WHAT DO YOU REALLY KNOW ABOUT VACCINES?

From Worldometer (new deaths from COVID-19 yesterday):

        DAY  USA  WORLD   Brazil    India    South Africa

June     9     1093    4732        1185       246          82

July    22     1205    7128        1293      1120         572

Aug    12     1504     6556       1242       835         130

Sept     3      1094    5886        830     1083         174
            9      1208    6222        1136      1168          82

Oct      8        957    6420          730       967        160

          21     1225     6849           571       703         85

Nov     4      1199       8192         276       511         74 

          11       1479    10178         564       550         60

          14      1260       8823        727       449         53

          17      1615     10502        676       472        118

          18      1964     10970        754       587        124

          19      2065     10758        644       584        115

          20      1999     11136        521       562          88

          24      2187     11710        638       489        115

Summary:  as feared the pandemic is not relenting.  

         

The coming Thanksgiving and Holiday periods will only worsen the rise of COVID-19 hospitalizations.  The question now is, will the USA reach a third of a million deaths by the inauguration of Joe Biden?  Around the World, the contagion is spreading.  For how long more?

On the political front:

• Certainly President Donald Trump will pardon a bunch of his cronies.  His staff is at work on how he will be able to pardon himself before being convicted.
• President-elect Joe Biden's policies are pretty obvious:
• Re-join the international arena, including the United Nations, to cooperate on global warming remediation and a range of topics abandoned by Trump.
• Reverse the environmental actions by Trump.
• Maintain an element of checks regarding China initiated by Trump, but work with allied countries to better contain what is looming as an international threat.
• Restore green energy activities, but in a transitional manner in tune with the price of oil, which, at $42/barrel, is a third the value of what it was a decade ago.  

Surely this is a prank, but first seen from a helicopter last week in Utah's Red Rock Country was a three-sided monolith 10-12 feet tall.  2001 had one of these at the beginning of film.  But this one was black and four-sided with a precise ratio of 1:4:9, or 1, 2 and 3 squared, supposedly left (thousands throughout the Universe, actually) by advanced extraterrestrials.

On afterthought, my posting on the truth about Thanksgiving is better presented tomorrow for obvious reasons.  Today is science day, so I'm crystallizing the essence of vaccine knowledge so you can anticipate the next phase of this current pandemic.

Looks like, worldwide, people are not taking sufficient precautions like mask-wearing and avoiding crowds.  Asymptomatic cases are causing havoc and there is yet no certainty of what percentage is represented by this group.  I suspect it will be just above 50% when someday determined.  So the solution comes down to an effective vaccine and successful inoculation program.

A vaccine contains a biological agent resembling a disease-carrying microorganism to provide immunity to that disease.  Mostly, it provides memory through antibodies and T-cells for the body to recognize the threat and react accordingly.  Vaccination is the process to apply this vaccine.

Edward Jenner used those phrases in 1798 when he transferred a virus, Vaiolae vaccine, which caused cowpox, into human subjects to prevent smallpox, a disease found in Egyptian mummies.  However, as early as the 10th century, China first used inoculation to control this ailment.   Louis Pasteur in the 1880's introduced a better second generation vaccine. The term smallpox was used from early in the 16th century to distinguish it from syphilis, which was known as the great pox.

In the 18th-century, 400,000 people in Europe annually died from smallpox.  Two out of three who got infected survived, but they were usually permanently disfigured in some way or went blind.  Smallpox killed up to 300 million just in the 20th century.  As recently as 1967 there were 15 million cases each year.  It took some effort, but smallpox has now effectively been eradicated worldwide since 1980.

Vaccines for tetanus and diphtheria followed in the 1920's.  The solution for Mumps came in the later 1940's.

Measles is so contagious that close contact will result in 90% infection of non-immune individuals.  In 1531 measles was responsible for killing half the population of Honduras and 20% the Hawaii population in the 1850's.  Between 1855 and 2005 measles is estimated to have killed 200 million worldwide.  Deaths remain at higher than 100,000/year

In the U.S., the infection rate was 3000 per million in the 60's, but with widespread childhood vaccination, the drop was to 1 in a million by 2000.  There remain outbreaks in certain communities, like Hassidic Jews in New York City, who avoid vaccinations, not because of Jewish laws, but a matter of attitude.  Natural health advocates, like Joseph Mercola, who has a degree in osteopathic medicine, tend to also shun vaccinations, arguing that nature provides a better cure.  His contention is that Big Pharma is evil.  He might be right, but the modern world offers alternatives, and some are better than others.

You would think a vaccine has long been available for measles, but it was only in 1963 that Maurice Hilleman of Merck developed the first vaccine, which was improved in 1968.

In the 1950's polio was largely eradicated by Hilary Koprowski and Jonas Salk, with Albert Sabin's oral vaccine in 1961.  Transgenic plants have been experimented with for next generation vaccines.

