TallGuyJohninBKK

T-cells and antibody levels aside, as best as I can follow the science, real world studies have shown that the actual rates of protection from COVID do tend to gradually decrease somewhat over time.... But those levels of protection are restored with subsequent, updated vaccinations. That's part of the reason countries around the world are recommending either that all of their populations (as with the U.S.), or in other countries just the more vulnerable populations, get updated COVID vaccinations this year... also because the newest monovalent versions are a closer match to the currently circulating COVID strains than the prior vax versions.

I believe there's been some debate in the COVID vaccine expert researcher circles about whether and much much of an improvement the bivalent vaccines were in the real world vs. the original vaccines. I noted this research report the other day.... It didn't compare the originals vs the bivalent vaccines. But rather, looked at the real world added protection levels that a third shot of a bivalent vaccine added beyond those with just the two original shots. Bivalent boosters offer added protection for previously vaccinated people, study shows October 27, 2023 "Bivalent (two-strain) boosters offer some restored protection against critical illness and hospital admission for people who had previously received only two doses of the original mRNA COVID-19 vaccines, according to a study yesterday in The Lancet Respiratory Medicine. ... Among those who had received a Pfizer BA.4/5 bivalent booster, relative VE was an additional 50% (95% confidence interval, 23% to 68%) against critical illness, an additional 39% against hospital admission, an additional 35% against emergency department or urgent care visits, and an additional 28% against outpatient encounters. Though protection against any infection waned from the bivalent booster from 0 to 3 months, then again from 4 to 7 months, the enhanced protection against critical illness, hospital admission, and emergency department or urgent care outcomes remained." https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/covid-19/bivalent-boosters-offer-added-protection-previously-vaccinated-people-study-shows https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanres/article/PIIS2213-2600(23)00306-5/fulltext "We aimed to investigate the effectiveness of the Pfizer-–BioNTech BNT162b2 BA.4/5 bivalent vaccine against both BA.4/5-related and XBB-related disease in adults aged 18 years or older. ... The relative effectiveness of the BNT162b2 BA.4/5 bivalent booster for XBB-related infections compared with BA.4/5-related infections was 56% (95% CI 12–78) versus 40% (27–50) for hospital admission; 34% (21–45) versus 36% (30–41) against emergency department or urgent care visits; and 29% (19–38) versus 27% (20–33) for outpatient encounters. ... By mid-April, 2023, individuals previously vaccinated only with wild-type vaccines had little protection against COVID-19—including hospital admission. A BNT162b2 BA.4/5 bivalent booster restored protection against a range of COVID-19 outcomes, including against XBB-related sublineages, with the most substantial protection observed against hospital admission and critical illness."

No further response is required.... The best the above posters can do is continually present dubious claims by sources with documented histories of peddling COVID misinformation, and/or people associated with organizations with documented histories of peddling COVID misinformation. As a result, their claims are and should be judged in that context and the sources recognized for what they have shown themselves to be -- non-credible.

Also, by way of background: "In June 2020, the FDA ended the emergency use of hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine for treatment of COVID-19. Over time, clinical trials showed hydroxychloroquine: Led to serious heart problems in some people. Did not effectively treat COVID-19. Did not prevent infection with the virus that causes COVID-19." Is hydroxychloroquine a treatment for COVID-19? Sept. 26, 2023 https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/coronavirus/in-depth/hydroxychloroquine-treatment-covid-19/art-20555331

No, it wasn't. The issue arose during Trump's abortive time as president: "Hydroxychloroquine had been granted emergency use authorization for COVID-19 in March 2020. The anti-malaria drug was authorized to be used for certain hospitalized COVID-19 patients, but the FDA revoked that authorization in June 2020, saying emerging data suggested it was “unlikely to be effective in treating COVID-19 for the authorized uses in the EUA.” ... Brian Garibaldi, the director of the Johns Hopkins Special Pathogens Center and Biocontainment Unit, concurred that hydroxychloroquine should not be used as any treatment strategy for COVID, and no new research or guidance suggests otherwise." AP Fact Check -- September 28, 2023 https://apnews.com/article/fact-check-false-hydroxychloroquine-covid-mayo-clinic-879901358147

Truth be told, there are plenty of reports of individual Thais and groups of Thai workers being abused and harmed -- though not necessarily killed -- in various other foreign employment destinations, including some of the various richer Middle East countries and even sometimes in places like South Korea. Perhaps given a hypothetical choice between Saudi Arabia, et. al. and [pre-war] Israel, Israel wouldn't have looked so bad / risky / dangerous -- though no way would I ever have taken a job anywhere near Gaza.

