COVID-19 RNA Based Vaccines and the Risk of Prion Disease

Insights and discussion from the cutting edge with reference to journal articles and other research papers.
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NF52
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Re: COVID-19 RNA Based Vaccines and the Risk of Prion Disease

Post by NF52 »

ApropoE4 wrote:
I have always valued your informed expertise and scientific knowledge on this forum, ApropoE4.

I don't personally know either "dod" or "TheBrain", but I have read possibly hundreds of TheBrain's many informative and information-seeking posts since she joined this forum in 2014. So let me offer "a view from the sidelines":
She and I have a lot in common: We're both women with ApoE 4/4 who face a much higher chance than men of living with and eventually dying with or from Alzheimer's or other dementia. We're both old enough to remember the last half-century of some mistakes made in this country. TheBrain was called "The Brain"; I was called "Egghead" in middle school--and we realized our brains were special--and as females we might have some pushback on using them. We both worked in fields viewed as preferentially male: She in IT, me in district-level school administration. We both have lost loved ones to Alzheimer's and both have dealt with other health issues. We're both married. (I assume her husband is at least at patient with hearing about Alzheimer's ad nauseam as mine is.) We both value our health and know that the decisions we make likely have far-reaching consequences.

Here's where we differ: I chose to get the Pfizer vaccine and have had no ill effects. I hope she decides at some point to maybe get at least the first shot of Pfizer. I worry about her and those who would deeply mourn her death or severe illness. As a school administrator, I have explained to parents that we had a child with a heart transplant who needed to be protected by the vaccinations of those around her. That still means I wish to listen and keep communication respectful.

While understanding your desire to vent, ApropoE4, please let me gently remind you of MarcR's quote of the Community Guidelines:
MarcR wrote:Community Guidelines:
Respect. All posts and private messages should be courteous. Disagree with ideas, not people. You may not attack, insult, undermine, or belittle anyone. This broad prohibition extends beyond other members and this community to the world at large.
... please refrain from inferring and impugning others' motives and intentions. Stick to facts and objective evidence. From the Humility clause:
Support your opinions with personal or clinical experience, your physician’s perspective, and/or published medical research.
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Re: COVID-19 RNA Based Vaccines and the Risk of Prion Disease

Post by ApropoE4 »

I am not attacking, insulting, or belittling anyone. I disagree with the idea that they did research, reached logical conclusions, suffer from media censorship, or have good reason to suspect such long term effects as rare auto-immune diseases or prion disease.
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Re: COVID-19 RNA Based Vaccines and the Risk of Prion Disease

Post by ApropoE4 »

@NF52 - sometimes very smart and reasonable people fall in with the wrong ideas.
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Re: COVID-19 RNA Based Vaccines and the Risk of Prion Disease

Post by NF52 »

ApropoE4 wrote:@NF52 - sometimes very smart and reasonable people fall in with the wrong ideas.
. Very true--I once thought wearing pink and purple plaid was a good idea. My desire is not to stifle discussion of the evidence for specific views, just to not use ad hominem language (idiocy; "good case") when trying to build bridges.
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Re: COVID-19 RNA Based Vaccines and the Risk of Prion Disease

Post by ApropoE4 »

Fair enough.

Here are some indisputable facts:

- All the short term side effects of the popular vaccines are known by now (both mrna and non-mrna) and the severe ones are very rare (how rare? likely not a single death of 8 million doses administered in nyc, about 1 in 50,000-100,000 severe events)

- No long term side effects have emerged even a year after the first shots were given in phase 3 trials and I have not seen a single paper by actual non-lunatic scientists positing why we should expect any to emerge.

- 98.5% of hospitalizations and deaths in nyc January-June 2021 are of unvaccinated folks. This implies more or less a 40 fold reduction in the risk for serious illness by the vaccine.

- Every person who does not isolate from all of humanity and is not vaccinated WILL get covid. If you don't believe that just look at India where about 4 million have died, implying at least 400 million and likely 800 million cases.

- Every person who is not vaccinated is going to cause roughly 10-50 times (very wide error bars on this) more infections than a person who is vaccinated.

- It is somewhat likely that a true vaccine escape variant will emerge by this fall, and that going forward new variants will keep popping up. Such variants will also likely escape antibodies resulting from an infection. This means people will get reinfected and that the same decimation of humanity we've seen in 2020-21 will keep occurring. Vaccinating today slows this process down (by reducing the number of copies of the virus created and thereby the number of successful new variants) and when supplemented by variant-specific boosters later on and hopefully some prophylactics and treatments that are in trials, can lead us to a future when we need to worry about LOAD again, and not about whether we'll end up in respiratory ICU next week.
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Re: COVID-19 RNA Based Vaccines and the Risk of Prion Disease

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ApropoE4 wrote:Fair enough. ...Vaccinating today slows this process down (by reducing the number of copies of the virus created and thereby the number of successful new variants) and when supplemented by variant-specific boosters later on and hopefully some prophylactics and treatments that are in trials, can lead us to a future when we need to worry about LOAD again, and not about whether we'll end up in respiratory ICU next week.
Fair enough. Thanks for presenting your information this way. I'd settle for a near future when we can get heated about paleo vs. vegan.
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Re: COVID-19 RNA Based Vaccines and the Risk of Prion Disease

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ApropoE4 wrote:sometimes very smart and reasonable people fall in with the wrong ideas.
One current effort to overcome skepticism regarding institutional sources of information about the vaccines involves encouraging people who are trusted within a community to advocate directly to those who trust them. With this in mind ...
Community Guidelines wrote:Humility. Refrain from posturing as an expert or relying on your professional status to make your point. Support your opinions with personal or clinical experience, your physician’s perspective, and/or published medical research. Avoid overreaching – we are most credible when we focus on our own personal experiences.
... I would like to share my experience.

