It’s too early to celebrate this, but from Japan comes the news that an extract made from natto–a sticky food involving fermented soybeans–inactivates Covid’s spike protein by digesting the receptor binding domain.
What’s a receptor binding domain? No idea, but Covid’s spike protein needs it, so anything that digests it has got to be good–at least from our point of view.
The extract of natto works on all the existing variants.
The reason it’s not time to celebrate is that so far it’s only worked in a lab. No one’s gotten the natto and the virus together inside the body. Eating natto won’t help. Neither will sending the virus invitations to a party and serving natto hor d’oeuvres. No matter how much it mutates, the virus will continue to be illiterate, so it won’t show up.
The next stage is to isolate the molecular mechanism that’s destroying the–what was that called?–the receptor binding domain. Figure that out and you could well have a treatment for Covid.
Possibly. At some time in the indistinct future. But c’mon, we need all the hope we can find.
England’s world-beating experiment in irresponsible government
On July 19, England took what little common sense it had forgotten in the drawers of 10 Downing Street’s desks and set it on fire. It’s been dry lately, but there wasn’t enough common sense to burn for long, so we didn’t get the second Great Fire of London, just another round of Covid stupidity.
To be clearer about this, nightclubs are now open. So are bars, restaurants, and pretty much everything else you can think of. It’s up to you whether to throw your mask away and sit nose to nose, indoors, and sing loudly with six of your favorite strangers and no ventilation. Or with thirty of them if you can get your noses close enough. Crowd limits are out of fashion, along with distancing.
The first day of that was called Freedom Day. Those of us currently cowering under the covers are free to cower under the covers. Unless of course we have to go to work or in other ways mix with the rest of humanity.
The official justification for this is that vaccination has severed the link between infection and hospitalization. Or weakened it, depending on when you listen to the explanations and who gives it. We have to return to normal life. We have to live with Covid. The economy needs us. And if not now, when?
Maybe when it’s safe, that’s when. Because the link between infection and hospitalization hasn’t been severed, it’s only been weakened, and that’s not enough. The number of infections is going up, and so is the number of deaths. Not as sharply as it once would have, but more than it would if we kept to a marginally sensible policy.
And the thing about deaths is that once people are dead, they’re gone. It’s kind of irreversible.
The government’s Scientific Advisory Group warns that the combination of a large number of vaccinated people and a high number of infections creates the perfect conditions to create a variant that will escape the vaccines. No one can know whether that will happen–vaccines mutate randomly–but the likelihood increases as the number of infections increases.
And while all this is shoving us in one direction, Boris Johnson says vaccine passports will be required for nightclubs etc.–but not until the end of September. Between now and then, let Covid rip.
What are they thinking? One of the government’s scientific advisors, Robert West, says it’s “a decision by the government to get as many people infected as possible as quickly as possible, while using rhetoric about caution as a way of putting the blame on the public for the consequences.”
That wave of infections would combine with the number of vaccinated people to push the country toward herd immunity and the virus would no longer spread.
What are the problems with the strategy? Well, in addition to opening the doors to a variant that evades the vaccines, no one knows what level of immunity is needed for herd immunity to Covid. The best guess is 85%. And then there’s long Covid–the long-term damage that some people live with for no one knows how long, after even asymptomatic infections.
The government says that’s not its strategy. You’re welcome to believe it if you like.
And a unicorn just pranced down the street outside my window. You’re welcome to believe that as well. It was wearing a tutu and singing a Mozart aria.
Not long ago, the Netherlands opened everything up and Covid infections rose sevenfold. They’ve since closed bars, restaurants, and nightclubs.
England’s reopening has caused the Covid tracing app to warn an annoying number of people that they’ve been exposed to Covid and should self-isolate–more than 600,000 last week–and that in turn has led to a lot of people being off work.
So what’s a responsible government to do about that?