A contingent of multiple Immigration police combined with local police officers had to withdraw from a confrontation and call in SWAT for backup reinforcements because they encountered ONE threatening foreigner with a baseball bat???? Are those guys actually real police, or just lackeys who sit around drinking coffee in police kiosks, filling out paperwork and periodically collecting brown envelopes? They need SWAT to take down one guy with a baseball bat?

There was nothing for her to admit. Unearthing more of the same past vaccine misinformation claims, I see: Alleged revelation about Pfizer vaccine trial is nothing new "Pfizer did not claim that a clinical trial for its COVID-19 vaccine was testing whether the vaccine prevented transmission of the coronavirus to other people. The aim of the drug trial was to study whether the vaccine was safe and if it prevented disease from SARS-CoV-2." ... "Pfizer, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and news reports before the vaccine’s approval were clear that while the vaccine was effective in preventing symptomatic and severe disease, there was no data [from the Pfizer trials] about whether it stopped transmission to others." https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2022/oct/13/instagram-posts/alleged-revelation-about-pfizer-vaccine-trial-noth/ As it turned out, the COVID vaccines did help prevent transmission in the real world, as many studies later showed... But that wasn't the basis that Pfizer originally ran their trials on, as was made clear throughout the approval process.

A bunch of biased and/or non-credible, non-news report sources: America First Policy Institute "Overall, we rate The America First Policy Institute (AFPI) Right Biased based on political affiliation with Donald Trump. We also rate them Mixed for factual reporting due to a complete lack of transparency and the use of poor sources who have failed fact checks. " "The staff consists of Ex-Trump aides." https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/the-america-first-policy-institute-afpi-bias/ AND Newsbusters "Overall, we rate Newsbusters Right Biased based on story selection that always favors the right. We also rate them borderline questionable due to the use of poor sources and numerous failed fact checks. One additional failed fact check will push this source by default onto the Questionable list." https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/newsbusters/

On my last prior online 90-day report to BKK CW in August, I finally received the online acceptance 9 calendar days after submission.... which was about 3 times longer than the typical 3-days turnaround time I'd experienced prior to recent months. It also meant I had to go thru the hassle, at 7 days before my filing deadline and several days before I later got their acceptance of my online report, of doing a paper mailed-in back-up report just in-case my online one ended up falling into a void somewhere.

Well, there goes my rent money for the month! 🙂

I personally am not discrediting the guy.... but a well-respected science-medical fact checking site and a news agency report are..... which is good enough for me... https://aseannow.com/topic/1310237-study-provides-evidence-of-covid-19-mrna-shots-rewiring-the-immune-system-with-unknown-long-term-effects/?do=findComment&comment=18451968 Especially when the guy has a non APA accredited psychology degree from an obscure university in a field that has absolutely nothing to do with the field of COVID vaccines or medical research. All of that kinda makes the conclusion easy. If you have a heart attack or a blood infection and they're rolling you into the hospital Emergency Room, are you going to seek your diagnosis and have your condition evaluated and treated by a psychologist? I think NOT! In short, when it comes to COVID vaccines, all available evidence pretty clearly shows the guy's a non-credible quack and misinformation peddler -- as documented by the previously cited sources above.

At the moment, those of us on my side of the aisle aren't making any vaccine claims here -- just shooting down the ridiculous, non-credible claims made by others by showing they have no valid credentials in the subject field and/or have documented histories of peddling misinformation. But if we are making claims in other places, they're almost always based on credible source news reports, high quality scientific research and recognized experts and health agencies in the field. Give it a try for a change...

The guy has a degree in psychology, not medicine. He has no credentials for credibility in the field.

"Guy is an international advocate of food safety and natural medicine. He received his undergraduate degree in Logic and Theoretical Physics from the University of Sussex and his Ph.D. in Psychology from Maharishi University of Management, Fairfield Iowa." https://hatchardreport.com/about-guy/ "Maharishi International University, formerly Maharishi University of Management, is a private university in Fairfield, Iowa. It was founded in 1973 by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi and practices a "consciousness-based education" system that includes the Transcendental Meditation technique." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maharishi_International_University WOW!!! If I ever need expert guidance about COVID vaccines, this guy's sure going to be at the top of my list... NOT!!! Right after anti-vax podiatrists and chiropractors. So this is what the anti-vaxers here have to stoop to to find their "credible sources" on COVID vaccines???

