TallGuyJohninBKK

Yes, boosters are now part of the plan, kind of like flu shot vaccines are required annually, and no one gets great distressed about that. But, if you've been following the news lately, you'd find that Pfizer and Merck have just recently unveiled new anti-COVID pills that, while not yet approved by regulators, have shown very high levels of efficacy (up to 89% in trials) in preventing illness and death, similar to the better vaccines. So if those end up being approved for being both effective and safe, the whole process of protecting yourself and others may become a whole lot easier. Also, for the record, people who have been fully vaccinated are MUCH LESS likely to contract the virus than those who are unvaccinated. And if the fully vaccinated person is one of the minority who does end up getting infected, their odds of having any serious medical issues are many times less likely than the comparable unvaccinated person. That's what the medical science has shown. https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/pfizer-says-antiviral-pill-cuts-risk-severe-covid-19-by-89-2021-11-05/ Pfizer says its antiviral pill slashes risk of severe COVID-19 by 89% "Nov 5 (Reuters) - Pfizer Inc's (PFE.N) experimental antiviral pill to treat COVID-19 cut by 89% the chance of hospitalization or death for adults at risk of severe disease, the company said on Friday, as its CEO vowed to make this promising new weapon in the fight against the pandemic available globally as quickly as possible. The trial's results suggest that Pfizer's drug surpasses Merck & Co Inc's (MRK.N) pill, molnupiravir, which was shown last month to halve the chance of dying or being hospitalized for COVID-19 patients at high risk of serious illness. Pfizer's pill, with the brand name Paxlovid, could secure U.S. regulatory approval by the end of the year. Pfizer said it plans to submit interim trial results to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) before the Nov. 25 U.S. Thanksgiving holiday. The trial was stopped early due to its high success rate." (more)

Some vaccines, as born out by numerous studies, are clearly more effective than others at preventing COVID infections and preventing serious illness and death. None of them are perfect or absolute, but that doesn't mean they're all the same when it comes to doing the job they're intended for.

Hold the presses!!! It's taken how many years now and how many hundreds of meetings for the Thai government (supposedly) to stop calling its seasonal widespread crop burning and vehicle emissions health disaster "DUST," and start calling it what it always has been... AIR POLLUTION, and bad air pollution at that!

My understanding was.... the PT Party folks had a LOT of Thai rice left over from their former government's fake government-to-government rice deals with the Chinese. So I guess, they didn't mind throwing a bit around Parliament. ????

Long gone, according to the news reports...

I was going to say.... wonder if this episode is the handywork of the GPO consciously buying dodgy ATKs from China, despite warnings that they were unreliable.

I'm not giving an endorsement to the view, just repeating it... My Thai wife and her family WANT to get vaccinated, but they're firmly insistent that they won't be vaccinated with Sinovac or Sinopharm -- and are holding out for purchased Moderna, which has yet to materialize. They won't be taking up the governor on his generous SV/AZ offer.

No one seems to be asking the simple question -- what the heck business does the Thai military have owning or controlling FARM lands??? Like, they don't have enough to do in defending the nation? They need to be branching out into all kinds of non-defense and non-military related ventures in order to occupy their time and fill their pockets?

Maybe you think you live in a world of 100% absolutes, only black and white, yes and no. But that's not the reality of the world. It's often shades of gray, such as with the coronavirus and vaccines. It's all about the scientific reality that reflects that, and not about fear. The better vaccines do a very good job of preventing death and serious illness from COVID -- but not at the 100% levels, more like in the 90+% levels at the outset. But then there are the pesky less than best vaccines that have lesser rates of preventing death and serious illness, including many of the types originally given to most people in Thailand. So vaccinated people in general may be largely protected, but there's no absolute guarantee on a person to person basis. Likewise with the ability to contract and then spread the coronavirus infection, the better vaccines are believed to lessen the likelihood of a vaccinated person becoming infected. And if that vaccinated person does become infected, the vaccine is believed to lessen the likelihood that they can infect others (by lessening the duration of their period of infectiousness, the scientists believe). Thus once again, the vaccines improve your odds, but are no absolute guarantee on a person to person basis. So those are the reasons for continuing prudent, reasonable social measures to reduce and limit the risks of CV infections and illness/death in a society. Because while the vaccines can do a lot of good, they're not perfect and absolute preventers of CV infection, illness and death. And of course, in Thailand and elsewhere, there remain large portion of society that haven't been fully vaccinated even now, and remain at risk despite the availability of vaccines.

