So you have your Dr. Cole and there are all the others who don't agree with him. Here's one
St. Luke's chief medical officer fact checks a doctor's anti-vax claims
"I'm afraid this is more from our anti-vax colleagues to stoke fear and misinformation instead of science."
VIDEO
Author: Brian Holmes Published: 6:09 PM MDT March 16, 2021 Updated: 9:11 PM MDT March 16, 2021
BOISE, Idaho — One of St. Luke's top doctors spoke with The 208 on Tuesday to discuss and fact-check anti-vax statements that one Garden City doctor told state lawmakers last week.
"Average COVID-19 death, 78.6. Average age of death in North America every year, 78.6, that's fascinating," Dr. Ryan Cole told lawmakers a meeting at the Idaho State Capitol Building. The statement elicited an eruption of laughs from legislators.
Cole, who owns and runs Cole Diagnostics, a testing lab in Garden City, made claims that the mRNA COVID-19 vaccines could cause cancer and medication for parasites in horses could be used to fight the virus instead of other proven treatments
Cole also suggested that other treatment options for COVID-19 should be avoided and questioned the vaccines that hundreds of thousands of Idahoans have already safely received.
He even went onto say that the COVID-19 pandemic in Idaho is statistically over.
In order to fact check the claims he made to state legislators, The 208 spoke with Dr. James Souza, the Chief Medical Officer at St. Luke's Health Systems.
Citing the rising number of new cases per day and the uptick in COVID-19 variants reported in the Gem State, Souza said the Idahoans may be done with the pandemic, but the pandemic isn't done with Idaho. He added that drawing conclusions with what to expect from COVID-19 based on what other viruses have done is just flawed logic.
When speaking with legislators, Cole said, "What are our highest risk factors? obesity, low vitamin d levels, advanced age. 90% of deaths in the state have been over 70 years of age, that's the at-risk population. We have stopped our society for something that is taking people that are already at that death risk age anyway."
Souza said that claim is simply false and cruel.
"But I personally have been the part of the care team, I'm an intensivist for 75-year-olds who died from this who were frankly fit as fiddles and their only 'crime' was that they're 75 and they came across covid," he said.
"When you actually look at the statistics of that group and you ask the question, 'Ok on average how many more healthy years of life does that group have?' It's 10-15 more years depending on race. I just think that statement about stopping our society for something that is taking people who are already at a death-risk age, beyond being wrong, I found it particularly cruel that that comment elicited laughs by some of our legislators, that I guess these people who were just going to die anyway, they just kind of went ahead and did it for us. It's chilling, and sort of like, who are we?" Souza added.
Cole also told lawmakers that ivermectin, a medication used in horses to treat parasites, killed the coronavirus in 99.9% of petri dish studies. Souza said while this statement is true, it would have to be given to humans in a dose 100 times the size used in studies, which would be unsafe for humans.
"When you actually go to the studies, the truth is, it's a mixed bag so we should talk about the entire bag and not just the positive sides of the bag," Souza said. "I understand the desire to reach for solutions that are easy, but I find it interesting that people might be more interested in putting an animal, anti-parasite, chemical medication into their body to prevent something that we already know we can prevent non invasively by wearing a mask and spacing out."
Another one of Cole's anti-vax claims he told Idaho lawmakers was that the vaccine is "an experimental biological gene therapy immune-modulatory injection. mRNA trials in mammals have led to odd cancers, mRNA trials in mammals have led to auto-immune diseases, not right away, 6-9-12 months later.
He also claimed that 50% of health care providers won't get the vaccine because they don't trust it.
Souza mustered an eye-roll before he explained that every part of Cole's claims was false.
"But let's be honest about it, I mean the vaccine trials started about a year ago so we are looking at data that's six and nine and 12 months now and we're not seeing these sorts of effects," he explained.
Souza added that about 72% of St. Luke's employees have voluntarily taken the COVID-19 vaccines.
"I'm afraid this is more from our anti-vax colleagues to stoke fear and misinformation instead of science."
dropdeadfred, Read this one as openly as others read yours. Two bits here
COVID-19 Vaccine Fact Vs. Fiction: An Expert Weighs in on Common Fears
[...]
Is immunity from the vaccine stronger than natural immunity from infection?
“The first time your body sees the spike protein, it activates some immune system cells to begin to recognize and develop antibodies against that protein,” said Boslett. The response may be similar whether that first encounter is from infection with the virus or from the first dose of the vaccine.
Studies of the mRNA vaccines suggest that one dose may offer between 50 to 80 percent protection against symptomatic COVID-19, though more data is needed, said Boslett. “We know you get some amount of protection after one dose of the vaccine or after infection with the virus, but we don’t know in either case how long that protection lasts,” she said. Some cases of reinfection have been reported after three to six months, so the protection from one dose of the vaccine also may wane in that timeframe.
“However, when you get the second dose of the vaccine, you’re further training your immune system,” said Boslett. “You’re strengthening that response from the antibody-producing B cells and you’re also activating T memory cells that stick around for much longer.” Getting both doses of the vaccine means your body is shown this spike protein multiple times in a short duration. “So that immune response might be bigger, better and longer lasting than just getting the infection one time,” she said.
Because the booster effect is so important, Boslett adds that this is why people who have had COVID-19 are still recommended to get the vaccine.
VERDICT: Probably.
[...]
Will we need new vaccines if the virus continues to mutate?
“The amount of changes that we’re seeing in the coronavirus is not an overwhelming number of changes, but we do have these other variants coming out in the U.K. and in South Africa,” said Boslett. “At some point, could the number of mutations on the spike protein end up overwhelming what the vaccine can cover? I think that is possible.”
Whether we’ll need a new vaccine every year depends on how quickly we can get the pandemic under control. The likelihood of mutations depends on how much virus is circulating, said Boslett. “When there’s lots and lots of virus out there, that enables it to be inside of humans and make all kinds of little errors in its reproduction, and some of those mutations may end up helping the virus to spread.”
It’s also uncertain how long immunity from the COVID-19 vaccine will last. We need a flu vaccine every year not only because the flu virus mutates quickly but also because the antibody response wanes over time, according to Boslett.
The good news is that mRNA vaccines are relatively easy to adjust to target a new variant. (Moderna is already developing a new form of its vaccine aimed at the variant in South Africa, which could be given as a booster shot.) “I think that can be done in just two or three months,” said Boslett. “But how often we’re going to have to do that, I think remains to be seen.”
Market Data 
Markets 
AI
