Opinion: DeSantis 2024?

[Sled21]

(04-07-2022, 05:38 PM)BigPapaKain Wrote: Nothing in there says the vaccines leave behind a spike protein. Now, the Covid-19 virus leaves a spike protein in the cell; that's how it punctures it and infects it. That's been known since about week 4 of the pandemic.

I think you're reaching for something that isn't there.

I'm not a micro-biologist, so I won't attempt to explain it. The only reason I knew about it is because I heard a news story about it and the expert being interviewed was explaining it. I'm not reaching, just relaying. I have no idea what kind of problems it may or may not present. But my point remains, there is still a lot about these vaccines they don't know. Did I take it, yes, it made sense for me. Would I give it to my 5 year old, absolutely not. The risk/reward is totally different.

BTW, Biden inherited 3 vaccines and monoclonal anti-bodies. He has not pushed to have more antibodies produced, and where they used to be available for everyone, they are now rationed. Most people now can't get them. And Pfizer has an anti-viral pill that can be a covid game changer. Again, the Biden administration has not pushed to have this mass produced. They have purchased only 30 million courses, and those won't be available till June. They've only released less than 300,000 courses. Biden is all about mandating someone to take a shot which won't keep you from getting it, but has done next to nothing when it comes to therapeutics to deal with covid when you get it.

Are Pfizer's Covid pills going to highest-risk patients? Inside the U.S. rollout (nbcnews.com)

Quote:Feb. 5, 2022, 4:30 AM EST / Updated Feb. 5, 2022, 8:08 AM EST

[color=var(--article-body--byline--color)]By Benjamin Ryan[/color]
Abby Robinson was gasping for air as she drove herself to a Long Beach, California, emergency room on Jan. 19, terrified that her cystic fibrosis and what she presumed was Covid-19 would prove a fatal combination.
After a nurse flagged her as a high-risk patient and a rapid coronavirus test came back positive, a physician offered the 24-year-old graduate student hope: a prescription for Pfizer’s new antiviral cocktail, Paxlovid.

As sick as she was, the responsibility now fell to Robinson to track down a supply of the medication.
Paxlovid, a five-day oral Covid treatment that can significantly reduce the risk of hospitalization and death, has remained in critically short supply since its Dec. 22 emergency authorization.
When Robinson was given the prescription, California was in the midst of a record-breaking omicron-fueled surge in cases. She was competing against scores of other newly diagnosed people for a share of the federal government’s most recent two-week allotment of just 9,560 courses of the pills. 
Robinson made a flurry of calls to some two dozen local pharmacies before identifying a nearly exhausted Paxlovid supply at an Orange County CVS. The pharmacy would have been 30 minutes away, she said, had she not driven “in the fast lane” to ensure she arrived before the drug vanished.
Long Beach, Calif., resident Abby Robinson, 24, was gasping for air after developing Covid-19 on Jan. 19.Courtesy Abby Robinson
“It was really humbling, for someone who desperately needed this drug, how tricky it was to get it and how my timing had to be so perfect,” she said about her ultimately successful quest to obtain Paxlovid. She’s now feeling much better — thanks, she believes, to Paxlovid — but still not quite herself. 
These critical shortages have hamstrung health care providers as the winter surge caused by the omicron variant has driven a desperate need for treatments to keep people with Covid out of the hospital. The situation has been worsened by states not prioritizing people at the highest risk of severe illness or death — people who are immunocompromised and unvaccinated people with underlying health conditions. 
The sole monoclonal antibody treatment still authorized by the Food and Drug Administration to treat omicron, GlaxoSmithKline and Vir Biotechnology’s sotrovimab, was not available at any hospital near Long Beach, an emergency physician told Robinson.
Timing is critical once someone at high risk of severe Covid is diagnosed. The pills must be started within five days of symptom onset, adding to the anxiety of filling a prescription. 
[/url]Restricting antiviral prescriptions
Robinson’s frantic medical odysseys are emblematic of the extraordinary lengths to which many Americans have been forced to go for this scarce, potentially lifesaving antiviral medication. 
The Biden administration has purchased 20 million Paxlovid courses, half of which Pfizer said it expects to deliver by the end of June and the remainder by Sept. 30. A robust supply of the treatment is not expected until April.
A Pfizer employee checks boxes containing Paxlovid at a distribution facility in Memphis, Tenn.Pfizer via Reuters
Thus far, the federal government has been able to release just 265,000 Paxlovid courses to state health departments, even as the U.S. documented some 20 million Covid cases and 55,000 related deaths in January alone. While cases of omicron are declining nationwide, there are still more than 140,000 hospitalizations, and thousands of people are dying from Covid daily. 
Currently, the federal government apportions the Paxlovid supply to state health departments, which then distribute their share to local pharmacies, health systems and long-term care facilities as they see fit.
“Not unlike the entire Covid response, the federal government has not wanted to put out anything other than guidance,” Richard Freeman, regional chief clinical officer at Loyola Medicine in Chicago, said. “Then it’s up to the states, so you have 50 different versions. I don’t think that’s helpful.”
Little did Robinson know, but California’s health department has not sought to restrict Paxlovid’s availability only to those at the very highest risk of hospitalization and mortality. 



