7 ms·
The Asian flu epidemic of 1957 was a turning point for antibiotics (2007)
- BillyTheKing 6y agoIt's probably not a stretch to say, that if there's one good thing coming from this pandemic then that's (probably) the mainstream adoption of mRNA technology. I'm very curious to see how this will help us fight other diseases or even create small amounts of vaccines dynamically on the go.
- blackrock 6y agoCan someone give an explanation of what this new mRNA vaccine technology is actually doing? What are the long term risks? Considering the fact that they are going to roll out this genetic technology to half the world, for the very first time. And there has been no long term studies (10+ years) on what it will do to the human body. Some rumors from the Moderna vaccine indicated that people got swelling the size of a softball on their arm, and it was rock hard. This does not sound like a vaccine that I want to take.
- cyphar 6y ago> Some rumors from the Moderna vaccine indicated that people got swelling the size of a softball on their arm, and it was rock hard. This does not sound like a vaccine that I want to take. Muscle soreness, minor fever, and minor swelling (as someone who had immunotherapy -- the swelling you describe really is minor) are pretty common side effects of most vaccines[1]. And of course, your example is just anecdotal evidence. These kinds of side-effects really aren't new at all, and I'd be surprised if anyone whose had regular vaccines hasn't encountered them at least once. It's just your body's immune response, and it's effectively an indication that the vaccine is triggering the desired immune response. [1]: https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/vac-gen/side-effects.htm https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/vac-gen/side-effects.htm
- darkerside 6y agoNever had swelling like that, and I take all the vaccines, including flu annually, and the whole cocktail recommended as a new parent (years ago). I've also never heard of that side effect on anyone in my circle from a standard vaccine. Anybody else want to chime in with their anecdata?
- cyphar 6y agoGood for you, but swelling is a known side effect of so many existing vaccines (I linked the CDC page in my comment) that there's no reasonable justification in saying that this vaccine having this possible side effect is strange. Just because it didn't happen to you doesn't mean it's uncommon. I also want to point out that in this comment thread we have an unsourced rumour about someone having swelling of some description (which you've also repeated without a source). That isn't even an anecdote, it's just an flat-out evidence-free claim.
- darkerside 6y agoJust because something is listed as a known side effect does not mean it is common. I don't have the context of the deleted comment, so I can't respond to it in general. What I can say is, this is not common in my experience or in the experiences of most people I know. That doesn't mean the original story is true, or that it isn't. I haven't done much research into the vaccine myself, although the mRNA aspect is really interesting. But, rumors are basically how human beings communicate. Ignoring and then complaining about them doesn't seem as productive as addressing them.
- cyphar 6y agoRumours are not an effective way of discussing the safety of medicine, because they are naturally prone to all sorts of biases which skew opinion. Rumour mills are how you get witch hunts (and interestingly, the "witches" in those witch hunts were actually the early forms of doctors -- they were women who had knowledge of traditional herbal remedies).
- 6y ago
- detaro 6y ago> Can someone give an explanation of what this new mRNA vaccine technology is actually doing? mRNA contains a temporary copy of gene sequences that is used by cells in the body to create proteins. i.e. normally in the body information in DNA in the cell core is copied into mRNA, and other parts of the cell then read the mRNA to create proteins based on the structure described in it. (thus the name "messenger RNA") A traditional vaccine (e.g. the flu vaccines) would inject either a weakened form of the virus or material with characteristic protein patterns matching the virus, with the goal to cause the immune system to adapt against this pattern. An mRNA vaccine instead provides the cells at the injection site with mRNA that describes the characteristic proteins, and thus causing them to create the proteins themselves.
- blackrock 6y agoThanks. What are the long term risks? Other than the obvious, why are they approving the usage of this technology, when there are no long term (10+ years) studies on the safety of this technology?
- nordsieck 6y ago> why are they approving the usage of this technology, when there are no long term (10+ years) studies on the safety of this technology? Under normal conditions, the FDA might be more reluctant. However, a substantial number of people are dying every day to Covid. Additionally, there is a substantial economic impact due to how easily it spreads. It seems prudent that this technology be approved if there is a reasonable, although less stringent than normal, reason to believe that it is both safe and effective.
- connicpu 6y agoI don't know about the size of a softball, but I have a medication I inject myself with weekly (subcutaneously) and "rock hard" swelling perhaps a bit smaller than a ping pong ball is a somewhat regular occurrence. Has nothing to do with what the medicine is, it's just your body's reaction to a foreign liquid being introduced where your body thinks it shouldn't.