We don’t have one of those, so who cares? Instead of deciding that too many people are being exposed to Covid because we took all our restrictions out and burned them, the government’s decided that too many people are being notified, so it’s created a list of crucial occupations whose employees can ignore the app if they’re double vaccinated–although they will at least have to test themselves.
Can people who are doubly vaccinated spread Covid? Why look! It must be time to talk about breakthrough infections! Because buried in that segment somewhere is the news that we don’t have a clear answer to that question yet.
Breakthrough infections
First we need a definition of a breakthrough infection, even if you already know it: A breakthrough infection happens when a vaccinated person gets Covid–or (it can happen with any matched pair of disease and vaccination) whatever else they were vaccinated against. When that happens, it doesn’t mean the vaccine isn’t effective. It means the vaccine isn’t 100% effective, much as we wish the Covid ones were.
That leaves us–or me anyway–wondering why one person will get a breakthrough infection and another won’t. The definitive answer is that it’s hard to say.
Thanks, Ellen. That was really helpful.
Sorry, but I can only pass on what I find. The direct quote is, “It’s difficult to determine why any particular breakthrough case happens.”
How large a dose of the virus you’re exposed to might make a difference–with the emphasis on might. Our individual immune systems will make a difference. They can be affected by health problems and by medications that make an immune system respond to the vaccine less enthusiastically.
And new variants can make a difference. The vaccines were developed for the Covid 1.0, or 2.0. We’re now onto–
Hang on a minute. I have to go look up the Greek alphabet and figure out where Delta comes.
We’re now at Covid 4.0.
It’s also possible for a person to have gotten a vaccine dose that wasn’t administered correctly, although that’s a lot less likely. And no, I’m not sure how you administer a vaccine the wrong way either. Maybe you let the stuff get too warm. Maybe you let it expire. Maybe you miss the arm entirely and inject it into the hat. That last one is the reason they don’t let me do vaccinations anymore.
People who are (fortunately) better than I am at figuring this stuff out are tracking the number of breakthrough infections, looking for evidence that the vaccines’ are wearing thin and booster shots are needed. So far, they haven’t seen it.
*
We can break breakthrough infections into a few categories, and in order of decreasing likelihood they are: 1, testing positive, 2, having a mild infection, 3, having a serious infection, and 4, dying.
Patients are strongly advised to keep themselves out of category 4.
If you’ve absorbed that advice–and it is important–we’ll move on to the question of whether fully vaccinated people who’ve been exposed to the virus should have to go into isolation. In the US, the Centers for Disease Control (citing “limited evidence” according to the article I found) says they not only don’t need to go into isolation, they don’t need to get tested unless they develop symptoms. The theory is that they’re less likely to infect other people than unvaccinated people with asymptomatic infections.
Other countries are making different rules.The evidence is limited, the lights are off, and we’re all bumping into the furniture.
What percentage of fully vaccinated people test positive after being exposed to Covid? If anyone has numbers on that, I haven’t found them.
What does seem to be well established is that breakthrough infections are rare, and we do have statistics (sort of) for categories 3 and 4–the one you want to stay out of and the other one you want to stay out of. In the US, 5,492 vaccinated people were either hospitalized or died and also tested positive for coronavirus. That doesn’t exactly say they were hospitalized for or died of Covid, but it’s as close as we’re going to get. That’s 5,492 out of the 159 million people who’ve been fully vaccinated. I’ll leave someone else to figure out what percent that is and just say it’s small.
Most breakthrough infections are mild, and the number of mild or asymptomatic infections will be larger, but again if numbers are available for that I haven’t found them.
A different way to live with Covid
Is it possible to return to normal life in some sane and safe way? A study from Barcelona points us toward a possibility. It followed the 5,000 people who attended a carefully controlled indoor concert.
