https://www.who.int/europe/news/item/05-10-2023-what-is-wrong-with-me---children-face-a-frustrating-lack-of-answers-about-long-covid posted:

“What is wrong with me?” Children face a frustrating lack of answers about long COVID

Platystemon posted:

https://www.fema.gov/disaster/historic/coronavirus/economic/funeral-assistance posted:

COVID-19 Funeral Assistance

The COVID-19 incident period ended on May 11, 2023. FEMA will continue to provide funeral assistance until Sept. 30, 2025, to those who have lost loved ones due to this pandemic.
(..)

Platystemon posted:

DR FRASIER KRANG posted:

update to my coworker's "beef stew induced cough": he has no decided it's a stress related cough and is taking a half day to see a doctor.

Platystemon posted:

Platystemon posted:

Pingui posted:

Kinda surprised this program is still kicking and apparently is set to continue for a couple of years still (the page was updated a few days back, so it came up in my search):

https://www.science.org/doi/full/10.1126/science.adj0070 posted:

Mapping SARS-CoV-2 antigenic relationships and serological responses

Editor’s summary
The SARS-CoV-2 pandemic was marked by waves of new strains of virus differing in virulence and immune reactivity. The advent of each new variant of concern brought more human casualties and waves of onerous quarantine measures. To map the evolutionary trajectory of the variants, Wilks et al. obtained sera from people who had been vaccinated or infected with a range of variants of concern and applied antigenic cartography to visualize structural changes in the virus. The authors observed changes in immunodominance and immune escape depending on the variant that had infected the patient or after vaccination. Such analysis has implications for variant risk assessment and for selecting the next candidate vaccine strains that will confer the highest protection. —Caroline Ash

Structured Abstract
INTRODUCTION
Vaccination has greatly reduced the disease burden of SARS-CoV-2. However, since late 2020, variants have emerged that are able to escape immunity from vaccination and previous infections, including B.1.351 (Beta), P.1 (Gamma), B.1.617.2 (Delta), and B.1.1.529 (Omicron and its descendants). In combination with vaccination, infections with different variants form the basis of current population immunity against SARS-CoV-2.

RATIONALE
Understanding the antigenic relationships among SARS-CoV-2 variants, the substitutions that cause antigenic change, and how the immune response is shaped by previous infections, is crucial for understanding the evolution of the virus, determining whether new variants avoid neutralization from antibodies induced by current vaccines, and evaluating the need for vaccine updates.

To this end, we analyzed patterns of neutralization and cross-reactivity among a panel of 21 SARS-CoV-2 variants and 15 groups of human sera obtained from individuals after primary infection with one of 10 different variants or after D614G or B.1.351 vaccination. First, we sought to understand patterns of cross-reactivity and response breadth in postvaccination responses 4 weeks and >3 months after second or third vaccine doses. Then, we used antigenic cartography to visualize antigenic relationships between 21 SARS-CoV-2 variants and experimentally test point mutations to investigate the drivers of the antigenic changes observed in the antigenic map. Lastly, we investigated how serological reactivity postinfection relates to the primary-exposure variant.

RESULTS
Quantifying changes in cross-reactivity and response breadth after vaccination, our results show the largest increase between 4 weeks and >3 months after a second dose. In particular, we found that the main short-term effect of the third vaccination was to boost the magnitude of a response that had already become more cross-reactive rather than to generate significant additional breadth of cross-reactivity.

Using antigenic cartography, we inferred and subsequently experimentally tested our inference that antigenic differences among pre-Omicron variants are primarily caused by substitutions at spike-protein positions 417, 452, 484, and 501 (see figure, top). The experimental effect of these substitutions was largely consistent with those inferred from the map.

We also found that sensitivity to these substitutions varied greatly between individuals infected with different variants. These differences are consistent with substantial changes in immunodominance of different spike regions, depending on the variant an individual was first exposed to and the amino acid present at these positions in the eliciting variant (see figure, bottom). For example, whereas sera of individuals exposed to D614G, B.1.1.7, and B.1.617.2 variants are sensitive to changes at position 484, sera of individuals exposed to B.1.351 and P.1 are not.

