example, we know from the Massachusetts death data that there were zero deaths in 2020 and 2021 for ages 5 to 11 (there was just one death coded as a COVID death but we contacted the family and found out it wasn’t true). So how is there a “problem”? Nobody wants to talk about that. They don’t even know there were no deaths in a large state like Massachusetts.
6. Parents are getting wise to the scheme. Just 1.3% of eligible children under 5 have received one or two doses of a vaccine, according to data from the CDC (see this Epoch Times article for details on the failure of the CDC to dupe parents to inject their kids).
7. Pierre Kory told me a mainstream doc he knows admitted to him confidentially that attitudes are changing now. Doctors now realize they’ve been lied to, but nobody has the courage to speak out about it since they’d lose their license. So they keep quiet. But most of them know the vaccines are killing and injuring people of all ages.
8. One of my nurse friends said that when a child had a cardiac incident recently, the entire trauma department thought “vaccine injury” as soon as they heard there was a teenager with a cardiac issue. However, none of the members of the trauma department will ever acknowledge any of this publicly because they know they will be fired for admitting the truth.
9. Doctors are now willing to meet with members of Congress and brief them on what is going on. For example, I now have 25 doctors in California willing to risk their careers to speak out to members of Congress in California. These doctors work at hospitals all over California. It’s not local.
10. Public health officials are now willing to be interviewed by me. I have one coming up on Monday July 11. Can you believe that? A public health official that will answer questions from me! I can’t wait.
11. Alex Berenson was re-incarnated on Twitter. Twitter admits they removed him erroneously (after they told Alex that they had “carefully” reviewed his Tweets and found them problematic). All the rest of us in Twitter Heaven will miss having Alex around.
12. A BBC documentary cannot get a simple vaccine statistic correct (the percent unvaccinated). But to their credit, they corrected it after Professor Fenton pointed out the error. That is progress because it shows that the truth actually is starting to matter now! Susan Oliver is far worse than the host for the BBC show, Hannah Fry. Neither of them are ever going to debate Norman Fenton. Nobody will.
13. The journal Science tacitly admitted that they aren’t doing science anymore. We requested that they ask for a correction or retraction of an obviously flawed paper. The request was made by a highly respected UK Professor, Norman Fenton. They ignored him! In short, junk science is fine for their journal. I really think they should rename their journal to “Junk Science” as that would be more accurate. But it’s clear that they don’t care about accuracy. You can be sure they will stay quiet about this junk paper. That’s the way “science” works nowadays.
14. I spoke with the CEO of a hospital near me. As soon as I sent him information about the vaccine being dangerous and suggested he could be a world leader by being the first hospital CEO to admit the truth, he stopped talking to me. So it’s actually promising he even responded to me even though he isn’t anymore. None of them want to be the first. They all want to keep their jobs. Your life is not important to them.
15. I actually got a reporter from the San Jose Mercury News to respond to an email I sent. We’re actually still conversing. Boy, that’s a first.
16. Fact checkers are now all afraid of me. Why? Because I got smart and I now insist on recording all conversations. Now they all refuse to talk to me. Because truth isn’t their focus. Listen to this recording. After I made this recording, I’ve never been contacted by any fact checker. And yes, it was a legal recording; they don’t dispute that. Here’s the story and a link to the recording. Now, no fact checker will talk to me nor will they debate me on the facts. Darn.
17. The US public is NOT permitted to know what is inside the COVID vaccines. A FOIA to the British government confirmed “the full quantitative composition of all COVID-19 vaccines is exempt from FOI disclosure.” In Uruguay, a judge has ordered the vaccines halted until they disclose the contents. Here’s a story with more details on the situation in Uruguay. However, in the US, it’s perfectly fine to mandate vaccination of Americans with substances that people are not permitted to know about. The people doing the mandating don’t even know themselves what is inside the vaccine. They are completely clueless as well. That’s just how it works. After all, it’s important that the public (and the authorities doing the mandating) NOT know the true composition because if they knew, nobody would take it. That’s why it has to be kept secret. Get it? It’s for your own good. We basically have to trust the drug companies, even though they have a history of fraud and defective products. After all, if you can’t trust Pfizer, who can you trust? Doesn’t this make you want to trust them?
    
