Northern Europe during Pandemic -- Summers 2020 & 2021 & onwards

[Montanan]

Denmark Extends Entry Restrictions & Travel Ban to at least April 20

The Danish government has announced its decision to extend the existing entry restrictions and travel ban until April 20, amid a warned third wave of COVID-19.

The decision has been announced by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which in a press release notes that through the “Framework Agreement on the plan for the reopening of Denmark”, the current travel restrictions will be extended as a starting point until and including April 20.

Among others, the Ministry also points out that the extension of restrictions means that business travel abroad remains highly discouraged.

. . .

As a part of the extended measures, the authorities have also decided to keep in place entry restrictions for all arrivals from outside the country, which were set to expire on April 5, at least until April 20, for those who do not have an essential purpose of entry to the country. All arrivals with an acceptable purpose of entry should present a negative COVID-19 test upon arrival, or else they will be turned back. Border controls at the border with Germany will remain effective until at least the same date.

[Montanan]

Denmark is working on a Covid Passport to be called a Coronapas.

the government is working to make it possible to open up to travel with Coronapas, as well as other COVID-19 precaution measures.

Back in February, Danish authorities warned they would soon launch a so-called digital Coronavirus passport in collaboration with business, in a bid to allow foreign travel and for restrictions to be slowly eased and lifted. At the time, the government noted that the plans would need another three or four months to come into life. The government has now revealed that the document will be shortly called Coronapas.

https://www.schengenvisainfo.com/new...n-to-april-20/

[GordMay]

“Assessment of protection against reinfection with SARS-CoV-2 among 4 million PCR-tested individuals in Denmark in 2020: a population-level observational study” ~ by Christian Holm Hansen, PhD, et al [March 17, 2021]

“Background
The degree to which infection with SARS-CoV-2 confers protection towards subsequent reinfection is not well described. In 2020, as part of Denmark's extensive, free-of-charge PCR-testing strategy, approximately 4 million individuals (69% of the population) underwent 10·6 million tests. Using these national PCR-test data from 2020, we estimated protection towards repeat infection with SARS-CoV-2 ...

... Discussion ...
... In summary, we found that protection against repeat SARS-CoV-2 infection is robust and detectable in the majority of individuals, protecting 80% or more of the naturally infected population who are younger than 65 years against reinfections within the observation period. However, we observed that individuals aged 65 years and older had less than 50% protection against repeat SARS-CoV-2 infection. Because the older age group is more prone to a serious clinical course of illness, this finding highlights the need to implement protective measures for the older population in the form of effective vaccines and enhanced physical distancing and infection control, even in those known to be previously infected
Furthermore, our data indicate that vaccination of previously infected. individuals should be done because natural protection cannot be relied on.”

Here ➥ https://www.thelancet.com/journals/l...575-4/fulltext

[Exile]

Originally Posted by Seaworthy Lass

The vaccines I was thinking of are the ones that use more traditional technology of inactivated virus. Several have been produced by China, India and Russia:

CHINA:
Sinopharm
CoronaVac (Sinovac)

INDIA:
Covaxin

RUSSIA:
CoviVac

The J&J / Janssen COVID vaccine uses similar technology to the J&J Ebola vaccine that was approved about 10 months ago, but the replication deficient adenovirus carrier is human. As far as I am aware the J&J Ebola vaccine was the very first vaccine of its kind approved for human use. This is also similar to the AstraZeneca vaccine which uses a chimpanzee adenovirus vector, and the Sputnik V which uses two different human adenovirus vectors for the 2 doses.

The number and variety of COVID-19 vaccines produced during this past year have been absolutely extraordinary. Some of the new technology may now lead to rapid advances in the treatment of other conditions including cancer. This may eventually be the silver lining to this pandemic.

Most informative and interesting, as usual. My thoughts were more along the lines of the J&J being the only one available in the US (that I'm aware of) that does not use the new RNA-based technology like Pfizer and Moderna. From your description, however, I'm not sure that's either here nor there when trying to evaluate whether it's new vs. more traditional technology. Obviously my knowledge in this area is limited, and I make no claim to expertise. But your post did increase my understanding a bit, so it was appreciated.

[Exile]

Originally Posted by GordMay

“Assessment of protection against reinfection with SARS-CoV-2 among 4 million PCR-tested individuals in Denmark in 2020: a population-level observational study” ~ by Christian Holm Hansen, PhD, et al [March 17, 2021]

“Background
The degree to which infection with SARS-CoV-2 confers protection towards subsequent reinfection is not well described. In 2020, as part of Denmark's extensive, free-of-charge PCR-testing strategy, approximately 4 million individuals (69% of the population) underwent 10·6 million tests. Using these national PCR-test data from 2020, we estimated protection towards repeat infection with SARS-CoV-2 ...