You must have missed the part about CREDIBLE.. But no, I realize credibility is not much of a criteria or value for such posters: GB News interview features misleading claims about Covid-19 and vaccines "An interview broadcast by GB News, and watched more than 250,000 times across Facebook and YouTube, makes a number of inaccurate claims about Covid-19 and vaccines. The segment on 23 March, presented by the author and television presenter Mark Steyn, featured Dr Guy Hatchard, a self-described “international advocate of food safety and natural medicine”. The claims from both Mr Steyn and Dr Hatchard include incorrect statements about excess mortality, Covd-19 risk factors and vaccine effectiveness." https://fullfact.org/health/guy-hatchard-mark-steyn-gb-news/ AND Finding fame in the anti-vax space "Looks at Dr Guy Hatchard, finding fame with 'alternative facts' in the online anti-vaccination ecosystem. ... and how Hatchard seems to lack any actual expertise to speak on epidemiology or medicine. Looks at his role as a 'superspreader' of misinformation and his claim to have received a PhD in Psychology from a Ayurvedic yoga university unaccredited by the American Psychological Association." https://natlib-primo.hosted.exlibrisgroup.com/primo-explore/fulldisplay?vid=NLNZ&docid=INNZ7175107670002837&context=L&search_scope=INNZ

Glad to see that the U.S. is so much a safer place because it's literally flooded with guns... 😞

It's telling that the same member supporting John Campbell as a legitimate source of COVID info is also giving his own unsupported summary of the research cited in the OP here.... Nowhere in the OP cited research does the study use the thread's headline language of "rewiring the immune system". It's also a non-peer reviewed study, and even more telling, try finding any credible news report on its findings, if it's supposedly some kind of news-worthy research. Here's the actual conclusion of the OP's cited study, which bears little to no resemblance to the OP's claims about it: "Conclusion Our results imply a major role for both IL-4/IL-13 as well as TNF in IgG4 class switching. These novel findings advance our understanding of IgG4 class switch dynamics, and may benefit future mRNA vaccine strategies, humoral tolerance induction, as well as treatment of IgG4 pathologies." I don't hear any COVID vaccine alarm bells going off there. And as for what to make of Campbell, this summary puts it in succinct form: "Regarded as an evidence-based source of information about COVID-19 in 2020, Campbell—who has accrued nearly three million followers on YouTube to date—has since repeatedly published YouTube videos containing false or misleading claims about COVID-19 and COVID-19 vaccines. A list of related reviews published by Health Feedback can be found here." https://healthfeedback.org/claimreview/analysis-adverse-event-variation-pfizer-covid-19-vaccine-batches-doesnt-indicate-safety-problems-contrary-john-campbell/ And more here: https://www.factcheck.org/person/john-campbell/ Misinformation peddling anti-vaxers of a feather flock together.

Re the OP's cited study from the Netherlands: COVID in Europe: Vaccine booster campaigns start as cases rise COVID-19 cases and hospitalisations are rising in Europe. Here’s a look at some of the plans for vaccination across the continent. Updated 10/10/2023 ... It comes as cases are rising in more than half of European countries, according to the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC), with increases in hospitalisations, ICU admissions, and deaths in some countries, though this remains limited. ... European countries recommend that vulnerable individuals at risk of developing severe COVID-19 get a booster shot, with some governments bringing up their winter vaccination campaigns amid rising cases towards the end of the summer season. ... The Netherlands has also started re-vaccinating at-risk groups against COVID-19. People who would like to get a vaccine because they live with people who are at risk for more severe forms of the disease may also receive one." (more) https://www.euronews.com/next/2023/10/03/covid-in-europe-vaccine-booster-campaigns-start-as-cases-rise

And it turns out, the second listed author of the above paper, Jessica Rose, also has quite a history of involvement in peddling COVID vaccine misinformation: Fact Check-VAERS data does not suggest COVID-19 vaccines killed 150,000 people, as analysis claims "The website credits the findings to Jessica Rose, who was a postdoctoral researcher in biology at the Israel Institute of Technology from 2016-20, according to her resume posted online (here). ... The blog article cites a paper titled: “Estimating the number of COVID vaccine deaths in America” (here), which Rose co-authored alongside Mathew Crawford, a statistician (here). Both appear to be members of a group questioning COVID-19 vaccines." ... VERDICT False. COVID-19 vaccines are safe and there is no evidence to suggest they have caused more than 150,000 deaths. The claim is based on misinterpreted data. https://www.reuters.com/article/factcheck-coronavirus-usa/fact-check-vaers-data-does-not-suggest-covid-19-vaccines-killed-150000-people-as-analysis-claims-idUSL1N2R00KP AND As 2021 shambles to a close, the misuse of VAERS by antivaxxers continues apace "So I thought I should write about Jessica Rose now, as she appears in an article from Sunday titled “What the VAERS Data Tell Us About COVID Jab Safety“. ... "this interview with Jessica Rose illustrates the various techniques used by antivaxxers like Mercola (and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., who has had a regular weekly “update” of VAERS reporting for several months now) and thus is worth writing about again, given that Jessica Rose appears to be a rising star in the antivaccine movement and a veritable font of antivaccine disinformation..." https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/as-2021-shambles-to-a-close-the-misuse-of-vaers-by-antivaxxers-continues-apace/