18. We are learning of huge conflicts of interest with up to $400M in payouts given to unknown people inside the US government. We know Fauci is one of the recipients because he refused to answer that question when Senator Rand Paul asked him. We are not allowed to know any of these details because it is considered confidential. In other words, it would not be in the public interest to have the conflicts of interest known for some reason. Watch this video at 7 minutes and 30 seconds from the start. The FOIA response is redacted as you can see. Senator Rand Paul wants to know. The rest of Congress: they think it is best if this is kept from the American people.

Last of it:

1. Drownings are up. One source of drowning data is at NOAA surf zone fatalities:
   2015 54
   2016 66
   2017 73
   2018 80
   2019 93
   2020 93
   2021 129
   2021 increased 39%
   The highest increase year-over-year prior to 2021 was 22%.
   2021 was 51% higher than the 7 year average.
   Weaker hearts can't handle stressful swimming. Wonder why?
2. Post-market all-cause mortality data is the gold standard for a vaccine. We have that in the UK which tracked it. It went up by up to 6X according to UK ONS data. But our own CDC cannot find any signal here, even though the VAERS death numbers and Medicare death numbers are off the charts. When the CDC looked at the VAERS death data (the Hannah Rosenblum VAERS paper published in the Lancet) they said none of the excess deaths were caused by the vaccines but they never said what caused the deaths. Why didn’t anyone in the medical community or the press want to know the actual cause of the unprecedented number of excess deaths? The deaths were 50 times normal and no other vaccine has a jump in death rates, just this one. Why wouldn’t the CDC want to know why? And why does Martha Sharan prohibit me from talking to the authors? The CDC is supposed to help stop misinformation. I reached out to find the “correct” reason for the deaths and their response was to not talk to me. That doesn’t help correct the “misinformation.” I just want to know what caused all the excess deaths that only happened for the COVID vaccines. Is that too much to ask? Nobody else is asking the question, but it’s an important question to ask.
3. The CDC isn’t releasing any data from their BEST database. Yeah, that’s what it’s really called. You can’t make that up. But because the data isn’t supportive, they never show us. It’s kept under lock and key. Nobody gets to look at it. You’d think if the vaccine worked as advertised, they’d be showing us the data. The fact that they don’t show us the BEST data… that has to be very troubling for anyone with a working brain.
4. They aren’t showing the public the Medicare all-cause mortality data. Did you know it is at an all-time high since right after they rolled out the vaccines? Of course you don’t know that because the CDC will not release that data and the press isn’t asking them about it. The only reason I know about it is because I was tipped off by an honest HHS employee (yeah, we actually found one insider who is livid about the cover-up).
5. The UK ONS data shows that all-cause mortality increases tremendously after each vaccination. If it isn’t the vaccine causing this, then what is causing it? It is a HUGE effect: up to a 6X increase in all-cause mortality after you get each shot compared to unvaccinated in similar age groups. Nobody will explain this on camera. They are all camera shy. Nobody dares to challenge Professor Norman Fenton on this. The CDC thinks the opposite is happening, that the vaccine makes you nearly immortal, lowering your risk of death to absurdly low levels. Someone is lying to you. I can safely guarantee to you that the CDC is lying because the all-cause mortality rates are so low in the CDC’s VSD study that the vaccine even prevents you from dying in accidents!
   