People were screened on the way into the concert, using an antigen-detecting rapid diagnostic test (it’s called an Ag-RDT if you want to sound like you know what you’re talking about), and the test was done by nurses. At least with other rapid Covid tests, that makes it more reliable than when people do it themselves, probably because they maneuver those nasty swabs into the right spots.
Everyone wore masks–specifically, filtering facepiece 2 masks–the whole time. Presumably over their noses and mouths, not their chins or back pockets. They look like this. (I’m conducting a one-person boycott of Amazon, but I’m not above using them as a link if I don’t have to give them money.) They’re a kind of mask that offers more protection than your average cloth mask, but they’re disposable, which if everyone used them everywhere would create its own set of problems. Especially since a few of us out there hate throwing things away when they still look usable.
But enough of that. Let’s move on.
The event’s described as a concert but people danced. People sang (presumably along with the music but it shouldn’t really matter from a medical point of view.) No one was asked to keep 6 feet away from anyone, at least by the organizers, although some predictable number of individuals will have told some predictable other number of individuals to back off.
I don’t have details on the ventilation except for a passing mention of improved ventilation. Ventilation’s probably the most overlooked way to make work and public spaces safe.
The event was held in an area that at the time had a moderate rate of Covid and a low number of vaccinated people.
What happened? The followup found 6 cases of Covid two weeks after the event. Three of those were traced to sources other than the concert. Another person may have been in the incubation stage when she attended the event and could’ve been missed by the test. No one’s figured out where the other two cases came from.
Which isn’t bad for 5,000 people. So it can be done if we have the will to do it.
. . . and in the schools
In the US, the American Academy of Pediatrics is calling for all students, teachers, and staff to wear masks in school, whether they’ve been vaccinated or not. That runs counter to Centers for Disease Control advice, which exempts the vaccinated and says the unvaccinated should wear masks in school to protect themselves.
Even though–apologies, CDC–your average mask is better at protecting people around the wearer than at protecting the person sporting one.
The article I got this from has the first statistics I’ve seen on how many kids get multi-system inflammatory condition (called MIS-C, in case you have any need to address it directly): It’s 1 out of every 600 infected children and teenagers. That’s not the same as 1 out of every 600 kids, only out of the ones who get infected.
MIS-C is seriously serious and more often than not will land a kid in intensive care. It comes several weeks after the primary infection.
Informative!! Thanks for sharing. 🙏
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Glad it’s useful. Thanks for stopping by.
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Aw, a singing unicorn in a tutu.
If only all news, etc…
Nick (avoiding category 4), Whitley Bay, UK.
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Hi Nick. The unicorn hasn’t made its way to Whitley Bay yet? That’s disappointing.
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I guess that the economorons currently ruling us, laser-focused upon a return to ‘growth’, misread that as an opportunity.
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I would no longer put anything past them.
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Well hubby is well pleased that he now has a cool new phrase (Breakthrough Infection) to describe the last two horrible and frightening weeks in our household. Yes, he is doubly vaccinated, his second jab was back in May (Astra Zeneca) and he tested positive.
He only got the test because our youngest was in contact with a covid case. But youngest had TWO negative tests…..go figure.
Symptoms for all of us were sore throat, runnig nose and bad headache.
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I trust you’re all okay now.
Okay, that should be a question: Are you okay now? And how sick did it make you? I’ve read that the symptoms of the Delta variant aren’t the same as the ones we memorized for the earlier versions, but I haven’t gotten around to memorizing them yet.
The quick tests only pick up people with a fairly high viral load, which might explain why your kid was able to test negative but (presumably) transmit the virus. With the emphasis on might.
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We took the full lab tests— don’t trust the quick ones at all.
We are all fine now, and weren’t very sick. Hubby says it was two days of feeling like his head was going to cave in. Youngest ( he’s 20 by the way) apparently had a bad moment at two in the morning whatever that means. My menfolk are stoic. One day I fully expect to hear one of them say calmly “ I appear to have cut off my finger” .