... Discussion ...
... In summary, we found that protection against repeat SARS-CoV-2 infection is robust and detectable in the majority of individuals, protecting 80% or more of the naturally infected population who are younger than 65 years against reinfections within the observation period. However, we observed that individuals aged 65 years and older had less than 50% protection against repeat SARS-CoV-2 infection. Because the older age group is more prone to a serious clinical course of illness, this finding highlights the need to implement protective measures for the older population in the form of effective vaccines and enhanced physical distancing and infection control, even in those known to be previously infected
Furthermore, our data indicate that vaccination of previously infected. individuals should be done because natural protection cannot be relied on.”

Here ➥ https://www.thelancet.com/journals/l...575-4/fulltext

I'm not quite understanding how the vaccine recommendation (bolded) logically follows -- at least for people under 65 -- from the preceding stats & analysis. Not that vaccines may not be a good idea for many if not most people generally (I recently opted to get mine), but that "natural protection cannot be relied on" for people under 65 when the study concludes that 80+% of the population under 65 who have already been infected have "robust and detectable" protection from reinfection. Especially when you consider that, of the remaining 20% or so who do get reinfected, 90+% of them will require no hospitalization or even a doctor visit, let alone be at risk of death, but will instead suffer flu-like symptoms (maybe worse) for a relatively short period of time.

Am I wrong? If not, then I keep bearing in mind the original (and still applicable??) goal here, namely to prevent hospitals and other parts of the overall health care system from being overwhelmed. Unless this has changed, and world health authorities now think there's a viable chance of eradication. If that's the case, then perhaps a cogent argument can be made for mandatory vaxxes & passports, but otherwise I'm not sure why reliable testing wouldn't suffice for int'l travel, etc.

[boatman61]

Originally Posted by Exile

I'm not quite understanding how the vaccine recommendation (bolded) logically follows -- at least for people under 65 -- from the preceding stats & analysis. Not that vaccines may not be a good idea for many if not most people generally (I recently opted to get mine), but that "natural protection cannot be relied on" for people under 65 when the study concludes that 80+% of the population under 65 who have already been infected have "robust and detectable" protection from reinfection. Especially when you consider that, of the remaining 20% or so who do get reinfected, 90+% of them will require no hospitalization or even a doctor visit, let alone be at risk of death, but will instead suffer flu-like symptoms (maybe worse) for a relatively short period of time.

Am I wrong? If not, then I keep bearing in mind the original (and still applicable??) goal here, namely to prevent hospitals and other parts of the overall health care system from being overwhelmed. Unless this has changed, and world health authorities now think there's a viable chance of eradication. If that's the case, then perhaps a cogent argument can be made for mandatory vaxxes & passports, but otherwise I'm not sure why reliable testing wouldn't suffice for int'l travel, etc.

It will not matter in the EU as they appear to be opting for mandatory vaccinations for all.. including minors..
We're going to get out of the ECHR: UK Defence Secretary

The Strasbourg-based court was answering a complaint brought by Czech families regarding mandatory jabs for children. The court ruled: “The measures could be regarded as being ‘necessary in a democratic society.’” Legal experts said the decision could pave the way for governments introducing compulsory vaccinations against coronavirus.
(this bit made me smile as I always thought democracy involved choice and dictatorships took choice away)

Trending
Nicolas Hervieu, who specialises in the ECHR, said it “reinforces the possibility of a compulsory vaccination under conditions of the current COVID-19 pandemic”.

[Exile]

Originally Posted by CatNewBee

I am inclined to believe, most psychological and neurological problems are on the side of covid survivers without an infection, rather then the recovered people. Anxiety, fanatic craving for experimental shots, hysterically defending masks and lockdowns, furiously attacking people with other views... This defines for me a psychosis, and the cause is not a survival of a pathogene virus but a overexaggregated, self amplyfying echo chamber of mass media, and the fear - this never ends.

I'm hesitant to quantify without more data and information, but there's certainly some truth to the negative mental health impacts of the responses to the pandemic that you describe, as opposed to the virus itself.

Originally Posted by Montanan

It can be hard to discern what "brain disorders" pre-dated the outbreak of Covid and which may have arisen or have been enhanced by Covid.

I suspect there was an innate predisposition of some sort that Covid may have exploited. Kind of like the association of the danger of this virus and co-morbidities.

Definitely, and perhaps the actual study which your cited CNN article attempted to explain accounted for this. But many will never make it past the bolded title which states and certainly implies that one-third of Covid patients will also contract a brain disease. You don't even have to read the underlying study since the article itself contradicts this, but even with that one can easily be left with the impression that there's a direct cause & effect btwn Covid and serious brain disorders. And maybe there is (anxiety, depression & mood disorders should never be trivialized), but we'd never know from reading the article. Again, it's likely not the scientific study that's to blame here, but the reliance on reporting from popular MSM outlets with an obvious agenda. (first & foremost to sell more copy).