6. There is a very real potential that the vaccine can integrate into a person’s DNA permanently. See Sweden Study Shows COVID Jab Can Modify DNA, Opens Doors for New Lawsuits. The vaccine might be permanently modifying your DNA and not for the better. They said this couldn’t happen, but now it is a real possibility and we’ll soon have confirmation if this is happening in people. In the meantime, “are you feeling lucky?” That is the question that the CDC should be asking people before they get the shot. Everyone should be warned about this before they get the shot. That will be true informed consent. Instead, people are kept in the dark. Nobody getting the shot has a clue. Is that really the way we do medicine in America to keep people in the dark like this?
7. How will they explain away all the sudden cardiac disease now happening in kids that only happens to vaccinated kids and only started happening after the vaccines rolled out?
8. I had doctors look at over 600 vaccine death reports. They found that 3 died from Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (CJD) which is extremely rate: it occurs naturally in 1 in 1 million people. Nobody can explain the .5% rate observed here. That’s 5,000 times normal. It didn’t happen by chance and the only thing these people had in common is it started right after the COVID vaccine. How can a safe vaccine cause CJD? Answer: a safe vaccine can’t. An unsafe vaccine can. No fact checker will touch that. For more, see the CJD section of “My latest survey.”
9. Unfortunately, the medical community is still united that censorship of articles in mainstream medical journals is OK when it conflicts with the political narrative. So it’s still fine with everyone that papers such as the Rose paper on myocarditis rates after the COVID vaccines which was withdrawn by the publisher because they didn’t like the conclusion. There is still nobody speaking out against Elsevier for unethically censoring science. Not one person from the pro-vax side thinks censoring science is wrong. It’s stunning because it is so objectively unethical. Nobody can defend this but everyone is silent.
10. There was fraud in the Pfizer trial. I’ve documented over a dozen issues that would be “hard to explain” if there wasn’t fraud including some that are impossible to explain if there wasn’t fraud. Nobody wants to explain them. But now we have something even better than my accusations of fraud: an admission from Pfizer in Federal Court that they defrauded the FDA. See Pfizer Asks Court to Dismiss Whistleblower Lawsuit Because Government Was Aware of Fraud. The mainstream press won’t cover it, so nobody will know.
11. Haiti did not vaccinate its citizens. The current vax rate is 1.4% -- yet country has one of lowest COVID death rates in the world. How is that possible?
12. There don’t appear to be any scientists who work in vaccine safety at the CDC anymore. I emailed a large list of internal CDC emails (all people working on the COVID vaccines) asking if anyone would consider evidence that goes against the narrative. No replies. A true scientist is always open to new data and to finding the truth. The CDC “scientists” are simply “propagandists.” If you find someone who is willing to consider evidence that runs contrary to the narrative, let me know.
13. They’ve admitted that nobody will defend the policies of the CDC or FDA on camera. We put out an open call for someone to do this and go no responses. They promote the narrative only when they are assured they will not be challenged with inconvenient things such as evidence and facts.
14. Nobody has been able to answer a single question on my list of over 100 questions.
15. The FDA’s head of vaccines, Peter Marks, has said he’ll do anything to help reduce vaccine hesitancy EXCEPT debate any qualified scientist with opposing views. Yet debating the opposition is the most effective way for Dr. Marks to achieve his goal. So why isn’t he doing it? Simple. He doesn’t have the facts on his side.
16. A paper published in a peer-reviewed journal says the “misinformation spreaders” (including myself) are telling the truth. Finally.
17. We are seeing medical doctors like Andy Bostom writing a scathing op-ed about Brown University where he works on the cover-up of a student who died from myocarditis after forced vaccination. So doctors armed with the facts are now willing to sacrifice their careers to tell the truth.
18. People are starting to wake up to the poor risk benefit of the vaccines. Our latest surveys give the same estimated number of deaths from the vaccine as the VAERS data (and 10 other sources): 500,000 at this point. But the estimated number of COVID lives saved based on the clinical trial is 1 in 22,000 which means around 10,000 lives saved. So we’ve killed 500,000 people to maybe save 10,000 people. That’s dumb. Nobody will debate me on the numbers. I even offered $1M to anyone who could disprove our estimates and show us the right numbers. No takers.
19. Elderly care homes like Palo Alto Commons can’t hide in the shadows forever. My article recount 6 residents getting the jab there and all 6 died within 5 weeks of the jab in their sleep, even though most all were perfectly healthy. How can 6 out of 6 die? The elderly is where the greatest benefit vs. risk is. It’s a felony to file a false VAERS report (and there is no incentive to go to jail here for the reporter) and Palo Alto Commons is saying nothing, falsely trying to hide behind HIPAA.
20. The “science” behind wearing a mask is now completely busted thanks to Professor Jason Abaluck agreeing to have his paper challenged by our experts. But half the people still wear masks at airports so the message isn’t getting out. But at least we’ve completely busted the scientific rationale for masks. It’s gone. See my article on asking Science to retract the study that the medical community was relying on. They won’t and couldn’t reply since there is no excuse for not retracting the paper.
21. The CDC had to change the definition of “vaccine” because the COVID vaccines weren’t vaccines.
22. The numbers just aren’t working out for the promoters of the vaccine. In NSW Australia, the vaccination rate is 96.7% . That means that if the vaccines are reducing hospitalization risk by 90%, then 25% of the people in the hospital should be unvaccinated. That’s what the math says. So why are there no unvaccinated people getting sick?
    
