The Coronavirus, not the beer

[thethe]

This video was from a year ago

Alex Jones ended up being right about a lot of things.

[acesfull86]

The anti-science crowd mocks and heckles the CDC at literally every step of the way.

Plenty of room for someone to believe in science and think the CDC sucks

[acesfull86]

https://reason.com/2021/07/30/the-pr...tes-that-risk/

"Every 20 vaccinated people, one or two of them could get a breakthrough infection," Walensky told CNN's John Berman. That statement, which implies that 5 to 10 percent of vaccinated people will catch COVID-19, grossly exaggerates the odds of a breakthrough infection. Walensky seems to have misconstrued the meaning of the effectiveness rates reported in vaccine studies, which is a pretty serious mistake for the head of the CDC to make.

When a vaccine is described as 90 percent effective against infection, that does not mean 10 percent of vaccinated subjects were infected. Rather, it means the risk of infection among vaccinated people was 90 percent lower than the risk among unvaccinated people. As the CDC noted on Tuesday, when it issued its revised mask guidance, post-approval studies of COVID-19 vaccines typically have found that they reduce the risk of infection by 86 percent to 99 percent. That means the odds of a breakthrough infection were much lower than Walensky suggested on CNN.

In one U.S. study of adults who had received the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines, for example, the incidence of positive COVID-19 tests among fully vaccinated subjects was 0.048 per 1,000 person-days, compared to 0.43 per 1,000 person-days among the unvaccinated controls, yielding an effectiveness rate of 89 percent. A study of U.S. health care workers put the incidence of infection at 1.38 per 1,000 person-days when the subjects were unvaccinated, compared to 0.04 per 1,000 person-days when they were fully vaccinated, yielding an effectiveness rate of 97 percent. In both cases, the risk of a breakthrough infection was at least an order of magnitude lower than the 5-to-10-percent estimate that Walensky offered.

…

Last spring, the misconception that seems to underlie Walensky's risk estimate generated an erroneous CNN story that claimed vaccinated air travelers face a 10 percent risk of infection. Confusion about vaccine effectiveness rates continues to show up in press coverage of COVID-19. Yesterday NPR quoted Kathleen Neuzil, director of the Center for Vaccine Development and Global Health at the University of Maryland, as saying that "even with a 95% efficacious vaccine, you will have one in 20 vaccinees who are exposed get the disease."

I emailed Neuzil about that statement, which is similar to what Walensky said on CNN. "I was actually misquoted on that one," Neuzil said, "and you are the first one to pick up on it (or at least reach out to me about it!). Sometimes in simplifying we don't get the message right. The bottom line is that vaccine isn't 100% protective, and even at high levels of protection we will have breakthrough."

That bottom line is certainly correct. But in warning people about that possibility, public health officials like Walensky should not distort the underlying science by implying the risk is much bigger than the evidence indicates. This episode is reminiscent of Walensky's hyperbole about the risk of outdoor COVID-19 transmission, which misrepresented the study she cited in several significant ways.


—————

*shrug* oops! *shrug*

Guess it’s too much to ask that the director of the CDC communicate risk to the American people in an articulate, honest, and accurate way.

It’s only, ya know, ******* central to what they’re supposed to do.

[sturg33]

https://reason.com/2021/07/30/the-pr...tes-that-risk/

"Every 20 vaccinated people, one or two of them could get a breakthrough infection," Walensky told CNN's John Berman. That statement, which implies that 5 to 10 percent of vaccinated people will catch COVID-19, grossly exaggerates the odds of a breakthrough infection. Walensky seems to have misconstrued the meaning of the effectiveness rates reported in vaccine studies, which is a pretty serious mistake for the head of the CDC to make.

When a vaccine is described as 90 percent effective against infection, that does not mean 10 percent of vaccinated subjects were infected. Rather, it means the risk of infection among vaccinated people was 90 percent lower than the risk among unvaccinated people. As the CDC noted on Tuesday, when it issued its revised mask guidance, post-approval studies of COVID-19 vaccines typically have found that they reduce the risk of infection by 86 percent to 99 percent. That means the odds of a breakthrough infection were much lower than Walensky suggested on CNN.

In one U.S. study of adults who had received the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines, for example, the incidence of positive COVID-19 tests among fully vaccinated subjects was 0.048 per 1,000 person-days, compared to 0.43 per 1,000 person-days among the unvaccinated controls, yielding an effectiveness rate of 89 percent. A study of U.S. health care workers put the incidence of infection at 1.38 per 1,000 person-days when the subjects were unvaccinated, compared to 0.04 per 1,000 person-days when they were fully vaccinated, yielding an effectiveness rate of 97 percent. In both cases, the risk of a breakthrough infection was at least an order of magnitude lower than the 5-to-10-percent estimate that Walensky offered.