[laird]

In a statement released by University College London , indicates that the UK should reach herd immunity by April the 12th ,this is measured by the number of people who have either had the virus or been vaccinated ,the figure being given us 73% of the population being in this category

One other interesting statistic is that out of 10,000 women who are using oral contraception , 4 will develope blood clots , this stat puts the risk of The AZ vaccine into a different perspective and perhaps highlights the politically driven response by the EU

On a brighter note ,the UK has just shipped 700,000 doses of vaccine to our cousins in Australia

[Exile]

Originally Posted by boatman61

It will not matter in the EU as they appear to be opting for mandatory vaccinations for all.. including minors..
We're going to get out of the ECHR: UK Defence Secretary

The Strasbourg-based court was answering a complaint brought by Czech families regarding mandatory jabs for children. The court ruled: “The measures could be regarded as being ‘necessary in a democratic society.’” Legal experts said the decision could pave the way for governments introducing compulsory vaccinations against coronavirus.
(this bit made me smile as I always thought democracy involved choice and dictatorships took choice away)

Trending
Nicolas Hervieu, who specialises in the ECHR, said it “reinforces the possibility of a compulsory vaccination under conditions of the current COVID-19 pandemic”.

Yup, generally speaking the further govt is removed from the people, the less democratic and therefore also the less accountable. Always takes more work to build consensus from the ground up. But why bother if a nameless, faceless govt official can do it for you? Hard to say in this case (yet) whether mandatory vaxxes have merit or not, but leaving it to people who can't be fired for screwing it up sounds like trouble. That's why a democratic republic is often favored, "if you can keep it." (as one of the US founders famously said following the Constitutional Convention). But those early Americans were all only recently converted Brits, and Brexit reminded us how you guys feel about the dangers of too much unaccountable power in too few hands . . . . (apologies to King George III, of course ).

[Seaworthy Lass]

Originally Posted by Exile

Most informative and interesting, as usual. My thoughts were more along the lines of the J&J being the only one available in the US (that I'm aware of) that does not use the new RNA-based technology like Pfizer and Moderna. From your description, however, I'm not sure that's either here nor there when trying to evaluate whether it's new vs. more traditional technology. Obviously my knowledge in this area is limited, and I make no claim to expertise. But your post did increase my understanding a bit, so it was appreciated.

The RNA vaccines (Pfizer, Moderna) are “newer” than the DNA ones (AstraZeneca, Sputnik V, J&J/Janssen, CanSino), but not by a long way. Although the COVID-19 vaccines were not the very first DNA vaccines, there were none in use prior to the pandemic. They are all in their infancy and their modes of action are very different to traditional vaccines.

Midway through last year the J&J Ebola DNA vaccine was the first one actually approved for human use, and this followed 6+ years of trials. That’s 6+ years of actual trials, not research and development that could potentially have been speeded up. In contrast, the COVID-19 vaccines had merely weeks of trials before being granted emergency/provisional/conditional approval.

The mRNA vaccines are brand new in terms of human use, although even these have had three decades of being researched:

“The first report of the successful use of in vitro transcribed mRNA in animals was published in 1990, when reporter gene mRNAs were injected into mice and protein production was detected....... However, these early promising results did not lead to substantial investment in developing mRNA therapeutics, largely owing to concerns associated with mRNA instability, high innate immunogenicity and inefficient in vivo delivery. Instead, the field pursued DNA-based and protein-based therapeutic approaches.”
https://www.nature.com/articles/nrd.2017.243

I don’t think people appreciate just how different these two groups of vaccines are to anything previously in use. Both act to genetically instruct our bodies to produce the viral spike protein. This is vastly different to all previous modes of action of vaccines (or any drug). We have never before used anything to genetically instruct our bodies to make foreign substances.


It has disturbed me for months now hearing the constant assurances from not just CF members pushing vaccination, but also from the media and government press releases regarding how very safe these mRNA and DNA vaccines are, and how they are “just another vaccine”. I am against censoring of any information or opinions, but why is propaganda such as this freely encouraged when discussions regarding safety are termed “misinformation” and censored, or at a minimum those voicing concerns are shamed?

Professionals in the field know it is essentially a death sentence for their careers if they speak up under these circumstances, but I think concerns regarding mass vaccination of those at no risk of severe illness are not rare amongst those working in the area.

None of this should detract that the SARS-CoV-2 virus can results in a frighteningly high percentage of deaths for those with certain risk factors. These new vaccines are simply lifesaving for these people. Describing these new vaccines as “miraculous” is not an understatement, but they need to be used judiciously.

