Dr John's "Important Announcement" - we are all going to get it.

[vera99]

I've been following 'Dr' John since the start and always found him to be informative and useful. In his latest video, he has changed his tone somewhat.

If he's right, and the consensus is now that herd immunity is impossible, because the vaccine can't prevent transmission, then that's obviously very significant in terms of what the policy will be from now on.

This presumably also assumes that it's not going to be possible to 'tweak' the vaccine such that it can prevent onwards transmission.

He doesn't really talk about what happens if we get to a point where the health service can't deal with hospitalisation numbers.

Bring on the boosters, please.

I watched this yesterday evening. Not surprised, with all the breakthrough infections. I will be having the booster if offered (over 65).

I’ll definitely have the booster if offered but I suspect I’ll have a while to wait (45).

A timely reminder from him to keep your vitamin D topped up with supplements. He also talks about an end to mass testing so no more daily covid figures.

His conclusions are pretty depressing, though I guess it's not a surprise - the data has been pointing that way for a while. But I still had some hope that when young people and kids were vaccinated the spread would be significantly diminished and there might be only occasional outbreaks. But it seems more like it will just be circulating everywhere most of the time. We just have to wait and see what the long covid rate will be with that. I hope lower than the unvaccinated rate.

And yeah, I wonder how Aus and NZ are going to deal with this. Will they be forced to let it in once everyone is vaccinated? I don't see how they can stay disease-free islands forever.

Yup, I watched this yesterday and sighed - it seems inevitable now. I am mainly worried for my parents in their 70s, with some health problems... the sooner they can get a booster the better, and if it's every six months that's fine. They're still being very careful.

I take comfort from the fact that everyone I know who've had Covid since being vaccinated (all under 50 years old) have had a fairly mild illness - no more than a week feeling rough, no long Covid.

Well,yes. I read something interesting yesterday and now I can't find it but will look again. It said covid is reaching endemic state in the UK now and we will likely have this level of daily cases forever. It also said the other coronaviruses have around 45,000 daily UK cases. It was really interesting

British fatalism at its finest.

I've been watching him too and, like you, find his stuff informative and useful.

I didn't find this one depressing though? In fact it was more the opposite reaction as I'd been thinking all of this for a while, so it was somewhat selfishly validating in a way.

And yeah, I wonder how Aus and NZ are going to deal with this. Will they be forced to let it in once everyone is vaccinated? I don't see how they can stay disease-free islands forever
I wondered this too

It's not depressing - it's realistic

But surely this type of modeling is only accurate whilst there is no change in the dominant variant. The next few weeks could even bring a more dominant strain that all but irradicates covid-19, no?

@DumplingsAndStew

But surely this type of modeling is only accurate whilst there is no change in the dominant variant. The next few weeks could even bring a more dominant strain that all but irradicates covid-19, no?

And tweaked boosters or the pan-coronavirus vaccine currently under development may eventually bring herd immunity.

Dr John is just recycling old news from a few weeks ago quoting Andrew Pollard. Nothing he says should be taken as definitive evidence of anything. He’s been wrong about a lot of things parroting various British scientists. In this case he’s most likely right but with a virus like this the future is not written.

The big fault in the logic that “we’re all going to get it” is the notion it’s one and done. Plenty of people get reinfected and get more severely ill the second or third time.

He's right, we will all come into contact with this virus sooner or later. You'd have to live as a hermit in a cave to avoid it. However there's always the possibility of new treatments and new vaccines.

@OliveTree75

And yeah, I wonder how Aus and NZ are going to deal with this. Will they be forced to let it in once everyone is vaccinated? I don't see how they can stay disease-free islands forever I wondered this too

NSW premier has already stated international borders will reopen once 70% double vaccinated. This is what I was expecting to happen and can’t see any reason why it won’t. What else can be done?

@IndigoC

British fatalism at its finest.

British fatalism pragmatism at its finest.

We'll probably never see Whitty/Valance/Van Tam on a triple bill again - Van Tam would make a good I'm a Celebrity guest should he wish to branch out. Whitty would just sulk and Valance would get the boot early on no doubt...

And yeah, I wonder how Aus and NZ are going to deal with this. Will they be forced to let it in once everyone is vaccinated? I don't see how they can stay disease-free islands forever.

NSW and Victoria have raised the white flag and accepted the delta is endemic and won't be eliminated so, realistically, this means the rest of Australia will eventually follow suit (one way or the other).

NZ is a bit of an unknown quantity. Yes, they really needed Singapore, Australia, Fiji et al for the bubble plan to work as an erstwhile "open" nation, otherwise they essentially are hermitted away from the world. As a Kiwi though, I would never underestimate the potential for a good political digging in of heels, so watch this space.

I'd like to go home and see my family before I or they die, so hopefully NZ will find a way to open up at some point, at very least to citizens with family to visit.

British pragmatism at its finest.

The same pragmatism that led to 50,000-100,000 unnecessary deaths while vaccines were coming online.

Plenty of people get reinfected and get more severely ill the second or third time.

Incidence of reinfection is very low. Incidence of more severe illness during reinfection is even lower.

@bumbleymummy

Plenty of people get reinfected and get more severely ill the second or third time.

Incidence of reinfection is very low. Incidence of more severe illness during reinfection is even lower.

CDC study out in last few days shows that 36% people never seroconvert (mostly younger people).

wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/27/9/21-1042_article

If you’re quoting British numbers they don’t even include the vast majority of people who got initially infected in wave 1 because there was essentially no testing!

CDC study out in last few days shows that 36% people never seroconvert (mostly younger people).

Not having anti-bodies doesn’t mean no immune response.

As bumbley suggests, confirmed reinfections numbers are still very low, even if we conclude some didn’t get picked up the first time.

Reinfection can happen, but thus far, it doesn’t appear to be very common.

It's very repetitive. He covers the same point about not needing mass testing about four times!

But yeh fair enough..

I think a lot of people haven't accepted or realised we will all get covid at some point

@ LaurieFairyCakes
It's not depressing - it's realistic

It can be both surely?

I don't find it depressing. More inevitable, and hopefully manageable.

Where are they on "tweaking" for variants?