What's Plan B if there's no COVID-19 vaccine?

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

WASHINGTON — Americans struggling through the worsening coronavirus outbreak got some rare good news this week as researchers delivered encouraging updates about potential vaccines. Even Dr. Anthony Fauci, whose gloomy warnings have frustrated President Donald Trump, has sounded consistently enthusiastic about the prospects.

It’s a heartening thought that even as the country has failed to contain the virus or implement the kinds of public health measures experts have called for, there’s a deus ex machina coming to rescue us if we can just hold out long enough.

But some experts are worried about Americans getting too used to the idea that a miracle vaccine or treatment is around the corner. While there’s broad agreement the latest news is promising, some are concerned that the prospect of future relief could breed complacency amid raging outbreaks that are killing hundreds of people each day.

“I think we absolutely have to have a backup plan in place,” Carl Bergstrom, a biologist at the University of Washington, said. “It's something that’s not talked about enough.”

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/whats-plan-b-if-theres-no-covid-19-vaccine/ar-BB179bIS?li=BBnb7Kz

[JT45242]

1. This is an excellent point

These vaccines are very unlikely to work --- no RNA vaccine has ever worked on any disease. No coronoavirus vaccine has ever given long term 100% protection.

So masks and social distancing will be the order of the day for a long time.

I am hoping that this will end more like AIDS. No vaccine to prevent getting it but there will be good treatments to manage the disease long term.

I remember when being HIV positive was a virtual death sentence. My oldest friend was diagnosed in 1993 and is still alive at age 50. He has some health problems (some of which are side effects of the AIDS medications) but he is alive with a normal T-cell count and low viral load.

I could live with that -- but the problem is that Covid-19 seems to attack every organ system -- how to manage all these pathways that are based on ACE2 or other markers may take longer.

The reality -- it will be a VERY LONG TIME before life will ever be the same.

[OrlandoDem2]

2. Rely on the medical community to find a therapeutic that keeps us out of the ICU.

Or significantly decreases that likelihood.

That *should* happen by fall or winter. If the interferon B study comes to fruition then we are almost there.

[CrispyQ]

3. There's not even a Plan A. Why does anyone think there's a Plan B?

Why America Can't Respond to the Current Crisis
by Robert Reich

March 17, 2020

https://www.truthdig.com/articles/why-america-cant-respond-to-the-current-crisis/


snip...

Dr. Anthony S Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and just about the only official in the Trump administration trusted to tell the truth about the coronavirus, said last Thursday: “The system does not, is not really geared to what we need right now … It is a failing, let’s admit it.”

While we’re at it, let’s admit something more basic. The system would be failing even under a halfway competent president. The dirty little secret, which will soon become apparent to all, is that there is no real public health system in the United States.

more...

Instead of a public health system, we have a private for-profit system for individuals lucky enough to afford it and a rickety social insurance system for people fortunate enough to have a full-time job.

At their best, both systems respond to the needs of individuals rather than the needs of the public as a whole. In America, the word “public” – as in public health, public education or public welfare – means a sum total of individual needs, not the common good.

Last summer I asked my right wing cousin, who is college educated & works with first responders, if he didn't think it was stupid to put the well being & health of the entire community at risk over the cost of healthcare for our fellow townspeople? He laughed & called me a bleeding heart liberal. I wonder if he's laughing now?

One entire party in this country has abandoned the concept of the Common Good.

[roamer65]

4. Monoclonal antibody therapy.

They have already discovered an antibody in those infected with SARS-CoV-1 that inhibits SARS-CoV-2.

Very likely monoclonal antibody candidate.

There will need to be a monoclonal antibody treatment for the immunocompromised, people who cannot take the vaccine or those do not generate an immune response from its administration.

[customerserviceguy]

18. Science will come up with something

Not in time for the election, but if it happens next year, that will save a lot of people.

Joe Biden will have his hands full cleaning up the thousand messes Trump has made.

[Yavin4]

5. Plan B is the same strategy that we use for HIV

Treatments that keep you alive if you get it, and change personal behavior to contain it (HIV: condoms, covid-19:masks). We don't have a vaccine for HIV, and that virus has been around for 40 years.

[roamer65]

8. Very true.

Reason we don’t have a vaccine for HIV is that it attacks the very system that is needed for a vaccine to generate immunity.

It will be years before we find a cure for HIV.

[0rganism]

6. plan B: virus becomes endemic within the population, hope our immune systems can handle it

so far our anti-body effectiveness seems to vary quite a bit, in terms of strength and duration

even if death rates are low (let's say 0.5%) with 60-70% infection we're looking at millions of deaths and 10s of millions of lives forever altered.

we may witness evolution in action, as whole segments of the population are selected for fitness in ability to resist the virus.

people freaking out about the economy, let alone re-opening schools or re-starting professional sports, are barking at the wrong wolf. while the economic damage is going to be unrelentingly severe (and it's already pretty harsh) it's a lagging indicator of our culture's inability to take the simple steps required to contain the disease.

[roamer65]

9. Natural selection at work.

Cold, but true.

[MoonRiver]

16. Survival of the smartest.

[0rganism]

19. unfortunately, i doubt that will be the case

granted, intelligence will enable some to be more inclined to take additional protective measures and the luckier, richer ones will have priority access to palliative treatments. however, on a large scale, the main cautionary procedures (masking, hand-washing, distancing) do not require any great intelligence, and will likely become standard practice as the disease ravages the population. access to life-extending palliatives is not gated by intelligence, but by fortune (both kinds) which is at best a secondary indicator of intelligence.

in the long-term absence of a vaccine, fitness will be almost entirely dependent on physical immune system traits, rather than cultural "smartness". some sub-cultures may be highly inclined to have higher survival rates, but this is probably not directly related to anything we would call "smart".

[lpbk2713]

7. Ben Dover

... and kiss your ass good bye.

[no_hypocrisy]

10. Plan B with two options:

A) a "cure" or at least medical intervention to prevent or abate death and multi-organ damage;

B) Herd immunity, but that's debatable as scientists are skeptical that one bout of Covid is definitive.

[TheFarseer]

11. Plan A

Talk about how it doesn't really kill many people and it's just the sniffles if you even realize you have it. Hope no one you are around gets it. Take no steps to make that happen. Plan B: Panic! Shut everything down! Get away from me!

[Baclava]

12. You're living Plan B right now, nothing changes

[Andy823]

15. Yep

Keep wearing a mask, wash your hands, and stay away from people as much as you can, especially those who don't want to wear a mask.

[soothsayer]

13. Mounting death

[lunatica]

14. I think medicine that can ameliorate the worst aspects will be

developed. Like AIDS and diabetes, medication that will keep you alive and that will combat the myriad side illnesses that this virus causes.

People who are HIV positive can now live normal lives. Before the medication people died of illnesses that the immune system couldn’t fight anymore. And people live perfectly normal lives with insulin to control diabetes. The same can happen with the Coronavirus by keeping people from the symptoms’ worst effect.

[moondust]

17. Cradle to grave at home. n/t

[Azathoth]

20. It's the same "plan B" we had for measles for hundreds of years

As Boris would say, we take it on the chin.

[uponit7771]

21. What the other countries who've beat CV19 have done, test/trace/isolate/monitor. We're not

... even doing the first 2 effectively