I was on the board of a company that was working on a vaccine for malaria. That was twenty years ago. This mosquito inflicted disease kills more than 400,000 annually.  Bill Gates announced $168 million to develop a next-generation malaria vaccine.  That headline was mis-named, for it should have stipulated, to develop the first ever officially approved malaria vaccine. Here are ten other diseases with no vaccine:

• Common Cold.
• Chagas disease (American trypanosomiasis)
• Chikungunya
• Dengue
• Cytomegalovirus
• HIV/AIDS
• Hookworm infection
• Leishmaniasis
• Respiratory Syncytial Virus
• Schistosomiasis

In 1989 I visited Papua New Guinea and survived an experience I will never forget.  I stupidly went there without taking any malaria precautions.  I also lucked out in La Reunion when I unknowingly went there in 2005 during a peak of their Chikungunya epidemic.

Why no vaccine for those diseases above has everything to do with priority and spending.   If the modern world had been threatened by any one of them, a vaccine would have been developed by now.  Future vaccines should eventually come for heart ailments, cancer and Alzheimer's disease, but lifestyles and the economy are not threatened by them, so there is no urgency today.

The success for a COVID-19 vaccine was almost predictable.  The USA alone has thus far spent $9 billion.  Double that sum and more for the rest of the world.  On May 4 the World Health Organization organized a telethon, gaining $8.1 billion in pledges from 40 countries.  Bill/Melinda Gates personally gave a third of a billion for this effort.  But you say, the next aircraft carrier will cost close to $15 billion when ready.  The Military-Industrial Complex is a very formidable lobbyist.  So was this Pandemic.

While success was expected, the challenge was formidable: 

• For never has a vaccine been so quickly made available.  
• The ability of science to use genetic sequencing helped.  
• By April, 80 companies in 19 countries were in this bio-gold rush.  
• As of last month there were 321 COVID-19 vaccine candidates, with 56 candidates in clinical research:  41 in Phase 1-11 trials and 15 in Phase II-III trials.
• Today, there apparently are ten vaccines almost ready.  
• Russian hackers have been active.  

• 
  WHO announced that 165 countries representing 60% of the world population have signed on to a COvAX plan for licensing and distribution to get their most vulnerable 20% quickly vaccinated.

• 
  On June 4 a virtual world summit (with a somewhat reluctant USA) raised $9 billion to support the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Imunization for 300 million children in under-developed countries.  The Gates Foundation dedicated $1.6 billion.

• 
  China:
• Provides low-interest loans to any vaccine developer.
• Made land available for production plants.
• By June, 6 of 11 vaccine candidates were coming from China.
• Gave $2 billion to WHO for COVID-19 programs.
• Provided $1 billion to Latin America and the Caribbean for vaccine accessibility.
• They then added Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand and Vietnam.

• 
  The USA announced Operation Warp Speed on May 15.
• Chief Advisor is Moncef Slaoui.
• Working with seven companies, including the top three:  Moderna, Pfizer and AstraZeneca.
• The Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine is a little less effective at 90%, but can be stored at room temperature and is cheaper by a factor of ten.

• 
  In general, companies have agreed to provide the vaccines at low cost, with profits to come later.
• There is a world attitude of rushing a vaccine even at risk, for the long-term effects will not be learned until much later.
• The measles vaccine and infection provide life-time immunity.
• There is no hint of immunity knowledge about the COVID-19 vaccines.

• 
  COVID-19 cases and deaths for the World are continuing to increase, and are expected to maintain growth until early next year.
• Herd immunity means that at least of 75% of the world needs to actually be vaccinated.
• The annual flu shot in the USA usually is taken by only half the population.
• However, there are signs that the 75% inoculation rate could be reached, maybe even in Year One, for some countries will make it mandatory.  Also, too, travelers on planes and ships will almost surely be required to show a global vaccine passport.  Perhaps this ID will also be required for restaurants and entertainment venues like sporting events.
• Even if herd immunity is never attained, it is unlikely for a significant next wave later next year, although certainly, like the seasonal flu period (cold weather periods in both hemispheres), there will be some return of COVID-19 again when schools open and cooler temperatures keep people indoors.

Song #33 is Polonaise in A, composed by Polish Frederic Chopin in 1842:

On hearing Chopin's Polonaise, Sand was left with a deep symbolic impression which she communicated to Chopin in their private correspondence. In one of their letters, she wrote passionately, "L'inspiration! La force! La vigueur! Il est indéniable qu'un tel esprit doit être présent dans la Révolution française. Désormais cette polonaise devrait être un symbole, un symbole héroïque!" ("The inspiration! The force! The vigour! There is no doubt that such a spirit must be present in the French Revolution.

George Sand (Amantine Lucile Aurore Dupin) was Chopin's soul mate, although six years younger than her.  She was short, smoked cigars, wore male clothing and had numerous affairs with both sexes; the one with Chopin went on for a decade.  They separated two years before his death at the age of 39, at which time he was penniless.  She was not there at his funeral, but others like Franz Liszt and Victor Hugo, were.

He composed over 230 works, mostly for piano.  Polonaise in A (by Arthur Rubinstein) came in his decline.  Reportedly, You Tube has 1500 pieces by Chopin.  Three hours of his best.  Not enough?  8 hours more.

The 1945 biographical film A Song to Remember earned Cornel Wilde an Oscar nomination for Best Actor.  Merle Oberon played George Sand.  Improptu in 1991 featured Hugh Grant as Chopin, Judy Davis as George Sand and Julian Sands as Franz Liszt.

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