Vaccinated: me, my wife, our children (four sons, a daughter, a daughter-in-law, a girlfriend, and a boyfriend); my parents and my mother-in-law; my sister, husband, two of her three children and a daughter-in-law; my wife's sister and husband; my wife's older brother; 100% of our in-person friends (dozens); 100% of our children's in-person friends (100+).

One of our friends had a persistent mild headache for a week after each Moderna shot. A couple of our children felt ill for a day or two after the second Moderna shot. My mother was ill for a couple of days after the first Pfizer shot. My wife and I had nothing more than brief mild soreness in the injected shoulder. No one else in this group of people had side effects serious enough to arise in storytelling, and we do not know or know of anyone who regrets being vaccinated.

To our knowledge, none of the people we know who are vaccinated has subsequently become ill with Covid.

Unvaccinated: my wife's younger brother and his wife; an uncertain number of nephews, nieces, and distant friends.

I agree with ApropoE4 that vaccine hesitancy directly supports the development of variants and thereby prolongs and intensifies the pandemic. Hesitant friends, for your own sakes and in support of the health and safety of all people, I encourage you to get vaccinated.

Vaccinated friends, I encourage you to share your experiences here in this thread as I have.
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Re: COVID-19 RNA Based Vaccines and the Risk of Prion Disease

Post by ApropoE4 »

You can see how authorities around the world have reached the conclusion that we're done with education and are switching to coercion - France is making life impossible for the unvaccinated, Israel and Italy are starting to demand proof of vaccination in most indoor settings, New York City is preparing the public for a vaccine mandate... of course all timed to coincide with the FDA approving Pfizer in a few weeks.

So people can remain skeptical as long as they get vaccinated, and that's just fine.
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Re: COVID-19 RNA Based Vaccines and the Risk of Prion Disease

Post by TheBrain »

NF52 wrote:
Thanks for pulling together all that we share! I hadn't made those connections myself.
MarcR wrote:
Thanks for sharing your vaccination story. You are, indeed, someone I trust. I'd like for others to share their stories as well, including those who've decided to get vaccinated and those who've decided not to.
ApoE 4/4 - When I was in 7th grade, my fellow students in history class called me "The Brain" because I had such a memory for detail. I excelled at memorization and aced tests. This childhood memory helps me cope!
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Re: COVID-19 RNA Based Vaccines and the Risk of Prion Disease

Post by TheBrain »

I'd like to share some additional information.

Here's an article that explains why the CDC and others are claiming that the only people getting sick with COVID-19 are the unvaccinated: Yale doctor calls out CDC for committing large scale medical fraud and hiding covid cases among the vaccinated

Note: If you click the author's name to the right of the article's date, you'll see his extensive bio.

Look at what's unfortunately happening in Israel:
Stats in Israel in vaccinated.jpg
Here's a link to the full article: More than 1,000 Israelis test positive for COVID

I'm not a medical person, but it appears that at least in Israel, vaccinated people are having more trouble with the Delta variant than the unvaccinated. I've read (and heard) that unvaccinated people with natural immunity actually have broader immunity than those who are vaccinated.

I do understand Quantifier's point here (and thank you, Quantifier):
Quantifier wrote:When (for instance) 2/3 of the population is vaccinated, there are twice as many vaccinated people as there are unvaccinated ones. If the vaccine protects from infection at just under 50% you will have just more cases among vaccinated people than among unvaccinated people. If the protection from infection is higher, then the vaccination rate at which infection rates among vaccinated vs non-vaccinated equalize is higher.
I know Israel has a high vaccination rate, but it seems like something more is going on here. Per the article, even Israeli health officials are saying that the effectiveness of the Pfizer vaccine against the Delta variant is "weaker" than hoped for.

A later addition: Per the article about Israel, the Delta variant in that country is weaker than the original virus. Here’s the text that introduces a graph that shows this: “Percent of cases that turn critically ill is now 1.6%, compared to 4% at a similar stage in the 3rd wave when there were no vaccines.”

From what I’ve read, over time, mutations of viruses become more contagious yet weaker.
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Last edited by TheBrain on Sun Jul 25, 2021 6:12 am, edited 1 time in total.
ApoE 4/4 - When I was in 7th grade, my fellow students in history class called me "The Brain" because I had such a memory for detail. I excelled at memorization and aced tests. This childhood memory helps me cope!
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