Anyone here get COVID again recently?

babaganosh wrote:

I'm a physician and cared for patients with COVID throughout the pandemic and into its now endemic stages.

COVID-19 was a serious illness during 2020-2021. Sure, young and healthy people weren't dying at particularly high rates, but older and obese adults with moderate health issues were getting really sick and dying frequently. Small down ERs were intubating a person a day, a rate exponentially higher than pre pandemic. We were opening up "mini ICUs" in smaller centers where ICUs didn't exist before. Sure, you might joke and say "these people (older with comorbidities) had one foot in the grave" but these are people who likely had at least a decade left on this earth. The loss of that time is nothing to joke about.

Early vaccine trials and observational data suggested that vaccines worked well in those early stages at both preventing illness and spread. It made a lot of sense to get vaccinated early on - even if not for yourself, for the population as a whole.

Fast forward a few years and the virus has changed to become less virulent. Even for older adults, it's usually a relatively minor illness. Vaccines are less effective at preventing serious illness and spread and have rapidly waning effectiveness. I still recommend them (along with the flu vaccines) to those who are quite old and frail as they don't do well with any respiratory infection, including COVID. I haven't received boosters myself - I felt quite ill after my third shot and the personal risk-reward doesn't bear out. The minimal (and rapidly waning) benefit in population-level spread is not worth my own discomfort (to me). If I didn't have a reaction to the vaccine I would probably still get it for the small benefit to myself and the population.

What I don't get is how so many people seem incapable of understanding how knowledge, policy, and opinions can change over time as facts change and new knowledge comes to light. It's so strange to me how a medical intervention has become some hotly divided political issue.

Early in the pandemic, those calling COVID "just the flu" were uninformed. It was a serious disease which needed to be taken seriously. Arguments could be made about balancing economic cost but it was crushing the health care system.

Now, those who preach moral failing for not getting boosters and continue to live in a "pandemic world" are also uninformed. It's almost like people cannot change their beliefs without somehow feeling like they were wrong or have a moral failing?

babaganosh wrote:

I'm a physician and cared for patients with COVID throughout the pandemic and into its now endemic stages.

COVID-19 was a serious illness during 2020-2021. Sure, young and healthy people weren't dying at particularly high rates, but older and obese adults with moderate health issues were getting really sick and dying frequently. Small down ERs were intubating a person a day, a rate exponentially higher than pre pandemic. We were opening up "mini ICUs" in smaller centers where ICUs didn't exist before. Sure, you might joke and say "these people (older with comorbidities) had one foot in the grave" but these are people who likely had at least a decade left on this earth. The loss of that time is nothing to joke about.

Early vaccine trials and observational data suggested that vaccines worked well in those early stages at both preventing illness and spread. It made a lot of sense to get vaccinated early on - even if not for yourself, for the population as a whole.

Fast forward a few years and the virus has changed to become less virulent. Even for older adults, it's usually a relatively minor illness. Vaccines are less effective at preventing serious illness and spread and have rapidly waning effectiveness. I still recommend them (along with the flu vaccines) to those who are quite old and frail as they don't do well with any respiratory infection, including COVID. I haven't received boosters myself - I felt quite ill after my third shot and the personal risk-reward doesn't bear out. The minimal (and rapidly waning) benefit in population-level spread is not worth my own discomfort (to me). If I didn't have a reaction to the vaccine I would probably still get it for the small benefit to myself and the population.

What I don't get is how so many people seem incapable of understanding how knowledge, policy, and opinions can change over time as facts change and new knowledge comes to light. It's so strange to me how a medical intervention has become some hotly divided political issue.

Early in the pandemic, those calling COVID "just the flu" were uninformed. It was a serious disease which needed to be taken seriously. Arguments could be made about balancing economic cost but it was crushing the health care system.

Now, those who preach moral failing for not getting boosters and continue to live in a "pandemic world" are also uninformed. It's almost like people cannot change their beliefs without somehow feeling like they were wrong or have a moral failing?

fisky wrote:

babaganosh wrote:

I'm a physician and cared for patients with COVID throughout the pandemic and into its now endemic stages.

COVID-19 was a serious illness during 2020-2021. Sure, young and healthy people weren't dying at particularly high rates, but older and obese adults with moderate health issues were getting really sick and dying frequently. Small down ERs were intubating a person a day, a rate exponentially higher than pre pandemic. We were opening up "mini ICUs" in smaller centers where ICUs didn't exist before. Sure, you might joke and say "these people (older with comorbidities) had one foot in the grave" but these are people who likely had at least a decade left on this earth. The loss of that time is nothing to joke about.

Early vaccine trials and observational data suggested that vaccines worked well in those early stages at both preventing illness and spread. It made a lot of sense to get vaccinated early on - even if not for yourself, for the population as a whole.