CONCLUSION
Our results provide a comprehensive analysis of the antigenic variation between SARS-CoV-2 variants and the development of the immune response after infection or vaccination. The large antigenic effect of a small number of substitutions in the receptor-binding domain (RBD) of SARS-CoV-2 is similar to the pattern observed for seasonal influenza viruses, for which major antigenic changes are often associated with single or double substitutions. These substitutions in the SARS-CoV-2 RBD not only allow the virus to escape from preexisting immunity but also influence the regions of the spike protein that the immune response targets. Depending on their infection history, different individuals can thus be sensitive to substitutions in different regions of the spike protein. As individuals increasingly experience multiple infections, choosing vaccine immunogens on the basis of immunodominance considerations may be an important aspect in ensuring high vaccine efficacy across populations with different patterns of preexisting immunity.


_{Serological responses following exposure to different SARS-CoV-2 variants.
(Top) Antigenic map showing antigenic relatedness of SARS-CoV-2 variants. Variants are grouped by amino acid substitutions present at positions 417, 452, 484, and 501, with an additional grouping for the six Omicron variants. (Bottom) Average effect size of single substitutions at different RBD positions on sera from individuals with different primary exposures, colored by the amino acid present at the respective RBD position in the eliciting variant.}

Gunshow Poophole posted:

The absolute best was the guy on top chef who made it to like the last five contestants out of sixteen while concealing from everyone that he could neither taste nor smell his food lmao

Jackson I think his name was. He should have just been declared winner by fiat

StratGoatCom posted:

Look around in the various finance mags Marx recommended to keep an eye on what the money is thinking, and there's already a section of the money that's been freaking quietly for the last year at least.

Platystemon posted:

Skyl3lazer posted:

Right he kept asking other people to taste his food lmao

Platystemon posted:

Steve Yun posted:

every pharmacy I called on the Novavax finders said they didn’t have it. I have Halloween parties in two weeks so I think I’m gonna cave in and get mRNA like a scrub

floffytoffy posted:

This is true, FT, Fortune, and The Economist have been pretty consistent about acknowledging covid is a problem (for capital) the last couple of years, and there has been some pretty sober reporting that has surprised people every time it was linked. Though I don't understand why that doesn't translate into action among their target audience. Other than like, air filtration at Davos or w/e

The Oldest Man posted:

WaPo editorial board

Platystemon posted:

floffytoffy posted:

This is true, FT, Fortune, and The Economist have been pretty consistent about acknowledging covid is a problem (for capital) the last couple of years, and there has been some pretty sober reporting that has surprised people every time it was linked. Though I don't understand why that doesn't translate into action among their target audience. Other than like, air filtration at Davos or w/e

GXL posted:

I am the Costco PAPR man

NeonPunk posted:

I mean, we are already halfway if not 5/6th of the way there right now. Just ask the average person about the homeless.

It's going to really suck when the mass disabling starts. A coworker who was out sick for a entire week is back at work and hoo boy he looks terrible! He's been talking about how his body is a wreck and he's not even sure if he can manage to keep his working schedule

Platystemon posted:

Oracle posted:

Friends sister died of a blood clot in her lung. She was 55. Someone found her in her car by the side of the road, unresponsive. She taught high school choir and was just generally a really great person.

Rescue Toaster posted:

I'm not sure that's that clear. Rapids often do have a very faint indent that will catch a shadow, if there's no actual color to it I personally would read that as negative.

Rescue Toaster posted:

I'm not sure that's that clear. Rapids often do have a very faint indent that will catch a shadow, if there's no actual color to it I personally would read that as negative.

U-DO Burger posted:

according to the state-by-state info on that page, FEMA has received ~584,644 applications for covid funeral assistance, and paid out on ~483,823 of them. That is 100,821 unpaid covid funeral assistance applications, which is about a 82.75% payout rate.

Oracle posted:

Friends sister died of a blood clot in her lung. She was 55. Someone found her in her car by the side of the road, unresponsive. She taught high school choir and was just generally a really great person.

Animal-Mother posted:

The rate at which things like this are happening make me think about what the state of the world is going to be in, say, five to ten years.

quote:

Over time everything gets steadily more expensive and you start not being able to always buy whatever you want, either because it's now out of your price range or because there are actual shortages of things like coffee. Weather gets more severe and less predictable. People you know have their homes and livelihoods destroyed by extreme weather events and have to decide whether to rebuild or start over somewhere new with nothing. If you're unfortunate enough to live somewhere like the desert (lol Phoenix, Arizona) then it will become actually unaffordable to live there at all because you'll spend more on air conditioning than you make in income. Every summer you hear about hundreds of elderly people whose air conditioning broke and they died of heatstroke in their own home. Diseases that haven't been seen in your country for decades or centuries start to reappear, like malaria. Diseases that have never appeared in your country before, like Zika or Dengue, also start to appear. Mosquitoes seem to be the one insect that isn't dying out.