23. There are over 500 articles on issues with the vaccine on my substack. Another excellent substack of vaccine injury stories is stopmandatoryvaccination. These stories are hard to explain if the vaccines are safe and effective.

I’ll update this over time, but that’s the list off the top of my head on what is going on. The momentum is all moving in our direction from what I can see.

As always, check out the comments below for additional insights from my readers. I’m only telling part of the story. There are over 1,000 comments you should read in addition to my article."

MinnesotaSmith said:

Major, major piece here. Please read, all, even if you've really kept up on the Chinavirus fauxine subject.
==================================================================

First place I read about the original source:

48 Facts Against the Vaxx - Vox Popoli

The list of the damning facts that comprehensively destroy the Covid vaccine narrative established by the government-media-science complex is growing. Read the whole list there. Here is my list of over 40 indicators that the “safe and effective” narrative is falling apart. It is a devastating...

voxday.net

48 Facts Against the Vaxx

The list of the damning facts that comprehensively destroy the Covid vaccine narrative established by the government-media-science complex is growing. Read the whole list there.

In sum: STOP GETTING VAXED, YOU RETARDS! DO NOT EVEN THINK ABOUT GETTING BOOSTED!
Seriously, if you got vaxxed, you’re retarded.

Look, I’m sorry that you did it, I’m even sorry if that offends you, but the increasingly obvious fact is that you permanently damaged your health because you were stupid enough to take the word of a) a bunch of confirmed liars (aka the media), b) a profession whose track record is literally worse than a coin flip (aka the scientists), and c) elite global depopulationists who want to reduce the human population by 93.75 percent (aka Bill Gates and the Society of People You REALLY Don’t Want Babysitting Your Children.)

And if you encouraged your children to get vaxxed, you’re retarded squared. Cubed if they were pre-pubescent and under absolutely zero risk from Covid in the first place. Furthermore, you’ve probably pretty much guaranteed that they’re going to hate you for the rest of your reduced lifespan once they realize what you did to them in your retardery.

Maybe there is a way to reduce or undo the circulatory damage done by the vaxx. I certainly hope there is, for everyone’s sake. But in the meantime, for the love of everything that is good and beautiful and true in your life, STOP MAKING IT WORSE!

Click to expand...

This is from a substack from Steve Kirsch. When he first posted it on July 7th he only 23 leading indicators, looks like he's updated it to 40. We should keep an eye on that substack to see if he continues to update it.

ETA: Thank you for posting it in full. Lots of info there and I know it takes a lot of time to format 4 posts worth of material.

HD

MinnesotaSmith said:

View attachment 350066

Click to expand...

MS, that very lengthy piece you’ve posted above ^^^ is the best summary I’ve ever read (I’m pretty sure) to date.
HD does the heavy lifting in the thread every night and posts some doozies, too!
If I could only get anyone, “someone” to read that I’d be thrilled.

