To Be or Not To Be VAXXed (Part 1)

16 June 2021

Many people can't make up their mind.   There are too many horror stories told about the Covid vaccines. Stories about how people died after getting vaccinated. Stories about long term effects. There are just no good answers. Many choose to wait at the side line.  This article will try to help. It will analyse and compare the odds of getting vaccinated and not vaccinated. Hopefully,  it will help someone.

Vaccine is Safe and Effective

This slogan has been used all the time. It really makes no difference.  No one can be 100% sure there is no long term ill effect.  There are also the serious adverse effects requiring hospitalization & even death. But if one knows one might have 20 times higher chance of getting infected, what would one think?   

20 Times Higher Chance?

To work this out,  one must refer to this formula often used to work out the vaccine efficacy

Using the above formula,  one could easily work backward to find out the relationship between ARU & ARV, the attack rates of unvaccinated and vaccinated respectively  Assuming  the vaccine efficacy or VE is 95%,  the ARU will be "1/(1-VE)"  times of ARV or simple "1/0.05" of ARV or  20 times of  ARV.  In simple words,  the attack rate of those unvaccinated will be 20 times higher than the attack rate of those vaccinated.  Even if we were to assume the efficacy is 50%,  the unvaccinated would still have 2 times the chance of getting infected.

What about the Serious Adverse Effects & Death?

It is true that there are people having serious adverse effect such as swelling,  high fever.  Some have to stay in ICU after taking the vaccines.   Some died.   The Authorities and manufacturers will never admit the deaths has anything to do with the vaccine.  

Let's not talk about whether the claims are true.  Let talk what if one gets infected.  What are the chance of one would get hospitalized or one would end up death?

What are the odds of Hospitalization and Death?

The medics are telling us that once we have been infected,   a person of age around 20 will have about 1% chance of ending up in a hospital with a severe sickness. This risk is higher for older people.  For example,  there is 8% chance for people in their 50s and nearly 19% chance for those over 80. (https://medicalxpress.com/news/2020-03-odds-hospitalization-death-covid-steadily.html)

As for the death,  the medics said young people has an odd of about 0.031% and  more than 7.8% for people over 80.

They also said,  people in their 50s made up the biggest age demographic among hospitalized patients, with 222 out of 790 hospitalized cases being aged 50 to 59.

The Economist has this interesting interactive chart showing the risk % of male and female for various age group (https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/covid-pandemic-mortality-risk-estimator)

 

The Economist has a model about estimating the odds of hospitalisation and death (https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2021/03/13/our-covid-19-model-estimates-odds-of-hospitalisation-and-death)

How the Odds Compared?

Every COVID-19 vaccine must undergo 3 stages of  clinical trials under controlled  condition to ensure accurate measurement.   The trials are required by World Health Organization (WHO) and/or any country before they approve the vaccine for emergency use.   The sample size must be more than 30,000 in the Phase 3 trial.   

In these trial reports,   the various safety and vaccine performance are recorded,  determined & evaluated.    The vital information about some vaccine brands are tabulated as shown

	Pfizer (Double Dose)	Moderna (Double Dose)	Johnson (Single Dose)	Averages		Attack Rates Include(J&J)
	BNT162b2	mRNA-1273	Ad26.COV2.S			%		X
Sample size	43,000	30,420	44,325
Vaccinated	21,720	15,210	19,630	III	18,853
Placebo	21,280	15,210	19,691	IV	18,727
Efficacy	95%	94.10%	66.9%
Serious adverse after vaccination	4	91	83
Vaccinated Group
Infected	9	11	116	V	45	V/III	0.24%
Serious Adverse Events	130	91	83
	Estimated from (I)	Estimated from (I)
Death	2	2	3	VI	2	VII/III	0.012%
Serious Adverse Events (I)	0.60%	0.60%	0.40%		0.53%
Death Rate	0.009%	0.01%	0.02%		0.013%
Platebo Group
Infected	169	185	348	VII	234	VII/IV	1.250%	5.20
Serious Adverse Events	106	91	96
	Estimated from (II)	Estimated from (II)
Death	4	3	16	VIII	7.67	VIII/IV	0.04%	3.31
Serious Adverse Events (II)	0.50%	0.60%	0.40%		0.50%
Death Rate	0.019%	0.02%	0.08%		0.040%
	LINK	LINK	LINK