Early on in the pandemic, that particular scientist estimated that the U.S. might have up to 10,000 deaths from COVID.... Turns out, he was more than a little bit wrong about that, along with various other things too. "If we assume that case fatality rate among individuals infected by SARS-CoV-2 is 0.3% in the general population — a mid-range guess from my Diamond Princess analysis — and that 1% of the U.S. population gets infected (about 3.3 million people), this would translate to about 10,000 deaths. This sounds like a huge number, but it is buried within the noise of the estimate of deaths from “influenza-like illness.” https://www.statnews.com/2020/03/17/a-fiasco-in-the-making-as-the-coronavirus-pandemic-takes-hold-we-are-making-decisions-without-reliable-data/ That above was Ioannidis' flawed delusion in March 2020. Here's the current reality he totally missed: https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/580006-us-passes-grim-milestone-of-750000-covid-19-deaths "The United States has surpassed the sobering milestone of 750,000 COVID-19 deaths despite the widespread availability of vaccines. According to Johns Hopkins University’s official count, the U.S. had 750,431 confirmed deaths due to the coronavirus as of Thursday morning. The U.S. has had more than 46 million confirmed cases of COVID-19 since the start of the pandemic."

The respiratory route has been the predominant means of transmission, far more than eyes or even surfacces contact... So I've worn N95 face masks ever since the start of the pandemic. Though, I will admit, at the height of the pandemic in BKK earlier this year, when I had to go outside and mix with people on someplace like BTS, I also was wearing glasses and keeping my eyes closed at times, just to be on the safer side. And cleaning my hands with alcohol gel, etc etc.

Ya, MSN sometimes changes their links after a period of time. Here's link direct to the CDC study on that topic: https://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2021/s0806-vaccination-protection.html New CDC Study: Vaccination Offers Higher Protection than Previous COVID-19 Infection

For most of us, it's nothing about fear. It's about a sense of social and civic responsibility, including to those around us, our spouses, children, friends, etc. As a age 60+ person, I've been wearing face masks consistently since the beginning of the pandemic. I have a Thai wife. Before I was fully vaccinated, I didn't want to leave her a widow if I was to get sick and die of COVID. I don't want to get sick and end up hospitalized in Thailand, if I can take simple. prudent steps to greatly lower the risk of that. Now that I've been fully vaccinated, my risks of serious illness or death are greatly less, but not eliminated. And meanwhile, my wife has not yet been fully vaccinated. So I continue to wear a face mask (apart from the fact it's the law in Thailand) because how would I feel if I caught the virus while not wearing a mask, and then spread it to her, and she became sick or even died -- all because I chose to not excercise prudent protective measures in the midst of a worldwide pandemic. It's not about fear. It's about having some sense of personal, familial and social responsibility.

If you were/are a theater nurse, then you surely should be aware of the N95 class masks made by 3M and others that are highly effective at both preventing the wearing from spreading a virus, as well as preventing the wearing from inhaling virus material. What surgeon wear/wore in operating theaters to prevent themselves from potentially spreading their own germs to the patient in a pre COVID world is an entirely different scenario and situation from needing to protect both medical staff and patients from a highly contagious virus that's become a worldwide pandemic.

Masks provide varying levels of protection from the wearer inhaling virus material, depending on the quality/type of mask and how well it's fit on the wearer's face. Some are very effective for that like N95 masks, others like the drugstore ties kind, not so much. But the other reason a responsible person would wear a mask is to also prevent themselves from potentially unknowingly becoming infected with the coronavirus and then spreading the virus to those around them, including those such as yourself who apparently refuse to wear a mask. For better or worse, we still live in a world where people such as yourself sometimes have the freedom to act irresponsibly toward those around them.

Well, in Thailand, it probably actually is... because of the nature of the typical Thai nightclub/pub for Thai patrons. Bunches of people clustered closely around tables (no social distancing), not wearing masks, often sharing glasses of drinks, and utensils for food plates/bowls. Typically poor ventillation relative to the numbers of patrons packed inside. Exactly the kind of things that contributed to the original 2021 outbreak that clustered around the various Thong Lor nightclubs in Bangkok, and then spread throuughout the country from there.

Last I saw reported here, the first round of the privately sourced Moderna doses acquired thru the Thai Private Hospitals Assn. were supposed to be arriving in Thailand as of Nov. 5 -- this Friday. Let's hope the various participating private hospitals start spinning up their Moderna vaccination programs for those who have already paid to reserve a dose / doses soon thereafter.