- fy20 6y agoI get that when I'm bitten by mosquitos. No other symptoms or known alergies.
- bamboozled 6y agoYeah i have had quite similar and intense swelling from mosquito bites (I think, could have been something else). Is it painful for you too?
- fy20 6y agoIt's itchy when I'm first bitten, but not painful. Just kind of weird to have a massive lump that looks like another elbow in the middle of my arm :D
- bamboozled 6y agoInteresting, mine swells up too, I recently was bitten on the calf and it kind of went like cellulitis.
- tejtm 6y agomRNAs. "messenger" RNA are intended to be disposable copies of the information tucked safely away in the cell nucleus. As such we all create and recycle untold billions of them daily. The half life of a mRNA will be lucky if it is a day after about 5 halving you are approaching 1% of the total remaining. So a decade for a particular mRNA in an active cell is effectively infinity and stands no chance of remaining. A question you may be thinking is then how can it help and the answer is in the new trick it teaches your cells to copy in those first few days, your body will remember the trick for a while, months maybe, a year hopefully, and that one cool trick is to recognize the virus so your body can do what it does with uninvited guests. But the mRNA delivered as the vaccine is long gone, recycled back into pulp and made into new sticky post-it notes over and over. The "trick" is the _information_ in the vaccine not the post-it note it comes on. It is exactly what your body will try to find on it's own more or less at random when you get sick, not stumbling on the correct information in time can be fatal in this case. If your body does find the right information to recognize the invader and you win your body will remember what worked, maybe for a while maybe forever. This is why successful invaders will change themselves to avoid being remembered and eventually those changes will have unintended consequences (e.g. pandemic).
- blackrock 6y agoThanks. This is best explanation so far. They say they’ve been studying this mRNA idea for decades, but yet, nothing has succeeded. Until now. And now, we’re about to do a trial run, and inoculate 100 million Americans, and the rest of the world.
- Narretz 6y agoIt's not true that they haven't succeeded. BioNTech has used mRNA vaccines to prime the immune system of cancer patients. The difference is that these vaccines are individually tuned to the genome of the patient. https://www.nature.com/articles/nature23003 https://www.nature.com/articles/nature23003
- glfharris 6y agoIt's unfair to say that they haven't been succeeding until now. Plenty of trials with mRNA vaccines have been finding positive results in humans. However, the appetite for new vaccines is generally pretty low, aside from pandemic situations.
- ulfw 6y agoWhy do you share 'rumors' like this without some proof or at least a link? This is how Facebook-style urban legends spread
- ab3rC1te 6y agoWhich eventually spread across the world at a slower rate. But not one time did any government shutdown happen. Nor did anyone wear a face mask and people kept on conducting daily life. Because during 1969 when that pandemic happened Woodstock was wide open. Still only 100k people died in America at that time. And today you have mass media control of the masses saying COVID is so deadly. Get the fuck outta here.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- just-juan-post 6y agoI would like to point out how this story is an excellent example of the @mods power to manipulate stories on HN. This nice little pro-mask antidote made it to the front page and yet this thread [1] get marked so it won't be moved out of the Newest and onto New. I watched thread get 30+ upvotes and 50+ discussion points yet it never never showed up anywhere on New. I like you mod but people like me can see the patterns where it's very clear that the owners and moderators have the ability to weight and manipulate the placement of stories in New. [1] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25320778 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25320778
- throwaway89201 6y agoIt's pretty well known that the HN algorithm punishes stories which have a lot more comments than points. So describing them as "discussion points" exactly misses the mark. You're likely wrong (and a bit silly).
- dang 6y agoThe submission was put in the second-chance pool by a moderator. This is explained at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11662380 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11662380 and the links back from there. Note that I described it as "long-running" and that was 4.5 years ago. None of this is secret. I haven't looked at the article but if a mod chose it for second-chance submission that's because they thought it might interest the community, not because we care about "pro-mask antidotes". The complete list of stories hasn't been published yet (it's on my list, I just haven't gotten to it), but you can see a subset of them at https://news.ycombinator.com/invited https://news.ycombinator.com/invited. That's entirely representative of the sort of stories we choose, and if anybody notices any bias in there at all, other than towards what HN might find intellectually interesting, I'd love to hear about it. As for https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25320778 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25320778, it set off the flamewar detector. No mod touched it.
- collyw 6y agoThis time it looks like a turning point for authoritarianism.
- sand500 6y agoThe antibiotics was for secondary infections, not the virus itself.