Links for Pfizer Trial Report:  https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/nejmoa2034577

Links for Moderna Trial Report:  https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/nejmoa2035389

Links for J&J Trial Report:  https://www.nejm.org/doi/pdf/10.1056/NEJMoa2101544?listPDF=true

One can see that in the vaccinated cases,  Those having Serious Adverse Events requiring hospitalization is only 0.53% in average among the 3 vaccines and those deaths accounted for only about 0.013% average. Those for Platebo cases where saline water was used instead  of vaccines,  the infection & death cases are slightly higher.  Of course,  the vaccine manufacturers claimed those deaths got nothing to do with the vaccines.

Now if we were to consider that the unvaccinated have higher chance of catching Covid and assumed that the Vaccine efficacy is only 53% (or 2.1 times ARV),  we could see that the odds of unvaccinated has increased by nearly 30% straightaway.  The males with age 80 and over will have over 60% chance of landing in a hospital bed and 25% chance of meeting a death.  The female will have 44% & 15% respectively. 

What will happen after the Covid Recovery

One in 10 recovered Covid-19 patients had persistent symptoms six months after their initial infection, a study led by the National Centre for Infectious Diseases (NCID) has found.

1 in 10 recovered Covid-19 patients in S'pore suffers persistent symptoms sixmonths after infection: Study

Part 2 is an update that talk about the new variant,  Delta,  affecting the odds of getting the Covid infection.

   

The Scary Number of UK Covid-19 Death Figure Cause by Delta Variant

The UK DailyMail has this news report which is self explanatory.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9681613/Study-shows-29-people-died-catching-new-strain-vaccinations.html

Daily Mail claimed that 1/3 or 29% of those death caused by Delta have been fully vaccinated. This news had caused a big stir among the Netizens. Many used the word "Shock" to express their feelings.

The UK Publish Health (PHE)'s Report

PHE made regular Technical Reports about Covid-19 works in UK.  In its 15th Technical Report,  it has this table 6. It shows the UK infection and death figures caused by Delta.  This table was arranged according to the vaccination status.

Among the various information,  the report said there were 42 death and 12 of them were fully vaccinated.

What Does this Death Figures Means?

It simple means what it means.  It doesn't tell whether these people died because the vaccine was not effective.  It also does not tell if the vaccine was the cause of death.  Do these people have pre-existing medical conditions that often cause death? Technically,  it is just another table with numbers if the numbers have not been analysed.

Does it not mean the Vaccine is not effective?

To understand better,  lets examine the other table,  table 4 as shown here.

This table 4 shows the infection number,  the death figure and the fatality of various virus variants since 1 October 2020.  Then we have  only Alpha. This Alpha caused over 4,000 deaths.  Delta came in after UK has the vaccine.  This Delta caused 42 deaths so far 

What the Tables Mean Exactly ?

Lets analyse the tables and put them into another table as shown below

This  table compares the "performance" of Alpha and Delta so far.  One can readily see that the performance of Delta has reduced drastically ranging from 70%  to 99%.    The rate of infection cases per day went  down by 70% per day and the rate of death  per day down by 98%.

Take Away

Most critics concentrated in comparing the raw death numbers.  This is not reflecting the real effectiveness of the vaccines.  One should always compare the numbers in terms of rates. For example,  US might have 20,000 deaths and Uruguay might have only 2,000.   When comparing in rates, Uruguay have 10 time more infections than the US.