But the denial is too strong, too ingrained. The brain washing is darned near, perfect at this point.
Only Fauxi himself, or the CDC themselves, proclaiming to the world they’ve committed crimes against humanity and lied will change the narrative.
Even my own boss, a medical Veterinary doctor….was overcome.
He says, “ people make the mistake of false causality every day”….. the example he gives every time goes like this;

“Say Someone has a heart attack. And Right before that heart attack they drank a glass of water. So they’ll then link heart failure on drinking water which is absolutely false reasoning “

I give up.

Thank You All for these articles.

Been caring for a sick family here for the past 3 weeks. Pretty sure it is “Rona” although tests are negative.

Supplements to strengthen my immune system and being Triple masked and gloves have kept me relatively protected…Thank The Lord.

Anyway, these articles just go to prove that you CANNOT VACCINATE YOUR WAY OUT OF A PANDEMIC! I am actually seeing it first hand!

By the way, this family has been vaxxed and boosted. (Except my young patient)

Stay Safe and well everyone

W. A.

FAUCI SAYS THOSE WHO WERE INFECTED WITH OMICRON VARIANT BA1 DO NOT HAVE GOOD PROTECTION AGAINST VARIANTS BA4 AND BA5
View: https://twitter.com/zerohedge/status/1546857982763212800?s=20&t=oXO2OHINk9n6xa1jIz-CZQ

NOW - CDC Director: "My message is simple: It is essential that these Americans get their second booster shot right away."
RT 35secs
View: https://twitter.com/disclosetv/status/1546856394955132929?s=20&t=oXO2OHINk9n6xa1jIz-CZQ

Great timing lol
RT 12secs
View: https://twitter.com/ArtValley818_/status/1546862567338823681?s=20&t=mBLcUKsu1FBV0QRhNCSbNA

(fair use applies)

White House urges caution on COVID variants, pushes boosters
By ZEKE MILLER
yesterday

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Biden administration is calling on people to exercise renewed caution about COVID-19, emphasizing the importance of getting booster shots for those who are eligible and wearing masks indoors as two new highly transmissible variants are spreading rapidly across the country.

The new variants, labeled BA.4 and BA.5, are offshoots of the omicron strain that has been been responsible for nearly all of the virus spread in the U.S. and are even more contagious than their predecessors. White House doctors stressed the importance of getting booster doses, even if you have recently been infected.

“Currently, many Americans are under-vaccinated, meaning they are not up to date on their COVID-19 vaccines,” said Dr. Rochelle Walensky, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “Staying up to date on your COVID-19 vaccines provides the best protection against severe outcomes.”

Walensky said the U.S. has seen a doubling in the number of hospitalizations due to COVID-19 since April, reflecting the spread of the new subvariants, though deaths remain steady around 300 per day.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease expert, said while the new variants are concerning, with boosters, indoor masking and treatments the country has the tools to keep them from being disruptive.

“We should not let it disrupt our lives,” he said, “but we cannot deny that it is a reality that we need to deal with.”
He added that even if someone recently had COVID-19, they should get a booster.

“Immunity wanes, so it is critical to stay up to date with COVID 19 vaccines,” he said.

All Americans age 5 and over should get a booster five months after their initial primary series, according to the CDC, and those age 50 and over — or those who are immunocompromised — should get a second booster four months after their first. According to CDC, tens of millions of eligible Americans haven’t received their first booster, and of those over 50 who got their first booster, only 28% have received their second.

“If you’re over 50 and you haven’t gotten the shot this year, you should go get a shot,” said White House COVID-19 coordinator Dr. Ashish Jha. “It’s going to save your life.”

Jha and Fauci said the U.S. is regularly discussing expanding eligibility for a second booster shot to all adults, but that no decision has been made yet.

“It’s a regulatory decision on the part of the FDA,” Fauci said.

Jha said people who are eligible for a booster but haven’t received one shouldn’t wait for forthcoming vaccines targeted at the omicron strain in addition to the original form of the coronavirus. The U.S. has ordered 105 million of those updated shots, which studies show provide better protection against omicron variants, but they won’t be available until the fall.