Demand for Covid antiviral pills far outweighs supply
JAN. 25, 202206:38

[url=https://twitter.com/intent/tweet?text=Demand%20for%20Covid%20antiviral%20pills%20far%20outweighs%20supply&via=nbcnews&url=https://www.nbcnews.com/now/video/demand-for-covid-antiviral-pills-far-outweighs-supply-131642438002&original_referer=https://www.nbcnews.com/now/video/demand-for-covid-antiviral-pills-far-outweighs-supply-131642438002]
According to an NBC News survey of state health departments, only a few — including those in Michigan, Minnesota and New Mexico — have established systems that limit access. Those states direct clinicians to only prescribe Paxlovid to the highest-risk patients. Or the health departments collaborate with pharmacies or health systems to which the state sends Paxlovid to help ensure they adhere to such restrictions.
“Our primary goal, with an eye on equity, is to protect the most vulnerable among us and to prevent the greatest number of severe outcomes,” Dr. Natasha Bagdasarian, chief medical executive of the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services, said.
In Michigan, the state health department issues and regularly updates a guidance document directing physicians to establish that a Paxlovid candidate is in the upper tiers of Covid risk. And then pharmacists at the Meijer retail chain, which is the state’s primary Paxlovid purveyor, confirm the eligibility documentation before filling the prescription.
Other states — such as Indiana, Maryland, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Wisconsin — take a more relaxed approach, issuing communiqués to health care providers that only advise, but do not require, that they prescribe the therapy to people who most stand to benefit from it. Providers are typically urged to follow the National Institutes of Health Covid-19 treatment prioritization guidelines.
Some states, including Tennessee, have not sent clinicians any guidance on prioritizing access to the antivirals.

And before somone screams Fox, this is from MSNBC. Imagine if Biden had "Warp Speeded" pills to deal with covid with as much vigor as they put into mandating shots, and with the same vigor the Trump Administration put into getting vaccines out. Pfizers pill reduces hospitalizations by 90%... get that....90%.

Quote:Molnupiravir reduces the rate of hospitalizations in high-risk patients by about 30% and carries some possible side effects, but Paxlovid reduces the rate of hospitalizations by around 90% and is considered safer. In other words, Paxlovid is a bit of an antiviral superstar.



https://www.cnn.com/2022/01/12/health/paxlovid-pfizer-antiviral-scarce/index.html
[/url]
[url=https://www.cnn.com/2021/11/06/health/antiviral-pill-covid-tool/index.html]Antiviral pills for Covid-19 -- not a cure, but a great tool

"I actually consider it the biggest advance in the pandemic since the vaccines, and the safety is part of it," Dr. Eric Topol, executive vice president for research at Scripps Research in San Diego, told CNN Chief Medical Correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta. "It's very rare to see something with this much efficacy of nearly 90% reduction of hospitalizations and deaths with no safety issue beyond placebo."

If they focused on this instead of being shot nazi's, covid would be in the rear view mirror.