How Do You Make a Spring Onion PanCake the Easy Way

14 June 2021

The traditional way of making a Spring Onion Pancake can be very time consuming.  One can easily spend up to 2 hours to make the dough and wait for the yeasts to make its way.  Then the rolling will start.   Some make it so complicated that it can be piece of art work.

This article will introduce one easy way which can be done in less than 20 minutes includng making the pancake crispy using air fryers.  Here is how.

The Once-in-100-Year Flood in China

Disclaimer:  This article may stroke the sensitivity of some,  especially when some of news might not have been verified.   But it is  never the intention of this article.  China has a very strong fire-wall.  Many information cannot always be verified.  However,  fake news if spotted will be removed

Why this Article?

This article will try to track and share this once-in-100-year event.  The Authorities have known about this event. It has taken necessary precautions. Hopefully,  there will be little or no damages. In the process, we will learn something.

Which Article Said Once-in-100-Years?

This news artical said "Red Alert Warning.  Once-100-Year Strong Rain Attack.  Many Areas and Roads Have Been Flooded or Collapsed"

https://www.163.com/dy/article/GC53KD5S0514EGPO.html?f=post2020_dy_recommends

The Authorities only said this year's flood might be one of the worse.  Lets find out the truth. Time will tell.

What Has Happended So Far?

The flooding season in China usually started as early as in May and will end around October.  The worst time will be during August & September.  This year's flooding appears to have started early.  Some areas were flooded in April.  ZheJiang areas had extreme weather conditions during April & May.  The lastest flooding appears in GuangDong Province.   Many rivers have excessive rising water level.  YangTze regions appears to be calm so far with no serious flooding.

Here are some news (select from drop-down box)

Select News to read1. 22 May 2021: Flood affected 147,000 people in JiangXi. 2. 26 May 2021: 71 rivers exceeding warning level 3. 27 May 2021: 2021 flood worse than 1981-1984. 4. 02 June 2021: Flooding in Southern China5. 06 June 2021: Flooding in Zhuhai, Macau and HK Areas6. 07 June 2021: Flooding in GuangDong & other parts7. 09 June 2021: Warning about 89 Rivers having rising water 8. 10 June 2021: Zhuji City having heavy rain falls 9. 12 June 2021: Only 50% wheats was harvested 10. Floods in ZhengZhou on 22 July 2021 11. spare

back to top

22 May 2021:  Flood affected 147,000 people in 2 Districts in JiangXi.  They have started the Level 4 Flood Prevention Procedures.

http://www.chinanews.com/sh/2021/05-22/9483199.shtml

back to top

26 May 2021:   71 rivers exceeding warning level

https://www.reuters.com/world/china/chin...ce=twitter

back to top

27 May 2021 :  Prediction about 2021 flood which is going to be worse than 1981-1984.  It is so much worse than 2020.    The market was expecting the price of cotton and crop to rise due to this massive flooding problem.  The map was trying to explain why there was  this flooding problem.

https://twitter.com/QMHedging/status/139...7290555392

back to top 

2 June 2021 :  Flooding in Southern China

 

 

back to top 

6 June 2021:  Flooding in Zhuhai,  Macau and Hong Kong Areas

back to top 

7 June 2021 :  Massive flooding in GuangDong,  HuiZhou,  DongGuan and various other parts of China

back to top 

9 June 2021:  Warning about 89 Rivers having water about warning level

http://www.xinhuanet.com/politics/2021-0...545913.htm

back to top 

10 June 2021:  Zhuji City in ZheJiang  Province having 100 mm of water per hour

back to top 

10 June 2021  Expert talking about many areas,  especially those in the South, have flooding incidents.  They said many areas experienced heavy rainfall: Hunan has more than a dozen rounds of heavy rainfall, causing more than 100 counties and cities to be affected to varying degrees; since May, Jiangxi has multiple rounds of continuous heavy rain. The rainfall is much higher than normal; recent heavy rains have occurred in many places in Guangdong, and serious waterlogging has occurred in some urban areas.

https://www.sohu.com/a/471511503_267106

back to top 

12 June 2021 :  50% wheats was harvested and 64,000 km2 were planted with corns.  This is far cry from the 90% harvest of wheats havested last year and 174,000 km2 planted with corns during the same period.   China said it will speed up the harvest using machineries.  China will have to depend lots on imports if the harvesting is badly affected.  According to Rueters,  China huge supply stock of wheats has known to peaked in March.  No one knows the details about the storage capacity.   Nonetheless,   China's imports had increased by 45% and  corn prices increased by 40%.

