WANING—After 3 doses, effectiveness of Pfizer vaccine against Omicron (BA1) hospital admission was 📌85% at <3 months but fell to 📌55% at 3-5 months. For ER admission, VE of 3 doses was 📌77% at <3 months but fell to 📌53% at 3-5 months. 2 doses worse. 🧵 thelancet.com/journals/lanre…
2) Trends in waning against SARS-CoV-2 outcomes due to the delta variant were generally similar, but with higher effectiveness estimates at each timepoint than those seen for the (BA1) #omicron variant.
3) Analyses were done for 11,123 hospital or ED admissions at Kaiser… ➡️effectiveness of two doses against the omicron variant was 41% against hospital admission and 31% against emergency department admission at 9 months or longer after the second dose. 👀
4) we have long known 2 shots has very poor efficacy against #Omicron. It was low ever since it emerged. Booster is still very very very important for protection with 70% efficacy against symptomatic infection early on.
6) and it seems the Moderna booster is very different than the Pfizer booster. The T cell response seems different too. Many experts advise mixing up the vaccines for broader immunity coverage.
7) And what is the efficacy protection against #Omicron mortality with 2 shots? It’s now only 59%! But with a 3rd shot booster— surges to 95%! You don’t want to stay at 59% protection. You want 95% with a booster folks! Please I beg you all. #getboosted
8) And again, data from 🇬🇧 shows, have had a full Moderna 2 shot series is much stronger than 2 shots of Pfizer or AstraZeneca. The data shows it’s over and over again. It’s the vaccine that has the least relative waning against #Omicron.
9) Here is an example of misinfo/ misunderstanding about vaccine efficacy / effectiveness. this is claim of 50/50 chance is a grave misreading. 55% vaccine effectiveness means it cuts risk by 55. So if instead of 2 in 100 with severe disease, it is lowered by half to ~ 1 in 100.
10) in case I’m not clear— the Moderna vaccine seems much stronger than the Pfizer vaccine. Even if the Booster for Moderna is just 50 mcg instead of Pfizer’s 30 mcg, it’s still likely stronger. Also the upcoming age <5 Moderna vaccine will be 25 mcg vs just 3 mcg for Pfizer.
BREAKING—FDA suddenly cancels meeting to update next season’s flu vaccines, with zero explanations. Any delays will jeopardize next year’s vaccine supply chain.
2) Folks who follow me know that I’m no bullshitter. I criticized past pandemic response right and left, and have called balls and strikes without bias. And I often say things that doctors & epidemiologists are whispering among themselves but don’t say publicly. (Cough cough) ⬇️
3) While I don’t recommend hoarding… I think stocking up on flu antivirals, which you can obtain prophylactically (preventively) from doctors if you ask nicely why you’re high risk, can be a good idea. I know many doctors, epidemiologists and virologists who do for their family.
Doctors are debunking RFK Jr’s claim that 20 hospitalized measles cases in Texas are there for mainly quarantine. Doctors on the ground say the 20 kids hospitalized are having trouble breathing. Oh and they are all unvaccinated against measles, which RFK Jr neglects to mention.
2) RFK Jr told Trump today there’s now 2 measles deaths.
Woke or biology? There are actually more than the basic “male” XY & “female” XX sexes. Why? Because biology also creates people with single X chromosomes, or extra chromosomes like XXX, XXY, XYY, or XXX+, plus many 🧬genes. 👉All I’m asking is— please be kind to others. Thanks🙏
2) “The most frequent SCAs include Turner syndrome (45,X), Klinefelter syndrome (47,XXY), Trisomy X syndrome (47,XXX), and Double Y syndrome (47,XYY).”
3) “The phenotype seen in SCAs is highly variable and may not merely be due to the direct genomic imbalance from altered sex chromosome gene dosage but also due to additive alterations in gene networks and regulatory pathways across the genome as well as individual genetic modifiers.”
I'm shocked a lot of doctors don't know about this newer flu antiviral drug called Baloxavir (XOFLUZA)... that shortens your flu illness by 33%, and reduces your viral load by day 2, versus what a placebo takes 5-6 days to achieve. Baloxavir also seems superior to TAMIFLU (oseltamivir) for smashing your viral load on 2 day, achieving what takes Tamiflu 3-4 days. CDC even lists Baloxavir on their website as one of the top 4 drugs that it tracks whether it works against new flu strains (it works)
2) "Baloxavir was associated with significantly more rapid declines in infectious viral load than placebo or oseltamivir (Figure 3A and 3B)." nejm.org/doi/full/10.10…
3) Adverse events for baloxavir were no different than placebo. in fact theres even hints that it could be lower than Tamiflu.
"Adverse events that were considered to be related to the trial regimen were more common in oseltamivir recipients (8.4%) than in baloxavir recipients (4.4%, P=0.009)"
⚠️WORST FLU SEASON ever since 2002-2003 when we began to track flu (red, first graph). Worst hit this year are children ages 0-4 and 5-17. ▶️We also have significantly LOWER flu vaccine uptake this year, one of the lowest flu vaccine coverages (red 3rd graph). Indisputable facts.
2) I don't need to tell you that certain US states have vastly lower vaccination rates than others. See map (lighter green, less flu vaccination coverage), and which have higher (darker green)...
If you want to see details and demographics on which state has the LOWEST flu vaccine coverage rates... the data is here. cdc.gov/fluvaxview/das…
3) It’s not just the flu that is going around… Gaines County, TX, where the epicenter of the measles outbreak is, has one of the lowest measles vaccination rates too.