Vaccinations: The big game changer within our CC community!

cuddleaddict

As a medical lab scientist, I've started & posted on a few forums on covid, but this is the best news yet.

Vaccinations are becoming available. When you can get it largely depends on your location, occupation, distribution & scheduling.

I received first shot of Pfizer vaccine last Fri as licensed Medical Technologist, second Feb 19, full immunity by Feb 26.

Acutely aware of the specifics of this pandemic, the risks & proper precautions during this pandemic, I urge everyone to actively seek vaccination soon as possible. Not only will it make safe cuddling possible again, but it will help prevent the spread of the recent more contagious mutant strains.

Personally I will feel comfortable meeting with anyone who reaches the full immunity time frame through any vaccine.

Remember it's natural if some feel a bit sick after any vaccine- it means your body is responding producing antibodies & developing memory cells that will be activated if you're exposed again.

Our community can begin to get back to engaging in the concept we all have in common.

quixotic_life

I'm scheduled to get my 1st one tomorrow morning!
Whoot!!! 🎉

CuddleDuncan

In the UK over 9 million people have been vaccinated. That's about 1 in 7 of the whole population. At the current rate we will have vaccinated everybody by the end of May.

We are expecting (hoping!) the vaccination programme to start having a measurable effect on transmission in about two weeks.

Both Pfizer and Oxford vaccines are being widely used. Any lingering concerns about the safety of these vaccines are now dead and buried.

bekah_cuddles

I got my first dose last Monday and I'll be getting my second dose in a few weeks! I can't wait to be as protected as I can be and I'm looking forward to others getting it soon.

transgirlkatie

I'm really hoping that the vaccine allows for parties to happen again and also cuddling. I've been hearing from a lot of doctors though that even if you get vaccinated you can't see people even if the other people are vaccinated though

CuddleDuncan

We don't yet really know the effect of the vaccine on transmission within the community. Amongst large countries, Britain is leading the world in vaccination and it will be several weeks before we have any data at all. That data will, in the first instance, not be particularly relevant to other countries since the subtleties of transmission vary wildly from country to country.

Neither do we know how long the protection lasts. And of course the wretched virus is mutating left, right and centre.

Consequently, the advice for vaccinated people is to continue to behave as if you were not vaccinated. Wash your hands, wear a mask, keep your distance. Once a majority of the population is vaccinated, and we have meaningful information on the vaccine's effect on transmission in the wild, it may be possible to relax the guidelines.

Remember that we know how this ends. It ends with handshakes, and cuddling, and parties, and holidays, and licking the face of everybody you meet. No, wait, that last one is just dogs.

transgirlkatie

I'm also concerned we'll never hit the herd immunity threshold due to how many anti vaxxers they are and people who are hesitant for legitimate reasons. What happens if the vaccine doesn't prevent transmission, and what happens if we never hit the required herd immunity threshold?

CuddleDuncan

The anti vaxxers are not going to be a huge problem here. It's an issue, certainly, particularly in certain communities. But steps are being taken, and there is unity from the political parties and medical profession.

However, as seen from here, I can imagine that it might be a real difficulty in certain parts of the US. However, reality always wins in the end. And the reality is, if your parents or your grandparents have been vaccinated, they are less likely to die.

BoomerSpooner

Comparing the UK to the USA is apples and oranges. First the US has about 330 million people to the UK’s almost 70 million. But the biggest difference is the physical dimensions—the USA is nearly 4,000% larger in land size than the UK. This provides an extra layer of logistics to deal with when you are transporting super cooled vaccinations. With that being said, over 30 million vaccines have been administered in the US and it is beginning to improve everyday.

quixotic_life

Cuddly nerd, and/or snuggly science junkie, input sought...

Herd immunity doesn't apply to this right? Same with the flu? Because the vaccines only last so long, may only decrease one's symptoms, and there are so many strains/mutations you may get a vaccine for strains A-F but then get sick from exposure to strain H... Yes?

SnugggleBunny

Getting my second Moderna tomorrow!

I'm getting my second Moderna Friday...for all the good it will do me on this site.

CuddleDuncan

@quixotic_life yes, herd immunity as a concept does apply in the context of vaccination. Herd immunity just means that enough members of a community have immunity to prevent an outbreak sprading very far. Whether that immunity came from vaccination or exposure to the actual pathogen doesn't matter.

Herd immunity only ever applies to strains A-F, as you put it. Strain H is a new mutation, and if it's just the right (i.e. wrong) kind of mutation then nobody in the herd has immunity to it.

