Researchers from Israel's Clalit HMO, led by @RanBalicer, find Pfizer Covid vaccine reduces symptomatic disease by 94% and serious disease by 92%.
@RanBalicer The research included 600k vaccinated people aged 16 and up, of whom 170k were over 60.
@RanBalicer Each vaccinated person was 'paired' with a unvaccinated person with a similar age, health and risk profile, creating a control group of 600k and a vaccinated group of 600k.
@RanBalicer The Clalit researchers calculated the reduction in serious disease to be 92%, but with a range of 91-99%. More precise data will become available as more time passes from vaccination.
@RanBalicer Another piece of good news: the effectiveness of the Pfizer vaccine at preventing symptomatic and serious illness was consistent across age groups, including over-70s
Some of the QAnon groups on Telegram are very big, but the members have some doubts. Here's an 2017 Q drop posted just now to a group with 180,000 members. I assume the poster wanted everyone to be reassured by the last line about "zero risk of impeachment". But...
People in the group don't understand. What's the relevance of some 2017 post about Jeff Sessions? Q believers try to get the discussion back on track. "future proves past... ask around". But some of the people are frustrated.
This 180k member QAnon group, with , is full of people who don't believe in QAnon. Hardcore Trumpers who joined for the community.
"I like trump i think what they're doing to him is disgusting and shameful!! But all these predictions make me feel like im listening to miss Cleo"
Israel is perhaps the first country to see significant vaccine hesitancy, despite vaccines being free and trivial to access to all over-16s. Telling people that they're protecting others could be a strong tool to encourage younger people to get jabbed.
The people who aren't getting vaccinated are not, on the whole, anti-vaxxers. They're just not sure it's worth it to take the time, or they don't want the side effects, or they'll get it at some point but they're busy right now.
Israel actually does incentivise vaccination. Vaccinated people are exempt from self-isolation when exposed to a Covid case, and may eventually be allowed to go to large gatherings closed to the unvavxed. But those benefits seem a long way away when nothing's open.
It seems that Facebook took down a Gaza-UAE network of fake accounts and pages that was boosting Muhammad Dahlan and UAE interests while attacking Mahmoud Abbas and the UAE's regional rivals.
The network also impersonated think tank and news websites in the UK and Israel, including popular Israeli news rumour site @RotterNet
It was actually a fairly large network, and even spend a little money on ads. Full report from Facebook here: about.fb.com/wp-content/upl…
Local media report a shooting attack on a health clinic in Buffalo, Minnesota. Reports of bombs used by the attacker.
AP reports multiple casulaties, one person in custody but unclear if the apprehended person is the shooter. Some media reported explosives were used but other reports haven't mentioned it. apnews.com/article/shooti…
We don't know if the attack is linked to Covid denial or antivax sentiment. Let's wait before jumping on speculative motives.
Positive vaccine news! An initial statistical analysis estimates that vaccinated people who do test positive for the coronavirus in PCR are likely to be LESS infectious. @erlichya's team estimate these people have 1.6x to 20x lower viral load than unvaccinated people.