2021-0826h-1534-AustinTX
Today, I ran for the first time in I don’t remember when. I ran two miles at a 10-minute mile pace. The temperature now is 99ºF so I’m guessing it was over 100ºF when I ran. It felt good to move my body and burn up some of the stress hormones I’ve been feeling in my body.
Today over 72 people were killed in two separate apparently suicide bombings in Kabul, Afghanistan – one at the airport’s Abbey Gate and one nearby close to the Baron Hotel.
Yesterday, the 7-day average of CoViD-19 deaths hit a record number of 9,856 for this sixth wave of CoViD-19 infections. A week ago on August 19, the 7-day average of daily CoViD-19 cases peaked at 657,522. Dividing these two results in a worldwide case fatality rate (CFR) of 1.499%. This compares with a CFR of 1.695% using the previous peak in the Spring of 828,292 7-day average of daily cases on April 29th and 14,041 7-day average of daily deaths on May 3rd. Both of these are lower than the CFR calculated from the previous Winter is 1.988%, based on Jan 26, 2021 peak 7-day average deaths of 14,808 and Jan 11, 2021 peak 7-day average of cases of 744,724.
Comparing to a year ago, the CFR was 2.43%, based on a peak 7-day average of 6,415 deaths on August 5, 2020, and a peak 7-day average of 263,473 cases on July 31, 2020.
For these calculations, I used data from https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/. Another source of data to compare with is https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/map.html.
For my county of Travis County, the CFR is roughly calculated as 0.7% using 7-day average of 4 deaths and 7-day average of 565 cases. This compares with 1.1% for total cases of 100K and total deaths of 1108.
It is important to remember that the CFR is not the same as the IFR, the infection fatality rate. Only a subset of infections are validated by tests and become confirmed cases. The ratio of cases to infections depends on the level of testing in the community. Deaths due to CoViD-19 are believe to be a more accurate value. So, the IFR is very likely less than the CFR. If the IFR is calculated for your specific cohort group (age, health conditions, etc.), then it can give a reasonable estimate of your chances of dying from CoViD-19.
For comparison, in 2018 living had a fatality rate of 0.7546% worldwide. Travis County had an age-adjusted fatality rate of 0.62% overall and 0.72% for men (TravisCounty nih.gov death rate). I’m not sure if I’m missing something, but it seems that living for a year in Travis County as a male is currently about the same risk of dying as having a positive CoViD-19 test result (7 per 1000).
2021-0901W-1700-AustinTX-OPAs
My brother sent me a link to research done in Israel comparing those who previously had CoViD-19 with those who were vaccinated. It is “the largest real-world observational study so far to compare natural and vaccine-induced immunity to SARS-CoV-2”. Science reported August 26, 2021 on this research in Having SARS-CoV-2 once confers much greater immunity than a vaccine—but vaccination remains vital. From the article:
The newly released data show people who once had a SARS-CoV-2 infection were much less likely than never-infected, vaccinated people to get Delta, develop symptoms from it, or become hospitalized with serious COVID-19.
https://www.science.org/content/article/having-sars-cov-2-once-confers-much-greater-immunity-vaccine-vaccination-remains-vital
The original research article, Comparing SARS-CoV-2 natural immunity to vaccine-induced immunity: reinfections versus breakthrough infections, reports the following results:
Results SARS-CoV-2-naïve vaccinees had a 13.06-fold (95% CI, 8.08 to 21.11) increased risk for breakthrough infection with the Delta variant compared to those previously infected, when the first event (infection or vaccination) occurred during January and February of 2021. The increased risk was significant (P<0.001) for symptomatic disease as well. When allowing the infection to occur at any time before vaccination (from March 2020 to February 2021), evidence of waning natural immunity was demonstrated, though SARS-CoV-2 naïve vaccinees had a 5.96-fold (95% CI, 4.85 to 7.33) increased risk for breakthrough infection and a 7.13-fold (95% CI, 5.51 to 9.21) increased risk for symptomatic disease. SARS-CoV-2-naïve vaccinees were also at a greater risk for COVID-19-related-hospitalizations compared to those that were previously infected.
https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.08.24.21262415
The conclusion is clear on the benefits of antibodies created from an active CoViD-19 infection versus antibodies created from one or more vaccines.
Conclusions This study demonstrated that natural immunity confers longer lasting and stronger protection against infection, symptomatic disease and hospitalization caused by the Delta variant of SARS-CoV-2, compared to the BNT162b2 two-dose vaccine-induced immunity. Individuals who were both previously infected with SARS-CoV-2 and given a single dose of the vaccine gained additional protection against the Delta variant.
https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.08.24.21262415
One statistic from the paper that was not highlighted above was that the chance of symptomatic breakthrough infection in the vaccinated group was 27 times more likely than symptomatic reinfection in the unvaccinated previously infected group.
After adjusting for comorbidities, we found a 27.02-fold risk (95% CI, 12.7 to 57.5) for symptomatic breakthrough infection as opposed to symptomatic reinfection (P<0.001)
https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.08.24.21262415
surfing the universe 