We know that the vaccines are safe and effective at preventing people from becoming ill or seriously ill. We are extremely confident that they reduce transmissability to some extent (if you are not ill you are not coughing), but we yet don't know by how much. In due course we will be able to figure this out.

In the UK it is slowly becoming apparent that the authorities are planning for the possibility of vaccination being required every year, although they haven't stated it explicitly. If it turns out that this is necessary - and we are a long way from that - then in the long term it's possible that it will be bundled with the flu vaccination.

quixotic_life

@CuddleDuncan ~ Thank you!! 🤗
I suppose I could've Googled that, but I appreciate you answering so I didn't have to sift through the returns and potentially end up in a rabbit hole around who knows what unrelated topic!! And you've certainly fulfilled my, "learn something new every day" quota so I'm much obliged. 💞

transgirlkatie

That's good to hear that the anti vaxxers won't be too bad of a problem in the usa

CuddleDuncan

First evidence that the Oxford vaccine cuts transmission.

The study by the University of Oxford swabbed participants every week to test them for the presence of the virus.

If there is no virus then they cannot spread it. In the study, the numbers testing positive halved in people once they had been given two doses of the vaccine.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-55910964

Something like this was expected, but it's nice to put some numbers on it.

Also good to see from this study that one dose provides at least three months of protection, albeit at a slightly lower level than two doses.

quixotic_life

Whoot! Got my Pfizer round 1 today!!

So glad I thought to eat something first. I was slightly light headed and my face felt a little twitchy for a bit, but that could be due to my anxiousness, lack of quality sleep &/or the four shot espresso... 🤷‍♀️

CuddleDuncan

The latest data from the UK vaccination programme has been analysed, and the conclusion is that the two vaccines being used here are "extremely safe".

BBC news report
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-55946912

Official release, with links to summary data
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/latest-monitoring-data-confirms-safety-of-covid-19-vaccines

CuddleDuncan

In the UK vaccine take-up is over 90% in people 75 years old and over.

Once you allow for things like people who never quite make it to the vaccination centre for one reason or another, and people who have relevant conditions that they know about but the vaccine system doesn't, I think that's probably about as high as you are ever going to get in the real world.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/newsbeat-56008081

MountainCuddles

Do not take the vaccine. The vaccine is based on a lie. It is not a vaccine. It is gene therapy. It programs your cells to produce the very thing that will make you sick. It forces your cells to do something that they are not supposed to do. Human cells are not meant to be pathogen manufacturing sites. The human body is meant to fight off pathogens, not create pathogens! This is a grotesque perversion of nature, and is bound to cause autoimmune disease, cancer, and many other diseases. This is even more dangerous than other vaccines up to this point. DO NOT TAKE THIS FAKE VACCINE!

Get educated, @MountainCuddles . Your statements are not aligned with science: "mRNA vaccines take advantage of the process that cells use to make proteins in order to trigger an immune response and build immunity to SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. In contrast, most vaccines use weakened or inactivated versions or components of the disease-causing pathogen to stimulate the body’s immune response to create antibodies." This forum and thread are not for anti-vax disinformation. [-Sid]

pmvines

Ummmmm

Mike403

I believe the mods should remove posts that spread misinformation about the vaccine.

@Sideon

I'll leave it for now, but I will not be kind to anti-vax disinformation in the future. [-Sid]

Maybe it was just a roundabout way of saying, "biology's not my major"

Mike403

Gallowglass

A virus has DNA and RNA. These both are sets of codes, instructions.

The virus will insert itself into the nucleus of the cell and cause the cell to create copies of the virus.
As this progresses, hopefully, your immune system catches on quick-enough to battle the virus.

The immune system, at some point, recognizes that the body is under attack. It send white-cells to battle. The immune system learns what the virus looks like.

Old style anti-viruses would either be created from the virus itself, in a weakened or inactive state.
The research to find, create the vaccine takes a long time to develop and to test.

The new vaccine, instead, splits the virus into DNA and RNA. Then it uses patterns in the RNA to create copies of the pattern. Not the whole virus itself. When the vaccines using this method are inoculated into someone, the body recognizes the patterns as bad, and starts building defenses against them. The development time is much shorter than old style vaccinations. The testing should be exhaustive. It hasn't been. All the antivrus R&D testing was abridged, due to the seriousness of the pandemic.

You can chose to believe what you like. I agree it's new technology. I believe it hasn't been tested long-enough for my comfort. But, the scientific process was followed. If it didn't work, more people would be dead.