Insurance stops covering a lot of climate change-related damage, so as extreme weather events hit other parts of your country and people aren't able to rebuild where they lived, places like southern Florida get abandoned, not from some government plan, but from millions of people individually deciding to pack up and leave one day. The place where you live gets more crowded as internal migrants relocate only to find that life isn't any easier when they show up out of the blue with no job, no money, and no assets to sell. Your wages get cut at work because there are suddenly ten highly trained unemployed professionals who used to do your job in Miami, any of whom would gladly replace you. Your rent goes up even faster than usual because of all the population growth in your city.

The news is full of stories of weather destroying other parts of the world like Mozambique and Puerto Rico, and conflicts breaking out in areas hit by drought, famine, and disease. It's also full of stories about migrants trying to come to the developed world. It never mentions that the two things are connected, and never explores the fact that the migrants are moving because they can no longer live in their homes because their fields dried up, it didn't rain for ten years, and the desert swallowed their town. You notice the people around you getting more and more anxious about migration as their own incomes are getting stretched thinner and thinner and there are only ever more and more migrants. Electorates vote in more and more extreme right-wing figures who ban all immigration, militarize the borders, and implement ever-more draconian surveillance and monitoring of people inside the country as well. You're repeatedly told that if you're a natural-born citizen and not breaking any laws, you have nothing to fear.

Global supply chains start to break down as some regions of the world get less and less livable and some resources get either more difficult to extract and process, or get wiped out by climate change themselves, making prices rise even more and shortages hit even harder. As places start to see economic decline, people get restless and there are instances of mass unrest. On the news you see stories about mass demonstrations and massacres in random other places around the world. But here people are too busy working five gig economy jobs just to afford bread, they're too busy to protest. Governments get overthrown, countries descend into civil war, millions die in armed conflict, famine, and ensuing disease outbreaks. This further exacerbates the millions of people already trying to migrate to the less-affected developed world, but by this point our borders are so hardened that most of them die before they make it here. Deaths of hundreds or thousands of people trying to cross our borders across oceans and through deserts stop even making the news because they're so routine and we're too concerned with our own daily survival to worry about people we don't know.

What you do see on the news are feel-good stories about how a billionaire CEO now flies around in a solar-powered plane and he planted trees on his green roof. Meanwhile our cities are more choked with smog than ever, and the numbers keep getting higher. Fewer people are smoking than ever before, but lung cancer rates seem to be higher than ever. You get a particularly bad cough and you'd like to see a doctor about it, but they cut your benefits at work so you just hope it goes away on its own. The UN releases a report saying that we have three years to act if we want to avoid 8 degrees of warming, but by this point we've read so many reports saying we've already passed the tipping point that no one cares.

All our topsoil is vanishing and by this point even some people with jobs literally can't afford food. But the state is militarized enough that no one really thinks about protest except for the occasional spontaneous riot that doesn't accomplish anything long-term. Facial recognition software and ubiquitous surveillance and tracking means protesting is a one-way ticket to prison, if you aren't literally killed or maimed by the police breaking up the protest. And anyway, even attending a legal protest harms your social credit score and means you won't be able to get a loan the next time food prices spike and you can't afford enough to get through the week. Drug abuse, overdoses, and suicide are all rampant as people lose hope and decide to numb themselves or end it quickly rather than die slow, painful deaths. There are people literally starving to death in the streets and every summer you're pretty sure some of the homeless people lying on the sidewalk have died of heatstroke. Half the food you used to see in supermarkets is just plain gone, wiped out by disease or unable to grow where it used to or the supply chains that used to ship it in from halfway around the world have collapsed completely. The other half of the food is so expensive that you can only afford to buy the barest essentials. The wars on TV get worse as countries invade each other to get at the farmland that remains. Despite the police everywhere, law and order seems to be breaking down in your city, there are enormous waves of robberies, burglaries, home invasions, murders, as desperate people do whatever it takes to get through another day. The rich are comfortably secure in gated communities protected by private mercenaries with tanks and machine guns, who regularly use lethal force to defend their employers' property.

Eventually you die. If you're lucky it's in some extreme weather event and it's over quickly. If you're unlucky you starve to death because you lost your job and bread is too expensive. I hope you don't have kids because they still have a few more decades in this miserable hellhole, while civilization continues to collapse around them. They probably eventually die deaths even less pleasant than yours.

Some humans will survive, even in 15 degrees of warming. Our civilization won't.