(Click pictures to enlarge)

back to top 

The flood in ZhengZhou,  China  22 July 2021

The tradegdy @ ZhengZhou Tunnel After the flood Where is ZhengZhou in China? Flood water gushing into the underground train Train flooded with water scene 1 Train flooded with water scene 2 Driver trapped inside car Woman struggled in strong current Woman rescued from strong current Car piling up along some roads Usual drive inside the 4.5 km ZhengZhou tunnel Cars trapped inside the ZhengZhou tunnel cars immersed at the exit of ZhengZhou tunnelRemoval of some dead from ZhengZhou tunnelPolice Dispersing waiting crowd for loved ones The scene aftermath. Inside the Tunnel after the flood Cars pulled out from Tunnel

Why They Said Some Brands of Vaccine were Not Effective?

4 June 2021

(Updated 8 June 2021)

"The Week" has this news article. It said that "the Chinese's Covid-19 vaccines appears not effective." Is this true? Why they are saying so? Do they have any reason? This article will describe a simple method where one can use to verify if what they are saying is really true.  

About The Week 

First, about "The Week". This is a weekly news magazine with editions in the United Kingdom and United States. Although it is a bit left biased, most media rating agencies rated them as unlikely to give fake news. The following is its news report on 4 June 2021. 

https://theweek.com/china/1001165/chinas-covid-19-vaccines-dont-appear-to-be-effective-in-preventing-outbreaks-in-the

 

 Responses

Netizens have mixed views. Those in favour of conventional vaccines like the inactivated vaccines have not agreed. They insisted that this news was very biased.  Some said "This Week" was reporting fake news.  Lets examine this news with real World data from "Our World in Data"

How to Examine?

We can use available charts in "Our World in Data". One of them is "the number of people who received at least one dose of COVID-19 vaccine' as shown on the left. The other is the 7-day rolling average of "Daily new confirmed cases per million people" . it is as shown in on the right. These 2 charts are arranged side by side for easy reading. The one on the left shows how much 1st dose vaccines have been given. Effective vaccine should bring down the rate of daily new confirmed infection shown on the left.

(Note: The following 2 charts for infection and death rate are interactive. One can change and add countries to get the desired results. The followings are countries that has been most affected by Delta)

The other chart that will be useful for comparison is   "Share of people receiving at least one dose of vaccine vs Daily Deaths Per Million People. This chart tells if the vaccines are effective to curb death rate in the country.

Putting 3 Chart Together

It will be clearer at times to put the above charts together for comparison purpose

(Note: these chart are interactive. Change the country name as wished. Clikc remove side bar for larger view plus many more charts)

Pfizer, AZ & Sinovac countries ASEAN countriesDelta attacked countriesJapan/Taiwan/Korea/HK/MacauBRA/CAN/FRA/DEU/IND/ITA/ISR/MEX/CHN Australiasia Countries EU >30MEU >10M BEU >7MEU >5MEU RestMiddle East >25M Middle East >4MMiddle East >1M

User Note on How to Navigate

1. Select the country by clicking the text button "+Add country". Then tick the appropriate check boxes. The chart will update automatically;

2 Note that the charts are not of the same horizontal scale. To compare, adjust the scale on the right hand chart. This is done by draging the scale at the bottom of the chart using the mouse;

3. The death rate would be more realistic than infection rate. The infection rate can be lowered if country has not done enough testings. Refer to Worldometer for testing frequency.

