Ok so just to be clear how would you describe Madrid currently? Its listed as 11.3% positive antibody tests on that graphic so about 750k infections in 6.6million population 2 months ago. Where do you think it is now for positive antibody results and how would you characterize the rest of the population in terms of susceptibility/other forms of immunity?

I would say that Madrid is right about where it was two months ago given that the infections peaked in March and were <10% of March levels by April 27th when the test started, and has been in terminal decline since thanks to have heavy lockdowns.

Given that antibody tests elsewhere have shown positive rates at 30% - 50% in some counties/towns (with a corresponding 0.3% to 0.5% death rate for a 1% IFR), and that itself only was arrested by lockdowns, I would say the "other forms of immunity" theory is pure bullshit and wishful thinking.

Outdoors is safer, but if you are in a crowded area where everyone is having a conversation in front of each other's faces, you're all basically breathing on each other. It's just a lot easier to do that indoors than outdoors because air has nowhere to go indoors

That's the point of distancing/masks, so you effectively don't breathe on each other. It also makes the viral load you're exposed to lower in volume. Pretty sure basically nothing is conclusive yet, but it is believed that the larger the load, the sicker you get and vice versa

The issue is in the US nobody wants to come to a consensus to do anything. We know some of the things that works and doesn't, but half the country is actively fighting the other half, and nothing works if there is no consensus in any specific locale

NYC has gotten deaths down to the single digits from a high of 799 in a day. That would be an example of a consensus doing what's necessary to lock down. Pretty much nowhere else did the same. AND everywhere else relaxed restrictions. We will have more deaths but not like NYC because 1) younger people getting sick from going out socially and others going back to work and 2) nobody is behaving like NYC did when they got hammered since we know things now that we didn't know back then and are following many behaviors that reduce the rate of transmission, even if it's going above 1 anyway

My guess was that deaths will rise everywhere, but not NYC level. We'll just keep opening up and shutting down trying to manufacture a flowing economy for both political reasons and because people have ****ing bills to pay

More casual racism from the most brilliant genius itt

Bolsonaro has tested positive

Dunno if that has any Brazil related market implications

My theory is vitamin D deficiency is a large risk factor. The elderly, people who don't go outside, and people with dark skin are especially at risk of serious D deficiency

It's not exactly my theory but its a theory that makes sense to me

Mandatory masks here now. People are pissed because there's almost no covid, and the decision was taken so many months after the peak. Also originally we were told masks wouldn't work.

I'll be curious to see how easily everyone comes on side for this now.

Not proof you're wrong but it's not looking promising

https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...us-say-experts

I'm taking Vit D supplements anyway because I'm getting almost no sun and it seems pretty harmless (also to appease my mother)

ditto, plus zinc (and a few other electrolyte sup's for non-covid reasons)

There's certainly nothing conclusive but being obese (fat soluble), elderly, or having darker skin are all serious factors contributing to vitamin D deficiency.

Also research shows that people that are deficient in vitamin D die from respiratory infections much more frequently. The criticism of that is those people may also have other contributing factors. They've also taken a look at a sub group with a genetic condition that creates D deficiency which is a somewhat tidier control group and that sub group also dies from respiratory infection at a much higher rate.

Its far from conclusive but when we are looking at large population groups it looks like a serious contributing factor. When doctors talk about it not being a preventive measure or treatment I think they're both speculating and speaking in terms of how it relates to other factors such as exposure, mask wearing, distancing, treating infected people etc. That's not the same thing as the theory that a vitamin D deficient population is going to do much worse than a sufficient one

https://www.tylervigen.com/spurious-correlations

Vitamin deficiencies are bad by definition so well worth addressing.

It all becomes a lot more dubious when people push any idea that an excess of a vitamin helps. Then absent scientific evidence it rapidly becomes nonsense.

Sodium overconsumption is also bad by definition so why not blame that instead.
The vitamin looking for a magic pill mania continues.

lol, love it. our nutrition science for the past 50+ years is garbage that was bought and paid for by people that want you to buy their garbage in a box/wrapper. in case no one else gets it, sodium is good for you.

I am not saying your intuitions are wrong, but I don't see how there is conclusive evidence one way or another the highlighted is true.

I have not seen any strong data one way or another whether there is some percentage of individuals who are PCR and antibody negative with partial/full immunity. If there was any, I would love to see it.

I have seen in vitro data indicating some Covid seronegative patients have T cells that react to Covid antigens (providing proof of principle immunity without being infected is possible), but the leap from this to having immunity in the real world is a big one.

The highlighted is true because every place goes completely vertical until the lockdown date slows infections. Here's NY for example:



Lockdown date was March 22nd, yet cases soar higher until the time the lockdown starts to bite then rapidly decline from the lockdown (5 to 14 day lag from infection to hospitalization).