[Montanan]

Originally Posted by laird

In a statement released by University College London , indicates that the UK should reach herd immunity by April the 12th ,this is measured by the number of people who have either had the virus or been vaccinated ,the figure being given us 73% of the population being in this category

One other interesting statistic is that out of 10,000 women who are using oral contraception , 4 will develope blood clots , this stat puts the risk of The AZ vaccine into a different perspective and perhaps highlights the politically driven response by the EU

On a brighter note ,the UK has just shipped 700,000 doses of vaccine to our cousins in Australia

Hmmm, given the concern regarding the AZ over potential blood clot hazards, might the Brits be performing the Mickey test using the Aussies as the tester?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CLQ0LZSnJFE&t=3s

[laird]

Originally Posted by Seaworthy Lass

The RNA vaccines (Pfizer, Moderna) are “newer” than the DNA ones (AstraZeneca, Sputnik V, J&J/Janssen, CanSino), but not by a long way. Although the COVID-19 vaccines were not the very first DNA vaccines, there were none in use prior to the pandemic. They are all in their infancy and their modes of action are very different to traditional vaccines.

Midway through last year the J&J Ebola DNA vaccine was the first one actually approved for human use, and this followed 6+ years of trials. That’s 6+ years of actual trials, not research and development that could potentially have been speeded up. In contrast, the COVID-19 vaccines had merely weeks of trials before being granted emergency/provisional/conditional approval.

The mRNA vaccines are brand new in terms of human use, although even these have had three decades of being researched:

“The first report of the successful use of in vitro transcribed mRNA in animals was published in 1990, when reporter gene mRNAs were injected into mice and protein production was detected....... However, these early promising results did not lead to substantial investment in developing mRNA therapeutics, largely owing to concerns associated with mRNA instability, high innate immunogenicity and inefficient in vivo delivery. Instead, the field pursued DNA-based and protein-based therapeutic approaches.”
https://www.nature.com/articles/nrd.2017.243

I don’t think people appreciate just how different these two groups of vaccines are to anything previously in use. Both act to genetically instruct our bodies to produce the viral spike protein. This is vastly different to all previous modes of action of vaccines (or any drug). We have never before used anything to genetically instruct our bodies to make foreign substances.


It has disturbed me for months now hearing the constant assurances from not just CF members pushing vaccination, but also from the media and government press releases regarding how very safe these mRNA and DNA vaccines are, and how they are “just another vaccine”. I am against censoring of any information or opinions, but why is propaganda such as this freely encouraged when discussions regarding safety are termed “misinformation” and censored, or at a minimum those voicing concerns are shamed?

Professionals in the field know it is essentially a death sentence for their careers if they speak up under these circumstances, but I think concerns regarding mass vaccination of those at no risk of severe illness are not rare amongst those working in the area.

None of this should detract that the SARS-CoV-2 virus can results in a frighteningly high percentage of deaths for those with certain risk factors. These new vaccines are simply lifesaving for these people. Describing these new vaccines as “miraculous” is not an understatement, but they need to be used judiciously.

Yes there is a risk , a real unknown danger especially to younger people who may go on to have families ,are the DNA based vaccines going to cause abnormalities in children ? Remember Thalidomide ,which was meant to be a wonder drug at the time of are we all in danger of developing illnesses that are unknown , there is also the possibility that the newer DNA vaccines may just lead us down the road to being able to cure previously incurable ailments

If we waited until there had been an extensive and exhaustive trial of all the vaccines ,the cost in human lives would have been very high ,there may still be a cost to future generations

I value your input seaworthy lass , you provide the discussion with balanced argument

[Seaworthy Lass]

Originally Posted by laird

If we waited until there had been an extensive and exhaustive trial of all the vaccines ,the cost in human lives would have been very high ,there may still be a cost to future generations

Yes, I fully agree. This was an emergency situation and emergency action was needed. I have been loudly cheering on the vaccination rate in the elderly and senior citizens and medical staff exposed to high viral loads etc. In the UK now that phase 1 is essentially completed, covering those categories accounting for 99% of deaths, I very much hope the rest of the population will not be put under pressure to be vaccinated. The temporarily limited availability of vaccines may mean this will naturally occur. Once we have had some months here under these new conditions perhaps the panic will ease and talks of vaccine passports to be used as entry to events (and possibly anything not classed as “essential”) will die down.

[UFO]

Originally Posted by Montanan

Hmmm, given the concern regarding the AZ over potential blood clot hazards, might the Brits be performing the Mickey test using the Aussies as the tester?

LOL


Wouldn't be the first time - I was recently planning my journey north and came accross the montebello islands - There are a few hotspots there where it is still radioactive from Nuke testing back in the 50's. Also from vague memory I think they let off a few in the outback as well.

[UFO]

Interesting research article on RNA vaccines and possible long term issues.


https://carterheavyindustries.files....sease-1503.pdf