…

Last spring, the misconception that seems to underlie Walensky's risk estimate generated an erroneous CNN story that claimed vaccinated air travelers face a 10 percent risk of infection. Confusion about vaccine effectiveness rates continues to show up in press coverage of COVID-19. Yesterday NPR quoted Kathleen Neuzil, director of the Center for Vaccine Development and Global Health at the University of Maryland, as saying that "even with a 95% efficacious vaccine, you will have one in 20 vaccinees who are exposed get the disease."

I emailed Neuzil about that statement, which is similar to what Walensky said on CNN. "I was actually misquoted on that one," Neuzil said, "and you are the first one to pick up on it (or at least reach out to me about it!). Sometimes in simplifying we don't get the message right. The bottom line is that vaccine isn't 100% protective, and even at high levels of protection we will have breakthrough."

That bottom line is certainly correct. But in warning people about that possibility, public health officials like Walensky should not distort the underlying science by implying the risk is much bigger than the evidence indicates. This episode is reminiscent of Walensky's hyperbole about the risk of outdoor COVID-19 transmission, which misrepresented the study she cited in several significant ways.


—————

*shrug* oops! *shrug*

Guess it’s too much to ask that the director of the CDC communicate risk to the American people in an articulate, honest, and accurate way.

It’s only, ya know, ******* central to what they’re supposed to do.

She's giving Fauci a serious run for his money on incompetence

[sturg33]

They make a point

[sturg33]

They can’t even tell the difference between the ccp virus and influenza.

Completely manufactured panic and so many useful idiots slurp it up.

It's a stunning level of incompetence

[sturg33]

Lol

[sturg33]

If she believed what she says, she wouldn't act this way.

It's not about health. Never has been.

The useful idiots are quite useful as they laugh at us

[acesfull86]

She's giving Fauci a serious run for his money on incompetence

Reasonable people can disagree on the size and scope of government and how much power/influence it should have over us. The one thing we should all be able to agree on is that whatever government we have is able to dispense good, reliable public health information in a clear way. On that count, our government has failed in spectacular fashion over and over during this crisis, and too many people seem disinterested in even acknowledging that there's a reason to be critical. I don't get it.

[nsacpi]

Reasonable people can disagree on the size and scope of government and how much power/influence it should have over us. The one thing we should all be able to agree on is that whatever government we have is able to dispense good, reliable public health information in a clear way. On that count, our government has failed in spectacular fashion over and over during this crisis, and too many people seem disinterested in even acknowledging that there's a reason to be critical. I don't get it.

Go back to the botched tests in the early days. A lot of ****ups to go around. My son worked at CDC until last August. It is an enormous bureaucracy that got complacent and arrogant. Some of their failures have been truly shocking.

[sturg33]

Reasonable people can disagree on the size and scope of government and how much power/influence it should have over us. The one thing we should all be able to agree on is that whatever government we have is able to dispense good, reliable public health information in a clear way. On that count, our government has failed in spectacular fashion over and over during this crisis, and too many people seem disinterested in even acknowledging that there's a reason to be critical. I don't get it.

The people who won't acknowledge it are Mindless sheep and/or support the tyrannical agenda that the CDC is leading

[thethe]

The nature of this virus should have never led to this response.

The way forward was obvious since we got the early data on Italy and Europe in early 2020 and now we are basically back to where we started and we will still have to continue on with the right approach eventually. The goal is not to stop people from getting the virus. Its about stopping specific people and now they are protected.

A reasonable person would then say lets move forward as normal before but there is no way these new powers are going to be given up.

[acesfull86]

Go back to the botched tests in the early days. A lot of ****ups to go around. My son worked at CDC until last August. It is an enormous bureaucracy that got complacent and arrogant. Some of their failures have been truly shocking.

The bolded is what I think it comes down to...individually, most of the people there are probably very good, but it's the nature of the beast

[nsacpi]

A reasonable person would say get the vaccine.

[zbhargrove]

The CDC is a train wreck at the moment. Was a train wreck under Trump too

[sturg33]

A reasonable person would say get the vaccine.

The vaccine is very likely the cause of variant strains

[sturg33]

I've been told for 18 months that questioning them is an attack on science

[thethe]

A reasonable person would say get the vaccine.

If the virus is spread amongst the vaccinated population then I'm not sure why it matters if healthy people are taking it.

And there is an argument that if too many are vaccinated the virus will more quickly adapt and then make them less effective.

[sturg33]

Australia has deployed the military to enforce its insane lockdowns

I once again invite out lefty friends to comment on whether they have gone too far

Any takers?

I guess not. The left will support quite literally any measure if they are sufficiently scared

[thethe]

The vaccine is very likely the cause of variant strains

We have turned healthy people into virus production plants.