Everywhere looks like this. There's nowhere that shows of getting anywhere near a low R pre lockdown. Therefore, spread rates were still rapid which means the proportion of people immune is far below herd immunity even with 30% to 50% infected.

re: Vit D

FYI,



The risks and benefits of sun exposure 2016

Ok so in summary ~12% infected/immune and ~88% susceptibles saved from infection by lockdown stamping it out in Madrid? If that model is true (or its say 20-30% immune/ 70-80% suspectibles elsewhere in Europe/NYC etc) why are we not seeing massive 2nd waves anywhere that has reopened after been hit hard and reached those sort of antibody levels? It doesn't seem like track/trace/isolation of further outbreaks or masks/distancing is anywhere near 100% to being reliably used as a containment measure.

I asked about the higher rates before, what large areas have way over 30% antibodies? Bergamo registered 57% but is a remote tight-knit city of 120k people and Ischgl was 42% but is an incestuous ski resort village so could be viewed as atypical. For major population areas I only saw Bronx at 32-34% which is a low income/minority area and outlier to the rest of NYC which is at 20-30%.

Also what about Sweden, which registered 0 deaths yesterday and is now almost back to average/below weekly deaths vs previous years?

I guess the real question to cut to the chase is what % antibody results you'd consider somewhere herd immune/saturated at?

Two main reasons:

- Europe locked down long and hard (and is easier to lock down) and infections got choked down to a low number

- The spread is a lot less than it was during the first outbreak. People isolate more, there's more general social distancing, many things are still officially shut down or partially open, testing and tracing and isolation is working quite well.

- Summer is helping

So we have low initial starting point + much lower reproduction rate from altered behavior + test and trace. I talk about this before.

If you start with 1K infected and have an R0 of 3, in 6 weeks you have 729,000 infected = 70K filling hospitals
If you start with 1K infected have an R0 of 1.5, in 6 weeks you have 11,400 infected = 1K filling hospitals.

That's a 70x differential. These are totally different outcomes in terms of how they look. One rapidly overwhelms hospitals before anyone knows what's happening, and the other looks like exactly what we're seeing.

It's not hard to understand and it doesn't require innate immunity theories at odds with the data.

It is in some places that got rates low enough. In other places it's partially reliable. A lot of small effects add up. For example, starting from a spread rate of 3 per generation:

- Some people socialize less/are more cautious = 0.2
- 1/3 of the population (or in high risk areas like shops and public transport) wear masks = 0.2
- High spread events are still locked down/closed (like bars): 0.3
- Test and trace and isolate of 1/6 of cases = 0.5 (can be as high as 2.0 imo)
- 5-10% of the higher spread nodes are immune = 0.3

Boom you're at 1.5 reproduction rate already, down from 3, and you're seeing the numbers above I calculated about the differential spread (1K in hospitals vs 70K in March with a 3.0 spread rate).

Those are the big ones. But Europe and the US overall are someone in the 5-10% stage: an incredibly long way from immune.

Sweden themselves have put this down to voluntary compliance in a quite compliant populace. The government has openly told people today to "not meet anyone new". The Swedish economy and consumer activity got hit just as hard as anywhere else, which is the best measure of how locked down they were:



It's also a large country with a tiny population like its Nordic neighbors, conditions conducive to keeping spread low.

The same place where the CDC puts it - around 70% under normal conditions living a normal life. Maybe 40-50% when not living a normal life, like now?

It is entirely possible a significant portion of the population has natural "immunity" without antibodies in the sense their immune system is strong enough to fight off the virus. That feeds into the heterogeneity causing herd immunity thresholds to be potentially much lower.

That's a dangerous thing to count on but if "natural" experiments continue to show data consistent with such a hypothesis, it needs to be considered.

We need to come to terms with the fact that we're going to be looking at new normals of social interaction and personal hygiene. I always hated shaking hands. Vulcan salute and masks in public please.

Tooth, do you think the US will have to lockdown again in the fall when the benefit of summer weather is no longer upon us?

Again? I must have missed the first one.

Ok thanks for the detailed reply, finally do you have any predictions for how it plays out going forwards and into winter in previously heavily infected places where it seems to be dying out?

For example, London has just 10-50 registered daily cases currently from 1k at peak with massively increased testing facilities now - you think it just rattles along in the background like that for ages at low numbers until it eventually gets to 50-70%, or there is a second wave coming as restraunts/bars/nightclubs etc reopen and summer ends? Are those numbers even vaguely accurate or could vast asympomatic/minor symptom transmission be happening unreported among younger/healthier people now lots of older/weaker/frontline ones have been exposed?

The UK as of right now claims they've gotten R0 below 1. It seems reasonable to me.

The biggest factor appears to be a highly successful test and trace program. For example, June statistics:

Test and trace is the most effective means of eradicating an epidemic. You saw it work in Korea months ago amidst a huge outbreak (over 3 to less than 1 in weeks), and I think you'd agree that no one in Korea was immune at that time.

To me the data all points to mitigations to get R a lot lower than 3 mostly working, hence the far lower spread rate. I see zero evidence of herd immunity or natural immunity anywhere, and very strong data points against that thesis. Populations are almost as vulnerable as they were when it first began. Europe broadly has around 5% immunity rate.

Test and trace is the way and I think you've been saying that since March.

We've really exposed ourselves as ******s in the US.