Category Archives: Science

COVID Briefs Feb. 1, 2021

Many COVID cases never get sick

A systematic review suggests at least one third of SARS-CoV-2 infections occur in people who never develop symptoms. Info:  shpr.fyi/covidnotsick

Americans questioned prefer vaccines that are US-made, over 90% effective, and carry a less than 1% risk of minor side effects.

Both the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines being given in the U.S. are 94% or more effective and carry a risk of minor side effects of much less than one percent.

The Pfizer vaccine is manufactured in Brussels, Belgium, and the Moderna vaccine is manufactured apparently mostly in Switzerland but with some manufactured in Massachusetts.
Infoshpr.fyi/vaccines

Vaccines vs Viruses Effectiveness

Vaccine       Older     **New
Pfizer*   95        Good
Moderna*           95       Good
Johnson&J’n      72         57
Astrazenica         95         62
Novavax            89         50
All of the vaccines are almost totally effective in preventing serious illness including death.
*=2 Doses,   **= Newer variants
Infoshpr.fyi/variants

Inslee: Lewis Co. Phase II but Yakima Co. still Phase I

Gov. Jay Inslee on Jan. 28 announced changes to the state’s economic reopening plan that allows seven counties including Lewis County to move next week into Phase 2, which allows limited indoor dining among other loosening of COVID-19 restrictions.Yakima County remains in Phase I.
Infoshpr.fyi/lcph1

SWW Fairgrounds event vaccinated 1300 people

Nearly 1,300 people were vaccinated event Jan. 24 at the Southwest Washington Fairgrounds.
Infoshpr.fyi/fairvacc

You cannot get COVID from the vaccine

You must be exposed to the novel coronavirus to get COVID-19. The COVID-19 vaccines being distributed in the United States do not contain any virus particles, so you cannot get COVID-19 from the vaccine.
Infoshpr.fyi/notgetcovid

The COVID-19 vaccine cannot alter your DNA

The COVID-19 vaccines cannot alter your DNA, which contains the unique genetic code that makes you “you.” The currently approved COVID-19 vaccines are messenger RNA (mRNA) vaccines. The mRNA vaccine delivers a “cheat code” to your immune system that shows it how to fight COVID-19.
Infoshpr.fyi/notgetcovid

Saliva test as good as nasophyngeal  test

Given the ease of use and good diagnostic performances, these findings suggest that saliva NAAT represents an attractive alternative to nasopharyngeal swab NAAT and may significantly bolster massive testing efforts. One example of home saliva test from Amazon for $110.
Infoshpr.fyi/saliva

Trained students filling need for additional vaccinators in Yakima County

As health organizations across the Yakima Valley work to make vaccines accessible to all who are eligible, local nursing, pharmacy and other students are pitching in to get those vaccines into community members’ arms.

Students at Pacific Northwest University of Health Sciences, Heritage University, Central Washington University and Washington State University, along with retired doctors, nurses, pharmacists, EMT’s and others are involved in the effort. Some are serving as supply runners for health care staff. Others, who are qualified to administer vaccines, are injecting them.
Partly excerpted from Yakima Herald Republic Jan. 24, 2021 by Janelle Retka
Infoshpr.fyi/vaccinators

You still need the vaccine even if you’ve had COVID-19

Health experts recommend COVID-19 vaccination even for people who’ve survived COVID-19 infection. Although infection likely gives you some immunity to reinfection, no one knows how long that immunity lasts.
Infoshpr.fyi/notgetcovid

The vaccine does not include a microchip

None of the COVID-19 vaccines contains a microchip. This misconception is just plain screwball but seems to have been fueled by a video featuring a vaccine manufacturer that can produce prefilled vaccine syringes with HUGE needles that include microchips for animals.
Infoshpr.fyi/notgetcovid

Ivermectin no longer prohibited for COVID

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) has dropped its recommendation against the 45-yr-old inexpensive antiparasitic drug ivermectin for treatment of COVID-19, and the agency now advises it can’t recommend for or against its use, leaving the decision to physicians and their patients.

Ivermectin is an old, cheap medication used to treat many types of parasite infestations including head lice, scabies, roundworms and river blindness. It can be taken by mouth or applied to the skin for external infestations.

Ivermectin is on the World Health Organization’s List of Essential Medicines.[12] Ivermectin is an FDA-approved anti-parasitic agent.

The drug is “safe at relatively high doses, widely available, and relatively cheap, too,” say a group of doctors pushing its use.