;)
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That’s the downside of stoicism, I guess: the sacrifice of fingers. In the meantime, I’m relieved that you’re all okay.
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Thanks!!!
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Depending on who you get your news from in the US, the vaccine protects well against the Delta variant or breakthrough infections are running rampant, It’s actually possible to read both stories every day.
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I know. I subscribe to a nut-level e-newsletter that counts, gleefully, every breakthrough case. You may notice I don’t bother quoting it.
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Understood
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I’m seeing that unicorn a lot these days, usually after the government briefings – not that I watch them. I’m too busy looking for unicorns. If I want sensible advice and information, I come here. I’m also avoiding category 4 by staying under the covers, and when I have to go to the shops, by swerving the dissenters who don’t even need to hang their masks off one ear any more.
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If we can substitute unicorns for government briefings, that should improve our mental health.
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I’ll second that!
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Yes honestly think at this point that our governments hate us. Our provincial premier won’t even make health care workers get vaccinated, refuses to consider making vaccines mandatory at places like gyms, and we’re open all over the place. Might as well just stay home.
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In the future, if our species is around long enough, people are going to look back, shake their heads, and wonder what was wrong with us. It’ll mystify them.
It mystifies me, and I’m watching it in real time.
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There is no spiked protein until dupes take the bioweapon jab. Viruses do not exist.
All Virology is based upon the fraudulent Germ Theory created by the Jesuit educated Pasteur who was exposed by the scientist Antoine Beauchamp as a plagiarising quack.
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Sorry, but you’re too far out there for me to respond to.
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Perhaps this will help you:
https://worldtruthvideos.org/watch/the-final-rebuttal-of-virology-dr-stefan-lanka-english-translation_689TA4hcDABKBHa.html
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I repeat what I said above.
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So you post an article on a subject that you have not researched. How does that work?
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I researched a small area of history, how England became Christian. Do I know everything about it? No. I’m not a historian–and no historian would claim to know everything about a subject anyway. I know enough to tell you what I told you. I have no interest in following your theological arguments down a rabbit hole.
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We’re not discussing theology. The subject is Covid 1984.
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And from your previous comments, you’re still far down the rabbit hole. I’m not going to engage with you, my friend. I don’t see the point.
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The Truth can be found in the most unlikely of places – including rabbit holes.
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This is the last reply I’ll make to you: Saying something is the truth doesn’t make it so, nor does it convince me that it is.
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So tell me, how do you deduce what is Truth and what is a lie? Just curious.
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Another reason not to celebrate yet : we would have to ingest fermented soybeans in some form.
Which Mozart aria ?
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Well, if eating them isn’t going to work, the trick will be to bypass the entire eating apparatus, so I don’t think you need to worry about that. I keep thinking there’d have to be a way to invite the viruses out and basically butter them, one by one, with it, but I suspect that’s not practical.
Which Mozart aria? Um, dunno. You choose.
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I can’t believe we’re back to talking about mask mandates. This is so depressing. And I keep reading about people who refused to get the vaccine becoming converts on their deathbeds
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Unfortunately, deathbed conversions come too late.
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Answer to your lede question – possibly, if they’re farts! :D
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Well, somebody had to make that joke. Thanks for taking on the burden.
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Heh, I consider it my sacred duty! :D
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So you’ve been lifted bodily into heaven by now, right?
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Been propelled a good way along, that’s for sure! :D
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It’s always good to have a tailwind.
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I have been wondering about the Soybean juice about its possible application. Covid-19 can be destroyed quite easily (soap and water etc) the trick is the stop it spreading.
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Agreed, but the soap and water trick relies on friction. Natto seems to contain something that does the trick by itself, meaning it could be used as a cure, since it seems to be much too late to eliminate the virus entirely. So if they can figure out what part of the natto’s doing that, they might be able to use it as a cure for people who do get infected.
Maybe. It strikes me as worthwhile work.
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Nicely exlpained, thank you
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