Not surprisingly, a non-peer reviewed paper published by an obscure researcher who's affiliated with a notorious Canadian anti-vaxer group previously cited for spreading COVID vaccine misinformation. A Canadian academic named David Speicher, with no meaningful record of published, peer-reviewed COVID vaccine research, is listed as the primary author. So what is David Speicher's affiliation with this Canadian anti-vax group? https://www.canadiancovidcarealliance.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/23MY3_Case-against-C19-vaccine-requirements.pdf So Speicher is affiliated with the Canadian Covid Care Alliance, the Canadian branch of a series of country-based anti-vax activist entities with documented histories of peddling COVID vaccine misinformation. Such as: Video repeats false claims about safety of Pfizer's Covid-19 vaccine "A video produced by a group claiming to represent Canadian doctors and health care professionals alleges that the Pfizer-BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine is dangerous. But the video repeats several previously debunked assertions about the safety of the shot, experts say the benefits outweigh the risks of rare side effects... "The Pfizer Inoculations For COVID-19 - More Harm Than Good," says the title of a video released by the Canadian Covid Care Alliance (CCCA). https://factcheck.afp.com/http%3A%2F%2Fdoc.afp.com%2F9VJ3DA-1 and more.... "The Canadian Covid Care Alliance presentation also makes a range of assertions based on Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine clinical trial report (here), including that the vaccinated group had “an increase in illness and deaths”. However, the “illness” detailed includes all adverse events including local reactions such as arm pain, and systemic events such as fatigue. Few participants had serious adverse events or adverse events that led to withdrawal from the trial, the study says." https://www.reuters.com/article/factcheck-coronavirus-vaccines/fact-check-covid-19-vaccines-considered-safe-for-children-idUSL1N2TM0QL And the Canadian group is affiliated with a notorious U.S. anti-vax misinformation group called the Front Line COVID-19 Critical Care Alliance. https://covid19criticalcare.com/about-the-flccc/ And their record: Front Line Covid-19 Critical Care Alliance (FLCCC) PSEUDOSCIENCE "Overall, we rate the Front Line Covid-19 Critical Care Alliance as a strong pseudoscience website based on the promotion of unproven alternative medicines that falsely mislead people to reject the Covid-19 vaccine and several failed fact checks." https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/front-line-covid-19-critical-care-alliance-flccc-bias/ Add up all of the above, and you most likely get a bunch of anti-vax activist rubbish.

Anybody with any recent updates on their actual 90-day report processing times for online submissions to BKK CW.... I submitted my latest one today online on the first available day for online filing given my upcoming due date. Now it's just the eternal question of how long I'm gonna have to wait before I receive their reply.... 😞

I tend to ignore the stations that have no current information, and save and bookmark the stations in areas of interest to me that do have comprehensive, up-to-date readings. The chart at the very top of each page tells the viewer the recency of the data:

The aqicn.org website aggregates air quality reading from numerous sources, both government and private. On any given page/source of theirs, if you scroll down a bit, you'll find a note of who/what is responsible for that particular sensor... such as the following for the main Bangkok one: "Air Quality Data provided by the Division of Air Quality Data, Air Quality and Noise Management Bureau, Pollution Control Department. (aqmthai.com) " https://aqicn.org/city/bangkok/ And if you scroll down a bit further than that, you'll see a section of historical readings by year from that particular monitoring station. If the entries are blank or missing, you'll know that station is (or isn't) recording comprehensive data.

In short, there have been quite a few studies over the years that have looked at the composition (and thus identified sources) of air pollution in Thailand and in Bangkok, in particular... The findings have been quite varied leading to some predictable confusion and variation in conclusions, but a lot of that is related to at what times of the year any particular sampling is done (wet vs. dry season). This past graphic from The Nation gives a pretty good and straightforward summary of what the Thai Pollution Control Department's own past research has shown, as follows: Predictably, the PCD found that during the wet/rainy seasons when agricultural burning isn't occurring so much, diesel vehicle emissions slightly exceed biomass burning as the largest single air pollution source in Bangkok, whereas during the dry (worst pollution) season when widespread agricultural burning occurs nationwide, biomass burning significantly exceeds vehicles emissions as the largest source.