Do your own research and decide if you are comfortable. But, trust the science. Educate yourself, And, make an informed decision.

cuddleaddict

Gallowglass, excellent overall comment, just a few notes. Viruses are either DNA or RNA, not both. Covid is RNA only. The newer Phizer & Moderna vaccines use a synthetic segment of Messenger RNA identical to a small part of the actual virus.

Testing actually was exhaustive involving around 80,000 people in final trials, but didn't include people with pre-existing diseases, thus it's not recommended for certain people & more studies are needed.

The usual comprehensive data review was done by experts working 24/7. The actual technology has been used in cancer therapy for 10 years which uses medicine much like the vaccine. Thus, on the industrial side, using existing production line techniques to produce a vaccine was not time consuming & actually well underway to producing vaccines in general.

Basic university based reseach was accepted by the scientific/medical community decades ago.

If anyone's interested in the detailed biology of how these vaccines work, including why 2 doses & why some feel "side effects" please message me as it will be longer than a post should be.

We're so lucky everything was in place to make a safe, extremely effective vaccine just in time to avoid a repeat of the unbelievable tragedy of 1918. Thanks for your very educational comment!

BryC

@Sideon so you are a pro vaxer that belives in censorship instead of free speech? @cuddleaddict are you part of Big Pharma?In that case I have questions instead.Can you explain why Phizer rescind their application when India told them that they had to prove that their vaccine is safe?Can you explain the deaths , bells palsey , autoimume blood diseases , severe allergic reactions to the different corona virus vaccines?Can you explain why people have won law suits against vaccine companies?Can you explain why I received brain damage from a vaccine?Can you explain why the Phizer & Moderna vaccines are new vaccines that were created and approved in less than a year.Can you explain why people are being used as human guinea pigs?Can you explain why we have an immune system and things to boost are immune system naturally when people use vaccines?Can you explain why we donate and receive blood , plasma , organs but we dont donate and receive antibodies instead of vaccines.Can you explain why people that got measles , rubella , mumps , chicken pox ETC naturally with out getting vaccines are perfectly healthy human beings?Can you explain why people that died from diseases in the past but when they get any of those very same diseases today not only dont die but live perfectly healthy lives with out getting a vaccine for that disease.Can you explain why people have to get flu and pneumonia vaccines every single year when there are treatments for the flu and pneumonia and there are ways to make the flu and pneumonia less severe?Can you guarantee that people wont have to get a corona virus vaccine every year for the rest of their lives?I saw a thing for the cow pox vaccine for small pox.This process for this vaccine that I saw was that people were taking cow pox directly from cows that had cow pox and injecting people with it.Nothing else was added to the vaccine.and the people that were injected with that vaccine were immune to small pox.If vaccines only contained dead or weakened or other viruses that were less serious than I would trust and get vaccines.Can you explain why poisons , toxins , chemicals , carcinogens , allergens like Mercury , Embalming fluid ETC are put in vaccines instead of just dead or weaken or other less serious viruses by themselves?Can you explain the need to silence , censor , cancel culture in a democracy or republic society the land of the free with freedoms and rights when we all are adults with minds of our own and free will when we can do are own research?Can you explain what pro vaxers are really afraid of besides getting diseases , illnesses , ailments , getting sick of course?because I know its more than that is it not or there would be no need to silence , censor , cancel culture in a free country?Can you explain why our founding fore fathers not only made the freedom of speech the very first amendment but also listed it first over all of the other freedoms and rights emphasizing the importance of the freedom of speech over all of the other first amendment freedoms and rights?Is it not because our founding fathers felt that the freedom of speech is the most important freedom , right in the whole entire constitution?One final question can you tell us about Merck's corona virus treatment program and its progress now this is something that may interest me.Or does anyone even know about any of this?

Keeping post intact, but note the user is in timeout for 5 days. Unless you're a virologist or immunologist or scientists specializing in infectious diseases and have absolute, peer-reviewed data... anti-vax disinformation is not welcome here. [-Sid]

littermate

There is a serious bee in this bonnet. Enter at your own risk oh hale and hearty cuddlers.

BoomerSpooner

How come Ted Kaczynski gets internet privileges?

More and more I come to believe that anti-vaxxers are totally sane, well-adjusted members of society. I have no idea how anyone could feel negatively about them in any capacity.

deefine

@cuddleaddict I'm high risk with a broken lung (punctured years ago I think), do you think I should get the vaccine soon or wait until we see more of the side effects?