I'm in Pfizer's COVID vaccine trial, ask me anything.

[Nish]

Friend of mine and I were talking about this tonight. Are they concernes about a long term affect on Tcells (tnf cells) and ability to fight off cancer?

[Diomedes]

Couldn’t imagine why it would be a problem; mRNA has a half-life of about five minutes in your cells. After those five minutes, this is essentially a subunit vaccine (a vaccine that delivers a dose of the specific protein your immune system detects and responds to). And we’ve been using those for decades.

[Nish]

Cool! I will let her know.

[JonM]

We received word today at work that all staff who want the vaccine should be able to get it within the next four weeks. Since my wife and I both work for the same healthcare system, we’re both going to be getting it asap. I expect my daughter will also be receiving hers soon as well since she is a first responder. I’m looking forward to being able to finally put this nightmare behind us.

[Diomedes]

Light at the end of the tunnel! Don't get sloppy, everyone. We're just about done.

[martix_agent]

We received word today at work that all staff who want the vaccine should be able to get it within the next four weeks. Since my wife and I both work for the same healthcare system, we’re both going to be getting it asap. I expect my daughter will also be receiving hers soon as well since she is a first responder. I’m looking forward to being able to finally put this nightmare behind us.

I want it to be over, but I suspect it'll be late next year before we get enough vaccines spread into the world for it to be pretty much negated. It sounds like the Us is going to target the vulnerable first, from what I've heard. After that the health care workers.

edit: well neverminded. My wifes friend who also works in healthcare just was contacted and was asked if she wanted the vaccine.

[Tarsun2]

its insane if you think about it. not the vaccine but the actual virus and the transmission.
A single trip to the bar and the whole group gets it.
A single dinner party and the whole family gets it.

ive been in and out of rooms with covid patients, repair equipment at my bench that has been used for covid patients, and have been on covid floors on a regular basis and have not gotten it.
I repair the ventilators that are used on covid patients and i know that there is no way to completely clean every nook and crany of these things.
Recently i spoke with a charge nurse who shares the same disbelief. She had stories of performing chest compressions on a covid + patient without a mask on during a critical event.

it makes me think that some people (age aside) are simply more likely to get it than others... or maybe healthcare workers have a "more robust" immune system. idk

[Jordan]

Or you're just asymptomatic.

[JonM]

I don't know about people being more or less susceptible or not, but I do know all about trying to maintain equipment in a medical environment. My team is responsible for equipment all over the hospital (including those from COVID wards). Precautions and PPE are just as important for us as they are for the nurses and doctors who actively treat patients. This is precisely why they're going to be offering the vaccine to all staff. Every day I go to work, I'm willingly walking into a warzone. Thankfully, we'll all have better protection for ourselves and for our families very soon.

[Scottybeans]

Do you feel any zombie-like tendencies forming? Foggy brain, thirst for human flesh, anything like that?

[Diomedes]

Haha, no I worked on viruses that infect bacteria. But I do teach about the zombie brain fungus every year, one of my favorite topics.

[boarder2k7]

I really hope we figure out bacteriophages soon, they'll be such a game changer when we get that cracked.

[AnarchicArctic]

Cordyceps is absolutely wild

[Tarsun2]

could be lol
but most likely not.

our department was tested for the antibodies not that long ago to see if we had it early on. No luck.

[un2xs]

This interesting article from The Atlantic showed up in my news feed today: https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine...=pocket-newtab

Do you have any critic of the article, either plus or minus? As a non-scientist, it seemed an interesting article to me.

[Axel]

Ooooh ... That title scares me. I don't care how scientific you are, don't declare victory too early and jinx the whole thing, dammit!

[un2xs]

This evening NPR had a story about Moderna's COVID vaccine. The study of 30,000 people has it's efficacy at 94%. What caught my attention was that in older populations it was not as effective. Do you have any idea why? If so, can you explain it to a non-scientist?

[Diomedes]

I can try! In general, younger people have more robust immune responses - faster ramp-up of antibody production, more antibodies, faster + more T cells. So a given vaccine dose, on average, is going to be more protective in younger people compared to older people.

[Axel]

As th vaccine goes out to front line medical staff--thank you Diomedes for you and your wife's contribution to making this a reality

[JonM]

My wife and I are both now signed up to receive the vaccine through work. My daughter is signed up to receive it through the EMS. What's odd is that hospital workers in PA are slated to get it before first responders. Never mind the fact that EMS workers are stuck inside of a tiny ambulance with COVID patients with nothing between them and the virus besides an N95 and goggles.

[Axel]

I suppose the logic is that without first having a staffed hospital to receive the patients, EMS can't do much good. Anecdotally, I hear that patients in little Franklin County are overwhelming the available medical staff so keeping every possible nurse healthy has got to be top priority. I'm sure EMS is a close second.

[Five Oh]

The way different states are rolling it out is kinda wild. I would assume you should do health care workers, then anyone that is elderly/has big comorbidity risks. I'm in Michigan and they are rolling it out to health care workers, then fire, law enforcement, and EMS. I'm actually slated to get it next week, but I would rather they give it to the elderly and those most likely to die before me.

[Tarsun2]

from my understanding, (and correct me if im wrong) the vaccine does not prevent you from getting and spreading the virus; only limits how "sick" you get from it. Is this true?

[Diomedes]

Yes and no. Vaccines are not on/off switches. They allow you to fight off an infection without getting sick. In many cases, this means there isn’t enough virus to spread. In other cases, there is, but you don’t get sick from it because it’s a less severe infection than it would otherwise have been (less virus, beaten faster).

The big idea is that a vaccine turns down the temperature on whatever “would have happened” if you’re exposed. Instead of getting really sick, you get a little sick. Instead of getting a little sick, you don’t get sick at all. Same for being able to spread the virus - the point is to shift the whole distribution of outcomes towards less spread.

And this is why this has to be a team effort. It only works if everyone is ratcheting the intensity down. If a big chunk of the population is getting just as sick and spreading just as much, we’re all out of luck.

[boarder2k7]

from my understanding, (and correct me if im wrong) the vaccine does not prevent you from getting and spreading the virus; only limits how "sick" you get from it. Is this true?

I'm not sure if we know this answer completely yet. I looked around (briefly) though, and came up with this article that was interesting, but several weeks old at this point. With how fast things have been changing it may be pretty outdated.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/08/health/covid-vaccine-mask.html

From that it seems like they still aren't completely sure how much is prevented past 90+% of illness.


Also TIL that the nose has essentially a separate immune system.