“It is important to stress that no one should try to self-medicate with versions of ivermectin that are for veterinary purposes or head lice.” The only safe way to get ivermectin is by prescription from a doctor, he says.
Excerpted from Medscape
Infoshpr.fyi/ivermectin2

If you’re allergic to eggs, the vaccine won’t cause a reaction

Neither the Pfizer nor the Moderna COVID-19 vaccines contain egg products, and eggs are not used to produce either vaccine.
Infoshpr.fyi/notgetcovid

The vaccines do not contain aborted fetal cells

The approved vaccines do not contain any fetal cells. During early development of the vaccines, pharmaceutical companies tested the effectiveness of the vaccines in cells that were the descendants of fetal cells obtained from tissue taken during a 1973 elective abortion. No fetal cells are used to manufacture or produce the vaccines. No religious faith has expressed opposition to the COVID-19 vaccines.
Infoshpr.fyi/notgetcovid

Serious reaction to Pfizer only 1 in 100,000

One in 100,000 Pfizer vaccinations results in anaphylaxis, serious allergic reaction, requiring medical treatment. Zero chance of death.
Infoshpr.fyi/allergic

Basic Immune System

For those who might need to be reminded of the basics of our fantastic God-created immune system, as I did, watch these:
Info: shpr.fyi/immunity
Info: shpr.fyi/immunology

The small bowel may serve as a viral entry site

SARS-CoV-2 uses the ACE2 receptor as its main attachment point to invade human cells. ACE2 receptors are present in various tissues including the oropharynx, nose, lungs, kidneys, pancreas and the small bowel. Thus, the small bowel may serve as a viral entry site. Could the infection rate being so uncontrollable by masking, etc., be caused partly by our eating the virus?
Infoshpr.fyi/eatcovid

You still must wear a mask after you are vaccinated and after you recover from COVID.

It takes time to develop immunity after vaccination, so wearing a mask may protect you from infection while your body develops the antibodies and other substances needed to fight the novel coronavirus. We also don’t know yet if the vaccine can prevent spread of the coronavirus. Vaccination will likely keep you from getting sick with COVID-19, but it’s possible you could get infected with the novel coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) and spread it to others.
Infoshpr.fyi/notgetcovid

Surgical masks 80% protection vs homemade masks 50%

A recent study found that surgical masks protect the wearer from influenza virus in droplets and aerosols by an average of 80 percent. Another found that homemade masks protect the wearer by 50 percent against air pollution particles.
Infoshpr.fyi/homemade
Vaccination does not cause infertility or miscarriage.
Reproduction experts encourage those who wish to get pregnant to seek the vaccine.
Infoshpr.fyi/notgetcovid

Hopefully the number of new cases/infections per day
has peaked and is dropping

The new cases number per day apparently peaked on Jan. 7 at 227,970 cases. On Jan. 29 the number of new cases was 164,876.
Infoshpr.fyi/uscases

The U.S. may have funded Wuhan Institute in China to make the coronavirus more lethal

Image result for Wuhan Institute in China

In October 2014, the Obama Administration paused study of SARS viruses that could “make them more risky to humans.” Disregarding the ban, our U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases directed by Dr. Anthony Fauci continued funding the Wuhan Institute Ecohealth Alliance, Inc in 2014 through 2017 at about $600,000 annually.

EcoHealth was paid to “Assess CoV spillover potential at high-risk human-wildlife interfaces in China,” in H5N1 bird flu viruses but got extended to bat virus strain RaBTCOV/4991, which Wuhan had identified as showing most “divergence from human SARS-CoV and could be considered a new strain of CoV’s.”

Virus RaBTCOV/4991 is essentially identical to the COVID-19 strain that got out into the public there and has circulated the world.

China has recently on Feb. 3, 2020 admitted, “We then found that BatCoV RaTG13 in our library —which was previously detected in Rhinolophus affinis (horseshoe bat) from Yunnan province—showed high sequence identity to 2019-nCoV.”

RaTG13 is also so nearly identical to 2019-nCoV that when its sequence is examined, it’s reported as “former lab designation Bat coronavirus Ra4991.”

That virus having then, almost certainly just by simple human error, getting out of the Wuhan Institute lab into the Wuhan public then not being contained there, is entirely China’s fault.

Fauci had said in Dec. 2011, “Important information and insights can come from generating a potentially dangerous virus in the laboratory.”

Partly excerpted and admittedly excessively condensed from Science Magazine the publication of the American Association for the Advancement of Science Feb. 8, 2019 By Jocelyn Kaiser
Infoshpr.fyi/usfundcovid

Dave Bunting

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Science and Digital Briefs Mar. 13, 2019

Pennsylvania state lawmaker offers bill
to save nuclear power plants

Nuclear power plants are zero-carbon energy producers.

Pennsylvania state Representative Tom Mehaffie said the typical residential power customer’s bill would only increase by $1.77 per month under his bill versus $2.39 if the reactors close.

Mehaffie said the bill would cost about $500 million, which he said would be much less than the $4.6 billion it would cost the state in higher electric bills and lost jobs, tax revenue and other costs if the reactors were allowed to close.

Pennsylvania’s five nuclear plants account for nearly 16,000 jobs and provide $69 million in net state tax revenues annually, Mehaffie said.