“Let me be clear, if you get vaccinated today, you’re not going to be ineligible to get the variants specific vaccine, as we get into the later part of fall and winter,” Jha said. “So, this is not a tradeoff, we’ve got plenty. It’s a great way to protect yourself.”

Added Fauci, “The threat to you is now.”

Walensky noted that CDC data shows that about a third of Americans are living in areas the agency classifies as experiencing a high level of COVID spread, where the agency recommends people wear masks in public indoor spaces.

Another 41% live in the CDC’s “medium” level, where it recommends that people consider their own individual risk and consider masking.

(fair use applies)

'Immune-evading' BA.5 subvariant now accounts for 65% of U.S. COVID cases
Dylan Stableford and Andrew Romano
Tue, July 12, 2022, 11:56 AM

Top U.S. health officials warned Tuesday that a surge of COVID-19 cases driven by the highly transmissible Omicron subvariant BA.5 has arrived, but stressed that the country has the tools — like vaccines and antiviral treatments — to prevent people from getting seriously ill.

“We know how to manage it,” Dr. Ashish Jha, coordinator of the White House’s COVID-19 response, said at a virtual press briefing. “We can prevent serious illness. We can save lives and we can minimize disruptions caused by COVID-19.”

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the BA.5 subvariant now accounts for 65% of current COVID-19 cases in the United States.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease expert and chief medical adviser to President Biden, said that BA.5 “substantially evades neutralizing antibodies” induced in people who have been vaccinated or previously infected.

But Fauci said that the current vaccines are “still effective at preventing severe COVID-19 outcomes” such as hospitalization and death — and urged Americans to stay up to date with their COVID shots.

“The threat to you is now,” he said. “If you are not vaccinated to the fullest ... then you’re putting yourself at an increased risk that you can mitigate against by getting vaccinated.”

The warnings Tuesday from Fauci and other top COVID officials come as the U.S. transitions into what experts describe as a new phase of the pandemic.

Call it the Age of Reinfection.

“BA.5 puts the nail in the coffin of the myth that the virus will evolve into a milder form and fade away,” Dr. Eric Topol, founder of the Scripps Research Translational Institute, wrote Tuesday in the Los Angeles Times. “We could easily see more variants — indeed a whole new family with more extensive immune evasion and growth advantage — in the months ahead.”

At first, COVID-19 seemed like a one-and-done infection. Not anymore. The primary culprit is BA.5, which has a bevy of mutations that make it better than any of its predecessors at dodging whatever immune defenses we’ve built up over two and a half years of infection and vaccination, then infecting us anyway.

BA.5 isn’t the first evasive variant we’ve encountered; both Delta and the earlier versions of Omicron also sidestepped first-generation antibodies. But BA.5 and its closely related cousin, BA.4, are unique because they evolved specifically to elude the massive amounts of fresh immunity left behind by the original iteration of Omicron after it swept the world last winter — meaning that the old assumptions about a recent infection completely shielding you from rapid reinfection no longer apply.

“We do know [BA.5] to be more transmissible and more immune-evading,” CDC Director Rochelle Walensky said at Tuesday’s briefing. “People with prior infection, even with BA.1 or BA.2, are likely still at risk for BA.4 and BA.5.”

None of this will set the U.S. back to square one. Despite elevated case levels, there are now fewer U.S. COVID patients in intensive care units than there were during previous phases of the pandemic, and the national death rate (about 300 to 400 per day) is near the all-time low. Acquired immunity, multiple rounds of vaccination and improved treatment options are helping — a lot.

“Even in the face of BA.5, the tools we have continue to work,” Jha said Tuesday, noting the importance of boosters for those over 50 and postinfection treatments such as Paxlovid.

