EXCEL SPREADSHEET CAN'T CONTAIN UK COVID NUMBERS
https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-54423988
This is what happens when you have non-scientists in charge of big data projects.

IMAGE: SPIKE IN CASES IN MALHEUR COUNTY 10/3
(This from the Oregon Health Department Website)
Trusting non-scientific "information" doesn't serve anyone when a real pandemic is afoot.

DO WE WANT RAPID ANTIGEN TESTING HERE?  YES.
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-02661-2
These tests are quick and inexpensive, and help us detect people who have enough virus on board to be contagious.  While it is true that they won't detect very low level infections, they will give us a good clue as to who should be allowed to go to the grocery store, or work.  The CDC was wrong when they said only symptomatic people should be tested.  To control a pandemic that has so many asymptomatic cases you need to test everybody.  The goal is to keep people who are contagious from sharing air (or bathrooms) with others.  So yes, get the $5 test that's ready in minutes, and use it to decide whether or not you should quarantine yourself.  Push your employer and your local governments to get behind wide distribution of this simple technology. It will definitely help.

​

NEW REVIEW OF MANY STUDIES ABOUT COVID ANTIBODIES
​https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-18450-4

Released 2 days ago, this synthesis review shows that immunity to SARS-COV2 behaves in a normal way.  When a person has been quite sick and survived, they will likely have high antibody levels for that particular sickness--for a little while.  These are the people from whom you might wish to get convalescent plasma, because it's probably full of antibodies that could help.  But these antibodies ramp down pretty quickly once you clear the sickness.  A person who had the virus months ago will not have as many antibodies in their plasma as a person who just cleared it last week.  This is why there aren't studies to prove that convalescent plasma is a good treatment: it depends on the person's immune response and on the timing. 

IgM is the first kind of antibody your body makes, and appears about a week into an illness.  After that your body switches over to making IgG antibodies.  The fact that IgM antibodies decrease after the illness is NORMAL.  The IgG antibodies that are made next are the keepers.  They keep being made, but at lower and lower levels if you aren't still fighting the same virus.  This is also NORMAL.  Your body does the same thing for ever flu it ever encounters.  The fact that your body KEEPS making antibodies has to do with its MEMORY.  The immune system has cells called Memory B Cells--the ones that know how to make antibodies for a specific condition--they are your body's memory.  As long as your memory B cells survive, your body has a blueprint of how to make more B cells that can more antibodies to fight that remembered infection--in other words, it can respond faster.  

Memory B cells can live a long time but eventually they die.  The rate at which they die varies by age and lifestyle and also by what other infections you get.  One really good reason to get vaccinated against Measles is that getting measles infection can kill your memory B cells, making you MORE susceptible to things that you've had before.  And that stinks.  I hope that you are vaccinated for measles (the MMR is available if you aren't) and that you also get vaccinated for the flu this year, because it's good to protect your lungs. 

As for the COVID vaccine, we're likely to have a lot of options with varying efficacy that are available to most of us next year.  I don't know for sure what will come out, but I will say that for myself I will try to get one vaccine/year, hopefully different kinds each year, to help my body build up resistance by exposure to lots of different parts of the virus.  For those who are worried about adverse effects from vaccines, let me just say that they really are rare, a lot more rare than the diseases. Also you can also minimize your risk of adverse effects to vaccines by improving your ability to detoxify your body.  I can help with that for sure.  Spring and fall are good times for a deeper detox!

CDC GUIDANCE ABOUT COVID-19 FLIES IN THE FACE OF SCIENCE
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/17/health/coronavirus-testing-cdc.html
Several of our most important government agencies have fallen prey to anti-science populist politics and can no longer be trusted to sort through the information and tell us what to believe or trust.  We need good-faith gatekeepers of information in this age of excessive and some false "speech" clouding every question.  In this case the scientists (especially the ones that study infectious disease) are telling us that to contain this pandemic we need to test EVERYBODY and make sure that all the asymptomatic carriers are quarantined.  The CDC just issued a report saying that we shouldn't be tested unless we have symptoms.  This is what we have been doing, and it has resulted in nearly 200,000 dead in this country alone.  If we continue with this method, and with the likely efficacy of vaccines being in the neighborhood of 50%, and with the likely avoidance of the vaccine by somewhere around 50% of the population, we can expect A MILLION DEAD in this country alone.  So the CDC, in line with the authoritarian administration that has perverted it, is setting us up for an ongoing pandemic disaster.  Best get some great time outdoors with friends this fall while the weather is still good, because when wintertime comes smart people will keep their indoor social circles tiny.  TINY.

WE NEED TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENED WITH THE ADVERSE EFFECT
https://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/archives/2020/09/14/vaccine-transparency
It is not OK for vaccine manufacturers to hide the specifics of adverse effects, any more than it is OK for governments to hide the specifics of nuclear incidents.  If the people is to trust the makers of vaccines or the governments of countries, we need to hear prompt, factual information from them.

STURGIS WAS A MISTAKE
https://thehill.com/homenews/state-watch/515453-sturgis-motorcycle-rally-was-superspreading-event-that-cost-public
I understand that riding motorcycles is all about freedom.  We all want freedom.  But freedom involves being alive.  The people who traveled to Sturgis made a mistake.  The people who didn't wear masks when they were going to bars and concerts made a mistake.  The mistake causes innocent people to die.  I've been in Flagstaff AZ where a spike is happening, like many places, due to the mixing of college students.  One young man visited his father without realizing that he had the virus, and his father died.  This really does happen and it is a tragedy every time.