Nationally, nuclear power in the United States is provided by 99 commercial reactors with a net summer capacity of 100,350 megawatts (MW), 65 pressurized water reactors and 34 boiling water reactors. In 2016 they produced a total of 805.3 terawatt-hours of electricity, which accounted for 19.7% of the nation’s total electric energy generation. In 2016, nuclear energy comprised nearly 60 percent of U.S. emission-free generation.

Info:   shpr.fyi/2UtdkOA

Have I Been Pwned?

Have I been Pwned (haveibeenpwned.com) is a web site that for no charge checks our email addresses against lists of addresses in known security breaches.

I (Dave Bunting, Shopper Editor) received this message last week:

“You’re one of 763,117,241 people pwned in the recent Verifications.io data breach!”

You can join and learn how to protect yourself here:

haveibeenpwned.com

Print transistors on paper

Cambridge engineers have developed a high-performance printed transistor with flexibility for use in wearable and implantable electronics.

The researchers’ inkjet-printed transistor is sensitive enough to accurately detect electrophysiological signals from the skin.

It is possible to fabricate a whole circuit using just a single, highly affordable, inkjet printing tool that puts a fabrication plant within reach of most university departments. It can achieve a low power, high signal resolution analogue sensor interface using low-cost, simplistic printing technologies.

Info:   shpr.fyi/2TwSAZz

Fast, flexible ionic transistors for bioelectronic devices

Many major advances in medicine, especially in neurology, have been sparked by recent advances in electronic systems that can acquire, process, and interact with biological substrates. These bioelectronic systems, which are increasingly used to understand dynamic living organisms and to treat human disease, require devices that can record body signals, process them, detect patterns, and deliver electrical or chemical stimulation to address problems.

A team at Columbia Engineering has developed the first biocompatible ion driven transistor that is fast enough to enable real-time signal sensing and stimulation of brain signals.

Info:  shpr.fyi/2Ht16Sk

Machine Learning boosts effectiveness of wind power.

 Machine Learning teaches wind machines to accurately predict output increasing efficiency of power grid planning.

Wind’s unwanted feature of unpredictability has hampered outlooks on wind as an alternative energy source.

If energy sources can be scheduled to deliver a set amount of electricity at a set time, they are often more valuable to the grid.

 Info:   shpr.fyi/2CewPmQ

Scientists turn carbon dioxide back into coal

Researchers have used liquid metals to turn carbon dioxide back into solid coal, in a world-first breakthrough that could transform our approach to carbon capture and storage.

The research team led by RMIT University in Melbourne, Australia, have developed a new technique that can efficiently convert CO2 from a gas into solid particles of carbon.

The research offers an alternative pathway for safely and permanently removing the greenhouse gas from our atmosphere.

Info:   shpr.fyi/2J7d1HL

Big Battle Against Huawei Chinese 5G networking

A large portion of digital equipment sold and used worldwide, including in the US, is made by or contains chips made by Huawei, a huge Chinese manufacturer. Such equipment includes computers, phones, tablets, routers and, most importantly, the servers, the big computers than run the internet.

Huawei’s devices are often only tiny, almost microscopic, integrated circuits inserted into larger circuits during manufacture by manufacturers including such as Microsoft, Apple, Cisco. As a real example the 22-core Xeon Broadwell-E5 CPU from Intel packs 16 million transistors into each square millimeter.

US intelligence officials strongly suspect that much, perhaps most, digital equipment made in China includes “back doors” by which the Chinese could take over control of these devices. The Chinese deny these claims.

The heads of six major US intelligence agencies have warned that American citizens shouldn’t use products and services made by Chinese tech giants Huawei and ZTE. The intelligence chiefs made the recommendation during a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing on Feb. 12, 2018. The group included the heads of the FBI, the CIA, the NSA, and the director of national intelligence.

FBI Director Chris Wray said the government was “deeply concerned about the risks of allowing any company or entity that is beholden to foreign governments that don’t share our values to gain positions of power inside our telecommunications networks.”

Huawei racked up a slew of deals to sell 5G equipment at the world’s top mobile fair in Spain despite Washington’s campaign to convince its allies to bar the firm from their next-generation wireless networks. Huawei’s success there likely means they will henceforth dominate worldwide 5G networks including in the US.

The US claims that Huawei’s cheap equipment used in telecommunications infrastructure across the globe is a Trojan horse for potential Chinese state spying and sabotage.

Info:   shpr.fyi/2NZVvUX

Why It’s Almost Impossible to
Extract Huawei From Telecom Networks

Allies are under U.S. pressure to shun Huawei. But the company’s prevalence in existing telecom networks and dominance in 5G technology make that nearly impossible.

Watch this good 20-minute Wall Street Journal video to understand.

Info:   shpr.fyi/2HAglZV

https://www.wsj.com/video/why-it-almost-impossible-to-extract-huawei-from-telecom-networks/122E816F-856B-4D3F-A361-B832D9862A99.html

 

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