COVID-19 (Coronavirus)

[Cedur]

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-55788924 shocking and devastating news from the netherlands

[ShadowStarX]

So there is a Brazilian variant besides the British and the South African ones?
Why am I not surprised...

[kr4k1n]

As long as people continue to travel abroad, there's always the risk of contracting it and bringing it back home

[Cedur]

My girlfriend is 550 km away. Still in Germany but too much of a difference to travel. *sniff* gonna be restricted to virtual contact for an indefinite amount of time ...

[ElectriKong]

The fuck?

[aero]

The fuck?

They're combing the usual anti-vaccine talking points, and some new ones for this specific vaccine. Like they're still using the "aborted baby tissue" argument for this even though it's a completely different type of vaccine, and they think the mRNA vaccine is loaded with genetic material to change your DNA even though that's impossible and contains just the instructions for the spike protein and not the full on virus which they also complain about in traditional vaccines.

That said, there is a right to protest and not get the vaccine but they don't have the right to shut down vaccinations for everyone else. These people don't need to be coddled, and should have consequences for the shutdown.

[ElectriKong]

So the currently available Covid vaccines are 'far less' effective against the South African variant of Covid-19 according to a new study, Moderna being 12.4X less effective and Pfizer being 10.3X less effective compared to the original variant, threatening the progress made so far.
https://thehill.com/changing-america/we ... a-covid-19

It should be noted that the vaccines are also less effective against the Brazilian variant, meaning that social distancing measures should continue regardless of the progress made so far with vaccinations in an attempt to prevent these 2 variants from becoming the dominant variants. Fortunately the UK variant, currently the dominant variant in both the UK and US, has been shown to have little effect on the effectiveness of the vaccines.

[kr4k1n]

I'm a little adamant about schools in my area reopening, yeah, only a few of us will be going back at a time, but new covid-19 cases could begin to surge at any point at the rate people are starting to gather again. My school's going to let some students come back after spring break on the 6th of April, starting with the elementary schoolers. Some of us can choose to stay at home and for those that will physically go to school, only a few students will be in class

[Cedur]

Would anyone want to get the Astrazeneca vaccine? (aka second-class vaccine?) I would not, even before today's news that Astrazeneca is put on hold in Germany. Even if I don't get a lung embolism, I still don't want fever and massive nausea and being knocked out for two days, while not even having full guarantee of inside and outside protection. Iirc they also proved not reliable on fulfilling contract duties to the european union.

I understand that people get upset when they're not getting their promised vaccination with Astrazeneca, but in my opinion it's not a real improvement for you. If it at least had a 95%+ likelihood to protect you, I'd think differently, but no, it's rather 70% only, or 30% failure rate in other words, plus it may strike you down like a flu.

Also today I learnt that since my grandma is an official care recipient due to her lung cancer, me and my mum are also in Priority Group II.

[aero]

I wouldn't say one way or the other with getting the Astrazeneca vaccine or any other for that matter. Vaccine passports are coming, HIPPA rules are being loosened for vaccination, and with the politicization of the virus and now the vaccine to take advantage of people; it just doesn't strike me as a good idea to share medical information.

[kr4k1n]

Hard pass for me as well

[francisbaud]

The recent reduction in number of new cases and deaths due to Covid-19 is encouraging (even though it seems to have nothing to do with the vaccine).

[Cedur]

That's pretty useless to say. This will stop as soon as we relax everything again. Why can people and politicians not understand that?

Anyway I realized that I was a bit too brash with my judgement of Astrazeneca. Maybe they'll reintroduce it soon again despite the few complication cases. But I stick to my opinion that it's my least favourite. I would not safely benefit from it, I would still feel not safe enough to travel around and move in public again.

I hope for Johnson&Johnson and Curevac to ramp up as well.

[ShadowStarX]

If I get vaccinated, I'll probably be more than happy to take Pfizer or Moderna, but regarding AstraZeneca and Sputnik-V, I am a little bit more skeptical, but still more leaning on the accepting side, though some extra research for AstraZeneca would've been better.
I am definitely not going to accept Sinopharm though, that one is just absolutely not potent.

The recent reduction in number of new cases and deaths due to Covid-19 is encouraging (even though it seems to have nothing to do with the vaccine).

https://i.imgur.com/4japTPp.png

You do realize that our number of cases and deaths exceeds that of the first wave's peak, right?

[kr4k1n]

That's pretty useless to say. This will stop as soon as we relax everything again. Why can people and politicians not understand that?

Apparently, my school district can't understand this either

[aero]

German friends, what's going on with this mask scandal?
https://www.reuters.com/article/germany ... SL8N2LA2UI

[Cedur]

I don't know, but the union parties are being punished for it in current polls.

[aero]

I've been reading about it today and it looks like a major corruption scandal around masks. The vaccine rollout there has also been slow and suspended the Astrazeneca vaccine with all that going on. The Astrazeneca one is DNA based, and people are already hesitant about the new mRNA vaccines so this doesn't bode well for the long term. A lot of misinfo is being spread about it with exaggerations of little available data. Then again misinfo is coming from official sources, even doctors, too which is just pathetic.

I would recommend following the CDC's guidelines and actively ignoring the news cycle about the vaccines: https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-nc ... oknow.html

[ShadowStarX]

I don't know, but the union parties are being punished for it in current polls.

Is it benefitting Grüne and SPD at least?

[Cedur]

Grüne gained 3 points recently in one of the polls. Hope they stay at this level until the election