Fast forward a few years and the virus has changed to become less virulent. Even for older adults, it's usually a relatively minor illness. Vaccines are less effective at preventing serious illness and spread and have rapidly waning effectiveness. I still recommend them (along with the flu vaccines) to those who are quite old and frail as they don't do well with any respiratory infection, including COVID. I haven't received boosters myself - I felt quite ill after my third shot and the personal risk-reward doesn't bear out. The minimal (and rapidly waning) benefit in population-level spread is not worth my own discomfort (to me). If I didn't have a reaction to the vaccine I would probably still get it for the small benefit to myself and the population.

What I don't get is how so many people seem incapable of understanding how knowledge, policy, and opinions can change over time as facts change and new knowledge comes to light. It's so strange to me how a medical intervention has become some hotly divided political issue.

Early in the pandemic, those calling COVID "just the flu" were uninformed. It was a serious disease which needed to be taken seriously. Arguments could be made about balancing economic cost but it was crushing the health care system.

Now, those who preach moral failing for not getting boosters and continue to live in a "pandemic world" are also uninformed. It's almost like people cannot change their beliefs without somehow feeling like they were wrong or have a moral failing?

I appreciate that you took the time to give your professional observations as a physician on the vaccine. Our situations are quite different. You were on the front line. I was able to almost completely isolate myself from society in 2020. For reasons that would take too long to explain here, I chose to take a wait-and-see approach after the vaccine was released.

My question for you is as follows:

Have you seen an increase in first diagnoses of cancer or heart disease since 2020? Have you seen an increase in cancers that previously were in remission?

Newname wrote:

Recently, the American Red Cross made a public statement asserting the safety of blood donations from individuals who have received the COVID-19 vaccine. The organization compared the COVID-19 vaccine to other vaccines like measles, mumps, or influenza, emphasizing that vaccine components are not found in the bloodstream and, therefore, pose no risk to blood recipients.

Surprise: It turns out that’s false.

A recent scientific study challenges this claim, suggesting that specific fragments of the recombinant Spike protein, distinct from the wild-type protein, are present in the bloodstream of vaccinated individuals. This raises concerns about the potential risks associated with blood transfusions from vaccinated donors.

A study accepted for publication in the Proteomics Clinical Applications used mass spectrometry to detect the presence of recombinant Spike protein in subjects who received mRNA-based vaccines. The findings revealed that the specific PP-Spike fragment, a component of the Spike protein, was found in 50% of the biological samples analyzed, regardless of the individual's SARS-CoV-2 IgG antibody titer. This indicates that the Spike protein can remain in the bloodstream even after antibody levels have waned.

All samples from the unvaccinated control group were negative.

wgvfswdvf wrote:

Covidiocy wrote:

Amazing how you guys always have to conflate politics and M.A.G.A. with otherwise reasonable people who have a background in “science” and merely were highly skeptical of the vaccines for anyone outside of the high risk groups. I simply read the literature, figured I could cultivate better immunity naturally than with a still experimental LNP-encased (non-targeted) mRNA vaccine coding for one super antigen by simply taking a few well-advised supplements to help mitigate the virus and inflammatory response. I’ve been proven right in my peer group, as has my family and friends who opted out. The unvaccinated among us are not getting Covid again.

So I just had dinner at my brother’s house yesterday and come to find out that his best friend, a pro-vax lunatic who shunned my brother for a period of time, had his heart stop, twice, at home. He had to get a pacemaker implant because he has an “electrical conduction” issue. This is a 50-year old, extremely fit cyclist with zero evidence of any cardiopulmonary disease. Now, can I prove this was the vaccine? No, I cannot. And, yet, I know so many people now who have similar stories. This case will never make its way to VAERS, even if the doctors could shed their cognitive dissonance and be reasonably open-minded about the cause.

Never voted for Trump, but, if you are so simple minded that it “has to be this way,” carry on with your sad, incurious, un-investigating life. None of what I’ve said is untrue, but if you need to tell yourself these “stories” aren’t true, I can’t stop you.

1. There are so many lunatics posting here, its hard to split hairs.

2. Getting covid is riskier than getting vaccinated.

3. I deal with teens and young adults all the time. Untold numbers of them have gotten covid multiple times. Sometimes its mild, sometimes not. Sometimes the first time is bad, sometimes the third. I have a relative that got infected early on, before vaccines, his sense of smell will never be right. But, hey, it was a mild illness!

4. Ignoring covid and going to school/work (esp unmasked) while ill, is immoral. That goes for flu etc also but flu isn't as insidious as covid because by the time your feeling well enough to do those things with flu, you probably aren't contagious.