Ya, I wasn't disputing the value or potential effectiveness of a Moderna dose as a booster dose for those who have already been fully vaccinated with something else. I'm signed up for a Moderna booster dose (yet to receive) in the wake of two AZ doses. Just pointing out, the dosing regimen and booster timelines that the FDA was presenting in your prior post weren't based on people who had previously received AZ, Sinovac or Sinopharm -- since none of those three have been authorized as yet in the U.S.

I'm holding out for: "The executive at the hospital will face charges that will be revealed this Thursday, November 4th." Regarding the medicine itself, this was a rather strange statement for the Consumer board guy to make: "Anan warned people about buying remedies for Covid-19 online that were not efficacious against the virus." Especially considering that the Thai govt. has bought millions of doses of Favi to use as a frontline treatment against COVID -- even though trials and most major countries other than Japan haven't recognized it as a legitimate COVID medication. And then, of course, if memory serves, the Thai GPO along the way also has gotten into the business of domestically producing Favi for local use as a COVID treatment -- again, despite a lack of credible, peer-reviewed evidence of its effectiveness. Perhaps they didn't want anyone else cutting into their sales prospects.

Just to be clear, that booster dose guidance from the U.S. FDA pertains to people who have already been fully vaccinated with either the Moderna, Pfizer or J&J vaccines -- which a very tiny portion of the vaccinated population here in Thailand. The FDA's advice didn't address at all, AFAICT, the potential use of Moderna and Pfizer booster doses for people who've been fully vaccinated with two doses of AstraZeneca, or worse, Sinopharm or Sinovac -- those three groups or mixed versions of them making up the vast majority of the fully vaccinated population here.

1. The current Covid vaccines are broadly effective against the various different strains of COVID. If you are infected and recover from COVID absent a vaccination, the only natural immunity you'll have will be for the one particular strain that was your infection, not the various others. 2. Natural immunity is NOT far greater than any vax -- a claim you notably provided no source to support. Rather, just the opposite, with the vaccines coming out on top: CDC finds immunity from vaccines is more consistent than from infection, but both last at least six months "It’s a question that scientists have been trying to answer since the start of the pandemic, one that is central to the rancorous political debates over coronavirus vaccine policies: How much immunity does someone have after recovering from a coronavirus infection, and how does it compare with immunity provided by vaccination? The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has weighed in for the first time in a detailed science report released with little fanfare Friday evening. Reviewing scores of research studies and its own unpublished data, the agency found that both infection-induced and vaccine-induced immunity are durable for at least six months — but that vaccines are more consistent in their protection and offer a huge boost in antibodies for people previously infected. In comparing the two types of immunity, scientists said research shows vaccination provides a “higher, more robust, and more consistent level of immunity to protect people from COVID-19 than infection alone.” (more) https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/cdc-finds-immunity-from-vaccines-is-more-consistent-than-from-infection-but-both-last-at-least-six-months/

In the last couple of days, I've been starting to see increased posting on Thai social media of videos and photos that look very much like Thais at some type of night club type venues drinking what looks to be booze. As with so many things in Thailand, what the laws say and the announced policies are don't necessarily match what's happening in real life, where, in these instances, there's probably substantial incentive for the plod to look the other way at times.

I've read some on that topic lately... And one of the advantages that the current better vaccines have over post infection immunity is the vaccines are broadly effective against the various different strains of COVID.... Whereas, if someone who's unvaccinated has previously contracted COVID and recovered, whatever post infection immunity they have would only be for the particular variant they had before, and not all the various others... So say the medical experts.

I wonder what they're asking you (the couple) to consent to?

I guess we're rather fortunate that the better vaccines with proven track records of success (Moderna, Pfizer, AZ) do a very good job at preventing "breakthrough infections" -- even though on average a very small share of breakthroughs do occur. Nothing works 100% of the time. "How common are breakthrough cases of COVID? A study in Washington state gathered data from over 4 million fully vaccinated people. The data showed a rate of about 1 in 5,000 experienced a breakthrough infection between January 17 and August 21, 2021. More recently, some populations have shown breakthrough infection rates of approximately 1 in 100 fully vaccinated people." AND "Is coronavirus after vaccination dangerous? Breakthrough coronavirus infections can cause mild or moderate illness, but the chances of serious COVID-19 are very low, especially for people who are not living with a chronic health condition. The COVID-19 vaccines are very effective in keeping you from having to go to the hospital, being put on a ventilator or dying due to severe coronavirus disease, including COVID caused by the delta coronavirus variant." https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/conditions-and-diseases/coronavirus/breakthrough-infections-coronavirus-after-vaccination