Covid-19 discussion

[plainjane]

18+. Originally for a different postal code than ours, but then just before 5pm it looked like they were taking our postal code too.

[Elle]

Yayyyy

[Meowmalade]

@zygote

PSA if anyone does decide to get an antibody test after vaccination, be careful that you get the right one. Many of the commercial antibody tests are designed to test for natural immunity, and may not catch antibodies to the spike protein specifically like you’d get from the vaccine. So a negative result wouldn’t necessarily mean the vaccine didn’t work.

I asked my eye specialist for a spike protein antibody test (got my second vaccine a week ago, yay!), but she says that’s not something she does and to ask my PCP. I talked to my naturopath (who has a Western medical background) and she said she’d be happy to write me a prescription for any test I wanted, but that you’d get antibodies from getting COVID but the vaccine is giving your body instructions on what to do if you get the virus, but it wouldn’t produce antibodies.

Is there anyone here who is pretty sure they didn’t get COVID but got a positive antibody test? Trying to decide if I should get one.

A vaccinated person should not be alarmed or worried if they receive a negative antibody test result because this test does not detect antibodies from the Pfizer, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson’s Janssen COVID-19 vaccines, which were developed against the spike protein of the virus,” says Fernando Martinez, M.D., medical director of Laboratory Medicine. “This reinforces the guidance from the CDC that serology tests should not be used to test for immunity.”

Can antibody tests tell you if a COVID-19 vaccine worked?

[Meowmalade]

Okay, looks like the part I quoted was misleading, it only applies to the tests given by MD Anderson. Upon doing more reading, the spike protein antibody test could show results from the vaccines. I have to get bloodwork next week anyway, so why not…

MD Anderson’s Blood Bank uses an antibody test designed to detect antibodies to the nucleocapsid protein, which means donors who have received the COVID-19 vaccine will likely receive a negative antibody test result.

[TrisPrior]

Uh. Chicago is apparently fully reopening in June and it’s been announced that goth club nights are coming back?!?

Honestly, I can’t think of anything (well, OK, I can, but the list is short) that feels LESS safe. Sweating on a dance floor right on top of other sweaty people. While drinking and thus having no mask on.

Meanwhile, a friend just lost 2 family members, our age, to covid. This isn’t over yet.

[darlingpants]

I’m almost positive I didn’t have COVID (no symptoms or close contact ever, tested every week at work from thanksgiving onward, 3 negative antibody tests from the Red Cross through the summer and fall) and I have spike protein antibodies (from my last blood donation ~2 weeks after my second shot).

The Red Cross says they test for two antibodies, the spike protein and the capsid protein and that most people who got covid have both, but people who the vax only have spike protein antibodies. I only have spike protein.

ETA also your naturopath is wrong. 90% of the point of the vaccine is to produce antibodies. There’s also memory cells that will get activated but their job is to remember how to produce antibodies quickly if you get infected again.

[Bracken_Joy]

New Study Estimates More Than 900,000 People Have Died Of COVID-19 In U.S.

[Meowmalade]

@darlingpants thanks, that’s very helpful! I’m on immune suppressants so I really want to see if the vaccine was effective.

[darlingpants]

The vast majority of people on immune suppressants seem to develop antibodies, but I definitely understand wanting to double check! I probably wouldn’t have paid for a test but I celebrated my antibodies when I got the results of the free one!

[Meowmalade]

I’ve reached my out of pocket max so I don’t expect to have to pay

[meerkat]

@meerkat

Two local high schools had a vaccine event (with a follow up event in two weeks) that got almost 300 students vaccinated! That’s really impressive considering it’s still only 16-18 year olds. Other high schools are supposed to have events coming up soon.

And in this morning’s news the school board has laid the groundwork for more events at high schools and middle schools as soon as the approval is given for ages 12 and up. There’s five full weeks left in the school year. I hope other school districts are making similar moves, it’s a really great way to help get lots of people vaccinated quickly and easily but summer break is definitely coming up soon.

[iualia]

@Meowmalade my rheumatologist specifically ordered a spike protein antibody test for me! It came back positive, and I’m pretty sure I didn’t have COVID.

This was part of our “ugh I had an allergic reaction to shot 1 what do we do next?” conversation. Since I got the positive spike protein result, she suggested I wait until I can see an allergist to figure out what happens next. So – we’re not using the test as a “antibodies == immunity” measure, but still clinically useful.

[Meowmalade]

Thanks! Why does it indicate an allergy to the test though?

[iualia]

Oh, I mean that I had an allergic reaction to the actual vaccine (throat swelling, because I’m that lucky one in a million). I took the spike antibody test two weeks later and tested positive for antibodies (so presumably the first shot worked). Therefore since I now have some amount of antibodies, it’s less worthwhile for me to get the second Moderna shot, given the risk of a more severe allergic reaction.

[Meowmalade]

Oh no! I’m sorry you had an allergy

[AllHat]

I AM FULLY VACCINATED!!! You guyyyyyyyyyyys, I’m so fucking excited. I am going to see movies and go climbing and find a hot tub somewhere and eat a million foods.

Cue shots song.

[diapasoun]

Shots shots shots!

[haypug16]

U.S. FDA (US_FDA)

[LadyDuck]

My FIL has had his first vaccine, and my parents are booked in for theirs in 2 weeks! NGL I’m a bit worried about them with all the clotting stuff in the news even though I know it’s rare. I’m also super excited that people I know are getting vaccinated, they have no reason to be vaccinated besides “over 50”.

[meerkat]

FDA Permits Pfizer Vaccine For Children As Young As 12

Two thoughts on this:
I like their use of “people” instead of “children” when talking about things like “Very similar to adults, some people in the study had immediate side effects … A lot of people have had the vaccine without any side effects whatsoever.” Maybe it’s a journalistic standard? I don’t know. But it reminds me a bit of how teachers are supposed to say “students” instead of “boys and girls” because they’re unintentionally separating the kids into two groups, in this case we’re all humans instead of adults vs. children and all humans should get vaccinated. The virus doesn’t magically go “Oh you’re how old? Never mind, I won’t infect you.”

Second thought: “They’re going to roll out data coming out from children, they expect, from later September, possibly, with children down to 2 year old…” So if the data for 12-15 year olds was released in April and it’s getting approved now, the data released in (theoretically) late September would lead to approval in late October. I hope they’re able to speed it up some (I don’t know how they’d actually do this, just wishful thinking) so more little kids can get vaccinated prior to Halloween. It really sucked to not let my kid have Halloween last year and I know other parents felt the same, I wonder how many of them are going to be like “Fuck it, we need this return to normalcy and Halloween only comes once a year.”