AGE IS STILL THE BIGGEST RISK FACTOR FOR COVID DEATH
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-02483-2
Of course there are the 100 year olds that survive the virus but they are outliers.  Basically the risk of mortality is near zero until age 50 and then it skyrockets.  This has been shown in lots of different human populations.  Protect your elders.

EUROPEANS + FERMENTED VEGGIES = RESIST VIRUS BETTER
https://www.news-medical.net/news/20200708/Study-links-fermented-vegetable-consumption-to-low-COVID-19-mortality.aspx
Basically if your gut is healthy your immune system will work better and you will be less susceptible to dying of the virus.  Eating fermented foods is a quick and easy way to assure that your gut has a steady supply of beneficial bacteria.

​

1/20 KENYANS w/ COVID ANTIBODIES BUT CASE COUNTS VERY LOW
https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/08/pandemic-appears-have-spared-africa-so-far-scientists-are-struggling-explain-why
The pattern may be similar throughout Africa, and testing is beginning to find out.  They don't hazard any guesses as to why so few Kenyans are getting sick or dying from this virus but I have one.  If you simply look at the photograph of two children in the article, and then compare that with a photograph of two children of the same age in the U.S. the difference is striking.  People there are lean, they are not overfed.  Here we snack ourselves into metabolic problems, and dine our way to fatty livers, high cholesterol and blood pressure, and a host of problems that all impact our ability to fight of contagion.  In other words the average skinny African kid is probably a whole lot healthier and the average padded American kid, and I suspect the adults show the same pattern.  Not many are repeating it but obesity is one of the biggest risk factors for a bad covid outcome, and here in America we're big.

​

Some days I see the emails with the latest COVID news and I just hit delete.  I don't need to know every single thing.  I don't have to think about it every single day.  I am curious, and attentive, but the value of a media blackout for morale cannot be overstated.  I get so fed up with the "news cycle" and the hopeless and repetitive nature of political reporting.  And I get really sad when I study on COVID.  It is good for me to turn it off.

We can't be hypervigilant all the time.  We're designed to nap. 

"MILD" WRONGLY DEFINED AS NOT NEEDING HOSPITALIZATION
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-02335-z
People who don't get hospitalized don't get medical follow-up either. We all know that some seek hospital care more willingly than others.  Some of us refuse to go to the hospital; we know it is full of antibiotic-resistant infections and stressed-out doctors and staff. I had a pneumonia that could have been Covid but I did not go to the hospital; I self-treated at home. My pneumonia was not "mild". I thought about going in. Many people who've survived the virus at home are having longterm after-effects. This author is absolutely right that we need a better way of categorizing and tracking the cases that did not result in hospitalization.

THE KIND OF MASK YOU USE MATTERS
https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/Does-your-coronavirus-mask-work-New-study-15473251.php
I've noticed that many police, highway patrol and fire department personnel are using what I would call "neck gaiters" for masks.  These are a single thin layer of polyester with some lycra for stretch. They drag the thing up over their mouths and noses when in close proximity with others. This kind of" mask" doesn't stay up well. Thin layers of fabric may stop large droplets but they are definitely not catching the aerosols which have turned out to be a major route of infection. Public servants who are in direct contact with the public should be wearing quality masks. Well, everybody should, but "should" doesn't get very far in America.

OVER 900 HEALTHCARE WORKERS HAVE DIED OF COVID
https://khn.org/news/exclusive-over-900-health-workers-have-died-of-covid-19-and-the-toll-is-rising/
POC's dominate the count and you can see from the photos that many victims of all colors are obese.  To reduce this grim outcome perhaps we should use front line workers who have fewer risk factors. Smokers shouldn't be on the front lines. People with hypertension, obesity, diabetes or a heart condition could (and should) be exempted from front line work. There's a great emphasis on PPE (personal protective equipment) and it is important, but the healthcare worker's baseline level of health and resilience is just as important.  People with immune compromise of any origin should not be expected to work with COVID patients. Period. There are so many obese nurses! They should not be put in this position. I heard on a podcast yesterday that 70% of our BMI is due to genetics: no point in punishing people for being heavy. We should evaluate the immune sufficiency of healthcare providers and place them accordingly. Those on the front lines of the pandemic should have top notch immune systems--and be most likely to survive the virus with minimal negative effects. Yes, I know there's a shortage, but seriously sending all these fine people to their deaths trying to help others?  This is murder.

ABOUT 10% OF COVID VICTIMS HAVE PROBLEMS AFTER 3 WEEKS
https://www.bmj.com/content/370/bmj.m3026
We're just starting to collect information about the after-effects of this virus but for a lot of people recovery is extremely slow.  This report has some excellent resources (links) for patients who are having trouble after they are supposed to have "recovered".  The list of possible lingering symptoms is long, and you are not malingering if you have chest pain or "lung burn" and would like to get some help.

A GREAT TIME TO QUIT SMOKING: EVEN YOUTH HIGH RISK IF SMOKE
https://www.jahonline.org/article/S1054-139X(20)30399-2/fulltext
Vaping is not protective. Using it just once in a while is not protective.  Inhaling smoke at all increases your risk, even if you're young. There has never been a better time to quit and quit for good.