But to our immune system, the distance from BA.1 to heavily mutated BA.5 is “far greater” than the distance between the original SARS-CoV-2 virus and previous blockbuster variants such as Alpha and Delta — which does make it harder to recognize and respond to. According to the latest research, that could mean:

• More breakthrough infections, especially among people who previously had BA.1. Compared to BA.2, BA.2.12.1 is only modestly (1.8-fold) more resistant to antibodies from vaccinated and boosted individuals. But BA.4 and BA.5 are substantially (4.2-fold) more resistant.
• More symptoms. BA.4 and BA.5 are also better at replicating in lung cells than BA.2 — a shift that might signal, according to one experimental model, that they’re more “pathogenic” as well (that is, more likely to make you sick). A new report from the highly regarded Kirby Institute in Australia also suggests that the “infectivity” of BA.5 — its ability to get into cells and make copies of itself — is more like Delta than like prior versions of Omicron.
• More resistance to treatments. At the same time, BA.4 and BA.5 appear to be 20-fold more resistant than BA.2 to Evusheld — an important monoclonal antibody treatment that has been providing preemptive protection for immunocompromised people.

So far, the rise of BA.5 in the U.S. has coincided with the decline of earlier versions of Omicron, leading to what appears to be a plateau in nationwide case counts of around 100,000 per day. (The vast majority of infections are now going unreported as Americans increasingly rely on rapid home tests rather than the PCR tests used earlier in the pandemic.) But reinfections have doubled in recent weeks in places like San Diego County, Calif., and test positivity, hospitalizations and even ICU admissions have been steadily increasing across the country. Experts worry that the virus’s accelerating evolution and aggressive new trajectory — toward greater transmissibility, evasiveness and possibly pathogenicity — could endanger vulnerable Americans in the months ahead.

According to CDC data, 67% of the U.S. population is considered fully vaccinated, having received the first two doses of Pfizer or Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccines or the single-dose Johnson & Johnson COVID shot. But less than half of those eligible for boosters (47%) have gotten one, and a new booster targeted to BA.5 isn’t expected until October at the earliest.

“It’s very, very clear ... that immunity wanes, whether that’s immunity following infection or immunity following vaccination,” Fauci said Tuesday. “If you were infected with BA.1, you really don’t have good protection against [infection with] BA.5.”

And though the daily U.S. death toll is lower than it was earlier in the pandemic, it’s still “too high,” Jha said.

“We are at a stage of the pandemic when most COVID-19 deaths are preventable,” he said.

“Variants will continue to emerge if the virus circulates globally and in this country,” Fauci added. “We should not let it disrupt our lives, but we cannot deny that it is a reality that we need to deal with.”

To that end, Jha said that the administration would be releasing two reports on “long COVID” in early August, followed by a strategy to speed the development of next-generation vaccines that can protect against all coronavirus variants and stop infection before it starts.

“You’ll hear more from us in the days and weeks ahead,” Jha said. “It’s something we’ve been working quite assiduously on.”

(fair use applies)

Moderna to advance two Omicron vaccine candidates against newer variants
by Mrinalika Roy and Leroy Leo in Bengaluru
Mon, July 11, 2022, 11:56 AM

(Reuters) -Moderna Inc said on Monday it was advancing two Omicron vaccine candidates for the fall, one designed against the BA.1 variant and another against the BA.4 and BA.5.

Vaccine makers including Moderna and rival Pfizer Inc are developing updated vaccines to target the fast-spreading Omicron subvariants BA.4 and BA.5, which have gained a foothold in the United States over recent weeks.

Moderna said its decision to develop the bivalent vaccines was based on different market preferences for shots against the subvariants.

Bivalent vaccines are designed to target two different coronavirus variants - the original variant from 2020 and the newer Omicron variants.

Moderna said new clinical data for its mRNA-1273.214 vaccine, designed to target the BA.1 variant, showed significantly higher neutralizing antibody responses against the fast-spreading BA.4 and BA.5 compared with the currently authorized booster.

The company's second booster candidate, mRNA 1273.222, is based on the BA.4/5 strain and is being developed in accordance with recent U.S. Food and Drug Administration advice.

Jefferies analyst Michael Yee said though the new data on the company's BA.1 subvariant-targeting booster shows better durability and antibody response, the original Omicron variant has already shifted in the United States and the FDA is likely to approve planned BA.4/5 boosters.