Chart Interpretation

Take UK US & Israel for example,  we can roughly say their vaccines are working to tame the infection. Their infection rates came down as soon as the vaccination numbers went up.

For Bahrain & Uruguay, there is still no sign that the infection rate has been tamed at all.   These countries will need to check if their vaccines are able to deal with the Covid-19 variants.

As for the case in Brazil and Chile, they managed to hold the infection rate. There is still no sign about when will they be able to tame the viruses.  Chile might have a vaccine that is not able to tame the Covid-19 variant.

The situation in Seychelles is not much different from the rest of the other countries. This tiny Easteern African island in the Indian Ocean has a volatile infection rate.

Some claimed Turkey and Hungary using inactivated vaccines.  They also tamed the vaccine successfully.  This "story" is not quite true.  Turkey used about 20-30 millions of Sinovac before April & they have more Pfizer now with supplies totalling 120 millions doses.  As for Hungary,  they have supplies from European Union until May;  by then,  the infection was almost over.

Take Away

Vaccines are highly politicized by various countries. This article describes only a simple method on how to check the effectiveness of vaccine using available public information. For those interested to know what brands of vaccine these countries are using, please refer to this webpage.   One can also find out how many of which type of vaccines have been used to-date by some countries in terms of numbers and % from the webpage.

This simple method is to give an idea on how one could judge if the vaccines are effective. Previously before we have vaccines,  many countries like China,  Singapore, Japan, Australia, New Zealand & Taiwan were able to tame Covid-19 using the traditional control methods. These methods are Covid-19 testings,  mask wearings,  quarantine, safe distancing & shutdowns.    

 https://tinyurl.com/v8j3b3t9

Coronavaccine Really Works?

 2 June 2021

 

This question was always in some people's mind.  We are hearing people saying "You can bluff and lie,  Covid-19 will prove you wrong"  

In this article,  lets explore some real World cases using graphs and data from Our World Data.

Cases in United Kingdom & United States

We heard many stories about how UK and US have tamed Covid-19.  These 2 countries have relaxed their Covid-19 protection guidelines. They are no longer insisting their residents to wear mask under certain conditions. They are also relaxing the social gathering & distancing rules. 

Lets examine their vaccination rate and infection rate to-date in these 2 charts.   If the vaccine is effective,  it will definitely help to bring down the infection rate

a) Daily COVID-19 vaccinations administered per 100 people

 Visit here for more charts and information

 b)  Daily new confirmed COVID-19 cases per million people

  Visit here for more charts and information

Unfortunately,  it is hard to digest the above chart because they are in different scales.  Lets superimpose the 2 charts and bring them in line as shown in the following chart

 

One could immediately see that in the case of UK and US,  the vaccine has brought down infection rates. The infection rate was a high of over 600-800 case per million people in early Jan 2021. Now it is only 40 cases per million people in Jun 2021 which is a 93% cut.  This is despite UK and United States have reduced the of vaccination rate about 2 to 3 months ago. They cut the rate in March to April 2021 from 80-90 per 100 people  to the present rate of less than 30 per 100 people in US.

In Conclusion

One can say that vaccine does work to bring down the Covid-19 infection rate as far as UK and US are concerned.  On how long this will  continue to work  will depend how fierce will be the coronavirus variants.  Science is telling us that virus will always mutate. They will mutate into a new kind of virus that will resist existing vaccines. 

In here, one can find out what brands of vaccines used in various countries. The webpage contains an interactive chart, providing some information about the vaccine brands. 

Doubleclick here or the picture for interactive chart

https://tinyurl.com/4yx5987c

Update: 10 June 2021

Here is a better way to compare the effectiveness of vaccines being deployed in various countries.   Not all vaccines are equally effective.  Some can tame Covid-19.  Some are struggling even without the attack of new variants which are more vicious and infectious. 

 https://tinyurl.com/v8j3b3t9