Tuesday, April 18, 2023

Sunlight on the Mountain

 


15 comments:

  1. F.D.A. Authorizes Another Covid Booster Shot for People Over 65 [Click]
    “The Food and Drug Administration on Tuesday approved an additional round of bivalent booster shots for adults who are 65 and over as well as people with compromised immune systems. The effort is to ensure ongoing protection against Covid, which is still claiming more than 1,300 lives each week.

    The bivalent shots target Omicron variants of the coronavirus. The agency said people who are 65 and older who have not had a bivalent booster shot in at least four months may get another one. For those who are immunocompromised, additional doses of the bivalent vaccine can be given two months after the last shot. Those who are unvaccinated can get a single dose of the bivalent booster, the agency said.”
    —Alan

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    1. C.D.C. data also show that only 43 percent of people over 65 have received an Omicron booster shot, and just 20 percent of those 18 and older.

      The spring booster approval was for the same formula that was released to protect people from the Omicron variant of the virus. An updated vaccine is expected later this year. (The agency on Tuesday also rescinded authorization for the original monovalent vaccines that Americans received in the first mass-vaccination campaign.)

      The decision to offer the booster to the most vulnerable this spring is sound for two reasons, said Dr. Daniel Griffin, an infectious disease specialist at Columbia University.

      “One is the traditional reason — it protects people from severe disease,” he said. “But there is what I call the superpower where for a matter of three or four months, you get an extra benefit of reducing your risk of even getting infected.”

      ---Alan

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    2. So I'm technically eligible as of today. Do I want to get it now? I've tended to favor an every-six-months schedule. But the new version will probably be out in five or six months, so waiting would potentially interfere with getting that promptly.

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    3. {listener}
      This is so exciting!!

      Wil and I had got the bivalent booster on September 7th.
      Can’t wait!!

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    4. Wil and I are getting our second Bivalent booster (Pfizer) tomorrow at 3:00pm! 😃👍

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  2. 'A gamechanger': this simple device could help fight the war on abortion rights in the US [Click] “Only a tiny fraction of primary care physicians provide abortion care. Dr Joan Fleischman believes that training them in a simple and easy abortion method might be the best way to offset the war on access”
    ---Alan

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    1. In my mind, this means Fox thinks it has a chance. Otherwise it would have paid whatever it took to settle. And Dominion would have taken any sufficiently whopping settlement.

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    2. (See below. They reached a settlement at the last possible second...literally several hours after the delayed trial was set to begin.)

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  4. Replies
    1. That $787.5 million is about what I expected the settlement to be. For context: "I didn't think there was any way they would get $1.6 billion – even when they proved their case, even if they proved it overwhelmingly to a jury. Let's remember, by its own estimation, Dominion valued the entire company at somewhere between $30 and $80 million. This settlement is 10 times the value of Dominion as an entire company. That's how strong a statement this is with this number," Honig explained.

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    2. The number is good. I still would have appreciated this playing out in the news night after night, pointing out clearly the consequences of lying to the people...rather than a "one and done" news cycle event.

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    3. This is not accountability. The anchors at Fox do not have to admit their lies on air. This is just "throw money at it and it goes away" ~ "The cost of doing business." Not enough.

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    4. I am disappointed that the Fox News anchors/commentators will not have to fess up on TV. Can't get everything, though. I am reminded of a judge observing that civil suits often settle when there is word a jury is on its way up from the assembly room. I suppose Dominion will share its discovery with Smartmatic.
      ---Alan

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